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pandora_parrotSpirit of the Century
The Alexandria Project
Session 1: The Skies over Manhattan!
I went to a gaming session last night, and we had a very exciting adventure! This is a story based on last night's game-log. It's a bit embellished and modified in places, but it is mostly accurate to the events as they took place.
The Alexandria Foundation was founded in 1917 as an organization to encourage world peace in the wake of the Great War. Members are encouraged to find exceptional individuals to bring on board as agents of the Foundation, to assist in their cause. The work of an agent is varied. Some days it involves dangerous deeds of derring do. Other days it involves things far more difficult.
"You ain't gonna find me in any of that fancy frilly shit." Chris Katana told Orlando, her Alexandria sponsor. Orlando grinned knowingly at the protestation. Chris was one of those tomboy sorts of girls, the kind that refused to wear a dress or put on "pretty things." Orlando could sympathize. He'd spent a significant chunk of his life living as a woman and sometimes couldn't stand the extravagant clothing. However, he also knew that the Foundation was in need of funding and it wouldn't do to have anyone dressing like a slob, especially not a war hero like Chris. He and Chris had been arguing about it for a half-hour, after she brazenly walked into the ball-room in her messy flight suit.
The Foundation was hosting a charity fundraiser on board the airship Hypatia, circling the skies over Manhattan. The ballroom of the airship was full of socialites and scientists, pretty young things and political figures. They had even shelled out to get a a string quartet to lay down a musical background for this meeting of minds and money. Every major dignitary throughout New York and from all across America was at the fundraiser. Even Nikolai Tesla was in attendance! Appearance and presentation were of high importance tonight.
Orlando paused to consider the situation and offered the slight girl a way out, "Alright. We'll do things your way. But there's no way you're going out in that trainwreck. You need something classy, and I think I have just the thing."
He pulled something out of his closet and handed it to the aerobat, then left her to get dressed. She reappeared in the ball room a few minutes later dressed in a smart pin-stripe suit. She was still scowling, but perhaps scowling a little less now. She approached the bar to ask for a drink and turned to Orlando.
"Thanks," she said, simply, and walked off with her drink in hand.
Orlando watched appreciatively as the girl gracefully navigated her way through the crowded throngs of people to the port observation room adjoining the main ballroom. He made sure that he could still see her through the doorway and moved to return to his flirting. He was interrupted by a gasp and the sound of several people running towards the door.
The other new Foundation member, Malaweso, had just entered the room. He stood out like a sore thumb in this affluent American party. Besides his more traditional African attire, he was also the only dark-skinned person in the entire room, and one of a handful on the ship entire. Considering the rest were down in the galley of the ship, doing the grunt work, Orlando figured that Malaweso felt very out of place.
As soon as he entered the room, the dignitaries had flocked around him demanding stories of his homelands. They were like little yapping dogs all yearning for exciting tales of the dark continent. Malaweso spoke to them politely for a while, but after a time, it was obvious that he was growing tired of being the novelty item of the party. There was a shift in the air, and suddenly, the throng seemed a bit less interested in the decidedly less friendly African shaman.
Malaweso meandered over to the bar and asked for a drink. He nodded at Orlando.
"Stupid fucking white people, eh?" Orlando commented, in the shaman's own language.
Malaweso smiled at his old frustrated expletive being returned to him in this context. He nodded and said, "I do not mind a few questions, but I find their intense interest in my exploits rather tiring."
Orlando nodded with understanding and the two continued their discussion. As they spoke, Orlando noticed "Airship" Jones enter the room and look around determinedly. Jones saw Orlando and recognition lit up in his eyes. Jones stepped over and greeted the two other men at the bar.
"I hear Nikolai Tesla is here, tonight?" Jones said inquiringly.
Orlando nodded affirmatively, "That right. He's right over there." He pointed towards the forward-starboard corner of the room, near the musicians. "What do you want with him?" He asked.
"I've got a few questions to ask him about some technology of his that wound up in some suspect hands," Jones responded.
Orlando raised his eyebrows but did not comment further, "Good luck getting past the throng of admirers packed around him."
Jones shrugged and pushed his way through the crowd to the indicated location. Orlando and Malaweso returned to their discussion.
Meanwhile, Chris Katana was standing in the quiet observation room on the port side of the Hypatia, slowly nursing her drink from the bar. The large room adjoined the main ballroom as a place for passengers to look out over the landscape. There was one on either side of the ballroom, and they both were lined with massive windows looking out at the city below. Chris watched wistfully as the beautiful city rolled beneath the massive airship.
"How did I let myself get talked into this?" she muttered. Although Chris had done the pretty-girl-in-a-dress thing in the past, she found a certain comfort in the male persona she had created during the war. She found it difficult to return to the pretty dresses and nonsense that she had always found so irritating growing up, when her father would take her to family parties and such. She was very glad of Orlando finding her something that matched her sensibilities.
She took another sip of her drink and stared at the towering buildings below. She had never been to New York before, having spent most of her time traveling around Europe and parts of Africa. The sight was astounding. Such tall buildings, towering so high over everything around them. She imagined herself dodging her plane between them for fun, a challenge that she would love to try sometime.
The shadow of the Hypatia was clear against the rough cityscape, illuminated by the bright full moon over head. It was a beautiful night for flying, the kind of night where Chris would fly to a high altitude, cut the engine, and just glide for miles and miles, with no sound but the wind that carried her.
Something odd tugged at her consciousness and she looked more carefully at the airship's massive shadow. She blinked, as if she wasn't sure what she was seeing was real. It looked like there was another airship approaching the Hypatia from above and starboard. Looking at the way the shadows were arranged, it looked like they were in some serious danger of a collision.
"That doesn't look good," she said as she pushed her way back into the ball room and worked her way towards Orlando and Malaweso. As she arrived, he smiled, but the concern on her face turned him serious fast.
"What wrong?" he asked.
"What's going on with the other airship you've got out there? Whoever is piloting it is an idiot. We're in danger of a collision!" she explained.
Orlando frowned with concern, "There's not supposed to be any other airships in this area tonight." He gestured at the port observation room, "We should take a look."
"Actually, they're coming up on the other side," she indicated, and started weaving her way through the thick thrown of party-goers to the starboard observation deck. Orlando and Malaweso followed.
CRASH!
The sound of shattered glass filled the room as a dozen armed thugs smashed through the glass and swung into the observation rooms! The men were dressed in black leather outfits and armed, each, with one pistol in each hand. They clustered into two groups of three, six on each side of the ship. Ropes extended from backpacks back out the windows of the ship. As the soldiers landed, they pressed a button on their vests, causing the ropes to detach and swing back out the windows.
Screams filled the room as the party-goers scrambled for the single exit towards the living quarters. People were running everywhere, terrified of the attackers and terrified of one another. They were a sea of dangerous animals, trampling each other and not knowing what to do about it. In the midst of this chaos, Chris, Orlando, and Malaweso looked at one another.
"Think we can take 'em?" Chris asked the others.
"Oh yeah," said Orlando, with a smirk.
With a shout, the three charged off in opposite directions of the ship.
Chris ran a few paces and leaped up over the crowd to grab one of the light fixtures attached to the ceiling near the observation room. Using her flying trapeze skills from her Flying Circus days, she swung herself into the intruding figures at top speed. Her feet connected with her targets and two of the men went flying back out the window to plummet to their deaths!
The third of their group turned menacingly and raised his gun at Chris. He fired, but Chris was too quick for him! She dodged the bullets and threw herself out the window of the airship. She effortlessly grabbed the rope still swaying in the wind and used it to carry her in a long arc back towards the airship. The intruder's shots went wild, unable to track her high speed maneuver. Swinging back towards the room at high speed, she used her spare hand to draw her gun from her holster. She smashed through one of the unbroken windows, rolled across the floor, took aim at her surprised aggressor, and fired. The bullet went cleanly through the chest and the man dropped to the floor.
"Now this is my kinda party!" she smiled as she holstered her weapon.
Meanwhile, Orlando and Malweso were charging charging towards the intruders on the other side of the ship at full speed! Orlando picked up a table from in front of the bar and used it as a battering ram to shove one of the groups of soldiers off the ship! Two of the men jumped out of the way, leaving the third of their group stranded in front of Orlando with no where to go.
SMASH! The man went flying into the night sky, his screams filling the air.
Malaweso got stuck in the throng of people and found himself standing on the edge of the crowd as Orlando completed his attack. Malaweso watched as one of the soldiers next to Orlando began to raise his gun towards Orlando. Quickly, Malaweso drew his blow gun and poisoned darts and shot a bolt off towards the man. The dart struck true in his neck, and he collapsed to the ground, leaving Orlando with one more soldier to deal with.
The man lifted his gun and fired at Orlando, but Orlando smashed his hand with the table, knocking the gun clear out the window. A final smash across the head knocked the man unconscious.
Meanwhile, the other six soldiers had charged for the front of the room, where Tesla and Jones were standing amidst the panicked crowds. Seeing the approaching figures, Jones thought fast and quickly pushed Tesla underneath a table near the wall. He drew a flash grenade from within his jacket and dropped it at his feet.
The blast filled the room with an incredibly bright light, blinding everyone nearby. The surrounding party-goers dispersed in terror, leaving Jones standing face to face with his six semi-blinded opponents. He whipped around behind one of them, grabbed his gun arm, and fired the man's own gun, using his body as a human shield. The shot wasn't true and merely caused a slight wound on his target's shoulder.
The two soldiers nearest him began to attack with the butts of their guns, afraid to fire for fear of hurting their comrade. The other three attempted to extract Tesla from his hiding place underneath the table. Tesla grabbed a nearby dinner knife and sliced through the air, cutting one of the soldier's hands! They recoiled in anger!
A deep voice shouted out from across the room and Jones turned his head to see Orlando and Malaweso charging towards him! Malaweso was waving his bone fetish about and shouting random words in his native language! Amazingly, it caught the attention of the soldiers attempting to extract Tesla from beneath the table! They turned and watched with fear as the strange African man shook his fists at them and uttered things in a strange foreign language. This was just in time to be knocked to the ground by a sweeping kick from Orlando as he joined the fray.
Jones and Orlando finished off two more of the soldiers, causing the remaining two to take off running for the window. Malaweso fired off another blowdart at the running intruders and managed to drug another one before they got to the window.
Meanwhile, seeing things well in order within the ball room, Chris Katana once more jumped out of the flying dirigible onto the treacherous ropes outside! Looking up, she saw the assailant's vessel situated high above the Hypatia. It was a relatively small craft, hardly large enough to hold more than a dozen people. It looked like a strange cross between a dirigible and an auto-copter. A massive propeller was on top of the main gas bag, allowing the vessel a great maneuverability. As Chris clung to the swaying ropes, she got to observe this fact first hand! The vessel began to rise away from the Hypatia, faster than should seem possible!
The cold winds of the high altitude bit at her as she pulled herself up the rope towards the hatchway into the vessel's gondola. Suddenly, a rain of gunfire came from up above! Two of the goons were hanging out the hatchway, firing down at Chris! She swung herself back and forth to dodge the oncoming bullets, and looked about wildly for a way out of their line of fir. She noticed one of the other ropes hanging next to her, swaying in the wind. Thinking back to a curious two-rope climbing stunt she did back in the Flying Circus, she climbed up the ropes as fast as she could and hurled herself into the gondola, right into the barrel of a tommy-gun!
The interior of the gondola was covered in lights, dials, and switches. The two gun-men were joined by a pilot and another, differently dressed man behind the tommy-gun. The man stood with a square jaw and harsh eyes. The grip of his gun was true and strong as he held it to the wild woman's face.
"So," he began, in a thick German accent, "You thought you could stop us?"
Chris pursed her lips and smiled tightly. The two gun-men had taken up positions behind her, virtually blocking off her path of escape. The man in front of her had his gun pointed directly into her face. She looked around for a way out of the situation and came up with an idea.
"No," she grinned, "but I think my friend behind you can."
Somehow, the bluff worked and the tommy-gun man turned his head away for the briefest of moments, giving Chris enough time to throw herself out of the vessel.
Back inside the ball room, Malaweso, Orlando, and "Airship" Jones had managed to finish off all but two of the remaining intruders, one of who was drugged. They surveyed the carnage around them and took off running. The drugged one jumped out the window and fell screaming to his death, apparently too incoherent to think straight. The second one slapped a button on his backpack to sprout a pair of glider wings, and he took off sailing into the darkness.
Orlando dashed up to the window to see where Chris was just in time to see her throw herself into the gondola above.
He cried, "The things I do for that girl," and took a flying leap out the window at the rapidly rising drop rope! He first grab went wild. His eyes widened at the sight of the rushing city beneath him and he made another attempt to grab the rope! He caught the very end of the rope just before he plummeted to a very messy end of the day.
"I should have spent more time learning gymnastics!" he cried as he was buffeted by the fierce upper atmosphere winds. Struggling to maintain his grip on the rope, he looked up to see Chris come flying out of the gondola admist a rain of gun fire. She arced through the air and snatched the same rope that Orlando was on, not knowing he was hanging on below. The shaking of Chris's fall shook Orlando's already precarious grip free of the rope, and he began to plummet towards the eart!
Luckily, at just that moment, "Airship" Jones few out of the airship to catch the falling Orlando in his arms! He had grabbed the glider-wing backpack of one of the soldiers and was flying through the air! He spun around with Orlando in his arms, caught a wind thermal, and flew back into the Hypatia with Orlando in tow.
The staccato sounds of gunfire once again penetrated the interior of the ship, and the pair ran back to the window to see what had happened. A man with a tommy-gun was leaning out of the air-copter's gondola, a fearsome grin on his face. In firing at Chris, she had been forced to let go of the rope and catch it neatly between her legs! She was now hanging upside down, high over the city of Manhattan, with a trio of gun-fighters firing down at her from above!
A noise caught Orlando's attention, and he noticed a hatch in the rear of the vessel that he had not noticed before. Two soldiers were climbing into it, carrying something between them. It appeared to be some sort of mechanical device, stolen, perhaps, from the Hypatia. Jones took off after them and used his expert piloting skills to neatly find his way to the same rope the soldiers had just been climbing.
"That damn girl is going to get me killed," Orlando complained as he turned away from the window to find another backpack.
Dangling from a rope, high above Manhattan, "Airship" Jones watched as Chris Katana twisted her body to and fro and generated a slew of momentum to hurl herself around the belly of the vessel and onto its roof. From his vantage point as he clung to the rope, he could see Chris draw her pistol, take aim, and fire at something above the air-copter's gas bag. Suddenly, a powerful noise filled the air as the hydrogen within caught fire! Jones closed his eyes and steeled himself against the shock wave as the airship began to plummet towards the ground.
He opened his eyes again to see Chris sailing back underneath the vessel, unscathed from the massive destruction she had caused. Soldiers were leaping out of the vessel as the tops of the skyscrapers drew closer and closer. Jones saw a gleam of anger in Chris's eye as two of the soldiers grabbed the mechanical device they had loaded onto the ship and sailed off into the night.
"She's going to pursue them!" he thought, as a hail of gunfire came down from above. The man with the tommy-gun had jumped from his rapidly descending wreck of an airship raining a torrent of bullets down as he left. The rain of bullets made pursuit impossible, even for the insane Katana.
The city drew nearer and nearer. They were close enough now that Jones could hear the sounds of screams and honking horns from below. They were going to crash! He thought furiously to try to devise a plan that could both save Chris and save the New Yorkers below. The first part of the plan was made irrelevant by the appearance of Orlando clumsily maneuvering another glider-wing through the sky. Chris looked uncertain about the impromptu rescue, but jumped into Orlando's waiting arms. She gestured emphatically towards the escaping soliders, but Orlando shook his head firmly and shakily flew back to the Hypatia.
"The Hypatia!" Jones exclaimed, and looked up towards the Hypatia above to see if he could find something of use there.
"Got it!" he spotted what he was looking for and reopened his glider wing. He let go of the rope and flew down towards the ever approaching city below to gain momentum. Then back up towards the rope and the Hypatia. He snagged the rope and carried it to the mooring anchors on the massive airship above. He grabbed hold of the mooring anchor and tied it off. His hands were barely out from underneath the rope when the line went taught and the falling airship below ceased its descent, and began to swing in a slow arc, narrowly avoiding the skyscrapers below.
The Hypatia keened as it struggled with the weight of the aero-copter. Well over weight, the Hypatia could not maintain altitude and began to fall from the sky! Jones held on tight as the pilot of the Hypatia steered it towards the Hudson River!
KABOOM!
A massive fireball turned night into day as the burning airship's gas tanks caught fire and exploded! The shock wave knocked Jones off his perch on the mooring and threw him spinning into the cold air.
The ship was now over the river, and the Hypatia was falling fast. Up ahead, a bridge was coming into view, covered with pedestrians and traffic. The aero-copter vessel was going to crash into the bridge!
Jones was determined now. He righted himself with the expert skills that only the greatest pilot in all of the Great War would have, and pushed his glider to return to the rope tying the two ships together. In a quick flourish, he cut the rope and watched the wreck fall into the Hudson.
The excess weight removed from the ship, the Hypatia once again began to climb towards the sky, and Jones breathed a sigh of relief. He pushed off from the mooring anchor and returned to the deck to survey the damage of all that had happened...
And so ends the first game session!
The Alexandria Project
Session 1: The Skies over Manhattan!
I went to a gaming session last night, and we had a very exciting adventure! This is a story based on last night's game-log. It's a bit embellished and modified in places, but it is mostly accurate to the events as they took place.
The Alexandria Foundation was founded in 1917 as an organization to encourage world peace in the wake of the Great War. Members are encouraged to find exceptional individuals to bring on board as agents of the Foundation, to assist in their cause. The work of an agent is varied. Some days it involves dangerous deeds of derring do. Other days it involves things far more difficult.
"You ain't gonna find me in any of that fancy frilly shit." Chris Katana told Orlando, her Alexandria sponsor. Orlando grinned knowingly at the protestation. Chris was one of those tomboy sorts of girls, the kind that refused to wear a dress or put on "pretty things." Orlando could sympathize. He'd spent a significant chunk of his life living as a woman and sometimes couldn't stand the extravagant clothing. However, he also knew that the Foundation was in need of funding and it wouldn't do to have anyone dressing like a slob, especially not a war hero like Chris. He and Chris had been arguing about it for a half-hour, after she brazenly walked into the ball-room in her messy flight suit.
The Foundation was hosting a charity fundraiser on board the airship Hypatia, circling the skies over Manhattan. The ballroom of the airship was full of socialites and scientists, pretty young things and political figures. They had even shelled out to get a a string quartet to lay down a musical background for this meeting of minds and money. Every major dignitary throughout New York and from all across America was at the fundraiser. Even Nikolai Tesla was in attendance! Appearance and presentation were of high importance tonight.
Orlando paused to consider the situation and offered the slight girl a way out, "Alright. We'll do things your way. But there's no way you're going out in that trainwreck. You need something classy, and I think I have just the thing."
He pulled something out of his closet and handed it to the aerobat, then left her to get dressed. She reappeared in the ball room a few minutes later dressed in a smart pin-stripe suit. She was still scowling, but perhaps scowling a little less now. She approached the bar to ask for a drink and turned to Orlando.
"Thanks," she said, simply, and walked off with her drink in hand.
Orlando watched appreciatively as the girl gracefully navigated her way through the crowded throngs of people to the port observation room adjoining the main ballroom. He made sure that he could still see her through the doorway and moved to return to his flirting. He was interrupted by a gasp and the sound of several people running towards the door.
The other new Foundation member, Malaweso, had just entered the room. He stood out like a sore thumb in this affluent American party. Besides his more traditional African attire, he was also the only dark-skinned person in the entire room, and one of a handful on the ship entire. Considering the rest were down in the galley of the ship, doing the grunt work, Orlando figured that Malaweso felt very out of place.
As soon as he entered the room, the dignitaries had flocked around him demanding stories of his homelands. They were like little yapping dogs all yearning for exciting tales of the dark continent. Malaweso spoke to them politely for a while, but after a time, it was obvious that he was growing tired of being the novelty item of the party. There was a shift in the air, and suddenly, the throng seemed a bit less interested in the decidedly less friendly African shaman.
Malaweso meandered over to the bar and asked for a drink. He nodded at Orlando.
"Stupid fucking white people, eh?" Orlando commented, in the shaman's own language.
Malaweso smiled at his old frustrated expletive being returned to him in this context. He nodded and said, "I do not mind a few questions, but I find their intense interest in my exploits rather tiring."
Orlando nodded with understanding and the two continued their discussion. As they spoke, Orlando noticed "Airship" Jones enter the room and look around determinedly. Jones saw Orlando and recognition lit up in his eyes. Jones stepped over and greeted the two other men at the bar.
"I hear Nikolai Tesla is here, tonight?" Jones said inquiringly.
Orlando nodded affirmatively, "That right. He's right over there." He pointed towards the forward-starboard corner of the room, near the musicians. "What do you want with him?" He asked.
"I've got a few questions to ask him about some technology of his that wound up in some suspect hands," Jones responded.
Orlando raised his eyebrows but did not comment further, "Good luck getting past the throng of admirers packed around him."
Jones shrugged and pushed his way through the crowd to the indicated location. Orlando and Malaweso returned to their discussion.
Meanwhile, Chris Katana was standing in the quiet observation room on the port side of the Hypatia, slowly nursing her drink from the bar. The large room adjoined the main ballroom as a place for passengers to look out over the landscape. There was one on either side of the ballroom, and they both were lined with massive windows looking out at the city below. Chris watched wistfully as the beautiful city rolled beneath the massive airship.
"How did I let myself get talked into this?" she muttered. Although Chris had done the pretty-girl-in-a-dress thing in the past, she found a certain comfort in the male persona she had created during the war. She found it difficult to return to the pretty dresses and nonsense that she had always found so irritating growing up, when her father would take her to family parties and such. She was very glad of Orlando finding her something that matched her sensibilities.
She took another sip of her drink and stared at the towering buildings below. She had never been to New York before, having spent most of her time traveling around Europe and parts of Africa. The sight was astounding. Such tall buildings, towering so high over everything around them. She imagined herself dodging her plane between them for fun, a challenge that she would love to try sometime.
The shadow of the Hypatia was clear against the rough cityscape, illuminated by the bright full moon over head. It was a beautiful night for flying, the kind of night where Chris would fly to a high altitude, cut the engine, and just glide for miles and miles, with no sound but the wind that carried her.
Something odd tugged at her consciousness and she looked more carefully at the airship's massive shadow. She blinked, as if she wasn't sure what she was seeing was real. It looked like there was another airship approaching the Hypatia from above and starboard. Looking at the way the shadows were arranged, it looked like they were in some serious danger of a collision.
"That doesn't look good," she said as she pushed her way back into the ball room and worked her way towards Orlando and Malaweso. As she arrived, he smiled, but the concern on her face turned him serious fast.
"What wrong?" he asked.
"What's going on with the other airship you've got out there? Whoever is piloting it is an idiot. We're in danger of a collision!" she explained.
Orlando frowned with concern, "There's not supposed to be any other airships in this area tonight." He gestured at the port observation room, "We should take a look."
"Actually, they're coming up on the other side," she indicated, and started weaving her way through the thick thrown of party-goers to the starboard observation deck. Orlando and Malaweso followed.
CRASH!
The sound of shattered glass filled the room as a dozen armed thugs smashed through the glass and swung into the observation rooms! The men were dressed in black leather outfits and armed, each, with one pistol in each hand. They clustered into two groups of three, six on each side of the ship. Ropes extended from backpacks back out the windows of the ship. As the soldiers landed, they pressed a button on their vests, causing the ropes to detach and swing back out the windows.
Screams filled the room as the party-goers scrambled for the single exit towards the living quarters. People were running everywhere, terrified of the attackers and terrified of one another. They were a sea of dangerous animals, trampling each other and not knowing what to do about it. In the midst of this chaos, Chris, Orlando, and Malaweso looked at one another.
"Think we can take 'em?" Chris asked the others.
"Oh yeah," said Orlando, with a smirk.
With a shout, the three charged off in opposite directions of the ship.
Chris ran a few paces and leaped up over the crowd to grab one of the light fixtures attached to the ceiling near the observation room. Using her flying trapeze skills from her Flying Circus days, she swung herself into the intruding figures at top speed. Her feet connected with her targets and two of the men went flying back out the window to plummet to their deaths!
The third of their group turned menacingly and raised his gun at Chris. He fired, but Chris was too quick for him! She dodged the bullets and threw herself out the window of the airship. She effortlessly grabbed the rope still swaying in the wind and used it to carry her in a long arc back towards the airship. The intruder's shots went wild, unable to track her high speed maneuver. Swinging back towards the room at high speed, she used her spare hand to draw her gun from her holster. She smashed through one of the unbroken windows, rolled across the floor, took aim at her surprised aggressor, and fired. The bullet went cleanly through the chest and the man dropped to the floor.
"Now this is my kinda party!" she smiled as she holstered her weapon.
Meanwhile, Orlando and Malweso were charging charging towards the intruders on the other side of the ship at full speed! Orlando picked up a table from in front of the bar and used it as a battering ram to shove one of the groups of soldiers off the ship! Two of the men jumped out of the way, leaving the third of their group stranded in front of Orlando with no where to go.
SMASH! The man went flying into the night sky, his screams filling the air.
Malaweso got stuck in the throng of people and found himself standing on the edge of the crowd as Orlando completed his attack. Malaweso watched as one of the soldiers next to Orlando began to raise his gun towards Orlando. Quickly, Malaweso drew his blow gun and poisoned darts and shot a bolt off towards the man. The dart struck true in his neck, and he collapsed to the ground, leaving Orlando with one more soldier to deal with.
The man lifted his gun and fired at Orlando, but Orlando smashed his hand with the table, knocking the gun clear out the window. A final smash across the head knocked the man unconscious.
Meanwhile, the other six soldiers had charged for the front of the room, where Tesla and Jones were standing amidst the panicked crowds. Seeing the approaching figures, Jones thought fast and quickly pushed Tesla underneath a table near the wall. He drew a flash grenade from within his jacket and dropped it at his feet.
The blast filled the room with an incredibly bright light, blinding everyone nearby. The surrounding party-goers dispersed in terror, leaving Jones standing face to face with his six semi-blinded opponents. He whipped around behind one of them, grabbed his gun arm, and fired the man's own gun, using his body as a human shield. The shot wasn't true and merely caused a slight wound on his target's shoulder.
The two soldiers nearest him began to attack with the butts of their guns, afraid to fire for fear of hurting their comrade. The other three attempted to extract Tesla from his hiding place underneath the table. Tesla grabbed a nearby dinner knife and sliced through the air, cutting one of the soldier's hands! They recoiled in anger!
A deep voice shouted out from across the room and Jones turned his head to see Orlando and Malaweso charging towards him! Malaweso was waving his bone fetish about and shouting random words in his native language! Amazingly, it caught the attention of the soldiers attempting to extract Tesla from beneath the table! They turned and watched with fear as the strange African man shook his fists at them and uttered things in a strange foreign language. This was just in time to be knocked to the ground by a sweeping kick from Orlando as he joined the fray.
Jones and Orlando finished off two more of the soldiers, causing the remaining two to take off running for the window. Malaweso fired off another blowdart at the running intruders and managed to drug another one before they got to the window.
Meanwhile, seeing things well in order within the ball room, Chris Katana once more jumped out of the flying dirigible onto the treacherous ropes outside! Looking up, she saw the assailant's vessel situated high above the Hypatia. It was a relatively small craft, hardly large enough to hold more than a dozen people. It looked like a strange cross between a dirigible and an auto-copter. A massive propeller was on top of the main gas bag, allowing the vessel a great maneuverability. As Chris clung to the swaying ropes, she got to observe this fact first hand! The vessel began to rise away from the Hypatia, faster than should seem possible!
The cold winds of the high altitude bit at her as she pulled herself up the rope towards the hatchway into the vessel's gondola. Suddenly, a rain of gunfire came from up above! Two of the goons were hanging out the hatchway, firing down at Chris! She swung herself back and forth to dodge the oncoming bullets, and looked about wildly for a way out of their line of fir. She noticed one of the other ropes hanging next to her, swaying in the wind. Thinking back to a curious two-rope climbing stunt she did back in the Flying Circus, she climbed up the ropes as fast as she could and hurled herself into the gondola, right into the barrel of a tommy-gun!
The interior of the gondola was covered in lights, dials, and switches. The two gun-men were joined by a pilot and another, differently dressed man behind the tommy-gun. The man stood with a square jaw and harsh eyes. The grip of his gun was true and strong as he held it to the wild woman's face.
"So," he began, in a thick German accent, "You thought you could stop us?"
Chris pursed her lips and smiled tightly. The two gun-men had taken up positions behind her, virtually blocking off her path of escape. The man in front of her had his gun pointed directly into her face. She looked around for a way out of the situation and came up with an idea.
"No," she grinned, "but I think my friend behind you can."
Somehow, the bluff worked and the tommy-gun man turned his head away for the briefest of moments, giving Chris enough time to throw herself out of the vessel.
Back inside the ball room, Malaweso, Orlando, and "Airship" Jones had managed to finish off all but two of the remaining intruders, one of who was drugged. They surveyed the carnage around them and took off running. The drugged one jumped out the window and fell screaming to his death, apparently too incoherent to think straight. The second one slapped a button on his backpack to sprout a pair of glider wings, and he took off sailing into the darkness.
Orlando dashed up to the window to see where Chris was just in time to see her throw herself into the gondola above.
He cried, "The things I do for that girl," and took a flying leap out the window at the rapidly rising drop rope! He first grab went wild. His eyes widened at the sight of the rushing city beneath him and he made another attempt to grab the rope! He caught the very end of the rope just before he plummeted to a very messy end of the day.
"I should have spent more time learning gymnastics!" he cried as he was buffeted by the fierce upper atmosphere winds. Struggling to maintain his grip on the rope, he looked up to see Chris come flying out of the gondola admist a rain of gun fire. She arced through the air and snatched the same rope that Orlando was on, not knowing he was hanging on below. The shaking of Chris's fall shook Orlando's already precarious grip free of the rope, and he began to plummet towards the eart!
Luckily, at just that moment, "Airship" Jones few out of the airship to catch the falling Orlando in his arms! He had grabbed the glider-wing backpack of one of the soldiers and was flying through the air! He spun around with Orlando in his arms, caught a wind thermal, and flew back into the Hypatia with Orlando in tow.
The staccato sounds of gunfire once again penetrated the interior of the ship, and the pair ran back to the window to see what had happened. A man with a tommy-gun was leaning out of the air-copter's gondola, a fearsome grin on his face. In firing at Chris, she had been forced to let go of the rope and catch it neatly between her legs! She was now hanging upside down, high over the city of Manhattan, with a trio of gun-fighters firing down at her from above!
A noise caught Orlando's attention, and he noticed a hatch in the rear of the vessel that he had not noticed before. Two soldiers were climbing into it, carrying something between them. It appeared to be some sort of mechanical device, stolen, perhaps, from the Hypatia. Jones took off after them and used his expert piloting skills to neatly find his way to the same rope the soldiers had just been climbing.
"That damn girl is going to get me killed," Orlando complained as he turned away from the window to find another backpack.
Dangling from a rope, high above Manhattan, "Airship" Jones watched as Chris Katana twisted her body to and fro and generated a slew of momentum to hurl herself around the belly of the vessel and onto its roof. From his vantage point as he clung to the rope, he could see Chris draw her pistol, take aim, and fire at something above the air-copter's gas bag. Suddenly, a powerful noise filled the air as the hydrogen within caught fire! Jones closed his eyes and steeled himself against the shock wave as the airship began to plummet towards the ground.
He opened his eyes again to see Chris sailing back underneath the vessel, unscathed from the massive destruction she had caused. Soldiers were leaping out of the vessel as the tops of the skyscrapers drew closer and closer. Jones saw a gleam of anger in Chris's eye as two of the soldiers grabbed the mechanical device they had loaded onto the ship and sailed off into the night.
"She's going to pursue them!" he thought, as a hail of gunfire came down from above. The man with the tommy-gun had jumped from his rapidly descending wreck of an airship raining a torrent of bullets down as he left. The rain of bullets made pursuit impossible, even for the insane Katana.
The city drew nearer and nearer. They were close enough now that Jones could hear the sounds of screams and honking horns from below. They were going to crash! He thought furiously to try to devise a plan that could both save Chris and save the New Yorkers below. The first part of the plan was made irrelevant by the appearance of Orlando clumsily maneuvering another glider-wing through the sky. Chris looked uncertain about the impromptu rescue, but jumped into Orlando's waiting arms. She gestured emphatically towards the escaping soliders, but Orlando shook his head firmly and shakily flew back to the Hypatia.
"The Hypatia!" Jones exclaimed, and looked up towards the Hypatia above to see if he could find something of use there.
"Got it!" he spotted what he was looking for and reopened his glider wing. He let go of the rope and flew down towards the ever approaching city below to gain momentum. Then back up towards the rope and the Hypatia. He snagged the rope and carried it to the mooring anchors on the massive airship above. He grabbed hold of the mooring anchor and tied it off. His hands were barely out from underneath the rope when the line went taught and the falling airship below ceased its descent, and began to swing in a slow arc, narrowly avoiding the skyscrapers below.
The Hypatia keened as it struggled with the weight of the aero-copter. Well over weight, the Hypatia could not maintain altitude and began to fall from the sky! Jones held on tight as the pilot of the Hypatia steered it towards the Hudson River!
KABOOM!
A massive fireball turned night into day as the burning airship's gas tanks caught fire and exploded! The shock wave knocked Jones off his perch on the mooring and threw him spinning into the cold air.
The ship was now over the river, and the Hypatia was falling fast. Up ahead, a bridge was coming into view, covered with pedestrians and traffic. The aero-copter vessel was going to crash into the bridge!
Jones was determined now. He righted himself with the expert skills that only the greatest pilot in all of the Great War would have, and pushed his glider to return to the rope tying the two ships together. In a quick flourish, he cut the rope and watched the wreck fall into the Hudson.
The excess weight removed from the ship, the Hypatia once again began to climb towards the sky, and Jones breathed a sigh of relief. He pushed off from the mooring anchor and returned to the deck to survey the damage of all that had happened...
And so ends the first game session!
