Centaurus Gate, Trauma Squad Session 2

Date: 2023-11-03

Player Characters (~300 points):

M2M2M, mech vehicular and robotics engineer, drone operator, hacker
Dr. Link Mercury, nanoswarm combat medic, pilot
Nectahii, edari sniper
Miko, human melee specialist, silent killer, psi

CP awarded: 2

This session was a relatively short one – it started late and ended early. After Trauma Squad blew up the turrets, M2 repaired Link who then attended to Heinrich’s injuries. T’was but a scratch, in both cases. The group entered the room which was now safe, and proceeded to examine it. It was obviously some kind of a lab, with a lot of scientific equipment and computer consoles. Link determined it was a bio-lab, but wasn’t quite sure of the specific research subjects since he’s merely a doctor, not a scientist. The team determined that Boron Squad was here and used the consoles, but little else about them. M2 discovered that the door to the lab, through which they entered, was remotely locked about a day ago. He found several other nodes on the network, but couldn’t ascertain anything more about them. He attempted to access the node which locked the door, but couldn’t get in. He did get access to most of the research data in the lab, but the group decided to look for Boron Squad first and download the data later. So they continued onwards, through the door on the opposite side of the lab than the one they entered through.

A corridor of hewn rock reinforced with artificial supports, and some ventilation shafts and cabling passed through it, was on the other side of the door. M2 sent his GEMINI drone to scout 10 yards ahead of him, while the rest of the squad tried to sneak a couple yards after M2. They failed to move silently. Some 20 yards from the lab, after turning a corner, the squad heard tapping and clanging noises coming from up ahead, around another corner, and from the walls around them. M2 rushed towards GEMINI, which was almost at that next corner, but Link started retreating towards the lab. Nectahii and Miko took positions in cover behind the ceiling supports. When M2 noticed Link retreating on the tacnet, he started to double back as well, but at that point the sources of the sounds revealed themselves – a dozen insectoid quadruped aliens, the size of large dogs, with bulging eyes, toothy maws, and sharp claws emerged from around the corner in front of the party, and another half a dozen burst forth from the ventilation shafts and wall panels around Nectahii and Miko. Trauma Squad was ready for them, if not optimally positioned, and opened fire.

For the first few seconds, M2 continued retreating towards the rest of the group, while Nectahii covered him, Link covered Nectahii and Miko, and Miko worked on the aliens surrounding the pair with her swords. More aliens appeared each second, and those from around the corner ignored GEMINI and rushed at the operators. M2 used this opportunity and shot down a good number of the hordelings via GEMINI’s gauss PDW. Once close to Nectahii and Miko, he turned around and started blasting himself. His sniper rifle wasn’t optimal for taking down many hordlings, and neither was Nactahii’s payload rifle, but Link and GEMINI fared better with their automatic shotgun and PDW, respectively. Still, the alien swarm didn’t abate, and Trauma Squad was risking the danger of being overwhelmed.

Just as the operators got some breathing room, four larger aliens emerged from behind the front corner (along with what proved to be the last wave of hordelings), and started focusing on Trauma Squad from afar. This proved to be taking aim with their corrosive spit attacks. At about the same time, the hordelings realized they couldn’t penetrate the operators’ armor with their claws, and started to attempt bites, with which they could also grapple. They piled onto M2, while Miko and Nectahii managed to keep themselves free. Nectahii ignored M2’s instructions to focus on the spitters, and tried to free M2 of some of the hordelings, but he merely managed to keep the number of hordelings latched onto M2 constant. This left Link the only one dealing with the spitters. The spitters only managed to land one hit on Miko and one on M2. Nectahii dodged several hits by floating close to the ceiling and then dropping lower, and Link made good use of cover. Miko’s psionic force field fully absorbed the hit; M2’s armor did the same, but got corroded. After a few seconds of tense shooting and grappling, the aliens started dropping like flies and Trauma Team fully wiped them out.