Chapter 3: on the station

[spanningtree]

Ringar

I'll go, but encountering government employees is not high on my bucket list.

[SpinwardMarch]

Which lab deck do you want to go to first?

[ybn1197]

First lab going up?

[SpinwardMarch]

The elevator pod spirals up to the main Lab Deck, and the door opens on a circular walkway. On the wall across from the opening, and slightly to the right, there is double door with a sign:

Sample Reception Area

Main Lab Deck

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What do you do?

[ybn1197]

Can we see in and out of the elevator sides or are they solid wall and the only thing we can see out of is the door when its open?

[spanningtree]

Ringar

Steps onto the circular walkway and walks, slowly, all the way around taking everything in.

[SpinwardMarch]

Can we see in and out of the elevator sides or are they solid wall and the only thing we can see out of is the door when its open?

It is like a regular modern elevator; there are no windows, just buttons and read-outs.

Ringar, you walk around the circular corridor(3). As you get to the point opposite the elevator opening, you see what must be the Mess Hall(20). It contains several tables. Most the tables are bare, and do not even have condiments on them. One table has a single place setting laid out.

[Jernau35]

Jrec inspects the door to the Sample Reception Area. The first thing he looks for is a keypad or card swipe or something similar to indicate if and how the door might be locked.

He also looks at the floor in front of the door, looking for footprints, blood drops, slime trails or any other clue as to what might have passed through recently.

[spanningtree]

Ringar

OCC: Does he notice that any of the doors have locking mechanisms on them?

[SpinwardMarch]

Jrec, you don't notice any unusual marks on the floor. Then you remember the Janitor Bot in the levels below. It (or perhaps another one) has cleaned up anything that might have been there. You guess that there is probably more than one Janitor Bot on this station; it is too big for just one cleaner.

Ringar, the doors have small windows and appear to have no locks. They are like emergency room doors, and can swing open easily. When you look in the windows, you see that in the center of the large room (~78'x16' - each square on the map is 3 meters!), is an air/raft on an elevator platform. It has a separate, covered compartment which is obviously an animal containment cage.

What do you do?

Sample Reception Room

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[spanningtree]

Ringar

Perhaps we can use the air raft to get back to the sub. With a shurg. Pointing at area 7 on the map. Maybe we try there?

[ybn1197]

Maddox nods enthusiastically. "Good find. We may have need of it later. There is as good a place as any other."

[Jernau35]

Jrec

Jrec looks the air/raft over."Do you think there might be something useful in there? Like coordinates in the navigation system?"

[SpinwardMarch]

As you look through the windows of the Sample Reception area (#6), you can see there are two heavy doors on the "south" side of the room, leading to room #7. Plaques on the wall next to the doors are labeled "Laboratory."

Chiree has been looking around, as well. I think we came into this place from that room. He indicates the room with the air/raft. We were in cages, along with other beings.

Do any of you push open the doors and go into the Reception room?

[ybn1197]

If there is no one visible, Maddox will slowly push the doors open and proceed in.

[Jernau35]

Jrec

Jrec asks Chiree a couple of questions. "How many of your people were brought here? And how many creatures were brought on that with you? Many different kinds of creatures or just a few?"

[SpinwardMarch]

Chiree answers, They took me and my two nest mates, because we had not learned to hide yet. There were other cages in the room where they put us, with several other kinds of beings. I do not know what happened to them.

[spanningtree]

Ringar


The other beings are probably down below as well. I am pretty sure we should be looking down where the containment facilities are, our propensity for running across a technician or robot is pretty high up here I would think.

[SpinwardMarch]

Ringar


...our propensity for running across a technician or robot is pretty high up here I would think.

Speaking of which, you can hear something mechanical moving from across central core. From around a corner, a robot emerges!


It looks different than the janitor bot you saw below. It looks like a stack of 4 variously -sized cylinders, the bottom one is flared out to accommodate the tracks for movement. The top cylinder is wide but shallow (it looks like a Roomba), which is probably the "head." Below that, on the main cylinder are two mechanical arms. At the moment, it is not carrying anything.

What do you do?

[Jernau35]

Jrec

Reasoning that security protocols in a remote outpost at the edge of the world are more likely to be focused on "escaping prisoners" than covert intruders, Jrec does his best to block the robot's view of Chiree. As casually as he can, he pretends to ignore the robot, and if ignored in return, tries to follow Maddox into the room.