The party meets with Reflective Scale, Aspexx's Junior Legal Counsel to Mytene, in their office in the city of Mytenea. Before anything else, Scale has the party sign standard NDAs. Red Nine uses an Intervention to make their NDA appear signed but actually be non-binding.
Scale explains that Aspexx has a facility on the outskirts of Mytenea that produces specialised equipment, and in particular security robots. However, the facility recently went haywire - Aspexx suspects a cyberattack - and the security robots have gone rogue. An elite team of non-robotic Aspexx security personnel was sent in to contain the situation, but contact with them was lost when a signal jamming field activated around the facility. Scale doesn’t know whether the security team are alive or dead, but is concerned that they have not reported back. They requested backup from Aspexx, but no other security teams are available - Aspexx has plenty of robotic security but doesn’t want to send those in for obvious reasons, and is unable to supply further organic units. So Scale has hired the party to deal with the situation.
The party escorts Scale to the facility, protected them from the local wildlife along the way. Arriving at the facility, built atop an abandoned mine, they find the perimeter littered with destroyed robots. Scale wishes to remain outside away from the danger; Red Nine calls in a favour from their Mystic Sect to bring in a team to look after Scale and guard the perimeter (as well as establish a foothold here to exert influence).
Inside the facility, the party are set upon by rogue security robots, speaking phrases such as 'aspexx sux' and 'destroy aspexx stooges'. At the main production line, the robots are stacking a large pile of mining explosives, brought from elsewhere in the facility. Once the nearby robots are defeated, the party debate what to do about the explosives, eventually leveraging Minted Parade's knowledge of thermal countermeasures to damp down the pile enough that it shouldn't spontaneously combust.
Moving deeper into the facility, the party locates the elite Aspexx security team that Reflective Scale had previously sent in, barricaded behind a large pile of destroyed robots. The squad is severely injured and unable to proceed. While fending off an especially persistent forklift robot carrying more explosives to the previous room, the party try their best to help the squad, and find out about a control room from where they might be able to remotely shut down the robots. The security team hand over an access card, and thanks to the party's help should be able to fend for themselves while waiting for rescue.
In the control room, the party fend off an endless stream of robots while trying to reboot the control terminal. Eventually they are able to issue a shutdown signal that disables every robot in the facility. After this, a message appears on the terminal, seemingly from the perpetrator of the cyberattack, congratulating the party on their success and suggesting that they should meet up if the party want to know 'what Aspexx are really up to'. A map to another part of the facility is provided.
Before moving on, the party examines the terminal. Red Nine spots a memory stick, decorated with an image of a hand holding a playing card, plugged in to the terminal. The device is already loaded with various bits of malware, but Nine copies a bunch of interesting looking Aspexx files onto the remaining space on the device and pockets it.
The party arrives at the advertised location, where a human introducing themselves as 'Hand Owning' decloaks, surrounded by holographic duplicates of themselves. Owning explains that, despite the party's actions, their cyberattack was a success: the point was not to compromise the facility itself, but rather to cause a large enough distraction that Aspexx's elite security detail would be forced to intervene. Owning's group of hackers-slash-conspiracy-theorists, Card Table, had uncovered evidence of a top secret Aspexx base on Kylal, established in the last few months, and wanted to break in to find out what nefarious conspiracy Aspexx was up to this time. However, the site was guarded by the elite security team. Since Aspexx is short on non-robotic security teams after the Orion Gate Incident, by manufacturing a distraction that required a non-robotic security response, the Kylal facility could be made unguarded long enough for Card Table to sneak in.
Hand Owning further explains that the hackers sent to Kylal have fallen out of contact, and offers to the party that rather than continuing to work for Aspexx, they could head to Kylal on behalf of Card Table to track down the hackers and find out more about Aspexx's secret base. The party confer amongst themselves, and agree to help so long as Owning promises not to attack the Mytene facility any further (which they agree to as their distraction mission is already completed), and if Owning provides some way to monitor the robots to ensure they don't wake up and cause more trouble, which they provide in the form of a PDA linked to the system.
On their way out of the facility, the party track down the persistent forklift robot which they earlier trapped in a cupboard, so that Endless Flame can take out their frustrations on it.
The party speaks to Reflective Scale outside the facility, explaining that the robots have been neutralised, and that lax cybersecurity seems to have allowed the attack to take place. They do not mention Hand Owning or Card Table, but present evidence of passwords written on sticky notes from the control room to back their story up. They also provide directions to the security team, so that they can be rescued. Scale is happy with this, and the party departs, with Red Nine ensuring that the Mystic Sect has some influence in the facility's recovery.
The party rendezvous elsewhere on Mytene with a pirate who appears to owe a favour to Hand Owning. The pirate seems especially competent and well-equipped, sporting a mid-sized vessel with its own Ship Heart. They aren't willing to name themselves, but don't ask for the party's names either, and are instead happy to ferry the party with minimal fuss.
A while later, the party touches down in the frozen wastelands on the surface of Kylal, far from any established settlements. Card Table don't have an exact fix on the location of the Aspexx base, but the pirate is able to drop the party off near a trail left by the previous hacker party. They leave the party with a communicator to call the pirate back for later extraction.
Following the trail of footprints and discarded hacking equipment, the party fight ice beetles and a horde of decaying creatures (perhaps made from the discarded tech), before arriving at the entrance to a cave. This appears to be the entrance to the Aspexx base - a semi-circle of beetle corpses and rusty dust surrounds the entrance, as though an elite Aspexx security detail had previously been stationed here.
Uncertain of what awaits, Red Nine blesses Endless Flame with the power to telepathically ping back to the rest of the party if they encounter danger, then Flame heads into the cave alone.
The cave is sparsely inhabited: there is zero technology to be found, and the caves walls are entirely natural, with the only additions being occasional wooden furniture and bioluminescent glow sticks to provide light. Aspexx appears to be going to great lengths here to avoid summoning the decay. Swatting away some insignificant decay creatures, Flame gathers notes and journal pages from the tables and summons the party.
Sitting down to read the notes, the party discovers that the base was recently established by Aspexx in response to the discovery by Zeitgeist and the Borderlands Botanists of a gate-like connection between Hive IV and Kylal, each within the ruins of the ancient 'pentagonal civilisation' whose ruins are often found on Kylal. The project appears to be run by Melodious Solution, Aspexx's Chief Mobility Mystic. The party debates for some time what to do with this information, and whether it is right for Aspexx and / or Card Table to have access to it.
Moving further into the cave, the party comes upon a host of powerful decay creatures trying to gain access to a safe room. Destroying the creatures, the party find the safe room to be a large stone door, bolted from the other side. Shouting through the door, they determine that both some Aspexx staff and some Card Table hackers are inside, and persuade them to let the party in.
Within the safe room, it becomes apparent that Melodious Solution is not present, having left the base in the past few weeks. The only Aspexx staff are technical staff, as the security team had also left to go to Mytene. On the other hand, the hackers had shown up a few days ago, laden with technology, and thus been pursued by the decay into the base. Overwhelmed and without a security team, this forced both Aspexx and Card Table into the safe room, where they have been trapped bickering with each other ever since.
The Aspexx staff, including one Elegant Solution who seems quite concern with 'when my mother hears about all this', are adamant that the hackers must not leave the base alive, due to its top secret nature. The hackers want to get to the bottom of the conspiracy so they can unmask Aspexx's schemes. Red Nine and Minted Parade appear minded to side with Aspexx, but are afraid that Iron Cold's code of honour will prevent them from killing the hackers, so collude to have Iron Cold escort the Aspexx staff out of the cave first. Once this happens, they murder the hackers and blame the whole thing on decay.
With everyone fleeing the cave due to the apparent threat of decay, the party heads back out in the wasteland and summons the pirate ship to pick them up.