Fatal Voyage

“The task is simple,” Spectre Vyix 9a says, “you enter a virtual reality being projected from the dying mind of a passenger of the ill-fated Immersabilis and once inside you find the saboteur, identify them, and then return so they can be tracked down and pruned. It sounds experimental, but we do this all the time: your brains couldn’t be safer.”

• Honest Jack - Susannah
• Gunnery Sergeant Desiring Peace - Phil

• The party’s first memory after signing up to aid Spectre Vyix 9a in tracking down a saboteur of the Vyix 9a moon is a series of fractured calibration memories, flashing back and forth through the memories of whoever it is they’re experiencing memories of and their experience of the destruction of the ship.
• When their memories stabilise, they find themselves reliving the experiences of someone on the ship who is friends with one Midnight Flight, a Ziline of low station who is on the maiden voyage of the famous Immersabilis (infamous for being destroyed by the explosion of Vyix 9a on its maiden fly-by voyage). They experience the arrival of passengers, including one Dazzling Pearl, 37, and her daughter, Dazzling Amethyst, 50, as well as a large number of Altarian nobility. Amethyst is clearly disillusioned with Alta and the party observe as she forms a bond with Midnight Flight — one that her mother abhors.
• The party flash forward and find themselves fighting to protect Midnight Flight from the attempts of Dazzling Pearl to have her killed, and eventually freeing her from the brig when there’s a large explosion and the shockwave breaks the connection, leaving them to fight against synchronisation errors in the memory which ultimately damage their ability to keep their identities separate from whoever it is they are in the memories.
• Honest Jack checks the Reality of the situation to stabilise their identity and with more clarity realise they recognise Dazzling Amethyst as the infamous pirate captain Violet Afterburn on Siruta, to whom they feel some degree of loyalty.
• Pushing through the memories of the sinking of the Immersabilis the party find themselves becoming protective of Midnight Flight who reveals to them and to Amethyst that they are actually Ninth Chance, a Vyixian terrorist who was responsible for some of the sabotage on Vyix 9a but had wanted to undo it if it wasn’t for the fact they were too late when they had that epiphany. Amethyst decides she wants to give Ninth Chance a second chance, just as she wants one herself, and fights against her mother when she tries to stop Chance leaving the ship alive when searching for her daughter.
• With the ship succumbing to Decay, the party desperately protect Amethyst and Chance as they make their way to the last surviving escape pod. They find themselves transcending physical form as they come to realise the memories they are reliving are not that of a person but of the Ship Heart of the Immersabilis. They expend their last power to get them to safety, shrinking themselves down to a fragment stored in Amethyst’s Heirloom, her rebranding herself as Violet Afterburn, but then experience themselves being lost in the sea, trading hands, and eventually ending up in the simulation today.
• The party are able to extract themselves from the simulation but find the holodeck of the Firebrand where they are currently in chaos as the Ship Heart fragment in the room with them is overcome with grief. Around them, Mystics sent to help have been twisted into Devourer of Light but by helping Immersabilis to find some peace the Party are able to rectify the situation. During the fight, Desiring Peace is infected by the darkness from one of the Devourers.
• Honest Jack immediately gives all the information they had on Ninth Chance to the Spectre excepting the identity of the rank 37 Altarian (Dazzling Amethyst) who Chance had run off with. Vyix 9a is surprised to hear that any of the Altarians made it off the ship alive, thanks the party and compensates them for their time.

• Jack takes the Immersabilis heirloom and goes to Siruta to talk to Violet Afterburn. In a seedy tavern in Azuria, Jack explains everything to Afterburn and by the end a teary-eyed Afterburn turns to her Quartermaster, one Third Time, who is also tearing up about it. She asks to see the heirloom and Jack shows her but is reticent to part with it. Afterburn sees the bond between them, and though she has her own bond with another Ship Heart, she explains that the Immersabilis‘s blessing still lingers over the core part of her ship that she’s Ship Of Theseus’d into near unrecognisability over the years. She suggests that Jack is a better pair for Immersabilis now and the two part ways, but not without a warning to Jack to avoid letting any Altarians in the system know he knows the identity of Amethyst 37.
• Jack puts time into bonding with the fragment of Immersabilis. It is by no means a full Ship Heart, but it has personality enough. Over time he’s able to coax some conversation out of it and gains some of its insight into the world.
• Desiring Peace, desiring peace of mind, submits to the Mystics aboard the Firebrand to investigate the darkness infecting their eyes from the Devourers of Light. They find that something of the grief that was empowering the Devourers has been imparted into Peace and while it can empower them in heights of emotion it could also leave them vulnerable. They offer to use the Firebrand‘s power to remove it, or to leave it be if they prefer (your choice).

• Spectre Vyix 9a is aware that their target, Ninth Chance, is in cahoots with Dazzling Amethyst 37, who is in system and survived the Immersabilis disaster.

• +10 Clout with the Elegy or +2 Clout with a faction of your choice.

• +5 Clout with Violet Afterburn (which turns into -10 if you out her identity or that of Third Time).
• Immersabilis amulet, contains a fragment of the Ship Heart. When worn:
  • Twice per Mission: immediately recharge your Solar Barrier to full.
  • Gain an additional use of Vessel for the fragment in the amulet (personality: compassionate)
  • If you would take a Severe Injury, instead call MONSTERS: BREAK and take a HEAL FULL as the amulet destroys itself to protect you.
• Dim undestanding of the life cycle of a Ship Heart.

• If you choose to keep the Devourer’s effect:
  • Roleplaying Effect: You feel emotions more keenly, particularly those of grief or loss which quickly can spiral into despair. When you feel despair are inclined toward destruction and lose regard for safety.
  • Mechanical Effect: Spend 3 hits to call DRAIN by melee.