Kesser’s Return - Part 2

The Skylark’s crew begins to explore the Kesser and and finds that it has become a deep space chamber of horrors.

This note is from our September 10th, 2017 session and was mostly written by Carl and Kay with additional material provided by myself. I made the model in Sketchup and I rendered it in Twilight Render.

We used Roll20 online virtual tabletop and Teamspeak to connect with each other since we are now scattered around the country.

Continued from Kesser’s Return, Part 1.

Date: 030-1107 Imperial.

Location: Shionthy System, Regina Subsector.

After the loss of the drone, Space Crab Freddie, we decided to run down through what we had discovered so far before proceeding:

Status of the Kesser’s Crew:

Capt. Hillary Clanson - Confirmed dead

Engineer George Medell - Confirmed dead

Engineer Sandra Lewis - Confirmed dead

Engineer Karl Zabrin - Confirmed dead

Engineer David Pitzen - Confirmed dead

Dr. Stuart Foster – Apparently alive in starboard drive control, twitched when camera moved, teardrop-shaped lines on his body.

Dr. Henry Morricone – Apparently alive in starboard drive control, twitched when camera moved, teardrop-shaped lines on his body.

Dr. Alisha Russell – Apparently alive walking a corridor in a vacc suit.

Julian (AI) - Unresponsive, signaling “help me”.

First Officer Andrew Takei - Missing.

Navigation Officer Rodney Pike - Missing.

Medical Officer Yu Chen - Missing.

Computer Systems Officer Sanja Balikrishnan - Missing.

Chief Engineer Dmitri Tarski - Missing.

Dr. Markelson - Missing.

Anomalies Found:

Bluish mist on bridge.

Odd energy readings.

030-1107 0000
Captain Weaver on the Armstrong says we should regroup at the ships and think about what we have seen. Recovering the drone will be a priority for the Armstrong, to see why it went dead (hoping nothing comes back with it).

Before disconnecting from the Kesser, Kipenzi had tried to communicate with the Kesser’s AI, but to no avail.

Kipenzi convinced the Armstrong crew not to send another drone to the bridge area to retrieve Freddie or at least for an hour or so as it slowly drifts away from the ship. They will be treating Freddie as being dangerous.

Fig, at the with the gunnery console up on the Skylark’s bridge is ready to shoot if needed. Never hurts to be prepared.

Before returning to the Skylark, the away team wanted to move to the center hatch along the corridor to the bridge section, and try to establish communication with Dr. Russell.

Armstrong sent Space Crab Kennie to the rear computer jack so that everyone on the Skylark and Armstrong can see out of the Kesser’s on board cameras. They will also have an interface so that Dr. Onassis can work with the AI.

Kipenzi decided to go in the hatch inner door and look down the corridor, in hope of getting more information.

Leon and Medicus followed Kipenzi from the rear hatch at the back of the ship over to the middle hatch/airlock module in the middle of the boom between the bridge and engineering sections.

Leon: “got a taser and a fire extinguisher with me this time.”

Medicus: “Okay, I got my kit and a pistol.”

The outer airlock was damaged, but the inner door was intact. The other side of the door led to a small room with hatches on the other three walls. The hatch in the opposite wall is also an outside airlock. The hatch to the left opened onto the corridor where Dr Russell was walking back and forth. The hatch to the right opened onto the corridor leading straight to the bridge.

The outer airlock is open and damaged. The hatch looks scraped and bent, Kipenzi connecting to the panel, is feeling uneasy.

As Leon boarded the ship, he suddenly has a vision of writhing tentacles and sound of wrenching metal as the hatch was ripped open by a tentacled monstrosity. Then the effect passed and he saw the normal ship. Perhaps a memory fragment floating in space...

Leon notifies the others “And I did NOT have any of Medicus' drugs!”

Kipenzi plugs into the intercom for corridor 4 and sees video from Camera 4. The corridor is beat up; lights are smashed, a side commentator on Armstrong says something is wrong with the time stamp on the video, it says three years have passed: the date stamp reads 063-1110. Kipenzi speaks through the intercom but no one answers, and Dr. Russell doesn’t change behavior. Dr. Russell had been walking the corridor, and approached the hatch area, turned around and continued her patrol.

They could hear footsteps over the intercom, indicating that:

1. There is atmosphere in the corridor.
2. It is not a holographic image of the doctor.

Dr. Li speculated that Russell is in some sort of walking catatonia, and wants her recovered as soon as possible.

Armstrong sent a message to Socrates asking the system navy to stop the Whale before it can dock. Whatever they found here, we don’t want it spreading to Socrates Station, home of over two million people and capital of the Shionthy System.

Kipenzi wants Leon and Medicus to hook up to a belaying line, Kipenzi is going into the hatch and wants to be able to be pulled out fast by hand if something goes wrong.

Looking through the hatch window into the right-side corridor, it’s empty towards the front of the ship. Looking at Dr. Russell through the other hatch window, she sees that her helmet doesn’t match, as if she was in the suit but grabbed a random helmet in an emergency. She is moving stiffly but consistently. Helmet’s tinted. Cannot see through the face mask tinting. Speaking through intercom still produced no results.

Kipenzi scans Dr. Russell, Fuzzy x-rays... looks human... not good readings, showing life signs... but kind of anomalous, see bone pieces missing; can’t see through the helmet, opaque – hazy- out of focus.

Medicus: “Yikes, Huh....could this be a new kind of disease or virus? Hopefully I can get samples. The inside of the ship somewhere there is biological material”.

The airlock registers as sterile.

Kipenzi: “I want to go to right and see into the bridge without Russell coming up from behind”.

Kipenzi tried to lock the hatch to Russell’s corridor so it could not open out, and was able to jam the one leading to Russell. She went up the other corridor to the bridge to see, and found yet another hatch, plus an intercom.

Kipenzi tries to open hatch toward bridge.

Looks onto bridge, sees scrapes and gouges; sees Freddy floating away in the Armstrong’s spotlight through the bridge windows. There are smashed control panels, chairs gouged, the upholstery is damaged randomly like an animal attack.

Blue mist roughly human shaped sitting in Captain’s chair; no blood or body parts.

Bridge panels are damaged at least some, probably could be repaired but at this time the ship would have to be run from engineering if someone wanted to fly it.

She jammed the hatch from the bridge closed also, and the mist started moving toward her. She backed off, and though the mist approached the door it did not come through.

Response to sound of clanking? Proximity alert to moving biomass?

Kipenzi walked back to the main airlock.

Kipenzi: “Discussion: do we want to try to rescue Russell and bring her to the med facility on SkyLark 2?”

Medicus: “Well, if she hasn't displayed any aggression that may be a good idea.”

“What does everyone else think?”

Drs. Rosenberg and Li want the crew to bring Dr. Russell back.

Medicus: “Okay.”

Leon: “I'm willing to try to rescue her.”

Medicus: “Do we have cordage just in case she gets unruly? I know I have restraints in the med bay. But do we have something here? How about the rope or whatever we tied to Kip?”

Medicus: “Will that work? Good. Get the lines ready to receive someone and we can get her.”

Kipenzi pointed out that we can't see through helmet if she’s infected by something and asked the doctors what to do in that case.

Medicus: “Yes, but can't she see out. Which would mean we could see in?”

Kipenzi: “The lighting is wrong, just see glare and reflections off the face plate.”

Medicus: “I got a flashlight.”

“The helmet has glare protection and the lights are creating too much glare to see in.”

Medicus: “Oh, okay. hmmm... Do we still want to do it? I could put her into the autodoc and see if it could scan her before we open up her suit.”

Medicus: “Can we introduce a sedative in her air supply?”

Kipenzi: “We do have tranq guns, but will puncture suit in vacuum, not a good idea.”

Kipenzi looks at the condition of Dr. Russel’s spacesuit. She finds no visible holes... but it looks badly worn... and tampering with the air supply will require us to tackle her.

Medicus: “Wasn't that what we kinda had to do anyways?”

They figure they will need to pin her down rather than just grab her.

We have enough people.

Kipenzi: “We can also bring others over here to help from Skylark.”

Medicus: “Good idea.”

Kipenzi: “Armstrong – have the Pinnace dock at the main port hatch with Marines, we’re going to pressurize the area where I'm standing.”

Medicus: “Oh, okay what happened with the idea with Russell ?”

Kipenzi: “Marines will help contain her.”

Armstrong sends their Pinnace to dock at hatch with Marines, so we can pressurize the corridor and get Russell out without vacuum. The Pinnace docks with Lt. Richard Obama piloting, and Marines Sgt. Russ Waters and Lt. Carla Brown on board.

030-1107 0115

The Marines board the Kesser and Kipenzi briefed them on the plan – Kipenzi and Medicus will get Russell and hope she stays calm. All the rescuers are to run away if Kipenzi is running.

One of Marines, Sgt Waters, says “holy shit - what was that?” He got the same hallucination from the ship as Leon did as he stepped onto the Kesser.

Kipenzi: “Medicus and Leon, do you want to help us and possibly die horribly?”

Medicus: “Yay!!!”

Leon: “That's what marines are for.”

Kipenzi to marines: “Medicus & I will open the hatch, you stay here, we’ll check her out. If she comes quietly, great. If we run toward you and shut the hatch, something’s wrong.”

Medicus: “I will scan her.“

Kipenzi: “OK, opening hatch now.”

Kipenzi draws her gauss pistol.

Medicus: ”Be careful with that, don't shoot me.”

Kipenzi: “we have gravity here in the corridor.”

Medicus’s scans show total organ failure... Russell should not be walking in that condition at all.

Medicus say, “She’s a Zombie!!” and lets everyone know the results of the scan.

Kipenzi tried to look inside her faceplate and didn’t see anything, just glare from the lights.

Leon: “Capture and return - nothing fancy.”

Dr. Russel’s body language was just ignoring them she was still trying to walk.

Kipenzi: “let’s try to grab her arms from behind and walk her to the pinnace.”

Russell follows Medicus & Kip’s lead and walks to the gig. She thrashes a bit when they get to the zero-g area of the ship.

Medicus asks one of the marines to help and we get her in.

Kipenzi: “I'm jamming the hatch from here.”

Medicus : “OK, good.”

Leon: “doooon't leave meeee.”

Kipenzi: “This means you toooooo.”

Medicus: LOL.

Captain Weaver to Major Whitmor: “Civilians.”

Medicus: “I think it would be safer if we could jettison her if something happens. We wouldn't be killing someone because she is basically already dead.”

The Armstrong might send another probe over and see if the one blue mist Kipenzi can see moves toward it. There were some blind spots in bridge area, so might possibly be another. We ask Armstrong to get pictures through the bridge window, so no blind spots.

Lt. Roam sent Space Crab Lucy to check on Freddy.

The pinnace with Russell arrives on the Skylark and docks at port cargo bay door. Medicus gets Russell into the airlock and the medical side of the living quarters they set up for survivors of the Kesser.

030-1107 0200

Marines Waters and Brown are on duty at each end of airlock.

Medicus, Drs. Rosenberg and Li start exam, scans show no brain activity, only neural and muscle activity.

They can’t see in the helmet – it’s dark and dirty.

Medicus says, “Perhaps a type of parasite.”

The outside of the suit is unusually sterile despite being grimy and worn.

Kipenzi: “Can you put a vacc suit in an autodoc?”

“No.”

Medicus: “Okay, taking a deep breath should we crack her open?”

Kipenzi: “Like a crab, stay in your vacc suits.”

Medicus: “Yes, definitely.”

Opening the suit.

Dr. Rosenburg says, “Opening the helmet... she has no head.”

Opening the rest of the suit... body looks intact. Just missing her head. She should not be alive at all.

Medicus takes a sample of flesh and take it to a scope. “Cells seem to be getting energy from an unknown source.”

Leon: “Is there any energy reading of any kind multi spectral etc. from the head region?”

“Nothing shows up in the head... same weird energy readings that the Armstrong detected on the Kesser's hull. Declining slowly. Half-life of a few days.”

Medicus: “Does anyone who was in the ship exhibiting the same energy signal?”

“No, just her.”

Medicus: “Okay, then I am guessing there is no contamination problem.”

Medicus: “I want to do a complete lab workup on the tissue and fluids. Anyone else have any ideas?”

Dr. Rosenburg: “This makes no sense... she should be dead.”

Medicus: “Perhaps our definition needs to change. I still think she is just... that the cells seem to be reacting to a stimulus (mysterious energy) and are behaving in an unusual way.”

Dr. Li: “Whatever is powering her seems to be slowly running down.”

Medicus: “It has been shown that if you put soy sauce on a dead cuttlefish the muscles will react. The same thing could be happening here.”

“It's pretty eerie.”

Dr Rosenburg: “But why walking back and forth? this makes no sense at all.”

Medicus: “Perhaps the energy mimics the way the body had functioned in life. Perhaps more than we care to admit. This energy is unknown to us.”

Kipenzi: “What a more important question might be - where's her head?”

Leon: “The space tentacles...”

Medicus: “Yeah, and how did her helmet get put back on without it?”

Leon: “Zhodani space tentacles.”

Dr. Rosenburg: "So what happened to her head and who put on her helmet? The answers are somewhere on that ship."

Medicus: “Yes, Looks like we need to go back in. Or at least someone does. I'm running tests.”

Leon: “In about 30 days the energy will have dissipated then we can go back.”

Kipenzi: “I'm not bringing the blue mist in.”

Medicus: “Oh, hell no! It can stay out there!”

Kipenzi: “The two other people who look like they are sitting and twitching are probably dead too.”

Medicus: “I agree.”

Kipenzi: “Again, the Whale may have taken off with any really alive survivors. we need to get that ship stopped.”

Medicus: “Hey since they are dead have one of the marines shoot one to see what happens. Just a thought.”

Kipenzi: “OK, suggesting we can try to go to the engine room and shut down the ship.”

Medicus: “Good idea Kip.”

Captain Weaver: “Some of those people are our friends. No talk of shooting them just to see what happens."

Medicus: “They are dead. It would be an interesting experiment to see if the bodies react in the same manor. Do they react to new damage?”

Kipenzi under her breath, “That is probably why Medicus kept blowing the Stewardship exam.”

0230
Medicus: “So what's the plan?”

Kipenzi: “Possible: 1) check out ship areas without cameras, 2) rescue two crew, 3 engine room shut down.”

Medicus says, “I think shut down first then people.”

Leon: “Number one: shut down engine, yep.”

Dr. Sikorski: “From what we have seen, Beta space may not be compatible with human life.”

Leon: “...or you just need the right shielding, like a psi shield and psionic defenders against tentacles.”

Kipenzi: “Leon, don't you have a helmet for that?”

Leon: “Yes, and if I go back I'm wearing it.”

Kipenzi: “Good idea. OK, new plan: go back 1) shut down engine room, 2) check out blank areas, 3 bring back crew.”

Kipenzi: “4) and ask for more money.”

Medicus: “Also, look for modifications to the engine.”

Over the radio, Dr. Onassis reports progress in getting Julian back on line.

Kipenzi thumbs up Dr. O.

0300
Dr. Rosenburg declares Dr. Russell legally dead and enters it into the official log. The discussion turns to what to do with her body.”

Leon: “A storage locker?”

Dr. Li “Cargo Lock?”

Kipenzi: “Put the body in the droid bay, in case we need to space it.”

Medicus agrees.

Kipenzi: “The teardrop shaped lines on other crew are not on Russel’s body.”

Medicus: “Lines?”

Kipenzi: “Dr. Foster and Dr. Morricone in drive control have lines on them.”

The Away team heads back, after putting Dr. Russell into the droid bay for safe keeping.

Leon is wore his anti-psy helmet to hopefully prevent further hallucinations.

Entering the corridor, they headed aft. Some areas of the Kesser are in zero-G, the gravity having failed or been turned off.

Dr Onassis still working on Julian reports that he should be able to recover the AI.

Dr. Skorski says that she wants to come over once the Away Team has cleared the area.

0315
Approaching the area 4 corridor, Armstrong says area is in zero-G. Scans indicate that the area is pressurized and air breathable.

Kipenzi jams the door leading to the two known crew members we saw twitching, and Leon jams door to the other side areas, so no one can get behind us as we make our way to the engine room to regain control.

Armstrong says something coming over comm system not Julian

Text from some source, typing without spaces or punctuation: “This is Dr. Markelson I am still alive but changed, I can only type slowly am in starboard drive control changed be prepared for my appearance still human on inside thank you for rescue”

WOWZA!

Looks like it came through when people were trying to get Julian (the AI) back online.

Markelson: “not human form typing slowly with one tentacle have several mouths but no vocal chords”

Medicus: What happened?

Kipenzi: “Keep him talking we're going into the engine room.”

Medicus: “K.”

Markelson: “changed by one of the beings who invaded the ship”

Medicus asks, ”Can you describe them?”

Markelson: “ship invaded by unknown creatures as soon as it entered Beta space”

Markelson: “Still on ship be careful”

Nothing about this sounds promising...

Continuing on to engine room, hoping Medicus will be able to keep 'the doctor' talking, and not get invaded by some other blue misty thing until the engines are shut down fully.

Kipenzi: “Both of you need to get your weapons out now.”

Medicus: “OK”.

Leon: “Sorry, I forgot the flamethrower.”

Medicus: “Locked and loaded.”

Kipenzi opens the hatch and could see three 'people' inside the first room they came to. Sanja Balikrishnan, Andrew Takei, Dmitri Tarksi and Rodney Pike. They have claws, shapened teeth and short tentacles growing out of their body at random locations. They are wearing ragged remains of spacesuits.

“Oh MY !”

The common area was pretty well trashed, but with what looked like four zombies walking around what do you expect? One door on opposite side is open, main corridor door is closed. Most of the overhead lights are smashed.

Dmitri Tarksi

They move forward not looking friendly at all. 

Both marines shoot at Dmitri, both miss.

Rodney Pike moves to attack.

Takei moves to Lt. Brown to attack.

Sanja attacked Brown.

Medicus shoots and misses.
 
Dmitri attacks Waters.

Leon shoots at Takei with his laser rifle and hits, Takei falls to floor on fire.

Lt. Brown shoots at Sanja, but her gun malfunctions.

Sgt. Waters shoots and hits Dmitri.

Medicus shoots at Tarksi but misses and hit Sgt. Water in the back – ouch, at least he was wearing an armored vacc suit. Unfortunately his suit is breached and he may be exposed to the Kesser’s air and anything in it.

Sgt. Waters being in some pain, shoots at Dmitri and misses.

Lt. Brown shoots Dmitri.

Pike attacks Waters, bites and scratches his suit with claws but doesn’t get through his armor.

Sanja turns and goes after Medicus.

Kipenzi yells: “pull back through hatch, corridor is in zero G, we can shoot them from here”

Withdrawing to a zero G part of the corridor, the fight continued.

The battle continues for several minutes, Leon did the big fire damaging shots, while the marines were largely ineffective for most of the fight, although Sgt. Waters did take down Pike.

After the battle Medicus tended to Sgt. Waters and had him patched up in about 10 minutes.

Dr. Markelson texts: “what’s happening? They can’t be hurt by gunfire. Our people shot them when they came on board the ship and that did not stop them.”

Kipenzi tells Armstrong “really STOP THAT SHIP” and Markelson says we haven’t found what’s on board yet.

Armstrong is sending video to Socrates, at least this video should help convince the system navy to stop the Whale from docking at Socrates.

The zombies look like humans that have been taken apart and put back together a few times.

Shortly after combat Medicus and Lt. Brown share a vision: Large amorphous tentacled creatures tear crew members apart, killing them and put them back together and resurrect them. Over and over and over again. Leon, who got a vision earlier, is wearing his psy helmet this time and gets nothing.

Medicus : “There went my lunch.”

Through the Armstrong, we asked Markelson to describe the 'things' that came onboard. Markelson describes them exactly like what people saw in the visions, says most of them left the ship just before Julian was able to get the ship back into normal space. It seems like years.

He doesn’t know for sure if any more are actually still on board, and presumably still are.

We take pictures.

Leon: “Yuck, Doc you got to see this.”

Medicus : “OK, what?”

Leon: “Come up and see these corpses.”

Medicus looks at them and takes samples. They look like they have been taken apart and put back together again multiple times by someone not too familiar with human anatomy.

“but make damn sure your samples are sealed.”

Medicus : “What could have done this?”

Kipenzi: “Ask your friend Markelson.”

Dr. Skorski, watching the video feed, says, “Something native to Beta Space.”

Medicus: “Perhaps the mist.”

Kipenzi: “I am afraid that the being calling itself Markelson is the real monster who did all this and expects us to ‘rescue’ it.”

Kipenzi: “Ask Markelson to describe the thing.”

Medicus: “It must be a new species we have not encountered before.”

Markelson describes creatures exactly like in the vision, says most of them left the ship just before Julian was able to get the ship back to normal space. It seems like years.

There’s still one on ship as far as he knows, he’s surprised it hasn’t found you yet.

Kipenzi: “Ask where on the ship it is...”

Medicus: “Oh, crap... Yeah ask ‘where is it now.?’”

He types back that he doesn’t know.

Kipenzi says that it may be on the Whale or we may be talking to it pretending to be Markelson.

Kipenzi: “We need to get to the engine room NOW.”

Medicus: “Okay let's go.”

At this point only two of the Kesser’s crew are unaccounted for: Med Officer Yu Chen and Dr Markelson.

Continued in Kesser’s Return, Part 3

See Also: Dramatis Personæ, Skylark 2, Campaign Starts, The 2nd Adventure, The Chamax Plague, Horde, Shadows, Research Station Gamma, Twilight's Peak, Prison Planet, Leedor on Aramis, First Call at Zilla, Trade War, The Bloodwell, ANNIC NOVA and The Kinunir.