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The Chronicles of Faust
By: Nez

Part 6

(Click here to skip to the chapter beginning)

Author’s note:  Looking at the parallels between our campaign and the DBZ series, this ‘saga’ is probably the closest to the Freeza saga out of all of ours.  Events in life, for Faust, go from being annoying to downright infuriating.  For a time matters go downhill, and this is the beginning of it.  In case you won’t be able to tell by my increasingly sardonic annotations, the last page or so of this week’s section is, what we call in the role-playing universe, RAILROADING.  Enjoy the show.

Lexicon:

Super Namek – A Namekian that has fused with another Namekian, AKA Piccolo/Nail/Kami.

Gold Hairs – AKA Super Saiyans.

New Plant – The home world of the Tsufarajins/Tuffles (AKA the people the Saiyans booted off of their own home planet).

Black Star Dragonballs – The ONLY reference we’ll ever make to Dragonball GT.  Basically they’re the ultimate Dragonballs, however, once they’re used, they scatter all over the universe and they have to be taken to a certain planet within a year or all of reality goes poof or some other such bullshit.

Sphere of Jabar:  A magical Sphere created by some powerful mage long ago (yada yada yada, you’ve heard this story before) and it can grant its wielder massive powers.  Stay tuned for future details.

The Trials Saga

 Life continued blissfully for a several months and then conflict found our heroes once again.  A Shadyk hound mage issued a challenge to Jerani, that she answer for all of the Shadyk hounds she's slaughtered, in three months time.  Another challenge was issued to Laucon by the "Super-Namek" that they would fight, also, in three months time.

* (The Super-Namek was the Namekian that showed up earlier when the EGPF was invading Huba.  I'm unsure of what made him "super" but he is probably a fused Namekian similar to Piccolo, only insane)

 In the three months, Ziganto and Faust were informed that Joe was irrecoverably certifiably insane, and getting worse by the day.  Ziganto told Faust that he and Joe had made a promise to each other long ago that if a situation like this arose for one (I.E. insanity, mortal wound, etc…) that the other would end it.  Faust nodded his approval and sent Ziganto off.  Shayla was now no better than a criminal and a murderer by his judgment.

 Zazzi informed the group that in order to beat the Super-Namek, they would need a few more "Gold Hairs" to fight him, so the group began training.  Unfortunately no new "Gold Hairs" came up during the training.  The three months went smoothly and the day of reckoning came.  During the three months, Faust managed to procure two galaxy class Tsufarajin cruisers as the core of a future planetary fleet.  Their ETA was set as two days after the "Day of Reckoning."

* (No new Super Saiyans came up probably because we skipped that three months and didn't actually play them out, as is said in the show "the power comes in response to a need" and there apparently wasn't a great need for it in that three months.)

 Jerani, along with Shakar, was shuttled to a remote planet on the edge of the system to fight with the Shadyk hounds and Laucon went with Zaru to the former site of Shiznit's city to face the Super Namek.  The latter fight was easier to keep tabs on, on account that it was right below the station.

 Having learned their lesson, the station technicians turned off the power sensors and used passive scanning only.  During the course of the fight, they detected several massive power levels (no estimates available).  Seismic activity began to increase dramatically on the planet and escape pods were being shot off like mad.  Seconds later the planet exploded, sending the station spinning through space.  The station survived only because of the last moment deflector realignment by Faust so the shields were facing almost entirely toward the planet.

 After the station finished spinning end over end, it began to take on survivors.  About 5 thousand Hubians were taken onboard, including Laucon, Jerani and a critically injured Shakar.  Shakar was seen to by one of the medics after a hasty stabilization.  Most notably, Zaru was not among the survivors, he had died fighting the Super-Namek. 

* (Shakar frequently gets beat up and barely escapes it.  This was the GMs attempt to have the Jerani character get her stuff together since the character wasn't really going anywhere at that point, according to the GM)

 Upon holding a short conference, Faust set the station's course to the current location of New Plant and informed them that they would have new orbital guardians in a bit over a year.  The station was taken in tow by the two cruisers and the ETA was cut down to 9 months.

 Faust managed to stay awake for the next 33 hours straight, directing matters and organizing the refugees from Huba.  He finally passed out in his command chair (after a grand total of 49 hours) while reading an update on the food stores sent to him by Chef Gumbo.  Carolyn carried Faust back to their quarters, stripped him down for bed and crawled in right after, snuggling up to him.  Before falling asleep she put Faust's hand on her abdomen and laced her hand over his.

 Faust awoke several hours later to a slight pounding sensation against the palm of his hand.  After taking in his current predicament he realized that one of the children must have kicked.  Carolyn stirred slightly at this and burrowed in closer to Faust.  Faust got one of those "warm, fuzzy" feelings inside and bunkered down in bed to enjoy the next quiet few hours with his wife.

*(If anything, it was this moment that totally justified, in Faust’s mind, a doctrine of peace and defense)

 Once the station was a few days into it's relocation, a certain villain named Tuscany made himself known to Faust.  He informed Faust that he had several agents on board his station and that they would be used against it if Faust didn't accede to his demands.  Faust blew off Tuscany as yet another terrorist and ordered an invasive sensor scan, just in case.  One person was turned up, and it appeared that the person had no knowledge of his condition (due to the inactive status of the implant).

 Faust also became aware that Sprout was acting somewhat differently.  In the beginning, Faust attributed it to stress (his home had just been destroyed, after all).  As was usual, (and good) Jerani was keeping to herself and Laucon was spending his time with Beauty and with the training simulator as far as Faust could tell.

 Faust was woken up early one morning by a call from Sprout complaining of technical difficulties.  Faust went down to Sprout's quarters to investigate and found that everything was operating as smoothly as the day it was installed.  Sprout seemed to calm down (slightly) at that point and demanded (impolitely) that he be fed.  Faust led him down to the cafeteria and collected Laucon on the way down to eat.

* (I'd later find out that Tuscany was using some sort of magic to mess with Sprout/2.)

 Sprout was acting disturbingly like #2, his evil personality and with his ill manners, so after the meal, Faust conned Sprout into going too sickbay for an immunization.  When they got to sickbay, Faust quickly locked Sprout onto the Brolly-table and set one of the technicians onto figuring out what the problem was.

 Faust later found out that Sprout somehow managed to free himself of the Brolly-table and disable (splatter) the accompanying technician.  Faust was tipped off that something went wrong when the bridge received a warning that a hatch had been opened.  Faust went to investigate.  On the way, he collected Laucon once again.  The Kison master joined them whilst they were on their way.

* (Theoretically there should have been no way that Sprout/2 would have been able to get off of that table, but the GM ruled that Tuscany used magic to set him loose *cough* bullshit *cough* Tuscany was light years away)

 The trio arrived in the cargo bay just in time to see Sprout (identifiable by the short stature of the figure in the space-suit) re-enter from the airlock.  He was carrying two orbs, which he quickly tucked into his belt.  Upon seeing the three, he immediately began to power up and assume an offensive stance.  Faust and Laucon immobilized him within seconds, initially for transport back to the Brolly-Table, but as it turns out, Faust was powering up for a death ball of disintegrating proportions when the Kison master told them to release Sprout.  Sprout was in the throes of turning into a Super Saiyan.

* (At this point, Faust is the only PC to have not gone Super Saiyan, which is bothering him, but he’s perfectly happy as is)

 After going Super Saiyan, Sprout/2 and the Kison master faced off.  The fight was rather one sided, as Sprout/2 wasted his power by fighting in pure, blind rage.  The Kison master ended the fight by coolly cutting Sprout/2 into four pieces and sending both of the personalities on to the next dimension.  The Kison master took both balls (one was a black star Dragonball and the other was the Sphere of Jabar) for safekeeping.

 Matters settled down for the next few weeks, and the station slid into the orbit of a temperate planet to give the crew and civilians a bit of shore leave, since the holo-simulators couldn't simulate reality completely accurately.  The usual sensor scan turned up a pre-industrial society and one half-Saiyan life form.  Faust sent Ziganto down to investigate this life form, suspecting it to be a third class Saiyan that had been sent out to "tame" the planet while sending civilians and crew members down to uninhabited areas of the planet for R&R. 

* (This new character was brought in as a cameo for one of my friends who happened to be visiting that weekend.  The character becomes a running gag through the campaign afterwards…)

 Ziganto returned the next morning with a tall, hulking, barbaric Saiyan-looking being.  The creature, later found out to be named "Quetzecoatl," considered everyone on the station to be "Great Spirits" of some sort.  Faust showed him around a bit, not knowing what else to do with him, and then took him to sickbay to get a genetic analysis done to determine his complete genealogy.

 The results were rather startling:  half-Saiyan and half-Shadyk hound.  Quetzecoatl didn't seem to care about this statement, so the conclusion was drawn that his parents, or some other agents, had abandoned him on the planet as a child since there was no evidence of a space pod or any other advanced technology, it was assumed that the Shadyk hounds had marooned him there.  Laucon became known as "Raccoon" or the "Golden Spirit" and Jerani came to be known as the "Great Spirit of Humor."

 After clearing up the mess and restoring order to the general situation, Faust retired to his quarters and to Carolyn, who was about 9 months pregnant and expecting at this point, for the night.  Midway through the morning Faust awoke to his door buzzer being rung by a messenger with a package.  Half asleep, Faust stumbled to the door to see what the guy wanted.  The messenger gave Faust the package and a clipboard to sign.  While Faust was looking over the info on the clipboard, he noticed that the sender of the package was one of Carolyn's friends, one of her friends who had died when Planet Vegeta was destroyed and wasn't wished back.

 It was about then when Faust realized that something foul was afoot.  Just as he looked up to ask the messenger what kind of joke this was, the messenger started to pull a blaster pistol.  Faust didn't even waste half a second in pounding the messenger halfway through the opposite wall and reducing him to something about the consistency of raspberry jam.  However, Faust was unable to avoid the gas that the dropped package began to emit.  As Faust collapsed into unconsciousness, he saw four Tsufarajins step into his quarters wearing gas masks.

*(Like hell you can ‘gas’ a Saiyan.  *Cough* bullshit *cough*)   

 Minutes later he was awoken by Quetzecoatl.  After a brief check to see what had happened, Faust furiously noted that Carolyn had been kidnapped.  Faust radioed the bridge, telling them to shut down all shuttle bays and seal the bay doors.  Too late, a ship had managed to escape and hit light speed before it could be immobilized with a tractor beam.  Faust began cursing the crew and wondering what he paid them for…

* (More GM fudging, like heck the kidnappers were able to waltz down to the shuttle bay wearing gas masks and lugging along an unconscious Saiyan without arousing suspicion)

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