LogYuriRT1-2011/04/28-Jason-1

Game log for the 2011/04/28 session of Rogue Trader: After the Gold Rush, as taken by Jason

Marneus asks Brother-Captain Bartel for more time to ponder the question of how the Imperial Fists can help him. Bartel happily obliges and asks for any information we can provide about the planet below. Bartel indicates that the Fists will be in-system and would no objection to killing some greenskins, should such appear.

Outside the meeting room, Roe Van der Weyden spots a dreadnought clanking around, complaining to itself. He decides to follow it and thus ends up in the hangar bay, watching Brother Lysander board the Space Marine Thunderhawk.

Marneus decides that he wants a much more intensive survey of Haldr, and possibly also of the fifth planet in the system. In fact, he decides that a full survey of all planets in the system makes sense. Our appetite for resources will be vast enough to justify a thorough search.

Teodor Ziel tells Marneus that he sent for STV Wandering Minstrel to help with repairs and logistics in the system. Marneus also borrows Ziel's Navigator, who is about seven and a half feet tall, incredibly thin, and generally weird looking. She also moves oddly. Now that we have the essentials for safe Warp flight, Marneus orders the crew back to the ship and prepares to get underway.

He orders Ziel to see to the survey work, using the station as a base, while we go to SR-651. Thanks to our less than brilliant interim Navigator, Warp Storms blow us way off course, and it takes us 24 days to make the not-actually-all-that-long passage to SR-651. Marneus tells the Navigator to start making charts, so that we'll have less difficulty along this route. During the voyage, Inquisitor Drax asks a good many members of the crew whether they've had any experience with missing time. Luckily Anastasia Xanatov has lots of experience recovering from lousy Warp exits and gets Solo Drakban onto a safe heading before we hit anything.

We dock and Marneus puts a retinue together to go aboard. He starts with Roe, whom he briefs on our experiences to date in SR-651. Most of the other senior officers horn in on this action, since a) Marneus needs help staying out of trouble, and b) we all like to get off ship periodically, even if it's just to smell the product of a different atmosphere processor.

We first stop at the docking office to get our papers in order, and ask them if they can recommend merchants who deal in the things we need. Turns out the station just got a couple prizes brought in for salvage, and the dockmaster gives us the broker's address. As we're walking out, a stranger walks in, and Roe notices that the stranger seems to be giving him a little extra attention. After a moments' thought, Roe realizes the stranger was a Voidmaster he knew once. The new NPC slips him a card with a number on it. Roe ducks off and dials in, and after exchanging sinister underworld recognition signals, asks his contacts if they can procure munitions. Turns out they can, and Roe informs Marneus that he can get the hookup.

Marneus decides to go the above-board route first and talks to the aforementioned salvage broker. Turns out the "prizes" look more like hulks, but we're not buying hulls, so we don't care. Sadly the ships did not mount macromissile batteries, so the broker can't help us. Marneus asks if they might have any other interesting hardware available, but it's no dice.

Marneus, Roe, and Livienne Corvus then go to meet with Roe's shady friends, who seem to have lots of munitions to sell, so long as you can overlook the Aquila on the packaging. After a bit of dickering, we give them a lot of cash in exchange for a lot of missiles, which they shall undertake to deliver to Drakban.

Drax takes a quick look around the breaker yard for ships in the range of eight to nine millenia old. He spots something that might have been a Hellion-class planetary assault ship back in the day, but it's hard to be sure. He decides to procure the use of a shuttle and check more closely.

The salvager whose hulks failed to interest us calls and invites Marneus onto the bridge of one of the demi-hulks. Turns out the ship had a warp sextant, and he's taking offers. That works out nicely, since Marneus feels like making offers... and unlike the salvage broker, Marneus has an idea what a warp sextant goes for. He gets it for a very nice price, and now Opiter Castus has something to do this session. He manages to get it moved to Solo without difficulty. Marneus then orders 12 hours shore leave.

Anastasia goes out drinking with Roe, hoping to learn more about the new guy. Roe loves talking about Roe, and now he's met someone who shares this interest. Turns out lots of people want to go out and have a little fun. Roe tries to get Anastasia drunk, but she demonstrates amazing fortitude and self-control. He drinks with both fists and tells stories of honor and violence. Jotham tries to save some souls but hits an overly pious note for the rough and tumble crowd on SR-651. Lucius also manages to find himself some bar fun. A bunch of senior voidmen are winding a rookie up about Orks, and he can't hardly pass up that conversation. Except that in this case one of them was there to witness a deal between an Ork and a well-dressed woman with obvious augmentation. Lucius uses his technically non-heretical brain powers to read the voidman's memories, and confirs that this is the same deal we've been hoping to find proof of. Oh yeah, and he describes one of the other Orks present for the deal... and it's clearly the Mekboy from the station.

Drax finds himself his ancient hull, and finds that it's not a Hellion. It looks like the escort ship based on similar designs. He does psychometry on it, gaining a point of corruption in the process. Oh yeah, and when he activates his powers, his face temporarily appears demonic, which causes his companion/pilot to flee in terror. In the shuttle that brought him here. Drax gets to hang out in his void suit for a while and then calls for help. On the plus side, he finds that this ship saw action with Battlefleet Obscuris, and was once boarded by Iron Warriors. She "remembers" having once encountered the same detachment of Iconoclasts in Segmentum Obscuris and then, long after being sold out of the service, meeting one of those same ships near Iniquity in the Koronus Expanse and being wrecked by her. By that time it was friendly fire. Drax makes mental note of all this and then calls for a ride back to Draban.

On our way back to Vanir, we experience lost time (twice) along with warp storms and a Gellar Field fluctuation that makes the bridge walls bleed for five minutes. Drax finds this fascinating and freaks the navigator out with his intense scrutiny. We're thirty-two days getting back.

Drax grabs Marneus and Jotham and lays out his agenda for us. His order seeks an artifact which they believe still lies in the Expanse, an artifact called Heimdal's Armillary, but which fell into the hands of Chaos and became known as the Chronophage. He hopes that by charting the locations where ships lost time in the warp, he can triangulate the location of the Chronophage and get to it before the Ruinous Powers. If we can help locate it, the Ordo Malleus will think very highly of us.

Lucius reports his encounter back to the Captain. This gives us two data points indicating Marneus' sister's seneschal in this plot. Something Must Be Done.

Anyway, turns out our trip took about four and a half months all told. The Space Marine Strike Cruiser is still in system. Captain Ziel reports that he's spent the time charting the area, and found possible trading partners in the area. The Space Marines spent almost all the time on Haldr, and found signs that an STC had been there. They also confirmed that the Haldr colony predates the Heresy, and the fighting on the planet would have been one of the last major events in the sector before the storms cut it off. Something under 8km of water on Haldr is sending a smuggler's ship beacon out. Upon hearing that the Space Marines have accessed all those logs, Drax immediately asks to review them and seek signs of the Chronophage.

While Drax busies himself with Haldr's database, Marneus gets the rest of the senior staff together and makes sure we're all aware of the various facts recorded in the log. The meeting breaks up when Ziel gets a all informing him that the Space Marines are leaving. Marneus bids them a farewell and promises to keep in touch.

Anastasia uses the local Choir to ask her family what they know about the situation inside the Machariel clan, and suggesting that they side with Marneus in the upcoming struggle.

Surveyors on the planet report finding some shelters where bones seem to have been... arranged. Jotham studied such matters in seminary, and determines that the arrangements do not reflect any common heresy. The Imperial Aquila made out of femurs certainly reflects a rather unorthodox view of the Creed, but as long as it's not a Chaos plot, it's not something to get too worried about.