CD Issue 15: Prairie Spider Burrito

General Summary

When we left the Cognitive Dissidents, the salvaged Covenant spaceship Artemis was hurling to the ground into the Prosperity DMZ. The violent frefall caused a weightlessness as they faced almost certain doom, luckily Siren was a quick thinker and used her magic to protect the passengers before their impact. The ship, robust like most Covenant things, smashed through ruined buildings and skidded to a halt on the fractured concrete roads of the remains of Prosperity City.
Everyone's least favorite tech bro, Sid was the only casuality, having knocked his head during the initial fall. While Clockwork tried to diagnose what went wrong, the Dissidents decided to head out and scout their situation.
Clockwork determined that the ship had not been shot down, but rather shut down from the inside. Malware's mysterious friend apologized again for what they did, and revealed that some sort of hostile energy fields blanketed the skies. These fields appeared powerful enough to have destroyed the Artemis, and the enigmatic communicator believed they had saved them. Malware wasn't really interested in talking and kept trying to swipe left on that noise.
Sid's assistant, Barbara, explained that the original mission was still achievable. The team had less than a day to reach a town called Wedge on the south border line of the Rustbucket. There they would meet the mysterious resistant contact known as 'Dragonfly' who could lead them to the crashed Covenant satellite that Sid and Clockwork wanted so desperately. The best way to get to Wedge was the take the border line from the Westgate Transfer Station
The Dissadents decided to head out on foot. The city, long abandoned, presented nothing but burnt buildings and empty streets. Richie summoned Pegasus, via his favored method of shooting flares off. Aliena transformed into an exotic Deyan creature known as a Garfole. Malware fired up their exosuit, and Siren hopped on Pegasus with Riche.
The Garfole tore off, yelling 'Keep up Richie' as it went.
But half way there, they got a call from Clockworld. A Dirth Storm was on it's way, able to tear apart matter and pervert living things. Realizing they wouldn't make it to the Station in time, they decided to take a leap of faith and let Siren make a blind jump to a place she'd never seen before.
It mostly worked, but landed them right in front of two technicans closing up the base in the face of the storm. They managed to sound an alarm, and Malware's drones tazed the pair. They got off a shot, which Paladin blocked with his armor. Malware was not pleased being showed up like this.
The base intercom announced that all personel were to retreat below level 7 to shelter from the storm. Malware pulled up the base schematic and found there was a cilivian sector near the train platforms.
The team decided to head that way rather than face the military. Styx swallowed their pride, flipping their jacket inside out, and taking the deadnamed identity of spoiled rich kid Sam Strand. Siren cast an illusion transforming the rest of the team into Sam's entourage. Pegasus was disguised as a hover cart, loaded with the groups illusionary luggage. They put the unconcisous technicians on Pegasus's back and headed towards the elevators.
But the alarm had sounded and a team of armed soldiers awaited as they hit floor 15. Styx flouted their wealth and priviledge, bribing and conning the guards into letting them through. Before long they were at the Mall.
The Mall was formerly the largest underground space in the world, now buried under buildings and rubble. The Station had transformed into the civilian sector of the base: full of shopping, hotels, and food carts.
On the elevator down, a young boy harassed the crew. Apparently their cart smelled like an animal. Paladin harassed the kid a bit, and Malware decided to use their nanites to make the kid very very sleepy.
As he wandered off to find his bed (it was around 11am), Malware's ghost asked 'Is this what we do?' Malware stepped away from the team to have a brief discussion with her personal invader. Siren hung out to keep an eye on them while they messed with thier interface.
Paladin and Aliena went hunting for food. They found it in the form of delicious Prairie Spider burritos. Aliena was not into the alien meat and opted for something more leafy, chewing a bouqet of roses (and then spitting them out, as one does.) Paladin pointed out those were not for eating, and then Aliena noticed the Nummy Boars cart. She purchased a large stuffed animal full of the treats.
Up above, as Malware tried to purge the living glitch in their armor, Siren had a visitor. Sleazeball, her old Trust handler, noticed her and made a very creepy approach. He told her that everyone who had died during her loss of control came back from the dead, empowered.
Siren did not like this opened a portal, shoving Sleazeball through. She also lost control of her power, opening portals everywhere. Chaos ensued. People were flying through portals, falling from the ceiling, objects were flying at high speed. Paladin jumped on Pegasus, swooped Aliena onto the back, and flew up to assist. Aliena lost their burrito, sadly. Malware finally noticed something was going on and applied their nanites to calm Siren down.In the chaos, Sleazeball escaped.
And then they were surrounded my guards, led by Capt Carl Winston (last seen CD #9)

Rewards Granted

Siren shifted her labels, giving +1 to Freak and Superior

Notes

Someone said 'Daddy Issues Dissidents' which was hilarious enough for me to write it down.

Campaign

Masks: The Revolutionary Cognitive Dissidents

Protagonists

Siren

Malware

Paladin

Aliena

Report Date

01 Aug 2020

Primary Location

Prosperity DMZ

Secondary Location

Westgate Transfer Station