SESSION 26 - THE BROTHERHOOD VERSUS GISCALA
General Summary
Previous Session: SESSION 25: SURPRISE WITNESS
Next Session: SESSION 27: VOX POPULI
Players: (The Heroes of St. Louis): Lex Garridan, Linda, Mister Man, Mouse, Zero
*May 28th, 2317*
(Adventure Day 34)
The Heroes of St. Louis decided to head back to Joe’s Tavern for dinner. Jefferson had been told of a pit on the edge of town where livestock which was unfit for human consumption was destroyed and left to rot. He made use of the “seasoned” meat while the others enjoyed a meal. The deathclaw reconvened with them for an after-dinner drink, and Mouse joined them.
In a corner, a ghoul named Jerry was shooting his mouth off about the Midwest Brotherhood. Jerry loudly toasted, "A drink! To the Brotherhood! Our good, good friend, who would never stick a knife in our back. No, they order you to put the knife in your own back!"
The bar laughed, as did the party. Zero raised his glass to Jerry, which he noticed. Jerry approached the group. He wanted help with a virtuous mission. The ghoul claimed that there was a warehouse on the side of town. This warehouse was full of new Brotherhood “civilian authority” uniforms. This was evidence that the Midwest Brotherhood was transitioning into an authoritarian state where the generals in Chicago had total control. If they were patriots, they had a duty to burn this warehouse to the ground.
The party were angered, the Brotherhood had gone to far. Jerry led them to the warehouse. It sat on the edge of town, far from the sight of most of the inhabitants. The warehouse bore the emblem of the Midwest on its doors. Jerry insisted that they should throw Molotovs from far away, even if it might injure workers within the warehouse. They were Brotherhood, after all.
The group disagreed, sending Mouse and Lex into the warehouse with stealth. Jerry complained that they were risking too much. If they were caught, they’d probably be executed on sight. They successfully infiltrated the building, and when Mouse opened a container, he was shocked. These weren’t Brotherhood of Steel uniforms of any kind. They were Pip-Boy wrist computers, but not functional units, fake imitations that couldn’t even pass a basic inspection.
They confronted Jerry with one of the items. The ghoul began to blubber an excuse, but Jefferson wasn’t having it. Looking into an angry deathclaws eyes, Jerry admitted that the warehouse was really a Brotherhood evidence holding facility. He had tried to rip-off the Midwest Brotherhood, selling them fake Pip-Boys, and gotten caught. He was due to appear in court tomorrow, in the hall next to their trial. He needed to destroy the evidence, or he might be sent to prison.
Having earned a number of caps salvaging as they crossed Missouri, and decided to splurge. They rented a nice suite at the North Village Inn and shared it. They continued to intimidate Jerry, bringing him back to the suite. They wanted to talk to Knight-Private Orman, the Brotherhood soldier who had started the fight in Emancipation, but he was being held in the jail at Bunker Gamma. They decided it was better if Linda and Jefferson didn’t go into Bunker Gamma, so they stayed behind with Jerry.
Once the others left, Linda was preaching the good word of Atom to Jerry. Jefferson, in a mixture of amusement and perhaps boredom, insisted that Jerry take Linda very seriously. Jerry had been a Gravestone Cathedral ghoul for a while and had specific ideas about supernatural powers and the metaphysical world. Linda claimed that her point would be clearer if he drank some Loose Juice. The Loose Juice chem was the concoction of a cult leader known as The Minister and produced psychedelic hallucinations. Jerry was uninterested but Jefferson didn’t give him a choice.
Lex, Zero, Mouse and Mister Man found Private Orman rude, but truthful. He admitted that he had insulted Alexa Garridan in the street as he and his Brotherhood unit were marching out of Emancipation. They had expected to take over, and were humiliated that the people of the village had voted against martial law. Alexa was looking smug as they were forced to leave, and it had angered him. She insulted him back, and he had lost his temper. He had attacked her, and only after that had a larger fight erupted. Orman said he would still comply with Paladin Hector’s account; he didn’t know what counted as a riot. But he wouldn’t lie on the stand. They tried to convince him of the nobility of their cause, but he didn’t care.
Jerry stared into Linda’s face, deep within the hold of Loose Juice and its waking dreams. She told him of the miracle of Atom’s Glow and the infinite gift of Division. And… Jerry… finally saw it. Atom was the divine parent. The people of all the worlds were his children. He swore his life to Atom and Linda’s teachings. The religion had expelled non-humans, but Linda was going to set them straight, bring them home. And Jerry would be her apostle, spreading the word and spreading the miracle of Loose Juice. When the others returned it amused Mouse to give Jerry the recipe for Loose Juice. In one night, he had become a ghoul with a mission.
Night fell on Gamma Town. The trial of John Giscala was the next, expected to be quick. Mayor Sabeen was holding a surprise session of city council. The Heroes of St. Louis had warned them of a Midwest Brotherhood plot to legally seize power in the city. With the Brotherhood’s legal advisor’s strategy in their hand, council was able to modify their charter to thwart the effort and secure their independence. Meanwhile, Lex Garridan slipped through the city’s shadowy alleys to Lotsa Goddam Guns. There, the proprietors could sell her a .44 magnum ammo press, even though it had been earmarked for Brotherhood use. Lex made the trade-off without incident.
*May 29th, 2317*
(Adventure Day 35)
In the morning, they let Jerry go. By skipping out on his court date, he would surely be in big trouble, but he begged to leave. At first he said he would head straight to Holy Toledo without fear, but they warned him that it would be too dangerous. He would have to spread the word for at least a little while before he martyred himself. Jerry thanked them and left.
The trial of the Midwest Brotherhood of Steel versus John Giscala began. It was well attended. The people of the Midwest knew that the judgment would have consequences for every municipality in the region. Paladin Axion stood as the prosecutor. He was wearing his best dress uniform and had touched up his face with cosmetics. This was rhetorical warfare and Axion had come to win. The proceedings began with Paladin Axion explaining the accusation. He claimed that there had been a riot in Emancipation and that Mayor John had done nothing to anticipate it or prevent it.
Even during opening the judges were engaged. Judge Laskin pressed Axion about the accusation. The judge was familiar with the concept of mayoral incompetence and knew that this charge was withheld for only the most egregious cases of dereliction of duty. Nothing as complex as stopping a riot had ever been associated with this charge. The party smiled, thinking that Laskin might do their job for them. But Axion was prepared, he brought forth and idea of a sliding scale of mayoral competence. He argued that in peace time, the law could be lenient with mayors, but with war with Caesar’s Legion looming over them they needed to be more demanding. Paladin Hector’s charges were unusual, but entirely within the letter of the law.
It was decided that Jefferson would make the opening argument. Zero could question witnesses, but Jefferson was more familiar with the protocols of this kind of courtroom. He spoke directly about their ambition to show that the fight in Emancipation didn’t qualify as a riot and that there was no reasonable way for Mayor John to have prevented or halted it. Judge Zhu asked if Mayor John’s character was relevant to the case. Worried about any surprising character witnesses, the party insisted that John Giscala’s personal character had no bearing on whether there had been a riot or if he could prevent it.
Paladin Axion was then allowed to call witnesses. He started with Paladin Hector, and with him was able to enter Hector’s after-action report into evidence. Hector testified that during the violence he was actually directing the troops out of Emancipation back toward Camp Jefferson. His understanding that there had been a riot had been from his staff.
Zero laid into Hector, though he wasn’t shaken. With the after-action report in evidence, Zero introduce the medical report that it referenced. The medical report clearly only had minor injuries which did not constitute a riot. But Hector held is ground. He insisted that although the report did not list severe injuries, his medical expert had verbally explained to him that there had been severe injuries. As a Brotherhood Paladin in charge of the defence of Missouri, he was in an expert in battle tactics, not medicine. Even though he had the medical report in his hand, he refused to admit that the injuries described were not severe.
Axion next called Knight-Private Orman. The prosecutor used the questioning to cast the Brotherhood as noble and responsible. Orman admitted to starting a fight with Alexa Garridan, that it was wrong and that the Brotherhood, in their righteousness, were now punishing him. When Axion asked if there had been a riot, Orman declared that it seemed like a riot to him.
Zero pushed Orman to admit that he didn’t know the legal definition of a riot. And he led the Knight-Private into admitting that once the fighting had started, he wouldn’t have obeyed any order to stop. He had been angry and carried away. There was no way Mayor John could’ve stopped his actions once they started.
Next the prosecutor brought Lex’s aunt to the stand. Axion found it easy to antagonize Alexa, who made several statements about how much she hated the Brotherhood. And to the fiercely independent people of Gamma Town, it was compelling. But the Brotherhood judges were not amused. Zero tried to get Alexa to backtrack, and she started to get even more angry. While she was testifying Alexa made eye contact with niece Lex. Lex gestured for her to calm down and be friendlier. In the end, Zero accidently got Alexa to testify that she would have followed an order from Mayor John to stop fighting.
The last testimony before lunch was Knight-Corporal Sadowski. When Axion questioned her, she remembered how the Heroes of St. Louis had fought for her. She gave simple, clipped answers. Sadowski agreed that she had seen the Heroes crossing the border from Caesar’s Legion with a person but was unable to identify that individual. Paladin Axion was enraged, but Sadowski wasn’t intimidated. Zero only asked a few questions and then dismissed the corporal.
The judges called a break for lunch. The group were feeling good about their performance in the trial, but there was still more to argue over. In the next phase, they would be able to call witnesses, and they would have to be strategic. As the court was clearing, Bob Hanssen made his way through the crowd to find Jefferson. Bob nervously explained that Jefferson had to get back to his mother’s house immediately. Jefferson protested, he was in the middle of a trial. And he was doing a good job. This was everything he had wanted to be when he left home in the first place. Bob sympathized but insisted that this was an emergency of the highest order. Everyone in their organization was in mortal danger. Jefferson apologized to the party and left immediately.
With the courtroom almost clear, Mister Man felt a presence clawing in his robotic mind. There was a voice that told him to look under the table. Quietly, Mister Man suggested that Lex check. Putting a hand under the table, Lex found a single sheet of paper taped underneath. When or how it had been put there was anyone’s guess.
The note read:
To the honorable and admirable Heroes of St. Louis, the United States of America, sometimes reductively referred to as "The Enclave,” is your friend. It is true. At least two of you were subject to unwilling medical experiments at our hands. We admit this and apologize.
If you only knew the value of the data you provided, we believe you would be proud to have been part of our noble project. Sometimes our affiliate operators get so fixated on results, they don't consider the human element in the subjects.
Though you have done so much already, America calls on you again. The Midwest Brotherhood of Steel has become angered by our operation and is considering rash and overzealous actions against us. We implore you that there are chaotic forces at work in America's great land. Caesar's Legion. The Capitol. And also a mysterious conspiracy, bent on destruction. We believe this group is responsible for the Augusta Detonation, the Nola Miracle, the New Vegas Event and the St. Louis Attack.
Convince the Brotherhood to spare us. The world needs it.
May God bless America and always keep her.
Next Session: SESSION 27: VOX POPULI
Next Session: SESSION 27: VOX POPULI
Players: (The Heroes of St. Louis): Lex Garridan, Linda, Mister Man, Mouse, Zero
*May 28th, 2317*
(Adventure Day 34)
The Heroes of St. Louis decided to head back to Joe’s Tavern for dinner. Jefferson had been told of a pit on the edge of town where livestock which was unfit for human consumption was destroyed and left to rot. He made use of the “seasoned” meat while the others enjoyed a meal. The deathclaw reconvened with them for an after-dinner drink, and Mouse joined them.
In a corner, a ghoul named Jerry was shooting his mouth off about the Midwest Brotherhood. Jerry loudly toasted, "A drink! To the Brotherhood! Our good, good friend, who would never stick a knife in our back. No, they order you to put the knife in your own back!"
The bar laughed, as did the party. Zero raised his glass to Jerry, which he noticed. Jerry approached the group. He wanted help with a virtuous mission. The ghoul claimed that there was a warehouse on the side of town. This warehouse was full of new Brotherhood “civilian authority” uniforms. This was evidence that the Midwest Brotherhood was transitioning into an authoritarian state where the generals in Chicago had total control. If they were patriots, they had a duty to burn this warehouse to the ground.
The party were angered, the Brotherhood had gone to far. Jerry led them to the warehouse. It sat on the edge of town, far from the sight of most of the inhabitants. The warehouse bore the emblem of the Midwest on its doors. Jerry insisted that they should throw Molotovs from far away, even if it might injure workers within the warehouse. They were Brotherhood, after all.
The group disagreed, sending Mouse and Lex into the warehouse with stealth. Jerry complained that they were risking too much. If they were caught, they’d probably be executed on sight. They successfully infiltrated the building, and when Mouse opened a container, he was shocked. These weren’t Brotherhood of Steel uniforms of any kind. They were Pip-Boy wrist computers, but not functional units, fake imitations that couldn’t even pass a basic inspection.
They confronted Jerry with one of the items. The ghoul began to blubber an excuse, but Jefferson wasn’t having it. Looking into an angry deathclaws eyes, Jerry admitted that the warehouse was really a Brotherhood evidence holding facility. He had tried to rip-off the Midwest Brotherhood, selling them fake Pip-Boys, and gotten caught. He was due to appear in court tomorrow, in the hall next to their trial. He needed to destroy the evidence, or he might be sent to prison.
Having earned a number of caps salvaging as they crossed Missouri, and decided to splurge. They rented a nice suite at the North Village Inn and shared it. They continued to intimidate Jerry, bringing him back to the suite. They wanted to talk to Knight-Private Orman, the Brotherhood soldier who had started the fight in Emancipation, but he was being held in the jail at Bunker Gamma. They decided it was better if Linda and Jefferson didn’t go into Bunker Gamma, so they stayed behind with Jerry.
Once the others left, Linda was preaching the good word of Atom to Jerry. Jefferson, in a mixture of amusement and perhaps boredom, insisted that Jerry take Linda very seriously. Jerry had been a Gravestone Cathedral ghoul for a while and had specific ideas about supernatural powers and the metaphysical world. Linda claimed that her point would be clearer if he drank some Loose Juice. The Loose Juice chem was the concoction of a cult leader known as The Minister and produced psychedelic hallucinations. Jerry was uninterested but Jefferson didn’t give him a choice.
Lex, Zero, Mouse and Mister Man found Private Orman rude, but truthful. He admitted that he had insulted Alexa Garridan in the street as he and his Brotherhood unit were marching out of Emancipation. They had expected to take over, and were humiliated that the people of the village had voted against martial law. Alexa was looking smug as they were forced to leave, and it had angered him. She insulted him back, and he had lost his temper. He had attacked her, and only after that had a larger fight erupted. Orman said he would still comply with Paladin Hector’s account; he didn’t know what counted as a riot. But he wouldn’t lie on the stand. They tried to convince him of the nobility of their cause, but he didn’t care.
Jerry stared into Linda’s face, deep within the hold of Loose Juice and its waking dreams. She told him of the miracle of Atom’s Glow and the infinite gift of Division. And… Jerry… finally saw it. Atom was the divine parent. The people of all the worlds were his children. He swore his life to Atom and Linda’s teachings. The religion had expelled non-humans, but Linda was going to set them straight, bring them home. And Jerry would be her apostle, spreading the word and spreading the miracle of Loose Juice. When the others returned it amused Mouse to give Jerry the recipe for Loose Juice. In one night, he had become a ghoul with a mission.
Night fell on Gamma Town. The trial of John Giscala was the next, expected to be quick. Mayor Sabeen was holding a surprise session of city council. The Heroes of St. Louis had warned them of a Midwest Brotherhood plot to legally seize power in the city. With the Brotherhood’s legal advisor’s strategy in their hand, council was able to modify their charter to thwart the effort and secure their independence. Meanwhile, Lex Garridan slipped through the city’s shadowy alleys to Lotsa Goddam Guns. There, the proprietors could sell her a .44 magnum ammo press, even though it had been earmarked for Brotherhood use. Lex made the trade-off without incident.
*May 29th, 2317*
(Adventure Day 35)
In the morning, they let Jerry go. By skipping out on his court date, he would surely be in big trouble, but he begged to leave. At first he said he would head straight to Holy Toledo without fear, but they warned him that it would be too dangerous. He would have to spread the word for at least a little while before he martyred himself. Jerry thanked them and left.
The trial of the Midwest Brotherhood of Steel versus John Giscala began. It was well attended. The people of the Midwest knew that the judgment would have consequences for every municipality in the region. Paladin Axion stood as the prosecutor. He was wearing his best dress uniform and had touched up his face with cosmetics. This was rhetorical warfare and Axion had come to win. The proceedings began with Paladin Axion explaining the accusation. He claimed that there had been a riot in Emancipation and that Mayor John had done nothing to anticipate it or prevent it.
Even during opening the judges were engaged. Judge Laskin pressed Axion about the accusation. The judge was familiar with the concept of mayoral incompetence and knew that this charge was withheld for only the most egregious cases of dereliction of duty. Nothing as complex as stopping a riot had ever been associated with this charge. The party smiled, thinking that Laskin might do their job for them. But Axion was prepared, he brought forth and idea of a sliding scale of mayoral competence. He argued that in peace time, the law could be lenient with mayors, but with war with Caesar’s Legion looming over them they needed to be more demanding. Paladin Hector’s charges were unusual, but entirely within the letter of the law.
It was decided that Jefferson would make the opening argument. Zero could question witnesses, but Jefferson was more familiar with the protocols of this kind of courtroom. He spoke directly about their ambition to show that the fight in Emancipation didn’t qualify as a riot and that there was no reasonable way for Mayor John to have prevented or halted it. Judge Zhu asked if Mayor John’s character was relevant to the case. Worried about any surprising character witnesses, the party insisted that John Giscala’s personal character had no bearing on whether there had been a riot or if he could prevent it.
Paladin Axion was then allowed to call witnesses. He started with Paladin Hector, and with him was able to enter Hector’s after-action report into evidence. Hector testified that during the violence he was actually directing the troops out of Emancipation back toward Camp Jefferson. His understanding that there had been a riot had been from his staff.
Zero laid into Hector, though he wasn’t shaken. With the after-action report in evidence, Zero introduce the medical report that it referenced. The medical report clearly only had minor injuries which did not constitute a riot. But Hector held is ground. He insisted that although the report did not list severe injuries, his medical expert had verbally explained to him that there had been severe injuries. As a Brotherhood Paladin in charge of the defence of Missouri, he was in an expert in battle tactics, not medicine. Even though he had the medical report in his hand, he refused to admit that the injuries described were not severe.
Axion next called Knight-Private Orman. The prosecutor used the questioning to cast the Brotherhood as noble and responsible. Orman admitted to starting a fight with Alexa Garridan, that it was wrong and that the Brotherhood, in their righteousness, were now punishing him. When Axion asked if there had been a riot, Orman declared that it seemed like a riot to him.
Zero pushed Orman to admit that he didn’t know the legal definition of a riot. And he led the Knight-Private into admitting that once the fighting had started, he wouldn’t have obeyed any order to stop. He had been angry and carried away. There was no way Mayor John could’ve stopped his actions once they started.
Next the prosecutor brought Lex’s aunt to the stand. Axion found it easy to antagonize Alexa, who made several statements about how much she hated the Brotherhood. And to the fiercely independent people of Gamma Town, it was compelling. But the Brotherhood judges were not amused. Zero tried to get Alexa to backtrack, and she started to get even more angry. While she was testifying Alexa made eye contact with niece Lex. Lex gestured for her to calm down and be friendlier. In the end, Zero accidently got Alexa to testify that she would have followed an order from Mayor John to stop fighting.
The last testimony before lunch was Knight-Corporal Sadowski. When Axion questioned her, she remembered how the Heroes of St. Louis had fought for her. She gave simple, clipped answers. Sadowski agreed that she had seen the Heroes crossing the border from Caesar’s Legion with a person but was unable to identify that individual. Paladin Axion was enraged, but Sadowski wasn’t intimidated. Zero only asked a few questions and then dismissed the corporal.
The judges called a break for lunch. The group were feeling good about their performance in the trial, but there was still more to argue over. In the next phase, they would be able to call witnesses, and they would have to be strategic. As the court was clearing, Bob Hanssen made his way through the crowd to find Jefferson. Bob nervously explained that Jefferson had to get back to his mother’s house immediately. Jefferson protested, he was in the middle of a trial. And he was doing a good job. This was everything he had wanted to be when he left home in the first place. Bob sympathized but insisted that this was an emergency of the highest order. Everyone in their organization was in mortal danger. Jefferson apologized to the party and left immediately.
With the courtroom almost clear, Mister Man felt a presence clawing in his robotic mind. There was a voice that told him to look under the table. Quietly, Mister Man suggested that Lex check. Putting a hand under the table, Lex found a single sheet of paper taped underneath. When or how it had been put there was anyone’s guess.
The note read:
To the honorable and admirable Heroes of St. Louis, the United States of America, sometimes reductively referred to as "The Enclave,” is your friend. It is true. At least two of you were subject to unwilling medical experiments at our hands. We admit this and apologize.
If you only knew the value of the data you provided, we believe you would be proud to have been part of our noble project. Sometimes our affiliate operators get so fixated on results, they don't consider the human element in the subjects.
Though you have done so much already, America calls on you again. The Midwest Brotherhood of Steel has become angered by our operation and is considering rash and overzealous actions against us. We implore you that there are chaotic forces at work in America's great land. Caesar's Legion. The Capitol. And also a mysterious conspiracy, bent on destruction. We believe this group is responsible for the Augusta Detonation, the Nola Miracle, the New Vegas Event and the St. Louis Attack.
Convince the Brotherhood to spare us. The world needs it.
May God bless America and always keep her.
Next Session: SESSION 27: VOX POPULI
Character(s) interacted with
Report Date
21 Nov 2021
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