Episode 38 - Outbreak

Disaster / Destruction

Seleema Jahlone, Kawfee, Udart Gunt, Tchal and Bae crash land on a small mining colony on an ice moon. They soon discover the moon is suffering from a serious infection turning the inhabitants into blood crazed psychopaths. The group eventually escape with some of the inhabitants, but not before Udart himself is infected with the disease.

It is a time of great discovery throughout the Rhao system. Whilst the Imperial Navy consolidates its forces and prepares to counter attack, the New Republic pushes outward in a bid to free more planets from the Empire’s iron grasp. Having already proven their worth as competent explorers on Janta V, the newly rescued scholars Tchal and Bae are dispatched to survey the volcanic planet, Kazan and search for the newly identified temple of power, accompanied by Kawfee, Saleema and Udart as protectors.
  Streaks of light race past the viewport as you hurtle through hyperspace, flanked by your X-Wing escort. Suddenly, the lights outside come to a standstill and you are surrounded by the darkness of space as you are knocked from your journey, far from the target destination. Confused, you drift silently for a few moments as the pilots struggle to determine your location when suddenly, from a viewport, you spy the glint of a missile launch ahead. The U-Wing rocks violently as the missile impacts against the hull and sparks explode from the pilot's consoles, causing them to keel over as the ship drifts lifelessly from its course.
The group are attacked by unknown pirates. Seleema and Udart fight valiantly but the combat takes the ships into an ion storm. As the attackers break off the groups ships are disabled and they are forced to crash-land into an unknown moon.

Icy winds slam into you like a wall as you pull yourselves free of the wreckage, attempting to assess the damage, it's a wonder any of you made it out alive. The X-Wings are little more than offerings for a scrapheap, but whilst the damage sustained by the U-Wing was severe, the ship still seems more or less structurally sound.
You try to survey the desolate, icy landscape around you but the darkness makes it impossible to see beyond the howling gale. Suddenly, through the churning mists, you spot the silhouettes of some figures in the distance growing steadily as they head in your direction.
As the figures draw closer you can eventually make out 3 men riding atop feline beasts as large as banthas, they eye you suspiciously for a moment before the one in the middle dismounts, holding on to his great coat and hat in the wind as he approaches. “Looks like you folk are in need of some assistance, storms really did a number on ya, huh?"
"Yep, sounds about right. Once that thing hits there’s no leaving this rock.”
“Welcome to Mining Outpost 31, Marshal Rayjun MaCreed at your service... and just who might y'all be? "Can’t be too careful these days, we’ve had more than enough strangers around these parts lately”
After some discussion, the Marshal agrees to tow the U-Wing back to the settlement using his enormous Jakobeast.

The journey to the town is long and arduous, you feel the icy wind’s bitter touch creeping through your bodies.
After what seems like forever travelling through the cold darkness you eventually start to make out the faint lights of a settlement in the distance. The party is led into a large junk yard where the marshal dismounts once again, send his deputies off and starts heading towards a run down looking garage.
  “WEX! Hey, Wex! Could do with a hand out here, buddy!”
  A half closed, heavily rusted shutter is pulled upwards and you see a heavy set man, clad in oil stained overalls, wiping his hands on a, just as oil stained rag, as he heads in your direction.
  “Ah, more victims of the ole storm eh?”
  The burly mechanic circles the U-Wing, kicking the odd crumpled hinge and sucking in his breath.
  “This thing is damaged bad, real bad. Maybe if I stripped down the old ZD, yeah, and replaced the… that could work. Yeah I reckon I could fix this up, but its gonna cost me some time… And you some credits. Though as you’ve already made nice with the Marshall I can go easy on ya, I’m thinking, hmm, what say 4000 credits parts and labour?”
The group haggle over a price with the large but infant like Wex. The mechanic, taking a shine to Bae, eventually agrees to discuss the price once the repairs have been made.
You hear hear a ringing from inside the workshop before the mechanic pops hits head back out into the cold “Marshal! Call for ya, says its urgent”
  MacReed heads over, grumbling to himself, and disappears inside.
  “MacReed her… WHAT!? Ok… ok, I’ll be right there…"
The Marshall leaves. With nothing else to do while they await the ships repairs, the group decide to explore the settlement. Leaving the injured Childs in the care of Wex, they head towards the cantina.

MacReed races off toward a ramshackle marshal’s office and ties up his jakobeast before hurrying inside as Sarna hangs her head, disappointed and starts heading towards the centre of a weather beaten town.

As you head into town towards the cantina you pass an old looking Rodian, his eyes grey with cataracts. His head perks up as he hears footsteps approaching in the snow and picks up a small cup, shaking it in your direction. “Spare some credits for an old blind man?”
Pitying the destitute Rodian, the group toss him a few credits.

You enter the dimly lit cantina and the buzz of chatting patrons within quickly falls to silence as they eye you suspiciously. The barkeep eventually goes back to serving and the low murmur of people enjoying their night returns.
Looking around you see a couple of old timers sitting in a corner playing a game of dejarik, one man on a stool passed out at the bar and the usual human detritus you would expect to see dotted around a backwater hole such as this.
The group get themselves refreshments before sitting down with the locals and learning more about the small settlement. It is a mining colony that rarely sees any visitors, during the day most of the inhabitants work in the mines at the edge of the settlement.

You hear the door open and the Rodian you saw earlier stumbles in, his milky grey eyes glazed over as he clutches a bloody wound on his neck. Suddenly his entire body starts to convulse as he doubles over and starts violently heaving up blood, but not just blood. You watch in horror as entire internal organs expel from his mouth before he collapses, lifeless in a pool of blood and gore.
The cantina is in shock. As the group go to investigate the corpse it inexplicably rears up and attacks. The group open fire and after taking a large amount of firepower, the body once again falls to the floor. The group decide to report the events to the Marshalls office.

Entering the Marshalls office, the front desk is unattended. After some exploration the Marshall and one of his deputy are found attending to the cells. Apparently another of his deputies has been bitten by a prisoner and is acting so strangely they have been forced to lock him in a cell.
The group explain the events of the cantina and begin to realise that an infection is spreading throughout the colony. They leave the sheriffs office intending to return to the garage and hurry along the ships repairs, but as they head out into the settlement they see what remains of the living occupants being chased by a large horde of the infected that have emerged from the mines.
Covering the escape of the survivors with blaster fire and distracting the horde by freeing the nearby Jakobeast the group manage to save some of them, including the bartender of the cantina, and return to what is seemingly the most secure building in the colony. The Marshalls office.

Exhausted and out of breath, the group hole up in what looks like safety. The sounds of the raging ion storm far above blends with the moans of the shambling groups outside. MacReed looks around, “Looks like this place will hold up for now, you people see if you can reinforce the perimeter. I’ll try and calm the rest of these folks down”.
The windows are boarded up using any spare supplies and furnishings as Tchal begins to inspect the survivors. He notices one has been bitten. After a very heated discussion it is agreed that the bitten survivor be placed into the cell containing the infected and restrained deputy. It is also agreed that the prisoners, a thief and a drunkard, will be freed to help the securing of the station.
As time passes tempers begin to fray between the survivors, it is revealed that the infection has seemingly come from an Imperial office who crash landed into the moon recently in an escape pod. Many of the survivors believe the Marshall should have executed the officer as soon as he was captured.
All the while in the survivors bicker inside the station, the horde outside grows. As it claws and thumps on the door it becomes clear that the hastily erected barricades will not sustain them forever and the group begin to plan an escape. A makeshift ladder is created and the group, along with the rest of the survivors ascend to the roof and begin to make there way from building to building using the ladder as a bridge.
Many of the survivors fall into the horde while crossing and Macreedy is bitten. Not wanting to turn on the group, he willingly jumps into the fray managing to lead the horde away temporarily before detonating an explosive device.
Using the distraction the group and the only remaining survivors, the bartender and the thief quickly make there way back to the garage.

You make it back to the scrapyard with the horde of infected closing in, leaving barely a spare moment to think of the survivors lost along the way. Looking around you see the workshop ahead, standing in darkness with the shutters raised, the scrapyard seems eerily quiet except for the growing sound of the approaching horde.

The group hastily enter the workshop and close the shutters, buying them sometime to inspect the U-Wing. The repairs have been started but are not yet complete. While exploring the workshop they find the Imperial Escape Pod and discover it is from the Star Destroyer The Purifier.
As they start to finish the repairs on the ship the horde begin to break through the shutters. At the same time Udart is attacked by an infected Wex, who was lurking in the workshop offices. 
The group mount a stand and manage to hold the horde off while the ship is repaired. Finally they crash through the roof of the workshop and make there way away from the moons atmosphere. Unknown to the rest of the group, Udart was bitten during the melee.