Chapter 2 Recap: Searching for Answers

October 16th, 2331

The group wakes up rested and ready for a new day trying to figure out who they are and what has happened to the world. As they wake up, Zara is visited by one fo the stuffed animals from the gift store, a fluffly blue fox. It speaks to her and tells her that her baby has summoned it with magic and that their goal is to protect both of them and send communications from the baby to Zara. Zara is delighted and names her new companion Kitsune, or Kit for short. Kit spends most of their time in a cloaked state, but will appear to cast shield protection, to talk, or when commanded.

Meanwhile, Russ finds himself in a dangerous encounter with a giant insect that has found it’s way into the mens bathroom. It spits acid at him and ruins his clothes and leaves him with a bad wound. He spends the remainder of the day resting, knowing he can’t be of much help in his current condition.

Bishop, anxious to get to the 3rd floor to get a treatment for his infection, finds himself coated in a terrible itchy substance from a plant in the lobby. Despite the irresponsible action of Eden to put such a plant around the general public, Bishop decides to stay with Russ and recover from his terrible encounter. 

Nims finally steps in and wishes everyone a good morning. She alerts them to a few things that they might want to address during the day including repairing the power cores so that they can have more power to the buildings in the complex. 

Before they can choose what to do next, an explosion rocks the building. Nims informs them that there are some hostile people outside trying to breach the lockdown shielding with some crudely made explosives. They are focused on the front of the building, allowing the group to take a rear exit if they desire. 

While they gather their bearings, Hannah has a strange encounter with an ominous presence where she seems to be repeating the same period of about 5 minutes over and over. Nims recognizes this as a magical time loop that can sometimes happen to novice magic users who have built up too much ethereal energy and need to distribute it. After she does this she feels a sense of peace and has relearned how to control her magic. 

Sam finds out he can he can get an upgrade to some of his augmentation, but chooses to stay behind with Flick who experiences a malfunction and is not feeling well. Bishop, Russ, Sam and Flick spent the rest of the day in the cafeteria and main room, talking about what has happened and what they remember.

Meanwhile, Edward, Hannah and Zara make their way outside. The world seems peaceful and calm and they all feel a boost to their morale. They make their way to the power core station without incident and find that the door is open. Making their way inside they are confronted with some serious damage to the connecting lines from the power cores to the power converter. Thankfully, Nims is able to talk them through the process of repairing things and they spend the next few hours doing just that. 

Meanwhile, Frederick encounters a security robot named  Melvin (ABRA unit 78900). He says that he can help him get an upgrade for his augmentation if they can reach the 4th floor. 

DK has a quick chat with Louie the chef robot and receives the Brew Master 9000. This device makes unlimited coffee and seems to make DK very happy. He instantly starts to sample different roasts and flavors and thoroughly enjoys his new gadget.

Back at the power cores, Edward has a close call as one of the power cores threatens to overload and explode. They diffuse the situation and complete repairs on the power core to restore 80% of power to the complex. DK joins up with them and helps with the final repairs before they all head back to the main building.

Back in the reception area, DK gets a message on his cd asking him to go to the bathroom. There he finds a creepy stuffed penguin that tells him someone needs his help on the 10th floor. Without delay, DK rounds up Zara and Edward and the trio goes up on the elevator with Nims. They are exposed to a chemical in a mist of air that relaxes them all called the Namaste Mist. They don’t seem to notice.

DK follows the directions of the stuffed animal and comes into a conference room with a strange blue door hovering over the desk with seemingly no room for it to lead to. It turns out to be a sort of connection door to a blue space area where a being named Clark was trapped during the lockdown. They ask that they be released by pushing a button. DK complies and they promise to find him later and reward him.

Frederick, down on the main floor, speaks to Melvin and asks for his upgrade. They travel to the 4th floor where Frederick is made to lay on a table and worked on. He is given a few upgrades and sent on his way, but not without taking a medical tray as a souvenir.

Back to the group on the 10th floor. They decide to explore around and see if there is any information or useful items. They find a few things, including a key to the executive vault. They decide to check it out and are soon met with a complicated grid of security boxes in a golden room. They decide to try and use magic, hacking, and brute force to get some of the boxes open.

Frederick joins them and has a strange encounter where his body is invaded by foreign nano tech and information transmitted to an unknown entity while he gains access to a flimsy lock picking tool that only works on physical locks and will break after 2 uses. He pockets it, but it doesn’t seem like a good trade off for the personal invasion. 

The group keeps opening vaults. They succeed in finding some useful and strange things before DK’s overzealous desire to get into more treasure starts a fire in one of the panels. This in turn locks down the vault and sends a spray of biohazardous water into the room. This is a security measure of the building, which prompts any intruder to have to decontaminate or become ill.  

The soaking wet group decides it’s best to try and make it to the residency where they can get new clothes and clean off and get treated if required. The complex is a little over 2 miles away and there are hostile parties outside. 

On their way they encounter Octus,  a bald man who turns out to be a high level executive for the Eden Corporation. He has two men with him pointing guns at the group and doesn’t seem to want to let them go on their own. He accuses them of being part of the terrorist group that attacked the facility and they end up having a fight. After a few well placed hits, Octus and one of his men escape. Meanwhile, Victor, the one who didn’t get away, is taken prisoner and they all high tail it to the residences to evade detection by security drones.

Unfortunately, Edward becomes infected by the Protozoan Bacteria and must be kept in a recovery chamber while the rest of the group can explore and shop in the facilities. They do just that. Frederick gets some more work done on his augmentation to improve it. Zara finds the magic villas and stocks up on potions and tonics. DK obtains some bots and droids from the robotics lab and also makes a new friend from the AI in one of the units named Maggie. He copies her into an amulet and is looking for a body for her to inhabit. 

Edward uses a proxy to look around a bit himself and comes upon some strange documents in the unit for one of the techs responsible for some of the events that led to the sabotage of the stasis unit.

As evening falls, Nims calls the group together and they are met with a very unexpected message from Weson Haught, one of the founders of the Eden corporation. He is over 200 years old and obviously benefits from augmentation, but he looks completely human and seems to have more advanced tech than was thought to be available. 

Weston is a treasure trove of information. He is able to reveal how they got to where they are and how to get their memories back. But he also has another task for them. Distributed to the different centers along with their minds is a set of files he needs to try and manufacture a permanent cure for the Bet 1 parasite. Since the group will be traveling for their own needs, why not help him out by retrieving the files and taking them back to him? The group agrees.

That’s not the only surprise. Not long after the message is played, Jaira, an extraterrestrial being arrives and tells them she is their Emissary. She works for a group called FEE (Facilia Expedia Exactos) which helps people to learn and train in specified skill groups to help them combat the dangerous and unknown terrain of the world at large. She offers to allow them to pick from a selection of classes so that she can further help them. She will take up residence in their blue space home (an amenity provided by Weston Haught) and assist them for as long as it takes. She proceeds to tell them that they have a Divinity Shard (the substance used to store their downloaded minds while they were in stasis) in the Master Terminal on that campus and she will take them there that very night to retrieve some of their lost memories!

The group has a lot to process.