Jackrum's Log Session 2

Today’s session was pretty crazy, made up of a bunch of little semi-related incidents leading up to one major event. It begins with the (expected) betrayal of our good old NPC pal Clutch. The ending was quite unexpected to me though, seeing as how badly I’m used to seeing in Tropes.

BTW, if I go all bold like this in the middle of the text, that’s me as the player breaking the narrative to say something about the game.

Here goes-

Jackrum’s Log, January 19th

Sigh… why are people so unreasonable? We all want the same things, we all want to get along, but there’s always some people out there who’ll want to cause trouble and screw things up for everyone. People who lie, rob, and kill. People who steal my horse! But I’m getting ahead of myself, it’s best to start at the beginning. So.

This mornin, after a nice cozy night at home, I awoke to a terrible surprise. Tornado, my faithful steed for the past 3 years, was gone, whisked right out of my stables in the dead of night. I was quite alarmed, woke up my son Jesse who unfortunately quite useless seeing as how he just can’t get started without a couple a cups o’ coffee in em. After confirming he truly was gone and payin a fruitless visit to the office of the Sheriff, I happened to run into Miss Sandra on the street, headin down to the saloon to meet me and Clutch. We had been planning to head out north to Canton today to see about selling that Elemental Seed we got ahold of yesterday. She was right annoyed to hear about my poor Tornado bein stolen, and as we were talkin a young lady I’ve seen around town before headed towards as though she had somethin to talk about.
The girl in question was Miss Virginia Cassidy, the daughter of Janos Cassidy, the water-baron of Clearwater and the only man in town in better finances than myself. She’s a bit of a tomboy to be honest, but she used to be Clutch’s girlfriend up until she dumped em about a month ago. Odd thing was, she was leadin three spry frontier horses, much stronger and hardier than a simple packhorse like my Tornado (though of course he’s always served me well).

“Ya’ll are talkin about Clutch aren’t you?” Virginia said.

“Um, no, Miss, not actually. We’re talkin about the thief that stole my horse!”

“Like I said: Clutch.”

She quickly explained as to how Clutch had showed up at her house last night, tryin to get they’re old romance started up again and talkin about how he was gonna be a rich man. She said she went by his house later and found out he was gone, along with everything he needed for a wasteland trip- including our priceless Elemental Seed. But more importantly, he stole my TORNADO!

“Uh, Jackrum, I think your missin the important aspect of the story here.” Sandra reminded me.

Right. So Clutch had our Seed and he’d done a runner, headed to who knows where to make a fortune off of our prize. With my horse.

“If your goin after him, you should take me with you.” Virginia said. “I know Clutch better’n anyone, and I think I know where he’s goin. If you help me out, I’ll let you keep 2/3s of the profit we make off of the Elemental Seed.”

Little pushy aren’t we? I was quick to point out that while I am an experienced, official Treasure Hunter, she was only a young girl who didn’t know anything about shootin and trackin. She claimed she could take care of herself, and against my better judgment, I decided to acquiesce. Virginia provided us with the frontier horses she had brought. Sandra took the white one while I ended up with the black. He was a good horse, fast, strong, solid, loyal and fearless too. But, he wasn’t Tornado.

“Anyway, I think Clutch is headin towards Canton.” Virginia said. “We can get there two ways: just head straight and ride for two days, or we can take the train and be there by tomorrow.”

Well we all figured that Clutch snatchin my horse was probably done so he could switch mounts when one got too tired- meanin he was ridin. After some discussion, we decided to take the train and head him off before he made it to Canton. I headed back home to get my gear and say goodbye to Jesse, givin some bullets to Virginia and Sandra to go and buy our tickets. Jesse was all worried I was gonna go off and get shot. He gave me a blunderbuss from the store to help out.

Well, we’re all here on the train now, and getting ready to ride. When I find that horse thief I’m gonna give him a good punch in the teeth.

January 19th, later.

Who would have guessed that goin by train would be so dangerous? Not an hour into our trip, there was a sudden screech and the train grinded to a halt. I heard screamin and hollerin from the front cars (we were in 2nd class. Sure, I could’ve afforded First, but hey, I’m not made of brass), so I decided to go and check it out. Sandy and Virginia stayed back.
Gettin a look at 1st Class, I was startin to regret my frugalness. I was just passin through the dining car when a pair of ruffians burst into the car, a young man packin a Desert Eagle and a woman with an AK-47. They made they’re intentions clear, and I put my hands up so they wouldn’t do anything rash.

“Now ya’ll want to be lookin very intently at your own belly buttons!”

We all got down on the floor while the two of them started makin threats and promises. Fortunately for me, I had all of my gear from my saddle bags with me in my luggage, and I had absentmindedly carried it up to 1st Class with me- meanin I had more’n a dozen guns on me.
Suddenly we heard a very loud flurry of gunshots soundin from the back cars-where I had just come from-and the man with the Eagle decided to go have a look-see. The woman with the AK took out a burlap sack and started goin around to the other passengers, gatherin up they’re brass and belongins. I slipped over to the nearest two passengers with my bag. One was a busboy workin the tables, the other was a large squinty eyed bearded man.

“What you say we take her out?” I whispered.

“You crazy?”

“I’m a gun merchant. Jackrum Twister, of the Brass Twister, Clearwater.” He disinclined to shake hands. “I’ve got so many guns here, we could easily over power her. There’s just one-”

Click. That lovely AK-47 was pointin right down by my face.

“You know what the definition of a hero is?” She asked smugly. “Someone that gets other people killed.”

I didn’t answer. I was too busy tryin to figure out how she had come across the room without me noticin. She reared back and smacked me across the face with her gun, which I have to say was pretty unfounded. As I collapsed, I made sure to drop the gold coin we’d found in the Crystal Valley right at her feet. As I had hoped, her eyes lit up at the sight of the sparkly metal, and she bent down to snatch it.
I kicked out, slammin my boots into her shin, and she stumbled back gruntin. I stuck my hands into my bag and pulled out the biggest gun. Her eyes flashed with fear as I aimed it up at her.

“You know what this is ma’am? This is a 20 gauge, antique, depleted- uranium-shell-firin sawed-off shotgun. It only holds one shot, but one shot is all it needs I can assure you. And if I decide to pull this her trigger, I assure you the results will not be pretty.” Now, I’ve never killed anyone in my life and I certainly don’t hope to start anytime soon, but she didn’t know that and I wanted her scared. From the look on her face, I was doin it right.

“Now, your gonna want to be reachin very quickly for the sky. Without the gun please.” I said. She shook her head, a stubborn look on her face.

“No. I aint goin back. Not again, not ever.” She said.

Sigh. This one has issues.

“Now I didn’t say anything about gettin arrested. Far as I’m concerned, you lay down your arms, you can walk off this train-”

“Like hell she will!” The bearded man shouted. He snatched a shotgun out of my bag, quickly followed by the busboy who grabbed an automatic. With three guns on her, she just looked more stubborn. Things were movin in a grim direction. I only pulled this stunt cause I wanted to protect the people on the train… but I wasn’t goin to sit by and let them shoot this woman if I could help it either.

The gun Jackrum’s got is a rather nice gun that shoots extremely rare ammo. It does a whopping 17 damage, and ignores all armor as well. 17 in our system is almost twice what is needed to instantly drop a default character, and even mine (who’s quite tough and has above average HP) would still likely die in a single shot. Problem is, I’ve also got a Flaw which makes it so that I’m obligated to help and protect people, and will not take a life unless it’s absolutely necessary to prevent further death. As a rule, I simply try to avoid killing whenever possible when I play a character with this Flaw (which is, so far, basically ALL of my characters).

I had to negotiate. I managed to talk the woman into dropping the gun… then had to smack down the bearded nut who tried to shoot her while she was unarmed! Fortunately he was less inclined to shoot at me what with the depleted uranium and all, so I took up her gun and marched her outside. I was plannin to get her to her horse and send her off into the wasteland where she couldn’t cause trouble. There was just one problem- they had another partner, keepin watch with a rifle. I never had a chance to talk, and he didn’t seem too worried about me holdin a gun to his partner’s back. He shot. Faced with no other choice, I pushed the woman aside and fired back.
His bullet whistled by my face with inches too spare. Even though I’ve only been a Treasure Hunter for two days, I’ve been practicin my shootin for years, just as a hobby. I’ve gotten quite good at it. My shot hit him high on the upper arm, and tore a hefty chunk out, just before exploding into an incredibly bright and spectacular lightshow of neon green energy, which I‘m really sure is supposed to happen. He screamed and fell straight off the train, collapsing on the ground. I breathed a sigh of relief. The shotgun I’ve got loses a lot of it’s kick after a few yards- had I been closer, the same shot would have torn off his arm at the least.

I know I said up above that the gun would have killed a normal character in one hit, so I’ll explain. The shotgun is a special weapon I made with our Special Attack ability, which is different from other guns. It does 17 damage, but it only has an effective range of 4 yards. Damage outside of that range is halved- meaning the damage dropped down to 8. Still more than enough to make him think twice about trying to shoot me again.

After some more talkin, I managed to get the woman to grab her friend and get on they’re horses. They rode off, leavin a horse behind. The man with the Desert Eagle was still in there somewhere, but I’d last seen him headin towards the 2nd Class cars, where Sandra and Virginia were. And then there was the matter of that loud gunfire I heard from back there earlier. These thugs didn’t seem to know about it- so did that mean there were more than one group causin trouble on the train? I rushed to find out-

-and found Mr. Desert Eagle with a bloody nose and black eye, unarmed, pushin past me too get on his horse. Bemused, I let him go, retrieved my guns from the passengers (except the bearded man, who insisted he had had the shotgun already and that he’d never touched my bag), and headed back to the girls. I stuck my head into the compartment.

“You girls okay?”

“Just fine.” Sandra said, reloading her guns. Virginia looked bored.

“Alright. Let’s get this train movin.”

Btw, while I was up dealing with the train robbers, Sandra was having a fight of her own which she handled quite easily. She dealt with the Desert Eagle guy too, and without killing anyone, which I found pretty unusual due to her player.

After some mild criticism to the conductor on they’re lack of security, we discovered the train’s equipment was heavily damaged, and that help for the train would likely take more than a day to arrive. Well, there was no way I was gonna sit around waitin while Clutch was runnin off with MY TORNADO, so we grabbed our horses off the cattle cars and took off through the wasteland.
Virginia took out her map and let us know what’s gonna be on the way. First up was a small frontier town called Little Raindrop, where we planned to spend the night and maybe pick up Clutch’s trail, then there was an old abandoned ghost town called Vash beyond that. In all likelihood, we’ll be reachin Canton by tomorrow night. Got a bit of a ride ahead of me, I’ll write more later.

January 19th, night.

This towns quite creepy at night and I’m not yet ready to fall asleep- though I’ve spent the whole day in the saddle- so I figured I’d write a bit. Oh, we’re in Vash, not Little Raindrop, for reasons I will explain now.

Little Raindrop turned out to be quite a mess. It was mighty annoying and I don’t much feel like rememberin it, so I’ll just sum it up in a few short statements. Clutch came to town, met with some old buddies, drew some fake wanted posters, and set his incredibly gullible buddies after us. They tried to arrest us for… I’m not really sure why, then Sandra did some dancin’ and made em all think twice about messin with us. Sigh, so as a result we couldn’t spend the night and went lookin for a good spot in the wilderness to make camp, when we came across this little town.

The town of Vash, an empty ghost town with shudders bangin in the wind. On one side of the town a tall cliff hangs over the town, and for some reason the townsfolk decided this would make a good place to make a nice cemetery. I have to wonder what kind of folk would decide to do somethin like that and how they went about convincing the people who weren’t complete morons to go through with it. Maybe they’re weren’t any. Anyway, we did a quick search of the town and found nothin alarmin so we decided to spend the night here. The girls seemed a bit jumpy, so when Sandy suggested we make camp on one of the low rooftops so as to have ourselves a defensible locale in case somethin came out of the dark at us I agreed. Well, I volunteered for 2nd watch and Sandra’s got the first one so I should probably get some shut eye. Oh, I forgot, I might as well recall the story Miss Virginia told us before I put this up for the night.

Once, the Town of Vash was housed by the ancestors of our own townsfolk of Clearwater. It was a small, unremarkable town, aside from the Winchester Manor on the hill. Nothin out of the ordinary happened here. Until the day Grim Reaper Grims came through.

Isaac Grims was his name. No one knew who he was, or what he wanted, but one day he came stridin up through the wasteland, draggin a rusty scythe blade behind him in the dirt. Before anyone could ask him his business, he tore into the town, slashin left and right, cuttin folk down like dry wheat. Three dozen men and women he slaughtered, near half the town, and when they finally caught him he refused to explain himself. He spoke, not a single word.

He was hanged from a tree in the cemetery over town, and the very next day the townsfolk packed up and left, every last one of them. And that’s how Vash became an empty ghost town.

Ha, I have to give it to her, Virginia tells a good ghost story. Still, a man aint got nothin to fear from a dead man, and chances are Grim wasn’t never nothin but a story anyhow. Well, time for sleep.

January 20th

Ok. So maybe next time I’ll pay a bit closer attention to the Miss’s ghost stories.

We awoke in the middle of the night to the sight of glowin eyes watchin us from the hangin cemetery. I unpacked my night vision goggles I keep for such an occasion, and we were quickly able to ascertain that the eyes belonged to a pack of coyotes… all save one pair. That one belonged to a grim lookin man, tall and gaunt, sittin on a gravestone under a tall tree. There was a rope around his neck, and he was fillin the air with the mournful sound of the harmonica he was playin. The strange man wasn’t doin anything threatenin, just watchin, but all the same I figured I should go and see what he was up too. Before I could though, Virginia got it into her head to go and do it herself! We had to rush off after her, leavin our defensive position, the horses, and all my gear behind. When we reached the top of the hill, the coyotes were gone, but the grim man remained. When Virginia tried to speak to him, he did not reply, not one word. Only stood, and from his side lifted a rusty old scythe blade stuck to the end of a long wooden plank. Me and Sandy drew our guns, shoutin for Virginia to get back, but old Grim only strode on past us, down the hill…
…right into the path of a dozen rabid Plagues chargin up at us. For the life of me I couldn’t figure how they’d snuck up so quiet, or how we’d past them by without spottin em. What followed was a desperate, chaotic battle, made all the more difficult for the fact that I’d only brought my sidearm and rifle. Grim slashed through Plague after Plague with that homemade scythe of his, and when all were gone, he just kept on walkin, disapearin off into the wasteland like a ghost.

Hell, if it weren’t for the others I’d have thought it were a dream.

January 20th, Evening.

By afternoon, we found Clutch.

He met us in a deep canyon, filled with a lake pierced by several tall spires of rock risin up out of the water. The no good bastard horse-thief shot me in the shoulder before we’d even spotted em, and I went down in shock while the others charged in. Virginia and Clutch shouted up a storm, and bullets and insults flew back and forth across the water. Sandy got in a few shots, and after I’d gotten back to my feet I managed to shoot his rifle, leavin him harmless. We started forth, and a huge burst of water exploded from the center of the lake. The biggest Plague I’d ever seen, somethin like an elephant-octopus, burst out and charged us, stabbin me in the gut (Treasure Huntin is dangerous business). We managed to kill it… but by the time we did, Clutch was already dyin.

None of us knew what to say. He was a backstabbin, horse-stealin lowlife, but he had been our partner. We tried to save him, but he told us he was sorry, that the money was too good, and breathed his last. The Elemental Seed rolled from his hand into the lake, mixin with the water and blood. A bright green glow rose up from the lake surface, and suddenly trees and roots were shootin out from everywhere! In minutes, we were surrounded by a veritable forest. And to our astonishment, a strange plant girl appeared from the middle of the lake, where an island had risen, and introduced herself as Leer.

Now we’ve got ourselves an oasis and a super powerful alchemical servant. Virginia was quite upset about Clutch… and about he money she’d demanded. She revealed that the money she wanted was what she needed to free her brother, who’d been kidnapped by that no-good Dale Canton. He was holdin him hostage, tryin to force the Water Baron of Clearwater to hand over the deed to our town.

Well I’m not sure what we’re gonna do, but we know we aint gonna allow that.

End of Session. I have to say I was pretty surprised by the developments in this session. And I'll I was dead right about Clutch- I'd originally predicted he would die or turn evil (lol, both)- I absolutely did NOT expect we'd actually get to use the Seed anytime soon. I assumed we'd be huntin after it for half the game. Turns out now we get to make a town. Lookin forward to the next session.

P.S. Yeah, there were a lot of little Firefly quotes in this session, I don't think I even got them all.