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Fourth one: (part II)

(Tura, Ploink, Lego, Zed, Nash, Flames)



They took guard in turns and except for one long far away mournful howl it was a restful night. In the morning they burned the body and continued.


The bridge turned out to be a brilliant place to scout from, Tura climbed up onto one of the tower looking constructs on the beginning of the tower span and looked out over the other side.

The island as a whole seemed mainly an industrial place, though just west of the group a group of buildings where surrounded by high fences and barbed wire. To the waterside of that zone two large ships where rusting – half sunk. They looked menacing with towers on them and pipes sticking out of the towers.

Tura still got the feeling that to go straight south would be the most dangerous – something about how some of the buildings looked damaged and how all of them stood in such a way to make ambushes very easy.

Zed and Tura led the way over the bridge and Zed announced that the group they where following where going west. He also thought that it was likely that the zone wraiths had followed because there where much signs and tracks – more then from the expedition and also Zeds dog was growling almost non stop.

The group had a long discussion at this point, as to where to go. Some people wanted to go east and follow the coast, some wanted to just go into the middle of the island and from there see if they could find a way to look out over the whole island – but most wanted to still follow the tracks of the expedition, zone wraiths or no.


So it was with extreme caution that they approached the compound. The overview was quite straightforward – long three story buildings very neatly placed with a large square and a central building in the middle of the zone.
Behind the central building a path down towards a dock where the two ships where placed.

There where no immediate signs of activity but the area was filled with hiding places.

Tura had a feeling that there might be an emergency generator here, having heard in the past that military compounds often had such a thing. As there was no outside generator house to be seen they guessed it might be placed in the central building simply because it had to be important.

In general they had the idea that it would be in the central building that everything would be – important things, the wraiths and the generator. No real reason it just felt right. Therefore they took to using the long buildings as protection when moving closer to the central one. Zed’s dog at a point made to cross the yard towards it also, and eventually they had scouted several houses and come up to the back of the central building. There was a few signs of habitation here – a trek pile which stank horribly outside a broken window was one of them, and another open window where multitudes of tracks led in and out.

It was noon when they snuck into the house, following the path that the wraiths seemed to use. All had agreed that this needed to be done – they could not have the wraiths cutting their possible retreat, even if they did not actually know for sure that the previous expedition went here.

They entered an office area, as silently as they could, but unfortunately it proved impossible for such a large group to stay silent and while climbing in Nash managed to bump into a small shard of glass from the window, which broke and fell to the ground with a tingling sound.

For a moment it was silent as everyone froze, half the group in the room and half outside..
Then they heard padding sound of someone who runs silently and they just had time to ready weapons before two short beings dressed all in raggedy robes with strange red face masks came running into the room, they both carried spears.

The two wraiths barely had time to raise their spears before they where slammed by arrows, flames, a throwing dagger and a throwing spear – they where dead before they stopped running.

“God job” Tura whispered. “Gather in here and I will scout the place together with Zed and find the rest of em”

The group spread out in the office area, which basically where old rotten furniture and garbage – and loads of dust.

Tura and Zed started searching the building, very easily navigated by having only two straight corridors with rooms on either side. A huge lobby with desks and stairs leading down and up.

Further the downstairs area was empty and they both looked towards the stairs down where they believed the wraiths probably would be hiding.

Back where the group where hiding they held a council. As the wraiths seemed to prefer the darkness they all assumed they would be downstairs. Further they also had a feeling it would not take too long before they would realize that the two dead ones where missing.

Tura took some time and opened up one of the dead wraiths, trying to understand just what manner of creature they where. With her knife she managed to cut the wraith open as well, and she really could not see much more then that they looked like very skinny people albeit filed teeth and sharp claw like fingers.

With no time really to waste the rest of the group had set up in a sort of ambush hiding behind the desks in the lobby with protection from whatever may be down below.

Whispering they decided to first have someone quickly sneak upstairs and look around, before they dared to venture into the darkness. Zed was chosen together with Ploink to go up.

Silently they snuck through the rooms upstairs one by one, until in one of the rooms they found a black case which seemed closed and very practical to carry. Ploink was quite excited when she went up to investigate and managed to bump the table it was lying on so hard that the rotten old thing just broke and the whole thing tumbled to the floor with a loud crash!

The sound was so loud that everyone downstairs heard it, and soon after they also heard sounds from below the stairs!!

Asphalt and Nash both took to the front, weapons at the ready, Nash took some time to change his skin into a more scaly and protective one while Asphalt just hefted his gigantic ax.

Then they came! Short and furtive, carrying spears they came running up the stairs and straight into the group.

The combat was short and furious! The wraiths proved weak fighters and not so very many actually – only six of them. They managed to stab Nash but not really do any serious damage whilst arrows, gunshots and the two crushers axes made short work of the group. Seconds later when Zed and ploink came running down there where blood and gore and dead zone wraiths littering the area.

“Okay what to do now”? Someone asked. “There must be more of them, Kara described it as dozens” someone else said. “Do we just run down there, its freaking dark?”

There was a discussion for a while, and after some time they also started to hear noises from below, scraping ones and heavy bouncing sounds.

Unsure of what was going on down there they decided to wait…

Very nice!

(sorry for the delay, new job and long vacation before that)

anyway,.....




After some time the noises subsided and there was silence, now and then sounds where heard below but nothing more then soft scurrying and similar.

Whispering Tura, Zed and Lego discussed what to do, and it was agreed that because these creatures seemed fairly week the best thing was to just storm them rather than to wait them out. Food was short anyway and so very much time they did not have.

So they started signaling everyone, and eventually all where ready – Weapons high they moved to the left stair, Bruisers first and then the rest.

That everyone where nervous where visible but suddenly the two bruisers started screaming war cries – and they charged! The whole group followed them down at a running pace!


A few torches where held high behind the bruisers, but other then that it was very dark – the room entered. Countours showed that on both sides where doorways leading away, btu that the room entered where very large.

The room where barricaded halfway with couches, tables and other various furniture and further behind a large bar provided good cover also.


Tura got an arrow off towards a creature hiding behind the couches – a lucky headshot which took it out! Then the creatures reacted to the invading mutants, and especially horrific was the effect of the one behind the bar holding an AK5! Bullet after full auto bullet crashed into the two bruisers leading the advance!

Bullet ridden and bloody both bruisers where broken, tumbling down the stairs to land with meaty crashes on the ground below. Zed where hit by a slingshot but still sent his dog to attack one of the creatures. Someone screemed “kill the one with the gun!!”

The fight was chaotic! Flames did his thing – flames shot off his fingertips and grilled one of the enemy. Lego did not want to be outdone and belched forth a cloud of flame setting several of them afire. Bullets wizzed and arrows flew. Ploink got hit by several stones and went down to her knees, almost broken from the pain, and Lego also got severely injured by hitting weapons.

It was a desperate fight with people falling on all sides.

Soon Tura was alone with only Flames and a half dead Ploink standing, and still five of the cannibalistic creatures standing. Fortunately for all the one with the assault rifle ran out of bullets and now threatened with it used as a club.

Tura realizing the desperate situation, seeing all her friends lying dying or dead around her got a brilliant idea – she turned on the lights! Suddenly all of the lamps long dead in the room lit up, the room bathed in light!

The creatures broke, already on the edge the hated light, oh so sharp – stinging in their eyes was enough to panick them! They all started running away.

Tired, maintaining the illusion was not easy, Tura pointed with her bow and fired one arrow into the back of a running thug “kill them quickly!!!” she screemed.

The one with an arrow in his back managed to limp into the corridor followed by another two. The last stumbling towards the darkness and the corridor where caught by flames, who – using his long knives – made short work of them.

Ploink staggered after the fleeing ones, and shot one of them just before he fled into the darkness – the shot hit squarely in the back, killing it instantaneously.

Furtively Ploink staggered into the hallway where the creatures where fleeing, flames coming running from behind. The hallway was very dark – the illusion of light did not reach it and soon she felt herself getting nervous stopping, pistol held high and trembling.

The spear came from nowhere, and it juuust missed her throat – suddenly one of the creatures appeared very close! The gun went off and it was quiet again.

Ploink stood still in the darkness, seeing nothing. She was waiting for the last one to put a spear through her but unable to see anything…

Then there was a spark, and flames came closer with a torch held high – behind him Tura also approached, bow at the ready.

The light fell on two prone figures, one dead by Ploinks shot and one dead by the arrow. Tura smiled and mumbled “the spider poison….” Having used on of the arrows dipped in poison from the spider she encountered in their first foray.


What followed was grueling work. Together the group did their best, patching up first Lego and then having Lego patch up everyone else. Fortunately Lego was a very experienced healer and did a fantastic job in the dank and dark area – unfortunately it was not enough for poor Nash, he passed away – simply too injured from the direct hits he took shielding the group.

A quick search of the building showed that there was really nothing of value that they could reach here, the doors where metal and shut with no visible lock. They decided that zed should keep the assault rifle as he seemed the best shot.

They dragged Nash out for a funeral pyre which was kept quick. They then made camp for the night in one of the adjacent buildings as they feared for further creatures and simply found it nasty to sleep close to all the corpses.

Fifth session

(Tura, Ploink, Lego, Zed, Asphalt, Flames)



Dawn came quickly, the group very tired after the troubles of the last night.

The morning passed with the group splitting up to search the area more thoroughly. There where engine halls with much interesting equipment for Ploink, there where also the large shipyard where the two gigantic ships lay. Both half sunk into the muddy water, and corroded and even overgrown with weeds and algae.

Ploink went through the engine halls, and found several rolls of grey tape, which she was very happy with. Tura took Zed for help and built a small smoking cabin to try to smoke fish, this went fairly fast because of the multitude of metal plates and the new and handy duct tape from Ploink. Then they went fishing.

The rest of the group investigated first all the other buildings, finding various junk items but nothing overly exciting. They then proceeded to go through the two large ships.

It took a bit of time to enter them because they where so slimy and slippery but eventually they got onto the deck. There they searched for a while but disappointingly they met with metal plate doors blocking the entrance to the ships. The interesting part being that they both had small black buttons with blinking red lights next to them. – Some type of lock mechanism.

They hammered it and tried various tools but eventually gave up. They needed something else to get in here.


In the end it took them the whole day and during the evening the fish smoked and throughout the night. They took guard and stayed one more night before continuing.

In the morning most of the fish, which had been hanging on hooks, had fallen off into the ground – smoked far too long – and unfortunately therefore was spoiled. There was a small crisis meeting as this meant food supplies was dwindling. In the end the decision went for moving on – trying to be quick about it and move further because sitting here and possibly failing fishing was deemed too risky and not helping them in their set task.

They left while it was still very early in the morning, following the coastline west and south.

The setup was Tura and Zed up in the front and the rest more or less spread out behind them about 20 yards or so after.

The military setup continued, with many concrete buildings of different sizes but very organized looking in placement. The whole place remained fenced in – it looked like most of this sector was part of the military compound.

They only came some meters into the sector when both Tura and Zed noticed smoke rising from the south west. Lights also shone clearly from there now that it still was the dark of early morning around. The place from where the smoke rose was also shining in green and red lights.

Again a short discussion, then Lego decided that one person sneaking in from the north was not going to be seen if moving slowly on the belly creeping up. Zed was chosen and he got Tura’s flashlight for the mission. (Lego used inspiration)


Zed crept up until he got a good look at the place. It was a very fortified area as large as a about half the ark. It had great walls of concrete all along it with an opening which was closed by a metal gate. It had all the visuals of being current and not only leftovers from the ancient civilization. Skulls and rottening heads where hanging on hooks on places, and Zed could see that along the walls two women where patrolling, both carrying rifles.

There where no windows and openings in the wall at all, and behind the gates you could not see much more then into some kind of room, so Zed could not really get much of an idea of what would be in there. After watching the rounds for a couple of minutes, he returned to the group and told them what he had seen.

After discussing the group decided not to tempt fate. Especially Tura and Ploink had memories from the people they had to kill earlier, and did not want a similar run in. they decided to try to sneak past the compound.

This proved very easy, several big buildings, completely intact, blocked the line of sight to the guards, and by moving in small groups from building to building they all managed to sneak by southwards.

Soon they left the sector, continuing onwards further south.

The sector they entered was dominated by a large lake, extremely clear water which here and there created a tiny bit of mist covered most of it, with in the middle of the lake a large island covered in buildings with a very distinct factory look. There where cisterns, huge pipes and large chimneys, as well as large flat buildings, and in the center some higher ones – looking like someone stacked some glass boxes there.

On the shoreline dozens of quite large crabs scattered and ran into small holes in the sand at noticing the group.

Tura and Zed, followed by the rest, stayed squatting behind rubble where they could watch the plant, they looked at each other.

“The tracks lead this way, I am sure” Zed murmured softly.

“It is looking fairly whole, like it is being maintained in some way… and I see some type of manholes here and there spread around it where people can come up I guess…” Tura said.

After looking a bit longer she added: “there are some very large pipes where perhaps you could enter the place without going over the island it self…”

She was about to continue when suddenly from one of the huge chimneys a massive dark shadow moved, an enormous black birdlike creature with a wingspan so enormous that it could easily lift a mutant and carry it away. The whole group froze until it became clear that it was not interested in them – it flew north, either it had not seen them or it did not care.

“Shiet” Lego said ”we cannot paddle across here … we’d be sitting ducks”