Sovereigns game
A fragment of the Garden of Remembering
The Job
The job: heist, some item/artifact
- held by powerful folks with lots of resources in vaults/with securtiy, need to infiltrate things, can get in past open floors of museum/casino/staging area/whatever
- folks might be the Magi, but probably aren't, because that would really complicate things later and also they really like keeping things in-house and thus would be rather hard to infiltrate. Probably some random other gang or corporation, or an operation by a specific bureau.
- have plan for getting past security, need to get crew/get rest of crew back from random holidays or out of prison or another totally random job they were already doing, or stuff, and figure out the details of everything else
- job is kind of sudden and high priority and they need to beat anyone else there
The opening: planning and all the stuff to actually do the heist
- They do the heist. They make it in. There's some unnecessary drama about all the over the top security, and some conflict with head of security guy.
- The item is already gone, head of security guy shows up absolutely pissed and everyone expects him to arrest them, but then he turns out to have been their totally adorable mechanic Khalemi, and their other inside source all along. Is absolutely pissed that she fucked up the security, because she was actually trying to make it good specifically so this wouldn't happen. Everyone is a bit surprised, because the security guy was actually some pretty good acting on her part, and also why was it a guy?!
Ensue: the plot. Hunting down the folks who stole the item. It's important, yo. Brains of their opperations, criminal mastermind Cithandra, won't say why, but it is, and they need to get it back. Things go sideways at some point. Comnen, usual point guy, talky person, swagger and all that, gets taken out of the running, and Cithandra has to take direct control of everything and more than being a general mastermind, turns out to be really, really scary as direct boss. Also really suave and sophisticated. But scary-like.
Somehow they get Comnen back. Hijinks ensue throuhout. Sokar does his thing taking random side jobs all the way through, which turns out to be a really good cover at least two times in a row when security people ask them just what the fuck they're doing here.
Ending: they get the item.
- Item is a key to a vault of scary group ..., which they open, and find... an alien girl?!
- Having no idea what the hell else to do, they take her with them as they head out into the stars for their next adventure.
- Also said alien girl probably wasn't at all what Cithandra was expecting either, but whatever.
Setting organisations
Somewhere in the background there's references to at least some of the three main scaries, which may or may not show up as clients hiring the crew at some point or other:
- The United Worlds, the massively bureaucratic galactic republic where everything mostly just goes through random bureaus regardless of what the politicians from all the random systems actually say
- The Magi, a quasi-religious guild of space wizards that basically force all magic-capable people they find to either join them or die (or maybe just be cut off from the magic, which is also horrible for them?)
- The ... which turns out to be this horrible mysterious organisation that experiments on monsters (aliens) for reasons, and is a good chunk of why so many of the aliens are humanoid (or elven?), because they actually started out as humans/elves or were previously much more alien and then engineered into hybrids. This is definitely not commonly known and will not come up for awhile. Is probably known as a major source of biotech through some front, and is in fact possibly really only known for that at all, publicly.
- Probably run by a group of dark wizards, or something.
Other random groups that occur:
- Citheldryn: a myserious organisation that has embassies on random planets and isn't entirely clear what its purpose is, where it came from, or anything. Also very unclear where any of their money, of which they seem to have a lot, comes from. Is generally suspected of just paying off the UW bureaucracy to ignore them.
- Syndicate: a major crime guild that somehow has never actually been connected to any crimes, officially. But everyone knows they do crime. They do crime.
- The Right People: not exactly a group so much as just random people who think the UW/Magi, in particular, are dumb, and do their own thing. Gnerally includes any gangs/other unlawful factions not actively at war with each other, as well as quite a few underground non-Magi wizards. Syndicate is not really a part of this, but sometimes involved.
- Various other guilds, gangs, corporations, cabals, and planets doing various things throughout
- The border worlds, which may or may not have any seat in the UW itself, and often go totally ignored by its bureaus/forces, and thus may wind up really doing their own things
Crew
- Comnen - probably actually owns the ship, boss as far as everyone is concerned, prefers smuggling jobs but also has history as a merc and will do heists etc if someone else figures out the details. Presents himself as a ball of swagger and confidence, and puts all this swagger and confidence to use to hold the crew together, along with just generally being awesome.
- Cithandra - suave, sophisticated, and above all, absolutely gorgeous and elegant criminal mastermind behind a lot of the jobs, sometimes tells the crew the full plan, sometimes... not. Also generally doesn't actually come across as particularly criminal or mastermind, and usually just suggests random things offhand, and then finances random parts of it, as the rest of them put the details of the operation together...
- Overtly, she's just this rich lady who hired the ship to take her with and finances them because she was bloody bored.
- Sokar - main pilot, keeps taking on these totally ridiculous side jobs whenever they get to a new system, much to everyone's annoyance. Possibly turns out that this tendency was precisely why Cithandra hired him.
- Khalemi - medic, tech handler in general, bot operator, very good with security systems and distributed operations, completely lost whenever she has to do anything hands-on. Also apparently a pretty good actor... when acting a man. Can't act out other women for the life of her.
- Jonas - some sort of 'public relations'
- Torkora Ma - wanton thief, possibly another sort of 'public relations'
- Nissa - young underworld wizard with a very peculiar view of how magic works, uses it to fix random stuff, very nonchalant about absolutely everything, with a particular skill for going completely unnoticed as she just walks right into pretty much anything unquestioned
Several of them really don't get along with each other, but do have the professionalism to keep overtly expressing it to a miniumum while actually doing the job (well, usually). Will get very annoyed when they have to fix things for each other, but generally make a point of doing it precisely so the other survives/makes it out/whatever so they can actually berate them about it...
Screenplay?
NISSA
There's a magus here.
(she gestures in a direction)
Somewhere thataway. We should be careful.
SOKAR
How do you tell?
NISSA
They're practically glowing with power.
Sokar gives her a sudden, worried look.
NISSA
Oh, don't worry. They're very bad at what they do, totally uncontrolled, so it's really easy to sense them. I'm much better than that.
SOKAR
If you say so, kid.
JONAS
Shit, how old are you, anyway?
NISSA
Mmm, I dunno. Maybe 10ish?
JONAS
What...
(turning and yelling toward Comnen)
BOSS! The kid is really a kid!
COMNEN
(showing up)
Yeah? So?
JONAS
So... she's like, really, really young!
Nissa just smiles, looking vaguely cute.
COMNEN
Yes...?
JONAS
Like... a kid. Why're we puttin' a kid in all these... situations?
NISSA
Is it really you putting me in these situations? Is it?
COMNEN
She's a fucking squid, man. They're weird.
He turns and leaves.
JONAS
But... but...
NISSA
(now looking a bit annoyed)
Squid. Yes, that is... exactly...
SOKAR
I got us a new job.
COMNEN
What... the fuck?
KHALEMI
...again?
TORKORA MA
Are we stealing something?
SOKAR
Naw, naw, this is just a strict pick up, drop off.
TORKORA MA
You say that like that's not exactly how stealing things works...
KHALEMI
What's the catch?
SOKAR
No catch, just passengers.
COMNEN
How is that not a catch?!
We're already sitting on stolen cargo, and we still have to catch up...
KHALEMI
Yeah, that does sound a biiit dodgy.
CITHANDRA
And passengers will be a very nice way to ensure nobody checks for stolen cargo when we stop off. Isn't that right?
SOKAR
Uh... is it?
The passengers turn out to be: two magi and a kid, a priest, a random couple, and three guys they're all mildly certain would also fall among the Right People.
Comnen glares at Sokar.
COMNEN
These are the passengers you managed to come up with?!
SOKAR
You know, maybe I am starting to think this wasn't such a good idea.
NISSA
Well, I'm going to need to be careful.
COMNEN
What exactly happens if you aren't?
NISSA
Depends.
COMNEN
On?
NISSA
Depends.
(quietly)
We might need that priest.
SOKAR
...what for?
Old stuff
Possibly some stuff that happens later...
