UST Episode 1: "In the Flesh"
The episode opens with Captain Antonio Ramirez trapped in darkness, something probing his thoughts. We cut from there to the Nautilus on route to the Marrat system where their merchant ships have been turning up Marie Celeste. No crew, but a green slime on stuff. As they discuss about what it could be, sensors pick up a large object (size 12) moving towards them at Warp 15. Since they are to be bait, they hold their course and are approached by a large grey ball with membranes, etc... Scanners detect that it is organic with life signs onboard.
Channels are open, but instead a feedback is shoved through, reaching in intensity (causing the crew to black out with a flash of light). Cut to Ramirez in the darkness again, trying to suss out where he is... flash of light triggers a memory of him not months ago, laying on the deck of his trimaran, sailing off the coast of Africa. The sun shinning past the flapping sail. Then a shuttle comes. On it is his former XO from the Dauntless, Cmdr. Xelona. She tells him that Starfleet has reactivated him and it is time to go. He resists slightly and then goes along, leaving two cadets who know how to sail to bring his ship back to port.
They travel to Spacedock, where he is met by Admiral Wesley (The Commander Starfleet). Wesley dismisses Ramirez's objections and fears about taking command again. He makes a point about how there is a new Starfleet forming. They are already laying the keel of the new experiment... The USS Ambassador. There is even talk of finding a way to bring families on ships in the future and create a new medical division called Counselor. Already he was over ridden and the new Enterprise was given to Captain Harriman, a fine officer but not what Wesley wants. Ramirez is what he wants, someone with a dark mark and a need to prove himself. Ramirez agrees to take command of the Nautilus, but only if he can have Thomas Lowell as his Flight Control officer.
Back on the bridge, the crew has woken up and been joined by Dr. Barnes. Seems the systems are frozen, working but frozen and the Captain is gone. The ship is in the tendrils of this weird ball-ship and the Doctor discovers that they all have little scars at the base of their necks, like a minor surgery has been done. Xelona takes command and orders the crew to get the ship back up and running, then they can attempt to determine the fate of the Captain, though she is pretty sure she knows where he is...
Ramirez in the darkness. There is someone probing his mind. He understands that now. They are scanning his memories... why? Fade to the memory of him arriving at the Auckland penal facility. He is lead by guards to the general population (the yard) where he sees Lowell dicing with some Andorians, who don't like losing and attack him. A minor brawl breaks out, with Lowell taking out one Andorian and Ramirez (by way of the thrown dumbbell) takes out the other. The guards clear the yard, but Lowell and Ramirez are allowed to remain and talk. Ramirez tells Lowell that he has been transferred from the prison to the Nautilus to serve the remainder of the sentence. Lowell is not hard to convince, but isn't happy to learn he will be restricted while onboard, but hey 2 years in space beats 2 years here. They head to the shuttle, join Xelona and head for space...
Back on the Nautilus the crew has learned that the reason nothing will respond is that their ship has been infected with a virus. Also they learn that they had samples taken from the base of their necks, but nothing else has happened to them, and that they were out for 45 minutes. Lowell wants to mount a mission to the weird alien vessel to get the Captain right away. Xelona and Dr. Barnes both agree that charging in would be a mistake. The first priority is to get the ship working. Lt. Sejunder (Sciences) and Barnes are to find a anti-virus and the rest of the crew will help. Once the ship is running, even barely, they will mount the rescue.
Ramirez in the darkness. He can't move. can't scream. The pain... intense... crippling... "What do you want?" "Why won't you talk to me?" His memory flares again and he is taken back to when he first met Dr. Barnes in the sickbay of the Nautilus. The two officers feel each other out, with Ramirez proclaiming that he is not a touchy-feely Captain, and while Starfleet might want to bring in Counselors, he needs a Doctor. Barnes doesn't say much, instead letting the Captain talk, almost like he is analyzing him. Then one o the nurses arrives with a package for the Doctor. A 200 year old bottle of 12 year old Scotch. Barnes explains that he always has one delivered to any new assignment. He pulls out two glasses, but the Captain says "I'm on duty Dr. Better make mine only 2 fingers."
The sensors on the Nautilus are working again. The anti-virus is a success and Dr, Barnes has managed to synthesize enough that they can go get the Captain. Sensors show the Captain in the centre of this massive vessel. Xelona assembles an Away Team, but Tactical officer Porter objects to her going. She acknowledges his concern and then informs him that she will be going all the same. Porter will remain in command and Lowell, Dr. Barnes, Xelona, Security Chief Serovin and one security officer will go on the mission. They now have less than 1 hour until the vessel reaches the Marrat system.
Ramirez is fighting his darkness now. He can feel them taking his memories. Feel them stealing his past. Meeting his crew. His first command. The Genesis War. They are looking for something. Seeking something. Ship. Federation. Earth. They want to know where Earth is! His mind snaps into focus and he awakens. He is naked and suspended by tendrils. "Who are you? Why do you want earth?" The response is a disembodied voice. "we have no name. We are flesh." "We seek your nest world. We shall harvest it." "You won't get the information from me!" Ramirez is defiant, but the flesh seems not to care. "We shall take the location of your nest world hen we harvest your brain." Tendrils shoot towards his head. "NO!" screams Ramirez.
The away team enters the tendrils and moves along into the alien vessel. Passing through sphincters and orifices, they head towards the centre. As they get closers they hit a slope of some kind and the slick juices cause them to slide down. At the bottom, Security Officer Johnson leaps for his rile, but it is swallowed into the organic matter. As he lands, so is he. Then they here the Captain scream "NO!" They rush forward and see the tendrils going for his brain. Dr. Barnes, who has rigged a sprayer of the anti-virus, fires it. With that and phaser fire they cut the Captain down. Dressing him quickly in a space environmental suit, they turn to head back. From out of the floor come weird homunculus creators, including Johnson. "FLESH! FLESH! FLESH!" is echoing around them as they fight their way back towards the ship. But suddenly they realize that they are in trouble, the interior has changed pattern... The way back is gone.
Circling the wagons, they prepare to go down fighting, Lowell beings to contemplate setting his phaser to overload. Thousands of these creatures shuffle towards them. The crew fights hard. Ramirez shoots with one hand and tries to raise the nautilus on his communicator with the other. Suddenly, as their power packs are getting low, a transporter beams envelopes them and they are back on the Nautilus. Dashing to the bridge, they use the ships phasers to detach themselves from the vessel. An in coming communication from Marrat IV tells them that an even larger ship, the mother ship surmises Xelona, is attacking the planet. Ramirez tells them to hold them off, help is on the way
Dropping out of warp in the Marrat system they are amaze to see a size 24 orb (much like the scout ship) in orbit. Tendrils are reaching out from it to the planet below. The scout orb is reabsorbed back into the mother ship. Ramirez tries once to talk the aliens down, promising peaceful contact. In return he is told the story of the flesh. From another dimension, they somehow wound up in this dimension. Now, with so much flesh around, they will harvest enough to open a rift back to their dimension and bring in a harvester and harvest all the flesh! Determined not to let that happen, Ramirez orders the Nautilus into the line of fire and begins attacking the tendrils. Porter determines that the phasers will be no use against that ship, he is not even sure torpedoes will.
Ramirez asks Dr Barnes if the anti-virus could be loaded into a torpedo. Barnes doesn’t see why not. Ramirez orders Chief engineer Fisk to meet Dr. Barnes in the torpedo bay and perform the modifications. tensions mount as the Nautilus fights a holding action, trying to stop as many tendrils as they can. Minutes later they are signaled that the torpedo is ready to go. One last communication comes in "FLESH! FLESH!" as the vessel opens some sort of maw, bgi enough to swallow the Nautilus whole! "Fire!" The torpedo flashes out, heading straight down the throat of this thing and detonates. The explosion is massive and brilliant. The shockwave knocks Nautilus hard and she is left powerless and adrift in the planet’s gravity pull.
With the alien destroyed but the engines offline, the Nautilus has less than 10 minutes until she is pulled burning to the planet below. Xelona suggests a "cold start" of the engines. The chances are they will succeed, destroy themselves or destroy themselves and the planet below. Ramirez asks for the odds. While there is only a slight chance they will destroy the planet, the chance remains. Still he can't do nothing. "Do it." he orders. Xelona heads to engineering to work with Chief Fisk. With only seconds of apogee left, the cold start is initiated. It is a success and they are shot away from the planet at Warp 9. Their speed keeps rising though, Lowell is unable to break their acceleration...
9.5... 10... 10.5... 11... etc... Doing his best, Lowell is able to gain control, but the result is a wormhole. They are traveling at unheard of speeds now and have no idea where they will come out. Using their photon torpedoes they create an antimatter blast that rips the wormhole apart and leaves them adrift. Once sensors are online they are unable to raise any Federation navi-beacons. Lowell does some astrogation and determines that they are one the other side of the Galaxy. 200 years from home. Ramirez calls a meeting for options, and the only one on the table to to try and repeat the experiment and create another wormhole. He dismisses the officers so he can think.
Once alone in the briefing room he sits back down to think. "Captain... Captain... Captain." the voice comes from the end of the table. He looks up to see a beautiful woman there. "My name is Susperia, and I am the one who brought you here."
Narrator’s Notes
So this session is based on the first issue of the Star Trek: The Early Voyages (Flesh of my Flesh) from Marvel Comics. I always liked this issue, based on how things were presented and I though it would make an excellent RPG adventure. Boy was I right.
My players were a bit thrown at first, expecting a more traditional “meet and greet” of the crew. Once the first flashback passed, they started to get it, and that got them right into it.
I was a bit worried since this was our first session in a long-awaited game, but it went without a hitch. The players got into their characters and everything was smooth as silk.
The ending was a tad slap-dash, as it was a reaction to a botched roll and then a story idea presenting itself. I rolled with it, scrambling for another idea I had (which luckily I did) and was able to roll right into episode 2. Since season 1 was is not supposed to be over-arching, but episodic, this was a bit of a deviation, but if it works, don’t fix it.
