TOPIC: R3: La Guerre des Mondes - Discussion Thread

Sorry, I was only at work until three, so I had to condense the write-up to finish before I left. I might also have done some actual work too.

EDIT: In-Seine. Groan. But still worth a benny tonight.

La Guerre des Mondes – Part Seven

Having survived the river crossing, the royalists are now on the same side of the Seine as their destination; the University of Paris, where one Professor Ogilvy holds the key to contacting the mysterious Gentlemen in Black.

“If he’s still alive.” Rugue added, unhelpfully.

Andre takes the lead, as he is the only member of the group to have attended (and subsequently been exiled from) the university. The most direct route to their destination is blocked by flaming debris, so the group are forced to take a more circuitous path.

“Wait, I recognise this street,” Jacques said, “We’re not far from the Place de la Revolution. We should go check if we can find any sign of the King.”

“We can’t risk taking the Queen into danger!” Lisette hissed.

“You and the others go ahead,” Rugue said, “Jacques and I will head over to the Place de la Revolution and catch up with you at the university.”

---

Andre, Lisette, Marcel and the Queen continued on, creeping through the empty, snow-buried streets. A crude, hastily erected barricade blocked the road ahead, from the top of which fluttered a burning flag of the Revolution. From the other side of the barricade wafted the smell of cooked meat. Despite their reservations, the royalist’s bellies began to rumble; over 24 hours had passed since their last meal of prison slops at the Square du Temple.

“You at the barricade listen to this!” Marcel called, “No-one is coming to help you to fiiiiight! You’re on your owwwwn! You have no friends! Throw dowwwwwn – your arms or die!”

No response. Apparently the rebels hadn’t seen Les Miserables.

Warily, Marcel edged closer and began to climb the barricade. Scrambling over the top, Marcel immediately realized why the revolutionaries had not been able to answer. They were all dead; burnt to a crisp in fact, with expressions of shock frozen upon their flame blackened skulls. Slowly, it dawned on the executioner where the smell of cooked meat was coming from.

“Come up – carefully!” Marcel called down to the others, “Your Majesty, you may wish to avert your gaze, there are more bodies in the street. It’s not pretty.”

As Andre and Lisette helped the Queen scale the barricade, Marcel spotted a swarm of metal spheres rolling into the street behind them. No one sphere was any larger than a balle de tennis, but there were a LOT of them – and they were picking up speed…!

“Forget careful, climb fast!” Marcel yelled.

---

Several blocks away, Jacques and Rugue had reached the edge of the Place de la Revolution; the large, open square where King Louis XVI had been scheduled to be executed before a crowd of thousands. The executioner’s scaffold still stood, but the crowd had dispersed when the Martian’s attacked. Many bodies still littered the flagstones, blasted into a bloody mess by the powerful lasers mounted on the invader’s flying ships. While devoid of humanity, the Place de la Revolution was teeming with Martians. UFO ferried squads of Martian infantry down from the mothership hanging overhead, so huge that it cast half of the city in shadow. Jacques and Rugue crouched behind an overturned cart, watching the alien activity with mounting trepidation.

“Any sign of the King?” Jacques asked.

“Nope, maybe we should check in the basket?” Rugue suggested, pointing to the guillotine.

“The blade is still raised,” Jacques observed, “The King must have gotten away before the Jacobins could behead him. I don’t think we can get any closer without being spotted, we should head back and re-join the others.”

To be continued….

La Guerre des Mondes – Part Eight

Back on the rebel barricade, Marcel snatched up the smouldering flag and flung it at the swarm of approaching shockspheres. Several of the metallic balls flashed red and attached to the flagpole, discharging a deadly electric shock. The rest of the spheres hit the barricade like a wave – reaching higher and higher as more balls joined the swarm.

“Up there!” Marcel called, boosting Marie Antoinette up and through an open window in the wall of an adjacent building. The house looked to provide cheap accommodation for students at the university, the Queen landed awkwardly in a small, communal kitchen. Marcel, Andre and Lisette clambered up after her and pulled the shutters closed behind them.

“Those balls are magnetic,” Andre explained, “Look for something we can use to distract them!”

In the attic of the house, Marcel found a battered suit of plate mail covered by a dusty sheet. Muscular arms bulging with exertion, he carried the heavy armour to the kitchen window and dropped it into the street.

CLANG! BANG! CLATTER! CRASH!

Attracted to the metal, the Martian shockspheres rolled away from the house the royalists were hiding inside, creating an opportunity to escape.

---

When the royalists reached the university, Jacques and Rugue were there waiting for them. They shared their findings from the Place de la Revolution and everyone concurred that it did appear that the King of France lived – although his current whereabouts remained a mystery.

Rugue scouted ahead, looking for any signs that the Martians might have beaten them to the professor. Turning a corner, he came face-to-hairy-face with a pack of wild dogs gnawing on the bones of a bright green skeleton. The dogs growled menacingly, advancing on the lone royalist. Fortunately, the rest of the party came to Rugue’s rescue, shouting and banging their weapons together to create a frightful racket. The dogs yelped and scampered away in surprise.

“Thanks for the assist, guys,” Rugue said, “But I thought we were trying to be quiet?”

“Ackack? Ack! Ackackack!”

A squad of Martians appeared, investigating the commotion. The aliens were escorting a pair of human prisoners, who cowered pitifully as their captors opened fire on the noisy royalists. The party manage to defeat the patrol and rescue the prisoners, who turn out to be students at the university. When asked about Professor Ogilvy, they revealed that the Martian’s rounded up all of the teachers several hours ago and took them to the lecture theater.

The doors into the lecture theater were closed. Pressing his ear to the wood, Rugue heard the familiar barking of Martians on the other side.

“I’ve got a plan,” Marcel said, clearing his throat, “Ack! Ackackack! Ackack!”

A moment later, the door opened and a curious Martian popped his head out to correct the executioner’s poor pronunciation. Marcel grabbed the alien and enclosed it within a bone-crushing hug.

“Urkurk!”

While Marcel manhandled his Martian, the rest of the royalists rushed into the lecture theatre to rescue Professor Ogilvy – but they were too late! The professor’s body lay limp and lifeless on the stage, as a pair of Martian surgeons transplanted his severed head onto the body of a dog! It seemed Ogilvy was not their first patient, as a half-dozen hybrids (human bodies/dog heads) attacked the group, scrambling around clumsily on all fours. One locked its jaws around Lisette’s neck and would have torn her throat out had Marcel not roared in his most commanding voice; “Mauvais chien! Sieger!”

Jacques demonstrated himself to be a formidable opponent, dangerous with a sword and deadly with a blaster – which is probably why the Martian Commander targeted him for mental domination. Levitating invisibly above the stage, the psionic alien turned his irresistible will upon the musketeer captain.

“What’s wrong?” Rugue asked, noticing his friend’s befuddled expression.

“Ackackack!” Jacques replied, raising his blaster and unloading the death ray into Rugue’s face, “Ackack! Ack!”

Rugue de la Pumpernickel collapsed, incapacitated by Jacque’s apparent treachery.

“Look there!” Andre cried, noticing the faint outline of the Martian Commander floating above his human puppet. The young scientist raised his own blaster and opened fire, blasting several large holes in the psionic wildcard. Its swollen braincase exploded outward, showering the royalists with green goo and shimmering skull fragments.

“What’s this?” Andre asked, picking a large piece out of the Queen’s hair, “Some sort of crystal skull?”

To be continued….

La Guerre des Mondes – Part Nine

Stepping over the Martian corpses strewn across the lecture theatre, the royalists approached the raised stage, where the headless body of Professor Ogilvy lay in state. Half sobbing, half retching, Lisette forced herself to turn away from the gristly tableau. Marcel approached, noticing that the smell of decay had barely begun to gather around the dead man. Ogilvy could not have been dead for more than an hour.

“Pardon moi monsieur, would you mind letting me out of this cage? I really could do with a good, long walk.”

Marcel spun around in surprise, groping for his axe. Stacked against the wall was a pyramid of metal crates, each one containing a strange hybrid. Whereas the royalists had previously battled men with the heads of beasts, the severed human heads had in turn been attached to the bodies of dogs! The hybrids all began talking at once, clearly the royalists had found the missing faculty.

“Might one of you… fellows… be Professor Ogilvy?” Marcel asked.

“Oui! Bonjour! That would be moi!” answered the creature who had originally spoken, “Shush Anton, he’s talking to me! Did you have a question about unorthodox meteorology?”

---

Progessor Ogilvy led the party to the observatory (pausing twice to mark his territory) and showed them how to access the secret entrance to the secret GIB base beneath the university. The royalists crowded into a small room and began descending through the earth’s crust via a complex system of weights and counterweights that only Andre would have been able to appreciate.

The lift doors slid opened, revealing a cavernous hangar, brightly illuminated by a cold, sterile light. Dominating the centre of the space was a partially reconstructed UFO; the same craft the royalists had last seen burning in a field outside Varennes. A pair of legs, garbed in black hose, pocked out from beneath the alien vessel.

“Bounjour?” Marcel said uncertainly.

“Agghhhh!” cried the man attached to the protruding limbs, banging his head against the underside of the ship, “Who’s there?”

The UFO mechanic slipped out from underneath the ship, rubbing his bruised skull and eyeing the party suspiciously. His eyes fell upon the Queen and bulged with the shock of recognition. Then he spotted Professor Ogilvy and emitted a most unmasculine shriek.

“Eeeeeee! What is that? Who are you people – well, not you, Your Majesty, but the rest of you? How did you get down here?”

“We’re looking for the Monsieur F,” Marcel explained patiently, “Martians have invaded France and we thought he might be able to help us find the King.”

“Monsieur F retired last month. My name is Monsieur G. Wait, you mean you’ve lost the King?”

“We’ve… misplaced him.” Marcel answered evasively, “Temporarily.”

“We think the Martians might have captured him.” Lisette added helpfully.

“Wait, what Martians?” queried Monsieur G, “Don’t be ridiculous, the chances of anything coming from Mars are a million to one.”

“But still they come!” cried Andre.

---

Monsieur G led the royalists through a warren off whitewashed tunnels, terminating in a small room full of metal pipes. Each one had a brass plaque attached, denoting various landmarks across the city.

“We call them periscopes,” Monsieur G explained, pressing his face against the pipe labelled ‘Place de la Revolution’, “Using a network of mirrors, we can bounce an image from almost anywhere in the city into this room. Now let’s have a look at these ‘so called’ Martians…..”

Monsieur G peered into the periscope, slowly rotating in a 360’ arc as he adjusted his field of view.

“Sacre bleu!” he exclaimed, “They’re everywhere! Look at the size of the mothership! If the Martians have the King, that’s where they’ll be holding him.”

“But how can we get up there?” Marcel asked.

“I have an idea!” answered Monsieur G, “There were two brothers at the university, Joseph and Jacques Montgolfier. They were developing a prototype flying machine called a ‘balloon’. If you could find the brothers – or their notes – we could build this machine and use it to reach the Martian mothership and rescue King Louis! I’ll stay here and try to locate the Montgolfiers, you should get some rest and familiarize yourselves with the layout of the facility.”

---

The royalists spent the next two weeks preparing to take the fight to the Martians. Rugue and Lisette spent most of that time suspended in a vat of glowing yellow slime that Monsieur G called a Lethe Chamber. The crippling/disfiguring wounds they had sustained since escaping the Square du Temple were miraculously healed after being submerged in the alien gel. Andre and Ogilvy busied themselves adapting a Martian blaster to emit a sonic attack powerful enough to shatter stone – pausing only to take the Professor for walkies. Marcel found the desiccated cadaver of the Martian from the farmhouse incident two years ago and the amateur anatomist had a great time poking around in the alien’s dusty entrails.

“He’s like a kid in a candy shop,” Andre observed to Ogilvy one day, “A really disgusting candy shop.”

Jacques did not do much of anything as his player was absent this week.

To be continued….

La Guerre des Mondes – Part Ten

Fourteen days after stumbling upon the Paris branch of the GIB, the royalists were finally ready to return to the surface and start looking for the brothers Montgolfier. After their dunk in the lethe chamber, Rugue and Lisette were fully recovered – and yet strangely altered. Lisette’s skin (horribly burnt by a Martian heat ray) had healed smooth and pink, but her hair had regrown with a curious blue tinge to it; and while Rugue’s wounds had closed, the resultant scar seemed to move around his body like a burrowing worm.

“I’ve located the Montgolfier brothers,” Monsieur G advised, having summoned the royalists to the briefing room, “Joseph Montgolfier has been apprehended by the Jacobins and is being detained within the Bastille. The fortress is under siege by the Martians but I don’t know how they’ve managed to hold out this long. Jacques Montgolfier was rounded up by a Martian patrol and has been taken to the slaughter yard district on the other side of the river, along with most of their other human prisoners. I’m not sure what they’re up to, but it cannot be good.

“I’ve also identified a few side quests that you might be interested in. A group of human survivors calling themselves ‘les bâtards’ have been attacking Martian outposts across the city. If you can make contact with their leader, they might be prepared to aid you with manpower or equipment. Also, since you arrived here, the Martians have introduced an virulent red weed to the ecosystem. It’s spreading like wildfire and chokes the river with crimson creepers. The source of the blight seems to be the Royal botanical gardens near the palace, if you can infiltrate the greenhouse and collect a sample, I can synthesize a toxin to kill the weed. Traversing the streets will be dangerous due to Martian patrols and low flying UFO, you might have better luck moving around unmolested if you use the network of catacombs beneath the city, the one entrance I know of is below Notre-Dame cathedral.

“Finally, if you manage to capture any Martian prisoners or alien technology, you can bring them back here for further study.”

The royalists decided to head for the Bastille and rescue Joseph Montgolfier from the clutches of the Jacobins. Hopefully, they could convince the revolutionaries to set their old grudges aside and work together; Frenchmen vs Martians. Leaving the university, the royalists immediately noticed a dense, green fog covering the city.

“It appears the mothership is pumping methane into the atmosphere,” Andre explained, “It’s not harmful to humans, although it won’t be pleasant to breathe. They must be doing that to make the environment more comfortable for their own kind.”

“It’s like trying to suck air through a cow’s arse,” Rugue added with all his usual charm and eloquence.

Forewarned that the Bastille was under siege, the party decided to sneak under the Martian cordon by accessing the Paris catacombs. Notre-Dame stood upon an island in the center of the Seine and all of the bridges had been destroyed.

“I don’t like our chances in the water,” Marcel said warily. The red weed writhed below the surface of the river like the tentacles of a giant squid.

“I’ve got an idea!” said Rugue, scampering over to the charred ruins of one of the many little cafes that had lined the waterfront in happier times. Breaking the legs off the stout wooden tables, Rugue was able to fashion a pontoon bridge across to the cathedral. The royalists crossed quickly, as the red weed thrashed at their legs.

Approaching Notre-Dame, the royalists noted that a number of large crucifixes had been erected outside the cathedral. Pathetic figures moaned and writhed upon their crosses, their hands and feet nailed to the wood. Tendrils of red weed had already begun to climb the crucifixes and and around the victim’s legs.

“We have to get these poor people down!” Marcel decided, sinking his axe into the base of the nearest cross. Wood splintered and the red weed spurted bloody sap across his chest. The rest of the royalists spread out and prepared to catch the crucifix as it toppled.

“Timber!!!” Marcel cried as the cross began to fall.

The doors of Notre-Dame groaned open and a mob of turbulent priests spilled forth from the depths of the cathedral. At their head came a large, muscular parson, his eyes bright with the wild fire of fanaticism.

“Why are you aiding these demons?” the pastor demanded.

“They’re not demons, they’re people!” Lisette cried.

“I don’t believe it is so!” the parson howled, “Didn’t I warn them this would happen? Be on guard, I said – for the evil one never rests! I said exorcise the devil! But no, they wouldn’t listen and the demons inside them grew and grew – until Satan gave his signal and destroyed the world we knew!”

“That’s enough of that noise,” Lisette said primly, flashing the deranged cleric with the neuroliser that Monsieur G had handed her as she left the GIB base, “These are not demons, they are people and you are going to tell your grubby minions to help get them down immediately!”

“These are not demons…” the pastor repeated gormlessly, “Get them down.”

Working together, the group managed to rescue four of the five victims when an alien screech rent the air.

UUUUUUUULLAAAAAAAAAAAA!

“Listen!” the pastor cried, “Do you hear them drawing near in their search for the sinners? Feeding on the power of our fear and the evil within us?”

Lisette flashed him with the neuroliser again.

“Get everyone into the cathedral!” Marcel yelled, “We’ll cut down the last cross and carry it inside.”

A Martian fighting machine entered the plaza, flagstones shattering beneath its tripod legs. It raised its funnel and an invisible wave of heat washed over the party. The last cross burst into flame like dry kindling and the man affixed to it began to scream. Rugue aimed the sonic blaster at the cockpit of the fighting machine and fired, shattering the tough, alien glass. The Martian pilot howled in frustration as it was showered with broken shards. Remembering that Professor Ogilvy had warned them that the Martian power cores could explode at any time, Marcel ejected the core from his own weapon and tossed it into the exposed cockpit.

BOOM!!

The fighting machine collapsed as bloody pieces of its pilot rained down on the royalists. Using one of the fallen crucifixes as an impromptu ladder, Andre clambered into the smoking cockpit to salvage whatever was still intact. Unfortunately, the explosion had destroyed the controls for maneuvering the fighting machine. Fortunately, it had not detonated the much larger power core within the tripod.

To be continued….

La Guerre des Mondes – Part Eleven

Still muddled by repeated flashes from Lisette’s neuroliser, Parson Nathaniel helpfully escorted the royalists into the dank crypts below the cathedral. Clutching tall candlesticks that dribbled hot wax onto their hands, the party passed between rows of dark tombs until they reached a sturdy gate securing the entrance to the catacombs. The parson extracted a large key from the depths of his musty vestments and unsealed the iron portal.

“These tunnels will take you all over the city,” Nathaniel advised, “But you should tread with caution. The catacombs connect to an old limestone mine deep beneath the city. You should fear to go into those mines. The miners delved too greedily and too deep. They awoke something in the darkness… shadow and flame.”

“Don’t make me flash you again!” Lisette warned, brandishing the neuroliser menacingly.

“Anyway, that’s the wrong genre altogether.” Andre muttered.

Leaving Lisette to babysit the mad parson (also, her player was absent this week), the rest of the royalists descended into the catacombs. Hundreds of skulls leered at them from shadowed alcoves in the crumbling walls. Water dripped and trickled from the low ceiling, forming shallow puddles on the ground that the party splashed through on their way towards the Bastille. After several hours wandering in the dark, they reached their destination. Another iron gate obstructed their progress, the rusty bars entwined with thick, red creepers that writhed like a nest of serpents as the royalists approached.

“Everyone get behind me,” said Marcel, pointing the nozzle of his acid-sprayer toward the alien weeds (he claimed this weapon in a random encounter last week that I forgot to mention in the write-up). Gurgling like a blocked toilette, the weapon disgorged corrosive slime in a concentrated arc, melting the metal gate and destroying the Martian weed. Beyond was a small room, containing little more than a rusty ladder. Marcel clambered up and shifted the heavy trapdoor, which opened into the small chapel located within the walls of the Jacobin stronghold. A disheveled soldier in revolutionary colors knelt before the altar, so engrossed in prayer that he failed to notice Marcel rising out of the floor beside him.

“Oh Father, please deliver us from the creatures that besiege our walls,” implored the young soldier, “Grant me the strength to carry the light of Heaven within my heart…..”

Marcel cleared his throat.

“Grant me the fortitude to endure the hard days ahead….”

“Excusez-moi?” Marcel said.

“Grant me the courage to face the hour of my death with dignity and – “

“Hey!” Marcel cried, prodding the kneeling figure with the blunt end of his axe, “I’m talking to you!”

“Intruders!” the young soldier yelled, scrambling for the musket propped against the altar. Marcel tackled him before he got there and the rest of the party helped tie him down to one of the pews.

“We’re not here to harm you,” Marcel told the struggling youth, “Within the Bastille is a prisoner called Joseph Montgolfier; he can help us build a machine to defeat the aliens. Whether we are royalists or rebels, we Frenchmen should be working together against the Martian menace.”

“But I am just a common soldier,” the young man answered uncertainly, “You should really speak to Robespierre.”

“Er…no.” Rugue interjected quickly, remembering their last encounter with the Jacobin leader, “Robespierre is a busy fellow, we don’t need to bother him with this. We’ll just pop inside the fortress, grab our man and be on our way. Robespierre need never know we were here.”

“But Monsieur Montgolfier is an enemy of the Revolution,” the soldier said, “I don’t think the prison guards will just let you take him.”

“That’s why you’re coming with us… comarade.” Jacques said with conspiratorial wink.

To be continued….