Session 5: 1/16/13

BURNING AVARINE!  Shit got real.  I tried taking notes last night as we played until I got too sucked into being angry at Kestrel (+Sara Williamson ) and got distracted.

[LOCKE COLOR] In the aftermath of their confrontation, Locke tells his Vaylen lieutenant not to go after Maris, much to Lt. Quinn's anger and dismay.
[MARIS COLOR] Maris is back in her small cell at the batallion compound, sitting on the edge of her cot and removing her leg brace. She looks at a photograph of Locke on her bookshelf and sadly turns it on its face. She then pulls a leather-bound journal from beneath her bed and searches through it until she finds an old broadsheet for one of Alix' speeches when she was young. She kisses his image.
[KESTREL COLOR] Kestrel looks longingly at a picture of Yvenne, while Wren tells her that their relationship was doomed from the start.
[YVENNE COLOR] Yvenne, in her chambers, looks at a picture of happy times with Kestrel. Then she digs in a box for an image of the Burning Wheel. She stares at it for a while, and then angrily smashes it against a wall.
[CROW CONFLICT] Crow and Phoenix board Kestrel's ship. Crow confronts Kestrel about the relationship with Yvenne. He insists that she marry a man, and a noble - and that he feel that she has built enough of a relationship with the people to rule.  Maris, riding along in her brain, urges her to think of her relationship first, to no avail - Kestrel is more concerned about her position. They argue. Eventually, Kestrel agrees that she will begin to seek an "acceptable" suitor, and Crow that he will gradually support her more as she pursues a better relationship with the people.
[KESTREL INTERSTITIAL] Kestrel confronts Yvenne about going to Crow about their relationship. Kestrel tells Yvenne that, at best, she can be her mistress, and Yvenne caves to Kestrel's insistence that she loves her, but has to put House Tamar first.
[LOCKE INTERSTITIAL] Locke convinces Maris to meet him at Moon Under the Sea.  When she asks him when he killed her lover and took over his body, he reveals that he has inhabited this body since it was a child. This does not horrify her less. He tries to evade her questions, but ultimately will not assure her that he is not part of a plan to devour everyone on Avarine. The best he offers is that he plans to take the planet peacefully and if he doesn't, it will be taken by much more destructive force, but you know what, fuck that guy.
[YVENNE INTERSTITIAL] On the way out of Moon Under the Sea, Thalia convinces Maris to talk with a very drunk Yvenne. Yvenne wants to apologize for rejecting Maris' psychic evidence of Locke's nature before, and support her against him. Maris tries to explain that that's not important - the threat is to human love and connection, and Maris thinks Yvenne should focus on fixing her relationship with Kestrel. I had this whole great monlogue on this but somewhere between the G+ connection and Yvenne being drunk, it got misinterpreted. Boo! Maris sends Yvenne home in her armored vehicle with Delphia, and climbs the crag to the Glass Palace to confront Crow and Kestrel.
[TORRENT BUILDER] Torrent distributes propaganda showing Kestrel with her arm around Yvenne at the party, implying that if even nobles are fucking commoners, THERE ARE NO RULES.
[MARIS CONFLICT] Maris makes tea for Crow, since she's rousted him from bed. They discuss Kestrel - Maris tries to make Crow understand that her adherence to the Mundus is not some matter of partisanship, but that she thinks Crow's very New Horizon-y focus on making things as he wants them to be, rather than taking them as they are, is wrong to do to Kestrel - as it was wrong to do to her as a child. No one appreciates Maris' pain. They argue. Maris, reeling from her confrontation with Locke, ultimately agrees to at least help Crow keep Kestrel safe, by defecting from the Sodality (though not, in her mind, from the Mundus faith, given who the Cotar Fomas is), and putting as many of her battalion as will remain loyal at the disposal of House Tamar, so long as he agrees that he will also take what steps he can to preserve her safety.
[YVENNE BUILDER] Yvenne, in a stroke of money, forges herself some papers showing she's a member of an obscure noble bloodline, and buys her way into one of the Houses.

MANEUVER ROLL: HUMAN TAKE ACTION VS. VAYLEN PIN! METAL!

The humans lacerate the Vaylen, knocking them down 8 (Maris rolled, and has been banking Artha).  The Vaylen nail a shoulda-been-impossible Ob 7 roll to Pin, putting the humans at a -2D disadvantage for next time.

Sodalis loyal to Maris deploy themselves in defense of pro-Kestrel nobles. This confirms the propaganda that the nobles have cast aside the traditions of Avarine in many eyes, and so now House Tamar is pinned down dealing with street protests.

NEXT: Seriously, fuck that guy. Lasers.