Run Synopsis
[As the evening progressed, most of the Players left cardboard characters behind, and Sheryl flailed. We did spend some time figuring out what "minor clue" I left out of the last synopsis, and, eventually, settled on the pile of plaster-of-Paris shards that was found upstairs in the Former Museum.]
The Major took significant injury in the raid on the APS Lost City base and is laid up in the hospital. The Team realizes that it has few other contacts with the Martian military through which more information can be gathered, so we accumulate a list of questions that we can ask via the report that Sam will undoubtedly receive from Martian military, as a courtesy if nothing else.
The borrowed equipment is returned and Lyle arranges to get various components so that he can build six 'scopes for our weapons similar to those we trained with. This will be his project-vs-boredom while shipboard. John wishes Chantal well as she leaves and gives her the device with which he'd gimmicked her Martian car. She is chagrined and not sure whether her opinion of him has gone up or down thereby.
We are to transport one of the several copies of the database Lyle and Robert lifted from the APS base. The others will go by other means of transport. We chhse to take the flight that leaves soonest but has a stop-over at Jupiter before it heads out to StarPort beyond Pluto. The Party essentially restricts itself to cabin. Chantal and Teresa in First Class (as before) and the gentlemen in lower class, also as before. Chantal does use the opportunity to stop in on Robert and question him about the wanted poster she and Teresa and Lyle had seen back at Mars Chevron. Robert denies any culpability in the charge of murder, postulating that that charge would merely better insure his being arrested if apprehended on Mars. He also denies serious industrial espionage, claiming merely to have told off some level of "superiors" at Mars Chevron when he left their employ. Chantal does not find him particularly convincing, but does not have enough information with which she feels she can prolong the questioning. She will have to resort to other means to find such information, she decides.
As the ship approaches Jupiter, Chantal dispatches a couple of messages to her father to apprise him of her visit to the Martian mining complex and to compliment him on his choice of bodyguard for her on Mars. Thus it is not surprising that the ship is met on Jupiter by one of her father's protocol people and a couple of bodyguards. Polite conversation ensues as she is shuttled to her father's office. Her father proceeds to question her doings on Mars and her intent in sending the messages she did. Apparently John's report to his employer included commentary on her proposed Lost Cities expedition and its encountering the Martian military on maneuvers out in the Basin. Chantal tries to explain that that should indicate that she was in no danger with such people looking out for her. She also tries to show - by telling the story of John suspecting her to have rigged her room with Mace and the story of John tossing the Russian paparazzi on the train - how impressed she'd been with John and, thus, why she'd thanked her father for his choice. In point of fact, her father seemed upset enough in general and in her inability to describe what she wants "to do with her life" or to make plans that are useful enough to but into a "business plan" that he doesn't really seem to listen to her at all. Not really listen. And she gets the definite impression that, by liking John Larson, she may well have put a serious crimp in the ex-Lt's career.
This does not get better when she is transferred to her parents' home compound. Her mother seems to be just as worried and just as unable to really listen. Chantal gives u0 and suggests shopping as a distraction; her mother pulls out the latest catalogues from Earth. sigh! The next few days find Chantal dogged by bodyguards [3, I think] and, shopping, home, or researching in the ligrary, is unable to find an effective escape from so many. She finally gives up, using a public phone (in case the home one is tapped by her parents) to contact the Team and let them know that she is, essentially, under house arrest.
The Team manages to divert the bodyguards and spirit Chantal aboard ship, having arranged the records to show that she had boarded some time before she actually did.
EPs: 1, Total 23; none to the cardboard characters. Brownie Pts: 0, Total 7.
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