Fifth Session Notes

Wow. Despite everything, including the weather and the service changes on the #7 line, this session ran with all players.

The Starkeweather-Moore Expedition had joined forces with the Lexington expedition, although the two expeditions had not thoroughly mingled. Lexington's people were convinced that the SME had been sabotaging their expedition and vice versa. The SME had found a saboteur, but had left him in custody of the authorities in Melbourne. Lexington's expedition showed definite signs of having a saboteur, which meant that now both expeditions had one.

If so, the saboteur has been laying low. Both expeditions sent planes back and forth until everyone had set up near the Lake campsite, the site where the scientist Lake had discovered a cave filled with fantastic fossils. The cave, Lake, the rest of his men, and the dogs had all been lost in a terrible storm. The rest of their expedition had buried everyone except for Gedney, who was never found, and had been very evasive about just what they had found.

But, the SME was determined to uncover everything. And, for a couple of days, the SME people made progress doing just that, while Starkeweather climbed some mountains far away. This made things more pleasant, as Acacia Lexington and James Starkeweather did not get along well at all.

Of course, proper British Professor St. John Pembroke nearly shot Acacia Lexington. Each evening, people would use a radio in a tent to send messages to the papers, and it was understood that people would be given some privacy. Nevertheless, when Lexington remained on the radio late into the night, St. John was curious. He heard what sounded like German, although he could not make out exactly what was being said, and Lexington's photographer, Priestly, stayed by the door.

Damon realized that it would be quite possible to listen in by using another radio. He, Julia, Erica, and Alicia gathered around the other radio and St. John. St. John heard Lexington negotiating with someone for tanks of fuel in return for letting that person's expedition, probably the German Barsemeir-Falken expedition, send people to go over the Miskatonic Mountains in her plane.

St. John, who had very unpleasant memories of the war, grabbed a rifle and strode toward the broadcasting tent. He knocked Priestly to the ground with the butt of the rifle, and went inside, as Alicia ran to get Professor Moore, unsure of what was going on, since St. John had stopped translating.

St. John pointed the rifle at Lexington, who asked if he had gone mad, but moved away from the radio, as instructed. She freely admitted -- well, admitted, anyway -- that she had been talking to the German expedition. She intended to make arrangements to give one or more of the Germans a seat in her plane when she flew over the mountains in return for some of their equipment. Acacia did not see anything wrong with that. The war had been over for years, and she did not like being dependent on Starkeweather's expedition. St. John pointing a rifle at her increased her determination to find other options.

Julia, Erica, and Damon entered the tent behind St. John, and so heard all of this. Moore and Alicia came soon after, and all agreed that, however much they disliked it, they couldn't very well forbid Lexington from working with the Germans or forbid the Germans from landing at Lake's campsite. They weren't happy, and Julia mentioned that someone German had had something to do with the kidnapping of Lexington's friend, Nicholas Roerich. Lexington noted that this could not have been anyone on the BFE expedition.

Meanwhile, people began excavating the Lake camp. They found a cairn with a monument to the dead members of the expedition. Moore said that he wanted to bring the remains home to the families of the deceased, although he didn't expect people to work on doing this until near the time the expeditions were ready to leave the ice. People agreed and sympathized, and Alicia tried to comfort more by giving his shoulder a quick squeeze. (Pamela had asked if hugging Professor Moore would be appropriate, and we figured that it was Right Out for an unmarried female grad student of this era.) No one tried to excavate the cairn.

They also found the cave that Lake had discovered. It was indeed a treasure trove of fossils. Erika found a five sided stone that heated up in the presence of people. She kept it. Alicia found an interesting broken piece of stone, but Professor Pembroke wouldn't let her keep it. He cataloged it, along with the other specimens.

Lake's campsite also contained tents and airplanes buried under snow and ice, and six strange hummocks. The buried airplanes were left until later. The tents were slowly excavated, leading to disturbing discoveries of blood, signs of struggle, and other indications of the fate of Lake's group. At Professor Moore's request, no one in either his expedition or Lexington's gave any details about this in their nightly radio broadcasts.

The hummocks each proved to contain the body one of the creatures that Lake had named "Elder Things". The survivors of his expedition later claimed that Lake had been overly hasty in his cataloging, and that these creatures were actually a strange form of plant life. Looking at the creatures now, and doing preliminary disections, it was obvious to the SME that these creatures were mobile, and were certainly not plants.

We noted that the campaign doesn't describe what the odor of the Elder Things is like. We checked the Dyer text -- er, the Lovecraft story, I mean -- to get that.

Folks also, obviously, set up their tents. This led to an odd result, which I might have handled differently. Julia had no trouble setting up her tent. Dan and Pamela both rolled critical fumbles, so I ruled that their tents had fallen down during set up, and that Gunnar chewed both women out thoroughly, giving them a long lecture on how unforgiving the ice was, something they accepted because he was right and because they knew that he would give a man the same scolding. He then helped them set up their tents.

This meant that when a storm rolled through, Damon, who had a respectable polar survival score, was at a disadvantage. That is, Julian rolled well, so the tent stayed up, so the guides didn't help Damon, so the tent fell down during the storm. This was completely due to my interpretation, not to the way the scenario was written. An alternate interpretation would have been to rule that Alicia and Erica seemed to have set up their tents well, but that the first storm blowing through would show that they had not.

After a couple of days, three planes arrived from the German expedition, the BFE, filled with men and dogs. The leader of this group, Herr Meyer, answered a few questions about the goals of the BFE, and offered everyone help from his expedition members and from their superior German equipment. He added that the BFE kept time exactly 12 hours off from the SME and Lexington expeditions, and he suggested that this would be useful, since work on the Lake camp site could go on around the clock. Professors Moore and Pembroke privately agreed that at least some SME members should keep an eye on the Germans.

The BFE people were all very polite, and did their best to be helpful. They respected the wishes of the SME people about which areas to avoid, and how to enter Lake's cave without disturbing anything. The second most annoying thing about them was their constant suggestions that the two expeditions would benefit from the use of their superior German equipment. The most annoying thing was that they were correct.

We noted that the picture of the BFE people was not a hundred percent true to the descriptions. Everyone in the picture was woefully underdressed for Antarctica.

The rest of the Lake camp site was excavated, the Germans using electric knives so specialized for excavating sites from ice that it was clear that Meyer, at least, had some idea of what would be found.

It was clear that the men at Lake's camp site had been attacked and killed in gruesome fashion. Clearly, the story about a storm was to cover this up. There were only six bodies of Elder Things, not the fourteen Lake had found. At this point, it was clear that people were beginning to consider the unthinkable, but those who speculated aloud said that, well, it was probably Gedney, who had gone mad in a storm, and whose body had never been recovered. Yes. It had to have been him, never mind how challenging it would have been for one man to butcher all of the others without being stopped. Yes. But, everyone agreed that this wasn't something to broadcast on the radio, because, ah, why speak ill of someone who had to be dead by now? Right. It had to have been Gedney.

Then, the dog corral was excavated. It was very clear that the dogs had been dissected, or, possibly, vivisected, although the bodies had been removed when the rescue team came. Poor Alicia blew her SAN roll, lost 5 points, and made her Idea roll. I considered what this should mean. I decided that, given that player and PC like dogs, she wandered in a daze and came to herself huddled in the middle of the expedition's dogs. The dogs pressed against her and licked her, having no trouble sensing her obvious distress. The dog handlers asked what was wrong. She told them not to go to the excavated dog corral, and they decided that they probably didn't want to.

At the point, Meyer handed a manuscript to Professor Moore, explaining that it had been given to him through channels he did not choose to speculate about, and that it would explain much. Moore went to his tent to read it.

Meanwhile, relations between the SME and Lexington expedition deteriorated when Acacia Lexington used some of the SME's oxygen on a flight. The oxygen was tainted. There was nothing actually wrong with it per se, but this was not medical quality oxygen. Rather, it was industrial quality oxygen, with traces of other elements in it. Acacia and the rest of the people on board her plane, the Belle, were nauseated. Acacia stormed up to Moore, accusing him of trying to poison her. While Moore is normally diplomatic, he was absorbed in the manuscript he was reading, and he answered vaguely, not paying that much attention to anything outside the manuscript.

This was the last straw for Lexington. She went to Meyer and offered him three seats in her plane when she went over the mountains in return for equipment. Meyer contacted the BFE base camp, and a deal was made. Moore finished the manuscript, heard what Acacia and the Germans were planning, and contacted Starkweather. Then, he told people to make arrangements for taking the SME's two planes over the mountains as quickly as possible, and he gave Pembroke the manuscript he had been reading, asking Pembroke, and perhaps the others (i.e., the PCs) to read it and let him know what they thought.

This manuscript was, of course, Dyer's account of the Miskatonic expedition, aka the Dyer text, aka Lovecraft's story, "The Mountains of Madness".

Dan and Pamela were the only ones who had not previously read the story, and each left with a copy of the story after the session.

Damon decided to start testing the SME's supply of oxygen. Meanwhile, Alicia, Erika, and Julia, the women of the SME, served as the diplomatic delegation to both Lexington and Meyer. They talked with Acacia Lexington about the Dyer text, confirming that Meyer had mentioned nothing about it to her. As they intended, Acacia wondered what else Meyer was keeping from her. They told her that her friend, Nicholas Roerich, had intended to give the manuscript to the SME, but he had been kidnapped by Germans who had roughed him up and taken the manuscript. Acacia told the SME women that, while she intended to keep to her bargain, she would keep an eye on the Germans with her.

The women then went to Meyer, asking how he'd gotten the Dyer text. He explained that it had been given to him, and that he was aware that it may not have been obtained quite legally. He neither knew nor asked about the details. He did know that it had been intended for the SME, and so, he had given it to Moore. I am not sure whether the SME women were entirely satisfied with Meyer's answer, but they were quite polite. They thanked him for being straightforward, and said that he had done the proper thing.

Starkweather returned and tried to hustle people to get ready to send the two SME planes over the mountain. It was a comical scene, with Starkweather giving instructions that were either irrelevant or had already been carried out. I don't know if that's how everyone plays this scene, but it felt right. And, while running this scene, I really got a sense of how important is is that Starkweather not be present earlier to interfere with the emotional tone of the Lake camp excavation. The rivalry with Lexington and the need to keep it from endangering the cooperation between expeditions combined with Starkweather's desire to climb mountains and garner fame so smoothly that I didn't realize the in character motivation supplemented an out of character need until this session.

Meyer was anxious to take off, but Lexington refused to do so until she received confirmation that the equipment she wanted had been delivered. This meant that the two SME planes took off not too long after the Belle did, tainted oxygen and more.

The players had a couple of questions, which I ran past Chaz for answers.

1. Couldn't the SME filter the impurities out of the oxygen, given that Damon started testing the cylinders over a day before the planes flew over the mountain?

Chaz:

As for tainted oxygen -- there is no practical means I can think of for the expeditioneers to "filter" the oxygen from their tanks. The tanks are filled with industrial oxygen, which just happens to have traces of other chemicals in it, like ammonia etc. There's a reason that "medical" oxygen is much more expensive than industrial oxy -- it takes effort and expensive equipment to refine it, usually by electrolysis... and it's much cheaper to make new oxy by electrolysis than it is to try to filter an existing supply. If it were easy, filtering would definitely be the preferred method, don't you think?

FIltering into a mask is slightly more likely -- people have worked with activated charcoal filters for a very long time. However, such filters do not do a very good job with gaseous ammonia, and for a man breathing would be very bulky. Most gaseous filters remove these things by passing the gas through the filter again and again and again many times, each time getting a little -- here, when the masks themselves are just "straws" to breathe through, there is no way to recycle the gas in any fashion. Even the German masks, which capture and re-use one breath at a time, are hopelessly inadequate for the purpose even if they do save on oxygen consumption.

If you wanted to reload the tanks, you have the problem of pumps. I'm willing to believe that someone -- especially in the BFE camp -- may be able to put together a pump that can repressurize a tank, but those tanks are under very high pressure and big nard-core machines were used to fill them. The kind of pump they might carry with them portably would probably take many hours to fully charge *one* of those big tanks -- let alone the 40 or so tanks they need to take along on the flight.

No, they're stuck with what they have. Checking in advance they can do, and if they do they're likely to find the taint early -- but unless they're gonna buy gas in massive quantities from someone else, *then* wait a couple days for it to be delivered, they're gonna go with what they have. Starkweather in particular will not be willing to wait. -- he might agree to such a trade/purchase to be used on future flights, but the first one needs to go *now*.

2. Given that the Germans want to go over the mountains, why don't they have planes capable of that?

Chaz: The Germans didn't *plan* to go over the Mountains when they put their expedition together; they came to follow up the Pym tale, and to do general exploration. The Junkers are the best craft available for overall combination of range and carrying capacity; if you don't *know* you need to climb to 24,000 feet to cross a mountain pass, they're perfect.

The BFE's interest in Lake's Camp stared after Loemmler et al read the Dyer Text, which was in mid-late September after the SME had already sailed. By then all their equipment was already either in Antarctica or on its way, and there was no budget to buy more aircraft anyhow.

So they went to look for Lake's Camp and hooked up with those who *did* have the means, and were already in place.

So, we broke as the two SME planes prepared for take off, intending to figure out the exact crews and any adjustments to the default cargo lists included in the handouts. Oh, and Professor St. John Pembroke is down to 26 SAN, and Dave would actively like the good professor to go insane. I'll see what can be done to accomodate him.