An Other CT solo - Part 3: The last days of prisoner Gx-1067-6B5D85-H5c82-θ

Justice does not tarry on Düningen. The trials are over within six weeks. Garvin's and Iuroaa's are deemed to be in the public interest and broadcast live. Ling and Khamine are deemed to be minor players, so their proceedings are closed.

Khamine is a first-time offender, and is given clemency: 8 years hard labour in a deep-sea mine. The other three, plus a handful of Iuroaa's other underlings who survived the restaurant assault, are sentenced to death, as are most of the ones rounded up in the affair's wake.

Iuroaa, as a crime boss, needs to be an example. His execution is carried out with an excess of pomp, a key spectacle at a public holiday event. He is made to apologise for his crimes, warn other citizens of following in his wicked footsteps, and praise the wisdom of the ruling council in cleansing his insidious influence from the planet before facing the firing squad.

The rest of the executions are also broadcast live (on all networks, interrupting the scheduled programmes), but are to take place en masse in the prison. These are generally ignored by the populace at large save for certain colleagues, friends, and family of the accused who are required to attend.

. . .

The door opens to reveal two guards in full armour. "It's time." says one in a voice distorted into low, barely-human tones by the helmet speaker.

Ling rises wordlessly. They lead her through a series of security doors, and usher her into narrow room with a round conference table and a holographic view screen taking up most of the far wall. The screen displays the prison interior. Ling watches the firing squad assembling and taking position. Then, one by one, the first sextet of the condemned are led in. Each is shown in close-up. Their crimes scroll along the bottom of the image as they are read out in voice-over by the warden. At the end of each litany, the sentence of death is almost ritually confirmed.

The first two she only knows by reputation, the next three not at all, and watches only distractedly. The last one, however, arrests her total interest. Engrossed, she jumps when she hears the door slide open once more. Bureau Chief Amson walks in with his suit jacket over one shoulder. Only his ID badge shows he's a high-ranking agent in internal security. He dismisses the guards. Ling turns back towards the screen.

"I'm surprised you wanted to watch."

"It's not every day a girl gets to witness her own execution."

"I suppose not."

"Who is she?"

"Just another enemy of the state. Do you really want to know her name?"

"Probably not. I'm surprised how much she looks like me, is all."

"Honestly, with the shaved head, bruising, and six weeks of max-sec prison life, people all start to look the same."

"So, you're saying I'm not the first to get off this way."

"I've not made this offer to anyone before, but I'd be surprised if this is the first time it's happened."

"Shh, it's starting."

Ling isn't sure what she thought she'd feel, but the stark emptiness surprises her. And she'd forgotten how much she hated watching these things. But she looks straight on until the end. She owes her nameless substitute that much. When it's over, she turns back towards Amson, whom she's surprised to see engrossed in his datapad.

She clears her throat and he looks up, briefly startled.

"You don't watch them?"

"Not unless I have to attend. I find the whole experience distasteful. Necessary for planetary security, but distasteful nonetheless."

"Hm."

"How are you feeling?" Ling blanches at the question, and Amson hastily adds, "I mean, after the surgery. I wouldn't presume to ask about the other."

"Oh, um, fine, I guess. I can't wear my hair up for a while until the shaved patch grows back in a little, but other than the nausea, the side effects aren't so bad. Yet."

"I hear they can get pretty rough. We don't use implants any more in the service; the risks are too great. And the expense! I'm not surprised the Bureau authorised it, given what you had to offer us in return, but I have to admit to some consternation at your insistence on this particular reward."

"They offered money, a stack of high passages, even gold for some reason. But that stuff's all transitory. This is something in my head, that no one can take from me. This is mine."

"Provided it doesn't kill you."

"The doctors told me the risks. I've faced worse odds."

"I see. Well, Ms. Gong, if you're done here, your shuttle awaits."

"Good, let's go. But I suppose you shouldn't call me that. Ms. Gōng is dead, after all."

"Indeed."

"So who am I now?"

"Ms. Lin Daiyu."

"Wait-- seriously?"

"I checked your borrowing records from the precinct library. I thought you'd appreciate the literary nod. Now, this is where we part ways, Ms. Lin. I know you acted out of selfish reasons, but you've done our world a great service. Should you ever desire repatriation, look me up. We can use a woman of your talents."

. . .

She's the only passenger on the shuttle to highport. She spends most of the trip looking distractedly at her new identity dossier. Lin Daiyu, Homeworld: Glun. She's not heard of it. Checking the shuttle's rudimentary Library programme reveals it to be a miserable little backwater at least 10 parsecs Coreward of Düningen, right on the edge of the cluster. She'd probably best learn about it, though doubts it will come up that often in conversation.

She puts the datapad aside and looks through her new travel bag. There's a toiletry kit, basic working jumpsuits in neutral colours including one with a name tag sewn on (nice touch, that), and one extra set of bland civilian clothes, vaguely similar to the ones she's already wearing. A billfold contains Cr1000 in cash and a single Middle Passage voucher. Finally, there's an Imperial hardcopy passport, in a pocket of which is her newly minted Pilot's certification card, courtesy of the RNA skill implant she demanded of the Security Bureau as her guerdon. And filling the rest of the carry-all, also courtesy of the RNA implant, are bottle after bottle of prescription painkillers & anti-nausea meds. She chokes down one of each and studies her Pilot's licence again. The name staring up at her is just a character in a book, but the face is definitely her. Ansom found a flattering picture and everything. She decides that she'll just tell people she goes by her family name. It's close enough to Ling that she won't get confused by it, and anyways, lots of spacers just get called by their family names, don't they? She's sure they must. Well, she's a spacer now, and that's what she's going to do, so it must be right. Damn, those pain meds are strong.

The shuttle docks at the highport. She is met by a uniformed station worker, who escorts her through the surface departures concourse to the queue for the interstellar terminal. As she waits her turn, her eyes cannot help but drift over to the dour, armoured security troops watching the proceeding from behind their dark, featureless visors. A brief panic seizes her: what if they didn't erase her identity as promised? But if they'd wanted to kill her, they could have left her in prison. And not wasted the RNA implant. Still, she doesn't fully believe it until she presents her wrist to the scanner and the screen flashes up her new identity with the legend 'Registered Foreigner : Medical Visa expiring in 00:53:21'.

They scan her bag, search it manually, then finally stamp her Imperial passport (both physically and electronically). At last they wave her through into the interstellar concourse. As she walks forward the last few steps she stumbles. The security agent catches her by the arm to steady her, and notices her cheeks are wet with tears.

"Are you alright? Should I call for a medic?"

"No. No, I'm fine. Really. Just relieved, and a little overwhelmed. I'd been so afraid I was going to die here."

–~ Ende ~–

Notes

Thus concludes Ling/Lin's first adventure. As I mentioned briefly at the start, she was an entirely random PC with a random homeworld. I was initially disappointed when the dice put her on Düningen, having wanted to save it for a later adventure location, and I would have re-rolled it had I not been committed to another random start.

It was very obvious to me that her major goal would be getting offworld (admittedly one of my usual starters), but since the odds of ever returning once she left were minimal, I needed to have some sort of actual adventure on the world; it's definitely one of the most interesting worlds in the sandbox, just not if you're from there. So I decided to give her one last job to do for her boss (this was the first Thread in Mythic terms on the unpublished list. Her secondary goal (and the second Thread) was getting offworld.

As I had done with Ortance, I rolled up 3 life events:

• Fell in love, but your lover (1-2) died
• Profited from a dirty secret and owe any promotion or money to that secret.
• Made a deal with a crime-lord you couldn’t decline

I was going to keep them aside as merely sources of colour to use later. But then the last two gave me an idea, which tied in to wanting to get offworld, but needed a separate Thread of its own. I already knew she worked for organised crime just based on her rolled skills, but making a deal she couldn't decline made it sound like a life of crime was not, in fact, her own choice. Profiting from dirty secrets was also obvious just from her skills (streetwise & bribery). But the biggest dirty secret of all would be knowing who the crime boss was and how to find him (at Law Level 13, the police don't need to wait for 'solid evidence' to arrest a known criminal; they only delay when setting up the trap). So I added 'made a deal with planetary security' as the third thread and let that define when/how they decided to close the dragnet.

Originally, her reward was just going to be a new identity (and effective exile), but when I was absently looking at the Experience chapter in the rulebook I saw the suggestion of RNA Implants under the Alternatives heading at the end, which set my mind spinning. She was on one of the highest TL planets in the sandbox, so something crazy like this was certainly within reach, but there needed to be a reason that they weren't in common use.

RNA Skill Implant (TL14, Mcr1)

Confers a single skill at level-1, subject to the referee's approval. The implant cannot be used to raise a current skill level (except in cases of skill-0, though these skills are generally not offered), nor can it be used to acquire Jack of All Trades. The implant must be installed in a TL14+ hospital facility by a qualified surgeon (Medical-3, DEX 8+).

Recovery from the surgery involves a week's bed rest in hospital. A further 4 weeks are required for the implant to complete its work. During this time the skill is effectively level-0. The side effects during this period are severe headaches, dizziness, and nausea. Without the proper medications (costing Cr100), the subject will have their physical characteristics reduced to half their normal levels (round down). In addition, each week a throw of current END- is required or the subject will suffer 1D hits to a random characteristic (applied after the halving of characteristics for lack of medication). These hits are treated exactly as damage received in physical combat for purposes of incapacitation, but cannot be healed in any week the END throw was failed. Use of slow drug, fast drug, or freezing (low passage) during this period will cause the implant to fail (no skill levels retained) and provoke an immediate Crisis (see below).

Should the subject survive the first five weeks, the character check to see if the implanted information has been successfully integrated. A throw of 9+ is required (DM +2 for INT 10+) for the skill to increase to level-1 permanently. Failing this throw freezes the skill at level-0.

The first time the skill is used in a stressful situation may provoke a Crisis afterwards. If the character fails to throw lower than their END, they will begin to convulse. All uninjured physical characteristics fall to 1 immediately. Any at less than full are reduced to 0. Characters who remain conscious are still functionally incapacitated for 1Dx10 hours, after which time damage may be healed as normal.

I thought she'd want a spacer skill so she could become a proper Traveller, but I didn't necessarily think she'd get her first choice, so I rolled 1d6 on the Crew Salary Table to see what was on offer. I would have re-rolled Steward, as I can't see anyone producing an implant for that.


next post: a spacer's life