THE RUN-DOWN

A room identical to the northern room, but this time the corpses are on the ground, including one covered in baby spiders. The spiders will not attack the mercs, nor will they run away. They stay with their "mother", waiting for her to milk them.

THE SET-UP

You enter the southern room to another grisly sight. This time, however, the bodies are not strung up. There are three bodies on the floor and one is completely covered with tiny spiders.

THE ACTION

The tiny baby spiders are not frightened of the mercs. They're part of the hive-mind and they believe the mercs are actually more scientists. They stay very still on the deceased body of their "mother."

One of the experiments that was taking place in the bunker involved a voluntary implant of an egg sack in one of the scientists. He experienced the same side-effects as our merc who is in the same predicament. The usual feeding technique for an adult spider is to devour food then regurgitate it for the babies to eat. However, mommy isn't moving and she is very, very cold. The tiny spiders want mommy. Then the mercs enter and things get very interesting.

Have the merc with the egg sack make another Intuition Roll. If he makes it, he will fully understand what is about to happen. If he fails, he will probably panic an cause seven young adult spiders to fall from the ceiling to protect the Young.

You see, when the merc with the egg sack enters the room, the baby spiders will sense him as a "mother." They will be confused for a moment, but then they will flee from their cold mother to the new "warm" mother. If the merc makes his Intuition Check, he will feel very natural about allowing the spiders to cling to him for warmth. He will even feel protective of the babies, backing away if the other mercs try to harm them. if not, well then, we're going to have some disappointed baby spiders.

If the mercs harm the baby spiders, seven young adults will fall from the ceiling, completely surrounding the mercs, but they will not attack!

Whether the mommy merc makes his Intuition Check or not, he will suddenly feel a strange sensation in his head and a pain in the back of his neck. Hundreds of voices will fill his mind and he will be unable to take any action but scream in severe pain. The spiders will all begin swaying back and forth as the merc screams and his back bursts and five tiny spiders (about the size of silver dollars) rip their way out of his back. This means that he will have babies crawling over the inside of his suit and the outside his suit. The spiders will then approach the new mother. If they are fired upon, they will run away. They will not fight back. After all, it's now mommy's duty to protect the young.

If the merc survives the birth (he'll take about ten hits from the whole experience), then he will now have a bunch of hungry babies attached to him. His mind is now fully attuned to the hive mind and he can communicate with the spiders.

Unfortunately, he cannot communicate words, only emotions and simple ideas. "Yes," "no," "run!" and other simple single words wilt communicate well. Anything else will require a successful Intuition Roll. Oh!

And he no longer suffers -20 to all of his rolls. However, he does suffer -20 to any Dex related rolls because of his new "bundle of love." If the merc dies, the babies will remain attached to the body, waiting for food. Quite a sad sight.

FOLLOW-UP

The mercs now have a solution to their problem. Kind of. They have a link to the spiders, and a means to communicate to them. Much experimenting should go on as soon as they put two and two together. If they don't, then they are really screwed. If they haven't figured out that the spiders are intelligent and generally a "don't mess with me; I won't mess with you" kind of species, then they are going to have to deal with two sets of enemies: the spiders and the swiftly approaching ARM ship.

Down the shaft three hundred more feet is the power source of the complex. Another climb is in order.

BattleLords of the 23rd Century An Old-Fashioned Bug Hunt (Part 2)

Introduction
Scene One: The Frying Pan No Good Enough?
Scene Two: The Control Center
Scene Three: A Letter to Home
Scene Four: From the Belly of the Beast
Scene Five and Six: Who's in the Kitchen with Dinah and The Elevator Shaft
Scene Seven: The One You Warned Me Of
Scene Eight: Mommy Won't Wake Up
Scene Nine: Sending Our an SOS and Afterward
Map of Driscoll VII Research Labs (slow: 102K)

BattleLords of the 23rd Century An Old-Fashioned Bug Hunt by John Wick, et. al. (Part 1)

GM Information
Scene One: Spiders, Spiders, Everywhere
Scene Two: Jane Fonda's Nightmare
Scene Three: The Living Quarters
Scene Four: Lost Little Alice
Scene Five: Waking Up Hatter
Scene Six: Goodies
Scene Seven: Putting The Hatter To Sleep
Scene Eight: Getting Some Wheels
Map of Starship Gamera (slow: 103K)

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