Save Science City - Day 3, part 1

 The Raven returns!  And - nobody asks where he was, or why he's back... But, if the players don't care, I as GM am too busy to force the issue.

Morning

8AM 

    Reece makes a quick phone call, verifying that none of the Sunset Boys will receive bail.  With their trial dates pushed back until after the end of the month, the violent gang members get to reside in the local prison known as The Anchor until the end of the campaign.

    Reece, Genevar, Anduin, and John all decide they want to interrogate Jasper Coleridge, the rogue CIA agent they captured at the end of last session.

    Raven and Trinket decide that Masharma (Snakeface) can be of financial boon to Raven's corporation-in-trust (Odin Industries), which he doesn't like is number seven or below on the American Industrials by income list (the player is concerned about his global standing as well).

    Maeve goes to the Locks, and interrogates Rear Admiral Shaffer about the condition of the Locks, specifically why the burrough is under martial law.  Shaffer explains that he was ordered to secure the area after night because military personnel of all four major branches are being ganged up on and beaten.  With Project Trojan going on at the military base, the Pentagon has decided that such activity could be a distraction for the kidnapping of a test subject by communist forces.  Shaffer himself is underwhelmed by the results of Project Trojan, but cannot be seen by his superiors as anything but fully supportive of Doctor Stickman, the self-proclaimed biological genius behind the program.

    She also learns that the Trojan claims to be immortal, from the actual city of Troy, during the events of the Illiad.  Learning that his name is Jason Demir (a Turkish surname), she decides this is fishy, and asks Professor Mith about his bona fides.  After a thirty second siesta break to remember an unfortunate misunderstanding during the Hundred Years War, he reveals that the Trojan began his life as Iason Mirde, and isn't much liked by other immortals because he has favored the bloodlines of the Tros people to the detriment of history as a whole.

    Maeve and the Professor attempt to make plans to infiltrate Oriflamme, but it is now 10AM, and -

10AM

    BOOM!  The interrogators almost immediately set off a suicide bomb inside the head of Jasper Coleridge.  No serious damage is dealt to any of the PCs (because Mutants and Masterminds), but the RavenBase now needs one of the interrogation rooms to be deep scrubbed.  The players summon Trinket to help with analysis of the bomb fragments.  She rapidly determines that it was set off by signals inside agent Coleridge's brain when he mentioned The Shop, a subsidiary of Black Box.  She also finds evidence that some of this alien technology bears Zinkmann corporate logos that have been filed off.  She easily makes a device to scan other prisoners for skull bombs.

    Maeve and Reece follow up separate threads of the Shop, easily determining that a clone of Gus was spotted, shot, and presumed killed.  Because (no internet yet), they engage in a little bit of legwork.  Maeve takes the time to submit a headline Hooded Hoodlums Suckerpunch Soldiers, which in retrospect should have earned a reward of some kind.  Oops.  

    Reece determines that the full cloned trio (Gus, Sam, and Bianca) are present in Science City, and that they have made friends with the staff of the Peppermint, an adult dance club near the military base.  He also finds evidence of a miracle-heal device that the clones have access to.  (It's actually less impressive than the one Trinket carries, but the PCs don't know that yet.)

    Professor Mith follows up on the gold, discovering that in addition to the supplies in villainous hands, there is enough gold to depress the local market that entered through the jewelers of Radium Heights.  When questioned, they all agree that people matching descriptions of Acrobat and Frogwoman (of the nefarious smuggling organization Steel Hand) have been the ones selling.

Noon

    Anduin Wessex decides that a quick visit to New York City, specifically to the embassy of the Valhallan Empire Aliens is in order.  Their diplomat readily confirms that the bomb matches technology given by the Asgardian faction to the German Society of Thule in contravention of Valhallan law.  She is very disturbed to hear that this technology has somehow made it into other tribal factions (nations).  Deciding to flaunt her superiority over the obnoxious primitives of America, the Valhallan shuttlecraft takes Anduin Wessex back to Science City.

    On learning that Mina Markone might be friends with Bianca, Maeve and Professor Mith approach her at lunch with her girl gang.  Almost all of them fail Fortitude saves, immediately charmed by Maeve's pheremones.  Mina agrees to skip school (a bonus) to speak with Maeve and Mith about Bianca.  She explains that Bianca has been helping her and Hamatsuke -

    The players immediately change tracks to Hamatsuke, learn that she is Usa Hana, a half Okinawan, half American latino whose father was slain by the Black Tiger Tong.  Totally ignoring the story leads, Maeve convinces Mina to guide her to Hamatsuke, who isn't expecting the meeting until Thursday (day 4).  Due to horrible Mike-dice (bad rolls by the GM), Hamatsuke is actually a fan-girl-crush of the Raven, and immediately allies with the party to be near him.

Early Evening

    Maeve looks at some old photo records, and notices the similarities in looks between Watchman and the younger Acrobat.  Given that Professor Mith has already noticed that Chromia and Steel Captain have identical powers and that Eyeclops is almost certainly Light Master, the party decides there might (duh) be a link between the fate of the Watchmen and the sudden rise of the Steel Hand.

    Reece, Raven, and Hamatsuke decide to patrol the Locks and almost immediately notice a group of mixed-gender mixed-race ruffians in military surplus uniforms putting green bags over their heads.  Due to late night in real life, the session is called at this point.

All players get 1XP.

Having learned that non-villain NPCs can be made up to Helpful through application of otherwise lost hero points at the end of the session, the PCs combine forces to ensure that all NPCs that they wanted alliances with anyway are suddenly Helpful to the party, with the sole exception of Dancing Heron.  Since the party has done diddly and squat to help her, the GM unabashedly spends a Villain Point to declare her off limits (for now).  Unfortunately, this also means that Admiral Shaffer and Chief Justice Cleo Preston are wrapped into the PCs fold, and the suddenly Upstanding Cleo Preston gives a short speech that (again, curse of the Mike-dice) ends the bulk of corruption in the justice department.

Lessons Learned

    The PCs barely even rolled dice this game, and still made progress.  

    The spotlight control was spotty, as several of the players would pass the spotlight, remember a question they wanted to ask, and just blurt it out.  Something that I, the GM, will need to keep tabs on.

    The PCs learned just how powerful helping to save Science City is, as they started realizing that even 1CP given to an NPC can make them vastly better allies to the party.  In particular, they enjoy moving the default attitude bar all the way to Helpful, and to make their allies Upstanding (immune to corruption during the campaign).  

    In particular, I was surprised the party chose to redeem Chief Justice Cleo Preston.  But, she is now their "in" to both Oriflamme and the racists of Humanity is Black.