Work Text:
“And so, each of you find yourselves in your respective cells, nestled deep within the confines of the Rura Penthe intergalactic space jail,” I narrate to my players.
Ilyukhina hummed happily while reading over her assigned character sheet. DuBois had a spread sheet open calculating success probabilities with his own assigned stats. Dimitri just stared at me eagerly listening to my setting description.
“The walls of each cell are padded with tightly woven nanomachine-“ I’m interrupted
“Wait wait, slow down friend,” Dimitri requested. “Why do we need to know the wall's material- is important? should I write it down-?”
“Eherm,” I dared to continue despite the earnest questioning, “-padded with tightly woven nanomachine squares which are designed to deflect any force applied to them. There is one medium-sized-double-paneled-bullet-proof window facing the main hallway, through which you can see the other cells. These high security cells are specially designed to contain only the most dastardly of intergalactic criminals,”
“Ooh-ooh- that’s us!” Ilyukhina beamed
“Correct!” I said, “and I can repeat anything you’d like Dimitri. Be sure to also refer to the map if you need a better understanding of the space,”
The map was scrawled on a large piece of A0 tabloid paper. I’d stolen it from a printer in the last conference room Stratt insisted I sit in. I had secret areas on the map covered by notecards taped on their top edge. A quick flip could reveal all of their secrets. This set up was definitely a step up from the first time I had tried to run this one-shot… all the way back in undergrad.
Look, it’s truly a Herculean task trying to get 3 or more adults to set aside a time for any sort of table top shenanigans. At least now I had the privilege of knowing 3 or more adults who were all trapped on the same aircraft carrier as me.
“So, when I gave you your premade character sheets I left a certain portion blank,” I said, “Who would like to describe their character, as well as describing what landed them in intergalactic space jail, first?”
Ilyukhina leaned forward “So seeing as my character is a scientist-,”
“Lab tech, specifically,” I squeaked under my breath
“— my crime would make the most sense as a crime of passion. First meeting her alien lover at her job: a lab intensely studying alien life. What started as a passion of study evolved into something more. This lab, obviously uncomfortable for her alien lover, had to go. My character is charged with theft of lab samples, property damage and a full heart,”
That makes absolutely no sense within the written lore for this universe— but okay. It’s a oneshot and we’re all having fun here.
“Damn that’s good, maybe I should’ve studied creative writing instead of stupid aerospace engineering in school,” She mused
“You’re a stellar engineer and the perfect person for this mission, I think you made the right academic choice,” DuBois answered the question in earnest, “Can I describe my character’s criminal record next Dr. Grace?”
“Oh yes, ofcourse,”
“Playing a true hardened criminal would be outside of my area of expertise. With that in mind you’ll find that my character Ren, isn’t actually a criminal at all. Rather the circumstances in which he found himself in this cell are all part of a masterful ruse,” DuBois started.
Oh boy.
“He took the fall for the damage and theft of a prime space vessel, planting a forged license plate at his residence. Of course the real vessel thieves won't be getting away, Ren has a timed message with their tracked location set to broadcast in a month's time. In that time he hopes to fulfill his greater mission here. He has his eyes set on a single target. The criminal who killed his father, still lives here within the Rura Penthe intergalactic space jail,”
“I like it!” I scratched my head looking over my notes. My glasses slid down my face, I wasn't looking for anything in particular. Man. it would’ve been nice to know earlier that everyone was going to make their backstories so detailed, I could've incorporated it in my notes.
“Dimitri?”
“Tax Fraud,” He said plainly
“That works,” His simple answer got a chortle out of me.
Scrolling to the next portion of my notes, I spotted Illyukhina lifting her tumbler, which I knew for a fact was spiked, and taking a sip. My eyes hovered there for a bit too long. I wasn’t irritated, just peeved if anything.
“Its okay Grace,” she caught my look, “I need it to get in character,”
I shook my head with a grinned exhale and continued, “Each of you, though muffled, can hear perfect steps at the end of the hallway. You see her soon enough, the warden patrolling in front of your cells.”
“2 years, 10 years, 36 years…, life. You may be serving time, but the fact is this: your time is your own,” I said as the Warden, “Take this time to own up to your faults-“
“Mmm no, Stratt wouldn’t be so choosy with her words,” Ilyukhina interrupted.
“W-what?”
“You were doing Stratt’s accent, no? She has a broadcaster accent- not simply a stereotypical German one. You were doing that. But Stratt wouldn’t say that,” She insisted.
“I…,” I faltered and felt the heat build up behind my ears.
Some days we’d be in meetings from 6 to 21. I’d be listening to her voice for no less than 5 hours. I kept a bag of honey drops in my lab coat pocket in case of an emergency. She had to talk A LOT. All I could do was listen. Sometimes I’d say things her way. Sometimes she’d notice. I think she thought I was making fun of her. I would never. The way she said ‘Petrova’ stuck, I couldn’t even remember how I had said it before.
“…I’m just trying to do a character voice,” I gave an excuse, “and well… we all hear that voice a lot,”
“Dr. Grace’s natural accent is so American, I could hardly hear it!” Dimitri laughed
“I thought it was a quality impression,” DuBois said, “Is the warden really Miss Stratt? That could be an interesting parallel,”
“No- completely different- I wrote this a long time ago. It’s just the voice, really,”
“Let out your inner Stratt, Grace,” Illyukhina took a long sip from her tumbler, “Dazzle us with the performance of a lifetime!”
“Right,” I marked an area of interest on my paper map, “Let’s continue,”
____________________________________________
The one shot ran so much longer than intended. Even as it got late, and Dimitri passed out in his chair, DuBois and Illyukhina insisted we finish. It wasn’t very often we’d get a free evening on the Taskforce.
Though that stunt might’ve been why I was 2 minutes late boarding Stratt the next morning. Oh geez, not-. Her plane, her private plane named Stratt.
I scampered up the air stairs and sat next to the plane’s namesake.
“I am so sorry, my first alarm didn’t get me going. I was up late playing a game with—,” I paused. It was unprofessional to make excuses.
“Don’t feel obligated to tell me, free time is scarce and that time is your own,”
“Right, I can shut up,” I smiled faintly
“I didn’t say that,”
I looked down at her profile. Stratt wasn’t even looking at me, but her cold tone felt so warm and inviting. She must’ve been thinking ‘Yes Dr. Grace, please blabber on and on about your table-top role play experience’.
“Okay so I was running a TTRPG oneshot for Dimitri, Illyukhina and DuBois last night. It’s kind of like playing pretend but for adults. You would not believe the character backstories they came up with,”
“I think I could,” Stratt said
“Hmm?”
“Believe it,”
“Oh!” Oh. My. Gosh! She was actually listening to my bologna sandwich!
I explained the sheer amount of pure improv I had to supplement the story with. I recapped how DuBois effortlessly solved all of my puzzles, but couldn’t stop making new problems for himself and his character. How Dimitri of all people was forced to be the straight man between the others’ characters. When Illyukhina finally confronted the warden- oh that was crazy!
“Okay so, say if you had a character, what got them stuck in intergalactic space jail?” I asked
She looked at me directly for the first time today!
“Abuse of Power, Eco-Terrorism, Kidnapping, Theft of Intellectual Property and Extortion,”
“Oh,”