Worlds Beyond Number - Solari: Episode 6 - Pinned Down

Episode Date: May 26, 2026

They watch, they wait, they wager. They hear you've made some friends. They see you through their scope. They know you play pretend.  Keep your head down.Content Warning: This episode contains depictions of violence. We are:Brennan Lee MulliganErika IshiiAabria IyengarLou Wilson Solari was produced by Worlds Beyond Number Edit and Sound Design by Jino Jang-Hansen at Big Giant Head Score by Will Savinohttps://wsavino.com/ Director of Operations: Melanie Bowman Social Media Manager: Shannon H Lorekeeper and Transcriptionist: Jack Morgan E.F. Lavandowska  Recording Engineer: Rainie Toll Character Art by Nikolas Draper-Iveywww.instagram.com/nikolasdraperivey/ Cover Art by Lu Tomkiewiczwww.instagram.com/_fromlu/ This campaign uses the Stillfleet TTRPG system, created by Wythe Marschall and developed by Stillfleet Studiohttps://stillfleet.com/collections/stillfleetYou can find transcripts of all our episodes on our Patreon. Just navigate to the post for the episode and the transcript will be attached. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

This is the sound of world's beyond number. Perhaps it is simultaneously too crass and reductionist to frame this as a simple product of biological determinism. But the millennial long streamlining of 100,000 powerful familial factions into but a handful of noble bloodlines in the modern era speaks to an undeniable evolutionary... Loser's histories. Zadavin, Varex. A trint of House Everex, intercepted on Janapar for a pull by House Jemis Octavo, which was interrupted violently on Karueda, where we find you now. You stand on slanted, unstable earth at the lip of the Zeeland Caldera,

bathed in horrid green light diffused through the bitter-scented fog, holding a score of massive deep space ships aloft. Your shoulder, shot clean through with a high-caliber ordinance, begins to hurt in earnest. Your assailant is on the move. Excelsial is very much on the move. You and Chi-Tanga need to move. This is not a pull. This is a call.

What do you want to do? I think in this moment, Esedavin recognizes that all signs point to call. not pull. There is a deep, cold sensation that I think freezes him in this moment. There is a pause and an emptiness of mind that comes over him as he, I think, maybe for the first time in his life, feels like it is under threat and it's just going to look at Chi they're going to kill me they're going to kill me

it's a call this is it's some it's an it's another ofyric's they're going to your family is doing this yes yes yes we can't get on the ship no no we can't and I look back towards

where the arabesque had docked I told her to hang back in case we needed it out. Right, but she's not docked. She's moving and staying in a dark spot where things are stroving. So she's circling the block for you. Does that make sense? I see. I see.

Yeah, sorry. All right. They can't make it back. And Jemis Octavo will cooperate with the Evirix? If there's no one in the high houses that would make a deal, I can't, I can't. Even with everything between. between me and I don't, it's not, it's not the move.

It's not the move, okay. I do some math in my head at this moment. Five houses versus one shot in the shoulder man that I'm standing next to. Would it really be worth sticking my neck out for this trend? Oh, fun. I want you to tell me what you want to roll. And I can maybe help play with the abacus in your mind a little bit. The difficulty, regardless, this is a big, good question.

Use whatever you want, but you got to get to a 10. And there's a little reminder you can spend grit. I'll keep reminding you because I'm the reason no one thinks of that right away. I do have only four grit to spend right now. I think I'm going to do a will roll to try and analyze this situation. I'm going to burn three grit for it and I get a plus two for political and corporate intrigue. So I need to get a five on a D10. Okay.

I get a 50-50 shot here. You can do that. I can do that. Oh, my God. I rolled a one. You are trying to think and assess whether it's worth risking your life, risking IAS's life, to stay involved with this trend. This is the biggest fish that you've had in the little pond of Janipar. And I think, I think your one gives you a little bit of an Ahab complex that you don't want to let this big fish go.

So what's the likelihood that it was a cull the whole time? Maybe. Maybe this is a couple families working against each other? There's got to be a way for you to stay in this fight, get him to safety, and get what you want. Zadavon, it occurs that you need to die. What? You need to die. I take my pistol that we got off of the ship, and I fire it twice into the ground.

Zadavon, full shell shock, no idea what's happening, but I think there's a confidence I read on you that is making me stay put. The trint is down. Oh. Okay. Excelsial, what are you doing? I hear the pistol shot. I drop my arms from screaming, help, and running, and I look back seeing that my friends are once again under fire.

Do I see any of the craft that are down in that area? Is there anything that looks like I would be able to swiftly hack into it and hijack it? Oh. I mean, how far of a distance do you think your powers work out? I think I just need to be on a network. So if it's at a distance, I have to be able to exist on a network or frequency with the craft. And if that thing is not uploaded to a frequency or a network that covers a range or distance, if it's not, there's not like a broadcastable thing that it's attached to you, then I have to interface with it physically. If you're on Wi-Fi, I can get you. If you're not on Wi-Fi, I can't get you. I got to plug in. Yeah, I think in a world where, like, comms are important to all of these, like, big deep spaceships because of the implication that they are sending smaller ships out to go do things in the area, you can ping any one of these. Give me a reasoned role. The difficulty is only going to be a seven. Oh. Okay.

Nine. Perfect. I think with, like, a cursory look down, I think you get to the same place Zadavin does. about which one the Foxglove 6 is. It's a little farther away on like a farther side of the dock. You can reach any of these. You'll have an easier time with something a little smaller and a little closer. But because all of these have to be in range of smaller ships moving around this planet and surrounding asteroids and moons, you can make an attempt on any ship down there,

Foxglove included. I will make a move on Foxglove 6. I'm going non-diplomatic. trying to enter a feed alert into the ship's security system. We know Keir was working for Jemis Octavo. So I would like to interface with the ship's computer and say, Foxglove 6, computer security system of the Jemis Octavo family. Interstitial security ticket, update level, urgent.

Jemis Octavo Pohl of target Zadavin Iverex in jeopardy. interloping third party unidentified seeks to undo Jemis Octavo poll occurring at this location within security perimeter of Fox Love 6. Basically announcing to Jemis Octavo, your poll is being disrupted by a third party interloper and this should appear on the security comms of this ship. Oh, I really like that. Okay, I'm going to have you give me a tech role. It's going to be an eight to get this sort of unproperly clearanced message, though the form of it is correct. You're sort of a unknown sender. Eight gets you through, 10 gets you a response immediately.

Cool. I'm going to burn six grit. I am riding so low right now. Three plus seven is 10. You send that message out in, it's a shot in the dark as you like pinpoint the exact frequency that all the Jemis Octavo comms have been working on. Both here and I think you feel that little bit of spider web tether to the comms that are clearly up on Jenipar, handling whatever errored out meant and the other nine ships that you are plugged into a network on. The Kenner came back down. the other nine smaller non-jump ships are still up at Genepar.

As soon as I feel that the Kenner is on this network, I will include a solemn digital bow and acknowledgement of the Kenner's presence on this network as an acknowledgement of our previous established relationship and detailed corroboration of the security clearance, meaning like this pull was affected by a member of the network that I'm addressing. I think the moment you send that little bow out, what you get is like any firewalls get slammed open by the Kenner. As you are allowed into this network and you are now part of the call and recognized as a like verified communication. Yeah, this is just like basically trying to put out an internal alert on their system being like security breach of this system.

Like, even though I'm an outside agent, I know that this is Jemis Octava business. It's being disrupted. And the second I get that message in, I will communicate digitally to that network that I am taking immediate action to interface to stop the disruption, but request backup and need help. And even before you start to like get the human speed responses of what that means, you're already feeling like those immediate. initial pings, whatever person that got that information on Foxglove 6 is immediately reaching out to Kear and like personnel on the Kenner to like get status updates. Everything you're getting in the second after that was sent and received is something hasn't gone to plan, this is bad.

I want to flag that very clearly because this was supposed to be a normal pull and they're now responding in earnest to your message. It's nice because it's not a lie. You know, it's very much like, I'm not saying, like, the fact that I know that Ayasa was responsible for the deaths on the Kenner and not the Averix. But, hey, if you see a bunch of dead bodies and I'm telling you that a prince of the Averick's house is being attacked, I haven't said anything wrong. That's all true, right?

It's also the, like, there's no sluggishness in the response for you to ping as anything. other than like a previously established plan is in fact going awry. I'm going to begin to run headlong towards Chi and Z, and I'm going to produce a series of stymtonil strips from my chest cavity. What pre-tell are stymtinal strips? Medicine. Amazing. As you book it back over, speedy or stealthy?

I think hearing the trint is down, we're going to go speedy. Okay. So you are staying up over the lip of the caldera so you're not running at that like weird slant. So you're still in view. So I think you see a single figure with like a very long maybe two thirds of the length of their body rifle has like begun moving slowly in the direction of where you are also headed. I will abruptly shift my LEDs to a. Violent, purple, orange, teal. Red, flashing, eyes flashing red.

And I will just start yelling, halt, assailant, halt, assailant. Security team inbound. Halt! Disarm yourself at once. I think all of you have heard the difference between a voice distortor and the, like, very neutral voice of a translator. and you hear a volume-boasted translator speak out and say, Whoever shot the trance, please handle your synthetic, or do you require assistance? Excelsie, I'll get over here.

I'm doing that. I'm going to walk out of here with my prize and my robot, and you're not going to stop me. What prize? The body of Zadavon-Evirix, a trint of the house of Eorex? What? What?

Shut up. My body? In this moment, can I help? Who do the averixes have the most bad blood with? If I can speak without being overheard, I would love to aid chi in this moment. If I can put together just really quickly some math. Yeah. It's too much for me to conceptualize my family and who would try and call me.

But I think there's something in this moment that is like, They just need an option. They just need someone else who heard that I was on Corueda and would want to make a move like this. The last you would know is the most active bad blood would probably be Camuri. But closest to you in size and might be a little like froggy would be Coga. Equally good case for either one of those. But you could make a case for any.

Got it. You guys can talk at like a normal volume and not necessarily. be heard right now. Gee, go Camry. Go Camry. Far-flung. Somebody who really wants big play, wants to make a big splash

going to the Doralee that they're not fucking around. Probably distant cousin. Not a big player, but somebody who has enough to want to say something. I don't have a name off the top, but Camry, Camry, for sure, Camry.

I've got a showboating Camry that's given me a lot of promises, and that's all you're getting for free. Great. Well, thank you. Excelsial, you see this person stop in their tracks and consider. And then you hear a little scramble. I think this person is now just close enough that they are shouting, despite not needing to because it's like a mechanically boosted voice, that you can hear that they are stammering through a couple ideas before they land on.

Do you have proof? Do I have proof? Who sent you? What are we, are we trading tips here? Bounty Hunter to Bounty Hunter? Are we negotiating? No. No, I have everything that you want. Why would I negotiate with you? I'll look at this interloper, see what she is saying and try to infer and say, Mistress, do you wish for proof to be provided? Have some documents on hand, but he's got nothing.

I'm going to look over to the interloper and say, do you have a message, de-encryptor? Obviously. Very well. And I am going to send over a file that I produced that is Loram Iipsum, Irina, Religious Doctrine, Jibberish, and send it over to him. But inscribe in it everything I have from Kamuri as like the top of the zip file is

Camuri and it is just like a robot religion text bomb with like from your friends at Kumuri on top of it. Seven terabytes of just fucking just fucking unzip this baby. Yeah.

About to fuck your Kazaa to hell. Torrent back to the days of limewire. It's so fucking crazy. I like it. I like it.

Don't give it. him anything. Oh, well, you're lucky that my personal assistant is a lot more accommodating than I am. Do you say that out loud? Yes. Okay, go ahead and give me a tech roll. We'll make the difficulty only a seven. Eleven. Woo! Gorge. I think you're able to see that like a little screen in the right glasses frame that this figure is wearing suddenly goes bright white. You also sent it in light mode. Got them. Monstrous.

So this person was already sort of like standing down a little bit and like kind of puts their rifle down and then just gets assaulted. And you see them almost stagger back with this truly like Mormon text with the word Khmeri put in it three times. That's just enough to buy you time. It's the golden plates with the word Khmerry on top. Yeah, 100%. If he looks at it as gibberish, I am going to. Has our shooter been able to see that Z is not dead? Nope.

Cool. They're basically on the inner lip of this caldera, and he was making his way there. In that case, I'm going to interface and continue to try to stall the shooter. And on Z's glasses, I'm going to send a quick text being like, Zadavon, I am going to interface with the shooter to buy time. I will attempt to be loud to cover the possible sound of you moving away. and I'm going to just start talking to the shooter and go, I'm so sorry to interrupt, but your de-encryptor is visible even from this angle.

I don't mean it as eavesdropping, but I'm able to see the reflection of light on your face. Your model might be slightly out of date. Do you require some help? Shut up. I'm trying to. This is, what did you send? You hear a bunch of things that are rough exclamations that are not being translated.

There's a propriety filter on this, and a bunch of cusses are getting bleeped out. I'll just look in again and be like, the text should be a simple short paragraph contract between my proprietor and the Camorri family. I'm not seeing that I, what? I don't believe your de-encryptor has successfully managed to interface with the file. Okay, what is your name? Who are you? Seeing the inscription from Excelsio, I'm going to start shifting. my position to at least put a ship between myself.

There's no emphasis on speed. There's just trust that these two people I found in this drug den are actively working in my interest for some reason. And so I think it's just going to be, can I get enough space leaving my jacket behind me, keeping my glasses on, crawling so that there is at least some larger, obstacle between myself and this assailant. Yeah. Okay. You are scooting down and away, sort of in the direction that Excelsiel is approaching you from to get down towards those ships.

Chi, you are holding position. Ayasa. Ayasa, get us out, I say into my comms. Iasa gives you a little message that's just sneaky or loud. I send back this sort of teleconetic comms version. of the explosion emoji. You just hear laughter in your ear. Excelsial, you are remaining in visual range.

And now, how close to this person do you want to be? I think if I'm close enough to address them, I would not step closer. But my goal is to have my body language communicate that I am here to be helpful. So I'm like engaging, but don't want to breach whatever the bubble of someone armed with a two-handed weapon is. So I'm just, I'm standing in a respectfully close distance offering help.

Okay. I like that. Then you know what? Go ahead and give me, I want one more roll from you. I want it to be a charm roll. Difficulty of this is going to be an eight. All you really don't want is a one. That is a six. Okay. That's okay. That's not a one. Yeah. That's not a one. Yeah. Look, an eight would have gotten you a sort of wildly miraculous. interaction here. But you're dealing with someone who is mad at you and or his tech and or whoever you are working for that may have stole his bounty. But there is something that you did in getting politely close that is both disarming because this is someone with a sniper rifle.

So this level of close is actually pretty bad in a fight for him. And is disarming that you would do it regardless, you are passively putting down defenses on his end. Like, he's mad, but less so at you than he should be. Okay, well. And he's going to take his glasses off and be like, we just need to have a conversation because if Camorre is a part of this too, then I don't know why too different. Why are we competing?

I don't have the authority to answer that question, but I can provide whatever data I have personally observed to help answer your question. Sure. I just... Normally these go differently and I sort of just shoot everyone and then deal with what I want to deal with later. My understanding is that there is some budget within our contract for those... For example, the ship that was chartered by my mistress was budgeted in our original contract.

It's possible that there is an apportionment in the budget for you helping us even if that sole help is just seeding the prize to the first of the mark. Okay, I mean... Minus the deductions of the explosives that you sent into the bar on Carueta, was that you? Sloppy? Sloppy? It wasn't sloppy. I was trying... You blew up a whole bar and a whole guy inside of it. And a cursory stipend will be sent to his family.

Oh. Also, he reached out to... Oh, so. So that's how you treat your sources. Incredible. Incredible. Oh, you preserve all of your sources. How many of these have you even been on?

You sound like a puller, not a color, anyway. I'm going to look over and I'll say, Mistress, professional critique can wait for a more advantageous time. And it's turned to... Yeah, this guy's fully leaning on his rifle. Like, all right, this is pleasant. Fuck you a little bit. But it's still enough to give...

he's off kilter. This is buying time in a way that, frankly, surprisingly. Give your, I guess what would it be? Give your call sign to my robot, and we're going to be on our way. I will follow up with the details later. Mistress, normally when you offer assassination guidance, you charge for that service. Should I issue a bill or invoice to this individual in exchange for the advice you've offered? Yes, thank you.

Consultation fee. You'll be receiving it. You're new at it. I don't, you haven't provided any. Oh, I'm new at it. I'm just coming down there. And he's going to turn and, like, continue walking. The gun is no longer out and ready to shoot, but he is back moving again.

Gotcha. I'm going to look at him and I'll just say as he's moving. I don't know if he's had time to get away. I don't know where these... He has moved sufficiently in this, and we'll get to that. So he's not going to be exactly where Chi is, but he's headed over the lip now. Do I get any ping on the network from Jemis Octavo on the security network? Oh, yeah. You can process several things at once.

And I think you've been also, like throughout this interaction, listening to chatter between the Kenner who has sent over all of the video footage of Iyasa's wetwork and is informing the next highest in command who is up on Jenipar continuing those moves to secure the asteroid. But they're not sending like some dudes on speeders over here to help us get this guy, right? No, no, no. What you're getting is that they are trying to scramble a couple people that were there for security for the Foxglove. Gotcha. And I think you get a little ping for a location.

Location sharing is on, baby. It is on. And I think with that, you feel like that little ping and then you hear the echo of it pinging off of, I'll make you roll for it. roll a D10 for me. Seven. Saptimal. Yeah. Oh, I like it.

That you hear this ping off of like seven individual suits who are now filing out of the Foxglove and are making their way up the dock and over to where you are. Great. As you turn to go down to see where Z is not going to be because he's not dead. I'm going to say, I don't have your call sign. Would you like me to remove the malware from your D encryptor? That's personal. No, I'll get it fixed later. Thank you.

And I think at this point, you see him slip over the lip. As he steps over the lip, I have my pistol trained on him. He is met with just the most incredulous, absolutely out of Spoon's face. Out of Spoons? Out of Spoons. I have none left to give. Spoons is a metaphor for bandwidth. So this guy slips over the lip, looks at you pointing at him with a pistol.

No sign of Zadavon. Okay, so you were a lie. No. Okay, I'm sorry, first of all, what's your name? You're going to ask me my name. What's your name? I have a pistol on you, my guy. Make a choice.

And he's going to level his rifle at you. I shoot his hand. Fuck yeah. I need you to make a roll about it, huh? Fuck yeah, you do. Fuck yeah, pop this guy, dude. Come on, gee. Come on, gee.

What do you want? A move, a combat, or... You're shooting a man. It's a combat roll, big dog. Six out of six. Okay. And you aim for his hand. I aim for his trigger finger.

Okay. You shoot him in the hand. He does not make a sound. You see, under, like, the glove where he was holding that gun up by his, like, trigger hand is reduced to bloody mess and he does not make a sound. He instead drops the rifle into the other hand and is going to turn and swing it at your face. I need you to make a dodgerle. Okay. That's move.

you have to beat an eight. Four. You're going to take two hit points as you are basically just taken off of your feet and hit the ground. Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to step back. Z, you've been taking bleed damage that I have not been resolving. Okay. So go ahead and roll a D6 for me, and that will determine how many rounds of damage you've taken. So roll up.

One. Okay. You've taken. Two more hit points. Two more damage. Okay. Yeah. I think because you've stayed relatively still and then only started moving recently,

that it's only because you're now making a dash for the ships that, like, you're beginning to feel that bleats damage. What's your health out right now? I'm at nine. Okay. Can I see what's happening at all? 100%. I think you can see foot soldiers coming up the dock.

Is there anything else you're looking for specifically? I think Chi getting hit just makes me stand up. instinct, like I go from being in the prone, like, hiding to should I be doing something. But I think that there's still too many cogs turning to actually go, but I do think I stand. Yeah. Am I aware that if this guy is clubbing chi that the foot soldiers will be here in time to save us? I think you think it will be close if this guy tries to make a bunch of moves. There is something about the, like, maintaining calm that you think you have more time than if you were in

an all-out fight. Gotcha. He responded to being shot by hitting her with the rifle, but has not otherwise broken into any sort of like rage or panic. So it feels like signs are pointing to, I can attempt to break this up and that the foot soldiers will be here in enough time to resolve this. Yes.

Great. I think without any other role, it's if this gets into an actual fight, it might be resolved by the time before, any backup can show up. If things stay kind of slow and measured like they are now, you'll have plenty of time. Does Zadavins bleeding look like it is threatening his life before that can be resolved? No. Okay, cool. In that case, looking like the cavalry is going to get here in time, one way or another, I ask everybody else, I think, Z, you look over, there is glowing light coming

out of the plastic seams of my head and that dies down a little bit? No. Lerner. Lou Wilson, the person is disappointed. Zadav and the character sees and acknowledges. Sees and acknowledges. So I am going to run up in front of the shooter in between him and she, box out my arms and legs like an ex like I'm boxing out someone in basketball, and just start hopping with my lights going crazy going, stop it, stop it, stop it, stop it.

Move. No, you move, no, stop it. So I actually only took one point of damage due to my resistance. So I get clocked in the mouth. I pick myself up. I use one hand that's not holding the pistol to wipe the blood off of my lip. And I spit in front of him. You spit onto the back of it.

I didn't aim for him. I'm hopping. I aimed for the ground. He's boxing out like in basketball. I'm hopping so fast and repeatedly it looks like I'm kind of. of vibrating. Oh, sorry. Stop it. Stop it. Stop it. You think that I leave the body

right here for you to come and trundle down and take a look at? You're good at CQC, but you suck at politics. And I think with that, Excelsiel, you knew that, like, buying more time

and keeping this from accelerating is the way that this gets solved by your backup. She is, is actively turning this into a fight. He's going to take two steps back. You don't have a lot of features visible here. He's obviously covered himself up to blend in with the very stark surroundings of this place. The best you can tell from the little bit of face that you see is like weirdly sunburned and healed over and burned again and healed over. So it's almost like patchy bits of

melanated and unmelinated skin as he backs up and looks like he might be about to listen before he kicks off the front of the rifle and tucked under his elbow and armpit a easier to one-hand version of this gun. This is about to be a fight. And that potentially has fatal consequences for Chi before help can get here. A hundred percent. I will look at him as I'm hopping funnily. I have like a disco ball midsection that's like, stop it, stop it. As I see him go for this half second to click the gun into a usable shape, I go, oh no, and I'm going to hit him with my laser eyes. Yeah.

I burn four grit. I have zero grit. My engines are going to be at zero. I'm like gone at this point. I also burn two health, so I'm at three health. Excelsial has been pushed almost to his physical and mental and energy limits. However, I am going to roll D-Will, which for me is a D-10 plus my level, health damage to him, which he cannot dodge. Yeah, how would he?

He thinks he's looking at a guy, and this guy's looking at him and is going to kill him with how he looks at him. He wouldn't know how to dodge this if he knew it was coming. Do you want to know the number you need to hit? Yes, I do, and I will be quibbling. Go for it. What number do I need to hit? You need to get to a seven. Seven.

Okay. Here we go. And this is the first murder of the campaign. What a thrill. Okay. So how are we explaining in the fiction that you quibbled your laser eyes? I just dig into a quantum engine that affects probability for what is going to be a suboptimal hit. Yeah.

All right. I like it. So this needs to be a six or higher on the die. Come on now. Nine plus one is ten. Oh, thank God. We'd have been devastating to use the laser eyes for the first time and not have them hit full effect. I would hate that.

Okay. Look, the best part of this table is that everyone is a killer storyteller. Brendan, just tell me what it looks like. Would you kill this man? I've been bouncing and glowing like an idiot for the past few seconds. And as this guy goes to change his weapon, it stops. Every light on my body goes out. I need all of the energy I can't.

This is the first time that anyone has seen my LED strips die, and I go to just white plastic and black rubber. My eyes are so expressive. They are more human than human. They're kind of large and animated like a cartoon character to make me expressive and sweet-seeming. Those screens go black, so there's just two black discs that roll out of the way, revealing a collapsing iris that suspends into deep dark space in the center of my head, where two tiny points of red light get noticeably bright. Impossible to not notice bright.

The brightest thing he's ever seen because I'm looking right in his eyes. As I say, be unafraid. Not a moment of your existence shall go unremembered. And I hit him for ten points of damage. Across the calms, you hear the Kenner. It's not that the Kenner knew what you were going to say, but there is some sort of like static feedback coming from that calm that seems to be humming in harmony with you as you speak.

Only you are aware of it. The entirety of that group of soldiers coming from the foxglove to come back you up that's heading to your point, they're all going to stagger suddenly as all of their calms go dark. They don't feel your ping. Everything internal in their systems and in their heads-up displays flickers off for what was only a second but feels like longer for them. And they kind of slam into each other before everything flickers back on and continues to run. And I think the massive green light sitting underneath that caldera for just a moment flickers off for the first time and back on again.

and when the lights return he is dead on the ground and you see Iasa's vehicle is sort of roaring through space and is going to intercept your group

maybe a second or two before the rest of the Foxglove troops come over to but the problem has been handled you are gassed but alive from a far Zich is whoa Ayasa is like

pulling up to you now and you've got maybe 30 seconds before the Foxglove 6. 7. Come and meet you. Having just fried this dude, does he have remains here? I think you made perfect eye contact. So it's just in and out of his eye sockets other than that, perfectly preserved remains. I am going to turn and start walking towards Zadavin. and my light strips are all dead, so it's just white plastic and black rubber. I will roll my ocular lenses back over the sockets,

but they are dead, they're like a dead television screen. So it's like kind of reflective, but dark. And I'm just going to start walking. Normally when I walk, I have a really smooth gait. My upper body is completely still, and the steps are very muted as I walk towards, Zadavon, and I begin to produce a Stimtenel patch, which is an emergency medical kit.

That can wait. I think you would see, as I'm up close to you, that the eyes have gone dark, where my tear ducts would be, smaller than the eraser on a pencil, are two cameras that are focusing in and out, and you see that my eyes aren't my eyes. That the large expressive eyes are just a screen,

and that the thing I look out of, of that I actually see the world out of are these tiny hidden little cameras towards the center along the bridge of the nose. And I don't make any verbal communication. The fans internally in me sound very weak. I am at low health and zero grit. So the words, okay, appear on your data screen. Can I pick up Excelsia? If you go to pick me up, I just very lightly collapse over your shoulder. I make it easy sort of like someone falling over your shoulder and I just fold. I'm extremely light. I'm not that heavy to carry.

Perfect. Because I'm not that strong. I'm picking up Excelsio, making eye contact with Chi. I clock the Foxglove 6'7, and I'm not interested in explanations right now. I'm interested in getting the fuck out of here. I will say picking him up will be another two hit points. Happily. Oh, my God. They're 30 seconds out. Can they see us?

I mean, still? I think this interaction. is brought it down to a tight 20 seconds. Okay. They see you and are headed for you. Is Chi bleeding or no? No, no, I'm fine. I'm fine. I've done my, you know, wipe my mouth and spit blood into the sand.

You can tell that I look a little concerned about the two of you. But while you two are interacting, I'm going to go over and grab comms from this sniper. Okay. Yeah, you go over to the body. pretty standard array. The kit, as far as you can see, is external. We have a HUD that is being worn as glasses with, like, a display that comes up on his right eye. Well, it would have.

He got shot through the eyes. So there's not so much of the heads-up display anymore. Right. He got shot right in the glasses. Okay. I will say this is going to take the rest of the time. The Foxglove backup will arrive. I'm going to ask you, do you want to want to be?

to let Ayasa know what's going on here because she was given an explosion emoji and sees seven fighters headed towards you and I just really want to remind you that that's happening to. So at this point, I want to make sure that I'm in a secure channel with her and I say,

just pick the boys up, I'm going to hop on and then we just got to get out of here. No need for pyrotechnics. No need. You're the one that told me Pirate. And you hear the sound of like a silencer being put back on. I know.

I'm sorry. It's okay. I'll explain later, but we had some fireworks of our own. Okay, you do realize that there's people coming over, right? I know. I'll be there shortly. Okay. Okay.

Z and Excelsiel, you see like a hatch is open for you. Charging up the hatch. Sweet. You were able to board the ship. Chi, it will take you sufficient time to strip this man. of whatever comms you're looking for, you will be intercepted by these people that were called. Chee, come on!

I'm just going to grab the glasses off of him, smoking holes in them and all, and run up the gangplank into the ship. As Chi gets on the ship, my Stimtonel patches can stop the bleed condition. And I think as soon as Z stops walking her gets in the hatch, I don't even need him to necessarily, like, let me down.

I'll just from where I'm hanging, produce a patch and begin to prepare it to cover the most egregious area of the wound. It's basically just like, I think when I produce it, there's literally some block text, like slanted blue, kind of like a direct-to-hospital retail bag

that just says, like, clinic in a bag. And it's like a series of pouches, almost like a tied pod with different stuff in them that you can vacuum seal and pull a little plastic tag that starts to mix the fluids inside that just go to work on the area of the body that it's applied to.

Chi, you're able to slide in right behind the boys and you see Excelsiel beginning to go to work with these patches over what is ultimately a very clean in-and-out wound through your shoulder, Z. So it makes it much easier work than if it was jagged or if you had to deal with like bits of shrapnel. Aiasa makes eye contact with you, Chi, the moment you're on board. What are we doing? What, what's?

There's an act of assassination intent on Z's life. We gotta get out of here. Okay, where are we going? What do you want? Zee, we're safe. Fuck, can I do another check for just what's in the area that feels like it's not a home system of one of the five families? Yeah, go ahead and give me a reason rule, or if you have something a little more specific to do with that, we'll say, because this is just you trying to scan for what you know in and around here, that's just going to be a six.

I will burn six grit. What? I'll burn all of my remaining grit because I think in this moment, Zadavon is carrying a robot who is actively attempting to fix his wounds. she took a huge swing to keep him alive. I know where we're going. And with an eight, I'd like you to tell me. I just got stunned it on so hard. That was so rad.

With a total of eight, you are scanning and thinking about what place is safe enough for you. And then you remember that you spent just enough time with your new good friend Iasa who has had this ship retrofitted to use Orm. She might have some and you always have a small supply

for emergencies. So the answer to this, you can get wherever feels safest for you. I'll say the closest things. Okay. There's nowhere close that feels safe without a jump. Great. You're kind of in the ass middle of nowhere. It would either be like going back to IAS's safe house or risking it and going back up to Jenipar, but you know that that's being aired out, whatever that means with Azult's troops. You can finish your own pull if you want to get to the Lotus system and interface with Azult and deal with whatever Demis Octavo is doing if you still trust them. You can get all the way home if you still trust your family. There is nowhere in the 40 Suns that is not available to you right now.

Great. I think you tell me, Priya, because I'm just going to pull. Like, I think if you're asking, we can go anywhere, we can go anywhere. I think that Daven is thinking about what is Janipar adjacent, but a Vyric's coded. What is a pleasure space straight up? Like, what's Hawaii where, like, my name and my context would carry weight, but I'm not going to run into a family member. Something that is a space to recoup and recalibrate before we make our next move. Right now, Zadavon is thinking that this group that he has found himself with needs a breath, not an answer.

Yeah, okay. I'll ask you just one more question and then provide you with this. do you feel safer hiding in the shadow of another one of the five families, or are you thinking like outskirts of the 40 sons where you might not meet anyone important, but that means that your name might provide a little less cover? I think I want a little five families influence. I don't want to be full rural.

We're not into the country. Yes. Okay. So this is maybe like the Ivericks is Aspen off-season. Yes, exactly. That's what I, I think I keep imagining like a... Picture Aspen in Hawaii. Yes, Aspen in Hawaii.

Abria, produce. The planet, a spy. Yes. Ayasa. A spy. Now. Hawaiian. Hawaiian.

Hawaii, it's already a word. Yeah, it's too close. It's too close. The feminine urge to rename a place a spyee. just to make it happen now. I mean, what did you have? Avana. Avana?

Avana's perfect. That sounds pretty cool. But that's pretty easy just to go like, that's the spy. I'll change a note. No, I like Avana. Your mind jumps to shadow. Shade somewhere you can cool out.

Going to the edge of the 40 suns or a place that you can, does not warrant counting amongst them gives you a better chance to hide out. But if something gets worse, you'll have the problem of not being able to fall back on your name and support if there is any to be found inside of House of your X or another of the five families. And then your mind drifts somewhere a little shady, a little cool. A moon, a vine. A vine. owned by the Kumori family. In one of their distributed systems that is still under their control,

but they are one of the lightest touch of the five families. If they're not involved in this, which you have no reason to believe that they are, it would be easiest to negotiate with them if you even come across them, which is deeply unlikely. A simple jump. It wouldn't even use the entirety. of your small supply of reserve ORM to get you out of trouble. Great.

I think I'm going to lay Excelsior down in one of the bunks that I was admiring earlier. Take my sunglasses off, stick them to the jewelry magnet, walk back up toward the cockpit. Ayasa, can you jump us to Ivana? I got it. Oh, I... I'll get you on ORM. I'm good for it. Yeah.

Oh, okay. Yeah, that's... You just have ORM? Let's go now. Okay, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm going on. I'm going, I'm going. And you see,

as she begins to immediately, like, pull into orbit and will make the first arm jump that you all have experienced shortly. It's going to take about 10 minutes to get up and out. And meanwhile, I think I'm going to pop open one of the side panels of the bunk and pull out some cables and plug in Excelsio. As you go ahead. to plug me in. I think if I've been placed down by Z,

there's a very simple charging port as you plug me in. My eyes sort of flicker back on. Thank you. And I'm going to sit and fold myself up and cover my knees and shins with my arms and have my hands sort of face around backwards and just curl into a ball. And my LED strips make a little climbing green scale

that then drop... is I just charge in a corner. I sort of say almost to myself, no, thank you. I am going to sit next to Excelsiel while he charges and examine the sunglasses, HUD glasses. You know what? I think they have transitions lenses, so they block the sun, too. Okay.

I think kind of stupidly, that is the first thing you see. like both of the lenses are perfectly shot through and shattered and the amount of corrosive damage without knowing too much about lasers in general unless you want to make a case for me that you are secretly very good at lasers the little like quick flash of light that came out of excelsial shot perfectly through the lenses and fried everything in those initial frames. So this tech is right now shot, and there will have to be some, like,

reconstructive work to pull anything good from it. I think the little bit of lens that's, like, still on there on one side, you see has gone hyper dark, like a transitions lens that has been worn for too long. But a level of dark that I think warrants noting. I will make a note of it. because I was not planning on trying to do the technical examination of it yet that is best left for Exelzeal to help. Talk to the glasses or whatever he does.

I'm more interested in the designer and the provenance of where these might come from. Ooh. Okay, I'm going to make you pick. Do you want to know who made glasses like? like these or where they were made for? Where they were made for. All right. Go ahead and give me a reason rule if you have any like tech ability to go with it.

I'm sorry. I know. It's the one for that though. A six will get you there. I got a one. A one? I have no idea. These are not any sort of, these are not like Zadavans where they're fancy designer that

happen to have tech capabilities. These are four Merks. They are some sort of gadget mumbo-jumbo that I have no idea of. They're standard issues, sleigh bands. They're not particularly interesting other than the fact that they seem to be not personalized. Like there is so much tech in the 40 Suns. And there's a lot of tech that is made specifically for people or for places. Like the personalization is where people sink a lot of their resources.

The only one that you can clock right now, again, is that hyper-dark lens. Something that has to block extreme sun. I think that's like the clue you have on its providence. And you know what? I'll say that because you ripped it off of his face, you would have gotten a good look at his face. you see that same thing that Excelsial was able to clock. What little bit of his face was showing was like patchy, sunburnt and re-burnt skin, a origin that does not match where he clearly spent most of his time,

a place with a very strong sun. You got to wear your SBF, folks. And that's the moral of this entire series. Solari Protection Factor. Anything else? No, fuck this place. Excelsial would want to communicate to the Kenner, but I don't think it makes sense in the condition he's in right now.

You know what I'm saying? Like, if you think it's appropriate for the Kenner to reach out to him in his, like, sleeper mode state, that's totally fine. But, like, that's the only thing I can think of. I think because you, like, you're out of grit, but you're not out of health. Like, you're not knocked unconscious. And you're not fighting death.

I think you are in that like 5% battery. The moment you get plugged in, like, yes, the less you can do the better you feel and the faster you will recover, but you can still get a text. And I think not a message from the Kenner, but you get re-pinged from Foxglove 6. And a voice, feminine seems to be switching between channels. trying to reach out and is just giving a call sign of a mumbo-jumbo of letters that you just sort of threw out as any kind of address when you were addressing the network for the Fox Club 6. Great. I'm going to tell what I believe to be a version of the truth or the reality in terms of Ayasa getting to us before Fox Club 6 did. I'll just say, independent detail is unsafe,

killing transmissions and location services, security response was not fast enough independent party interceded. Any identifying? Nope. Nothing that identifies me. I mean, I already know that the Kenner identified me because it was concluded that these security tapes were there. They know who and what I, like the details about who and what I am were there to even give the legitimacy for the original message. But I'm not adding an extra big John Hancock on the bottom of this. they know who I am and what I'm communicating.

I am a, genuinely low energy, and then B, also am just like, not in a dick way, but just being like security response was not fast enough, independent measures had to be taken. We are no longer safe and have to kill location services. Then the last message you're going to get before you go dark will actually be from the Kenner, not words, not a conversation,

but the closest thing you could describe it as is, are you safe? Yeah. With the implication being, is the vehicle you are currently on a friend or foe? I send a response back immediately reading 100% safe from known threats. Unknown threats impossible to determine at present moment security protocols engaged to avoid possible unknowns. And then I think you feel the Kenner like kicks you from.

this like web just a half a heartbeat before you would have unplugged all of it. So you have someone sort of not intercepting on your behalf, but has enough information to maybe like bodyblock for you as whatever's happening with the Jemis Octavo comms is scrambling and trying to understand what just went down. Is it possible as a parting gift as I can feel the Kenner digitally advocating on our behalf to leave some minor fragment of data or code that would put me as a signatory of that exit command in case the Kenner is interrogated about who removed me from the network. Oh, that's really nice. Yeah, absolutely.

Not to foist it, but I just leave it there in the Kenner's data logs as a should you need it. I think you just feel an alert icon of just surprise. that that is the last thing and then you are kicked from the web and you go into rest proper. I can't believe one of the most tender romances of my time as a PC is with a spaceship. Why not? It's sci-fi. Anything's possible.

It's sci-fi. It's genuinely so sweet. I'm very touched by the Kenner's actions in this moment. Amazing. You all feel that shift in your bodies as you break atmosphere. In this little ship that for any of you that have done any amount of travel does not feel like the make or size or sturdiness required for what an orm jump would be, whether you've experienced that inside of your own self or it's something that's been mythologized across your history, books, and data stories. worm has only been back for a small amount of time and the resource is still so expensive and so precious.

Just to clarify, I also is going to use her storage of worm and is operating off of like a you got me. So you all see as she pulls something from a little vial around her neck and opens a small, almost blink if you'll miss it, It looks like a little turnkey, but it opens all the way up, kind of like a cigarette lighter. And she injects a small green capsule and recloses it. And everything around you becomes light as you speed up. And those of you who know nothing but the stories of how warm worked before,

don't just lean in. You must pass through. It makes sense now because it feels like your body is moving through a tunnel. You feel pressure even on you inside of this structure like peristalcis, but somehow so much faster. You're being squeezed through a thing and it feels simultaneously, agonizingly slow like you could stop and roll down a window and touch the light outside of this place. but you have an internal sense of how fast you must be going, covering light years in an instant. It is surreal and strange, and then it is suddenly over, and you can't help, but send your awareness back towards what you think the tunnel you just passed through was,

but looking back through even the windows at the back of this tiny ship, there is no unbroken space. The place you were was not a place and you've moved through it. And ahead of you, you see a large crescent of green across a moon that you know. You would have never reached in 10 lifetimes before Orm was back. And I think you realize in this moment how strange and wonderful it would be, Z, to have experienced that for the first time and not every few years when your family, one of the families, gotten in their mind to get everybody together

and celebrate some strange political or economic very, victory, you think about the tremendous privilege you've had growing up and that little taint of unsuredness as you wonder who inside that great and magical and powerful family of yours tried to kill you on Karu Ada. As you approach this green crescent on an unknown moon in a system, I don't think either of you ever imagined you. would see why would you need to. I'm going to say you all level up for the first time. Welcome to Ivana.

That was Erica Ishii as Chitanko, Renanley Mulligan as Excelsia, Lou Wilson as Zadavinavina Virix, and Abria Aingar as everyone and everything else. Solari is produced by Worlds Beyond Number, edit and sound design by Big Giant Head Productions, and score by Will Savino. stories like this, join us on our Patreon. We'll see you by the fireside. Someone push okay on my updates.