Victory At All Costs

Detained by authorities on an unfamiliar planet, the crew uses any means necessary to get back to the Swan Song

Short Summary
The date is currently unknown. The party has been taken captive by assailants from the planet Elouahabu and is currently under detention.

Piani has been lying in her bed feeling week and feeble with an IV administering medicine into her. Dr. Obramawitz has been checking up on her and during one of their sessions, the doctor shows her a video feed of Mr. Sicarian dressed up as a cook holding a meat cleaver to a fish. Piani tells the doctor that the man is named Mr. Sicarian and that she has fought many battles by his side. The doctor looks sad as if that is not correct, and then leaves Piani by herself. Higgins sits in front of a feast eating. Also in front of Higgins is a man in a suit who tells Higgs that he can give him five million credits for safe entry into the ship so that he can retrieve the residing AI. The man brings in Mr. Sicarian and Viktor to meet with Higgs and tells them all that Piani is unable to come because she is being operated on. Alone in her room, Piani gets into her wheelchair, breaks the mag-lock on the door, and heads to a computer. On the computer she sees that she is being held at a hospital owned by the Homeland Federation on planet Elouahabu. She also sees the three of her friends feasting around a banquet table and her blood starts to rise. A man comes down the stairwell next to Piani. She shoots him and then quickly retires back to her room. Higgins convinces the man in the suit to let Viktor and Mr. Sicarian see what they can do for Piani and so the two of them and the man head up to Piani's floor. Just as they are about to head into the door, the man bolts down the stairs and men come out onto the stairwell to greet them. Viktor chases after the man down the stairs. Mr. Sicarian throws one man over the railing and watches as he sees another man shoot Viktor in the head, killing him instantly. In a rage, Mr. Sicarian disposes of the second man as well. After hearing gunshots, Piani wheels herself out of her room and ends up running into Mr. Sicarian. The man in the suit rushes back into the room where Higgins is and takes him into the lobby through the elevator. Mr. Sicarian and Piani notice the elevator stopping by the lobby and go down to the lobby themselves. The three remaining crew members get re-united, shoot the man in the suit who identifies himself as Meyer, and head towards the Swan Song. Pi tells Piani that help has come and when they arrive at the Swan Song, they are greeted by a group of people in black uniforms. One of the men tells the crew that they are there to help and so they all get aboard the Swan Song and leave Elouahabu.

Detailed Summary
The date is unknown. The party has been taken captive by assailants from the planet Elouahabu and is currently under detention.

Orbiting a giant green planet is a grim-looking war ship that has an embellished white cross painted on its side. In the ship, there is a woman wearing a blue and white military-cut dress. She has blonde hair that is shaven on one side revealing cybernetic implants on her face. A man in a gray captain's uniform approaches the woman and says, "Madam, reports of the Swan Song being captured on Elouahabu." "Agent Meyer then?" Asks the woman. The man nods. The woman says, "What about L'enfant?" The man doesn't respond. "Send a team. Hopefully it's not too late" says the woman.

Medicine has been continuously administered to Piani Pic via an IV but it doesn't seem to be helping because she is still feeling feeble and weak. She has been getting regular visits from Dr. Obramawitz and during one of their visits, Piani explains to the doctor how she first met the crew of the Swan Song. She says that she was the first crew member to be picked up and Mr. Sicarian was the last. She continues saying that the crew picked her up because of her communication skills and that none of them knew about her MES until later. Dr. Abramowicz says to Piani that due to recent trauma, her MES may be messing with her memory. The doctor turns over a tablet that she is holding and Piani looks at the screen and recognizes a busy marketplace from her homeworld Majid. The feed is coming from a drone camera that flies by a couple of market stalls and eventually settles down next to a stall that has a bunch of cooking trays laid out on it. The camera freezes on the face of a plain-looking man in an apron who is holding a cleaver up to a fish. Piani recognizes this man as Mr. Sicarian and after telling the doctor the identity of this man, Dr. Abramowicz looks depressed as if her answer is not correct. Piani tells the woman that she had previously fought by Mr. Sicarian's side and the lady, still looking depressed, tells Piani that they will try again tomorrow, and leaves the room.

In a banquet-style room, there is a large table containing an assortment of good quality food. Sitting at the table is a well-dressed Wilbur Higgins III sipping on a glass of bourbon and enjoying the contents displayed in front of him. Sitting across the table is a man in a suit wearing a blue tie who escorted Higgins here. Higgins had been taken from his small cell, given back his clothes, allowed a shower, and escorted to this room. Higgins looks up at the man and notices him smoking. He asks for a cig and the man hands him one and lights it for him. The man then says that he has to get on the Swan Song. There is a brief silence as Higgins takes a long drag and then slowly exhales smoke out of his mouth. After all the smoke has escaped his lungs, Higgins asks if they have a TV. The man says no. Higgins rips a leg off of a nearby cooked turkey and starts eating it. The man speaks up, saying that the entity on the ship has locked all access to it. That it is too fragile for them to be able to just force their way in and so he needs codes to grant them safe access. The man asks Higgins what he wants in return and Higgins replies, "About five mil." The man nods and says that he will have to get it approved. Higgins asks for the crew to be brought up to the room and the man replies, saying that it will be possible for all but Piani. He continues, saying that Piani has something wrong with her head and has about 2–3 weeks left to live. The man gets up to go get Viktor Kovacs and Mr. Sicarian, and leaves Higgins alone with a servant. Higgins looks up at the servant, takes a glass of water, and slowly pours the water onto the middle of the table. The servant looks up to a camera in the corner of the room and shrugs. He then puts his hand up to an earpiece, scowls, walks over to the table, and starts dramatically dapping up the water with a towel. Higgins asks for the servants name but he responds in an unknown language. "Speake da English?" asks Higgins. Higgins then notices an LED panel located on one of the walls of the room that contains a looping display of a city-scape. He gets up and stands next to the screen, longingly looking into it while smoking his cig.

Mr. Sicarian and Viktor walk into a fairly large and orderly room, much better looking than the rooms that they had previously been locked away in. The deranged Viktor walks over to Higgins, puts a bloody hand on his shoulder, says, "It's nice to see you" and hugs him. Higgins tells the party that Piani has only three weeks left to live. Viktor mentions that it has been a while since she has had her MES medication, and that could be the cause of her condition. The suited man that had previously been talking with Higgins returns and tells the party that Piani took a turn for the worse and is being operated on as they speak.

Piani wakes up in her wheelchair, this time feeling a little more cognizant and generally aware of her surroundings. Fed up with waiting, she breaks the mag-lock on the door to her room and sets out to try and find the party. She doesn't see anyone in the hallway or in the surrounding rooms, everything looks to be set up like an empty hospital just as the doctor had previously mentioned to her. Piani wheels herself to a lobby where there sits an old computer on a desk. After some input into the computer's BIOS, Piani finds that the hospital seems to be the property of the Homeland Federation and that she is currently on the planet Elouahabu. She isn't able to access patient records but she does gain control of a camera focused on three familiar people eating at a table and her blood pressure starts to rise. While looking for the location of the room that her friends are in, she hears footsteps coming from a nearby stairwell. Piani scrambles to get under a lobby desk but is too noisy. A man approaches the desk, spots Piani, and radios for help. Without hesitating, Piani grabs the man's gun out of his holster and fires a shot directly into his groin. The man gasps as he is flown back into Piani's chair of which starts moving backwards, hitting the wall behind it with a clash. Piani shakily stands up, fires another round into the guys head, and takes the gun with her back into her room.

In the banquet room, the man in the suit shows the crew a camera feed of what seems to be Piani's current operation. Seeing this, Higgins grabs the suited man by the collar and pleads to him to allow the doctor Viktor to operate on Piani. The man agrees and Viktor convinces him to allow Mr. Sicarian to come along as well. When the man turns and starts walking towards the door, Mr. Sicarian breaks off a sharp turkey bone and hides it up his sleeve. When Viktor, Mr. Sicarian, and the suited man arrive at an elevator, the man tells them to go up seven floors and that there will be a nurse waiting for them when they get there. Not trusting the man, Mr. Sicarian says that they will take the stairs. The three of them head up seven flights of stairs and get up to the door. Seeing that the suited man hasn't completely followed them up, Mr. Sicarian shouts down to the man that the door is locked and that he'll have to come up and unlock it. Shakily, the man speaks an unknown language into his walkie-talkie. The door in front of Mr. Sicarian starts to open up. At this, the suited man locks eyes with Viktor, turns, and bolts down the stairs. Viktor chases after the man and from the top of the stairs, Mr. Sicarian sees a metal canister fall onto the floor. Just in time, he moves to the side of the door and blocks his eyes from the surge of light that comes from the flash grenade as guns start to fire into the door. Being safely away, Mr. Sicarian cuts himself with his turkey bone and smears blood on the window of the door to resemble that he had been shot. The gunfire stops and after a couple of seconds, the door opens up and a guy walks out. Prepared and waiting, Mr. Sicarian lunges at the guy with his turkey bone. The two of them grapple and a second man comes out of the door and takes aim at Viktor running down the stairs. Mr. Sicarian looks at Viktor just in time to see a bullet and a spray of blood come out from the back of his head. Invigorated with rage, Mr. Sicarian takes the man who he is grappling with and throws him off the side of the stairwell, who falls down multiple stories before crashing onto the ground below. The remaining man who had shot Viktor turns his rifle towards Mr. Sicarian but is too slow as Mr. Sicarian grabs the man's rifle and throws him over the railing as well. The man wraps his arm around Mr. Sicarian as he is falling but his shoulder dislocates as his rifle gets stuck in the railing. Unable to hang on, the man falls down to his death. At this moment, Mr. Sicarian starts to hear the loud cursing of a familiar voice coming from the room behind him.

Piani is back in her room when all of a sudden she hears lots of footsteps run by her door. She then hears loud shots being fired from somewhere nearby. Grabbing her wheelchair and hiding her weapon behind her, she starts to head toward the direction of the shots. Down the hall, she sees a guy standing next to a pair of doors who is holding a short machine gun and talking into a walkie-talkie. Piani calls to the man for help. Startled, the man runs over to her and asks if she is alright. Piani then grabs the gun from behind her and takes a shot at the confused man. Her projectile misses but instead of firing back, the man runs away and ducks into a nearby room. Piani loudly curses at the man as she presses forward to where she had heard the original gunfire. As she is wheeling herself towards the pair of doors that the man was standing at, Mr. Sicarian comes out from the other side. Immediately, Piani tells Mr. Sicarian that there is a guy hiding out in a nearby room and gives him her gun. Mr. Sicarian walks into the room and tells the man that he doesn't have to die and can surrender instead. The man kicks his gun over to Mr. Sicarian whom proceeds to pick it up and shoot the man in the head. Mr. Sicarian loots a bunch of knives and weapons from the newly made dead bodies and gives Piani one of the guy's personal cell phones for her to contact Pi. Piani tells Pi that they are trying to get to them and to not let anyone on the ship and Pi responds, "[Truth] Don't worry, help is coming." Mr. Sicarian wheels Piani to the elevator with the plan of going back to the banquet room to get Higgins and then head for the Swan Song. They arrive at the elevator and notice that it stops by the lobby for a few seconds before coming up to their level. Seeing this, Mr. Sicarian and Piani get into the elevator and head for the lobby.

The servant gestures for Higgins to stay where he is and leaves the room. Higgins acquiesces and continues to enjoy his meal. After a few minutes, the man in the suit comes into the room sweating and out of breath. He tells Higgins that terrorists have come, that all of his friends have been shot, and that the two of them need to get to the Swan Song and leave. The man says that he will give Higgins all the money he wants and with lots of money, Higgins can buy lots of new friends. The two of them get to an elevator and make their way up to the lobby. Reaching the lobby, the elevator closes behind them and starts going up. The guy takes out a very advanced communications pad and says into it, "It's Meyer." Looking over at the pad, Higgins notices a logo that he has seen before but can't quite figure out from where. After a short conversation, the man closes the comm pad and says to Higgins that an extraction vehicle is on its way. As he is saying this, the elevator behind him opens up and inside is Piani in a wheelchair and Mr. Sicarian. Higgins gets up and cheerfully goes over to Piani and says, "Piani, they put your face back on, that's incredible! This planet is insane. Viktor is so good. Where is he at?" Meyer says, "Oh fuck!" and puts his hands up. Mr. Sicarian explains to Higgins that this man had got Kovacs killed and had planned to kill them all. Higgins says, "Wait, you killed Kovacs?" He then grabs a pistol off of Mr. Sicarian's back, points it at Meyer, and asks him who he works for. Piani all of a sudden yells out, "You've got a fucking psychic in a goddamn wheelchair who's about to fucking go off. You better ask his fucking questions or I'm going to fucking melt your face mother fucker!" Mr. Sicarian says, "Piani, eloquent as always." Higgins exclaims, "Piani, I've missed you so much!" Piani responds with, "Fuck you, you owe me fucking 40,000..." Mr. Sicarian asks the man who he is working for and the man responds, saying that he has conditioning that is preventing him from telling them anything but that there is a vehicle coming to them as they speak to take them to the Swan Song. It is at this point that Higgins shoots Meyer in the head.

Piani receives a message from Pi that says, "They're here :]" as well as the location of the Swan Song. To get there faster, Higgins breaks into a cargo van which causes the alarm to go off. He can't shut it off, so instead he presses play on the cassette player and turns the famous 'Hebrew Bluegrass Containing Banjos' music up. After a minute of driving, a fast vehicle appears behind the van but does not attempt to drive them off the road as they continue towards the Swan Song. The party starts converging onto a large cargo-building as a spotlight splashes down onto them and the car behind them. The party hears a loud pop, a whistle, and then sees an explosion behind the car that was chasing them which causes the car to crash into a nearby pole. The crew drives up to the cargo building, gets out of the vehicle, opens up the doors, and inside they see the Swan Song which is looking in very bad condition. There is also black cabling dangling from the ceiling of the building and in front of them stands six men in black armor. One of the men makes a signal to the rest of them who head up onto a hovering stealth-vehicle. The man who had made the signal approaches the party. He is black, about 40 years old, and has a chrome cybernetic eyeball. The man sticks out his hand and says, "Monsieur Sicarian." Mr. Sicarian shakes his hand and the man says, "I am sorry we couldn't be here sooner. Your ship is ready to go, let's get out of here." Mr. Sicarian asks the man who he is and the man replies, saying that they can talk about it later once he and the party gets onto the ship and off of the planet. The man says that he was told there were four of them. "Fuck you" says Higgins. Piani tells the man that they no longer have a pilot. The man turns to Piani and tells her that L'enfant, the machine ghost spirit on the ship, can pilot it for them. The man says that they will leave one guy here to give them enough time to escape and the four of them quickly board the Swan Song. As the cargo bay is closing, they witness the last guy get shot down at the entrance of the building as men pour into the building after them. Piani sits at her terminal and Pi says, "Welcome back. Sorry I don't have any pizza for you." Piani responds with, "<3 get us the hell out of here." The cargo bay closes and 'Don't Wanna Miss A Thing' by Aerosmith plays as the Swan Song takes off into the atmosphere. Looking out of the window of his room, Higgins sees the planet of Elouahabu getting smaller and smaller. He then sees Viktor's face in the window, puts his hand up to it, and closes his eyes.

Crew Status

 * Casualties: Viktor Kovacs
 * Passengers: Unknown 40-year-old man

Ship Status

 * Integrity: Unknown
 * Malfunctions: Cargo Integrity Nullified
 * Malfunctions: Fuel Scoops Offline
 * Malfunctions: Sand-thrower Offline

Criminal Activities

 * New Crime: Killed 4 people in the hospital in addition to agent Meyer

Business

 * Credits Acquired: None
 * Credits Spent: None
 * Jobs In Progress: None
 * Jobs Completed: None
 * Debt Paid Off On Swan Song: 0 credits
 * Current Debt On Swan Song: 742,120 credits