Rogue Trader One-on-One: Part Twelve: There's Always a Plan B

So we left our intrepid Captain about to begin a game of Regicide, with an incredibly heretical board, with a Necron Lord.

Yes, I went a bit gonzo - but we're both loving it.

The Necrontyr proposed a stake, to make the game more interesting - if she won, she could take any item she wished from his collection. If he won, he got to keep one of her crew as a trophy, held eternally like the other "live" samples he had collected. Harry the Tech-Priest, to be exact. While Harry (being a massive coward) was none too keen on the idea, the thought that she might attain the final starmap piece without resorting to violence against this god-like creature was one that appealed to her greatly.

The Captain had a lot of experience with Regicide - at the Military Academy, she had used it as a way to both relax and hone her tactical skills, and could reliably beat most comers.

But not the Necrontyr.

He was pulling manuvers that would put Deep Blue to shame, with feints, set-ups, and bizarre choices that seemed to show he could read her every move, and somehow stay at least 5 moves ahead. She struggled her way through the game, until calling for a small break as he plotted his next move. Ever gracious, the Necron allowed her to speak to Jayne for a moment as he plotted. She dropped Jayne the verbal clue that everything had went to shit, and it was time for Plan B.

With Jayne, Plan B is always explosives.

She pulled something off of her belt, and tipped the Captain back out of her "chair", practically slinging her over her shoulder to carry her away as a great flash of blue light erupted behind her. Turns out Harry had "liberated" some fine technology from the Champagne Room, and was in the process of categorising and testing it when Jayne happened upon one of these beauties. He "gifted" it to her, for no small expense, for her personal collection.

Looking back, Claudia saw the Necrotyr frozen, his expression still what she assumed to be one of deep thought and planning - surrounded by a familiar blue glow. The Stasis Grenade would hold him in the frozen state for somewhere between 15 and 30 minutes, so they had to act fast. Asking Harry what the field did, he explained it was just like the ones on the ship - but much smaller, if just as effective. He was worried that the Necrotyr might not be affected, his technology far outstripping their own - but, as Claudia surmised, their lower-tech solution still had him stumped.

The crew ran into the back room, swiping up whatever loose items they could - most things which weren't once living were simply carefully placed, not held by arcane technologies. She also noted that the starmap piece, a disk the size of her torso, was floating free of the field - perhaps it only worked on living beings? She would need to make some notes when she got out...

If she got out. The crew, having grabbed everything they could, huddled around the massive set of golden armour, and she cried for a wide-range beam-up via the Teleportarium. The other Necrontyr had started to twig that something was wrong, and began pursuing the crew - swarms of scarabs and skeletal Warriors, somewhat lost without the Necron Lord's guidance, began firing wide shots at the crew. While travelling through the Warp is never a pleasant experience, teleporting out of the fields generated on the Necron ship nearly tore the crew apart.

It was a good few hours before the Captain awoke, safe in one of the Medicae bays, but she still held onto her prize - the final piece of her starmap.