The Astonishing Alchemist - vol. 01

It is just past midnight and you are having second thoughts about this whole superhero thing. For weeks you have been waiting for a lead, anything really, that would give you reason to move against your former employer. Your friend on the inside of Lloyd Laboratories, Dr. Alicia Morrison, finally called you today with some useful information.

"His name is Anton Folstad." She told you over the phone in a very hushed voice. You could tell she had her wrapped around the receiver, trying to prevent her words from carrying; but there was also a hint of excitement in her voice. This whole world is very new to both of you and it was clear she was having a little fun playing spy. "Never heard of the guy before today and now he shows up here with a whole entourage and they're being given free range of the place. No ID badges on any of them. I only heard his name when he introduced himself to that pretty new intern. You know the one that never really seems to get any work done but is always being cut some slack because all the guys--" you have to cut her off and remind Alicia that time is of the essence.

"Anyways... I am not sure what he was here for, but he left with a bunch of rolled up blueprints. I followed them outside as they left. Get this, I bought a pack of cigarettes a week ago; went out pretending I was taking a smoke break. Never smoked a day in my life but I had them totally fooled. Ha! How great is that!? You have to admit, I am nailing this assignment so far. But back to Folstad... I was pretty far away but could pick up his men complaining about a late night pick up. It's going to go down at midnight in the parking lot across from that old pet shop with all the sad little puppies in the window. I can't go by that place anymore. I don't have any more space in my apartment for another wittle fluffy guy. If you go there and these guys are doing something... shady. Please make sure you don't actually get any animals hurt if things get ugly. Oh yeah, make sure you don't get hurt either."

That brings us up to date. You showed up early and got a good vantage point on the roof of the abandoned building adjacent to the parking lot. For awhile it was just you, the darkness, and a couple of sleeping puppies across the street. Folstad and his cronies finally showed up a couple of minutes before twelve. Anton Folstad is a tall, but lean built man in his late twenties. Slicked back bleach blonde hair. Finely cut suit. He is surrounded by two towering muscled men that you do not want to mess with. At least not without a little help from your concoctions.

As another car with darkly tented windows pulls into the parking lot your heart starts to race. Folstad's men unbutton their jackets and make it visible that they are packing heat. A number of equally large men get out of the second vehicle and walk to the trunk. They motion Volstad over and he looks over what is inside. Try as you might, you don't have a view of it from up here. After a moment, Volstad snaps his fingers and his boys come over to collect the goods. Two dufflebags that look very full and heavy.

Sweat beads and drips down your face as you contemplate what to do next.

I have to find out what’s in those bags.

The hooded figure of The Alchemist scans the nearby alley for the quickest way down from his vantage point and swings — literally — into action, the sticky hands and feet from the mutagen he ingested a few minutes ago still active. He clambers down the fire escape with little effort to land lightly on the ground. He moves toward the mouth of the alleyway and reaches for one of the glass tubes at his belt. Speed, I think. Take the bags from their hands before they even know to blink.

And then it slips from his hand, and he watches it tumble end over end in what feels like slow motion. The shatterproof glass — another of his own inventions — turns out to be a blessing and a curse. The vial doesn’t shatter and spill its contents all over the concrete sidewalk, but the noise! Oh my stars, the noise. The clinking and clattering echoes in his own ears, and he quickly, desperately looks to see if the goons or Folstad heard.

Every eye in the parking lot swings over in your direction. "We got a cape!" Folstad's men rush to load the bags into his car. Anton himself just shakes his head in frustration.

"Act like professionals. Get that fool, but do it quietly. Don't go shouting and waking up the whole neighborhood."

Every door on the second car opens and in reverse clown car fashion, far too many men climb out of the vehicle then you thought would be possible. Before you've even had time to react an entire mob appears to be sprinting toward you. Folstad climbs back into his car and waits for his men to make short work of you.

---

Dice Pool Limit - 5

Threat Rating
Mooks (Well Dressed Muscled Thugs) - 10

I have got to finish that anti-clumsiness mutagen formula...

Luckily, the vial didn't bounce far away. It's a simple matter to swipe it up, unscrew the cap and down the contents. He feels the tingling, rushing, warming rush through his limbs, drawing a grin to his face as he stares down the goons. The first of them is nearly on him and draws a fist back to drive it into the Alchemist's face, but the mutagen's taken effect already and he dodges almost faster than the eye can see. He zips past the first and elbows him in the back of the head, then turns and pummels the next one with a series of sharp punches, and finishes with a sharp kick to the next one's knee.

You hear a sharp popping sound as your foot strikes the goon's knee. He lets out a yell of pain and falls to the asphalt. One of the other men you struck is slowly getting to his feet as the rest of the mooks realize they may have underestimated you and decide the best course of action is to try and slow things down. As long as that chemical compound is pumping through your blood, they may find slowing things down more than expected. They regroup by forming a perfect circle around you and prepare to attack from all angles at once.

Folstad starts to pay more attention to the fight. He puts a hand to his chin as he watches and studies how you fight, while preferring to stay in the relative safety of his vehicle.

---

Dice Pool Limit - 5
Alchemist - 3 HP
Speed Mutagen Counter - 5 (it was reduced by 1 because of the one failed roll last round)

Threat Rating
Mooks (Well Dressed Muscled Thugs) - 7

"Come on, boys. Gonna have to get up earlier in the morning if you're going to keep up!" says the Alchemist, standing still long enough to grin broadly at the thugs, beckoning them forward with both hands. "Or grow a second brain cell. Maybe you can all share it!"

Okay, first order of business back at the lab: reinforce the gloves on this suit. I can't keep punching forever. Not without a few broken fingers, he thinks. As usual, one part of his brain is making to do lists while the rest takes care of the situation at hand.

He moves back into action, jumping forward to grab one of his assailants by the arm. He spins and launches him toward one of the others. It creates an opening in the circle, and he slips quickly out through it, sweeping the legs out from a nearby thug and pushing him down to faceplant on the concrete.

Folstad rolls his eyes at the ineptitude of his minions. Having escaped their encirclement, you now find yourself positioned between the mooks that remain standing and the vehicle that contains their boss.

"Forget noise, just take this guy out," one of the men orders while drawing his pistol. The rest follow suit and take aim.

Folstad sees you winning this encounter as enviable and motions for his driver to get him out of here. The driver slams on the gas and the tires smoke for a moment before gaining enough traction to propel the car forward.

---

Dice Pool Limit - 5
Alchemist - 3 HP
Speed Mutagen Counter - 5

Threat Rating
Mooks (Well Dressed Muscled Thugs) - 3

Optional Side Objectives
Disable Folstad's car - 5 (One Round Time Limit)

Just throwing this out there, since it isn't always clear to new players what can and can't be done in a game of Wushu (hint: the answer is almost always - Yes, you can do that): Leaping onto the car as it speeds away is an option, and it would not require any successful rolls in this instance. However, if you choose to get onto the car while any mooks are left standing, they may shoot you off.

"No! No no no!"

The hooded Alchemist zips up next to the nearest goon and wrenches a gun away from his grasp, punching him in the throat to take him down. "Stay here, we've got things to talk about!"

Leveling the gun, he squeezes off several shots at the rear tires, hoping to disable the car before it can get too far away. He's not all that experienced with a gun, so he has to keep most of his focus on aiming.

Bullets tear into the vehicle, but none seem to find purchase with the squealing tires. You watch as the car flies down the street and out of sight. There isn't much time to focus on Folstad's escape as your attention is drawn to the shattered window of the pet store across the street. You are taken over by panic and fear as you contemplate having ended the life of one of those poor innocent puppies with your stray bullets. Suddenly the puppy rises unharmed and leaps from the store front. It takes off running after Folstad's car as fast as its little legs an carry it.

The worry drains out of your body only to replaced by blinding pain as one of the goons pistol whips you across the back of the head. You fall to the ground in a heap and when you roll over you find yourself looking down the barrels of no less then three pistols.

---

Dice Pool Limit - 5
Alchemist - 2 HP
Speed Mutagen Counter - 3

Threat Rating
Mooks (Well Dressed Muscled Thugs) - 3

Optional Side Objectives
Disable Folstad's car - 2 (Unsuccessful)

To do: practice using a gun. That was embarrassing. Also to do: do not tell Alicia about the pet store.

Aloud, the Alchemist says, "Gentlemen, gentlemen. There's no need for violence. Surely we can come to some sort of an arrangement that involves you putting down your weapons, me getting back to my feet, and all of us talking about our situation like civilized people. Right?"

He turns from impassive unfriendly face to impassive unfriendly face, seeing no indication that they agree with him. Or understand what he's saying. Or really, even heard it in the first place.

"No? Guess it's the hard way then."

He kicks out with both legs at a goon's knees, then quickly clambers to his feet. With Folstad's car tearing away, he knows that staying to take care of the rest of these knuckle-draggers is only going to prevent him from getting to the real problem: those dufflebags. That's when he hears the yapping puppy that started chasing after the car.

Chasing the car. And hey, maybe I can scoop up the pup on the way. Alicia would like a puppy.

"You fellas take care of yourselves. Maybe we'll meet again soon."

He turns, becoming a blur as he races down the street after Folstad.

The two goons scream in pain and go down when you strike their knees. A loud crack echos off nearby buildings, indicating that you might have broken one of their kneecaps. Hopefully they get workers comp.

As you sprint off in chase of Falstad dozens of shots ring out. Your speed mutagen kicks into overdrive and you can actually see the air rippled by the bullets as they slowly make their way toward you. If only your concoction could make you this fast all the time. You are easily able to dip and dodge the slow moving projectiles and give the goons one last wave and a smile before disappearing down the street.

After only a few seconds you see the dog has given up the chase and is on the sidewalk digging through a spilled trash can. Looks like you’ll have to come back for the little guy after everything is taken care of.

You come across Folstad’s car a little while later. Assuming he was in the clear, he must have told the driver to bring the speed back down to the legal limit. Just as you get close enough to touch the rear of the vehicle your mutagen granted speed powers start to falter. You nearly topple over as your body rapidly changes from super fast to normal human levels and back again. You know you only have a short time remaining to make use of this power.

To make matters worse, you hear the screaming engine of a car flying down the road behind you at its absolute max speed. Turning around you see the remaining goons driving the second vehicle that arrived at the meet up. One goon has his white knuckled hands wrapped tightly around the steering wheel, while the rest of them are leaning out of the windows with guns drawn.

Hearing the engine of the car behind you, Folstad turns to look out the back window. He shakes his head in frustration while shouting at his driver to pick up the pace.

---

Dice Pool Limit - 5
Alchemist - 2 HP
Speed Mutagen Counter - 1

Threat Rating
Boss: Mook Mobile - 3 HP

Fiddlesticks. This is going from bad to worse. All right, think about the physics, you knucklehead...

The Alchemist slows down dramatically, allowing the mook's car to come racing up behind him. As it does, he jumps into the air and springboards off the speeding car's front grille, using its momentum to augment his own chemically-induced speed. He launches himself toward Folstad's rear window, expecting a hail of bullets to follow him and hoping they're just poor enough shots to shatter the window instead of filling him full of holes. As he sails toward the back window, he makes another leap into the air, bouncing off the trunk of the sedan at a trajectory that should land him atop Folstad's car.

Suddenly, I wish I'd gotten better than a B+ in physics my freshman year...

Things don't quite go as you plan. You manage to land successfully on Folstad's car but quickly find out that his goons have switched to non-lethal ammunition. You would think this would be a good thing, but it is hard to feel that way when multiple prongs from tasers pierce your skin and begin zapping you with high voltage electricity. You lose all control of your muscles as they spasm and you slide off the rear of the vehicle.

Your body dents the hood of the mook mobile as it slams into you. Your body continues to roll up and over the windshield before the electrical shocks cease and you are able to use up the last bit of juice from you speed mutagen to grab hold of the spoiler. You now find yourself staring down at the rapidly moving asphalt as the car you barely cling to flies down the road at 75+ MPH. Inside the car you can see the mooks loading new taser cartridges and preparing for another volley.

---

Dice Pool Limit - 5
Alchemist - 1 HP
Speed Mutagen Counter Power expired

Threat Rating
Boss: Mook Mobile - 3 HP

This is bad this is bad this is bad...

Without the time or focus to compose any to-do lists in his head, the phrase keeps looping in the Alchemist's head.

His grip loosening, he makes a desperation grab for the strength mutagen at his belt. As he brings it to his mouth to ingest, his hand slips a little more on the spoiler as the car shimmies to one side. There's a terrifying moment as he tries to latch onto the spoiler with both hands again, clinging by just his fingertips...

...and then the rush of chemically-induced strength floods through his body and he clamps his hands onto the spoiler, grinning from ear to ear. Half relieved, half thrilled, he pulls himself up onto the back of the car and plows a fist through the back window to grab one of the mooks and drive his head into the poor fool sitting next to him.