4952 Delcia

Nero, Kandza, and Mesec, a glob of acid falls near you, exploding and starting to eat away at a portion of the bridge. Make a dodge check (AGL, no multi-action penalties since we're not in round-by-round combat).

The three of you successfully avoid the acid glob and subsequent hole it created. Your group finally crosses the bridge. you reach another room carved from the rock, and in the distance, you see a large machine of alien design. As you step into the room, you feel a slight sensation of prickling, as if you felt some static electricity in your clothes. You keep running for a bit longer when you hear atrocious screams behind you. You turn around to notice many crabs explode in a gory fashion as they reach the place where you felt the static electricity. Many crabs try stopping, but they are pushed by the wave behind them and explode once they reach this sort of invisible energy screen... Many jump to their death in the chasm on either side of the bridge to avoid the grisly fate of exploding...

Eventually, the wave stops, as if the remaining crabs managed to understands what fate awaited them if they continued... they are standing there, waiting, watching... But most importantly, in range for spitting at you, so you decided to not wait here any longer and continue running towards this strange contraption...

You notice several control panels as well as a screen showing a very familiar countdown. Whatever time you felt you had, it looks like it's nearing its end, though it is hard to say for certain...

Perhaps there is a switch or a breaker somewhere you could flip?

Kandza takes out her portacomp and tries to scan the alien device... "Over there, to the left... I think this might be a breaker..."

Mesec grabs the large breaker (although alien-looking) breaker thing and flips it. There is a loud thud, followed by a humming. The countdown stops, and in the distance, you hear bloodcurling screams accompanied by what sounds like wet explosions... Probably indicating that the magnetic field has extended and killed the crabs on the bridge... Hopefully, it will have killed the rest which might nest in the coumpound...

You seem to be relatively safe to explore the coumpound to your liking. At the very least, you no longer seem to be under constant threat of eplosion...

"Yeah, I guess we can head back to the ship, regain our strength there. I'm not sure if the pulse killed all those crabs or if there are any left in here... then I guess we can continue exploring. Who knows what else we might find here... And then there are all those people in cryo tubes..." Shrugged Nero.

"People?" Asked Kanza. "There are other people here in cryo tubes?"

"Oh yeah, I guess you missed them taking the lift..." responds Nero.

Nero shakes his head.

"No. Judging by the size of the room, I'd say there were about 5000 pods in there. About half of those were occupied, so that would mean around 2500 frozen people. We cannot carry them on such a small ship. Not even as cargo. We'll have to relay the location of this place to some other governmental entity so they can mount some sort of rescue."

Kandza looks horrified at this news.

"Over 2000 people frozen here? What were they doing in this place?"

Nero simply shrugs.

"Well, considering that when we accidentally started that self-destruct sequence, the automated message referred to us as specimens, I'd say nothing good..."

Samantha looks around, but right now, there isn't much of interest expect the large machine in the room where you all are. You guess you could always dismantle it, but then again, it is producing the electromagnetic field which should keep those pesky crabs away...

Seems that the only logical thing left is to explore this place floor by floor either before or after the gang has received some healing back at the Dawn Star (as IIRC, the party has taken up their daily allowance of first-aid...).