As our mutants made their way towards the munitions factory, it soon became clear that Kong was ill (see PC profiles here). He began to suffer from aches and chills, and his eyes turned bloodshot. Kong suspected that it may have been the result of a poison in a red stew fed to him by Battenburg, which was not given to the other slaves. That night, when the party made camp, an anthropomorphic camel mutant suddenly appeared in front of them. He introduced himself as Joe, and explained that he had followed the party from Battenburg's Trading Post.
Joe's village had been taken as slaves by Battenburg's goons and sold to the Army of Dawn to work at their munitions factory, and he was only able to evade capture by using his chameleon powers. Having heard their plan to free their friend from the munitions factory, Joe decided to join them on their mission. But first, there was the matter of finding a cure for Kong's ailment, which Joe had a proposal for: the elders in Joe's village of mutants had spoken about a community of monks in a sacred mountain who guarded a pool of healing, and that the faithful who are pure of heart may be healed of any disease or wound by the water from the pool. Joe had never been to the sacred pool, but he knew where the sacred mountain was. With no other option in sight, our party decided to travel to there.
After two day's travel, our party arrived at the foothill of the sacred mountain, and followed a path that led upwards. By now Kong was severely ill and bleeding from his nose and mouth - the party was running out of time. Halfway up the mountain, at a narrow defile, the party found their path blocked up a two-head giant, who claimed to be the guardian of the sacred pool. The giant explained that only those who were pure of heart and embraced peace could pass, and bade the party to throw all their weapons down the ravine beside the path. With Kong at death's door, the party had no choice but to comply... but as soon as they had done so two more giants appeared on the hillside above them, and began throwing rocks at them! Our unarmed mutants tried their best to fight back, but were almost overcomed by the giants, until Vik used his mutant power to cause the side of the hill to disintegrate, causing the giants to fall and become incapacitated. The use of his power caused Vik to fall unconscious, but with his two accomplices taken out, the two-headed giant surrendered, and confessed that they were just highwaymen who preyed on pilgrims to the sacred pool.
Our mutants recovered their weapons, and continued their way up the mountain. Close to sunset they arrived at a clearing, where they were greeted by the monks guarding the sacred pool. After our heroes passed a test of their compassion (and wits), they were allowed to lower Kong into the sacred pool, which restored him to health.
With Kong healed, our mutants made their way to the munitions factory, guided by Amaltea's map and Rex's super sense of direction.
Two days later, our mutants reached the munitions factory, which they could see from afar due to a airship that was moored above it. Batte flew over the compound and saw that it was a walled compound housing not only the munitions factory and the quarters of the slaves who worked in there, but also the barracks of the forty or so Dawn soldiers who guarded the compound, the quarters for the officers, and also a massive hangar for the Army of Dawn's airships.
With so many soldiers guarding the compound, a direct assault was impossible. Using the chameleon powers, Joe sneaked into the compound and made contact with his fellow villagers. From them, he learned about the organisation of the Dawn soldiers, and their routine. Now armed with information our mutants put their heads together, and devised a cunning plan.
The next evening, when the officers of the Army of Dawn were having dinner in their mess, Teva, a mutant from Joe's village with shapeshifting power took the form of their commandant and entered the mess. Inside, Rex, who accompanied Teva, used his paralysing gas to knock the officers out, and then kidnapped the real commandant.
Then Teva, still in his guise as the commandant, ordered the soldiers to load all the slaves onto the airship. The plan worked for a while, as the soldiers were not used to questioning orders, and the slaves, already informed about the plan, moved quickly. But as the last slaves were boarding the airship, a Dawn soldier decided to check in with the other officers at their mess, and found that they had all been knocked out. The alarm was raised, but by then it was too late. The soldiers started shooting at the departing airship, but soon stopped when they realised that their commandant was missing and might be onboard too.
Our mutants piloted the airship southwards through the night, heading for a place where Joe and his fellow villagers could start a new home. The next morning, when they went to see the commandant to decide his fate, they found him dead with no apparent cause. Our heroes landed the airship and disembarked, leaving it to Joe and his villagers.
Prepping and Running the Game
As Kong's player once again could not join us for the session, I had to come up with a way to have Kong travel with the party without him doing much. At the same time we had another player who could join us for just one session, so I had Joe the Camel join the party.
I used part of the content of the Mutant Crawl Classics module Blessings of the Vile Brotherhood for the first half of the session. The module is quite an interesting one, and involved a literal hexcrawl and chase which I did not use.
The second half of the session was based on the Mutant Year Zero module, although I added the part about slave workers.
The players were having difficulty planning the rescue of the villagers, until Joe's player asked if there were any mutants among the slaves who had powers which might be helpful. I decided that two of them would, and had him roll up random mutant powers for them. The powers gave them the inspiration they needed to plan the rescue, and they managed the rescue with minimal fighting.
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