#spacerpg

Special thanks to @freighter1_FUTS for inspiring today's random tables. One is a slice of paradimensional pie and the other an encounter with a random starship that may or may not get me in trouble for trademark infringement. 😅

Maybe your Transwarp Drive malfunctioned, or a Portal spell went awry. Roll 1d12 to see where you end up: Minor Hell. Lots of little demons. (They hate short jokes, btw.) Red skies and dark clouds. Fear is amplified. Red Desert. The sky is red, the sand is orange and it goes on in barren, windy desert for miles in every direction. Could there be something under the sand? Junk Rift: There are…

I hope it's okay to mention @FreighterOne for an endorsement of a new space game campaign I'm hoping to design. SFO is an authority on space and games, after all.

Picture, if you will, “The Orville” using Star Frontiers Rules. The sheer awesomeness of Space Freighter One. Art by @tinyworld96 Gonna try to make my friend on Twitter, @FreighterOne proud with this one. I’m contemplating writing a short series of adventures or at least an outline for 9-12 episodes. It’s going to be centered on a smaller starship crew (the PCs and a few select NPCs) traveling…

It’s a few hours past midnight when Adayin wakes up, refreshed and ready to start the day. The apartment is dark and still. Two moons hang in the sky, one large and one small, shining through the slats of the window in her room.

She rolls out of bed, stretches, and yawns hugely. Her nighttime waking periods are lonely – tarru and humans sleep through the whole night, unlike sayane – but she’s gotten used to the solitude. Quietly, she throws on a blue housecoat and slips out of the room. The robe’s hem swishes softly against her calves as she moves.

Urrov’s room is right next to hers, and as she passes it she can hear him snoring through the door. He sounds like a cargo truck with engine problems. For such a quiet person, she thinks, he can be remarkably loud without meaning to. It’s a thought she’s had before, and it still makes her smile.

Her smile fades as she rounds the corner and sees the light spilling from the kitchen. Urrov insists that everybody turns off the lights before they go to bed; he’s a stickler for household orderliness. It isn’t like him to forget. Unless…

Adayin stops just before the bend and peers around it.

The kitchen is typical tarru architecture, which means that everything inside it is built to accommodate people who average a little over seven feet tall. The wooden stepstool Sam’s sitting on only serves to emphasize how short she is compared to everything around her (though, to be fair, Adayin is only a little taller). Blue fluorescent light gleams off of the metal and plastic of her prosthetic leg.

“You’re up early,” says Adayin.

Sam looks up from the glass of water she’s nursing. She looks disheveled. Her bleary brown eyes meet Ada’s yellow-orange.

“Hey,” she replies.

“Trouble sleeping?” asks Ada.

Sam looks back into her water. She nods.

“Bad dream?”

Sam nods again.

Adayin sidles up next to her and sits down. Cloth rustles against the tiled floor. This isn’t the first time she’s heard this, nor is it the first time she’s done this. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Sam hesitates for a moment, then shakes her head. “It’s just a dream,” she says. “I’ll get over it.”

“Do you want me to help you get back to sleep, or are you going to stay up?”

She shakes her head again. The three of them – Sam, Ada, and Urrov- share beds occasionally, for comfort or for company, but this isn’t one of those times. “Don’t worry about it. I know you’ve got work to do.”

“Work can wait,” says Adayin. She scoots closer to Sam and rests her head against her arm. “You’re more important.”

Sam can’t help but smile at that. Her smile is tired but appreciative, and a little embarrassed. It looks at home on her face.

“You are such a sap,” she says. She tilts her head toward Ada’s, lifting a hand from her glass to stroke her partner’s head-frills.

“I love you too,” purrs Adayin, closing her eyes.

Sam chuckles. She leans over and plants a sleepy kiss on Ada’s forehead.

Adayin’s eyes blink open. “What was that?”

Sam pulls back. “What? What was what?”

"You just put your mouth on my head!" Adayin gives Sam a weird look, rubbing the spot with a finger.

"What? Oh, I..." Sam's expression shifts rapidly from confusion, to comprehension, to sheepishness, and finally back to confusion. "I kissed you. Have we never kissed before?"

Adayin looks at her blankly. She blinks, once. "What's a kiss?"

"Um," says Sam. She rubs the back of her neck, thinking. "It's something humans do to show affection. We, like, push our lips together, or our lips on some other part of their body, and wow I'm making it sound really weird..."

"It is weird,” insists Ada. “Humans are weird.” She pauses. "Do it again."

"What?"

"Do it again. Right here." Adayin bows her head and taps her forehead.

"Ah," says Sam, and does.

She's slower this time. Her lips are warm against Ada's papery skin.

"Oh, that’s nice," says Ada, when Sam draws away. "Let me try."

Adayin has to get on her knees to do it. Her first try is clumsy and awkward, and it makes Sam laugh. Ada laughs too.

"Pucker up your lips a little," says Sam. "Like this."

"We should be standing up for this," says Ada.

Sam does, and helps Ada up, setting her water aside. Then they try again.

"Better," laughs Sam. Their hands are still clasped together. "Try it like this."

She leans in and pecks Adayin’s cheek. Adayin, giggling, responds in kind. She is getting better at it, doing as Sam does. They take turns. They exchange kisses on the cheek, once on the nose, back on the forehead. Bad dreams are forgotten. So is work. Ada bows to kiss Sam’s hand, after she tells her about how knights did it in the old stories; Sam takes the chance to plant one on Ada’s frills. Both of them break down laughing again. They can't keep it in; it bubbles over like foam from a shaken soda can.

Light-headed with excitement, Sam cradles Ada's face in her hands and stands her back upright. Then she bends in and kisses Adayin full on the lips.

The connection only lasts a second or two, but the sensation is electrifying.

"Oh," says Sam.

"Oh," agrees Adayin.

Then they do it again.

Ada's lips are as papery as the rest of her skin, stiffer and more textured than Sam's. They feel rough against Sam's own - they tickle, and the tickling delights her immensely.

It feels good. Like excitement and anxiety and giddiness all rolled into one whirlwind of feeling. The world becomes two people. She’s hyperaware of her partner’s presence: every shift in the pressure of her lips, every little movement and change of position. She matches them - meets them - she can’t be certain who’s adapting to who. The kiss is the only thing that matters.

The kiss deepens. Sam bumps into the counter behind her. Some time in the last few seconds, Adayin’s hands have clasped behind Sam’s waist, quite unconsciously. Sam’s mechanical knee bumps against Ada’s organic one. One of her own hands still cradles Adayin’s face; the other she’s placed on the countertop for balance. They're all but standing on each others' toes. Ada slides a hand up Sam's back-

"Not in the kitchen, please," says Urrov.

Sam and Ada both jump, tumbling out of their embrace. Ada yelps. Sam turns an interesting shade of red. They look at each other as if for the first time, and then they both double over laughing.

"Oh, my god," wheezes Sam. "'Rov! Don't do that!"

"The look on your face...!" cries Adayin.

Urrov, peering around the corner, looks somewhere between bemused and curious. He has no idea what they were doing, but the three of them have lived together long enough for him to know when things are going in a certain direction. Mostly, he's just concerned that having sex in the kitchen is unsanitary.

"We were having a moment," explains Sam, between gasps.

"Sam was just teaching me how to kiss..." continues Ada.

"...and I think we got a little carried away," finishes Sam.

Urrov tilts his head quizzically. "Kiss...?"

Sam looks at Ada. Ada looks at Sam.

alliance of stars: intergovernmental organization of humans, tarru, and sayane. holds 33 star systems. functions sort of like the UN in space (the UN is actually one of its component bodies) but with more direct influence on its comprising nations and slightly more militarized following the iceworlder wars.

bidonite empire: a large militaristic empire controlling at least 27 systems. the entire bidonite (bug aliens) race is united under the imperial banner, which is highly unusual, but not completely absurd given their intensely eusocial behavior. 

they're friendly towards the alliance but are uninterested in joining or trading. meanwhile the alliance keeps the empire at arm’s length because of past diplomatic incidents in which bidonites were really weird

iceworlder nations: a moderately sized military alliance composed of at least 9 iceworlder nations. xenophobic to the extreme. they hold 18 systems, used to be 21 until the iceworlder wars and the bidonite intervention kicked them down to 17. they’re more or less at a constant state of war with the bidonite empire

necrox commonwealth: full name is "galactic commonwealth of progress and enlightenment”, but the only way we know this is through the bidonite empire, which is currently at war with them.