Been a while since I hade an AW game going, but now I´ll be doing my second run as MC.

Me and my group found our apocalyptic home in a neverending, gargantuan redwood forest. The main power players of the world we found out to be; The Queen of Fortress, a ruler with spies everywhere and a great dislike for the Deep (a tunnel system below the rocky hills that never quite break through the canopy), The New Marquise of Great Oak (the grandest tree in all the forest, home to hundreds), Rolfball and his gang who rule the Dead City and control the Highway (does it really lead out of the forest?) and Elder Hoyt of Marshtown (a floating village in a swamp).
Fortress, Great Oak and Marshtown are joined by rough roads (often bothered by The Jiggys Brigands) and lots of politics.

The group I´ll be playing with are:

Tai Cullen the Savvyhead, a stumpy, practical young woman with her workspace in an old truck. She´s more fond of the technology of THIS age, rather than the so called "Golden Age" trinkets. Cullen is from Fortress, but moves around quite a bit, fixing stuff up and trying to create plants more edible than the mushrooms and mostly-poisonous roots that make up most of the diet in the woods. She dreams of the unseen lands outside the forest, and is planning to spend some time stocking up on resources for the trip out.

Cat Cherokee the Driver, a tall, thin boy who just got his wheels (a loud Cherokee Jeep called Jonesy) as some sort of adulthood marker. Cat is from a nomadic family that travels the "known forest" in a yearly loop, but Cat himself longs for wider horizons.

Brace the Brainer, a small person always dressed in a green raincoat with the hood up. The violation glove always visible, and a laquered pistol hidden. Perhaps they got something to do with the mutant cult on the island in the river, or with the Staring People. It´s hard to know Braces motivations, I´m looking forward to asking their player a lot of questions.


We start off in the bustle surrounding Great Oak - it´s time for the summer market (the river close by has a ford that´s passable when it´s dry). Cat Cherokee and his family is there, selling trinkets from the trunks of their vehicles. Fauna, one of Cats younger cousins, tells him that rumor has it that Cullen has a plan - she´s leaving the forest, and Fauna is very much inclined on joining the adventure! Cat´s not gonna have any of that, so he tells his uncle (Faunas father) Boo about it all and promptly decides that he himself is going to talk to Cullen about it.

A few nights ago, on the road between Dead City and Great Oak, Brace is staying the night in one of many man-made hollows in the trees along the roads (high enough that no non-climbing forest beasts will reach it). As they climb into the hollow they find the chewed-on corpse of Twice (a marshdweller). Brace, spooked, hides in the shadows as they hear engines outside and then somone climbing the tree. The Brainer scares the living shit out of Cullen (that was her truck), but then both of them turn to the partially eaten body on the floor. A quick search brings out a pack of matches and an amulet made of a nut. Cullen lets the things speak to her, and the last feeling around the matches is fear - someone was desperate to get a fire going.
Brace and Cullen pushes the body out of the hollow. The next morning Brace opens their brain and learns that Twice walked away.

Brace hitches a ride with Cullen to Great Oak. Cullen usually sleeps in her truck, but Brace offers her to stay in the room that old Janice always keeps for Brace.

Cat is searching the market for Cullen, but is found by Teller (also a nomad, around the same age as Cat but not yet given a car) who tells him that the Marquis is up and about in the marketplace. The Marquis is a short, slim, stylish man with skin the color of a polished hazelnut and his dark hair in a tight horsetail. He´s flanked by short, brutish Fifi and the tall, graying woman called Partridge. Both are the Marquis personal guards. Both sport the mark of the last Marquis on the side of their necks (this mark was put on criminals and outcasts, showing them as persona non gratas in Great Oak, but when the new Marquis beat the old in a duel not long ago he pardoned all bearers of the mark). Partridge seems to be looking for someone, and reading her Cat realizes she wants the nomads for something to do with keeping the Marquis safe.

By now we had run out of time, so we called it a night. Next time a new player will join the group, hopefully eager to be a part of our apocalypse.

Characters retired to safety should have a nostalgic shimmer...

Starting to think about retiring Canaveral as well, with everyone else running around in their spiffy new characters... But then again, would Batman ever quit?

Nice text! And Tai seems like such a nice guy, full of energy and "active Hot" or what you would call it...

But I sure will miss Nero, as will Canaveral. I´ll probably write my own text about it sometime this week, something like a letter that never gets sent.

New gamesnight, new story. I´ll try to summarize.

A short jump back to Crimson, accompanied by some 20-odd survivors from the Riverpeople. They see Sin as a prophet and Nero as some kind of invincible hero (cutting their arrows in half mid-flight does that, i presume).
Brace and Razor also keeps hanging around, catching up on the last couple of months.
Canaveral occupies herself with Corbet, the Crimson child ridden with the mystical disease that was the reason for confronting the Riverpeople at all. Red blisters, cold and clammy skin, that kind of thing.

While Sin chats the evening away with Brace and Razor (who keeps hoping for a threesome, but Sin would rather just have Brace), Nero and Canaveral speaks to the Riverpeople about a cure for the disease. One of their young guns, Abraham (?), chucks a spear at Nero, who catches it and snaps it in half, winning even more of a hero status. The crowd calms down, and offers to bring them both to a place where the cure might be found. Having no other leads they accept, agreeing to leave Crimson the next morning.

Back in the tavern where they are lodged they meet up with Sin, Brace and Razor again, and relaxes together for a while. Sin whines a bit about her (mostly self-inflicted) wounds from the "Great Dam Battle", and Canaveral helps her weird-style with Healing Touch, letting her warm and dry interpretation of the maelstrom take the edge of the near-drowning damage Sin has suffered.
Suddenly a buzzing is heard from Neros luggage. The old walkie-talkie comes crackling to life! Daimyos voice carries over the room, and Sin picks up the call, acting secretary for Nero. Daimyo don´t recognice her voice, but he wants to talk to Canaveral. Canaveral lets him spill his beans - there seems to be quite a lot of people in New Jerk struck by the very same disease they are already trying to find a cure for. The team reluctantly promises to see what can be done, and agrees to head down to New Jerk after the expected cure has been tried out on Corbet.
Sin ends up in bed with Brace and Razor, snuggling rather than fucking, somewhat unpredictedly sharing secrets with Razor after Brace falls asleep. Razor learns that Sin is born and raised in New Jerk, and she is in fact the daughter of restaurant-owner Rose.

The next day Nero, Canaveral and the Riverpeople head upstreams, towards the source of the River. The Mother.
The trip is unexpectedly simple, the only issues being Moses (a Riverchild covered in so much algea and goo we started thinking of him/her as Cousin It) and Rachel (Nero´s very own fanboy, he badly wants to be close to The Hero).
Anyways, the expedition arrives at this great structure up in the mountains, like a giant spear cleaving the rock. The Riverpeople seem to hold some kind of reverence for this place, and motions Canaveral and Nero to carry their quest inside.
Stalking the interior of the place, they notice something stirring in the shadows. Nero opens his brain to it, reassuring the being of his good intentions and arranging for some kind of meeting. Following the soft noices it makes they finally come to a large room with high ceiling, all filled with old computers and screens. And in the middle of this the very same man Canaveral knocked out cold inside the Great Dam. He certainly must have moved fast to get here on his own... We learn his name is Reckoning, and he really wants to join us with the equipment that should be the cure for the disease. Some kind of advanced dialysis, we decided. The needle reminds Canaveral of Brine a little to much for comfort, but if this is the cure so be it.
On the trip back to Crimson Rachel warns Nero about Reckoning, whispering about how he carries death and that one should not let him touch you. Oblivious to this little chat, Canaveral spends most of the raftride keeping close to Reckoning an trying to get him to talk about how the machine works.

Meanwhile, in Crimson. Sin is spending time with Brace and Razor in the fields surrounding the village when Levis finally gets around to asking her about Diesel (his betrothed, the girl who fell in the river and later was chopped up by Sin). She lets him know that Diesel is dead, and when he whines about it Razor steps up and shoot him, just like that! "What, he seemed to annoy you, and it´s not like we´re staying here much longer." Sin and Razor argues a bit about this, but Brace herds Razor away and leaves Sin with the dying Levis. At first she tried to drag him back to Crimson, but she finds he´s to heavy for her. In the end, she just sits there and lets the young man die listening to her MP3-player in the middle of the field.

The River-expedition returns to Crimson. Canaveral and Reckoning immediately hooks Corben up to the dialys, with Nero and Sin as on-lookers. They keep at it for hours, Nero and Sin heading back to the tavern. Canaveral falls asleep in the sick-room, dreams of a deep-frozen girlchild in a cold room smelling of salt... She is woken up in the dawn by the touch of Reckoning, who tells her the process is done. Corben seems a little warmer now, breathing with a bit more ease. Success!

Soon enough the team is ready for the journey to New Jerk, and Reckoning is coming as well. Brace and Razor heads off to other horizons, making this weird promise about burying us if we die before the next time they see us. We immediately establish this as one of the more common leave-takings in California. Noone in Crimson knows about Levis´ death as of yet.

Failing all the rolls to travel safely over the wastelands our heroes find themselves lost in The Pit, the very place the were trying to avoid on the way to New Jerk. Sun is setting, supplies have been out for a while, and both Reckoning and Canaveral have disappeared...
Nero starts to open his brain (getting more and more common) to locate them, but Sin stops him and shows him her "Lost" move instead, whispering Reckonings name to the maelstrom.
Canaveral finds herself waking up from briefly passing out stuck in some kind of forgotten Dog-cult-trap (courtesy of a failed Bonefeel-roll at the start of the session). Reckoning is gleefully giggling, having hooked her up to the dialys (blood out only). Canaveral stares him down, forcing him to back of, and then he just walks away (drawn back to the camp by Sins maelstrom-call). Keeping her cools, Canaveral manages to get the needle out and proceeds to free herself from the trap.

In the camp, Sin easily spots Reckoning´s lies as he tells her and Nero he has not seen Canaveral. Sin goes aggro on him, but he forces her hand, stating he is invincible. Sin promptly runs him trough with her sword, and then she and Nero tries to backtrack him. They find Canaveral just out of the trap, packing the dialys together. She tells them about Reckoning, and learns that he´s dead as a doornail.
As they get back to the camp, a couple of the Pit-dogs are fighting for the last scrap of Reckoning, nothing else is to be seen of the body (dun-dun-duuuuun).

Night falls. An argument breaks out regarding the fact that the party is out of food, ending with Canaveral accusing Sin of being a spoiled brat, telling her to stop her whining. Sin takes the first watch (you don´t sleep without in The Pit). Tired of being hungry and lost she calls for backup through the maelstrom, pulling on Rolfballs strings, hoping for a savior before dawn.
Then the dogs attack, a whole pack of them. They start chewing on Sin, who (mostly) takes care of herself until Nero jumps into the fray to scare the bastards away. Canaveral is still half-asleep, dreaming about Brine, sensing her out in the wastland night. As a result, Canaveral misses out on the fight, but at least tries to help the wounded Sin. Sadly, she fails and opens her brain and Sin´s up to The Pit and the everpresent Brine...

By now, Arvid was out of ideas and we agreed to leave the results of this roll to the next session.

Since you get to mark experience whether you succeed or fail when you roll, I feel that the reason for highlighting new stats every now and then is to see other sides of the characters.
It´s also an effective mechanic for the MC and the other players to force each other to go the way they want the campaign to head? "I really need you to beat the shit out of my character´s enemies today, highlight Hard."

I figure Canaveral is still a cool girl, and still a warrior at heart. She will probably excel at being a combat-medic, and she has always had a soft spot for the down-and-out and the weak.
With the change to Angel she finally can let that "weakness" show, as a Battlebabe she had indifferent eyes, but now those eyes are caring...
So, to answer Jonatans question about how "peaceful" Canaveral has become: She is still prepared to fight for the ones needing her help, and she will not show her throat to the bullies.

I´m really looking forward to the next part of this campaign, this is Neros time to shine! We just have to pick up the pieces of the armies, build a new gang, and start the operating!
Also looking forward to making the acquaintance of Sin!

I started writing some kind of introduction to this one, but decided against it. It is what it is.
______________

The sun was setting behind brush-covered hills. A metallic ticking could be heard from Joe´s Girl´s ambulance as the car cooled down, and from the small cook-fire sparks were flying towards the evening sky.
Canaveral leaned forward, turned the spit over to let the surprisingly fat groundhog grill evenly and stirred the bubbling chili. Joe´s Girl returned from the hidden wateringhole with a large plastic canister filled with the brownish water of the californian plains. New Jerk might not have been the most pleasant place to live, but the town was blessed with amazingly clean water. What they had to content with here had a sharp and bitter taste. 
Canaveral made an effort not to dwell on the subject of Daimyos holding. That short time of her life was gone now, new possibilities were surfacing. Actually, one of them was on his way back to the camp from a short walk this very moment, bruised arms full of twigs for the fire. Nero was a whole different man now, somehow. Not as fundamentally changed as Canaveral herself without the gun, the spear, the shining armor, but still different.

It had been four days since the battle between Daimyo´s army and Newton´s on the shores of Sunken City. Wounds were slowly healing (it felt good to have a father again, and a competent medic at that). Survivors from the battle had been spotted. Someone had to gather them up, give them a chance to reach some relative civilization and find out for themselves what they were to do now the war was over. Canaveral knew that her father wanted to help those lost souls, and she heartilly agreed with him.

Nero put down his burden, sat himself down by the fire and poked the embers with a stick. Joe´s Girl handed out bowls filled with the steaming chili. Canaveral started to carve pieces of the grilled groundhog, dishing out long strips of meat. They ate in a more or less comfortable silence. Nail trudged down from the hill where he and Dandelion were keeping watch, picked upp two of the bowls and returned to the sunkie and the game of cards.
A quick glance towards Nero. Canaveral could almost see his longing for the rest of his gang, or at least for Dubs and Topple. James was dead somewhere below the surface of Sunken City, and from what she had understood Fox was unlikely to return to her former employer this time even if she had survived the battle.

Carefully chewing a mouthful of meat and chili Canaveral pondered her own part in the war. Was Newton dead because of her, because she had persuaded him to meet with Daimyo before the battle? She had hoped for the men to see each others strenghts and back down from the unnessecary bloodshed, but she finally felt that she knew the true Daimyo now. Treacherous, self-righteous, bloodthirsty bastard, not one bit better than his mad hyenas. She felt ashamed of herself for believing in the hardholder for too long, but could not dwell on that now. There was a future to take care of, one that hopefully would not include Daimyo.
First step would be to search the surrounding area one more time, gather up the people, horses and supplies that still lay scattered after the battle. After that, they had to choose their new course. She would prefer north, but would probably leave the final desicion to Nero. She hoped Joe´s Girl would join as well, at least for a while. They had things to talk about.

By now, the sun was but a sliver of blood red light in the west. It was getting chilly. Canaveral buttoned the checkered shirt up and rose to get a blanket from the ambulance. The broken ribs smarted as she pushed herself off the ground, but it was the dull pain of a healing injury. The bones would knit back just fine. She was alive, and happy to be.

Somewhere to the east a cackling howl shattered the evening. A reminder that there were things to be done.