Quick facts
Campaign: Campaign 1.5 · Where: North City, Ginger Town and a neighboring town · Party: The Cacklers with Belle Pepper and Ruby · Villains: Dr. Gero, Android 19 · Next: C1.5 Chapter 02
About twenty years after the fall of the Rose Ribbon Army, The Cacklers were rich, famous and mostly retired. A new face joined them, an old enemy came back for revenge, and a whole town went quiet.
Twenty years on
The Cacklers had done very well out of saving the world. Bulma had set each of them up with retirement accounts full of stock options, and the Cackler Barrel had grown into a worldwide phenomenon. Asked how much gold they had, the answer was “kind of innumerable.”
The newest member of the group was Belle Pepper. “Like the vegetable,” someone said when she introduced herself, and she was surprised anyone had never heard her last name. She was shown around and introduced to the people the Cacklers kept close.
One was Satchel, an old hand from Barqs’ crew on the Rootbeer Float. He had trouble hearing her name. “I have a hard time hearing,” he explained. “I’ve been in explosions and stuff.” Everyone agreed it was crazy he was still around.
Another was Ruby, the daughter of Juliette. Her parents, Juliette and Will, were still together. Asked whether a tall man with black hair ever came by to check on her mom, Ruby knew exactly who they meant: “Uncle Reese.” He showed up now and then just to say hello. He never wanted to stay for dinner.
A visit from 17
The Cacklers also caught up with 17, one of Dr. Gero’s androids. Like his sister, he doesn’t age. He was looking for something fun to do. What he really wanted was wide-open country full of wildlife that he could watch over, and the forests of Tabasco came up as a good fit. He wanted anything that would drown out the voice in his head. The “good old doctor,” he explained, had programmed him and his sister to want to go around destroying everything. They didn’t want to do that, and they liked sticking it to the old man, so they found other ways to cope.
The Cacklers offered to send him a message if something huge ever came up that needed its ass kicked. He told them they couldn’t. Nobody could send him messages or scry on him.
The attack on North City
Word came in that two individuals were blowing up buildings in North City. The Cacklers went to stop them. The attackers were Dr. Gero and his android, Android 19.
Gero told Greene he was there to enact his revenge. “Are you afraid? It’s okay, you know, to feel that creeping, seizing fear. Not everyone faces their deaths so openly.” Greene wanted to know why anyone would want revenge on him for something that happened years ago.
“Twenty long, grueling years I’ve waited,” Gero said. “You destroyed everything I worked for. You picked the wrong side.”
Greene didn’t see how that was his fault. Gero wasn’t dead. He could rebuild. Nobody was even chasing him.
Greene’s Power Pole crashed through Gero’s chest in a burst of radiant energy. Gero’s body went limp. Then his eyes lit back up, and he grabbed Greene and pulled him close.
“I was your greatest creation,” Greene told him.
“Now I take you with me,” Gero answered, and blew himself up in a huge explosion. Greene survived it.
The Cacklers destroyed Android 19 as well. North City had been saved once again.
Silence in Ginger Town
Later, when someone who hadn’t heard the news asked after Gero, the Cacklers answered that he was not doing great. In fact, he had died.
The Cacklers wondered whether Gero had anything to do with the message that had just come out of Ginger Town in the Crepe Republic. Moments earlier, screams had erupted through the town’s streets, followed by deafening silence. Now the place was a ghost town, littered with the clothes of its former inhabitants.
The party went to see. It was night, and a town at night is often still, but this was different. There was no movement anywhere. No smoke rose from the chimneys and no light showed in any window. Clothing lay in the streets, neatly discarded. Most of it looked normal. On the back of one tunic, near the spine, was a small, ragged circular hole. Every piece of clothing had the same telltale rip somewhere.
Tracks led away from the town, and the party followed them into another settlement where every street looked just like Ginger Town: clothing neatly discarded, every piece with the same rip. Then a shadow in a nearby alley began to creep along the wall.
Next: Chapter 2: Perfect Cell