Today we gamed a Fulton's place, in Santa Clara. It was an opportunity to see the house he bought about a year ago and to see just how much of a trip Woo and Fulton have to make to come to gaming each week. First off, Pick called me wondering if we had some sort of carpool planned. I had only arranged to go with Sweet but Pick could come along. Unfortunately, it upset my timetable so instead of getting there by 13:00, we got there at 14:00. It's about 45 minutes from Sweet's place, with a slight amount of traffic. Quite easy to find with the directions that Eric provided.

How do I describe Fulton's house? He did warn us that the lawn was dead and it was the worst house on the block. And he wasn't kidding. The front lawn is covered with dead brown grass, as is the back lawn. Otherwise though it's a very white-bread suburban house. Three bedrooms, one bath, family and dining room. There is a semi-outdoor addition (a large room with screened windows -- always exposed to the outdoors). Also in the backyard is a covered area with a few chairs and a toolshed. Not really much of a backyard left.

Actually, maybe it's only two bedrooms. I only saw too but there were a couple of doors, though I can't recall if the backyard indicated an extra room. One of the bedrooms is Eric's computer room, with a couple of tall bookshelves full of books -- quite a few of them hardcover (non-paperback). Definitely more fiction books than I have. The computer room is a small room while the master bedroom is largely empty other than Fulton's bed.

Fulton claims he has two cats, though I only saw one black rangy cat that looked half-feral. It wasn't all that afraid of strange people though. Lots of cat fur everywhere and the kitchen floor was covered with cat food and cat litter. You know, somehow it all fits Fulton. Not that it was a bad place, just needed a really good cleaning. Too bad for Sweet and Pickering who are both allergic to cat fur. They were dying after a few hours.

Woo started his Cyberpunk game. We all made quick GURPS characters, using the random character generation system (which is quite inadequate for making fleshed out characters). It's the late 21st Century. Earth is ruled by three mega-corporations (which I claimed were Sony, Procter and Gamble, and Nestle to represent Asia, America, and Europe). There are colonies on the Moon, Mars, and a few other places.

Our characters are veterans of the Colonial Wars, when the colonies tried to rebel from EarthGov. Although we're from Mars, we joined the Colonial Marines and help put down the rebellion, after which we were discharged and returned to civilian life. Or at least we tried. It seems as if we had no useful skills, or not the right temperament for normal society. So it wasn't long before we were all down on our luck among the lower classes, eeking a living doing odd jobs.

So one night we four find ourselves at the local bar reminiscing about old times. There's David "Hawk" Hawkins, a good rifleman though none too bright; Russell, sniper and a bit shy around a firefight; Hudson, electronics wizard; and myself, Frost. What a coincidence that we ran into our old squad leader, Sergeant Apone. He had done well for himself, working for Procter and Gamble as a security specialist. Bless him that he offered to give us jobs, just come to his office on Monday.

Too bad they killed him. Who knows who they were working for. Two men, one handcuffed to a suitcase, met Apone at another table. We watched them go to the bathroom. After a few minutes Hawk and I went to make sure Apone was ok. That's when we heard the shots. Once we arrived on the scene though, all three were down and dying. Apone had the briefcase and asked me to get it someplace, but he died before he could tell me where. The bartender called the police and we fled, except for Hawk who insisted on trying to clean up.

Once back at my apartment we cleaned up and opened the briefcase. Just some disks and a small locked metal box. Time was wasting though, and he had to get to the rendezvous to meet Hawk. I had a bad feeling about this though, so I sent Russell with the briefcase and told him to get to a place where he could survey the cafe we had to meet at. Then Hudson and I took the two guns we palmed from the dead guys (Hawk had the other gun) and walked into the cafe. On seeing us, Hawk yelled out that it was a trap, then slumped to the floor. Looks like my fears had been justified... (To Be Continued)