The funeral is held at the Endurance Methodist Church in the morning, and the body is to be interred in the Hubble family crypt, in the attached graveyard. For the most part, heroes attend in costume, because it’s their costumed identities have the relationship with Doc Cosmic.
The church is packed, and the PCs have to stand near the door. The service is nice (it turns out an attending hero has his Doctor of Divinity and hosts the service). The PCs open the doors for the pall bearers, and are therefore the people who notice the zombies.
(In fact, the zombies are an attempt at a warning by some supernatural being; Theodora Darna is not well liked in some mystical circles. Aim the warning at the logical PC, or skip the zombies entirely. They are useful to demonstrate a simplified version of combat with the minion rules.)
Zombies have pulled themselves out of the ground (mostly…one starts the page still buried to the waist). The PCs are in the best place to deal with them. There are three zombies per PC; use the minion rules. Besides the usual zombie moans, the zombies are trying to say something. An unconscious zombie is an un-animated zombie. A really good hits disintegrates them…these are old bodies, from the 1930s and 1940s. The fact that they even make sounds is a testament to the embalming process.
Using the minion rules, the PCs should make quick work of them. If they need weapons, the groundskeepers left a spade and a rake in sight.
The actual internment in the crypt goes flawlessly, though there might be dead bodies on the graveyard lawn….
After the funeral, people go to the Methodist Community Center for a reception. The church ladies have made sandwiches. It’s a fine opportunity for the PCs to investigate.
Some items are common knowledge (marked “free”); some are public and need only to be mentioned (“I’m investigating…” and marked (investigate). Others are discovered through the use of qualities or pyramid tests.
If there was an incident with zombies, the players probably want to know what just happened.
With the minion rules, it’s unlikely that they have a zombie to question, but they might. If they do, the complete message is “sidekick name, beware.”
In the aftermath, the bodies can be identified by the graves they crawled from. The zombies are just the people who were buried around the crypt. It looks like someone or something with the power to animate corpses used what was available. The PCs get the sense that who they were isn’t important.
If anyone can read residual magic, the magic is similar to the magic on the former TwirlyGirl’s magic boots. There’s a difference between “divine” magic (heaven, hell, angels, and demons) and “fey” magic (leprechauns, trolls, dragons). There are other types of magic as well, but the people involved in the adventure were only aware of the difference between divine and fey magics.
They identified some of the people at the funeral, including:
Rusty Rooster (formerly the Jimmy Olsen to Doc Cosmic’s Superman)
Silk Cat (the daughter of the original Silk Cat, but who was currently on the side of the law…though she’d been on both sides)–her mother had a relationship with Doc Cosmic, and her parentage is a mystery, even to her; PCs will. naturally assumed tht Doc Cosmic is secretly her father
Nurse Dyne from the Golden Age retirement home
An old man in a wheelchair with horrible scarring (League Seven tentatively identified him as Doctor Armageddon, a former world-threat super villain whose body had been so wasted that even though his mind was there, his body was almost useless)
The orderly Brock Fenton from Golden Age who was tending him, and who had that muscular super-person look
Putty Lad, of course, whose response to them depends on their earlier response
Azuziel (a winged man), who claims to be a fallen angel, and who gave them information on divine versus fey magic, including that the residual magic around the zombies was “fey magic” but that is not his specialty, so he can’t identify it
Through talking with other people in attendance, they can learn that no one understands why the ex-sidekicks are even in the will. Apparently that change was made six months ago or so; Rusty made it, saying that Doc Cosmic had asked for it during a lucid period. (Rusty has power of attorney for Doc Cosmic’s estate).
Brock Fenton is interested in any PC who talks to him, and suggests a dinner date, whether it’s romantic or platonic.
This is available by talking to Rusty or (most of it) by Googling.
Doc Cosmic had invulnerability, flight, and “power over cosmic energy,” which had variable effects, but he normally used for increased strength or “cosmic blasts.” He had used it for various sensory powers, too. (Free)
Doc Cosmic went public in 1977, and was a founding member of the Guardians (1979). (Free)
This was his first death, though he did disappear three times for a year or more at a time. (Free)
In the 2000s, he started to show signs of early-onset Alzheimer’s, and shortly after that, he retired, By 2010, his condition had worsened so much that he was put into the Golden Age, an old age facility for supers. Several of his old foes were already in there. (Investigate)
His father died in 1975; his mother in 1992. Both are in the family crypt. (Investigate)
The Hubble family came into the possession of a fortune in gold, after the city bout their farm, while gold was at nearly a thousand dollars an ounce. Their son Steve found the gold while on vacation; appropriate taxes were paid on it.
The secret base (in the Colorado mountains) has two entrances. One is under the old farmhouse; an underground rail car goes through an evacuated tunnel to the secret base. The trip feels slightly odd because of Coriolis forces, and takes 22 minutes. There is a password.
The crypt is heavily secured but is easy to get out of. (Hubble was aware of the tendency for heroes to return from the dead.)
Retrofitting on the crypt was done by Wreckreation, a company that started by dealing with danger rooms.
Researching Old Foes and the Golden Age
Because he went into the Golden Age as a relatively young man, there aren’t many foes of his in the retirement home. However, there are some, and there are other villains.
The foes of his are Electrophasm (ability to change into electrical plasma and electricity) and Dr. Armageddon (body wrecked from his armor), Mr. Mephistopheles, Crimson Scarab, and Silk Cat, who was primarily a thief.
Other (former) villains include Rocket Raider (Gimmick-based high tech thief), Tech Tok (thief who worked through mechanical “avatars”), and Radium Lord (powered villain).
Nurse Dyne is a new hire, having started at the Golden Age fourteen months ago. She has a good record.
If anyone actually investigates her record…it exists on paper. If you talk to her references, they say a canned response about how good she is, but they have no actual memories of her.
In the time since Nurse Dyne joined, two others have joined as orderlies, and both are on Nurse Dyne’s shift.
Scene 3: Investigations And a Dinner Date
This is largely a continuation of the previous scene, with the PCs investigating. If any PC accepted Brock Fenton's invitation for dinner, that happens this evening.
Various heroes who attended the funeral will want to share information without being bugged. Though there might be clever answers, the best place for any non-genius who doesn't carry anti-bugging equipment is the park. If the PCs split up, you might need to intercut between them.
Superheroes sharing information can be met at the park or, with the correct powers, overheard. If the PCs missed vital information before, you can insert it here. The important things are:
No one knows why the sidekicks are in the will.
The change that put the sidekicks in the will is less than a year old.
There's a rumor that Theodora Darna is trying to sell something at the Golden Age.
There are conflicting stories about Darna's origin, but the one that she tells most often has her as a lover of a scholar four hundred years ago who took his books. She has been playing off factions of Hell and Heaven since then, in the quest for greater arcane knowledge. Darna may be a liar, but some famous heroes treat her as a credible threat to the world. She's certainly a person with a strong magical knowledge and some spells.
At the dinner with Brock, he'll be open about his power: he can nullify any inherent power. This makes him useful as an orderly, because some of the old folks can't control themselves any more. He is useful when the old guy who can lift a mountain has an episode. He lives on the Golden Ages grounds...he is essentially on call.
Anyone who can get into the Golden Age (the security system is difficulty 5, though it can be circumvented with the appropriate specialties or powers) can search. The underground hangar is relatively easy to find. The hidden occult chamber is difficult, but access to it is in Brock's room, and he intends to check it when he gets home tonight.
