Fear and Loathing in Atlantis

Picking up from last time with Dirge's big appearance in Atlantis, we find Harvey Wallbanger knocked out and floating around aimlessly while the evil volcano spirit manifests in all his underwater fiery multitentacly glory and threatens to end the line of Atlantean sovereignty once and for all.

Immediately, the force of Dirge's aura burned into their brains and made them start going crazy. He also animated the buildings all around the team and had them reach out to grab them. Land Shark and Disco dodged the first swipe, but Torpedo was caged by a grabby tower. Land Shark attacked with a column of earth and found that Dirge was protected by a powerful force field. Torpedo crashed through the cage and dove so hard at Dirge that he was able to harm him even through the force field. 

Because of the madness aura, Torpedo immediately asserted his Atlantean kingship and started assigning positions and ordering people around. Disco, likewise affected, became extra diva-ish and took everything Torpedo said as an insulting failure to recognize his fabulousness. I think Landshark was just curled up in a ball or fighting with the animated buildings or something. Then he freaked out and let loose with an earthquake, which trashed the neighborhood, but didn't otherwise help much. Torpedo did manage to save the bystanders by swimming so fast that he created an underwater twister to whisk them to safety.

Eventually Disco decided to show them how it's done. A combination of dice magic and determination points led to the emotion control lightshow of Disco's life, dazzling even un-targeted onlookers. Dirge cried out that "the Avatar" was coming and fled, also ranting about how the black sphere will rise and "he will come from beyond the stars and crush you all" as he fled into the volcano.

Shaking off their madness (well, as much as they ever do) and rallying the Atlantean troops, the Scrap Pile pursued the demon. While Atlantean mystics performed a collective binding ritual, Torpedo channeled the lava and Landshark reshaped the stone to support the Atlantean magic (also taking time to turn the carved face into a shark head). Disco capped it off with another light show, manifesting as a ghostly disco ball image shining briefly above the mountain.

Later they got a video call from Fire of Saturn and found out about the B Team's recent exploits. Also, Mister Chompers barked into the camera when Nimble showed up. Disco saw a subtitle appear underneath reading, "The sow is mine!"

Back on the B Side

Jumping back to the end of the fight with the giant lava monster over Lightfoot Island, we find most of the B Team (Comet, Pork Chop, and Grave Grizzly, but not Ghost Lad) freshly released from Rapture's lair. They watched the monster go down, then made their way back to Scrap Pile HQ to see if they could figure out how to find Techmaster.

Techmaster, if we haven't already covered this somewhere, was a special effects man turned supervillain who was horribly maimed when Ghost Lad phased his hands into a lightning machine. He lost both hands, and his face was badly burned. When last we saw him, he had high tech artificial hands and was about to unveil his giant mechanical hornet before the lava spirits got it and turned it into Dirge's volcano monster.

At the base, they met Nimble, who was there looking for her brother, Disco, who of course had just headed out to Atlantis. Grave Grizzly declared that he could find Comet just fine without any help and staggered off to play accordion in an alley somewhere. Chromaticat was teleporting around, and Mister Chompers was there, telling Nimble to kill people. So, apparently, there's something about Disco's family that lets Chompers communicate with them.

Their research led them to an abandoned warehouse disco place, which they noticed was guarded by swarms of bees. Pork Chop got 'em going and Nimble used her super-speed to disperse the converging swarms with a mini-tornado. Inside, oh yeah, this is actually where they found Mr. Chompers. He was locked up in a bathroom next to the lobby. Farther back in the club, they heard screaming and found a big supervillain lab all set up in the main dance hall with Ghost Lad and his buddy John Jameson shackled to a machine and being tortured by Techmaster.

Techmaster had actually started with Jameson, for maximum effect on the main course. As the team burst in, he was pushing a big bluish-white gemstone into Jameson's chest to the tune of breaking bones and screams.

Pork Chop was delayed by a pair of shadow creatures that ambushed him. He quickly dispatched both with a chair he had picked up. At the other side of the hall, they found that Corrosive Soul was there too. She pointed at Jameson, who howled and turned into a white-furred wolf man. This seemed to surprise Techmaster as much as anyone.

Comet crashed into people, Pork Chop threw chairs, and Nimble used her rock-hard purse as a weapon, although at one point she was overwhelmed by the howl of the Man-Wolf and ran away until she could gather her wits and come back. Corrosive Soul used her mind control powers to briefly turn the team against each other, then summoned a group of green fire demons when the fight looked like it might not go her way.

Battered by purses and Comet-fists, Techmaster used the distraction of Corrosive Soul's conjuring to slip out the back door. Pork Chop managed to trigger the emergency sprinkler system and snuff the fire demons. The Man-Wolf eventually went down, too. Surrounded and battered, Corrosive Soul literally fell apart, but her head continued to cackle as it rolled over to Nimble, then abruptly melted into a skull and turned to dust.

The unconscious Man-Wolf turned back into Jameson, but the gem appeared to be grafted to his chest so that they couldn't remove it without badly injuring him. And they got Ghost Lad out so, apart from Techmaster escaping, mission accomplished.

Banging the Walls

Started off with a cut to Harvey Wallbanger, who had a little too much fun at the Christmas Party and woke up lost and alone in the pocket dimension. He wandered deep into the caves where he found a weird mystical substructure and saw something that he decided the Scrap Pile really needed to know about (held for later revelation). Then he found his way back to Lightfoot Island where Fire of Saturn helped him out with the tech to get him to Atlantis.

In Atlantis, he found the team bound and shackled to the walls of a temple. He burst in and bounced around and set the Scrap Pile loose and they fought some undersea villains: Starfish, Sea Mantis, Anemone, and Kelp Queen.

Then big ole scary Dirge showed up and that was the end of the session.