The Steampunk's Apocalypse Game

[Steampunk Away]

A soft backpack, somewhat heavy, with nothing moving inside. Poking it causes shifting noises, and rattlingg can be heard.

[Fairley B. Strange]

Anything useful, Keith?

I've found the staff lockers and lunch-room in through here.

[flicks the switch on a kettle on the darkened bench and turns the tap on the sink - to check if the power and water are still working]

Looks like nobody's home, we might as well have a rummage around to see what might be useful...

[Steampunk Away]

The power flickers and then turns on.

The backpack contains some tins of food and a small knife. The backpack is in good enough shape to be reused.

[Fairley B. Strange]

Ok, now the thing about staff at places like a 'Hobby Lobby' is that, basically, they're 'nice' people, so for instance when its somebody's birthday, they'll have a cake... and to cut that cake..?

[rummages in the drawer under the sink and emerges with a 10-inch cooks knife]

Et voila - hmmm, not too sharp but we can fix that. And, with a cake you need candles... and then...

[pulls out a disposable gas lighter and flicks it alight]

Well, with so many non-smokers these days, you can't always rely on borrowing a light.

And we'll need an opener for those cans... Hmmm, nope. Oh well, I'll check the lockers. One of these ladies is sure to be on a crackers-and-tinned-fish diet...or there's always the Concrete trick...
[wanders off towards the staff lockers]

[Keith_Beef]

And I'm pretty sure that in a craft and hobby shop we'll be able to find some goggles or face mask to protect from splashes of hot glue, varnish, etc., as well as cut-resistant gloves, latex gloves… a workplace is probably also required to have a first aid kit, a fire extinguisher (or fire blanket, or fire bucket)…

There must be lots of potentially useful stuff around.

[Fairley B. Strange]

Whoa! Speaking of facemasks, I guess the water was cut off in the toilets early.
Anyway, whether you want to risk going back in there, or making like a bear in the woods, this'll come in handy.

[passes around four of the larger rolls of double-soft scavenged from within]

I haven't done much on survival in the USA, but I've heard those stories of guys using Poison Ivy leaves and this is a much better idea. And its a handy fire-starter too.

Anyway, most of the lockers were pretty scant - presumably whoever kept warm jackets or rainwear in their lockers in New Mexico took it with them when they split. Oh, but at least one gal was on the 'cat-food' diet, so there's three more tins, but the opener must be in her handbag, so no luck there.

So, there's heaps of party supplies and trinketry out there so we can dress ourselves a bit warmer in that, but I guess the next big need is going to be water without that grey muck floating in it.

[Steampunk Away]

To build a water purifier it will take 2 hours (stamina is gone now, replaced with time). The required materials are: container, mesh, tubes, and funnel.

Searching for these will take 1 hour with a 40% chance of finding all materials on the first try.

It is 2 hours to dusk, what do you wish to do?

[Fairley B. Strange]

Well, we're due for some retail therapy anyway, so off we go.

Although I'm not sure if a mesh filter will remove any dissolved nastiness, so lets keep our eyes open for any other sources or methods.

[Steampunk Away]

Where to search first?

Aisle 4: craft arts
Aisle 7: Jewlery
Aisle 9: fabric

[Keith_Beef]

Where to search first?

Aisle 4: craft arts
Aisle 7: Jewlery
Aisle 9: fabric

There are several of us, and I don't think that having two people search aisle 4 halves the time it takes. So we search an aisle each. Not just picking up stuff for a water purifier, but also stuff like a blowtorch and fuel (jewellery section), for example.

[Steampunk Away]

Items found.

Craft knife
Craft foam
Heavy burlap
Scissors
Mesh
Craft tubes

[Fairley B. Strange]

{ooc: actually googled 'Hobby Lobby' - being a non-US resident and went virtual aisle-hopping}

3 extra t-shirts for layering
2 bandannas - one for my pocket, one on my head for warmth as all I found were 'novelty' hats
1 large canvas duffle-bag to hold my treasures
An improvised bedroll from the fabric dept - 2 blankets of green tartan fleece and an overwrap groundsheet/fly of black canvas with a webbing strap to tie it together
3 pink metal buckets
I was looking for water containers and all I could find were these glass bottles with metal clip seals, so I got four and went back to fabrics to get more fleece to wrap them in to avoid breakage
No proper rope, but I got a bag full of of 20yard coils of strong jute string, so I can hand-twist a rope later
Nothing really useful in fabrics, just a pair of scissors, but I got a ball-pein hammer, a set of shears, and a variety of pliers in craft.

But I had an idea while thinking of taking some craft books as logs for lighting a fire.
This place is big enough that it has to have a fire sprinkler system, and a lot of water will be in those pipes that's been just sitting there waiting in case of fire, even if the drinking water pipes have been affected by drawing in 'fresh' greywater from the mains before they shut it down.
We should look at draining the system, that's why I got the buckets.