Six, Glyph, Ki-Rin, Ash,
The runners had made their way onto Alcatraz, and were now engaged in a firefight with Allisom’s elite Seraphim troops. Ki-Rin, Ash and Glyph were inside the main prison block backed up by Six’s drones, while Six remained hidden in an old unused concrete toilet block.
Ki-Rin lobbed in a few grenades into the kill zone and a few moments later Six’s drone led the charge into the corridor followed by Ash, Ki-Rin and Glyph. It could have easily become a kill zone, with Seraphim soldiers overlooking the corridor they ran down but Six spotted the movement of men suiting up and the team lobbed some well aimed grenades which reduced the fighting fit to mortally wounded. Glyph and Ash made their way up to make sure they were dead.
Six, outside, heard movement and braved a snap look out from his hiding place to see a small squad heading over to a underground emplacement not far from where he hid. An inspection with a drone indicated some kind of concrete bunker, he gave the others a heads up, and this was enough for Ki-Rin who left the main block to investigate.
Ash had made his way over to the now dead Seraphim and found that the area where they were was an equipping station. There were sets of their hi-tech armour scattered about the flooring, and although blast charred from the grenades, seemed relatively undamaged. His mercenary tendencies shone through and he quickly began to don bits and pieces of the armour, until someone remembered that the last time they were able to inspect one of these suits they saw that the man inside was attached to the suit cyberneticaly and a warning was shouted out that he may become entwined into the Seraphim system. He had a moment of clarity and aborted the idea.
Ki-Rin came to the top of the concrete emplacement and saw that it lead down into some kind of bunker. Six tried to send a drone down to investigate but there was some kind of signal shielding and nearly lost contact with the drone completely. Ki-Rin waited for the rest of the team but managed to tweak a signal booster so that Six could drop a eyeball drone and get information back. The drone reported that there was a circular room at the bottom of the ladder that was completely empty with the exception of a dead body, that of a Seraphim trooper.
Glyph announced her arrival at the top of the bunker by lobbing a grenade down, obliterating the corpse, and the eyeball drone.
The runners had gathered at the top of the concrete bunker when Six realised that they were in the open and could be fodder for the sniper, he aligned the Flyspy onto the lighthouse tower and both the Sniper and the spotter were overlooking their position and for some reason hadn’t fired. This news was enough to hustle the runners out of sight into the bunker despite Ki-Rin’s protestations that they could be dropping into a trap.
Cautiously the runners investigated and discovered that this bunker seemed to be the housing for a gigantic computer that they presumed housed the A.I, Choir, but when they descended into the computer room they were surprised to find more dead Seraphim troops. Each seemed to have been in the process of laying anti-personnel mines before having been killed with some kind of laser, the runners assumed that Choir had struck them down.
The runners experimented by taunting the A.I.’s weapon system and realised that she tracked the runners constantly but only fired when Ash brought out his weapon in the computer room, Ash was lucky to survive, but his combat reflexes were good.
Ki-Rin decided to engage the A.I. in the matrix, and was surprised and a little intimidated when the computer was able to impose it’s own profile over his own powerful persona, he persisted and tried to talk to the AI. Being given nothing but riddles and unhelpful answers he gave up and apologised to the rest of the team. They then barracked him back into the matrix and he tried again.
Choir was more helpful than he imagined, and once he cut through her computer jargon, she told him that she had killed the guards so the runners would be able to stay alive to cease the scourge. When questioned deeper, she knew nothing of what she had just said and the runners assumed that she had been hacked in some way. Choir also told the runners that Blake was on route with the Primary (whom they took to mean Allisom) and that the Primary had stood down the rest of Seraphim.
The runners realised that this was their chance to take out Allisom and hurried up to the only helipad which was on the roof of one of the buildings. They set the anti-personnel mines around and took up positions around the helipad. They then watched in dismay when two helicopter gunships and an executive helicopter swooped over head, the executive touching down on the scrubland at the other end of the island. The runners moved quickly and hustled across to where Allisom stood outside the helicopter.
Allisom had Blake at gunpoint and was surrounded by six handpicked Seraphim troopers, the runners were quickly closing on the scene. Ki-Rin was first on the scene and fired the first Salvo at Allisom. The Sedim realised that it was not going to be able to bargain with the runners and dispatched Blake with a single bullet before ordering his troops to open fire.
The runners were forced into a desperate fight, Six had to break cover, his drones stranded on the rooftop ambush, Ki-Rin was strafed by both helicopters and had to make a do or die shot at the pilot through the windshield. Glyph and Ash engaged the Seraphim guards in a close run firefight.
After the dust settled, Dominic Cross/Allisom lay dead in the dirt. The runners weren’t sure how to kill a Shedim but urged Ash to decapitate the body with his weapons focus. There was a slight glint of light at the cut, but that was all. They weren’t sure if they had banished the spirit but they could think of nothing else to do.
The runners took Dominic Cross’s helicopter and flew back to San Francisco main land with Blake’s body which they left in Ash’s care.
The runners returned to their homes. Blake was dead. Allisom was gone. Cross Applied Technologies had become nothing more than corporate assets divvied up between the bigger corporations.
But was that the end?...
Monday, October 22, 2007
Friday, August 24, 2007
The Rock. Part 2
Six, Glyph, Ki-Rin, Ash.
Monday 13th November 2070 03:00
The explosion sent a shower of debris down the tunnel back toward the runners and none were aware of the prickling sensation that accompanied the activation of a spell. After a moment or two to gather their wits the runners began to make a move, but before they could react, Six was knocked off his feet by some kind of projectile web and dragged into the dusty darkness beyond the breech in the wall. Ash and Glyph reacted quickly firing shots into the gloom towards some kind of massive arachnid. Seraphim troops stormed towards them from the entrance to the pipe that the team had made their way up. A desperate battle ensued, The massive spider was topped with a muscled human torso belonging to the long dead mage, Silk. Ash and Glyph deployed grenades towards the three Seraphim troopers who were blown to pieces, Six managed to free himself from the web, but in an effort to aid the rigger, Glyph became caught up in the spiders silk. Ash made his way to the entrance of the tunnel to fight off any more Seraphim troops and was horrified to see that one of the troops they had already killed was Blake. In a flat panic he tried to medikit his brother, but as he sat waiting for the nanites to do their work, he saw that all three troopers were the visage of Blake. Thoughts of cloning and other horrors flashed through Ash’s mind. The runners fought on, the mutated Silk/spider seemingly ignoring horrific wounds inflicted onto it continued to try and cocoon the team,
Six’s attention was attracted by a familiar voice, he sent his drone across to investigate and was shocked to find the long dead troll runner, Ono. He seemed to be gesturing back towards where Six’s meat body stood, and Six was confused. He called out over the com that Ono was here but the others had become bogged down in a firefight with more Seraphim troopers. Six focused on what Ono was trying to tell him, and eventually he could see a faint outline of words hanging in the air across where the new concrete wall had been. He yelled for Ash to come and investigate, but was snatched from his feet by the spider and he too began to get cocooned. Ash made his way over and could see that the writing was some kind of spell lock, he swiped once with his weapons focus which broke the spell. The runners found themselves in what seemed to be an old pumping room underneath Alcatraz, they had been firing at mirages and their own fears, made real by the spell. They knew they could well have made enough noise to bring the Seraphim army down onto them and they hustled.
They arrived at another pumping room with the all of the equipment removed. The pipe continued onward through the island but again was blocked up with a newer concrete wall. This room seemed to be a junction for some kind of sewage system and there were several apertures in the ceiling which had old crumbling pipes. Six dispatched his flyspy drone up one of the larger pipe sections and planned out a navigable route that led to a toilet block. They would need to smash their way through a toilet but it was doable.
Glyph was sent first and set a small explosive charge beneath one of the porcelain thrones. The team quickly swarmed into the toilet block and secured it. They then considered their options, they guessed that the supercomputer would need power and identified the buildings around them which did seme to have power. That logic discounted all but four buildings. The light house, the large building in the centre, and two of the lower outlying buildings. The initially planned to start at the lighthouse, but the sniper nest and the open ground made them change their minds. They instead went for the large building in the centre of the island. Ki-Rin was first, and he bypassed the doorlock, the rest quickly followed, with the exception of Six who remained hidden in the toilet block, preferring to use the drones.
The searched the building from room to room, until Ki-Rin opened one door that lead directly into the main prison cells. Six, through one of his drones saw that Ki-Rin was already compromised. Although there seemed to be no reason why the alarms hadn’t already sounded.
No longer used as cells, Seraphim used the main prison building as the bunkhouse for the troops while on base. Ki-Rin opened his account with a shotgun blast through the bars of one cell. But the Seraphim soldiers, although not dressed up in their full mil-spec armour were still more than capable of returning fire and very quickly the room Ash and Ki-Rin hunkered in became a fire trap. Ki-Rin was dropped, but Ash, on hand was able to administer first aid. And although this floor of Seraphim were all but wiped out, there were more on upper floors.
The fight continues…
Monday 13th November 2070 03:00
The explosion sent a shower of debris down the tunnel back toward the runners and none were aware of the prickling sensation that accompanied the activation of a spell. After a moment or two to gather their wits the runners began to make a move, but before they could react, Six was knocked off his feet by some kind of projectile web and dragged into the dusty darkness beyond the breech in the wall. Ash and Glyph reacted quickly firing shots into the gloom towards some kind of massive arachnid. Seraphim troops stormed towards them from the entrance to the pipe that the team had made their way up. A desperate battle ensued, The massive spider was topped with a muscled human torso belonging to the long dead mage, Silk. Ash and Glyph deployed grenades towards the three Seraphim troopers who were blown to pieces, Six managed to free himself from the web, but in an effort to aid the rigger, Glyph became caught up in the spiders silk. Ash made his way to the entrance of the tunnel to fight off any more Seraphim troops and was horrified to see that one of the troops they had already killed was Blake. In a flat panic he tried to medikit his brother, but as he sat waiting for the nanites to do their work, he saw that all three troopers were the visage of Blake. Thoughts of cloning and other horrors flashed through Ash’s mind. The runners fought on, the mutated Silk/spider seemingly ignoring horrific wounds inflicted onto it continued to try and cocoon the team,
Six’s attention was attracted by a familiar voice, he sent his drone across to investigate and was shocked to find the long dead troll runner, Ono. He seemed to be gesturing back towards where Six’s meat body stood, and Six was confused. He called out over the com that Ono was here but the others had become bogged down in a firefight with more Seraphim troopers. Six focused on what Ono was trying to tell him, and eventually he could see a faint outline of words hanging in the air across where the new concrete wall had been. He yelled for Ash to come and investigate, but was snatched from his feet by the spider and he too began to get cocooned. Ash made his way over and could see that the writing was some kind of spell lock, he swiped once with his weapons focus which broke the spell. The runners found themselves in what seemed to be an old pumping room underneath Alcatraz, they had been firing at mirages and their own fears, made real by the spell. They knew they could well have made enough noise to bring the Seraphim army down onto them and they hustled.
They arrived at another pumping room with the all of the equipment removed. The pipe continued onward through the island but again was blocked up with a newer concrete wall. This room seemed to be a junction for some kind of sewage system and there were several apertures in the ceiling which had old crumbling pipes. Six dispatched his flyspy drone up one of the larger pipe sections and planned out a navigable route that led to a toilet block. They would need to smash their way through a toilet but it was doable.
Glyph was sent first and set a small explosive charge beneath one of the porcelain thrones. The team quickly swarmed into the toilet block and secured it. They then considered their options, they guessed that the supercomputer would need power and identified the buildings around them which did seme to have power. That logic discounted all but four buildings. The light house, the large building in the centre, and two of the lower outlying buildings. The initially planned to start at the lighthouse, but the sniper nest and the open ground made them change their minds. They instead went for the large building in the centre of the island. Ki-Rin was first, and he bypassed the doorlock, the rest quickly followed, with the exception of Six who remained hidden in the toilet block, preferring to use the drones.
The searched the building from room to room, until Ki-Rin opened one door that lead directly into the main prison cells. Six, through one of his drones saw that Ki-Rin was already compromised. Although there seemed to be no reason why the alarms hadn’t already sounded.
No longer used as cells, Seraphim used the main prison building as the bunkhouse for the troops while on base. Ki-Rin opened his account with a shotgun blast through the bars of one cell. But the Seraphim soldiers, although not dressed up in their full mil-spec armour were still more than capable of returning fire and very quickly the room Ash and Ki-Rin hunkered in became a fire trap. Ki-Rin was dropped, but Ash, on hand was able to administer first aid. And although this floor of Seraphim were all but wiped out, there were more on upper floors.
The fight continues…
Friday, July 27, 2007
Finding Blake
Ki-Rin, Glyph, Drifter, Six, Ash.
Sunday 12th November 2070.
The runners had to spend a bit of time R&R after the clash with Book but they were beginning to get a bit restless when Ash finally received the phone call from The Juggler about his brother, Blake.
Ash went round to see the Juggler at Clive’s Dive where he was told that Blake had been drafted into the Seraphim, the strong arm of Cross Applied Technologies. Apparently Seraphim had two classes of soldiers, C1 and C2, Blake was designated as a C2 soldier. Both class of troop were interlinked with a semi autonomous AI called Choir, which coordinated their actions. It seems that Choir was in constant communication with each Seraphim troop.
The Jugglers network of information gatherers had also managed to locate the headquarters of the Seraphim and that it was on the Isle of Alcatraz. Cross had somehow managed to move in as General Saito was moving out and now that they were there no one really knew that they occupied it, and those that did, didn’t have the balls to try and oust them.
The Juggler told Ash that his brother was sure to be on the old prison island, and if he wasn’t then that computer would know exactly where Blake was.
Ash made his way round to Six’s apartment and after filling him in on the intel, Six took charge, summoning the rest of the runners to remove some of the burden from his friend.
Once the team had arrived and the information had been shared, they swung into action formulating a plan to storm Alcatraz.
Ki-Rin tapped the information that he could from his contact who used to be a member of Seraphim. They discovered that magical security had been provided by Dominic Cross himself, that the surface was covered by two separate sniper nests, and that the rest of the troops would stay inside the buildings of the island. Ki-Rin’s contact also told him of two ways into the island that he considered to be weak points. One was an automated re-supply ship that departed on a weekly basis from a Cross controlled facility. The other way was an inlet pipe that the patrols would to use as a sneaky smoking spot, he suspected that it led deep into the interior of the base.
With the intel gathered the runners set about ordering ordinance. Bullets and grenades featured highly. Six dispatched a newly purchased skimmer drone out to the island to get a closer look.
They decided on getting to the island by swimming the 1 mile cordon underwater to gain access to the inlet pipe.
The runners launched from Glyph’s boat and swum unhindered to the pipe. The team quickly and relatively easily made their way into the pipe and changed their scuba gear for their armour. The Flyspy drone was sent on ahead and came to a square sump room which seemed to be occupied by a small crystalline ring that hovered and rotated in the centre of the room.
The runners went closer to investigate, Ash, being the magical one went first but retreated back as the ring began to head towards him. After discussions they decided to head into the room two at a time to try and trick the ring. Ash and Glyph headed in, one on either side but they hadn’t counted on the power inherent in the magical trap, and both were whisked off to an astral realm where they were assailed by some kind of spirit.
The rest of the team watched in horror as the two runners disappeared, but a matter of seconds later they both reappeared as the ring winked out of existence, battered and bruised, by their encounter with the spirit but they were able to defeat it.
The runners made their way out of the sump and continued down the tunnel into the heart of the island when they came across a new cement wall that now covered the tunnel. To a man they turned to the demos expert, Glyph, who declared that she hadn’t bought any more plastique since the last run. They stood around as if it was a union meeting for a while before they all shuffled out of the tunnel and headed back to Glyph’s boat. While the rest of the runners waited Ki-Rin went back to his apartment where he had a can of explosive foam and a detonator cap lying about. He got back to the boat, the team suited up and made the long swim back to the pipe. 3 hours later the runners were back in the tunnel, explosive foam primed and ready to blow. The team retreated back to the sump and Ki-Rin detonated the explosive sending chunks of concrete wall down the tunnel.
TBC…
Sunday 12th November 2070.
The runners had to spend a bit of time R&R after the clash with Book but they were beginning to get a bit restless when Ash finally received the phone call from The Juggler about his brother, Blake.
Ash went round to see the Juggler at Clive’s Dive where he was told that Blake had been drafted into the Seraphim, the strong arm of Cross Applied Technologies. Apparently Seraphim had two classes of soldiers, C1 and C2, Blake was designated as a C2 soldier. Both class of troop were interlinked with a semi autonomous AI called Choir, which coordinated their actions. It seems that Choir was in constant communication with each Seraphim troop.
The Jugglers network of information gatherers had also managed to locate the headquarters of the Seraphim and that it was on the Isle of Alcatraz. Cross had somehow managed to move in as General Saito was moving out and now that they were there no one really knew that they occupied it, and those that did, didn’t have the balls to try and oust them.
The Juggler told Ash that his brother was sure to be on the old prison island, and if he wasn’t then that computer would know exactly where Blake was.
Ash made his way round to Six’s apartment and after filling him in on the intel, Six took charge, summoning the rest of the runners to remove some of the burden from his friend.
Once the team had arrived and the information had been shared, they swung into action formulating a plan to storm Alcatraz.
Ki-Rin tapped the information that he could from his contact who used to be a member of Seraphim. They discovered that magical security had been provided by Dominic Cross himself, that the surface was covered by two separate sniper nests, and that the rest of the troops would stay inside the buildings of the island. Ki-Rin’s contact also told him of two ways into the island that he considered to be weak points. One was an automated re-supply ship that departed on a weekly basis from a Cross controlled facility. The other way was an inlet pipe that the patrols would to use as a sneaky smoking spot, he suspected that it led deep into the interior of the base.
With the intel gathered the runners set about ordering ordinance. Bullets and grenades featured highly. Six dispatched a newly purchased skimmer drone out to the island to get a closer look.
They decided on getting to the island by swimming the 1 mile cordon underwater to gain access to the inlet pipe.
The runners launched from Glyph’s boat and swum unhindered to the pipe. The team quickly and relatively easily made their way into the pipe and changed their scuba gear for their armour. The Flyspy drone was sent on ahead and came to a square sump room which seemed to be occupied by a small crystalline ring that hovered and rotated in the centre of the room.
The runners went closer to investigate, Ash, being the magical one went first but retreated back as the ring began to head towards him. After discussions they decided to head into the room two at a time to try and trick the ring. Ash and Glyph headed in, one on either side but they hadn’t counted on the power inherent in the magical trap, and both were whisked off to an astral realm where they were assailed by some kind of spirit.
The rest of the team watched in horror as the two runners disappeared, but a matter of seconds later they both reappeared as the ring winked out of existence, battered and bruised, by their encounter with the spirit but they were able to defeat it.
The runners made their way out of the sump and continued down the tunnel into the heart of the island when they came across a new cement wall that now covered the tunnel. To a man they turned to the demos expert, Glyph, who declared that she hadn’t bought any more plastique since the last run. They stood around as if it was a union meeting for a while before they all shuffled out of the tunnel and headed back to Glyph’s boat. While the rest of the runners waited Ki-Rin went back to his apartment where he had a can of explosive foam and a detonator cap lying about. He got back to the boat, the team suited up and made the long swim back to the pipe. 3 hours later the runners were back in the tunnel, explosive foam primed and ready to blow. The team retreated back to the sump and Ki-Rin detonated the explosive sending chunks of concrete wall down the tunnel.
TBC…
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Six's blog
By N.Barnes
Call Dir: Shadownet/ShadowlandsBBS/>
Select Region: Region=SanFrancisco>
Call SubDir: SanFrancisco/WeBlogs>
Select Blog: Author=V.Six>
Initializing…>
Entry 31: 28.10.70>
Man, do I fucking hate Las Vegas. Seems we can guaran-damn-tee that everything’s gonna go belly up the minute we hit town. Maybe it’s cursed.
Maybe it just hates us because we never go to gamble? I dunno, but if I never see Vegas again, it’ll be too soon. Wish we’d never ended up back there…
Few days ago, we got a call from Mal asking us to drop by his surgery.
Understandably for a guy who spends his working days elbow deep in gore, Mal doesn’t scare easily but he sounded spooked. We smelt trouble but Mal was safe and he told us he had a job for us. By way of background he started to tell us a ripping yarn and revealed that he had some close links with our old nemesis the Juggler and the Notable Anarchists. We knew Mal had street docced for them but the story he told us now made him an integral part of the team – a team which had an almighty boner for screwing over Cross Applied Technology.
The way Mal told it, Juggler had tipped them off to Dominic Cross’
acquisition of an Orichalcum book that could be used to summon the Sheddim – the goofy spirit that had Essence-raped Ash and I and left us bleeding out our auras into Astral Space. The NA had decided to spoke Cross’ wheel and raid his offices for the book and had togged up as commercial cleaners for a covert insertion before their contact on perimeter security had decided to boost his pension prospects by turning them over to the boss mid-op. They were screwed but pressing on and succeeding was going to be no more dangerous than bailing out so they forged on and you’ve gotta admire their balls.
In the middle of the tale, the door opens and the tea boy waltzes in – only this tea boy is the fucking Juggler. He’s carrying nothing more offensive than a double espresso though and Mal points out that Cross had originally employed us to stop Juggler’s attacks yet ironically we had ended up attacking Cross ourselves. We’d gone Poacher turned Gamekeeper and had been fighting the Juggler’s war for him ever since! Mal had a point, the enemy of my enemy is my friend so we all sat down with a brew and Juggler took up the tale.
The team mage, named Book, had done an Astral scout and located the Orichalcum book but it was being protected by a spirit of some kind. In real space the team had battled their way through to Cross’ private apartments and found the man coughing up blood, his eyes blackened and burnt, lying not far from the physical book itself. Seems the team finished the job and iced Cross (there’s a lot of that going around lately) but then couldn’t decide what to do about the Orichalcum Book. Their mage believed the spirit seemed keen for them to take it but they were worried about getting mixed up in things they didn’t understand. In the end, they seemed to think the Wizboy could protect himself against spiritual influence and had taken the book until they could destroy it. Bad move. Book the mage seemed to have gone screwy and was now officially AWOL with the Orichalcum Book. Juggler wanted both back and Mal was the go-between offering us 50k for our services.
Now this, this was a head fuck. I know that in real life nothing is black and white and it’s all just shades of grey, but this was totally blurring the lines between friend and foe, right and wrong. Time was when I would have shot the Juggler for less than 50k and the thought of us all trailing off after this Mage and a book that could potentially push us all over the edge into mad servitude to the Sheddim was far from appealing.
Continues: 1/4>
|| >
However, Juggler sweetened the deal with the promise of further info on the whereabouts of Ash’ brother and also said he had been told that the Orichalcum Book could be used to banish Allisom. Helping find Blake, giving the Sheddim the Bird, shafting Cross and plugging my sucking aura wound all added up to an interesting answer to the question – what the frag’s in this for me? We shook on the deal and started swapping info – Juggler had been totally frozen out of Book’s life but we’d had tabs on the man twice in recent runs. He’d been hanging out with Dr Manton Ford poisoning the Caribou sports drink and we’d been on his trail in Vegas before Ash and I were busted…
Ford was the weaker link and we we’re all set to hit research mode. A bad Burrito I’d picked up at Deano’s Diner intervened however and laid me up a while. As I lay dying in my bed, the rest of the team quickly established that Ford had fled town. Don’t ask me where Ash got the info – I’ve realised just lately that it’s better for me not to query his dubious contacts – but he found out a crack squad of Cross’ Console Soldiers called Seraphim had spirited the good doctor away and deposited him with a Barrens’ street gang called the Whites. The way I understand it, the Whites traded their info in a deal that required Glyph to go gung-ho on their local rivals. Maybe the Whites get off on ladies fighting? Whatever, the deal went down and the gang handed over a business card for a Johnson who had picked Manton Ford up in a chopper.
Johnson turned out to be a Lone Star Facilitator – a can do man who made things happen. I was back on point by this stage and Croner filled in the blanks for me. We met up with the guy and he was happy to talk about his brief stint working for Cross. He had made Manton Ford disappear and replaced him with John Austin, an executive for TecTonic who lived in Nixon.
We well-remembered Nixon and particularly the CAT facility at Pyramid Lake where we had swamped the technology being used to produce clones of Dominic Cross in dozens of feet of dirty lake water. It didn’t take too long to put two and two together and sure enough CAT were trying to rebuild the facility and Ford was slap bang in the middle of it. Surveillance went badly when my FlySpy was spotted by an eagle eyed brickie and we decided we had to move fast before we were thoroughly rumbled. We assaulted the facility as stealthily as possible but the alarm had already been sounded and before we knew it, a chopper was dropping a Seraphim Elite FRT on our heads.
The fire fight was intense and brutal. We weren’t equipped for heavy combat while Seraphim were togged up in military gear, but even their Elite were just console soldiers when you got right down to it and we had faced them before and knew how to defeat them. Ash and Drifter hit the deck and needed resuscitation and then, just as we were ready to Cas Evac Ford and high tail it before Seraphim reinforcements arrive, Ash goes totally postal, sobbing over the console soldiers’ corpses and tearing their helmets off. Only afterwards do I realise that he’s worried Blake has been drafted into the elite…
Ford sang like a canary. I get the impression the team’s ‘innovative’
interrogation techniques were more than he knew how to handle. I think Ki-rinn threatened to ram his teeth down his throat, Glyph let him drool on her cleavage and Ash just sobbed about the loss of his brother. I don’t do interrogation so I kept well clear. Props to the guys though, whichever method it was that worked, it got results and we were soon off to Vegas, back to the Volcano Club – scene of our last sighting of Book and my ignominious beating at the hands of a Lone Star patrol trooper.
Ki-rinn quickly established that if Book was inside, he was with the movers and shakers on the high rollers tables. I deployed drone observations while Frosty and Glyph tarted themselves up. They would play a young, flush couple splashing the cash inside while I kept tabs on them and Ash played fire support. I’d managed to pinpoint Book’s motor in the car park so we were confident he couldn’t easily give us the slip.
Continues: 2/4>
|| >
Ki-rinn and Glyph demonstrated a remarkable skill for wasting their money on bad bets. They played the ‘easy mark’ nicely and had obviously soon caught the attention of someone in the casino who wanted to strip their credsticks bare. They were escorted into the private elevator and whisked up to the private card tables. Shame Ki-rinn wasn’t quite so good at placing surveillance devices inconspicuously. My IBall Drone had been rumbled straight away so we were effectively blind. A tense half hour ticked by until Frosty dropped the dime in the callbox and tipped us off to the fact that he was sitting opposite Book. He and Glyph had been forced to go in unarmed and there were guards on the high stakes floor so Ki-rinn needed a rapid distraction before he lost the shirt off of his back.
Ash grabbed K’s sniper rifle and moved into position as our poker playing duo painted the guards by Smartlink. I held my breath as Ash took the shot – he was shooting high, through at least one wall and into an unseen foe… It was impossible to work out what was going on – the paints started to wheel around chaotically as a fight ensued. Ash was firing, reloading, moving and firing again, smashing shots through the wall. Worse, Glyph and Ki-rinn might have painted the enemies but we really didn’t know who was who or where our friends were. Each shot Ash fired could have hit Glyph or Ki-rinn or shattered the Mage’s skull like an over-ripe melon preventing us from ever finding out where he’d stashed the Orichalcum Book. We started losing paints. At first I wasn’t sure if they were ticking down confirmed kills but then so many of them flicked out at once we knew either Glyph or Ki-rinn was down. Ash was out of sniper rounds and helpless and then the rest of the paints disappeared. Both of our chummers were down, definitely shot up; at best unconscious and at worst dead and we had no way of working out which it was.
Ash and I sat in the van just looking blankly at each other. It seemed like hours but I guarantee it was just a matter of seconds. We didn’t know what had just happened to the other half of our team and going in to find out seemed like suicide. It didn’t take us long to decide to commit suicide though – what else could we do? Ki-rinn and Glyph had risked their lives to rescue us last time we were in Vegas. Looked like it was time to repay that debt. We at least knew Book was still inside, but it was a fair bet that he and the Red Samurai security in the joint would know that we were coming. We stealed ourselves for an assault. Frag Vegas.
I made a call to Nunzio and paid for a few Mafia goons to come and lend us their guns. Ash got hold of a shiny new rifle and we planned to go in hard and fast. My drones would lead the assault – parts come cheaper than lives – backed up by Ash who would lead in our hired heavies. The casino was emptied by Red Samurai and the disgruntled gamblers turfed out into the pre-dawn gloom told us we were expected.
I opened the batting by sticking the drone van through the casino’s front windows, laying down covering fire from the HMG as I deployed the drones and as the meat made its way in. The ground floor was open plan and Red Samurai didn’t stand a chance – we were clear and making a move on the first floor.
Trouble was, Red Samurai now had the edge. They knew where we would be coming up and had the escalators covered. Until those escalators were working again, the drones were effectively useless – unable to reach the next floor. It meant the meat had to go in first and take the brunt of the enemy fire and they suffered. By the time I had drones in support, we were men down and limited on medical supplies. One of the Mafia goons, Mario I think, got Ash back on his feet with a nano-medkit and the extra automatic fire from the drones helped tip the tide in our favour.
On the second floor, a nasty surprise in the form of twin-linked sentry guns awaited us but I know what I’m doing when it comes to confusing sensors. A grenade brought down debris from the ceiling tiles to confuse the targeting computer while the drones zipped in. By the time the drones had been acquired, Ash was able to pop up from the stairwell and finish the job properly with no casualties.
Continues: 3/4>
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The sentry guns were covering the glass elevator to the High Rollers floor and we again realised anyone using the lift was making themselves a sitting duck. Sending the drones first was an easy compromise so I patched Ash in on the camera feed and we sent them up. I flattened the Steel Lynx down on the elevator floor and that gave us an edge of surprise over the Red Samurai who were expecting man-sized targets. The cameras revealed a private bar that looked a dead match for the room Ki-rinn and Glyph had described. Six guards were dotted around the place and amongst them was the Mage from the Notable Anarchists, Book.
I popped the Steel Lynx up and started firing through the glass as targets presented themselves. Book threw himself over the bar to take shelter from a volley from the Doberman and on the other side of the room I saw another set of elevator doors open and vomit out Glyph, guns blazing. She was alive! And now we were rocking! Attacked unexpectedly from two different directions, we had Red Samurai on the run and the glass elevator began to descend again to collect Ash and Mario.
My exultation was short lived. Book has a couple of mage tricks up his sleeve and reduced the Doberman to smoking metal with a stream of acid out of the end of his fragging fingertip and then the Steel Lynx ran out of ammo. I saw Glyph go down in a hail of gunfire and my only option was now to run distraction. The Lynx drew the guards fire while Ash piled into the lift, before a couple of grenades blew it right off of its legs.
I was blind. A little dump shocked and completely fragged for intel – all I had was an occasional burst of gunfire relayed to me over the comm. I was out of combat-effective drones too. My one consolation was that the grenades used on the Lynx hadn’t gone Ash’ way but it was small beer compared to the creeping realisation I’d have to go against everything I’ve learnt lately and put my carcass on the line in a firefight against Red Samurai with nothing but my Ares Pred. What else could I do? Three of my friends’ lives and the success of the Run could hang on whether or not I was there to put a bullet in one of the fraggers. I ditched the van and ran for the escalators.
By the time I got to the top floor, things had gone from bad to worse. I could see the bodies of Glyph, Ash and Ki-rinn scattered about the room and it was only our Hired Help Mario who was preventing MDK. Almost whooped with joy to see him knelt over Ash, spraying suppressing fire from an AK in Book’s direction while he stuck the nano-medkit into my boy. Ash eyes cracked open and I could see he was able to fight on. With Mario keeping Book’s head down, Ash and I flanked the fragger. As Ash wheeled around one end of the bar, Book turned in that direction, no doubt with some vicious spell in mind. I rose on his blind side, opening my flick baton and clubbing him over the back of the head as Ash pulled the trigger and thumped a Stick Shock round into his grid.
Book was out for the count. His Rentacops were goners. We were all alive. A quick medical once over convinced us neither Glyph nor Ki-rinn was about to shuffle off of the mortal coil and we discovered that the devious swine Glyph had somehow managed to lay her hands on the Orichalcum Book during her attempted escape. We knew it wouldn’t be long before Lone Star, a Red Samurai FRT or more of Book’s friends came running. Ash, Mario and I carried Glyph, Frosty and Book downstairs double time and blazed. We’re en route back to San Fran now and you better believe I gave Las Vegas a big old bird as we crossed the border and left the dusty hell hole behind. It’s a shame Mario lives there. I liked him – he proved to be a good man in a pinch and we swapped numbers after it all, but I don’t imagine I’ll be too keen to visit!
Mood: Bone weary. I needs my sleep, but not until we hit SF!
Ends: 4/4>
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Call Dir: Shadownet/ShadowlandsBBS/>
Select Region: Region=SanFrancisco>
Call SubDir: SanFrancisco/WeBlogs>
Select Blog: Author=V.Six>
Initializing…>
Entry 31: 28.10.70>
Man, do I fucking hate Las Vegas. Seems we can guaran-damn-tee that everything’s gonna go belly up the minute we hit town. Maybe it’s cursed.
Maybe it just hates us because we never go to gamble? I dunno, but if I never see Vegas again, it’ll be too soon. Wish we’d never ended up back there…
Few days ago, we got a call from Mal asking us to drop by his surgery.
Understandably for a guy who spends his working days elbow deep in gore, Mal doesn’t scare easily but he sounded spooked. We smelt trouble but Mal was safe and he told us he had a job for us. By way of background he started to tell us a ripping yarn and revealed that he had some close links with our old nemesis the Juggler and the Notable Anarchists. We knew Mal had street docced for them but the story he told us now made him an integral part of the team – a team which had an almighty boner for screwing over Cross Applied Technology.
The way Mal told it, Juggler had tipped them off to Dominic Cross’
acquisition of an Orichalcum book that could be used to summon the Sheddim – the goofy spirit that had Essence-raped Ash and I and left us bleeding out our auras into Astral Space. The NA had decided to spoke Cross’ wheel and raid his offices for the book and had togged up as commercial cleaners for a covert insertion before their contact on perimeter security had decided to boost his pension prospects by turning them over to the boss mid-op. They were screwed but pressing on and succeeding was going to be no more dangerous than bailing out so they forged on and you’ve gotta admire their balls.
In the middle of the tale, the door opens and the tea boy waltzes in – only this tea boy is the fucking Juggler. He’s carrying nothing more offensive than a double espresso though and Mal points out that Cross had originally employed us to stop Juggler’s attacks yet ironically we had ended up attacking Cross ourselves. We’d gone Poacher turned Gamekeeper and had been fighting the Juggler’s war for him ever since! Mal had a point, the enemy of my enemy is my friend so we all sat down with a brew and Juggler took up the tale.
The team mage, named Book, had done an Astral scout and located the Orichalcum book but it was being protected by a spirit of some kind. In real space the team had battled their way through to Cross’ private apartments and found the man coughing up blood, his eyes blackened and burnt, lying not far from the physical book itself. Seems the team finished the job and iced Cross (there’s a lot of that going around lately) but then couldn’t decide what to do about the Orichalcum Book. Their mage believed the spirit seemed keen for them to take it but they were worried about getting mixed up in things they didn’t understand. In the end, they seemed to think the Wizboy could protect himself against spiritual influence and had taken the book until they could destroy it. Bad move. Book the mage seemed to have gone screwy and was now officially AWOL with the Orichalcum Book. Juggler wanted both back and Mal was the go-between offering us 50k for our services.
Now this, this was a head fuck. I know that in real life nothing is black and white and it’s all just shades of grey, but this was totally blurring the lines between friend and foe, right and wrong. Time was when I would have shot the Juggler for less than 50k and the thought of us all trailing off after this Mage and a book that could potentially push us all over the edge into mad servitude to the Sheddim was far from appealing.
Continues: 1/4>
|| >
However, Juggler sweetened the deal with the promise of further info on the whereabouts of Ash’ brother and also said he had been told that the Orichalcum Book could be used to banish Allisom. Helping find Blake, giving the Sheddim the Bird, shafting Cross and plugging my sucking aura wound all added up to an interesting answer to the question – what the frag’s in this for me? We shook on the deal and started swapping info – Juggler had been totally frozen out of Book’s life but we’d had tabs on the man twice in recent runs. He’d been hanging out with Dr Manton Ford poisoning the Caribou sports drink and we’d been on his trail in Vegas before Ash and I were busted…
Ford was the weaker link and we we’re all set to hit research mode. A bad Burrito I’d picked up at Deano’s Diner intervened however and laid me up a while. As I lay dying in my bed, the rest of the team quickly established that Ford had fled town. Don’t ask me where Ash got the info – I’ve realised just lately that it’s better for me not to query his dubious contacts – but he found out a crack squad of Cross’ Console Soldiers called Seraphim had spirited the good doctor away and deposited him with a Barrens’ street gang called the Whites. The way I understand it, the Whites traded their info in a deal that required Glyph to go gung-ho on their local rivals. Maybe the Whites get off on ladies fighting? Whatever, the deal went down and the gang handed over a business card for a Johnson who had picked Manton Ford up in a chopper.
Johnson turned out to be a Lone Star Facilitator – a can do man who made things happen. I was back on point by this stage and Croner filled in the blanks for me. We met up with the guy and he was happy to talk about his brief stint working for Cross. He had made Manton Ford disappear and replaced him with John Austin, an executive for TecTonic who lived in Nixon.
We well-remembered Nixon and particularly the CAT facility at Pyramid Lake where we had swamped the technology being used to produce clones of Dominic Cross in dozens of feet of dirty lake water. It didn’t take too long to put two and two together and sure enough CAT were trying to rebuild the facility and Ford was slap bang in the middle of it. Surveillance went badly when my FlySpy was spotted by an eagle eyed brickie and we decided we had to move fast before we were thoroughly rumbled. We assaulted the facility as stealthily as possible but the alarm had already been sounded and before we knew it, a chopper was dropping a Seraphim Elite FRT on our heads.
The fire fight was intense and brutal. We weren’t equipped for heavy combat while Seraphim were togged up in military gear, but even their Elite were just console soldiers when you got right down to it and we had faced them before and knew how to defeat them. Ash and Drifter hit the deck and needed resuscitation and then, just as we were ready to Cas Evac Ford and high tail it before Seraphim reinforcements arrive, Ash goes totally postal, sobbing over the console soldiers’ corpses and tearing their helmets off. Only afterwards do I realise that he’s worried Blake has been drafted into the elite…
Ford sang like a canary. I get the impression the team’s ‘innovative’
interrogation techniques were more than he knew how to handle. I think Ki-rinn threatened to ram his teeth down his throat, Glyph let him drool on her cleavage and Ash just sobbed about the loss of his brother. I don’t do interrogation so I kept well clear. Props to the guys though, whichever method it was that worked, it got results and we were soon off to Vegas, back to the Volcano Club – scene of our last sighting of Book and my ignominious beating at the hands of a Lone Star patrol trooper.
Ki-rinn quickly established that if Book was inside, he was with the movers and shakers on the high rollers tables. I deployed drone observations while Frosty and Glyph tarted themselves up. They would play a young, flush couple splashing the cash inside while I kept tabs on them and Ash played fire support. I’d managed to pinpoint Book’s motor in the car park so we were confident he couldn’t easily give us the slip.
Continues: 2/4>
|| >
Ki-rinn and Glyph demonstrated a remarkable skill for wasting their money on bad bets. They played the ‘easy mark’ nicely and had obviously soon caught the attention of someone in the casino who wanted to strip their credsticks bare. They were escorted into the private elevator and whisked up to the private card tables. Shame Ki-rinn wasn’t quite so good at placing surveillance devices inconspicuously. My IBall Drone had been rumbled straight away so we were effectively blind. A tense half hour ticked by until Frosty dropped the dime in the callbox and tipped us off to the fact that he was sitting opposite Book. He and Glyph had been forced to go in unarmed and there were guards on the high stakes floor so Ki-rinn needed a rapid distraction before he lost the shirt off of his back.
Ash grabbed K’s sniper rifle and moved into position as our poker playing duo painted the guards by Smartlink. I held my breath as Ash took the shot – he was shooting high, through at least one wall and into an unseen foe… It was impossible to work out what was going on – the paints started to wheel around chaotically as a fight ensued. Ash was firing, reloading, moving and firing again, smashing shots through the wall. Worse, Glyph and Ki-rinn might have painted the enemies but we really didn’t know who was who or where our friends were. Each shot Ash fired could have hit Glyph or Ki-rinn or shattered the Mage’s skull like an over-ripe melon preventing us from ever finding out where he’d stashed the Orichalcum Book. We started losing paints. At first I wasn’t sure if they were ticking down confirmed kills but then so many of them flicked out at once we knew either Glyph or Ki-rinn was down. Ash was out of sniper rounds and helpless and then the rest of the paints disappeared. Both of our chummers were down, definitely shot up; at best unconscious and at worst dead and we had no way of working out which it was.
Ash and I sat in the van just looking blankly at each other. It seemed like hours but I guarantee it was just a matter of seconds. We didn’t know what had just happened to the other half of our team and going in to find out seemed like suicide. It didn’t take us long to decide to commit suicide though – what else could we do? Ki-rinn and Glyph had risked their lives to rescue us last time we were in Vegas. Looked like it was time to repay that debt. We at least knew Book was still inside, but it was a fair bet that he and the Red Samurai security in the joint would know that we were coming. We stealed ourselves for an assault. Frag Vegas.
I made a call to Nunzio and paid for a few Mafia goons to come and lend us their guns. Ash got hold of a shiny new rifle and we planned to go in hard and fast. My drones would lead the assault – parts come cheaper than lives – backed up by Ash who would lead in our hired heavies. The casino was emptied by Red Samurai and the disgruntled gamblers turfed out into the pre-dawn gloom told us we were expected.
I opened the batting by sticking the drone van through the casino’s front windows, laying down covering fire from the HMG as I deployed the drones and as the meat made its way in. The ground floor was open plan and Red Samurai didn’t stand a chance – we were clear and making a move on the first floor.
Trouble was, Red Samurai now had the edge. They knew where we would be coming up and had the escalators covered. Until those escalators were working again, the drones were effectively useless – unable to reach the next floor. It meant the meat had to go in first and take the brunt of the enemy fire and they suffered. By the time I had drones in support, we were men down and limited on medical supplies. One of the Mafia goons, Mario I think, got Ash back on his feet with a nano-medkit and the extra automatic fire from the drones helped tip the tide in our favour.
On the second floor, a nasty surprise in the form of twin-linked sentry guns awaited us but I know what I’m doing when it comes to confusing sensors. A grenade brought down debris from the ceiling tiles to confuse the targeting computer while the drones zipped in. By the time the drones had been acquired, Ash was able to pop up from the stairwell and finish the job properly with no casualties.
Continues: 3/4>
|| >
The sentry guns were covering the glass elevator to the High Rollers floor and we again realised anyone using the lift was making themselves a sitting duck. Sending the drones first was an easy compromise so I patched Ash in on the camera feed and we sent them up. I flattened the Steel Lynx down on the elevator floor and that gave us an edge of surprise over the Red Samurai who were expecting man-sized targets. The cameras revealed a private bar that looked a dead match for the room Ki-rinn and Glyph had described. Six guards were dotted around the place and amongst them was the Mage from the Notable Anarchists, Book.
I popped the Steel Lynx up and started firing through the glass as targets presented themselves. Book threw himself over the bar to take shelter from a volley from the Doberman and on the other side of the room I saw another set of elevator doors open and vomit out Glyph, guns blazing. She was alive! And now we were rocking! Attacked unexpectedly from two different directions, we had Red Samurai on the run and the glass elevator began to descend again to collect Ash and Mario.
My exultation was short lived. Book has a couple of mage tricks up his sleeve and reduced the Doberman to smoking metal with a stream of acid out of the end of his fragging fingertip and then the Steel Lynx ran out of ammo. I saw Glyph go down in a hail of gunfire and my only option was now to run distraction. The Lynx drew the guards fire while Ash piled into the lift, before a couple of grenades blew it right off of its legs.
I was blind. A little dump shocked and completely fragged for intel – all I had was an occasional burst of gunfire relayed to me over the comm. I was out of combat-effective drones too. My one consolation was that the grenades used on the Lynx hadn’t gone Ash’ way but it was small beer compared to the creeping realisation I’d have to go against everything I’ve learnt lately and put my carcass on the line in a firefight against Red Samurai with nothing but my Ares Pred. What else could I do? Three of my friends’ lives and the success of the Run could hang on whether or not I was there to put a bullet in one of the fraggers. I ditched the van and ran for the escalators.
By the time I got to the top floor, things had gone from bad to worse. I could see the bodies of Glyph, Ash and Ki-rinn scattered about the room and it was only our Hired Help Mario who was preventing MDK. Almost whooped with joy to see him knelt over Ash, spraying suppressing fire from an AK in Book’s direction while he stuck the nano-medkit into my boy. Ash eyes cracked open and I could see he was able to fight on. With Mario keeping Book’s head down, Ash and I flanked the fragger. As Ash wheeled around one end of the bar, Book turned in that direction, no doubt with some vicious spell in mind. I rose on his blind side, opening my flick baton and clubbing him over the back of the head as Ash pulled the trigger and thumped a Stick Shock round into his grid.
Book was out for the count. His Rentacops were goners. We were all alive. A quick medical once over convinced us neither Glyph nor Ki-rinn was about to shuffle off of the mortal coil and we discovered that the devious swine Glyph had somehow managed to lay her hands on the Orichalcum Book during her attempted escape. We knew it wouldn’t be long before Lone Star, a Red Samurai FRT or more of Book’s friends came running. Ash, Mario and I carried Glyph, Frosty and Book downstairs double time and blazed. We’re en route back to San Fran now and you better believe I gave Las Vegas a big old bird as we crossed the border and left the dusty hell hole behind. It’s a shame Mario lives there. I liked him – he proved to be a good man in a pinch and we swapped numbers after it all, but I don’t imagine I’ll be too keen to visit!
Mood: Bone weary. I needs my sleep, but not until we hit SF!
Ends: 4/4>
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Thursday, May 17, 2007
Rescue from the Volcano Casino
Six, Glyph, Ash
Friday 27th October 2070
The runners were in Las Vegas trying to find and capture a Mage who had gone AWOL with an orachachum book. Glyph and Ki-Rin had found him in a casino and had played a round of cards before trying to take him down. Glyph and Ki-Rin were out gunned and were near killed and were taken captive. Six and Ash, powerless to do anything initially, decided to stage a daring rescue attempt.
Six phoned his brother, the mafia man, and arranged for 5 mafia goons to come down and help out lay down some bullets and maybe draw some fire. Meanwhile Ash contacted Snow and arranged a weapon upgrade complete with under-slung grenade launcher.
Glyph came round, seemingly in Book’s private quarters, Ki-Rin unconscious in the room with her. She heard the mage talking on the phone outside the room, clearly making preparations for some kind of robust defence of the building. Eventually he left leaving a couple of guards watching over the captured runners.
Glyph seemed to be in Books bedroom, and after checking that Ki-Rin was alive she sought around to try and fashion some kind of improvised weapon.
At about 6 in the morning the Volcano casino emptied rapidly. Although early, Casinos never completely emptied but over the course of an hour every guest was ushered out of the building. Ash and Six had the feeling that someone was onto them. Six’s mafia goon squad turned up, and not long after, a Ork fixer known to Snow called Baz turned up with Ash’s bullets and grenades. The plan was simple, Six was going to drive his drone van, in through the plate glass lobby and lay waste to the pop up targets. After that point they would pick their way through the building killing anyone who would be a threat until they found Glyph and Ki-Rin.
Six rolled and exiting the road at speed, ploughed through the glazing of the casino. The mounted gun began taking out the guards who were in the lobby area while Ash the mafia goons and the drones deployed. The ground floor was relatively easy considering, and while Six sat in the comfort of the van controlling the drones, Ash and the Mafia made their way up the escalators.
Glyph had managed to fashion some kind of electric prod, out of a bedside lamp, a pole from a wardrobe, a length of ripped cloth and 3 metres of flex, and then began to try and lure the guards into the room. Eventually one of them stupidly opened the door and was electrocuted when Glyph jabbed the home made lightsabre into his ribs. She quickly dropped the second guard with the first guards weapons.
At the top of the escalators Ash and the mafia goons were coming under heavy fire. The Red Samurai guards had prepared a killing zone and despite Ash delivering a grenade to the minigun nest, three mafia goons had been cut down, and Ash was lying unconscious on the floor before the drones reached the top of the escalator and were able to come into play. The Steel Lynx was devastating though and the Red Samurai were quickly dealt with. Ash was brought back round and they moved onward to the next floor.
Glyph had checked around the apartment and had found a chair that seemed to be used by the mage. An orachalchum chippy lead had been strung through the eye sockets of five skulls and linked into an old Fairlight Excalibur. She had no idea what it was for but took the cyberdeck so that Ki-Rin could have a look at the data once he was up and well again. She then took the unconscious decker across to the lift to make their way down.
The next floor for Ash, the Mafia goons and Six’s drones had been cleared back of all furniture and two static mounted pintle gun drones, these locked onto and tracked the team making their way in and opened fire. The team kept their heads down while Six’s drones went in to distract these gun turretsbefore Ash finished them off with some well aimed bursts of armour piercing bullets.
They moved across to the single glass lift, and decided to send up the drones first. They sat in the lift and made their way up to the room where the card game went wrong for Ki-Rin. The drones sensors scanned the room and detected amongst the 6 guards, Book was in their. The Steel Lynx and the Doberman drones began to take down targets.
Glyph and Ki-Rin descended into the same room from a different lift. And as the doors opened Glyph let rip with the guns she had liberated. Book wasn’t getting taken without a fight and fired an acid stream at the Doberman which fizzed before popping. The Steel Lynx took down as many guards in the room as possible before running out of ammo. Ash summoned the lift and the last thing Six saw through the drones cameras was Glyph getting dropped by another magical stream of acid. Two grenades dropped into the lift with the Steel Lynx, and that drone was reduced to twisted metal.
Six was now out of contact with everything that was going on, and after a brief mental debate hopped out of the van and decided to dash up the stairs to help out.
Ash and the remaining mafia goon called Mario (the one with the big shoes and the AK97) made it to the top floor and were instantly under attack by the mage, Ash instructed Mario to use the medkit on the unconscious Glyph and then was also hit by one of Books acid stream spells which dropped Ash. The mafia goon was able to keep Books head down long enough with suppressing fire to administer more first aid to Ash, and long enough for Six to arrive. Ash and Six moved round either side of the bar Book was using for cover and shot him with stick shock rounds and whacked him on the head.
Ash, Six, and Mario then had to haul the unconcious Ki-Rin, Glyph and Book down three stories and back into the van. After thanking Mario for his efforts and an exchange of phone numbers Six blazed from the wreckage of the casino lobby and headed back to San Francisco to hand Book over to the Juggler.
Friday 27th October 2070
The runners were in Las Vegas trying to find and capture a Mage who had gone AWOL with an orachachum book. Glyph and Ki-Rin had found him in a casino and had played a round of cards before trying to take him down. Glyph and Ki-Rin were out gunned and were near killed and were taken captive. Six and Ash, powerless to do anything initially, decided to stage a daring rescue attempt.
Six phoned his brother, the mafia man, and arranged for 5 mafia goons to come down and help out lay down some bullets and maybe draw some fire. Meanwhile Ash contacted Snow and arranged a weapon upgrade complete with under-slung grenade launcher.
Glyph came round, seemingly in Book’s private quarters, Ki-Rin unconscious in the room with her. She heard the mage talking on the phone outside the room, clearly making preparations for some kind of robust defence of the building. Eventually he left leaving a couple of guards watching over the captured runners.
Glyph seemed to be in Books bedroom, and after checking that Ki-Rin was alive she sought around to try and fashion some kind of improvised weapon.
At about 6 in the morning the Volcano casino emptied rapidly. Although early, Casinos never completely emptied but over the course of an hour every guest was ushered out of the building. Ash and Six had the feeling that someone was onto them. Six’s mafia goon squad turned up, and not long after, a Ork fixer known to Snow called Baz turned up with Ash’s bullets and grenades. The plan was simple, Six was going to drive his drone van, in through the plate glass lobby and lay waste to the pop up targets. After that point they would pick their way through the building killing anyone who would be a threat until they found Glyph and Ki-Rin.
Six rolled and exiting the road at speed, ploughed through the glazing of the casino. The mounted gun began taking out the guards who were in the lobby area while Ash the mafia goons and the drones deployed. The ground floor was relatively easy considering, and while Six sat in the comfort of the van controlling the drones, Ash and the Mafia made their way up the escalators.
Glyph had managed to fashion some kind of electric prod, out of a bedside lamp, a pole from a wardrobe, a length of ripped cloth and 3 metres of flex, and then began to try and lure the guards into the room. Eventually one of them stupidly opened the door and was electrocuted when Glyph jabbed the home made lightsabre into his ribs. She quickly dropped the second guard with the first guards weapons.
At the top of the escalators Ash and the mafia goons were coming under heavy fire. The Red Samurai guards had prepared a killing zone and despite Ash delivering a grenade to the minigun nest, three mafia goons had been cut down, and Ash was lying unconscious on the floor before the drones reached the top of the escalator and were able to come into play. The Steel Lynx was devastating though and the Red Samurai were quickly dealt with. Ash was brought back round and they moved onward to the next floor.
Glyph had checked around the apartment and had found a chair that seemed to be used by the mage. An orachalchum chippy lead had been strung through the eye sockets of five skulls and linked into an old Fairlight Excalibur. She had no idea what it was for but took the cyberdeck so that Ki-Rin could have a look at the data once he was up and well again. She then took the unconscious decker across to the lift to make their way down.
The next floor for Ash, the Mafia goons and Six’s drones had been cleared back of all furniture and two static mounted pintle gun drones, these locked onto and tracked the team making their way in and opened fire. The team kept their heads down while Six’s drones went in to distract these gun turretsbefore Ash finished them off with some well aimed bursts of armour piercing bullets.
They moved across to the single glass lift, and decided to send up the drones first. They sat in the lift and made their way up to the room where the card game went wrong for Ki-Rin. The drones sensors scanned the room and detected amongst the 6 guards, Book was in their. The Steel Lynx and the Doberman drones began to take down targets.
Glyph and Ki-Rin descended into the same room from a different lift. And as the doors opened Glyph let rip with the guns she had liberated. Book wasn’t getting taken without a fight and fired an acid stream at the Doberman which fizzed before popping. The Steel Lynx took down as many guards in the room as possible before running out of ammo. Ash summoned the lift and the last thing Six saw through the drones cameras was Glyph getting dropped by another magical stream of acid. Two grenades dropped into the lift with the Steel Lynx, and that drone was reduced to twisted metal.
Six was now out of contact with everything that was going on, and after a brief mental debate hopped out of the van and decided to dash up the stairs to help out.
Ash and the remaining mafia goon called Mario (the one with the big shoes and the AK97) made it to the top floor and were instantly under attack by the mage, Ash instructed Mario to use the medkit on the unconscious Glyph and then was also hit by one of Books acid stream spells which dropped Ash. The mafia goon was able to keep Books head down long enough with suppressing fire to administer more first aid to Ash, and long enough for Six to arrive. Ash and Six moved round either side of the bar Book was using for cover and shot him with stick shock rounds and whacked him on the head.
Ash, Six, and Mario then had to haul the unconcious Ki-Rin, Glyph and Book down three stories and back into the van. After thanking Mario for his efforts and an exchange of phone numbers Six blazed from the wreckage of the casino lobby and headed back to San Francisco to hand Book over to the Juggler.
Thursday, May 10, 2007
The Mage in the Volcano.
Thursday 26 October 2070
Glyph, Six, Ki-Rin, Ash.
The runners drove away from the facility with an injured and unconscious Manton Ford. They drove to a secluded spot on the highway and parked up. Six had a bit of a heart to heart with Ash while Ki-Rin and Glyph questioned Manton Ford.
The questioning was light and friendly, an approach Ford hadn’t steeled himself for, and he found himself opening up to the runners, hinting at his fear of Dominic Cross. He gave the runners a phone number for Book and after Ash joined in the questioning gave them the number for Dominic Cross as well.
Ki-Rin ran a trace on Books number while Six made a phoney call, and they pin[pointed his location to the Volcano Club. They suspected he was going to be there, but now they were sure. Six and Ki-Rin went onto the Volcano Club in Las Vegas, while Ash Glyph and Drifter went back to San Francisco to palm off Manton Ford onto The Juggler and to seek medical attention.
Six and Ki-Rin pressed onto Las Vegas, and after setting themselves up in the Volcano car park, set about surveillance. Six deployed drones for visual obs, while Ki-Rin picked up a tux and headed into the casino to see what he could see. After about an hour, and after loosing one of Six’s drones Ki-Rin came out and retired back to the van with the knowledge of the rough layout, the security measures laid on by Red Samurai and that there was a high rollers table on the 3rd floor of the building. The pair settled down and waited for Ash and Glyph to catch up.
Friday 27th October 2070 02:00
Ash and Glyph caught up with the others at about two in the morning, they caught up on what had transpired so far, and they came up with a bit of a plan, Glyph and Ki-Rin would go in to see if they could get up to the high roller table to see if their quarry, Book, was up there. Six and Ash were to remain outside as a fast response.
Ki-Rin started splashing the cash at the tables, and eventually his keenness to loose his money was noticed by someone. He was approached by a bouncer who told him that he could make his way upstairs with a 50k buy in. Ki-Rin accepted and then had to pool the teams money to be able to afford the buy in.
Heading upstairs, Ki-Rin was introduced to Book and his four gambling mates. Glyph joined them at the table, and watched in horror as over the course of half a dozen hands Ki-Rin lost a good chunk of the money. Ki-Rin himself readily admitted that he was no card shark, and he knew soon enough that he was going to loose the lot, he was in on the last hand an knew he would be out, he got on the phone and called Six and Ash to tell them that they had Book in their sight but needed a distraction.
Ki-Rin painted up the targets with the smartlink, and seeing this, Ash took Ki-Rin’s sniper cannon and found himself a sneaky place to shoot from. He was shooting at range, through the external concrete structure at an unseen target marked out only by the smartlink system, he had two armour defeating high velocity anti materiel shells left, and two guards near the lift to take out.
Ki-Rin was shaking the hands of the card players when Ash took the shoot. It punched through the wall but a lot of the potency had been taken out by the exterior cladding only winging the guard. He kicked up a stink all the same, and guns appeared in the hands of his colleagues and one of the card players had come in with a six shooter too. Ki-Rin went over to the guards all pally-pally asking what was going on before snatching the gun of the guard who was shot.
Glyph saw what was going on, and was going to take out Book, but instead went for the card shark with the six shooter. A mistake, as bullets flew, he attacked magically, dropping first Ki-Rin and then Glyph bringing them to the very brink of death.
Ash and Six were helpless, loosing the smartlink feed from one, then the other. They knew it had gone badly, and didn’t even know if they had survived. They sat outside, and thought, and were unable to do anything. They watched, and hoped that they would be dragged out by security, or that lone star would turn up and collect the body bags, or their friends would get a message to them but there was nothing.
It was Six in the morning, the sun was just coming up, and then they decided to go in. Six made a phone call while Ash checked the trunk of Glyph’s car to see what they had in the way of ammunition.
Glyph, Six, Ki-Rin, Ash.
The runners drove away from the facility with an injured and unconscious Manton Ford. They drove to a secluded spot on the highway and parked up. Six had a bit of a heart to heart with Ash while Ki-Rin and Glyph questioned Manton Ford.
The questioning was light and friendly, an approach Ford hadn’t steeled himself for, and he found himself opening up to the runners, hinting at his fear of Dominic Cross. He gave the runners a phone number for Book and after Ash joined in the questioning gave them the number for Dominic Cross as well.
Ki-Rin ran a trace on Books number while Six made a phoney call, and they pin[pointed his location to the Volcano Club. They suspected he was going to be there, but now they were sure. Six and Ki-Rin went onto the Volcano Club in Las Vegas, while Ash Glyph and Drifter went back to San Francisco to palm off Manton Ford onto The Juggler and to seek medical attention.
Six and Ki-Rin pressed onto Las Vegas, and after setting themselves up in the Volcano car park, set about surveillance. Six deployed drones for visual obs, while Ki-Rin picked up a tux and headed into the casino to see what he could see. After about an hour, and after loosing one of Six’s drones Ki-Rin came out and retired back to the van with the knowledge of the rough layout, the security measures laid on by Red Samurai and that there was a high rollers table on the 3rd floor of the building. The pair settled down and waited for Ash and Glyph to catch up.
Friday 27th October 2070 02:00
Ash and Glyph caught up with the others at about two in the morning, they caught up on what had transpired so far, and they came up with a bit of a plan, Glyph and Ki-Rin would go in to see if they could get up to the high roller table to see if their quarry, Book, was up there. Six and Ash were to remain outside as a fast response.
Ki-Rin started splashing the cash at the tables, and eventually his keenness to loose his money was noticed by someone. He was approached by a bouncer who told him that he could make his way upstairs with a 50k buy in. Ki-Rin accepted and then had to pool the teams money to be able to afford the buy in.
Heading upstairs, Ki-Rin was introduced to Book and his four gambling mates. Glyph joined them at the table, and watched in horror as over the course of half a dozen hands Ki-Rin lost a good chunk of the money. Ki-Rin himself readily admitted that he was no card shark, and he knew soon enough that he was going to loose the lot, he was in on the last hand an knew he would be out, he got on the phone and called Six and Ash to tell them that they had Book in their sight but needed a distraction.
Ki-Rin painted up the targets with the smartlink, and seeing this, Ash took Ki-Rin’s sniper cannon and found himself a sneaky place to shoot from. He was shooting at range, through the external concrete structure at an unseen target marked out only by the smartlink system, he had two armour defeating high velocity anti materiel shells left, and two guards near the lift to take out.
Ki-Rin was shaking the hands of the card players when Ash took the shoot. It punched through the wall but a lot of the potency had been taken out by the exterior cladding only winging the guard. He kicked up a stink all the same, and guns appeared in the hands of his colleagues and one of the card players had come in with a six shooter too. Ki-Rin went over to the guards all pally-pally asking what was going on before snatching the gun of the guard who was shot.
Glyph saw what was going on, and was going to take out Book, but instead went for the card shark with the six shooter. A mistake, as bullets flew, he attacked magically, dropping first Ki-Rin and then Glyph bringing them to the very brink of death.
Ash and Six were helpless, loosing the smartlink feed from one, then the other. They knew it had gone badly, and didn’t even know if they had survived. They sat outside, and thought, and were unable to do anything. They watched, and hoped that they would be dragged out by security, or that lone star would turn up and collect the body bags, or their friends would get a message to them but there was nothing.
It was Six in the morning, the sun was just coming up, and then they decided to go in. Six made a phone call while Ash checked the trunk of Glyph’s car to see what they had in the way of ammunition.
Thursday, April 26, 2007
Back to the Facilty. Looking for Ford.
Thursday 26th October 2070
Glyph, Ki-Rin, Six, Ash, Drifter
Glyph, Ki-Rin and Ash returned from the barrens with the business card that they had acquired from the gang called the Whites. Six was back up and well, and had met Drifter who was back in town looking for work. The team all met back up and discussed their options.
Ki-Rin was the first to do some legwork in the matrix. He tracked down the number for the Mr. Johnson and hacked into his comlink. He had some security but Ki-Rin bypassed that with ease and was able to have a sniff round. The Mr. Johnson was a Lone Star Facilitator, whatever that meant, and he had files on hundreds of people including Dr. Ford. The data itself was deleted though. Six contacted Croner, his Lone Star contact and found out that a Facilitator was the Lone Star equivalent of the Company man. He arranged for things that the normal bobby on the beat can’t do.
They decided after some debate to arrange for a meeting with this Johnson, and Drifter was going to make the meet as he hadn’t been seen by anyone involved in this shadowrun and was the least likely to trigger suspicions.
The team decamped to the Bowlarama and Ice rink complex, and set themselves up in various locations within eavesdropping distance of Drifter. The Johnson arrived and quickly deduced who it was he needed to meet. After introductions they asked him about Dr. Manton Ford, and after a fee was negotiated, he told them that he was solely responsible for Dr. Ford’s disappearance. He worked for Cross before he moved across to Lone Star, and while there was instructed to extract Ford and move him to Nixon by someone higher up in Cross Applied Technologies. Ford’s life was being threatened and Johnson’s job was to make him disappear. After scrubbing his identity and hiding him out in the barrens for a few days, Dr. Manton Ford became John Austin, resident of Nixon, and employee of Tectonic Industries.
The runners had been to Nixon before when they had launched the attack on the underwater facility at Pyramid lake. The team kitted up and set off.
Arriving late into the afternoon the runners headed directly round to the home address given to them for Manton Ford, and after a bit of surveillance Ki-Rin and Ash went in with some smooth talking and good hacking they were inside the flat without a problem. It was an off the peg residence with standard fixtures and fittings and barely any personal touches. They did find a smashed up comlink and after traling through the damaged memory they found that Ford was receiving instructions from Dominic [assumed to be Dominic Cross] and his demands appeared to be driving Ford to acts of frustration, including the smashed comlink. Ki-Rin scanned the airwaves for any other signals in the building and found that there was a camera that was fixed in the lighting. Not part of the building security and the team suspected that it was there to keep an eye on Ford. There was nothing that they could do about the signals that had already been broadcast, but Ki-Rin recovered the hard memory and watched back the moments that led Ford to smash his comlink and then leave the apartment the following morning.
The runners feared that he had become spooked by Dominic’s demands and did a search on his credit trail and car. They were surprised and pleased to discover that he hadn’t fled as first thought and was in fact smack bang back at the facility that they had bombed not so long ago.
It was about now that the Juggler informed Ash that his brother, Blake, had been drafted into Cross Applied Technologies mini army, called Seraphim. Ash took the information on board but could do nothing about it at the time.
The team headed off to have another look, and after parking up in the same place that they did last time out and walking the trail that they did they looked down onto a building site. A lot of the pre-fab buildings had gone, and some kind of bio-dome was being erected over the whole site. There were dive teams working the lake, and there was a good deal of construction activity all over the place.
Ki-Rin cracked out his sniper cannon and started scoping the site. He picked out their mark, Ford, inside a building talking to a site foreman, and while Glyph tumbled her way into a better position, Six dispatched the flyspy.
The flyspy made it’s way in and using a circuitous route crawled it’s way onto Ford’s jacket, but the keen eyed foreman spotted it and swatted it thinking it to be a biting bug. When they saw that the insect was actually a small drone, Ford got onto the phone. The runners knew the game was up and moved. Ki-Rin handed over the sniper cannon to Glyph and led the walking charge down toward the compound with Ash and Drifter in tow. Six remote controlled the trio of vehicles to the site and ran to meet up with them.
Entering the site wasn’t too hard, the civilian contractors fell under Ki-Rin’s stick-shock rounds and the trio made their way quickly toward the building where Ford was. A helicopter thundered overhead, a rapid response troop transporter flew low. Glyph started shooting at it but didn’t have enough time to bring down the chopper before it was able to unload its cargo of six heavily armoured soldiers. A squad of Seraphim troopers.
They moved quickly and began shooting up the team who had made their way inside the building and had dropped Manton Ford. Bullets flew and the runners found themselves fighting a desperate battle with Glyph firing armour piercing shot after another, even these shots were being mostly deflected by their armour. Ash and Drifter were taken down, and only with the aid of their team did they survive.
After the smoke had cleared and the team had survived did what had transpired dawn on Ash, who frantically checked the bodies of the Seraphim soldiers to see of they were his brother. None were, but this didn’t stop the rush of emotion which took over Ash.
The others were out of there, with an unconscious Ford and Six knew that now was not the time for Ash to be soul searching, he picked him up and bundled him into his car and the team left the scene.
Glyph, Ki-Rin, Six, Ash, Drifter
Glyph, Ki-Rin and Ash returned from the barrens with the business card that they had acquired from the gang called the Whites. Six was back up and well, and had met Drifter who was back in town looking for work. The team all met back up and discussed their options.
Ki-Rin was the first to do some legwork in the matrix. He tracked down the number for the Mr. Johnson and hacked into his comlink. He had some security but Ki-Rin bypassed that with ease and was able to have a sniff round. The Mr. Johnson was a Lone Star Facilitator, whatever that meant, and he had files on hundreds of people including Dr. Ford. The data itself was deleted though. Six contacted Croner, his Lone Star contact and found out that a Facilitator was the Lone Star equivalent of the Company man. He arranged for things that the normal bobby on the beat can’t do.
They decided after some debate to arrange for a meeting with this Johnson, and Drifter was going to make the meet as he hadn’t been seen by anyone involved in this shadowrun and was the least likely to trigger suspicions.
The team decamped to the Bowlarama and Ice rink complex, and set themselves up in various locations within eavesdropping distance of Drifter. The Johnson arrived and quickly deduced who it was he needed to meet. After introductions they asked him about Dr. Manton Ford, and after a fee was negotiated, he told them that he was solely responsible for Dr. Ford’s disappearance. He worked for Cross before he moved across to Lone Star, and while there was instructed to extract Ford and move him to Nixon by someone higher up in Cross Applied Technologies. Ford’s life was being threatened and Johnson’s job was to make him disappear. After scrubbing his identity and hiding him out in the barrens for a few days, Dr. Manton Ford became John Austin, resident of Nixon, and employee of Tectonic Industries.
The runners had been to Nixon before when they had launched the attack on the underwater facility at Pyramid lake. The team kitted up and set off.
Arriving late into the afternoon the runners headed directly round to the home address given to them for Manton Ford, and after a bit of surveillance Ki-Rin and Ash went in with some smooth talking and good hacking they were inside the flat without a problem. It was an off the peg residence with standard fixtures and fittings and barely any personal touches. They did find a smashed up comlink and after traling through the damaged memory they found that Ford was receiving instructions from Dominic [assumed to be Dominic Cross] and his demands appeared to be driving Ford to acts of frustration, including the smashed comlink. Ki-Rin scanned the airwaves for any other signals in the building and found that there was a camera that was fixed in the lighting. Not part of the building security and the team suspected that it was there to keep an eye on Ford. There was nothing that they could do about the signals that had already been broadcast, but Ki-Rin recovered the hard memory and watched back the moments that led Ford to smash his comlink and then leave the apartment the following morning.
The runners feared that he had become spooked by Dominic’s demands and did a search on his credit trail and car. They were surprised and pleased to discover that he hadn’t fled as first thought and was in fact smack bang back at the facility that they had bombed not so long ago.
It was about now that the Juggler informed Ash that his brother, Blake, had been drafted into Cross Applied Technologies mini army, called Seraphim. Ash took the information on board but could do nothing about it at the time.
The team headed off to have another look, and after parking up in the same place that they did last time out and walking the trail that they did they looked down onto a building site. A lot of the pre-fab buildings had gone, and some kind of bio-dome was being erected over the whole site. There were dive teams working the lake, and there was a good deal of construction activity all over the place.
Ki-Rin cracked out his sniper cannon and started scoping the site. He picked out their mark, Ford, inside a building talking to a site foreman, and while Glyph tumbled her way into a better position, Six dispatched the flyspy.
The flyspy made it’s way in and using a circuitous route crawled it’s way onto Ford’s jacket, but the keen eyed foreman spotted it and swatted it thinking it to be a biting bug. When they saw that the insect was actually a small drone, Ford got onto the phone. The runners knew the game was up and moved. Ki-Rin handed over the sniper cannon to Glyph and led the walking charge down toward the compound with Ash and Drifter in tow. Six remote controlled the trio of vehicles to the site and ran to meet up with them.
Entering the site wasn’t too hard, the civilian contractors fell under Ki-Rin’s stick-shock rounds and the trio made their way quickly toward the building where Ford was. A helicopter thundered overhead, a rapid response troop transporter flew low. Glyph started shooting at it but didn’t have enough time to bring down the chopper before it was able to unload its cargo of six heavily armoured soldiers. A squad of Seraphim troopers.
They moved quickly and began shooting up the team who had made their way inside the building and had dropped Manton Ford. Bullets flew and the runners found themselves fighting a desperate battle with Glyph firing armour piercing shot after another, even these shots were being mostly deflected by their armour. Ash and Drifter were taken down, and only with the aid of their team did they survive.
After the smoke had cleared and the team had survived did what had transpired dawn on Ash, who frantically checked the bodies of the Seraphim soldiers to see of they were his brother. None were, but this didn’t stop the rush of emotion which took over Ash.
The others were out of there, with an unconscious Ford and Six knew that now was not the time for Ash to be soul searching, he picked him up and bundled him into his car and the team left the scene.
Thursday, April 19, 2007
The Pig in the Barrens
Wednesday 25th October 2070
Ki-Rin, Ash, Glyph.
The runners have been approached by The Juggler who has told them of his friend Book, who has taken into his possession an orachalcum book that had belonged to Dominic Cross and was in some way related to the Shedim, Allisom. The Juggler has since been informed that the book could be key to destroying Allisom and now wants the runners to help him find his friend and the book for the fee of 50k and the promise that the Juggler will do everything in his power to find Ash’s brother, Blake.
The runners had tangled with Book more recently that the Jugglers last sighting, and remembered that they had seen him headed for Las Vegas with an unidentified man in a cowboy hat. They had traced him to the Volcano, a club in Vegas. They had also seen Book at a party that had been held by Dr. Manton ford, a man that they were employed to terminate, but failed to do so.
It was nearly 3am by the time that they had pooled their information, but they were keen to make the move there and then and rushed round to the house where they had spied Manton Ford. Six was beginning to come down with some kind of flu that was making it hard for him to focus and he elected to stay in the van while the others went in.
They had spotted that security had been ramped up since the last time they were parked outside the doctors AAA mansion but Ki-Rin worked the security from the matrix, disabled the alarms, and looped the cameras to playback the previous night. They then headed over toward the front gate. A pair of security guards spotted them but did nothing as they were presently only loitering. They didn’t seem to care for the idle banter that the runners were offering, so Glyph opened fire on them, Ki-Rin dropped the second before Ash could even get his hand on his gun.
The trio stole into the property and made their way into the house. Ki-Rin mooched around downstairs and found a fridge full of beer. He helped himself and couldn’t help but think that Manton Ford didn’t seem the type to drink this much beer.
Ash and Glyph headed up stairs, and Ash made his way into the main bedroom, stick-shocking the pair in the bed. He then flicked the light on and drew back the covers to find a young couple now comatose. The man he recognised, an up and coming simsense musician called Johnny Rock.
The runners had a brief discussion before leaving. Ash convinced Ki-Rin to find out when the house had been sold and where ford had gone, and after a bit of a data search Ki-Rin found that Ford had stopped paying his rent from July 1st and had defaulted the house. Not only his household bills stopped being paid, everything, his SIN trace, transactions, his comlink activity, all had stopped on the 1st of July. The runners retired for the night planning on heading out to Las Vegas the following morning.
Six’s fever got progressively worse, and by the morning he was in no state to do anything but lie in bed.
Thursday 26th October 2070
Ash got a mysterious message left on his comlink advising him that if he was to find Dr. Ford, then it might be worth talking to Sergeant Buck at the NRA shooting range in downtown. The team met at Ki-Rin’s before heading off to the range.
The team went through a few checks at the range before they were let in, and they met up with Sergeant Buck, a shooting instructor. They asked about Dr. Ford, and after some money changed hands, Buck told them that he used to be part of a Cross Applied Technologies elite guard called Seraphim, he quit when the Corporation began to fall apart and his squad was being bolstered with “console kids” who had only done simulator missions. But the last mission he had done before he left involved Dr. Manton Ford. For some reason Cross (or whoever his employer was that day) wanted him extracting for his own safety, and then have him delivered out to the barrens where he was to be handed over to a street gang called the Whites. He gave the runners the coordinates and told them that the gang leader was called Silence. The runners chatted for a bit longer, and one ex-forces man to another Ki-Rin made a new contact.
The team decided to head out. Ki-Rin bought a third hand scrambler bike, and then joined Ash and Glyph on the rat bike that they had acquired a while ago.
After an uneventful drive into the barrens the runners found the hang out for the Whites, an old power station. A rough barricade had been set up around the perimeter and as they rode up the runners were approached by the spokesman of the barricade. He insisted that they could only see Silence if they were unarmed, and not keen to leave his battle rifle and the bikes in the barrens unattended, Ki-Rin went in alone leaving Glyph and Ash on watch.
Silence was a two bit gang leader who had beaten his way to the top. He had charges to look after and a rival gang was causing him troubles. He decided that the information he had about Ford was clearly valuable to this runner stood before him, and told Ki-Rin that he would tell him what had happened if he dealt with the other gang.
It turned out that the gang called the Razors had gotten lucky not so long ago and had managed to liberate a Lone Star Citymaster during a riot. They are now driving around in the vehicle killing the Whites and capturing and booty that they find. This riot van had been called the Pig on the streets and Silence wanted the Pig for his own gang.
Ki-Rin made a friend with a packet of cigarettes who had warned him that the Razors liked their booby traps. After Ki-Rin told the others what they had to do, he headed back to San Fran to pick up the Sniper Cannon, which would be more than capable of punching through the armour of a riot truck. Ash and Glyph headed down to the Razors territory for a bit of a mooch.
After setting up a look out from a building Glyph got bored and headed out for reconnoiter alone. In no time at all she was being followed by a couple of gangers and Glyph decided to challenge them. They drew a knife while politely asking for a tithe for walking around in their turf. Glyph drew her guns. She then began to make her way back the way she had come, aware that she was on their turf. The pair followed her although he guns were loosely trained on them. One broke off to get reinforcements the other just followed at a distance. Glyph continued to retreat and spotted one of their improvised pipe bombs that appeared to be quite obvious. She took a detour around it and stood on another explosive.
Glyph picked herself up from the explosion and dusted herself off quite unharmed but something had gone off in her head. She drew a grenade and pulled the pin, and made her way back to the ganger who was following her asking if he liked to play with explosives, the ganger was scared but he had buddies (one with a shotgun) and as his eyes flicked to his friends, Glyph drew her gun a killed both of them before they moved a muscle. The ganger ran.
Ash having watched all of this suggested that they get out of dodge and wait for Ki-Rin to get back, but Glyph was having none of it, and while Ash left she rode around the streets of Razor territory. The Razors reinforced but they also knew that the crazy has at least one grenade and a pair of SMG’s so they held back until the Pig got on the scene.
Ki-Rin called in to see Six before he picked up the sniper cannon to drop off some lemsips and was completely unaware of the action that Glyph had kicked off.
The Pig duly arrived and Glyph decided that a single handed assault of the riot van was in order. She began to ride rings around the slow moving pig on the rat bike. Inside the vehicle gangers fired from gun ports, and Glyph took many hits triggering the nanite medkit. She finally leapt on top of the vehicle and began to cut her way through the windshield. The driver rammed the vehicle trying to shake her off but she was on a one girl mission and when the rear bulk head doors opened so gangers could shoot her off she lobbed in a flash bang which disabled almost everyone.
She drove down the street triumphant, picking up Ash on the way, who bundled the unconscious gangers out onto the street. Glyph phoned up Ki-Rin to tell him that the sniper cannon was not needed. Ki-Rin rode back to make the hand over with Silence.
Silence was pleased and told Ki-Rin that he had been approached by a suit who wanted the gang to look after a man and ensure that no harm came to him, when he made arrangements for him to disappear. Silence agreed and a few days after that call, a team of soldiers arrived in a helicopter and dropped off the man. Silence and the Whites looked after him for two days, and then another helicopter turned up and the man was taken away. Silence had kept the business card left by the suit. A Mr. Johnson, and a telephone number, and he handed that over to Ki-Rin.
Ki-Rin, Ash, Glyph.
The runners have been approached by The Juggler who has told them of his friend Book, who has taken into his possession an orachalcum book that had belonged to Dominic Cross and was in some way related to the Shedim, Allisom. The Juggler has since been informed that the book could be key to destroying Allisom and now wants the runners to help him find his friend and the book for the fee of 50k and the promise that the Juggler will do everything in his power to find Ash’s brother, Blake.
The runners had tangled with Book more recently that the Jugglers last sighting, and remembered that they had seen him headed for Las Vegas with an unidentified man in a cowboy hat. They had traced him to the Volcano, a club in Vegas. They had also seen Book at a party that had been held by Dr. Manton ford, a man that they were employed to terminate, but failed to do so.
It was nearly 3am by the time that they had pooled their information, but they were keen to make the move there and then and rushed round to the house where they had spied Manton Ford. Six was beginning to come down with some kind of flu that was making it hard for him to focus and he elected to stay in the van while the others went in.
They had spotted that security had been ramped up since the last time they were parked outside the doctors AAA mansion but Ki-Rin worked the security from the matrix, disabled the alarms, and looped the cameras to playback the previous night. They then headed over toward the front gate. A pair of security guards spotted them but did nothing as they were presently only loitering. They didn’t seem to care for the idle banter that the runners were offering, so Glyph opened fire on them, Ki-Rin dropped the second before Ash could even get his hand on his gun.
The trio stole into the property and made their way into the house. Ki-Rin mooched around downstairs and found a fridge full of beer. He helped himself and couldn’t help but think that Manton Ford didn’t seem the type to drink this much beer.
Ash and Glyph headed up stairs, and Ash made his way into the main bedroom, stick-shocking the pair in the bed. He then flicked the light on and drew back the covers to find a young couple now comatose. The man he recognised, an up and coming simsense musician called Johnny Rock.
The runners had a brief discussion before leaving. Ash convinced Ki-Rin to find out when the house had been sold and where ford had gone, and after a bit of a data search Ki-Rin found that Ford had stopped paying his rent from July 1st and had defaulted the house. Not only his household bills stopped being paid, everything, his SIN trace, transactions, his comlink activity, all had stopped on the 1st of July. The runners retired for the night planning on heading out to Las Vegas the following morning.
Six’s fever got progressively worse, and by the morning he was in no state to do anything but lie in bed.
Thursday 26th October 2070
Ash got a mysterious message left on his comlink advising him that if he was to find Dr. Ford, then it might be worth talking to Sergeant Buck at the NRA shooting range in downtown. The team met at Ki-Rin’s before heading off to the range.
The team went through a few checks at the range before they were let in, and they met up with Sergeant Buck, a shooting instructor. They asked about Dr. Ford, and after some money changed hands, Buck told them that he used to be part of a Cross Applied Technologies elite guard called Seraphim, he quit when the Corporation began to fall apart and his squad was being bolstered with “console kids” who had only done simulator missions. But the last mission he had done before he left involved Dr. Manton Ford. For some reason Cross (or whoever his employer was that day) wanted him extracting for his own safety, and then have him delivered out to the barrens where he was to be handed over to a street gang called the Whites. He gave the runners the coordinates and told them that the gang leader was called Silence. The runners chatted for a bit longer, and one ex-forces man to another Ki-Rin made a new contact.
The team decided to head out. Ki-Rin bought a third hand scrambler bike, and then joined Ash and Glyph on the rat bike that they had acquired a while ago.
After an uneventful drive into the barrens the runners found the hang out for the Whites, an old power station. A rough barricade had been set up around the perimeter and as they rode up the runners were approached by the spokesman of the barricade. He insisted that they could only see Silence if they were unarmed, and not keen to leave his battle rifle and the bikes in the barrens unattended, Ki-Rin went in alone leaving Glyph and Ash on watch.
Silence was a two bit gang leader who had beaten his way to the top. He had charges to look after and a rival gang was causing him troubles. He decided that the information he had about Ford was clearly valuable to this runner stood before him, and told Ki-Rin that he would tell him what had happened if he dealt with the other gang.
It turned out that the gang called the Razors had gotten lucky not so long ago and had managed to liberate a Lone Star Citymaster during a riot. They are now driving around in the vehicle killing the Whites and capturing and booty that they find. This riot van had been called the Pig on the streets and Silence wanted the Pig for his own gang.
Ki-Rin made a friend with a packet of cigarettes who had warned him that the Razors liked their booby traps. After Ki-Rin told the others what they had to do, he headed back to San Fran to pick up the Sniper Cannon, which would be more than capable of punching through the armour of a riot truck. Ash and Glyph headed down to the Razors territory for a bit of a mooch.
After setting up a look out from a building Glyph got bored and headed out for reconnoiter alone. In no time at all she was being followed by a couple of gangers and Glyph decided to challenge them. They drew a knife while politely asking for a tithe for walking around in their turf. Glyph drew her guns. She then began to make her way back the way she had come, aware that she was on their turf. The pair followed her although he guns were loosely trained on them. One broke off to get reinforcements the other just followed at a distance. Glyph continued to retreat and spotted one of their improvised pipe bombs that appeared to be quite obvious. She took a detour around it and stood on another explosive.
Glyph picked herself up from the explosion and dusted herself off quite unharmed but something had gone off in her head. She drew a grenade and pulled the pin, and made her way back to the ganger who was following her asking if he liked to play with explosives, the ganger was scared but he had buddies (one with a shotgun) and as his eyes flicked to his friends, Glyph drew her gun a killed both of them before they moved a muscle. The ganger ran.
Ash having watched all of this suggested that they get out of dodge and wait for Ki-Rin to get back, but Glyph was having none of it, and while Ash left she rode around the streets of Razor territory. The Razors reinforced but they also knew that the crazy has at least one grenade and a pair of SMG’s so they held back until the Pig got on the scene.
Ki-Rin called in to see Six before he picked up the sniper cannon to drop off some lemsips and was completely unaware of the action that Glyph had kicked off.
The Pig duly arrived and Glyph decided that a single handed assault of the riot van was in order. She began to ride rings around the slow moving pig on the rat bike. Inside the vehicle gangers fired from gun ports, and Glyph took many hits triggering the nanite medkit. She finally leapt on top of the vehicle and began to cut her way through the windshield. The driver rammed the vehicle trying to shake her off but she was on a one girl mission and when the rear bulk head doors opened so gangers could shoot her off she lobbed in a flash bang which disabled almost everyone.
She drove down the street triumphant, picking up Ash on the way, who bundled the unconscious gangers out onto the street. Glyph phoned up Ki-Rin to tell him that the sniper cannon was not needed. Ki-Rin rode back to make the hand over with Silence.
Silence was pleased and told Ki-Rin that he had been approached by a suit who wanted the gang to look after a man and ensure that no harm came to him, when he made arrangements for him to disappear. Silence agreed and a few days after that call, a team of soldiers arrived in a helicopter and dropped off the man. Silence and the Whites looked after him for two days, and then another helicopter turned up and the man was taken away. Silence had kept the business card left by the suit. A Mr. Johnson, and a telephone number, and he handed that over to Ki-Rin.
Thursday, April 12, 2007
The Jugglers hit on Cross
Six (book), Glyph (O’Bannon), Ash (Slab), Ki-Rin (Fenix)
Wednesday 25th October 2070
The runners were contacted by their St. Doc contact, Mal. He seemed a bit odd on the phone and when the runners headed to meet him at 11pm as instructed they were cautious. He met them in his surgery at the back of the Gym and sat them down in his office. He then asked the runners if they remembered when they had first met, and they recalled that they were trying to track down The Juggler. He then began to tell them a story of a run against Cross Applied Technologies that happened over six months ago.
Friday 3rd March 2070
The gang sat in the back room of Clive’s Dive for 20 minutes. The Juggler was always late. There was the dark skinned, bespectacled mage, Book. The street doctor, Mal. The troll bruiser Slab, the face of the party, O’Bannon. And the covert ops specialist, Fenix.
The Juggler turned up and like always carried on as if he wasn’t late. He had another hit against Cross Applied technologies. He had been tipped off that Dominic Cross had recently acquired a small book, the pages made from orachalchum. His little bird also had suggested that this book had something to do with summoning a spirit called a Shedim, and the Juggler thought it best that they recovered this book before Dominc got himself into trouble with things he shouldn’t.
O’Bannon had a contact on the inside of Cross Applied technologies, a security guard who would be prepared to open the doors and things. The team began to put together a plan.
The team were going to go into Cross HQ late into the evening disguised as cleaners. They would make their way up to the 15th Floor where they suspected the book to be. Book would confirm the location of the book by assaying the area astrally before they set off. The team split up to get hold of the various bits and pieces, ammo, overalls and cleaning equipment, a battered van and signage to imply a contract cleaning company. O’Bannon let his contact know that they wanted the underground car park un-attended, and also asked for passes for the five of them. His CATco Security guard contact obliged.
The Juggler made his way into Mal’s surgery to the surprise of the runners. Six was especially perturbed as last time out The Juggler was the enemy. But he came with coffee as a gesture of goodwill, and the story Mal was telling was making for interesting listening, the enemy of my enemy and all that. The juggler just encouraged Mal to carry on to the good bit.
The team went in. Book was able to confirm that the book was clearly visible from the astral plane even though the 15th floor was isolated from the astral plane by a bacteria shield that had been embedded into the walls, floor, roof and glazing.
The team snuck in, and the security guards waved them past without really studying their ID’s. Inside the team were again waved past by the security guards who were quite blasé, although after they had made their way to the lifts, they did notice that the guards were making a quick phone call to someone. It was enough to make O’Bannon nervous and he contacted his security guy, who told him that all was fine.
The team made their way to the 8th floor where they had to change lifts, and were briefly accosted by an indignant cleaning lady who was having her floor invaded by outside contract cleaners. (When she buzzed down to security she was told that they were going to be got rid of shortly). Fenix was sure that they were being flanked by some security and went into a door that had just clicked shut, backed up by Slab. Going in there was a stressed out young exec who was working late. He didn’t like being disturbed and decided to run the ID he had demanded off the cleaners through the database so that he could file a complaint. Slab made out that he was getting the bin, before inverting it and jamming it onto the head of the suit. Fenix lifted the bin off the stunned exec, and then smacked him out cold with a decorative glass paperweight.
The team continued up. This time using the emergency stairs. Rather than the lifts. They made it up to the 14th floor, the last floor they could get up to before changing lifts one last time to get to Dominic Cross’s executive apartments on the 15th. Book too a quick peak through the wall in the astral plane and saw that there were guards out there, and also a watcher spirit. He warned the others who burst from the stairwell, guns blazing.
The fire fight was short lived, Book took on a watcher spirit in astral combat and dismissed it with flagrant ease, and the rest of security were dropped without too much of a problem by the other runners. Almost too easy. The team dashed across to the lift and Fenix bypassed the executive override system. Book thought of a gap in the security and astrally projected through the lift out into the apartment. He found the orachalchum book. And there was some kind of spirit actually reading the astral form of the book. The mage returned to his body and warned the team what was up there.
The lift came and they all headed up. They spread out in the plush apartment of Dominic Cross. The book was left open on a table. Switching his perception from the mundane and astral planes Book could see the spirit regarding them and almost encouraging them to take the orachachum artefact. Slab found Dominic Cross in one of his offices, his eyes black pits, he was coughing up blood. Slab killed him there and then.
Book was worried with how keen the malevolent spirit was with them taking the book and he sought advice from contacts, and the rest of the team, take the book, destroy the book, leave it here. In the end the mage took charge, took responsibility for the magical artefact and they left…
And this is where Mal ended the story. The Juggler then took over explaining what happened since. The mage had taken the book, and over the course of about a month had lost contact with his friends, and now was missing. The Juggler had received advice that implied that this book was key to dispelling this Shedim, and now wanted the runners in to help.
Knowing that the Juggler knew a bit about CATCo, Ash asked if he knew about the Dreamseed project, about Perfect Shooter, and about his brother, Blake, who was missing again and probably in the clutches of whichever guise Cross Applied was working under. The Juggler knew nothing new.
Six wanted to see the colour of the green, and when they were offered 50k they were set to leave. The Juggler came in with one last offer. 50k to cover the expenses of finding his friend, and the book that could deal a death blow to Alisom, and in return The Juggler would pull his resources to help find Blake…
Ash was set to refuse the job on account of being fragged with too many times over this. Yet something in the Jugglers voice made him really believe that he could help. Six was there and would back up Ash no matter what. Glyph and Ki-Rin were also ready to back up their team.
The runners and the Juggler traded information for many hours, they learned that the Notable Anarchists was a front used by the Juggler to strike out at incursions by a type of spirit called a horror. Alisom was just one Shedim trying to pervert one corporation, but there were many more, The Juggler was at the forefront of the battle, trying to stem the tide. the Dragon, Alamais, who also worked against these spirits was financially backing the Notable Anarchists.
The runners then remembered that they had seen Book more recently than the Juggler. He was embroiled in a run that they had trying to solve the deaths in the Castro sector. They had seen him enjoying a party with Dr. Manton Ford, a man they were paid to kill but failed to do after the run went sour. They also trailed the mage, Book, to Las Vegas again before the run went wrong.
They had some leads and were going to start with Dr. Manton Ford…
Wednesday 25th October 2070
The runners were contacted by their St. Doc contact, Mal. He seemed a bit odd on the phone and when the runners headed to meet him at 11pm as instructed they were cautious. He met them in his surgery at the back of the Gym and sat them down in his office. He then asked the runners if they remembered when they had first met, and they recalled that they were trying to track down The Juggler. He then began to tell them a story of a run against Cross Applied Technologies that happened over six months ago.
Friday 3rd March 2070
The gang sat in the back room of Clive’s Dive for 20 minutes. The Juggler was always late. There was the dark skinned, bespectacled mage, Book. The street doctor, Mal. The troll bruiser Slab, the face of the party, O’Bannon. And the covert ops specialist, Fenix.
The Juggler turned up and like always carried on as if he wasn’t late. He had another hit against Cross Applied technologies. He had been tipped off that Dominic Cross had recently acquired a small book, the pages made from orachalchum. His little bird also had suggested that this book had something to do with summoning a spirit called a Shedim, and the Juggler thought it best that they recovered this book before Dominc got himself into trouble with things he shouldn’t.
O’Bannon had a contact on the inside of Cross Applied technologies, a security guard who would be prepared to open the doors and things. The team began to put together a plan.
The team were going to go into Cross HQ late into the evening disguised as cleaners. They would make their way up to the 15th Floor where they suspected the book to be. Book would confirm the location of the book by assaying the area astrally before they set off. The team split up to get hold of the various bits and pieces, ammo, overalls and cleaning equipment, a battered van and signage to imply a contract cleaning company. O’Bannon let his contact know that they wanted the underground car park un-attended, and also asked for passes for the five of them. His CATco Security guard contact obliged.
The Juggler made his way into Mal’s surgery to the surprise of the runners. Six was especially perturbed as last time out The Juggler was the enemy. But he came with coffee as a gesture of goodwill, and the story Mal was telling was making for interesting listening, the enemy of my enemy and all that. The juggler just encouraged Mal to carry on to the good bit.
The team went in. Book was able to confirm that the book was clearly visible from the astral plane even though the 15th floor was isolated from the astral plane by a bacteria shield that had been embedded into the walls, floor, roof and glazing.
The team snuck in, and the security guards waved them past without really studying their ID’s. Inside the team were again waved past by the security guards who were quite blasé, although after they had made their way to the lifts, they did notice that the guards were making a quick phone call to someone. It was enough to make O’Bannon nervous and he contacted his security guy, who told him that all was fine.
The team made their way to the 8th floor where they had to change lifts, and were briefly accosted by an indignant cleaning lady who was having her floor invaded by outside contract cleaners. (When she buzzed down to security she was told that they were going to be got rid of shortly). Fenix was sure that they were being flanked by some security and went into a door that had just clicked shut, backed up by Slab. Going in there was a stressed out young exec who was working late. He didn’t like being disturbed and decided to run the ID he had demanded off the cleaners through the database so that he could file a complaint. Slab made out that he was getting the bin, before inverting it and jamming it onto the head of the suit. Fenix lifted the bin off the stunned exec, and then smacked him out cold with a decorative glass paperweight.
The team continued up. This time using the emergency stairs. Rather than the lifts. They made it up to the 14th floor, the last floor they could get up to before changing lifts one last time to get to Dominic Cross’s executive apartments on the 15th. Book too a quick peak through the wall in the astral plane and saw that there were guards out there, and also a watcher spirit. He warned the others who burst from the stairwell, guns blazing.
The fire fight was short lived, Book took on a watcher spirit in astral combat and dismissed it with flagrant ease, and the rest of security were dropped without too much of a problem by the other runners. Almost too easy. The team dashed across to the lift and Fenix bypassed the executive override system. Book thought of a gap in the security and astrally projected through the lift out into the apartment. He found the orachalchum book. And there was some kind of spirit actually reading the astral form of the book. The mage returned to his body and warned the team what was up there.
The lift came and they all headed up. They spread out in the plush apartment of Dominic Cross. The book was left open on a table. Switching his perception from the mundane and astral planes Book could see the spirit regarding them and almost encouraging them to take the orachachum artefact. Slab found Dominic Cross in one of his offices, his eyes black pits, he was coughing up blood. Slab killed him there and then.
Book was worried with how keen the malevolent spirit was with them taking the book and he sought advice from contacts, and the rest of the team, take the book, destroy the book, leave it here. In the end the mage took charge, took responsibility for the magical artefact and they left…
And this is where Mal ended the story. The Juggler then took over explaining what happened since. The mage had taken the book, and over the course of about a month had lost contact with his friends, and now was missing. The Juggler had received advice that implied that this book was key to dispelling this Shedim, and now wanted the runners in to help.
Knowing that the Juggler knew a bit about CATCo, Ash asked if he knew about the Dreamseed project, about Perfect Shooter, and about his brother, Blake, who was missing again and probably in the clutches of whichever guise Cross Applied was working under. The Juggler knew nothing new.
Six wanted to see the colour of the green, and when they were offered 50k they were set to leave. The Juggler came in with one last offer. 50k to cover the expenses of finding his friend, and the book that could deal a death blow to Alisom, and in return The Juggler would pull his resources to help find Blake…
Ash was set to refuse the job on account of being fragged with too many times over this. Yet something in the Jugglers voice made him really believe that he could help. Six was there and would back up Ash no matter what. Glyph and Ki-Rin were also ready to back up their team.
The runners and the Juggler traded information for many hours, they learned that the Notable Anarchists was a front used by the Juggler to strike out at incursions by a type of spirit called a horror. Alisom was just one Shedim trying to pervert one corporation, but there were many more, The Juggler was at the forefront of the battle, trying to stem the tide. the Dragon, Alamais, who also worked against these spirits was financially backing the Notable Anarchists.
The runners then remembered that they had seen Book more recently than the Juggler. He was embroiled in a run that they had trying to solve the deaths in the Castro sector. They had seen him enjoying a party with Dr. Manton Ford, a man they were paid to kill but failed to do after the run went sour. They also trailed the mage, Book, to Las Vegas again before the run went wrong.
They had some leads and were going to start with Dr. Manton Ford…
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
Six Blog
Call Dir: Shadownet/ShadowlandsBBS/>
Select Region: Region=SanFrancisco>
Call SubDir: SanFrancisco/WeBlogs>
Select Blog: Author=V.Six>
Initializing…>
Entry 30: 18.10.70>
We’ve had quite an entertaining few days just lately – a successful run, the beta test phase of some new Corp medikit (which, needless to say I was paranoid and savvy enough to turn down, it remains to be seen whether Glyph and Ash suffer for their enthusiasm) and a sniff of info on Ash’ brother Blake that was tied to a sabotage mission we just couldn’t justify undertaking. Some damn Troll Toxic Shaman worked Ash over out in the Barrens and having beaten nine bells out of him, told him to sink a ship inbound for the San Fran Bay area if he ever wanted to see Blake again. Trouble was, our research soon found out that the ship had a 10,000 tonne cargo of carcinogens. Cuts me deep to think of the look on Ash face when he realised we were being asked to pollute and poison the whole San Fran Bay but I’ve got a whole trunk load of respect for him being the one to realise that sometimes the price is just too high. He made the call and we bailed but at what cost? I wouldn’t want to be in his shoes, thinking he just gave away his last hope of finding his brother…
It isn’t all doom and gloom though. We know Blake is out there somewhere now and that word of him is circulating through the shadows. If there’s information to be found, we can try to find it ourselves and we also have a new face to look out for. That Troll Toxic wont be blending in at many Frat Parties so if we can hunt him down, maybe a little violent persuasion can be employed to make him cough up the goods.
It’s our second run in with the toxic underbelly of the world in the last five days. Through Snow, we picked up a run from Saeder Krupp to investigate a lapsed Governmental black op codenamed Buttercup. SK wanted the project files because they thought it would help inform some ongoing research of their own. The only catch – if there were any project files, they’d be hard copy because everything else had been wiped in the crash.
Old documents about Buttercup recently made public thanks to historic declassification regulations gave us the names of both scientists who headed up the project. We hit research mode, trying to find them or tie them to a location during the project run but quickly discovered that both Docs were dead. However, Doc Schaeffer’s missus was waiting for God in a retirement home just outside of San Fran so we blazed over to try and milk her for Intel. Mrs Schaeffer didn’t know much, her hubby had kept pretty tight-lipped about his research, even in the bedroom, but she did point us in the direction of a colleague and research student who had served under the main men. She also tipped us off to the fact that someone else had been asking the same questions and sure enough, we were a little way behind a.n.other interested party.
Knowing Mrs S had given the other goons the same name and address, we blazed on over to a quiet little residential area. I clocked a rotordrone high and we saw and heard a gunshot from an upstairs room of our man’s house. I pulled up, dumping Frosty out so he could get busy and then pumped a Flashbang and a Thermal Smoke grenade into the upper floor of the house with the Antioch. With the front of the house covered I burned rubber heading around back to cover anyone trying to give us the slip. It proved unnecessary, the Dream Team had whacked the goons before they left the back yard and Glyph had patched up our man well enough for him to tell us that the lab had been out in the Nevada desert at a place called Duckwater.
Continues: 1/2>
|| >
Duckwater had been caught in the fallout of a nuclear reactor that had gone critical in the nearby town of Ruth and that meant our target location was slap bang in the middle of a toxic hotzone. The less time we spent in the toxic zone the better so while we geared up in the proper toggs, I remoted the drone van out there, figuring we would zip in onboard the chopper to rendezvous with the van, do the job and then get the fuck out of there just as quickly.
Flying through the toxic zone in the chopper was an education and no mistake. The engine struggled in the mucky atmosphere and I spent the whole flight on the edge of my seat, monitoring and managing the engine so it didn’t fail on us. Even so we had to ditch at one point, after attracting the attention of an amorous toxic spirit and though I do say so myself, it was only my skill at the stick that kept us from face planting high speed dirt. Right about then we realised the chopper was a bit of a white elephant. Ground vehicles were certainly slower but there was less risk of death if the engine conked out. We got the bird back in the air and limped to the rendezvous but then I just got the chopper out of the zone, up above the ceiling of the worst pollutants and on the quickest and most direct route to clear air and then home. We were anchored to the earth from then on.
Duckwater was a shocking mess. A small community of largely residential buildings, decaying and half buried in the toxic debris and scavenged over by a pack of pitiful grey skinned bottom feeders scratching out a living in the filth. There was only one building that looked like it might be large enough to conceal Buttercup’s labs so we wasted no time in heading over there. Ash immediately got himself spooked, insisting he could hear children’s voices but for the first time, I was able to seal myself into the safety of the Step Van and let the drones do the work, sharing point duty with the Steel Lynx and using the offensive Iballs to scout out rooms.
The labs were smaller than I had been expecting and largely empty. We’d been warned that the project had ended abruptly with a lab fire during the crash but had hoped to find something intact to prove we were on the right track.
We finally struck paydirt with a small file store – computers and filing cabinets for hardcopy that were largely undamaged by the fire but beginning to suffer from the ravages of the acidic atmosphere.
Glyph almost began a new career as snake chow right there and then as this damned viper rose up out of its nest. Cursed thing was as thick as a man’
torso and easily ten or twelve feet long – I’ve learned since that they’re called Nagah and use human mimicry, the children’s voices Ash had heard, to lure prey to its death. All I knew as I opened up with the LMG on the Steel Lynx was that I was glad to be tucked up inside the van. All told there were maybe six or eight of those damn snakes and they took some killing! Ash copped a nasty bite that looked like it would need attention but we didn’t need a second invitation to take the hint and get the hell out. We grabbed as many of the files as we could and the hard disks from the computers, loaded up and slowly rumbled off through the mire.
The lengthier return journey gave us opportunity to catalogue some of what we had found to see whether it would satisfy the Johnson from Saeder Krupp and although none of us was a specialist, we seemed to have got what we needed. We gave Ash chance to visit Mal back in San Fran while we finished up our collating and then we handed the data over. Remarkably, no one got shafted – Johnson paid up with minimal fuss. Something tells me he’s not cut out for life in the Corps.
Mood: Despondent. Wish there was more we could do for Ash.
Ends: 2/2>
||
Select Region: Region=SanFrancisco>
Call SubDir: SanFrancisco/WeBlogs>
Select Blog: Author=V.Six>
Initializing…>
Entry 30: 18.10.70>
We’ve had quite an entertaining few days just lately – a successful run, the beta test phase of some new Corp medikit (which, needless to say I was paranoid and savvy enough to turn down, it remains to be seen whether Glyph and Ash suffer for their enthusiasm) and a sniff of info on Ash’ brother Blake that was tied to a sabotage mission we just couldn’t justify undertaking. Some damn Troll Toxic Shaman worked Ash over out in the Barrens and having beaten nine bells out of him, told him to sink a ship inbound for the San Fran Bay area if he ever wanted to see Blake again. Trouble was, our research soon found out that the ship had a 10,000 tonne cargo of carcinogens. Cuts me deep to think of the look on Ash face when he realised we were being asked to pollute and poison the whole San Fran Bay but I’ve got a whole trunk load of respect for him being the one to realise that sometimes the price is just too high. He made the call and we bailed but at what cost? I wouldn’t want to be in his shoes, thinking he just gave away his last hope of finding his brother…
It isn’t all doom and gloom though. We know Blake is out there somewhere now and that word of him is circulating through the shadows. If there’s information to be found, we can try to find it ourselves and we also have a new face to look out for. That Troll Toxic wont be blending in at many Frat Parties so if we can hunt him down, maybe a little violent persuasion can be employed to make him cough up the goods.
It’s our second run in with the toxic underbelly of the world in the last five days. Through Snow, we picked up a run from Saeder Krupp to investigate a lapsed Governmental black op codenamed Buttercup. SK wanted the project files because they thought it would help inform some ongoing research of their own. The only catch – if there were any project files, they’d be hard copy because everything else had been wiped in the crash.
Old documents about Buttercup recently made public thanks to historic declassification regulations gave us the names of both scientists who headed up the project. We hit research mode, trying to find them or tie them to a location during the project run but quickly discovered that both Docs were dead. However, Doc Schaeffer’s missus was waiting for God in a retirement home just outside of San Fran so we blazed over to try and milk her for Intel. Mrs Schaeffer didn’t know much, her hubby had kept pretty tight-lipped about his research, even in the bedroom, but she did point us in the direction of a colleague and research student who had served under the main men. She also tipped us off to the fact that someone else had been asking the same questions and sure enough, we were a little way behind a.n.other interested party.
Knowing Mrs S had given the other goons the same name and address, we blazed on over to a quiet little residential area. I clocked a rotordrone high and we saw and heard a gunshot from an upstairs room of our man’s house. I pulled up, dumping Frosty out so he could get busy and then pumped a Flashbang and a Thermal Smoke grenade into the upper floor of the house with the Antioch. With the front of the house covered I burned rubber heading around back to cover anyone trying to give us the slip. It proved unnecessary, the Dream Team had whacked the goons before they left the back yard and Glyph had patched up our man well enough for him to tell us that the lab had been out in the Nevada desert at a place called Duckwater.
Continues: 1/2>
|| >
Duckwater had been caught in the fallout of a nuclear reactor that had gone critical in the nearby town of Ruth and that meant our target location was slap bang in the middle of a toxic hotzone. The less time we spent in the toxic zone the better so while we geared up in the proper toggs, I remoted the drone van out there, figuring we would zip in onboard the chopper to rendezvous with the van, do the job and then get the fuck out of there just as quickly.
Flying through the toxic zone in the chopper was an education and no mistake. The engine struggled in the mucky atmosphere and I spent the whole flight on the edge of my seat, monitoring and managing the engine so it didn’t fail on us. Even so we had to ditch at one point, after attracting the attention of an amorous toxic spirit and though I do say so myself, it was only my skill at the stick that kept us from face planting high speed dirt. Right about then we realised the chopper was a bit of a white elephant. Ground vehicles were certainly slower but there was less risk of death if the engine conked out. We got the bird back in the air and limped to the rendezvous but then I just got the chopper out of the zone, up above the ceiling of the worst pollutants and on the quickest and most direct route to clear air and then home. We were anchored to the earth from then on.
Duckwater was a shocking mess. A small community of largely residential buildings, decaying and half buried in the toxic debris and scavenged over by a pack of pitiful grey skinned bottom feeders scratching out a living in the filth. There was only one building that looked like it might be large enough to conceal Buttercup’s labs so we wasted no time in heading over there. Ash immediately got himself spooked, insisting he could hear children’s voices but for the first time, I was able to seal myself into the safety of the Step Van and let the drones do the work, sharing point duty with the Steel Lynx and using the offensive Iballs to scout out rooms.
The labs were smaller than I had been expecting and largely empty. We’d been warned that the project had ended abruptly with a lab fire during the crash but had hoped to find something intact to prove we were on the right track.
We finally struck paydirt with a small file store – computers and filing cabinets for hardcopy that were largely undamaged by the fire but beginning to suffer from the ravages of the acidic atmosphere.
Glyph almost began a new career as snake chow right there and then as this damned viper rose up out of its nest. Cursed thing was as thick as a man’
torso and easily ten or twelve feet long – I’ve learned since that they’re called Nagah and use human mimicry, the children’s voices Ash had heard, to lure prey to its death. All I knew as I opened up with the LMG on the Steel Lynx was that I was glad to be tucked up inside the van. All told there were maybe six or eight of those damn snakes and they took some killing! Ash copped a nasty bite that looked like it would need attention but we didn’t need a second invitation to take the hint and get the hell out. We grabbed as many of the files as we could and the hard disks from the computers, loaded up and slowly rumbled off through the mire.
The lengthier return journey gave us opportunity to catalogue some of what we had found to see whether it would satisfy the Johnson from Saeder Krupp and although none of us was a specialist, we seemed to have got what we needed. We gave Ash chance to visit Mal back in San Fran while we finished up our collating and then we handed the data over. Remarkably, no one got shafted – Johnson paid up with minimal fuss. Something tells me he’s not cut out for life in the Corps.
Mood: Despondent. Wish there was more we could do for Ash.
Ends: 2/2>
||
Thursday, March 29, 2007
The (un)-sinking of the Nova
Six, Glyph, Ash.
The runners had returned from a successful run in the Nevada toxic zone. They had to spend some time to disinfecting themselves and their kit but the Naga bite that Ash had suffered became infected, for two days he suffered a raging fever which filled his nights with nightmares. By Monday though he had snapped out of it and was better than ever.
Monday 16th October 2070
Snow contacts the team and tells them that he has a Mr. Johnson from Mitsuhama who wishes for a team of shadowrunners to field test a new bit of kit that his company are looking to bring to market in the first quarter of ’71. The runners agreed to meet up but Six was concerned that they had messed with Mitsuhama a run or two ago and chose to go in a nanopaste disguise.
The Johnson was not only from Mitsuhama, but was also the executive that had been on the receiving end of the cat prank but he didn’t seem to make the connection to the runners in front of him.
The device was called Shugotenshi, or as it was to be marketed in the west as the Guardian Angel. It is a medkit device which hooked up to the bio-monitors and when the users life was threatened it would automatically fire life saving nanites into the blood stream. Mr. Johnson openly admitted that the final prototype device that they would be testing for about a month would have monitoring systems for Mitsuhama to assay the systems workings but assured the runners that they knew their client base and wouldn’t do anything to compromise their anonymity. The pay was 10k up front, and a further 10k if the device was used successfully or not, there was a payout to next of kin should the worst happen also. Six called a private meeting and argued that it wasn’t for him and warned the others that this was bad. Glyph and Ash however were not swayed by his decision and opted to take and use the device.
Tuesday 17th October 2070
Daisy had arranged a meeting and Ash had met up with a construction company to quote him for the building of his house in the desert, and after a good meeting where Ash aired his needs for the site, he was approached from yonder, by a distinct and unpleasant troll. There was an air of disease and corruption about him. The troll didn't introduce himself but he knew Ash's name and also knew that Ash’s brother was missing. The troll then professed that Blake was going to be killed but would be prepared to tell Ash where he was, for a favour. There was a ship called the Nova bound for San Francisco and the troll wanted it sunk before it arrived. With that the troll departed, walking back off into the desert.
Ash’s mind raced, and the first thing he did was get Daisy onto the matrix to find out about the Nova. The info she came back with wasn’t good. The Nova was a bulk goods ship which was escorted by a mercenary frigate, Greenpeace were haranguing the ship because of it’s cargo. Cyanogen Chloride V, a lethal toxin destined for the UCAS Naval port in San Francisco.
Ash wasn’t going to be fragged with by some ugly pig faced troll and drove across the desert towards the retreating form. Ash demanded that he give him some proof that he knew about Blake’s whereabouts. The troll was dismissive, if Ash didn’t believe him it was his problem. Ash’s temper flared and drew a gun on the shaman.
The fight was short. The shaman had a bound toxic sludge spirit that tossed the pickup truck Ash was in as though it was a toy. Ash woke in the desert sun a few hours later, covered in a foul smelling substance, the van a battered mess. Ash tried to find this toxic shaman again but couldn’t.
He sought the help of his friends, Six and Glyph. They debated long and hard about the pro’s and the con’s of doing the work of this toxic, they contemplated how they would go about the mission and the consequences that their actions would have on the environment as well as the corporations that it would affect. They knew that it would be folly to even attempt this mission and vowed to try and find this troll and get the answers they need from him by other means. Ash sometimes wished that he didn’t have family that he had to look after.
The runners had returned from a successful run in the Nevada toxic zone. They had to spend some time to disinfecting themselves and their kit but the Naga bite that Ash had suffered became infected, for two days he suffered a raging fever which filled his nights with nightmares. By Monday though he had snapped out of it and was better than ever.
Monday 16th October 2070
Snow contacts the team and tells them that he has a Mr. Johnson from Mitsuhama who wishes for a team of shadowrunners to field test a new bit of kit that his company are looking to bring to market in the first quarter of ’71. The runners agreed to meet up but Six was concerned that they had messed with Mitsuhama a run or two ago and chose to go in a nanopaste disguise.
The Johnson was not only from Mitsuhama, but was also the executive that had been on the receiving end of the cat prank but he didn’t seem to make the connection to the runners in front of him.
The device was called Shugotenshi, or as it was to be marketed in the west as the Guardian Angel. It is a medkit device which hooked up to the bio-monitors and when the users life was threatened it would automatically fire life saving nanites into the blood stream. Mr. Johnson openly admitted that the final prototype device that they would be testing for about a month would have monitoring systems for Mitsuhama to assay the systems workings but assured the runners that they knew their client base and wouldn’t do anything to compromise their anonymity. The pay was 10k up front, and a further 10k if the device was used successfully or not, there was a payout to next of kin should the worst happen also. Six called a private meeting and argued that it wasn’t for him and warned the others that this was bad. Glyph and Ash however were not swayed by his decision and opted to take and use the device.
Tuesday 17th October 2070
Daisy had arranged a meeting and Ash had met up with a construction company to quote him for the building of his house in the desert, and after a good meeting where Ash aired his needs for the site, he was approached from yonder, by a distinct and unpleasant troll. There was an air of disease and corruption about him. The troll didn't introduce himself but he knew Ash's name and also knew that Ash’s brother was missing. The troll then professed that Blake was going to be killed but would be prepared to tell Ash where he was, for a favour. There was a ship called the Nova bound for San Francisco and the troll wanted it sunk before it arrived. With that the troll departed, walking back off into the desert.
Ash’s mind raced, and the first thing he did was get Daisy onto the matrix to find out about the Nova. The info she came back with wasn’t good. The Nova was a bulk goods ship which was escorted by a mercenary frigate, Greenpeace were haranguing the ship because of it’s cargo. Cyanogen Chloride V, a lethal toxin destined for the UCAS Naval port in San Francisco.
Ash wasn’t going to be fragged with by some ugly pig faced troll and drove across the desert towards the retreating form. Ash demanded that he give him some proof that he knew about Blake’s whereabouts. The troll was dismissive, if Ash didn’t believe him it was his problem. Ash’s temper flared and drew a gun on the shaman.
The fight was short. The shaman had a bound toxic sludge spirit that tossed the pickup truck Ash was in as though it was a toy. Ash woke in the desert sun a few hours later, covered in a foul smelling substance, the van a battered mess. Ash tried to find this toxic shaman again but couldn’t.
He sought the help of his friends, Six and Glyph. They debated long and hard about the pro’s and the con’s of doing the work of this toxic, they contemplated how they would go about the mission and the consequences that their actions would have on the environment as well as the corporations that it would affect. They knew that it would be folly to even attempt this mission and vowed to try and find this troll and get the answers they need from him by other means. Ash sometimes wished that he didn’t have family that he had to look after.
Thursday, March 22, 2007
Project Buttercup
Six, Glyph, Ash, Ki-Rin.
Friday 13th October 2070
The runners were contacted by their fixer, Snow, he was quite keen to pass on the latest job that had come to him, this one from Saeder Krupp, and they asked for this team specifically. Snow game the team a word of warning about SK’s intolerance of failure and then passed them the job.
Contacting the Mr. Johnson they met up with him in a swank five star hotel where a boardroom had been booked for the meet. The Johnson, told them the details of the run.
70 years ago the then government of the united states instigated a black project called Buttercup. A genetic research program aimed at integrating genetic code into the human genome via viral carriers to make the population resistant to biological terrorist attacks. This project disappeared off the radar during the crash of ’29. The government forgot about it, and for whatever reason the scientists working the project didn’t start screaming out when the funding from central government stopped.
Following the 70 year rule, the CIA released documents purporting to the Buttercup project into the public domain. Saeder Krupp were keen to see if any evidence of this project still existed and were prepared to speculate 200k on the off chance that it did and that they could make use of some of the findings.
This is where the team came in.
The only evidence that the runners had that this project existed was the CIA document. But this did mention the names of the doctors who would head up the project. Ki-Rin hit the matrix and found the doctors details. Both dead. One died during the Eurowars in Belgium the other was killed during the crash of ’29. One of the doctors, William Schaefer, had a wife who was living in a retirement home in San Francisco.
The runners also looked into medical facilities around the city that could accommodate the Buttercup project because the report that they were given suggested that it may use an existing facility in San Fran. They had three set aside and would follow those leads if everything else dried up.
Heading to the retirement home the runners quickly discovered that a pair of company men was a few hours ahead of them, having already visited William Schaefer’s wife. Ki-Rin got their images up on camera, while Glyph and Ash asked the old lady a few questions. She didn’t remember much, and as her husband had worked for the government, she didn’t know very much either, but she did point the runners in the directions of one of Schaefer’s undergraduates who worked with him not long before he had died.
Ki-Rin isolated the sound feed from the surveillance cameras and determined that the company men already knew about the undergraduate.
The runners were already on the move heading out of San Francisco to get out to the undergraduates house in Sacramento CA.
Screaming into the residential area, the runners spotted the Company men’s car parked on the drive of the ex-undergraduate, a rotor drone hovered in the air above the cul-de-sac and then they saw the muzzle flash from an upstairs window. Six dropped a flash bang grenade and then a smoke grenade into the window of the house, while the rest of the team surged out of the cars to storm the building Ash and Glyph went in through the front, Ki-Rin surged round the side and to the rear of the house.
Ki-Rin marked two targets, one began to flee and as soon as he was painted up on the smartlink Six headed off in the car to head him off at the pass, the other stopped and began shooting at Ki-RIn. Between Ash and Ki-Rin the first company man was dropped, the second had got away over the fence but Ki-Rin charged through the fence and trapped him into fighting.
Ash and Glyph headed upstairs and found the ex-undergraduate bleeding, Glyph used her medkit to save his life, while Ash helped out Ki-Rin finish the fight with the company man by shooting him from one of the upstairs windows with a harpoon.
The ex-undergraduate was alive and told the runners that the other men begun to ask him about his life working for William Schaefer. He told them that they had worked together ion a place called Duckwater until the crash of 2029. The power was cut off and the people they were experimented on tried to escape. A fire started and all but him were killed. There were bigger things going on in the world, and the death of a few scientists in a secretive and forgotten science project didn’t register and the whole incident was forgotten.
Duckwater was a town in the Nevada Desert. It was until the nuclear power plant at Ruth blew creating a toxic zone across a large portion of the desert and had to be evacuated, surrendering the town to the corrupting elements.
The runners weren’t keen to head into the toxic zone but guessed that this was the best lead they had at the moment, so the team headed back to see their fixer to source chemical seals for their armour more ammo, and a bit of advice.
Five house later the runners were en-route in the helicopter, Six had remote rigged his drone van out into the toxic zone already to give them some obs. on the ground, the road was rough and Six knew that the thin polluted air would make the flight a taxing journey.
The runners flew into the toxic zone, the governmental health warnings displayed on the runners AR giving them one last warning to the dangers beyond. The polluted air quickly began to tell on the helicopter engine, surging and choking, Six did his best to manage the engine, but the buffeting was too much for Ki-Rin who was getting air sick.
The runners were 20 minutes into the flight when they were joined in the air by something. Looking like a large skeletal carrion bird with tattered leathery wings and completely lacking flesh it assayed the runners helicopter for a moment before diving into the engine ducts, using its powers to starve the engine of oxygen to bring the helicopter down. Six fought to handle the now heavy controls to bring the helicopter into a controlled landing.
Landing heavily the runners spilled out of the helicopter to attack the spirit that was attacking them.
Spirits barely notice mundane weaponry but the sheer volume of fire that the runners put into the corporeal form of the Harbinger made it think twice about being manifest, and it fled to the astral plane.
The runners were able to get the helicopter airborne again and flew the rest of the distance to the ruined town of Duckwater. A quick flyover the runners saw that the town consisted of approximately 100 buildings, most of which seemed to be residential but one building Six picked out was larger and completely demolished. They all agreed that this building was worth a closer look. The runners also saw movement on the ground, ghouls were eaking out a living amongst the spoiled remains of the land, and they were steering clear of the large demolished building.
The runners landed near the van and swapped vehicles. They headed back into town on the ground and although regarded by the ghouls, threats from Ki-Rin seemed to keep them at bay.
The runners headed across to the building and began to pick their way amongst the rubble. Six stayed in the van, rolling out a Steel Lynx in his stead. Around them, they saw flickers of movement, the heard noises, they heard a child’s voice plead a single word “Please”.
The runners didn’t know what was going on, but they headed to the source of the voice, the centre of the ruined building. Ash was picking his way through the rubble jumping at shadows.
The rest of the team found a short strip of concrete steps which led down to a fire door. The acid rain was pooling at the foot of the stairs and the bottom of the door was mostly rotted away. Ki-Rin kicked the door down and Six (the Steel Lynx) Ki-Rin and Glyph made their way though into a short corridor, Ash was convinced that they were going to get ambushed from the rear and remained on guard near the steps.
There were Six doors off the corridor and the runners quickly checked the rooms. They found some kind of nest with discarded bones that the runners assumed were that of Ghouls. The sixth room they found computers, files and data tapes, a lot of them were rotting away in the acidic atmosphere.
Glyph was the first into the room and she heard the pleading voice again behind her. A large Naga rose up behind her using it’s mimicry to lure its food to it’s nest. It lashed out, and the rest of the nest came out of the walls and through the vents to kill. The nest of Naga has become lazy and complacent, more used to hunting sluggish Ghouls rather than wired shadowrunners and they were all slain quickly. Ash received a bite though and the toxic tainted Naga pumped venom into his system before being taken down by the Steel Lynx’s gun.
The runners were keen to get out of the toxic zone and quickly bundled up the files, computers and hard copies into the back of Six’s van, and they left. The drive out of the toxic zone was a long and arduous one, but it passed off uneventfully, and the runners headed back to San Francisco once they had spent a bit of time in a jet wash.
Ash headed off to see Mal who treated the Naga venom, (although he had to cross his fingers that the linctus he gave his patient would combat the toxic corruption too) They were going to make an impression on the Mr. Johnson from Saeder Krupp, and while Ash sought medical help, the rest of the team stayed up through the night sorting filing and cataloguing the information. The runners met up with Mr. J. the next day and he was happy to pay the runners, confident that the Saeder Krupp reputation for dealing with defaulting Shadowrunners would ensure he got what he wanted.
The runners left happy. Saeder Krupp got what they wanted and the Mr. Johnson was equally happy. Maybe the runners had found a corporation they could work for?
Friday 13th October 2070
The runners were contacted by their fixer, Snow, he was quite keen to pass on the latest job that had come to him, this one from Saeder Krupp, and they asked for this team specifically. Snow game the team a word of warning about SK’s intolerance of failure and then passed them the job.
Contacting the Mr. Johnson they met up with him in a swank five star hotel where a boardroom had been booked for the meet. The Johnson, told them the details of the run.
70 years ago the then government of the united states instigated a black project called Buttercup. A genetic research program aimed at integrating genetic code into the human genome via viral carriers to make the population resistant to biological terrorist attacks. This project disappeared off the radar during the crash of ’29. The government forgot about it, and for whatever reason the scientists working the project didn’t start screaming out when the funding from central government stopped.
Following the 70 year rule, the CIA released documents purporting to the Buttercup project into the public domain. Saeder Krupp were keen to see if any evidence of this project still existed and were prepared to speculate 200k on the off chance that it did and that they could make use of some of the findings.
This is where the team came in.
The only evidence that the runners had that this project existed was the CIA document. But this did mention the names of the doctors who would head up the project. Ki-Rin hit the matrix and found the doctors details. Both dead. One died during the Eurowars in Belgium the other was killed during the crash of ’29. One of the doctors, William Schaefer, had a wife who was living in a retirement home in San Francisco.
The runners also looked into medical facilities around the city that could accommodate the Buttercup project because the report that they were given suggested that it may use an existing facility in San Fran. They had three set aside and would follow those leads if everything else dried up.
Heading to the retirement home the runners quickly discovered that a pair of company men was a few hours ahead of them, having already visited William Schaefer’s wife. Ki-Rin got their images up on camera, while Glyph and Ash asked the old lady a few questions. She didn’t remember much, and as her husband had worked for the government, she didn’t know very much either, but she did point the runners in the directions of one of Schaefer’s undergraduates who worked with him not long before he had died.
Ki-Rin isolated the sound feed from the surveillance cameras and determined that the company men already knew about the undergraduate.
The runners were already on the move heading out of San Francisco to get out to the undergraduates house in Sacramento CA.
Screaming into the residential area, the runners spotted the Company men’s car parked on the drive of the ex-undergraduate, a rotor drone hovered in the air above the cul-de-sac and then they saw the muzzle flash from an upstairs window. Six dropped a flash bang grenade and then a smoke grenade into the window of the house, while the rest of the team surged out of the cars to storm the building Ash and Glyph went in through the front, Ki-Rin surged round the side and to the rear of the house.
Ki-Rin marked two targets, one began to flee and as soon as he was painted up on the smartlink Six headed off in the car to head him off at the pass, the other stopped and began shooting at Ki-RIn. Between Ash and Ki-Rin the first company man was dropped, the second had got away over the fence but Ki-Rin charged through the fence and trapped him into fighting.
Ash and Glyph headed upstairs and found the ex-undergraduate bleeding, Glyph used her medkit to save his life, while Ash helped out Ki-Rin finish the fight with the company man by shooting him from one of the upstairs windows with a harpoon.
The ex-undergraduate was alive and told the runners that the other men begun to ask him about his life working for William Schaefer. He told them that they had worked together ion a place called Duckwater until the crash of 2029. The power was cut off and the people they were experimented on tried to escape. A fire started and all but him were killed. There were bigger things going on in the world, and the death of a few scientists in a secretive and forgotten science project didn’t register and the whole incident was forgotten.
Duckwater was a town in the Nevada Desert. It was until the nuclear power plant at Ruth blew creating a toxic zone across a large portion of the desert and had to be evacuated, surrendering the town to the corrupting elements.
The runners weren’t keen to head into the toxic zone but guessed that this was the best lead they had at the moment, so the team headed back to see their fixer to source chemical seals for their armour more ammo, and a bit of advice.
Five house later the runners were en-route in the helicopter, Six had remote rigged his drone van out into the toxic zone already to give them some obs. on the ground, the road was rough and Six knew that the thin polluted air would make the flight a taxing journey.
The runners flew into the toxic zone, the governmental health warnings displayed on the runners AR giving them one last warning to the dangers beyond. The polluted air quickly began to tell on the helicopter engine, surging and choking, Six did his best to manage the engine, but the buffeting was too much for Ki-Rin who was getting air sick.
The runners were 20 minutes into the flight when they were joined in the air by something. Looking like a large skeletal carrion bird with tattered leathery wings and completely lacking flesh it assayed the runners helicopter for a moment before diving into the engine ducts, using its powers to starve the engine of oxygen to bring the helicopter down. Six fought to handle the now heavy controls to bring the helicopter into a controlled landing.
Landing heavily the runners spilled out of the helicopter to attack the spirit that was attacking them.
Spirits barely notice mundane weaponry but the sheer volume of fire that the runners put into the corporeal form of the Harbinger made it think twice about being manifest, and it fled to the astral plane.
The runners were able to get the helicopter airborne again and flew the rest of the distance to the ruined town of Duckwater. A quick flyover the runners saw that the town consisted of approximately 100 buildings, most of which seemed to be residential but one building Six picked out was larger and completely demolished. They all agreed that this building was worth a closer look. The runners also saw movement on the ground, ghouls were eaking out a living amongst the spoiled remains of the land, and they were steering clear of the large demolished building.
The runners landed near the van and swapped vehicles. They headed back into town on the ground and although regarded by the ghouls, threats from Ki-Rin seemed to keep them at bay.
The runners headed across to the building and began to pick their way amongst the rubble. Six stayed in the van, rolling out a Steel Lynx in his stead. Around them, they saw flickers of movement, the heard noises, they heard a child’s voice plead a single word “Please”.
The runners didn’t know what was going on, but they headed to the source of the voice, the centre of the ruined building. Ash was picking his way through the rubble jumping at shadows.
The rest of the team found a short strip of concrete steps which led down to a fire door. The acid rain was pooling at the foot of the stairs and the bottom of the door was mostly rotted away. Ki-Rin kicked the door down and Six (the Steel Lynx) Ki-Rin and Glyph made their way though into a short corridor, Ash was convinced that they were going to get ambushed from the rear and remained on guard near the steps.
There were Six doors off the corridor and the runners quickly checked the rooms. They found some kind of nest with discarded bones that the runners assumed were that of Ghouls. The sixth room they found computers, files and data tapes, a lot of them were rotting away in the acidic atmosphere.
Glyph was the first into the room and she heard the pleading voice again behind her. A large Naga rose up behind her using it’s mimicry to lure its food to it’s nest. It lashed out, and the rest of the nest came out of the walls and through the vents to kill. The nest of Naga has become lazy and complacent, more used to hunting sluggish Ghouls rather than wired shadowrunners and they were all slain quickly. Ash received a bite though and the toxic tainted Naga pumped venom into his system before being taken down by the Steel Lynx’s gun.
The runners were keen to get out of the toxic zone and quickly bundled up the files, computers and hard copies into the back of Six’s van, and they left. The drive out of the toxic zone was a long and arduous one, but it passed off uneventfully, and the runners headed back to San Francisco once they had spent a bit of time in a jet wash.
Ash headed off to see Mal who treated the Naga venom, (although he had to cross his fingers that the linctus he gave his patient would combat the toxic corruption too) They were going to make an impression on the Mr. Johnson from Saeder Krupp, and while Ash sought medical help, the rest of the team stayed up through the night sorting filing and cataloguing the information. The runners met up with Mr. J. the next day and he was happy to pay the runners, confident that the Saeder Krupp reputation for dealing with defaulting Shadowrunners would ensure he got what he wanted.
The runners left happy. Saeder Krupp got what they wanted and the Mr. Johnson was equally happy. Maybe the runners had found a corporation they could work for?
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Six's blog, Scavenger hunt.
By N.Barnes
Call Dir: Shadownet/ShadowlandsBBS/>
Select Region: Region=SanFrancisco>
Call SubDir: SanFrancisco/WeBlogs>
Select Blog: Author=V.Six>
Initializing…>
Entry 29: 28.09.70>
From the sublime to the ridiculous – I can’t believe what Glyph and I just put ourselves through for the good of Brutal Deluxe. I’m whacked!
So yeah, Brutal Deluxe - long story. This time the call came in from a man called Milan offering 250k for a brief sally on to the streets of San Fran.
I was interested but Glyph was the only one of the team free to join me and we soon found out we were outnumbered. Two other Shadowrunning teams were at the meet and it quickly became obvious that this was far from run of the mill. Each team had to register itself with Milan, which is where Glyph decided to christen us Brutal Deluxe, and was then given a shopping list.
Each item on the list had a points value and each team had three and a half hours to collect as many items from the shopping list as possible. At the end of the night, the team with the most points would win the 250k.
The teams blazed and I got vehicles on to the road via remote as we began calling down favours. Our strategy was to go for the biggest points first and then pick up what else we could incidentally. I blazed to the San Fran Giants stadium and we spotted a grid guide camera en route which we liberated to notch up our first point! At the Giants, Glyph diverted off to pick up some cats for a later item while I laid it on thick that I needed the First Base for a charity fundraiser. The manager swallowed it hook, line and sinker. I got the base, signed by the entire first team, a pair of box seat tickets for the match against the Padre’s and a cheque for 100k. The blag had been good but it was getting out of my control and I needed an out from this hairy situation fast. Feeling slightly guilty, I contacted the legitimate charity to collect the 100k and then, explaining that my charity treasure hunt was against the clock, I got the funk out of Dodge with the First Base and five guaranteed points.
I paid honest money for 50 gallons of AvGas and remoted one of the vehicles down to the airfield so it could be loaded up and that was our seventh point in the bag. I thought Papa could source a pre-grid guide car and called in a favour there, though that one never came off, and then begged Nunz to ‘liberate’ a Yakuza finger for me. I figured that with his Mafia connections there would be some coup to count against the Orientals but Nunz wasn’t playing ball. I could cough up ten large to pay for a hit or get the damn finger myself. I figured I had to speculate to accumulate and put my hand in my wallet again to secure two more points.
Snow proved willing to lend Glyph and I a Panther Assault Cannon for a test firing and we met there. Glyph had the transit full of half-feral rescue cats and it didn’t look as though she’d had a pleasant journey. The whole debacle was lunacy but Snow was able to shed some light on Milan’s bizarre game. Seems the treasure hunt is Corp-financed and allows Milan to put fledgling Shadowrunning teams through a dry run and test their resourcefulness. With our Rep and possible future contracts on the line, we redoubled our efforts for the sake of the whole team.
We took the Panther Assault Cannon out to the Barrens. We needed a spent shell casing to earn our tenth point and there were bonus points available if the shell had been fired at us. We had no intention of risking anyone else shooting at us so we set it all up. Glyph fired and recorded a POV film of the shot while I concentrated on jumping aside just before the shell hit.
It took us a couple of tries but we pulled it off and headed back to Snow in high spirits.
Continues: 1/2>
|| >
En route, I realised that an RFID tag in the grid guide camera we had first pinched had attracted Lone Star’s attention. I called in another favour, this time from Bumfluff and between the two of us we managed to get away from the cops long enough to burn the tag. Seeing Lone Star reminded us that we might get some joy from Croner and sure enough he was game. We were going to have to put our hands in our pockets again but he could help us out with a couple of items on our shopping list.
From Snow, we went to the Municipal Waterworks and cut free the door for another point before loading Glyph’s rescue cats into the helicopter and heading for our next target. There were five points riding on rearranging the letters on a corporate building to say something rude, with bonus points for targeting an A, AA or AAA firm. We wanted to combine this with an item demanding we leave a dozen cats in a CEO’s office and that made this at least a seven pointer, plus bonuses. I’d realised that Mitsuhama was a perfect anagram of u_shit_Mama and we identified a small depot that would fit the bill.
Landing on the rooftop, we bailed out the cats and Glyph rappelled over the side of the building and got to work. She soon attracted the attention of the Rentacops so I bought the vehicle mounted weaponry into play to cover her ass and drop the opposition. Needless to say, that only attracted more attention and though Glyph was working like a Trojan, we soon had a Citymaster full of CorpSec en route. With Mitsuhama rechristened u_shit_Mama we moved to phase two, located the CEO’s office and started lobbing mangy feral cats in through the window. CorpSec appeared and the vehicle weaponry was called into use again while Glyph and I finished up and hightailed it in the chopper.
Time was running short so we headed to Lone Star and coughed up the cash for a set of Lone Star rims and a uniform shoulder patch. We struck lucky and spotted a ganger in the holding cells who sold us his jacket which took our tally for that encounter to four plus any bonuses we picked up for the rank of the shoulder patch.
Glyph wanted to stop for at least one more item but I was twitchy. By now I had four vehicles on remote, each carrying valuable points-paying cargo and I knew that if just one of them didn’t get to the meet by 11pm we would forfeit the whole game. I called it, took the gamble that we had done enough and we blazed. Fortunately, I was proven right. We dragged our haul into the meet to find we had been beaten back by both of the other teams. It didn’t matter though, we were back before Milan and that meant our points would all count. He did the totting up and announced the Brutal Deluxe total of 27 points as the winning score and by some margin! Result!
We’d coughed up the best part of 30 large between us but still earned 110k a piece, to say nothing of the boost to our Rep and the potential contracts Milan might now poke in our direction. It’s clearly time for a well-earned break though so Kitty and I are off to Paris for a romantic week away – our first visit to Europe. Back soon!
Mood: High as a kite!
Ends: 2/2>
||
Call Dir: Shadownet/ShadowlandsBBS/>
Select Region: Region=SanFrancisco>
Call SubDir: SanFrancisco/WeBlogs>
Select Blog: Author=V.Six>
Initializing…>
Entry 29: 28.09.70>
From the sublime to the ridiculous – I can’t believe what Glyph and I just put ourselves through for the good of Brutal Deluxe. I’m whacked!
So yeah, Brutal Deluxe - long story. This time the call came in from a man called Milan offering 250k for a brief sally on to the streets of San Fran.
I was interested but Glyph was the only one of the team free to join me and we soon found out we were outnumbered. Two other Shadowrunning teams were at the meet and it quickly became obvious that this was far from run of the mill. Each team had to register itself with Milan, which is where Glyph decided to christen us Brutal Deluxe, and was then given a shopping list.
Each item on the list had a points value and each team had three and a half hours to collect as many items from the shopping list as possible. At the end of the night, the team with the most points would win the 250k.
The teams blazed and I got vehicles on to the road via remote as we began calling down favours. Our strategy was to go for the biggest points first and then pick up what else we could incidentally. I blazed to the San Fran Giants stadium and we spotted a grid guide camera en route which we liberated to notch up our first point! At the Giants, Glyph diverted off to pick up some cats for a later item while I laid it on thick that I needed the First Base for a charity fundraiser. The manager swallowed it hook, line and sinker. I got the base, signed by the entire first team, a pair of box seat tickets for the match against the Padre’s and a cheque for 100k. The blag had been good but it was getting out of my control and I needed an out from this hairy situation fast. Feeling slightly guilty, I contacted the legitimate charity to collect the 100k and then, explaining that my charity treasure hunt was against the clock, I got the funk out of Dodge with the First Base and five guaranteed points.
I paid honest money for 50 gallons of AvGas and remoted one of the vehicles down to the airfield so it could be loaded up and that was our seventh point in the bag. I thought Papa could source a pre-grid guide car and called in a favour there, though that one never came off, and then begged Nunz to ‘liberate’ a Yakuza finger for me. I figured that with his Mafia connections there would be some coup to count against the Orientals but Nunz wasn’t playing ball. I could cough up ten large to pay for a hit or get the damn finger myself. I figured I had to speculate to accumulate and put my hand in my wallet again to secure two more points.
Snow proved willing to lend Glyph and I a Panther Assault Cannon for a test firing and we met there. Glyph had the transit full of half-feral rescue cats and it didn’t look as though she’d had a pleasant journey. The whole debacle was lunacy but Snow was able to shed some light on Milan’s bizarre game. Seems the treasure hunt is Corp-financed and allows Milan to put fledgling Shadowrunning teams through a dry run and test their resourcefulness. With our Rep and possible future contracts on the line, we redoubled our efforts for the sake of the whole team.
We took the Panther Assault Cannon out to the Barrens. We needed a spent shell casing to earn our tenth point and there were bonus points available if the shell had been fired at us. We had no intention of risking anyone else shooting at us so we set it all up. Glyph fired and recorded a POV film of the shot while I concentrated on jumping aside just before the shell hit.
It took us a couple of tries but we pulled it off and headed back to Snow in high spirits.
Continues: 1/2>
|| >
En route, I realised that an RFID tag in the grid guide camera we had first pinched had attracted Lone Star’s attention. I called in another favour, this time from Bumfluff and between the two of us we managed to get away from the cops long enough to burn the tag. Seeing Lone Star reminded us that we might get some joy from Croner and sure enough he was game. We were going to have to put our hands in our pockets again but he could help us out with a couple of items on our shopping list.
From Snow, we went to the Municipal Waterworks and cut free the door for another point before loading Glyph’s rescue cats into the helicopter and heading for our next target. There were five points riding on rearranging the letters on a corporate building to say something rude, with bonus points for targeting an A, AA or AAA firm. We wanted to combine this with an item demanding we leave a dozen cats in a CEO’s office and that made this at least a seven pointer, plus bonuses. I’d realised that Mitsuhama was a perfect anagram of u_shit_Mama and we identified a small depot that would fit the bill.
Landing on the rooftop, we bailed out the cats and Glyph rappelled over the side of the building and got to work. She soon attracted the attention of the Rentacops so I bought the vehicle mounted weaponry into play to cover her ass and drop the opposition. Needless to say, that only attracted more attention and though Glyph was working like a Trojan, we soon had a Citymaster full of CorpSec en route. With Mitsuhama rechristened u_shit_Mama we moved to phase two, located the CEO’s office and started lobbing mangy feral cats in through the window. CorpSec appeared and the vehicle weaponry was called into use again while Glyph and I finished up and hightailed it in the chopper.
Time was running short so we headed to Lone Star and coughed up the cash for a set of Lone Star rims and a uniform shoulder patch. We struck lucky and spotted a ganger in the holding cells who sold us his jacket which took our tally for that encounter to four plus any bonuses we picked up for the rank of the shoulder patch.
Glyph wanted to stop for at least one more item but I was twitchy. By now I had four vehicles on remote, each carrying valuable points-paying cargo and I knew that if just one of them didn’t get to the meet by 11pm we would forfeit the whole game. I called it, took the gamble that we had done enough and we blazed. Fortunately, I was proven right. We dragged our haul into the meet to find we had been beaten back by both of the other teams. It didn’t matter though, we were back before Milan and that meant our points would all count. He did the totting up and announced the Brutal Deluxe total of 27 points as the winning score and by some margin! Result!
We’d coughed up the best part of 30 large between us but still earned 110k a piece, to say nothing of the boost to our Rep and the potential contracts Milan might now poke in our direction. It’s clearly time for a well-earned break though so Kitty and I are off to Paris for a romantic week away – our first visit to Europe. Back soon!
Mood: High as a kite!
Ends: 2/2>
||
six's blog. Eleven nameless men
By N.Barnes
Call Dir: Shadownet/ShadowlandsBBS/>
Select Region: Region=SanFrancisco>
Call SubDir: SanFrancisco/WeBlogs>
Select Blog: Author=V.Six>
Initializing…>
Entry 28: 18.09.70>
I just made it back from the briefest run of my career – there’s something pleasantly pre-ordained about spotting the wet work target you’ve just been set, sitting about five feet behind the Johnson doing the hiring!
I picked up a call from a man called Donovan who had been pointed in our direction by Lone Star pragmatist Croner. We met at a waterfront café and Donovan announced he represented an international business cabal called the Eleven Nameless Men. They pride themselves on their anonymity and the power that gives them to manipulate the Stock Markets. Unfortunately, their identities had been compromised and an assassin had begun systematically taking them out. With two dead, the remaining Nameless Men wanted the assassin stopped and his employer identified before anymore bodies hit the floor.
Donovan claimed to be an unknown factor, working as a go-between for the Eleven but otherwise unconnected to them. However, Ki-Rinn spotted someone at a nearby table paying a bit too much attention to our meet. He was concerned enough to run a Matrix sweep on the man and turned up that he was French ex-military, Special Forces and dishonourably discharged for mental instability. His poor surveillance skills had made him our Prime Suspect and we resolved to keep him in our sights until his guilt or innocence could be confirmed.
I began remoting vehicles into position, while Glyph went off to meet Croner and check out the police reports on the two deaths. Ki-rinn kept tabs on our man while I pulled a quick vehicle switch to give us an unmarked tail we could use on him. Glyph was soon back in touch with details of a magical ‘bent’ to the assassinations and a unique orichalcum bullet that had been used. Orichalcum bullets had to be hand-made – if Frenchie had made them himself we were fried but Glyph had spotted an engraved ‘A’ on each bullet and that led Ki-rinn to a Weaponsmith called Apollo though we knew he wouldn’t be too forthcoming about his clients.
Our mark was being far too relaxed – going about his daily commute with all the innocence of the other tram passengers and that was getting K and I twitchy. Either we were in danger of losing our man, or we were wasting time on an innocent bystander. We decided to ask him directly and at the next stop I blocked the tram so Ki-rinn could board it and take our target out.
As he surged aboard, I saw the driver reach for an alarm and had plugged him before I’d really thought about what I was doing. That bought Lone Star down on us and it was only good preparation that meant I was equipped to deal with them. Using the Antioch, I slammed a FlashBang through the windscreen on the Patrol One to take out the cops inside. Out of control, the Patrol One careened toward innocent bystanders and I couldn’t face having that on my conscience. The next grenade had to be precisely planted but I got it under the front off-side and the blast knocked the car to one side where it crashed harmlessly.
Ki-rinn bundled Frenchie into the van and we hightailed it. I left the subsequent interrogation to Frosty and Glyph but the guy was stone cold and they weren’t getting a peep out of him. Ki-rinn hit the matrix again, checking back on Frenchie’s first arrival in San Fran. From there it was a fairly routine sweep to track him through to his accommodation and we headed there to see if we could turn up any evidence.
Continues: 1/2>
|| >
I made damn sure our slippery customer would still be present and correct when we returned to the van and then we headed inside. We didn’t have an apartment number and my smart mouth soon got me in trouble with a redneck nationalist who didn’t like the idea that I might know someone from another country. Glyph and Ki-rinn’s speedy trigger fingers dealt with that problem and Frosty got lucky with the B&E.
Frenchie had photographs of eleven people we assumed were the Nameless, a custom sniper rifle, a box of orichalcum bullets and some sort of ritual magic thing going on, using blood on the bullet and on the photographs to defeat his targets magical defences. Ki-rinn was able to hack Frenchie’s Commlink and that allowed us to piece together who his employers were and what the Eleven had done to piss them off in the first place.
And that, was pretty much that. We dealt with Frenchie, passed on the info to Donovan and even got a little extra cash from the Eleven because we were able to warn them how their magical defences were being bypassed. Talk about sweet.
Mood: Job done.
Ends: 2/2>
||
Call Dir: Shadownet/ShadowlandsBBS/>
Select Region: Region=SanFrancisco>
Call SubDir: SanFrancisco/WeBlogs>
Select Blog: Author=V.Six>
Initializing…>
Entry 28: 18.09.70>
I just made it back from the briefest run of my career – there’s something pleasantly pre-ordained about spotting the wet work target you’ve just been set, sitting about five feet behind the Johnson doing the hiring!
I picked up a call from a man called Donovan who had been pointed in our direction by Lone Star pragmatist Croner. We met at a waterfront café and Donovan announced he represented an international business cabal called the Eleven Nameless Men. They pride themselves on their anonymity and the power that gives them to manipulate the Stock Markets. Unfortunately, their identities had been compromised and an assassin had begun systematically taking them out. With two dead, the remaining Nameless Men wanted the assassin stopped and his employer identified before anymore bodies hit the floor.
Donovan claimed to be an unknown factor, working as a go-between for the Eleven but otherwise unconnected to them. However, Ki-Rinn spotted someone at a nearby table paying a bit too much attention to our meet. He was concerned enough to run a Matrix sweep on the man and turned up that he was French ex-military, Special Forces and dishonourably discharged for mental instability. His poor surveillance skills had made him our Prime Suspect and we resolved to keep him in our sights until his guilt or innocence could be confirmed.
I began remoting vehicles into position, while Glyph went off to meet Croner and check out the police reports on the two deaths. Ki-rinn kept tabs on our man while I pulled a quick vehicle switch to give us an unmarked tail we could use on him. Glyph was soon back in touch with details of a magical ‘bent’ to the assassinations and a unique orichalcum bullet that had been used. Orichalcum bullets had to be hand-made – if Frenchie had made them himself we were fried but Glyph had spotted an engraved ‘A’ on each bullet and that led Ki-rinn to a Weaponsmith called Apollo though we knew he wouldn’t be too forthcoming about his clients.
Our mark was being far too relaxed – going about his daily commute with all the innocence of the other tram passengers and that was getting K and I twitchy. Either we were in danger of losing our man, or we were wasting time on an innocent bystander. We decided to ask him directly and at the next stop I blocked the tram so Ki-rinn could board it and take our target out.
As he surged aboard, I saw the driver reach for an alarm and had plugged him before I’d really thought about what I was doing. That bought Lone Star down on us and it was only good preparation that meant I was equipped to deal with them. Using the Antioch, I slammed a FlashBang through the windscreen on the Patrol One to take out the cops inside. Out of control, the Patrol One careened toward innocent bystanders and I couldn’t face having that on my conscience. The next grenade had to be precisely planted but I got it under the front off-side and the blast knocked the car to one side where it crashed harmlessly.
Ki-rinn bundled Frenchie into the van and we hightailed it. I left the subsequent interrogation to Frosty and Glyph but the guy was stone cold and they weren’t getting a peep out of him. Ki-rinn hit the matrix again, checking back on Frenchie’s first arrival in San Fran. From there it was a fairly routine sweep to track him through to his accommodation and we headed there to see if we could turn up any evidence.
Continues: 1/2>
|| >
I made damn sure our slippery customer would still be present and correct when we returned to the van and then we headed inside. We didn’t have an apartment number and my smart mouth soon got me in trouble with a redneck nationalist who didn’t like the idea that I might know someone from another country. Glyph and Ki-rinn’s speedy trigger fingers dealt with that problem and Frosty got lucky with the B&E.
Frenchie had photographs of eleven people we assumed were the Nameless, a custom sniper rifle, a box of orichalcum bullets and some sort of ritual magic thing going on, using blood on the bullet and on the photographs to defeat his targets magical defences. Ki-rinn was able to hack Frenchie’s Commlink and that allowed us to piece together who his employers were and what the Eleven had done to piss them off in the first place.
And that, was pretty much that. We dealt with Frenchie, passed on the info to Donovan and even got a little extra cash from the Eleven because we were able to warn them how their magical defences were being bypassed. Talk about sweet.
Mood: Job done.
Ends: 2/2>
||
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