starpuck Posted February 28, 2017 Report Share Posted February 28, 2017 To User Group: Hide and Seekers Message: You call the shots Cap'. I'll pull my end of the job. Just say what needs what. And for what its worth, I agree on the subtle outside looking in until we're ready to actually move on some info. But info first. Speaking of. I might have someone that can give us some more of that- but... gotta work some charms to get her. I'll keep you in the loop. ----------------------------- To user: Green Hornet Message: It's... well, it is what it is. You'd be drop jawed at the crew I got for this job. I'll have to tell you about it some time. Old fuddy primp and preen Elf in it. Name's Vintage. He's got his eyes down his nose at all of us, not that I can totally blame him. But I'd love to find some dirty scoop on him just to knock him down a peg. Or threaten it at any rate. Thanks for the tip. Any guess as to where I can best find her ... say, oh, in the next few hours? You know how Rook is, always chomping at the bit for some speed and action. And yeah yeah, I'll do more than skim the dossier in a minute! I'm lazy. ------------------------------ To User: Vintage Attachment: Reese Frenzy - Rough, Rowdy & Rebellious Message: Huh! Call me intrigued. I'll be there- - -should be there. Just need to check into something first. Hope you don't mind putting business first. Not that what you have isn't business related, but I got a timetable on my side of things. I'll reserve judgement on your cool factor for /after/ the drinks. Morrighan managed all of this while effortlessly weaving Rook through the streets. She had a little bit of time to kill before any info came back on where to look for Ms Hongo. If it was a straight race between Rook and another party, she'd have no concerns about the outcome, but she had to do some digging first. As the bike moaned beneath her, she took the time to flip through the info that Green Hornet gave her. He was usually pretty good on the details, it was just a matter of distance and timing. She tsked softly as she reached a hand back behind her, running it over the smooth black panel of her ride. "Looks like you're getting all manner of threesomes tonight. Well, with any luck that is. This Hongo better not LOOK like her name sounds." 3 Quote Level 83 ~*~ Ranger Deviant Art Gallery || YouTube Channel Current Challenge "It is difficult. All things worth keeping are." Thane Krios - Mass Effect 2 "Maybe it's not as simple as you imagined, Seeker." Varric Tethras Dragon Age 2 "Staying within your limits is no fun, Ryder." Vetra Nyx - ME: Andromeda Spoiler ::PAST CHALLENGES:: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 43 | 44 | NEIN | 45 | 46 | 47 | 48| 49 | 50 | 51 | 52 | 53 | 54 | 55 | 56 | 57 | 58 | 59 | 60 | 61 62 | 63 | 64 | 65 | 66 | 67 | 68 | 69 | 70 | 71 | 72 | 73 | 74 | 75 | 76 | 77 | 77.5 | 78 | 79 | 80 | 81 82 | 83 | 84 | 85 | 86 | 87 | 88 | 89 | 90 | 91 | 92 | 93 | 94 | 95 | 96 | 97 | 98 | 99 | 100 Link to comment
Wild Wolf Posted March 1, 2017 Report Share Posted March 1, 2017 Part 1 To User: Druss Message: Hey there Hotshot. I know you didn't mean to start a riot back there at Johnny's, but this is how things work here and the deck is stacked against us. Don't blame yourself too hard over what happened, just remember to think twice before saying or doing anything next time. Gotta think several moves forward to stay ahead in the game. Reply> To User: Vintage Message: Thanks for the tips, Vin. I'll make sure to use more caution next time. I'm not a fan of those fraggin drones and I let my dislike overtake rational thought. I'm not one for Chess but I gotcha covered in the long run, Vin. Send>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From User: KatTom808 Hey Harasser, chatter on the street is you’re up to your old trouble causing way. Lemme guess, a drone popped in front of you, and you went all blender-mode without thinking about the cameras?? You’re in luck, you looked excellent in front of the cameras and your instincts were spot on. It was also too embarrassing for the corps to have threatened a former UB player, so you’re not getting any play except in hand-recorded vids being passed around this side of the bay. About your cat, man, this is how you’re paying the bills after UB? Can’t fault a man for hustling. But you need street level chatter Druss. I know you’ve been having a rough go of it professionally since the league gave you the boot, and it’s been weird with your fans not knowing if you were doping or if you got shafted. If you wanna clean up some of that karma that’s been dogging you, you might check into the crucible. The adepts on the street can be fairly closed to outsiders, too much prejudice and hurt. They tend to do their job and keep quiet about their abilities, doesn’t pay to admit you got magic flowing through you. The guys the crucible are a mix of free running couriers and street gang muscle. It was an open secret that the Terminators had some Yak money behind them, but that won’t hurt you there. A few Shatei put in time there too, and there’s a general peace agreement for any street muscle that comes in, enforced by the Wolves toughs that run the joint. Show up, ask for Warbeard, and then it’s up to you to impress them. I don’t wanna know what you have cooking, but I know a guy like you always has a deal running, and you’ll always make good for Orklands. If you need news off the streets, you gotta make good with these guys first. ___________________________________________________________________________________________ Reply> To User: KatTom808 Message: KT! It's good to hear from you, omae. That's swag news considering I just got my ass chewed by this squishy older elf. He's been in the game as long as I've been alive, probably, but I'll have to let him know that corporate aint doing shitall about it. *Druss smiled at the thought of mentioning this to Vintage later on* Yeah...it's not my finest moment, but I have to rebuild my reputation, KT. And I gotta find that cat. This aint no pet detective movie, omae. My true fans know the real story about what happened. I definitely wasn't doping. So what if I was born with a gift? These chromed out breeders get to enhance themselves with cyberware...and I'M the one kicked out of the League. Frag that. Warbeard.. I've heard of him. I think he used to be a UB baller back in the day if it's the same chummer I'm thinking of? I aint got anything else to do except find this pussy and do right by my team, so I'll go check out the gym. The Forge is what it's called? Can you send me the coordinates? Thanks for your help, KT. I'll update you later on how my "interview" goes... Send>> From User: ThousandEyes Druss-kun, good to hear from you greenie. I’d love to help you on this cat caper you described for me, but it sounds well above my paygrade man. It’s an open secret that the arcologies are a way to get some labor out of us metahumans without having us dirty the precious streets of Frisco. Someone hiring you to bust into an arcology in Oakland, this week? No, I’m not gonna say nothing, I’d like to keep the rest of my fingers. For what it’s worth, there’s a truck that runs through McClymonds and the low bottoms. Leaves out of Shiapet around midnight on Tuesdays and Thursdays, sticks to Low Bottoms, Acorn, maybe as far north as McClymond or Hoover Foster.. You follow that truck, you’ll get an idea what you’re playing with. Only thing is, you follow that truck, you’re going to be walking across enough turfs at the wrong time of night, you’re gonna have a problem if you’re on the streets Reply> To User: Thousand Eyes Message: Well I guess I'm in luck since it's already Thursday morning, huh? This is all good info, thank you. I knew I could rely on you, omae. I'll see what I can do about locating that truck tonight and getting a jump on what and who we're dealing with. I appreciate the sentiment of looking out for me Thousand Eyes, but I think I'll be ok out there. I am the "Hero of Orklands" after all. Send>> Druss pondered the messages and began to work a strategy for the evening. The Forge was a must. Maybe not even so much for the info he could pull but just a place to let loose and not worry about being condemned for being an adept with damn near the ability to go super speed. He would prove his self to this Warbeard chummer. But Druss couldn't delay any-he needed to make sure to catch that truck leaving out of Shiapet or catch it somewhere in the Low Bottoms His phone buzzed twice and a message displayed across the screen: Coordinates: 37.80497, -122.2906, The Forge- Elite Adept Gym And with that, the former UB champion threw up his grey hood and set out to towards the gym. Despite being praised for his work done at Johnny's, Druss ultimately needed to keep his head down. To be continued.... _______________________________________________________________________________ I'll get into the juicy stuff later today but I wanted to go ahead and cover the messages On 2/24/2017 at 5:40 PM, Laghail said: For the second one, that can be a series of diplomacy/intimidation street encounters as you chat with the gangs and get gang passes to clear up any problems you might have running across west Oakland after midnight. Or, get your free running game, athletics and adept powers, and stay high and above it all roof to roof. Or both. You shouldn’t have problems with Wolves or Hecate turf as long as you wow the crap out of them in the first half. So for my intimidation rolls, that's my charisma (5) + intimidation (1) + Bruiser (+2 for intimidation) = 8 dice? Wolf 4 Quote Wild Wolf Class: Peerless Scarred/ Height: 6'2 / Weight: 188# Instagram: @ryanwolfbell / Facebook: Ryan Wolf Bell / Bible App (YouVersion) Ryan Wolf Bell Current Challenge: Intro to Wolflean Spoiler Last Challenge(s): 1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/9/10/11/12/13/14/15/16 Epic Challenges: Welcome to the Fireteam & Wolfpool Gotham Project: 1 " Know, O prince, that once the sun burns out and the earth's core becomes solid and cold, there will come a man to provide the endless energy needed to sustain life and for the planets to keep moving. He is the source of light and the warmth of hope back into the hearts of humanity...." - Dark_Raider A wolf rises in my heart; against my darkness; against my demons; against my despair. I DECLARE WAR! Romans 8:28 (CSB) We know that all things work together for the good of those who love God, who are called according to His purpose. Link to comment
Laghail Posted March 1, 2017 Author Report Share Posted March 1, 2017 8 hours ago, Wild Wolf said: _______________________________________________________________________________ So for my intimidation rolls, that's my charisma (5) + intimidation (1) + Bruiser (+2 for intimidation) = 8 dice? OOC: yup, roll 8 dice, and add a 9th as a situational modifier (explanation below) and report how many came up 5 and 6. But this should probably happen after you wrangle the gym scene. In game, it's roughly 1am Thursday morning so, in game, your character has the day to press flesh if he wanted to smooth over relations with 7/9 gangs in west Oakland, before the truck leaves Thursday night. Per the info you already got, the two large gangs in blue (Wolves) and pink (Hecate) on the map are already cool with druss if he wows the folks at the forge. Lets also give druss a free pass on the yellow gang (X-men) because he was fighting with them in the opening scene at the bar, and a free pass on the two rangers gangs, because duh, rangers. Leaving 4 gangs with turf along the 980: Bloody Trogs, Manslayers, Hellions, Stonewall Avengers. Make a roll for street diplomacy (intimidation) for each of the four gangs, but that situational modifier +1 applies to diplomacy with the bloody trogs (Troll gang, they like your green skin) and the manslayers (same). For any roll where you get below 4 hits (remember, a hit is one dice coming up 5 or 6), gimme an athletics roll to represent druss having to sneak or ninja across the rooftops while keeping eyes on his target. 3 Quote Level 38 [Raveling Bard] Link to comment
Laghail Posted March 2, 2017 Author Report Share Posted March 2, 2017 Kaanta Cock-A-Doodle Café, 719 Washington St, Oakland, CA 94607 Although enquiring minds wonder, how you spent the last several hours, midnight comes and finds you inserted deep in the warm embrace - of the café network system. Yes, only you could manage to spend half the night at an adult venue and find yourself repairing the cafe's hardwired matrix setup. It started as a few simple requests from Jun, "hey kaanta honey, don't bother paying for that expensive dinner of almost real tasting soy-kebabs, maybe just have a look at Big Dai's tablet when you're done?" And with your stomach to trap you in the verbal contract, you're surfing the matrix old school on a actual hand held tablet, like you're some kind of 2017 savage. Apparently Big Dai forgot everything you told him last time and you had to wipe and reinstall his OS from a copy you pulled out of your ass. Well, almost. Thank god you can broadcast from your cyber leg data cache and aren't forced to use a link cable, else drek would get real awkward, real fast. Using your link to the device with it's hardwire to the matrix, you're able to refresh your AR feed and receive the messages below, but you obviously also ripped a copy of the staff schedule to keep tabs on your favorite performers. You know, business reasons. From user: Abdul - Hey Chimp, I surprised myself and felt like digging around after I got home. I ran those vid stills you sent me of that cat in the lab, and I got no scratch on the pussy, but that's Union Square Garage. You're an out of towner, so I'll save you the Wikipedia fees to research it yourself - it's this utopian multi-corporate sponsored research facility. Renraku opened it right after occupation ended as a goodwill gesture, and event got MCT and Shiawase in on the banner come ribbon cutting day. It was supposed to be a sign of new things to come, out with the old Imperial Japanese regime, in with the benevolent corps. What a load. It's turned out to be a multi-corporate barracks and weapons research lab. Anytime something is driving or fly across the Bay to even the kill score in San Fran's favor, you can guess the bullets and drones were built here. I ran the metadata against their publicity stills and public vids from the tour grand opening. It looks like this vid was shot in the biolab, but remember, they don't have a medical wing. The biolab is where they engineer some of the better grade teargasses that every orkland resident has come to know and love. I'm not getting into anything that'll piss the Kyodai off, but if I had to find a cat that's the property of three triple A's, and I had to do it before this weekend, you can bet your furry hoop I'd want any info from that lab before I go near a biolab cat. Not without a hazmat suit. 4 Quote Level 38 [Raveling Bard] Link to comment
Broba Fett Posted March 2, 2017 Report Share Posted March 2, 2017 *The following message is sent just after Pendergast awakens from his astral plane adventure at midnight.* COMPOSE: Hiders and Seekers: All - I've been tipped off that a woman named Ren Hongo may have information that will help us out dramatically. However, she needs to be extracted from her current situation and taken underground to get away from a prison/death sentence she doesn't yet know is coming. This needs to happen in the next couple hours. I can likely do the talking but I'll need some help getting her out. Anyone available? If so, meet me back at San Cha bar before 0045. -P Pendergast showers quickly, changes into a fresh suit, brews a cup of tea to help him stay awake, and motors off back towards San Cha in his Shiawase sports car. (OOC: @starpuck and anyone else who wants to tag along, RP meeting Pendergast at San Cha and let's rock and roll) 4 Quote Spoiler Currently... Playing (Video Game): RDR2 DMing: Tyranny of Dragons. First session 11/29. Broba Fett tracks em down. Facebook (Personal) Facebook (Author Page) Past Challenges: 13,12,11,10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 Link to comment
Volki Posted March 2, 2017 Report Share Posted March 2, 2017 Message Reply>> Abdul Dude! That's why you are the shit Abdul, I don't care what Dranon says about you man! I owe you a fresh ork squish when this is over, or whatever you are into these days. I will send out the info and ask around about Union Square Garage. Hey man let me know when you have some more of that purple Buddha laying around so we can celebrate. Hey also let Dranon know I got the relay set up in Big Dai's tablet. Tell him to reach out to me when he wants me forward the info, I have it saving under my alias CommVault account. It will be only a matter of time before Big Dai fucks it up again with his weird fetish porn viruses so he better act quick. Alright man keep reppin and I'll be in touch. -K Message To: Pussy Patrol(group/shadowrun357) Hey everyone I just got word that the cat footage came from Union Square Garage, I'm finishing up a few things then I'll be over to the San Chan to help out. Hey I'll see if I can drag up a home coordinate for this chick and maybe we can get to her before the bacon shows up. Either way I'll be there soon. -K Kaanta walks out of the Cock-A-Doodle Café still smelling like stripper oil and purple Buddha but even that is beginning to fade as the adrenaline begins to kick in. Nothing could make the night better than screwing over the cops and saving a chick. Who knows, maybe she will be so grateful she'd want to take a spin on the K train. He walks down the sidewalk in the general direction of San Chan. He spots a taxi parked and unattended, maybe if I get into the taxi database I can look up and see if she caught a ride home anytime soon. Also I need to get into the nearest traffic camera so I can scan for any incoming police headed for her location. Maybe if I'm lucky I will catch something. Kaanta pops the lock of the taxi with the ease of years running petty theft jobs for the yaks until he earned his rank. OOC: I will roll to see if I hack the taxi system as well as the traffic cams in order to check on the police and find out when Ren Hongo lives. If I find anything I will forward the feeds to everyone. (Rolled 14 1d6 for hacking the Taxi database Got 6 hits of 5 or 6 out of the 14 which was a success! Success narrative coming soon. Rolled the same for the Traffic cams Got one damn hit out of 14!! terrible, just terrible. I blew my digital hacking load on the first hacking attempt apparently. Utter failure narrative coming soon too) 5 Quote Link to comment
starpuck Posted March 2, 2017 Report Share Posted March 2, 2017 [Just a quick reply to @Broba Fett] To group: Hiders and Seekers Message: I got a tip on the same name. Pendergast, I'm in and on it. I'll head back and meet up with you. I can get her out. Provided she's not a freaking huge girl or a serial crusher. Less bodies in on this bit the better, probably. Unless we need some to run block and distract. But I just drive Well ... "talk" also, but typically when it gets to arguments that words fail. 4 Quote Level 83 ~*~ Ranger Deviant Art Gallery || YouTube Channel Current Challenge "It is difficult. All things worth keeping are." Thane Krios - Mass Effect 2 "Maybe it's not as simple as you imagined, Seeker." Varric Tethras Dragon Age 2 "Staying within your limits is no fun, Ryder." Vetra Nyx - ME: Andromeda Spoiler ::PAST CHALLENGES:: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 43 | 44 | NEIN | 45 | 46 | 47 | 48| 49 | 50 | 51 | 52 | 53 | 54 | 55 | 56 | 57 | 58 | 59 | 60 | 61 62 | 63 | 64 | 65 | 66 | 67 | 68 | 69 | 70 | 71 | 72 | 73 | 74 | 75 | 76 | 77 | 77.5 | 78 | 79 | 80 | 81 82 | 83 | 84 | 85 | 86 | 87 | 88 | 89 | 90 | 91 | 92 | 93 | 94 | 95 | 96 | 97 | 98 | 99 | 100 Link to comment
DarK_RaideR Posted March 2, 2017 Report Share Posted March 2, 2017 Already home by now, Vintage takes off the suit and leaves it in a hanger resting on some nail protruding from the wall. Long gone are the days of corporate-sponsored lofts, dead along with his former self. Well, technically he's been declared missing since whoever bothered to check only found an opened cryotube, but his accounts and assets are a thing of the past. Slipping into a fuzzy fleece robe, Vintage feels something warm and equally fuzzy on his calf. Sherri, his orange pet cat is clearly in the mood for late night cuddles. In the most appropriate manner, the rest of the tiny flat looks like an entire Urban Brawl team held a practice bout while he was away. "What's up, foxy lady?" he says to the cat as he squats down to pet her head. "Looks like you were busy while I was away." A pop-up AR notification bleeps on the corner of his vision, forcing him to stand back up and move towards the bed as he checks out Morrighan's message. "Well, the fish has caught the bait, but will it swallow the hook as well?" he says to no one in particular, then deletes the message. Druss' message pops up seconds later. There might be more sense to the young orc than looks suggest. At least he's willing to listen. He's a lot more... coachable. Vintage lies on the bed and prepares himself for the jump to astral space, wondering if he'll ever get used to that feeling in his gut, same one he'd get when a sub-orbital flight took off the ground. Might as well look around the arcology before going to sleep. His concentration is ruined by more AR notifications. Kaanta saying the cat footage came from the Union Square Garage, the starting point of the route Firefox sent out to all members. Alright then, might as well check that out too while in the astral. Vintage closes his eyes, but seconds later another buzz lets him now of more messages. "Oh come on, will this ever stop?" Initially Pendergast, then Morrighan mention a Ren Hongo. Drek. To User Group: Hide and Seekers Message: Looks like you got yourselves a Face in Pendergast and I'm not being paid enough to pull out Ms Hongo or piss off whoever wants her put in there. To User: Shades Message: Sorry to bother you again, but I got two names I need you to look up for me. One is Jeffrey Pendergast. He's on my team, social type, elf, the whole nine yards. Not sure if he's the corp type, but he looks filthy stinkin' rich. You know, as in, not the kind of guy who'd run the shadows for money. Makes me itch, gotta know what's driving him. Other name is Ren Hongo, possible mega affiliate as she's got relative info. Somebody wants her thrown into a killer prison within the next few hours. Any clue as to who or why would be nice. Not interfering, just wondering how high this thing goes. Vintage lets a long sigh out as he stares at the ceiling. Will he ever be able to tell Shades? Or will he always be that annoying colleague who calls when he needs something? He's set to visit some awakened bar with Reese Frenzy but what he'd really like is to hang out with Shades at some classy place for a drink or two. His thoughts are interrupted by the feeling of Sherri jumping onto his belly. Instinctively, Vintage reaches out to pet her but gets a set of claws for his trouble. Before he can react, Sherri walks onto his chest and knocks away the commlink, dropping it to the ground as the crash conveniently shuts it off. "Alright, alright, I'll get to work" Vintage says with a grunt and a smile as she makes herself comfortable on his solar plexus. Sherri is more than a pet, it's his medium to Fox. The mischevious spirit often takes over and acts through the cat, this time apparently telling him to knock off the tech and enter the astral. OOC: Going to astrally scout the Shiawase arcology and the Union Square Garage. Next stop is the San Cha bar because reasons. 4 Quote Lvl 65 Multitasker Link to comment
Teros Posted March 2, 2017 Report Share Posted March 2, 2017 Vintage: " Message: Well, now that the initial Johnsoning and running out of burning buildings is through, let me say it's good to see you again. I'm meeting Reese at the Zephyr Gate tomorrow and Morrighan's probably coming along too. Feel like catching up in a more relaxed setting? " Looking at his flood of spam, Teros finally finds the message from Vintage. "Knew you were familiar. Sounds good. I'll be there." BTO: " That's bassass goatboy, any day now you getting a real job, like walking a dog! Haha! Then maybe you man enough I letting you ride with my crew! " "Man enough? Last time I checked, your buddy Auroch was at The Pit and was taken down in under 2 minutes by a certain goatboy. I try to stay as clean as possible, knowing that these days that's like washing yourself with a rag from the garbage." Teros knew what BTO was getting at, but still felt there was a bit of light to salvage. Reese: " Anyway, I'm looking for word of this new drug on the street, supposed to look like deepweed, but it hits harder and it's not just for magic types. Chatter is some uyghur in Chinatown are trying to find distribution for this drek, but the families on both sides of the bay won't touch it after the Tempo bloodbath. You hear anything about a burqa babe with funky ganj, you ping me first, so ka? " "Burqa babe..." Teros said aloud and grimaced. Interestingly enough, last week he had heard a minor detail from Big Mamma about a new Turk seller having thugs near her parts. However the stuff wasn't called 'deepweed' but instead 'monkeyweed'. "Million names for the same shit." he pondered. Originally, the satyr was going to head back to his apartment and get some aggression out on a practice dummy and work on his fighting form. Maybe instead he'll be hoofing it tonight. He would hold off on telling Reese anything until he knew for sure. After all, he was going to meet up with him and Vintage shortly. He already had the initial payment for the current job so he mine as well spend a little bit of it on something that actually mattered to him. Walking down 5 or so blocks, the satyr waited at the stop for the next bus. He looked at his watch and saw what day it was. "Should be Barty driving" he thought. Less than 15 minutes later, the bus pulled up. Letting a few file in before him, Teros' hooves thudded against the trio of worn metal grating steps. As the chubby troll with a gimp leg turned to get into a spare seat, Teros noticed it wasn't the driver he expected. Someone new. "Barty get a route shift?" the satyr said to the unfamiliar driver while holding up two passengers behind him. The orc driver gave a tilt of the head and kept chewing some sort of tobacco, a slight film of black on his bottom lip, which pooled near his right tusk. "The slub's sick so I'm pulling double coverage." With a nod of approval, Teros didn't think anymore of it and found a ceiling strap to hold onto in the back of the bus. No more free spaces. Hopping off at his stop, the satyr saw a strange new graffiti tag on a brick wall, looking like a capital (F) in a circle. His eyes narrowed. He knew what turf this was and hoped there wouldn't be more bloodshed in these parts. This didn't seem good. It better not have any connection to the monkeyweed/Turk he was coming to speak to Big Momma about. Crossing the street, the satyr made his way to 'Clueless', a bar/restaurant where Big Momma resided. Passing the security and pushing open the faded red leather-looking double doors, Teros went inside... 2 Quote Link to comment
Laghail Posted March 2, 2017 Author Report Share Posted March 2, 2017 Sally Oakland Flower Mart The voice in your head has gone silent and the spinning whorls of color have slowed to resolve into the night sky. The stars are still again and no menace whispers from the heavens. But down below, passers by are still gawking at you and their eyes seem to have caught a star of their own; bright specks that glint behind everyone's eyes as they nervously sidle around the intoxicated razor girl on a Thursday early morning. The flickering light behind their eyes dances and guts as they move, it's like they don't realize there's a candle burning in their head, shining their soul out of the holes of the skull. Your own eyes are playing tricks on you, your peripheral vision tells you the candles are bursting into kaleidoscopes of sputtering emotions and flickering memories as people dart by you, but the souls you stare at directly, only golden light. Your high stabilizes and the chatter of English and Chinese dialects in the street around you finally resolving into words you know, you straighten your hair and brush the dirt off from your fall, and fix your eyes on an imaginary point above Firefox's head where she stands up the block. You put on your hard won "sobriety walk" and close the gap between you and your friend, trying to ignore the aurora borealis of emotions that cascades out of the girl anytime you're not looking directly at her. 5 Quote Level 38 [Raveling Bard] Link to comment
Teros Posted March 3, 2017 Report Share Posted March 3, 2017 The oldies music blared as soon as the satyr passed the red leather doors. A few steps in and Teros was engulfed with smoke. The air was heavy with the pungent ripeness of sweat from a few...unsavory patrons. The thin fluorescent tubes of light lined the corners of the wall and ceiling, giving a dull but even lightning at Clueless. The bartender orc with black bushy mutton chops flecked with gray gave a greeting nod to the satyr. Leaning over the counter, Teros spoke barely above the thundering music and the clacking of billiard balls. "Big Momma and a Red" he said. The bartender orc barked, "Be a few" as he poured a tall glass from the tap and slid it to the patron a couple stools down. Then filling up a smaller glass with juice, the bartender handed the drink to the satyr. Sitting on the stool and spinning to face the rest of the bar, Teros leaned his elbows against the counter and sipped. He watched as two trolls were playing a game of pool on the scratched and worn table. One of them was complaining about a shot made. Teros heard bits and pieces, "You used that scuff 'fer 'yer shot!" All the gruff voices seemed to mingle here, creating a cacophony of stupor . Despite hating this type of atmosphere, it was also a place that Teros could people-watch and zone out for a few minutes. "Be comfortable in uncomfortableness" he muttered to himself. He saw a bruised up elf at the bar sporting a shiner, a beat-up brown coat, and taking a long drag from a cigarette. Generally this was orc, troll, and the occasional minos that frequented this area. No doubt the elf got some shit, was called 'pretty boy' a few times and a couple scraps later had earned his stripes here. That's generally what happened at Clueless. They didn't take kindly to uppity strangers and would be 'initiated'. That's the reason this bar was renamed Clueless in the first place. It used to be 'Grunge House' until about 3 years back. When some drones and cops came in to ask a few questions about one of the usual crew, everyone played dumb. The misinformation worked, even after a few scuffles with authorities. Declaring this place a waste of time and a shithole, they didn't come back. Authorities had sent word back to HQ about how effective their instigating of the patrons was. A hacker was able to view the message: "Bunch of fucking clueless morons" the message read. Shortly after, the place was labeled Clueless as a reminder of that comradery. Comradery that was rare to find these days. "EYYYP!" the bartender shouted and motioned. Whirling around, Teros grabbed his drink and was led behind the black curtain near the counter. Past the curtain, the narrow hallway lead down some worn wooden stairs. The curtain was something specially treated to absorb the smoke and stink. Now it smelt of patchouli as he thumped down the stairs and saw a small brass cup with an incense cone hanging off the wall. Crossing another black curtain, the smell changed again to something extremely rare: home-cooked food. A sort of seafood stew was simmering. The sound of the drumline for the song blaring upstairs was all that could be heard, as well as the far-off sound of bubbling or boiling coming through the other doorway which was adorned with a bead curtain. "Just a sec" a throaty but pleasant orc-woman's voice rang through the small room that Teros was now standing. The room was cramped with all sorts of varying tinctures and formulas. Bottles of differing colored glass lined the old-world looking bookshelves. Small stacks of stockcards were filed in tiny trinket boxes. No doubt medical compound cards for all the things that Big Momma makes behind the scenes. Sipping the rest of his drink, Teros put the glass on a nearby endtable that had some spare room on it. Straight ahead were glass cages that were filled with fat rats, twice the size of a fist; a few scurrying through plastic tubes that were connected to other glass cages. An entire rat labyrinth with auburn, black, and white ones all mixed together in sleeping bundles. Looks like Big Momma had expanded the cages. Business must be doing better than ever. Fixating on the thriving mass of rat-life, Teros' concentration was broken by the clanging of the bead curtain. The plump older orc woman plinked through the beaded curtain, her broad face etched with a warm smile. "Teros! How nice of you to visit." Clutching a dishrag, she waved for the satyr to come through the beaded doorway, her dozen or so faux-gold bangle bracelets on her left arm making a chorus of jingling as they clanged against each other. Barely taller than 5 feet, the bulk of her dark dreadlocks were in a bundle, with a few of the cottony ropes on each side being loose and framing her face. Her faded brown muumuu clung to her waist but was free-flowing everywhere else. Heavy glasses that weren't quite coke bottle dense lay hung around her neck; a thin black rope connecting the back of it like a necklace. Stepping through the beaded doorway, Teros saw what was being made: lobster stew. He was never a seafood person but considering this was real and not nutrisoy with lobster flavoring; it made a world of difference. A huge pile of lobster shells were overflowing in a wicker basket near the cutting board and the stovetop which was boiling two vats of stew. Big Momma turned the dial down to reduce the heat. Teros was about to open his mouth but Big Momma beat him to it by throwing her arms wide open for a hug and curling her fingers in a 'over here' motion. Leaning down, they embraced. "What can I do ya for, Honeychild? If you want some of this, the batch will be done in bout 15 minutes or so. Lettin' the herbs do their magic." Teros leaned forward and rubbed the back of his neck. "Got a message from Reese about deepweed. I remember recently there being word on the street about monkeyweed. Wanted to know if they were the same thing and if you heard anything about it." Big Momma grabbed a wooden spoon and stirred the two vats of stew while she pondered. "Yessim, believin' they be one and the same. Saw a new fella jus' yesterday barge through the main doors as I was heading upside to grab some things. Lookin tweaked outta his mind. You know how it is around here: corps use the slums as a 'testing ground' for their new products. Iron out the details later." -DAMNIT I RAN OUT OF TIME!- 5 Quote Link to comment
Laghail Posted March 3, 2017 Author Report Share Posted March 3, 2017 Firefox Oakland Flower Mart Sally abruptly straightens out of her feral crouch and heads towards you with a deliberate walk and a careful nonchalance, like an intoxicated person doing a better job of sobriety than the nearest AA member. Coming abreast of you and Titus, she recognizes him and exclaims "oh you! You're the troll from the bar! I can still taste that place in your… Never mind, you have a bike, yes? Something fast and powerful that you love? Something you won from the Harrison Barbarians in a race? She's purple and you never take her out on the freeway because you couldn't bear to see... Something." Sally breaks off her stilted monologue as her gaze settles full on Titus's face. His teasing smile for you had shifted into a grimace when Sally started picking memories out of his head. "You know this keeb honey," he asks you, not taking his gaze off Sally. He winces at the pejorative, "sorry, I uh, I don't talk to many kee- I don't talk to a lot of elves." Soothing the 9 foot wall of muscle and street leathers, you quickly pickup that Sally is not her usual laconic self and she needs a ride, to a gym in the low bottoms?? "I actually know that place, the Crucible? I can get you there, if she's a friend of yours," a thought visibly crosses his mind and a leer stretches across his green face, "but you know, that would mean you owe me for two now, three if I'm taking her too." Minutes later you're roaring west on 7th astride an electric purple Harley Scorpion. Titus' long arms the perfect fit on the gorilla bars, both you and Sally astride the troll-sized rear seat. Something has Titus extra motivated and takes the last turn at a deep lean, before he's fishtailing the bike around as Sally vaults over the back, dashing for the concrete walls of the pre-singularity construction. Possibly a former warehouse, but with more a modern quick-fab second and third story added on. The once proud letters atop the entrance announce "t-e Cr-c--le" in gap-toothed 6 foot steel. Sally The Crucible The world spins on the crazed motorcycle jaunt, psychic visions of auras blurring in your sight as the bike jaunts off 7th, down Market Street, west again along 6th to skirt the 8th Street Ranger turf, then a sharp leaning turn onto Adeline and faster even with Titus nearly laying the bike down to rocket back onto 7th, and your thumping over sunken train tracks in the street and you've arrived and your body is launching off the bike to land in front of the two story warehouse building. That voice is back, but faint, it's words are distinct this time from the flow of your own thoughts. You can even tell it's not English that you're hearing it excitedly mutter as you get closer the to walls of the Forge. The building itself is wreathed in an opaque aura of muted purples and blues, and you can't see anything through the walls as you could from other buildings; except one aura, rushing outside the front doors to investigate the roar of the Scorpion as it peels out and roars west. The light spilling from this guard's skull is fierce, memories of violence and blood are clear even on the surface, but a gentleness lies underneath; you see cherished memories of little green skinned girls, wrapped in this father's love. When you finally resolve the shape under the flow of astral impressions, a barrel chested ork in body armor is confronting you with the business end of a double-barreled street sweeper. His words resolve from the babble in your head, "...not gunna ask again girly. I don't have your AR signature on my list and I don't know your face. You best keep moving, unless you got some frakkin' story explaining why that Trog enforcer dumped your hoop on my doorstep and pealed out like he knows he ain't welcome." It's hard to focus on his words with the voice in your head suddenly frantic to get inside - Küçük kızı taşı - içeriye gir ve bir yakuzayı bul - and you can't understand the internal voice and the guard's rising tone and the clear intent spilling out from the candle burning behind the guard's eyes. He will shoot you and he's uncomfortable with how you're someone else's little girl. His want for you to leave is being shone in your face and the want from your internal rider is pressing you forward. Caught between the two, you inhale to speak, but instead, fixing your eyes on fluttering candle within the guard, you breathe out a sharp puff of air, and the candle winks out. Firefox Dwight D Eisenhower Expressway, westbound "You know honey, if you asked me earlier if you could have a ride, and by-the-way, would you mind running past hostile turf, through friendly turf I've been specifically banned for, but all that is a warm-up to flashing state of the art fake passes to get a troll and his kee-, elf, his elf girlfriend into San Francisco; well, I would have asked for two cosmetics. Minimum..." Titus trails off and the voice-com goes silent again. Your two systems have linked from proximity and his subvocal words are being piped into your mastoid implants in a mismatched old-timey-voice-distortion effect. Apparently you have a new boyfriend, and apparently he likes retro kidnapper voice effects. But the sweet scorpion at least puts a mark in the pro column of this life event. More discussion later, you know, when you're not frantically spoofing ID requests on the broadcasted SIN of every decent looking car or bike you pass. This hacking on the fly drek isn't easy, especially when you're not sure what kind of credentials will get an obvious ganger through the imposing security checkpoint on Yerba Beuna Island. The rolling waves beneath you and the views of bay and both cities, rubbish. You've set the cables running through your sleeves and gloves to lock onto Titus' jacket and you've passed out to give your full attention to the hack job, now in virtual reality. Your view shifts to take in the backed up traffic as a solid line of gridlocked SIN profiles, most multi-tasking with a miniature galaxy of apps and games active and spiraling around their central user icon. Your body and the scorpion are still moving, but with VR processing speeds, the bare minutes before you reach the checkpoint have stretched into a subjective hour. Like William Blake's creator God, you crouch above the glowing nebula of information, dipping your fingers to touch individual SINs and sampling their electronic essence. Gurdy Levinson - a secretarial manager coming back from a trip to the rockies, judging by the social media pictures she's currently uploading. Pass. You're bored even reading her surface level profile, security is supposed to believe a mother of three on a Harley? Hal Halk - Mountaineering guide and CEO of a minor touring outfit. Promising, but the male human would require you to play male and tuck your ears. Doable, but it needs to be perfect as any second line interrogation would reveal that the flimsy physical disguise that you'd have 90 seconds to assume once you drop out of VR. Skimming a little lower, you spawn a cloud of obscene emoji as you realize who ever this is, they're running their own fake SIN, and it's a damn cheap one. Their bio idents are clearly copied from scanned chicken blood. Pass. Have fun "Halk", see you in jail, maybe. Jaks Wildman - a telecom consultant, licensed to carry a handgun and cyber-spurs, runs between the cities troubleshooting high profile cases for double B through single A rated corps. Perfect. Second level scan of public info and her available information checks out. With your god fingers, you pinch her profile, running a spearfishing request for her to preauthorize her credentials for expedited entry into the city. You had the good sense to copy city security certificates from a Shadownode site when you arrived in the city; nothing that'd fool the actual city security checkpoint, but if Jak's has been gone more than a day, her system shouldn't know they've expired. Approved. Jaks has been gone far too long and she's all kinds of eager to jump into an express line. You clone her profile and fill in the public key info she forwarded, then wake out of VR. "Alright, Titus," - You announce over the com, careful to avoid more contractually binding terms like "honey, baby, boyfriend, person I'm obligated to speak to again once this is over" - "can we stay ahead of that white VW? The Impuls model that's, uh, four cars back now? The second one of us to hit the checkpoint is going to have what's called 'a negative customer service experience' with security. Call me crazy, but I'd like that to be her." Bracing against the lurch of the bike accelerating, you tie your wind-whipped hair, and incriminating ears into a scarf and toggle your hair and contacts to mirror the bio ident profile that's set to transmit as you approach the checkpoint. As traffic congests approaching the checkpoint, Titus locks your place in line well ahead of your id theft victim, but it'll be a close thing with her thinking she's entitled to turn off into the express lane. The imposing security tower looms five stories above the overpass, giving the system clearance to scan every approaching car with plenty of time to shut down the lane for any problematic result. If that bitch in the Impuls beats you to authenticate, the segmented road plates below your vehicle will drop out, handily lowering you and the vehicle into a cell, and resealing over your head without inconveniencing the cars behind you in the lane. Oh yeah, Titus would be detained as well, you suppose. Yerba Beuna Island looms large, the expressway running under part of the island and that tunnel mouth is the finish line. You're cruising with three cars ahead of you, then two, but you've lost sight of your unknowing adversary. The white car disappeared into the mouth of the expressway. You silently pray for the VIP's ahead of her to have tax evasion charge, something, but you're reminded that God hates you, as the dreaded "pop-hiss" of bollards erupting from the smart roadway around you. The four poles marking the corners of what will be a box around your vehicle. Titus groans as he slows the scorpion so as not to smash into the leading wall of the box where it should pop in front of the bike. But it doesn't! Approved flashes in your AR feed, and the bollards move past you to mark out a red sedan in line behind you, and the car halts as a four walls emerge around the car, and then the makeshift elevator disappears into the freeway, and a replacement tile slides into place. You miss most of that anonymous luckless bastard's drama as Titus guns the bike into the tunnel, and you both breathe free air all the way across the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge and into the city. Sally The Crucible The guard collapses in a heap. He looks inert in the astral, dead and lightless. You can now see his green skin, and the blues and blacks of his tactical armor without astral color saturating his body. In fact, the colors from the building are gone as well. The THC you inhaled has you very much still tripping, but a weak body high and mild vertigo are the only symptoms effecting you. Your head is fuzzy, no Turkic mutterings, and the only weird impulses you feel are Sally wanting to do Sally. Crouching down to touch the guard's neck where he's slumped against the wall, you feel a strong pulse. He even emits a rasping snore. Chuckling in relief, you indulge in a chemically aided giggling fit. Still enjoying the laugh, your fingertips extend their alloyed razor spikes, and the folded head of a grappling hook emerges from your right forearm, just below the wrist. You feel the padded hook catch on the third story ledge, and a few minutes effort has you perched on the roof, in full stealth mode. From this vantage point, you see the roof is littered with vented steel trapdoors, most of them propped open, and several of them having a spider web of cables strung along poles adjacent to the doors, with leads disappearing down into the building. You hear grunts and yells of effort as if a boot camp is being conducted below you inside the building. Making your cautious way to the nearest trapdoor you see a small army, not quite 100 people of various races training below you. Orks are the heavy numerical favorite, but dwarves and trolls are making a decent showing, with a filtering of elves, and even an odd handful of humans, shockingly enough. The ground floor hosts a maze of 12 foot sheets of corrugated steel arranged over a full quarter of the floor space. The maze is littered with trip lines, pit traps and sections of wall that hide weaponry ready to fire on anyone in the narrow, twisting corridors. The remainder of the first floor is carved into nests of sparing rings, training equipment, climbing walls, and the ground end of rope climbing ladders that stretch up to span the full three stories. The ropes and ladders connect to the second floor network of girders and narrow catwalks suspended over the floor, and there’s a score of people leaning on the railings to watch the action on the first floor. The third story is a snarl of connected gutters, industrial factory rigging, and hanging hoops and cables; a tight-rope obstacle course, with only the suggestion of safety netting at strategic locations. Even as you watch, several ork youths burst out of a nearby trapdoor, hand vaulting over the lintel to land in a dead run, sprinting across the rooftop to dive headfirst back into the building through a different trap door. You spy them swinging on the leads they caught as they finish out their obstacle course run and arrive panting on the ground floor, and take a spot in line at a queue for admission into the first of several sparing rings. Combatants are entering the ring in trios of uke to a single tori who wears a set of handcuffs, while the uke carry a single rubber knife between them. The matches are fast and refereed carefully, with the tori apparently chosen for expertise in two of the rings as the lone orks deftly negotiate the attempted blows from one opponent to hinder his or her fellows, pulling uke’s opportunistically into fast hip throws, the occasional submission hold, and in some cases, into a clinch, where the soft appearing style transitions to hard very quickly. Regardless of the skill difference, the matches often end with the tori “dead”, and the three uke sent for another lap of the day’s obstacle course, with uke that perform well being promoted to join the queue for the third ring as tori, where two referees keep an closer eye on the practice. Using your vison enhancing contacts, you zoom in on the elves and humans specifically, knowing your now-silent rider had wanted you to speak with a yakuza contact. The humans and some of the elves sport distinctive irezumi, but the men and women below you are half naked for the ring and no one is uninked. The jagged runic style is very much in fashion, and Tîwaz seems a favorite. The humans maybe, might, have that epicanthic fold to their eyes that is supposed to demark Japanese ancestry. Hard to say, round ears all look the same, it’s a fact. Checking for counter measures, you grip the edge of the trapdoor and swing yourself over to spider crawl along the ceiling. The paramilitary training facility may be frantrically active, but they do leave enough handholds that you barely need to engage your climbing claws or toe/heel spurs to make stead progress across the ceiling, and then you’re sliding down a rope to land on the edge a catwalk. A potential yakuza human has joined the spectators group, winded from his time in the ring, and you’re not sure what you want from him, but a closer look is a good start. As you settle into your second story perch, a decidedly scrawny looking elf comes up the rope ladder, perhaps more slowly than the others, and makes his way over to exchange a few words with your potential yak target, but in Japanese, yata! Your stealth skin is engaged, and you earned the invisible fist bump of triumph you give the air. But the skinny elf looks up at the tiny motion, as though he saw you. You freeze, startled, and let your contact zoom in to check his shoulders, hands, and knees for any obvious signs of enhancement. No hairline metal/flesh seams, he seems just flesh and blood. But when he pushes off the railing and makes his way towards you, his off center gaze that looks everywhere but you, reminds you of yourself earlier downtown, only watching people in peripheral vision, he stops well outside striking range and pointedly doesn’t look at you. In a low voice that only someone with hearing upgrades like yours could pick up, “you’re pretty good you know. No big movements, controlled emotions, you even picked a spot where other auras can screen yours. I’m pretty damn impressed.” He touches his shoulder tenderly, both of you knowing that haymaker his fellow uke inadvertently landed on him is going to color up like a sunset. He continues, “This doesn’t have to go like the script says you know, you pull something lethal and try and leave in a spray of bullets or toxins. You take down a few street kids that are training down there,” he indicates the crowded floor with a nod, “and you die before you make it to the street. There’s a mana barrier you know, a spell that let me and a few other shaman know when you’d entered. I couldn’t find you and I figured it was a stray cat or something, and then you get all ‘win’ over there and I saw your emotion spike. Anyway, it’ll knock you down when you try to leave. Shouldn’t kill you, but,” he looks up and makes a falling gesture with one hand the ends in a splat motion, “the fall will.” Still maintaining disinterest and looking over the crowd, “I’m not even a heavy hitter; I’m a bear shaman, a healer. I work with a few of the entertainment houses in the different families around west Oakland, even into Chinatown if the Triad or Yak house healers are swamped. Magic away the brothel workers VD’s, sober up any high rollers’ if they can’t remember their payment info; I’m good with that kind of thing. Did you know you actually have a spirit latched onto you? Something weaker than possession, but he’s latched on pretty good. Looks like a fire spirit, maybe from one of the Islamic or Arabian traditions? I’d have to talk with it, and I’m not too good with calling fire spirits, but I could get him off you easily enough. Looks like something has you fucked up pretty good too, but your aura says coming down is gunna suck. I could make it so you skip that part too. Buut, big but here, you can’t try and murder me or any of the kids here.” Offering you his right hand to shake, he still doesn’t look at you as he introduces himself. “I’m Shobi, welcome to the Crucible.” 5 Quote Level 38 [Raveling Bard] Link to comment
Teros Posted March 4, 2017 Report Share Posted March 4, 2017 On 3/3/2017 at 5:50 PM, Laghail said: yata! 3 Quote Link to comment
Teros Posted March 4, 2017 Report Share Posted March 4, 2017 22 hours ago, Laghail said: Looks like a fire spirit, maybe from one of the Islamic or Arabian traditions? Djinn? 1 Quote Link to comment
Leigh Posted March 5, 2017 Report Share Posted March 5, 2017 Oakland Flower Mart "You know this keeb honey,” he asks you, not taking his gaze off Sally. He winces at the pejorative, "sorry, I uh, I don't talk to many kee- I don't talk to a lot of elves.” With a slight roll of her eyes at the unintentionally racist remark she smiles and rubs her hand over Titus’ arm and smiles ”It’s okay 'Trogdor', I don’t talk to many Elves either.” she says and glances around trying to spot a purple bike. A little sliver of metallic purple peeks out from under a tarp behind Titus’s flower stand.”How about we get my friend where she needs to be and you and I can discuss fees afterwards?” Without missing a beat, she slides one hand into her hair and tugs slightly on the implanted trigger strands and changes her hair colour to match the bike just because she can. ”That’s better! C’mon you two! He’s driving, and I call…. shotgun I guess?” Fox laughs and slips around behind the stand and tugs the tarp off of the bike, a long whistle of appreciation escapes before she notices and she tightens the straps on her pack and waits for the other two to catch up. Dwight D Eisenhower Expressway West ”You know honey, if you asked me earlier if you could have a ride, and by-the-way, would you mind running past hostile turf, through friendly turf I've been specifically banned for, but all that is a warm-up to flashing state of the art fake passes to get a troll and his kee-, elf, his elf girlfriend into San Francisco; well, I would have asked for two cosmetics. Minimum…” ”Oh har har, let me focus for a little while and then we can stop for something to eat and we can negotiate fees for services rendered. Now Shh! I need to work” Fox replies, her tone a bit harsh, but the hand securing cables to his jacket strokes over his back with unintentional affection. Closing her eyes Fox taps her headware trigger and slips into the matrix, her body going slightly limp as she puts nearly all of her energy into sifting through the VR world around them on the highway. Several minutes later she hits pay dirt and starts rapidly cloning all the pertinent information she’ll need from poor, unfortunate Jaks and as she shuts down her full VR feed she pulls a colourful green scarf from her pack and ties it over her head, the colour nearly matching the shirt she had on so the outfit seems to be intentional, instead of the quick fix it really is. ”Alright, Titus, can we stay ahead of that white VW? The Impulse model that’s uh, four cars back now? The second of of us to hit the checkpoint is going to have what’s called ‘a negative customer service experience’ with security. Call me crazy, but I’d like that to be her.” A deep chuckle sounds through the tinny comm link and one huge hand guns the throttle and they swerve between a few different cars to get just a bit further ahead of the white car. ”Ahhh dreeeeeeeeek! Hang on babe!” Titus groans and decelerates at a somewhat alarming rate to avoid splattering the both of them into the security wall. Approved flashes over Fox’s left eye, blinking a bright transparent green overlay. ”Gun it! We’re clear, but maybe not for long. Don’t want to be anywhere near this place if that useless breeder gets manually cleared. Take 2B when we get onto the main island and then circle back to 2nd Street, if I remember correctly some slag that rents the coffin next to mine said there was a decent cafe place just across from the 2nd Street Plaza.” Fox tells Titus through the comm. Her quick disguise may have outclasses the security sweep programs on the highway checkpoints, but there’s no way that she’s going to try and waltz into Union Square with a massive Troll enforcer smelling like flowers and get away without anyone asking questions. As the wind dies down with their speed, Fox slips on her glasses once again and starts building another search program to find useful female workers who visited the lab where the cat had been held at Union Square. There should be at least one female she could reasonably imitate, or at the very least she could slip in a fake communications service call and keep Jaks’ identity for a little longer and walk right in through the front door of the lab. ”It’s like 2 am, and you want coffee??” Titus asks as they stop for a traffic light, turning to look over his shoulder at Fox, his mouth turning down in a slight frown. He had other ideas for what they could do after dumping Sally at the Crucible. The tiny elf flashes him a huge smile and just laughs ”Fine… but you’re buying.” They pull through the light and circle the lot at the cafe for a moment until an overly slick looking wage mage and a tall blond pro walk through the front door and get into a very clean, but very low end car and open up a space for Titus’ bike. The troll carefully locks down his bike before arming what looks like a fairly deadly theft prevention device. ”Cost an arm and a leg to get this damn thing installed, but like hell I’m letting some cocky drek-for-brains try and take my bike. I won it fair and square and had to fight the bastards to actually keep it because they didn’t think that I’d win. The Tin Man I won it from tried to jack it from me not two days later and I had to rip off his god damned arm for-” Getting slightly annoyed with the babbling rant about his bike, Firefox hooks her foot into the chain on his pants and hauls herself up and plants a fierce kiss on his still talking mouth to shut him up. It works, and with a slightly dazed look on his face when she pulls back, Titus shakes his head and allows himself to be pulled into the cafe and then pushed into a booth near the farthest window from the door. Still slightly stunned he doesn’t really seem to hear Fox ordering herself a large iced coffee and a salad or the beer and burger for him. He jolts slightly when their server sets his drink down next to his hand and looks over at the retro hipster Trich for a moment and narrows his eyes at the young man as he catches him leering at Fox. A barely audible growl bubbles up from his throat as the server walks off to another table. Turning his head back towards the elf across the table from him he notices her slightly blank expression and the fluid motions of her hands through the air above their table and leans forward, one hand reaching for the beer and the other reaching over to touch Fox’s hand. ”I wasn’t sure what you liked to drink, but I think I remember you having a glass of that in your hand back at the bar from earlier so I took a chance with it.” Fox says with a slight smile as she blinks a few times trying to focus on the real world again. ”I’m going to be walking into a Lab of some sort tomorrow morning to dig up some dirt for a run I’m working with my friend and some other runners. I think I have an idea for how I can pay you back. I’ve got a rigger friend that owes me a few favours and I can cash one in if you want to get that slick purple machine tweaked to be faster, or armored, or kitted out to hide stuff, things and stuff under the seat. I don’t like to leave debts unpaid, so what do you say? Do you want me to introduce you to my friend or did you want to haggle over lipstick for a while?” She asks as she reaches for her coffee taking a sip and leaning back to give the returning server the space to set down her salad and a carry basket of condiments and dressing on the table. Titus nearly chokes on his beer when she mentions haggling over lipstick. He wipes the back of his hand over his mouth and sets the half empty glass on the table and arches one bisected eyebrow at Fox. ”I think we both know I’d rather trick out my bike than lipstick.” He grabs the ketchup and drizzles out a flower pattern on top off his fries before fishing one out and popping it in his mouth. ”You go play in your little digital wonderland and I’ll find us a place to crash for the night.” He grabs another fry and fishes his hand held comm from his pocket and taps out a few messages to the semi friendly gangers in the area to see if any of them know of a room they can crash in for the night. To User: TheBloodiestTrog Message: Boss man, do we have any friends over near Union Square? I picked up something rare over at Johnny Midnight’s before it got torched. Need some place to crash for the night. Pass the word to the Trogs if you think any of the guys have any leads. Can’t find a damn coffin big enough for me half the time, let alone with something this rare with me. Fox dug into her salad for a moment before slipping her glasses over her eyes and flipping through her partially built program. Her hands weaving the familiar motions as she puts a bit of polish on her program before setting it lose into the Matrix. She pauses her actions and reaches into her pack and pulls out her battered iPod and a pair of patched headphones. Sliding her thumb across the screen she pulls up a playlist and slides the device over to Titus. ”This could take me a little while, feel free to browse” she says and zones back into her program, the first two fingers of her right hand drawing a star pattern as she pushes her program through and a slight smirk played over her face as she watched her baby systematically kick the shit out of the defenses of the Lab’s local Matrix. From User: GoGoBoy46 Message: Boss man said you were looking for a lock box for you and some rare piece of shiny? My cuz, the vat job one, not the wage slave, moved in with his girl and has a few more days left on his lease of some shit flat over a chop shop on Howard at 8th. Ask for Mikey. He’ll have a safe spot for your precious in the garage. Think there’s only an old ass couch left to sleep on but it’s better than nothing. It’s pretty well sound proofed too ^_~ Titus’s face cracked into a wicked looking grin as he read the last line of the message and he went back to his burger. His shoulders shaking with laughter as he systematically demolished the food on his plate. Firefox mirrored the sudden laughter as she flicked her fingers at invisible targets and then slipped off her glasses to grab the iPod from Titus, pulling the headphones off of him in mid song as she attached a cable from the device to a port on the back of one of her earrings and started the download of the Lab’s personnel database. She drained the last of her coffee and left the rest of her salad where it was, and slapped a few slightly wrinkled Nuyen bills on the table for the bill and slid out of her seat. Stealing one of the last fries on Titus’ plate and heading out of the cafe with the troll. ”C’mon, I found us a place to crash not too far from here.” Titus says with a jaw cracking yawn as he ducks out of the door and heads out to his bike, disarming the anti theft measures and swinging a leg over the seat. ”Well you’ve got the first free ride, the second and the one for your friend covered with that rigger hook up you say you have… Now we just need to settle up for the accommodations.” Firefox blinked a few times and then put on her serious face. ”I would say that a night’s accommodations on no notice should warrant some hardcore, all night, full friction games of Words with Friends. What do you say?” she asked with a perfectly straight face. Titus cracked up laughing and kept on laughing as he gunned the bike engine and rolled them out of the parking lot and on toward their crash pad. Dice stuff Hacking into the Lab 3+Logic (6) +1(datajack) = 10 rolls results: 4 Fives, 1 Six = 5 successful Jacking the HR database 3+Logic(6)+1(datajack) = 10 rolls results: 5 Fives, 2 Sixes = 7 OOC: gonna leave off there for now, to give my brain a chance to unwind from writing for two people. More tomorrow! or Monday… in case my head implodes into chaos. 4 Quote Link to comment
Teros Posted March 5, 2017 Report Share Posted March 5, 2017 On 3/3/2017 at 4:37 PM, Teros said: Teros leaned forward and rubbed the back of his neck. "Got a message from Reese about deepweed. I remember recently there being word on the street about monkeyweed. Wanted to know if they were the same thing and if you heard anything about it." Big Momma grabbed a wooden spoon and stirred the two vats of stew while she pondered. "Yessim, believin' they be one and the same. Saw a new fella jus' yesterday barge through the main doors as I was heading upside to grab some things. Lookin tweaked outta his mind. You know how it is around here: corps use the slums as a 'testing ground' for their new products. Iron out the details later" "That or there's a new game in town..." Big Momma trailed off. Grabbing the basket of bright red lobster shells, the orc woman shuttled them across the kitchen to a side table, taking a few shells out. She grabbed a small wooden hammer and slid an empty basket under the edge of the table. She began carefully hammering away at a lobster carapace. Fragmenting into a dozen pieces, she nimbly moved her chubby fingers to the smaller pieces, broke them even more, and with the edge of her hand, swept the pea-sized fragments off the table-edge. They trinkled into the basket below. Teros perked up. "I thought Runt helped you with the plates?" She half-turned her head, only her right eye meeting the satyr. It was the look of a parent that knows they need to loosen the reigns on a child: tinge of sadness mixed with worry but trying not to show it, "He's gun' out all the time with his friends. When not schoolin', he makes himself scarce." *crunch crunch* with the wooden hammer. A deliberate *fwwt* of Big Momma's hand to sweep more shell fragments raining into the basket below. "Running with a group. He's actually been askin' a lot about you. Said he needs.....'pointers', whatever dat boy means by it." She sighed. "Anyway, the tweaker I saw stumble inta' here I had followed from a safe distance. Tiny kicked him out of here and a patron that was already leavin' offered to see where the tweaker went. Afta' gettin' out of here, the scuzz went about 20 blocks down the road to the laundrymat out on 4th and Weston. I think it's called 'Sudsy's Laundrymat'. The tweaker got into a heated debate with the owner of Sudsy's- some Turk fellah with a dusty yellow turban, and the damn fool didn't even have clothes there. Seemed real suspicious as they mumbled about needing more 'stuff'. Afta' the squabble, someone brought the tweaker to the back. That's all one of my boys saw and booked after that. Honeychild, I don't like the bad juju from that an-" *caw!* A bird cry came from the side room. "Pipe it down, Siga" she barked back at the raven. Letting out an exhale, Big Momma sighed again, "That's all I know." The orc woman's tone changed. "Hearin' the bird reminds me...She misses you. It's been a while since you two met up." Looking away from the orc woman who had a tinge of scold in her voice, Teros replied, "Yeah... I know. Just finished a job and now I got this new one, along with a friend asking me about info on 'deepweed'." The raven cawwed again in the back. Placing a calloused pale green skin hand on the satyr's face, "Jus' know she cares about yah. I care about yah. Runt cares about yah. We all care about yah." The tinge of scold switched to sadness. "Thanks" the satyr said, the word heavy and dense like it signaled defeat. Or maybe the scold and guilt transferred through words from Big Momma to Teros. The satyr gave the orc a dozen credits. "I'll take a batch of the stew." Her expression changed to a warm smile. "I'll make it double. You know you don't owe me nuthin', Honeychild." The satyr made his way back home. When he meets up with Vintage and Reese tomorrow, he'll explain the tweaker at the bar and the Sudsy's yellow turban confrontation. For now, it was time to call it a night. He grabbed his container of stew, threw it in a paper bag, and went back to his place. [Hey I finished!] [Ok @DarK_RaideR , I have my info bit ready. Whenever you want to pick up the ball and start the meetup between me, you, and Reese, I'm ready.] 5 Quote Link to comment
Wild Wolf Posted March 6, 2017 Report Share Posted March 6, 2017 The Forge....well, it didn't look like much on the outside, Druss thought to himself as he neared the warehouse looking building. It seemed to low from ground to roof to house an elite training facility but the former UB baller knew that outside appearances could fool you. The thought made him go back to his rookie days when he earned the name, "The Harasser". For an Ork, Druss was on the leaner side of the physical spectrum and when he first entered the league, his opponents would heavily underestimate his prowess, thinking his lean frame resulted in weakness. Especially since the average Ork Urban Brawl baller was close to 300 pounds of coiled muscle. Druss sat at smooth 250. But what made Druss so special in the arena was his speed. Weather he was finishing the match with a game winning score untouched or shoulder bashing someone out of a 4th story window, Druss was everywhere and sometimes it seemed he was in all places at once. This is how he earned the name, "The Harasser". Parked at the entrance door was a fellow Ork taking a long drag from his cigarette. He was taller and wider than Druss and one his tusk was chipped near the top. His dark hair was kept short on top and shaved bald on the sides where you could see tribal tattoo work interwoven along his skull. Druss assumed he was the "bouncer" for the gym to make sure the wrong meta's were kept out. He was there to intimidate but this did little to worry the dual vibro-ax carrying Ork. Druss approached with a half-assed grin, taking his hood down on his jacket to reveal his face. The bouncer ork eyed Druss suspiciously. Taking another long pull from the cigarette, the ork flicked the stubby tip near the right and blew the foul smoke in Druss’s direction. “I’mma stop you there, trog. This place iz for members only and I don’t believe I’ve eva seen you aroun here.” “I’m here on an invitation, omae. No need to get hostile.” Druss quickly interjected. “Invitation, huh? An who are ya here ta see? The doorman puffed up his chest a bit and almost said that last part in a snarl. “An old UB ball player...goes by the name of Warbeard...” Druss looked at the doorman, trying to notice something to give him an opening but the ork barely blinked. “...Oh, c’mon! Warbeard. He was MVP in the Urban Brawl Bowl like 7-8 years ago?” “I think it’s time yew get loss, little ork. There’z no one here by dat name.” But Druss was stubborn and didn’t give up that easily. “Ok fine. Do you know who I am?” Druss let emphasis fall on the last part, his irritation level slowly climbing to “boiling point”. “Don’t give a shit who yew arr, trog. All’s I care about iz yew leaving before I smash yur tusks in.” Druss ignored the threat. “My name is Druss the Harasser. I am the best UB baller on this side of the ocean...and you’re gonna let me in there, omae, or I’ll escort myself in. So that’s YOUR option.” Druss flicked back his jacket to reveal the twin vibro-axes held comfortable on either hip. (Roll for Intimidation: Char (5) + Intimidate (1) + Bruiser (+2 Intimidate)=8 dice/4 hits-Success!) The ork doorman looked less than impressed but reluctantly slid away from the door, opening up the door to reveal a long and dark hallway. Druss eyed him cautiously then made his way inside. The ork doorman yelled out after him as he continued on, “And you’re NOT da best ballar on dis side of da ocean, trog!” Druss snorted and made a right when the hallway ended, leading to double doors about 100 feet down. The air smelt sour with sweat and blood. Not a murder scene kind of smell, but the smell someone indulges when entering the gym or a locker room. The smell of competition! Druss shoved the double doors open to reveal a massive interior. Wall to wall obstacles of all sorts with 2 corners of the giant room dedicated to weights. Very old school and Druss liked that. But as he made his way into the belly of the Forge, the inhabitants begin to notice Druss. They whispered to each other trying to figure out if they were seeing a ghost or not. Some smiled so wide that they nearly yelled out...while others scowled and looked at Druss with eyes of distaste. The former UB baller did his best to ignore them because he wasn’t there for explanations or autographs. He still had a mission to do and finding Warbeard was Druss’s top priority. To be continued…. __________________________________________________________________________________________ OOC: i'm having to break my posts up so I dont have a 6 page post lol. I'll try and get more done tonight but more than likely I wont post my "battle" with Warbeard until tomorrow if thats ok? Wolf 3 Quote Wild Wolf Class: Peerless Scarred/ Height: 6'2 / Weight: 188# Instagram: @ryanwolfbell / Facebook: Ryan Wolf Bell / Bible App (YouVersion) Ryan Wolf Bell Current Challenge: Intro to Wolflean Spoiler Last Challenge(s): 1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/9/10/11/12/13/14/15/16 Epic Challenges: Welcome to the Fireteam & Wolfpool Gotham Project: 1 " Know, O prince, that once the sun burns out and the earth's core becomes solid and cold, there will come a man to provide the endless energy needed to sustain life and for the planets to keep moving. He is the source of light and the warmth of hope back into the hearts of humanity...." - Dark_Raider A wolf rises in my heart; against my darkness; against my demons; against my despair. I DECLARE WAR! Romans 8:28 (CSB) We know that all things work together for the good of those who love God, who are called according to His purpose. Link to comment
Leigh Posted March 7, 2017 Report Share Posted March 7, 2017 OOC: This is my 1000th post! Neat! F.R.O.G. at Howard and 8th Shortly Before Dawn… Fox blinked her eyes open and groaned slightly as a huge arm tightened around her stomach and pulled her back into a wall of slightly rough skin. Her glasses were still half on, one side had slid down over her cheek bone but she could still see the Matrix feed and her messages icon blinking in the left sense, a little out of focus and tipped to the side sharply. Wriggling one hand free from the circle of arms around her, she tips her glasses back into place and gestures with her finger tips to pull up her missed messages. -------------------- From User: Unknown Message: I haven’t forgotten little Fox and now I know what you look like, and it is only a matter of time before I find you again. Enjoy your last weekend alive, slag. From User: Cosmetology_Queen Message: I haven’t forgotten little Fox and now I know what you look like, and it is only a matter of time before I find you again. Enjoy your last weekend alive, slag. From User: Iced_and_Forgotten Message: I haven’t forgotten little Fox and now I know what you look like, and it is only a matter of time before I find you again. Enjoy your last weekend alive, slag. -------------------- An ice cold shiver went down her spine as she cleared all but the first message in her inbox. Titus’s arms tightened around her again and his jaw rubbed against her hair. ”Quit wiggling’ like that… S’too early for more Words.” the ganger’s sleepy voice rumbled against her head before he yawned and settled again, a quiet snore reverberating against her back, blowing a few strands of hair across her face. Fox gestured to shut down the feed to her glasses and hefted Titus’ arm off of her to sit up. ”Five more minutes babe…” he murmured and rolled over to face the back of the half dead couch. Keep it together Fox, focus on the job, focus on the pay off for the run. That much Nuyen and you can disappear again. she thought and got up from the couch, grabbing the rumpled grey shirt from the floor in front of her and pulling it over her head. The cold fabric damn near drowned her as she rolled her eyes, noticing that she’d stolen Titus’ shirt. With a shrug she walked over to her bag and rummaged around until she found her iPod and headphones. Slipping the patched headset over her ears, she unwound the outdated USB cable and slipped the lose end into the cyber port behind her left ear and tapped her glasses once before punting Matrix controls to the deck she’d melded into the nearly ancient media tablet. Sliding her fingers across the scratched screen she sorted all of the Lab’s personnel files into gender, race, age, height and then department and carefully tagged the entries that would be easy to clone, the women who looked the closest to her current look to avoid having to do major cosmetic work before heading out later that morning. The choices were down to 4 in a matter of minutes. They all worked in different sections of the facility, but one stood out as the most promising. Shelly Ericksen, a 28 year old human chemist. Her HR photo showed a freckled human with a riot of dark brown curly hair in a shaggy bob, completely covering her ears. Rectangular glasses and whiskey brown eyes filled out the rest of the picture, and she worked in a bio-chemical lab within Union Square. Her security clearance gave her access to most floors, but not all of the lab space. Her height was a slight issue, considering she was at least three inches taller, but that’s nothing a pair of carefully selected heels couldn’t fix. A slow smile spread over Fox’s face as she ran a basic social media search and found the woman’s profile on a few different networking sites as well as a purely social one. Photos and status updates indicated that she was just back form holidays in Vegas and wasn’t due back at work until Monday morning. ”Oh thank you Shelly, thank you very, very much” she thought out loud and started sending a few messages out to some fashion contacts in the city to see about swapping some of her clothes and accessories for a pair of hidden heel boots, and a suitable pair of glasses. Skimming through more of Shelly’s social photos and videos she downloaded a video clip from a live show at a local dance club and made a copy with new metadata time stamped from the night before. She saved it to digital locker and slid her glasses off her nose, folding the arms in and tucking them into the neck of the shirt she’d stolen from Titus. She flipped open her bag again and started pulling out a few different tops, rejecting one after another ”Too conservative… to warm… eww, why do I even have this thing… Hmmm… maybe? It’s a bit slutty though…” she murmured as she shook out a cold shoulder shirt with lace down the back and a low cowl neck line. It was a deep shade of purple and had a slight glittery sheen to the fabric. She nodded and tosses it to the side before she began to work on her hair, tugging in specific sections to play with the colour variances and twisting it sharply into lose mahogany curls. Titus had woken up fully a few minutes after Fox had left the couch, his skin cooling without her body heat. He had turned over to watch his elf sitting on the floor in his shirt, muffled music pumping from those damn headphones of hers as she messed around with some tapped up hand held he vaguely remembered from the night before. What the hell is she doing at this god awful hour of the morning? And is that my shirt? he thought as he dug one hand into his pants pocket and pulled a small two sectioned twistable container with some sort of blue-green powder inside. With a twist and a sharp tap to the bottom he emptied a small amount of the drug into the empty section of the container and twisted it closed in the middle before bringing it to his nose. ”Novacoke; breakfast of champions!” Fox declared, and struck a pose. Her hair an uneven mass of deep brown curls, but her eyebrows still the vivid purple she’d picked out to match his bike last night did him in. He started laughing before he could even take a hit. ”What the hell is up with you and your hair? I mean what colour is it for real? Fuck… what time is it even?” He blinked a few times and rubbed sleep from his eyes and then scrubbed his hands thought his own hair, it was tangled around the end of one of his horns and pulled slightly at his scalp. And that’s not slutty compared to what you had on last night… Seriously what the hell are you up to?” he asked, narrowing his eyes on Fox. He knew nothing about this girl, her accent wasn’t local and none of his friends knew who she was when he stopped by the main house after the raid at Midnight’s. After thinking about it for a moment he shrugged. It didn’t matter who she was, she was his for now and he planned on keeping it that way. ”Getting ready for work, and honestly? I have no freaking clue what colour my hair is for real, it’s been close to 10 years since I got the bio implants so It grows into whatever colour it is set to until I change it.” Fox said as she picked up her iPod again and sent a faked message to Shelly’s manager. ------------------- To User: PhillipKD2035 Message: Hey Phill, just wanted to let you know I’ll be popping in to grab those test results I submitted before I left for vacation. I want to consolidate some of it so that I can start fresh on Monday. Vegas was amazing, by the way, thank you for the hotel recommendation, it wouldn’t have been as nice a vacation if I’d been stuck in a coffin the whole time. -Shelly From User: PhillipKD2035 Message: I am out of the office until Tuesday at 11 am for a conference in Sacramento. Your message has been forwarded to my off site inbox and I will reply at my earliest convenience. Do not reply to this message. - Phillip. From User: SaintStiletto Message: I’ve got a pair of black ankle boots a half size up from your usual that you can borrow for the weekend. But I’m gonna need your red frag me pumps in exchange, got a hot date tomorrow night! I’ll drop them by your place on my way to Sunbeam and grab your pumps okay chicka? Gotta jet! But we need to have coffee and you need to tell me about this stalker that Cosmo won’t shut up about! -------------------- ”Think I could get a ride to my place? I’ll buy you breakfast?” Fox asked, surpassing the shiver that went down her back at the mention of her stalker. She had a pretty good idea who it could be, but she really didn’t want to think about it just yet. OOC: more tomorrow when my brain is more functional! 5 Quote Link to comment
Laghail Posted March 7, 2017 Author Report Share Posted March 7, 2017 Vintage (@DarK_RaideR) Undisclosed location, Orklands With a gasp of not-breath, your spirit jolts awake from inside your body. The shabby room your body went to sleep had a cheap plastic flip calendar fixed on the wall and a few printed pages laying about, tributes to your paranoid tendency to distrust “secure” connections. Now standing in the room as a naked soul, your eyes can’t read the text on the scattered pages, even their images flicker as the soul of the document shows first one face, then another. The walls and the few shabby possessions you have, they’re covered in the impression of a well lived space. Both echoes of your own emotions and the room’s memories of past tenants, and a few of their more violent events still hang in the room like a stubborn odor. The batting paw of your cat drags you out of your reverie. She has sat up on your body’s chest and is swatting through your astral self as you stand with your two self’s bodies perpendicular. Other creatures, animal or metahuman, they appear to you as a blooming pattern of emotions and memories, visible concurrently with their own spirit’s memory of their own body. But your crazy cat refuses to cooperate with metaphysics and stubbornly presents as your faithful pest of a cat; her tail now twitches and you take a hint and apparate on the street outside before she pounces. It’d be incorrect to say your spirit teleported. The T-word is a big deal in theoretical circles, and your spirit merely moves as fast as though, sliding through the world’s memories of itself to arrive on the street with only theoretical astralphysicists to worry about the precise units of time elapsed. The mana barrier you’d enspelled around the eight corners of your room wasn’t expensive, but intent and experience count for more than money in this place, and the barrier only brushes across your soul as you pass; emitting your astral signature easily but promising pain and suffering to anything else. You emerge on the streets of orkland in the astral, some blocks from your flat. It’d take an astral tracker already having known where you lived to trace back to your rented rooms, but always cautious, you stay ground level and begin apparating down the street, searching for just the right signs of urban decay, until you arrive in the astral shadowing linden street in Oak Center district. You’d had a hunch that this patch of Hellion turf would provide the signs you needed, and the urban blight and crushing poverty certainly did make for a colorful reflection in the astral. What was a seedy residential neighborhood 70 years ago had only reached new depths in the 6th world, and the graceful Queen Anne mansions that had already been converted to multi-units had plunged into architectural and economic squalor as landlords grew cheap quickfab rooms, supports, and extensions on their rotting buildings. The pink and grey tumorous additions blur the edges of the buildings, in many cases joining homes together, with some extreme cases of block-wide abomination of spongey quickfab and aluminum siding. The spirit world cares little for the architectural contrivances of flesh creatures, and the astral reflection of this neighborhood was dark for other reasons. Every murder leaves some trace. Even an angry outburst makes a pained echo in the astral. This street was dark, with a tumult of shrill cries and hard roars of anger echoing from the building around you. The people that pass around and through your spirit are washed out to your eye, their own spirits showing dull and withdrawn, everyone trying to get home and be done in these early morning hours. Finally you spot the trash fire. You’d seen three others, but the squatters there hadn’t found anything wooden to burn. This one had an old fragment of a chair leg smoldering in the oil barrel that the several orks huddle around. The smoke that drifted off the burning wood didn’t have the washed out look that other smoke in other fires did to your astral eyes. Having recognized a suitable anchoring point, you feel the first catch of the astral sliding into place, obediently conforming to the demands of lore. The astral twists and the mirror image of the burning timber is now opposite the first. You walk between the two entry point unseen by the orks, your inadvertent doormen. There, the two hollowed stones appeared against the brick walls of the alley, just past the burning wood. You observe the ritual and dip your left hand into the stone on the left, bringing water to your mouth and drinking. Next, your right hand dips into the stone on the right, bringing a handful of sugar to your mouth and you eat. Carefully not observing the vanishing edges of the alley as you walk forward along what has turned into a dirt under your feet, you hurry along as the astral around you thins and disappears, stopping only when you feel grass bending under your feet and the sun on your very corporeal face. You have arrived in the land of the dead. 5 Quote Level 38 [Raveling Bard] Link to comment
DarK_RaideR Posted March 8, 2017 Report Share Posted March 8, 2017 Vintage takes a moment to let the scenery sink in. He's heard various wiz-kids mumble about the Astral being splattered with auras and emotions, he's even had chats with the occasional street shaman who'd talk about the Astral being all green and flowery, the way the world should'ave would'ave been if not for men and pollution and whatnot, but this is new. Might be the spirit of Fox showing him a new place or playing tricks on him. Most likely both. He never bothered with the theoretical stuff and he hated hanging around with all those wiser-than-thou awakened drekheads. "Just my damn luck" he thinks to himself. "Some get formal training, some are born into a shamanic culture and then there's me: awakened by accident, a tad too late in life." For a moment, the elf feels a rush of terror sweeping him. No commlinks here, no way to reach out to anyone. He's a natural being among people, to the point where solitude can quickly turn into existential dread. Vintage digs down deep inside to find the discipline that will keep him going. Intense emotions like these are no joke in the Astral, or wherever the heck he is right now. People. He's gotta find someone. There's gotta be somebody around. 5 Quote Lvl 65 Multitasker Link to comment
Laghail Posted March 8, 2017 Author Report Share Posted March 8, 2017 Vintage Metaplanes: Ohlone Land of the Dead For a moment, the elf feels a rush of terror sweeping him. No commlinks here, no way to reach out to anyone. He's a natural being among people, to the point where solitude can quickly turn into existential dread. Vintage digs down deep inside to find the discipline that will keep him going. Intense emotions like these are no joke in the Astral, or wherever the heck he is right now. People. He's gotta find someone. There's gotta be somebody around. This might have been one of fox’s crueler jokes, sending a city elf tripping through the astral to emerge in this, this place. It’s not the ghostly astral and it’s not quite the mundane world. The sunlight is too sharp and the air too fresh. Dappled sunlight ripples across your face where the spirit road left you, deep in the heart of a mature redwood forest. The tree canopy extends hundreds of feet above your head with the smallest mammoth trunk easily reaching past 400 feet. A carpet of moss, cones and needles provide a soft carpet underfoot with ferns and smaller scrub spruce and firs fighting a battle for dominance in the lower stories of the cathedral forest. The insistent rapping of woodpeckers and the caws of jays quiet as a crashing in the underbrush some 40 yards from you precedes a foraging heard of elephants before they emerge into your clearing. The beasts are smaller than the vids, in fact they look all wrong; straight tusks almost scraping the ground and they’re hardly any taller than a horse. The beasts incessantly feed on the redwood cones and other ground level forage as the heard moves on without noticing you, and you’re so transfixed that you almost miss the clawed giant behind you. The scrape of claws on wood alerts you and you spin around to see a wall of cinnamon fur. A massive ursine beast, easily 20 feet at the shoulder, with sickle claws for rending - is calmly shredding bark from the giant redwoods and chewing contentedly. The giant sloth’s bulk is supported on hind legs that seem like stubby tree trunks, with a ponderous tail providing a tripod support. Your alarm finally subsiding, you remember your instructions from your mentor spirit and take a deep breath. Fox assured you that physics in this tribal happy hunting ground work more along moral laws that physical laws, but the next part of this trip was weird enough on paper. You stretch your mouth wide open and reach your hand inside, first to your knuckles, then your wrist, then forearm and elbow. “Just pretend you’re telling yourself a bedtime story” Fox had said. Not daring to think about what you’re doing, you pull a pink bakery box and a brown paper packet of tobacco and rolling papers from out of your own gullet. No gagging, no esophageal scrapping, just a moist arm holding your prizes. “You’re still a young kit that doesn’t know anything, I don’t care how old you feel. There’s a way these stories go young one, and only one way to bring trade goods to the land of the first people. Now eat up!” You certainly hadn’t ingested the paper wrapping on the donuts or cigarillo’s that you ate last night, but this plane of existence seemed to share Fox’s perverse sense of humor. Rolling a quick cigarette was the work of a moment with your fingers never forgetting an old habit. You focus your will on the tip of the cigarette and it smolders into a lit cherry, no magic required. Physics are more about intent here, interesting. Lit cigarette in one hand, an open box of bacon praline long johns in the other, you cautiously approach the sloth, hoping that eating the tobacco was the only punch line of Fox’s joke. “Hey uncle!” You yell in greeting, trying to be respectful and loud simultaneously, “would you care to share tobacco?” The words have no visible effect on the Megatherium, but as the smoke wafts up to his jowly horse shaped head, the beast turns its dim eyes to regard you below. A long moment stretches out between you and the six ton sloth. Some decision reached, the sloth releases its clutch on the tree and takes a ponderous step towards you, and another; each step has the sloth reducing in size as he walks towards you, until an apparently human-sized creature has joined you; his head still the shaggy horse shape of a sloth, but his body a man’s, a portly man with an impressive paunch, but clad in jeans and a black t-shirt that reads in white block print, “sloths do it slooooow”. Repeating your offer to make sure you get this part right, Fox did stress the tobacco bit, “would you care to share my tobacco uncle?” The man-sloth silently reaches for the rolled cigarette and takes a long drag with its supple horsey lips. The absurd picture of camel joe’s chubby younger brother, the sloth speaks around the cigarette in his lips with ease, “I thank you for the gift of tobacco young one, we seldom see the grandchildren of fox in these woods. Coyote’s yapping get, and the cousins wander here as they will, but you fox children are rare indeed. What brings you to the world of the first people?” Your shoulders relax as you hear an almost word for word rendition of what Fox predicted his cousin Sloth would say. Picking up your memorized piece of the dialogue, “I come for the favor of guidance safe journeys. Long have your people been psychopomp to my kind, and I offer gifts in gratitude of your help, as is fitting.” Here you lay out the donuts on the forest floor before him, and add four more hastily rolled cigarettes. His long horsey face stretches wide into a smile, a pleased one you guess, and he sighs before replying. “It is good to receive a visitor with manners. I accept your gifts and I grant you in turn the gift from the first lands into your own shadowland. But do not stay overlong here. I grant you passage, but brother dire wolf and brother smilodon prowl here, and the gift of your safety is not mine to give.” His ritual speech finished, Sloth scoops up the cigarettes first and then reverently lifts the bakery box to his mouth and inhales deeply (the lit cigarette in his mouth almost disintegrating into ash). Small sounds of anticipation escape him, but he pries his attention away for a moment and adds “oh, but passage is by the old way, bury yourself in the earth of my forest, and the ground will conduct you home.” And with a spray of crumbs, Sloth is lost in the bakery box. Vintage Astral: Shiawase Oakland Arcology The metaplane disgorges you into the astral over Oakland. One moment, dirt is pressed around your physical body, then the next you’re falling through the earth and your spirit comes to rest with a view of the bay underneath you. Knowing the dangers of attracting attention in the astral, you will yourself to the ground and on Peralta street in front of Shiawase Oakland Arcology. The skyscraper work camp of a building has been wrapped in a segmented manna barrier. Thousands of smaller manna barriers have been cast and then knit into a multipart translucent barrier of spirit, like fish scales around Shiapet. The barrier isn’t reflective, so you can easily see inside the building, or you could anyway, but the mosses and climbing vines and cliff grasses that have been given free reign over the exterior of the arcology, they serve as a privacy screen to your astral eyes. The green life has its own whorls and tiny galaxies of networked life auras blanketing the building, meaning you’d have to penetrate the manna barrier to obtain more information. And there’s even security spirits on patrol. The air kami that guard the exterior of the building in the astral take on the shape of cranes as they fly slow corkscrew circuits about the building. You count eight distinct spirits on the outside, with no way of seeing inside unless you breach the manna barrier. The spirits themselves ignore you as you’ve been staying far enough away as to not signal a threat. Additionally, coming from through the metaplanes, you smell off-putting in the astral. You’ve seen flitting watcher spirits zing wide arcs to avoid you and the clinging sweetgrass and pine impression that forms a cloying astral odor around you. From the astral, you also can assense the living auras of several guards in the entryway, their dull signatures speaking to heavy cybernetic modifications, not to mention the tedium of guard duty. Running your own discreet corkscrew circuit of the building, you note the shipping/receiving dock at 8th & Cambell Street. The mana barrier there is not woven into the fish scale composite barrier and seems cast across the loading bay door itself. In your limited experience, okay, in what you’ve read about astral security, this kind of arrangement is used when visiting spirits or awakened outsiders are routinely permitted in and out through an entrance. A normal corp astral security setup can include employee astral signatures in the barrier to allow seamless passage. This could represent a vulnerability. Reaching the top of the building, you see a noticeably lighter security setup in the physical world – at least, there’s no auras for guards on the roof, and the same independently manna barrier door is used up here, the same as the loading bay down at street level. An aura traveling midair through you at some speed catches you by surprise, until you assense the man and realize he’s traveling in a auto piloted glider craft. The man’s calm boredom and his projected memories of hundreds of these flights between Shiawase San Francisco and the Oakland arcology; rooftop launch catapults fling him out over the bay, then riding the air currents to dive in towards Shiapet at an angle taking him below the roof and then following a corkscrew upwards to off speed as he gains altitude, then stalling out above the roof to allow the landing system to safely net and decant the passenger from the single person craft. The security kami still sweep the landing pad and rooftop entry door, but again, this could represent a vulnerability. 3 Quote Level 38 [Raveling Bard] Link to comment
Leigh Posted March 10, 2017 Report Share Posted March 10, 2017 F.R.O.G. at Howard and 8th Shortly After Dawn… ”Think I could get a ride to my place? I’ll buy you breakfast?” Firefox asked with a slight twitch to her body. She tried to cover it up with a bright smile, and for a moment it worked. Titus smiled back and nodded before lifting the popper to his face, he inhaled sharply with his gaze leveled on the tiny woman sitting on the floor across from him. The intense burning dissipated within a few seconds as his heart rate ratcheted up. The colours in the room sharpened, the blacks darker, colours more vivid and the white of the far wall seemed to almost glow. Exhaling slowly through his nose he offered the popper to Firefox and tossed it to her lightly when she nodded. Slicing through the air it got caught in a slash of sunlight streaming in through a tear in what passed as a curtain in the apartment. A riot of teals shimmered across it’s surface as it arced down into the tiniest hand he’d ever seen on an adult. You don’t even know where the hell she lives, who she runs with or even where the fuck she’s from, what the shit are you doing Titus?? he thought as he watched her take a hit of Nova, clearly not all that familiar with the drug, her face scrunched up for a long moment before she furiously rubbed at her face and started laughing. ”You’ll sneeze if you keep that up babe, and trust me you don’t want to do that. It hurts like a bitch.” he said and rolled off the couch and got to his feet, heading into the tiny kitchen to get a drink of water from the tap. GoGo’s cousin hadn’t left even a plastic gas station cup in this heap of an apartment so he turned on the taps and tilted his head under the faucet, gulping down surprisingly clean tasting cold water. He cupped some into his hand and splashed it on his face and attempted to de-tangle his hair from around his left horn before turning back towards the couch. ”So where exactly are we going now? I’m not exactly welcome in all corners of the city…” he trailed off and focused on Fox. ”Acorn Apartments over on 10th and Adeline, it’s pretty close to your shop actually now that I think about it. Come to think of it, don’t you need to be getting to work too, I thought flower shops opened up like really early?” she replied and started messing with her hair again, the colour saying the same but the length shrinking until it was just skimming her shoulders. The curls becoming more pronounced. It made her look older, more calm, despite the glow to her face from the Nova. She looked like a stranger to him now and he didn’t like it at all. Watching her pull on her pants from the night before and shove her feet back into the flats she kept up a steady stream of chatter about how it wasn’t really an apartment so much as a walk in closet with a mattress on the floor somewhere. ”You know, this place isn’t half bad, if it had some furniture and maybe some actual curtains, but man the neighbors would lose their minds with an elf living on this street… Wait… didn’t you say this was your friend’s cousin’s place or something? How the heck did he get the place in the middle of human land?” she asked looking up at him as she pulled the stolen shirt over her head and slipping on the questionably slutty top. ”GoGo’s cousin is human, only one in his generation I think. Rest of the family is Orcs and a few Trolls here and there. Got a hell of a lot of shit growing up in Orkland so he moved out here a few years back. The funny thing is he wound up dating some orc chick and is moving right back home again.” Taking his shirt back and tugged it over his head and shrugged back into his jacket and looked around for his boots, finding them on the floor at the other end of the couch. ”Pancakes for the ride to your place, but you’re on you own for anything on this side of the bridges. I don’t care what magic you can work with your hair, there’s frag all you can do to shrink me down or hide the horns out here in breeder land. ”I bet you lunch that I can work my magic so well that nobody will even bat a damn eye at seeing you walk into a lab with little ‘human’ me in a few hours. You up for it?” Fox asked as they left the apartment and headed down into the garage below to unlock his bike. She had a sneaky grin on her face and was still bouncing slightly as she walked from the Nova. There was no way in hell this little keep could possibly make him blend in anywhere out here in San Fransisco and he knew it. It was an easy way to get to spend more time with her though. ”If you want to have lunch with me babe, you just had to ask. But if you want to make a bet of it sure, I’ll buy you lunch if you can magically make me acceptable to the little humans out there on the street. he turned to face her at the bottom of the stairs and offered his hand to shake on it. In a few minutes they were leaving San Fran and heading back into Orkland. Fox smiled and tapped into her messages while they rode back to her hole in the wall of an apartment. ---------------------------------- To User: TimothyGunn-2nd Message: Good morning you devious bastard! What’s it going to cost me to get the standard intimidation kit to fit a 9 foot tall bruiser of a Troll? I need on in black asap. I’ve got shit to trade for it, or if you’ll let me, I’ll pay you next week after the Nuyen for my job clears my account. Pretty please Timmy? <3<3<3 From User: TimothyGunn-2nd Message: Giiiiiirl! What the hell do you think I’m running a Biggest and Tallest here?! Just bring the tusker here and I’ll see what I can do… and I’ll take trade. My sister is getting married and needs her makeup done for her engagement photos and for the bachelorette party and the wedding. And no, not my pretty sister, Vero’s managed to hook a blind wage mage this summer. --------------------------------- 5 Quote Link to comment
Volki Posted March 18, 2017 Report Share Posted March 18, 2017 After Kaanta's failed traffic cam hack he sat on the trunck of the taxi and lit up a cig with his trusty lighter. "Hmm the hack hadn't been a complete wash, at least I have her address. She is staying at the Iron Horse Hotel, its not the most secure hotel in the city." he thought to himself. After some quick scans of the VR\AR channels streaming to and from the location Kaanta finds a tunnel program that lets him access the hundreds of tiny cameras hidden in all of the guest rooms. The channels showcased every facet of the culture he found himself currently in. From junkies to weird sex parties involving balloon animals and vintage cowboy outfits he kept himself busy with the kaleidoscope of debauchery. Then he stumbled upon the room containing a slender dark haired elf that seemed to match the photos of Ren Hongo. After a quick shuffle of the stored footage and a couple of gratuitous copies to his shadowdrive of the shower cams he finds out what room she is in. From the organized luggage and hotel bill it seemed we didn't have much time left before she was in the wind again. Kaanta meticulously set a few security hooks and a backup plan in the industrial connection just in case. Kaanta makes his way over to San Cha and he and Pendergast begin to lay out an extensive plan to rescue her. The plan was incredible detail oriented and well laid out and accounted for what we could see at the time. They created a Powerpoint presentation and had more tea and bagels while the contemplated. Then they set out to carry out their parts of the plan. Pendergast went out to find out where Ren was going after we got her away from the police. Kaanta went to do Kaanta things with the help of his Yakuza connections. Ironhorse Hotel Kaanta makes his way up the stairwell inside of the hotel accompanied by two friends for hire packing pistols. They make their way up to the 10th story and into the hallway. With a quick click and a swipe Kaanta send out an email to Pendergast: P, Yo! we are in position and operation Jenkins is about to kick off. -K Just as the plan predicted we were alone in the eerily quiet hallway, except for the cowboy sex party in the room next to us with its peppered yehaws and the sounds of a balloon being assaulted by oiled hands. His AR comms went off as the program he set up to monitor the telecom systems went off. It seems someone saw a few armed strangers creeping up the stairs and the police are in pursuit. Oh how lucky for the receptionist, the police were already on their way to pick up a suspect. What a lucky break for her! Ren's room was at the end of the hall and we crept along with our weapons at the ready. We came up to the door and the two temp freinds took lookout behind me. I knocked calmly on the door and motioned for the two guards to get out of the view of the hollow glass of the door. The door became clear as glass as I was now standing in front of Ren. "Who the fuck are you?" she sneered at me. "Ms. Hongo if you would be so kind as to accompany me downstairs I have something very important to discuss with you and we do not have much time." Kaanta did his best to stand up straight and to give his best smile but his cigarette stained smile and missing teeth didn't exactly scream teenage heartthrob. Just as the plan predicted she told him to fornicate with himself and the door became opaque once more. Kaanta's special brand of charisma wasn't always a hit with the ladies. Plan Jenkins protocol B Kaanta and his 2 best friends ran down the hallway and gained enough momentum on the way back to send the door shattering to the floor with an explosion of noise and electrical sparks. Ren Hongo was running toward her bag to no doubt grab something to defend herself from the less than sexual foursome that has become her hotel room. Kaanta grabs his crossbow with the stun dart and fired one well placed dart into her perfectly formed keeb behind and she droped to the ground and slid across the carpet. Despite the amazingly discussed plan, she now had a rug burn across her forehead. This was business as usual for the carpet. Hotel carpets were made for giving rug burns, although they are usually against the knees of the happy victim but the carpet was not one to complain. As planned one of the guards scooped Ren up off the floow and grabbed her backpack from the table. They all made their way down the hallways toward the stairs to make their escape. Every doorway had a curious head watching the ones who were making all of the noise. Unfortunately they did not make it to the end of the hallway however. The last door swung open with an enormous gust of hair that sent the group stumbling against the cherub wallpaper of the halls. A group of astral beings were heading toward them mumbling some enchantment. As the amazing plan predicted the inevitable shit hit the inevitable fan. Kaanta set off his emergency exit protocol and the entire building began to shake. Every tiny lens that was hidden inside of everything from the light fixtures to the toilet seat began to self destruct and began to cause chain reactions of melting plastic and mattress fires. The lubed up balloon party lit up immediately as a well placed spark caught an oil drenched towel on fire. The rumbling was from the water system generators that, according to plan, had mysteriously short circuited and instead of bringing the fire up to the 10th floor in began to flood the bottom 3 floors of the hotel. This was enough of a distraction to allow us to slip down the stairs running faster than we had ever run before. The bottom floors were flooding and pouring into the stairwell along with the panicked hotel guests. The astral beings were in hot pursuit as they flung people aside like they were panties in the honeymoon suite. Kaanta, followed closely by an unconscious woman who hung over the shoulder of a tall yakuza member and his pistol toting friend spilled out into the lobby. The flow of people was all over the place, firemen and police were fighting to get up as hundreds of people fought to get out while 4 astral being mowed through them. A quick click on his preloaded AR commands and the power went out in the lobby which sent the crowd in a panicked frenzy. The pandemonium was enough to get the obvious gang members out with the help of their blackmarket night vision AR toggles. The street was a mess and filled with motorcycle cops, firemen and hundreds of onlookers recording the hotel for their AR vlog series or the daily news. Thanks to a couple Yak strings we had to pull and definite favors we now owed, we had a decoy news van that we threw Ren in. As we edged our way through the crowed and away from the chaos Kaanta sent off another message to Pendergast. P, Welp, operation Jenkins went absolutely smoothly and despite setting yet another structure fire, causing a flood and almost getting killed by a couple of astral creeps we made it out. Where is this chick going? I definitely do not mind keeping her company in the meantime I just want to know how much time I have with her -K Kaanta and the van creep out into the shadows, leaving the pissed off astrals and the confused police to deal with the simultaneous fire and flood. Damn that was a good plan.... 4 Quote Link to comment
Leigh Posted March 19, 2017 Report Share Posted March 19, 2017 Acorn Apartments Shortly after Rush Hour "Girlie, that was fun! We need to do this again sometime. Now remember, you need to find a cute dress for Vero, and for the love of Prada, do not put her in anything peach! it makes her look like she's dying of liver failure. Such a tragedy that she got all of Dad's flaws and I got all of this fabulousness from him. Anyhow, Tah!" Tim said and left the tiny apartment in a flourish of very expensive silks, the tools of his trade carefully draped over one arm as he left to head to work. Fox waved and closed the door behind him before turning back to see her friend's handiwork. Titus was decked out in a classic G-Man black suit with a flat black tie and his usual boots, which she had cleaned up and polished while he was being tortured into the suit he clearly looked very uncomfortable in. "I look exactly like what my mother taught me to hate in this world..." Titus sighed and loosened the tie just a bit despite the slight glare Fox gave him for fiddling with it. "I still think you're going to have to get lunch though babe, no matter how freaky I look in this get up. Finish getting into your gear so we can get going, the sooner I'm out of this monkey suit the better." He said and put on the sunglasses she had lent him and crossed his arms, practicing being threatening without being terribly obvious about it. Fox laughed at him and slipped on her costume for the break in to the Union Square Labs. She kept the questionably slutty top, and pulled on some black jeans and the tall slouchy boots her friend had lent her and threw a few seemingly random things into a deceptively small looking purse and slipped her arms into a short, casual black blazer and rolled the cuffs up to just shy of her elbows and headed for the door. Her makeup was a simple clean human look, and a careful application of eyeliner made her almond shaped eyes look far more rounded and the huge messy curls hid her ears perfectly. "Let's get going, the sooner we can get in the sooner we can get out again, and the sooner you can buy me some lunch!" she grinned at him, turned around and flounced out of the apartment, acting the part of the pretty, human woman she currently was. Union Square Garage - P4 After parking Titus' bike a few levels closer to the street, they made their way down to the Security door that lead into the labs. She placed her palm on the hand reader and keyed in her stolen access code and the lock blinked green and she pushed it open, Titus following close behind her. She started humming a stupid pop song and put an exaggerated swap to her hips as she headed down the hall towards where she hoped was the lobby or at least some signs pointing towards the various parts of the labs. She still had her sunglasses on, the reflective plastic hiding the Matrix feed that was scrolling up the lenses on her side only. She had an prob program running basic facial recognition of all the HR files so that she could access public social media to give her information about the people she saw in case they spoke to her. Titus followed about three steps behind her, a grim look on his brutal face and his black glasses still in place. At the end of the hall and through the double doors Fox looked up at the small sign that was mounted high on the wall. Union Square Laboratories and Research Centre Security and Reception > Restrooms > Cafeteria < Research and Administration < Defense Labs ^ Bio-Tech Labs ^ Turning on her heel she picked up the volume of the stupid song and headed down towards Security to flirt with whoever was on the desk and to get a first hand look at what she would have to work with. She'd been unable to glean much about their on site security measures during her hacking attempt last night. The guard's name was Dave, married, two grown kids, one who had recently had a baby according to social media. She guessed that Shelly would be the nice type of girl to ask after the new grand baby and so she plastered a cheery smile on her face. "Hey Dave! How's it going?" she asked and leaned on the desk hoping he would be the friendly type he seemed to be from the data her prob uncovered and paused her program to get a low level sweep checking into the local security system, doing a non invasive check into what she might have to deal with. "Shelly? I thought you were on holidays until next week?" asked an overweight human in early middle age. His eyes flicked between Fox and the giant of a Troll behind her. He swallowed hard, his one hand sliding down under the security desk and onto the pistol that was mounted for his personal defense in case the lab was ever breached. "Who's your friend?" "This, scary looking tr- person is my body guard! I caved to the girls and went into one of the Casinos and made out like a bandit! I almost got mugged twice while I was still there so I used some of my winnings to hire some muscle for a while until I can get my winnings on lock down and until the news dies down on my social feeds. The last thing I need is cousins and 'friends' crawling out of the gutters asking for favours." she said, air quoting and sliding her glasses off and sighing. "Although I did see the most adorable little dresses the other day that would look just adorable on your grand daughter! I should pick one up for her. I'll bet it would look just adorable! How's Amanda doing now? Is her little girl sleeping through the night yet?" she asked, chattering away with Dave until she heard a slight ping indicating that her sweep was finished and that she had what she should need to get in and out without too much hassle. A glance at Titus and she gave him a wink as he arched a brow and continued to stand there all stoic and scary while she listened to Dave brag about his newest family member. He even had a physical picture of the squishy little baby in his shirt pocket, All wispy hair and squishy cheeks. "Aww she's adorable! Listen, I've got to head down to my workstation and get some files I hadn't finished working on before my va-cay, I don't need Phil on my case about taking off for two weeks without finishing my work." she said, rolling her eyes and handing back the dog eared photo. She waved good bye and walked through the doors heading down to the Bio-Tech labs, Titus following three steps behind. "You are seriously creepy when you're not you... You going to let me know what the hell we're doing here anytime soon?" He asked quietly as they walked down the halls. "The less you know right now the better, just keep being scary and we should be able to get in and out in no time. I just need to find a terminal and see what I can dig up about Mister Kitty and what the hell they were doing with him and we can be on our way..." She replied and slipped her glasses back on so she could keep an eye on the security situation. Mister Kitty? Titus mouthed and arched an eye brow, he simply shook his head and followed his girl. This whole weekend was turning into one hell of a strange trip and it was only getting started. 3 Quote Link to comment
Laghail Posted March 26, 2017 Author Report Share Posted March 26, 2017 Vintage Union Square Macy's, San Francisco The perfume counter of Macy's is hardly prime territory for shadowrunners, but you followed a flock of watcher spirits across the bay and they led you here. After the trip through the Ohlone plane, the spirits here in the cities have been treating you like you're a fellow bound spirit drudge. The watchers you flew in with, they scatter for the corners of the store, apparently tasked to work loss prevention for the last hour of their summons. The unbound you've seen are acting restless as Dawn draws closer. Their ethereal forms growing transparent even in the astral, which, is hardly anything to boast over at a retail store in the small hours of the morning. Sleepy auras of stock clerks on the early shift bleed into the astral to join the spirits who're providing high cost security. Acting quickly before you lose your cover, you vanish from the store to appear outside on Geary street. The union station lab is in front of you, a midrise commercial tower built in the neo-brutalist style that made a comeback in in the 2060's; naked girders and concrete columns supporting floor to ceiling black glass walls. The modern honesty of the structure is inverted in the astral where lines redirect and warp with impossible geometry. The mirrored manna barrier is almost a demi-plane in its complexity, but you apparte in front of the structure confidently, trusting your cover to hold. You lay a ghostly hand on the barrier and feel the pulse of the spells holding the manna, the substance of the astral, into a wall shape. Your own heartbeat thrums in your awareness, even miles from your body. Remembering Fox's lessons, you listen to the space between the two pulses, and focus as your awareness expands to recognize the larger pattern that includes the two rhythms; the barrier melts around you and you fall into the astral space within union square garage. The noise within the astral is deafening. Some floors are nearly empty in the astral with only quiet auras of early morning assembly techs working on something mechanical - the dull impression of complex tasks that filter through the workers auras are muted by the thrasher metal they're blasting to stay awake. The other floors and spaces you pass through are, well they aren't quiet. Intense astral static howls through your awareness, coruscating curtains of rage and death scream in echoes from the walls in almost every room. Pale shapes of meta humans infest the astral, the broken ghost forms of metahumans howling and whimpering add another layer of ambient pain. The living auras on these floors are largely ignorant of the sea of misery around them, but you've seen the straining ghosts press themselves into moments of manifesting. The lack of astral security spirits around the facility makes sense in context, you couldn't imagine how the ghosts would respond to your presence without the masking from the land of the dead. You flee. Taking refuge on ground floor with its merciful quiet and no death echoes, you gather your thoughts for a moment, only to recognize the vibrant aura of Firefox at the reception desk. You trail your teammate in the astral as the amusing play of controlled panic, determination and deceit play across her aura as she schmoozes past the front desk guard and gains access the elevator for the upper floors of the facility. As the doors close behind Firefox and her companion, some troll with warm colors of affection in his aura, you manifest visibly in the elevator with them. "Firefox, don't react, it's me, Vintage! The cameras don't pickup astral bodies but don't talk. There's some fragged dreck up there. Lots of dead non-humans, and the living metahumans are dying. I saw some living humans up there but I couldn't stay for details. It's like a blizzard of razors in the astral. You should be fine in meatspace, but don't get separated." You quickly sketch out the building layout as you saw it, and then gratefully fade back to astral and get the hell out of Frisco. 4 Quote Level 38 [Raveling Bard] Link to comment
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