Mission 2b - Special Delivery

((if you are going to sleep until morning, you can just have all your stun back. same for everyone else. The check is just for an hour of rest. Technically you are supposed to check for every hour, but a full night's sleep is enough checks that I don't expect anyone to have stun left unless for some reason they have an exceptionally low body AND willpower.

As for what happened to your roll, you forgot the / on the close tags))

Morning comes and the people all awaken, somewhat surprised to find themselves tied up. They are still recovering from the shakes when Wujen starts probing into the mind of the leader. He only manages to get surface thoughts which basically amount to, "Shit, I feel awful," and "You know, you could try asking questions before mucking around in my head."

WuJen hears him and steps into the room.

"I could, but given the circumstances I don't feel you are due any courtesy at all.  Also, you might lie, and it saves time.  In fact, if what I believe to be the case it true, you are already a proven liar.  I will keep at it until I am satisfied I know the truth of last night, and then we will decide what to do with you, if anything."

"Now, I suppose since you are awake and feeling so talkative we can start with that.  Bear in mind I will be verifying your story, and the decision on what to do with you will depend heavily on how closely what you say matches what we find out to be the truth."

(ooc: I'm not dropping the spell just yet.  While I can't directly access his memories, it should prove fairly difficult to lie without thinking of the truth, thinking of what actually did go down the previous night, etc...  Kinda like not thinking about strawberries right after being told not to do so.)

The leader eyerolls so hard that Wujen can hear him thinking it. He says, "Start with what, exactly? You're the mind reader here, not me. What do you want to know?"

"What do you think I want to know, genius.  We get hired to deliver a package to the third circle of hell, and it turns out to all be some kind of game.  Tell me all about it."

He says, "If you went through some problems before delivering the package, I don't know anything about that. Our job was just to call you when you arrived at the delivery point and see if you could make it to the junkyard on time. The package had a tracker in it so we would know when to call.

"I don't know about the others here, but my son has Lesch-Nyhan disease. He can't walk or control his muscles, and the doctors don't expect him to last until his 10th birthday. I was told that a cure exists and that all I had to do to get it for him was to call the contacts in the commlink I was given when the tracking signal reached a particular address, give whoever it was on the other side the message I presumably gave to you, accept the package when it arrived and keep it safe.  

"The moment I finished the call, we were ambushed by ninjas and that's when you showed up. Before you ask, I have no idea what was in the package other than the tracker."

Having said his piece he takes a deep breath and looks at the floor, "I have no idea if there actually is a cure or not. It was a long shot to begin with, but I am going to assume that my son doesn't get it at this point."

((eyerolls so hard that Wujen can hear him thinking it ))

Sent from Topic'it App

"There's a hole or two there, just at face value.  First, why the lie that we took longer than expected?  Second, why have us deliver it to the Kita Barrens, if you wanted to keep that package safe we could have handed it over almost literally anywhere else without the fuss."

"I can put your mind at ease about one thing-- we received payment for the delivery.  Since you apparently aren't our Johnson, the persons that set all this up were satisfied that all conditions were met.  If there is a cure, you have likely earned it to their satisfaction."

"Thirdly, why the hardass act here?  As far as I can tell from your perspective you were attacked and left for dead in the middle of a ghoul infested barrens.  We didn't feel right leaving you there, so we picked you up and carried you out at least as much to save your lives as for the intel you might provide."

Sun, sitting on a chair while listening to all of this, gets up, walks over to one of the goons, and pokes him with a foot. "I assume all these guys have sons with that disease?"

"First, like I just said to you, I said on the commlink the message I was told to say. In case it was unclear, that is including the part about you being late. It didn't matter when you showed up, I was supposed to say that.

"Second, I met you where I was told to meet you. I suspect the location was chosen because of its relative lack of security cameras, but as for the real reason, your guess is as good as mine.

"Third, what hardass act? I have literally told you everything I know the second you asked me. We did wake up tied up in a love hotel with you poking around in my brain though, so I am not sure what to take from that."

To Sun, he says, "I don't think so. It is a pretty rare disease. It occurs in about 1 in 400,000 people, and even then almost exclusively in boys. My son is probably the only living person in the city who has it. I've met other parents who had kids with the disease, but their children have passed over the years. I never met these men before last night and we didn't get too chatty while standing around in the dark in a junkyard. Pretty sure if they had kids with the disease, I would have met them before. If you want to know why they were there, go ahead and ask them."

Chougou walks up to the one that's talking and puts his hand on his shoulder.

"I'm sorry to hear about your son. I hope that they follow through with what they've promised. We are taking extra precautions because of the strangeness of the situation, but once we all understand the details we will of course let you go on your way. We have you guys tied up for your own safety as well as ours, I truly apologize for the inconvenience."

To Wujen:
"Does he seem to be telling the truth?"

Sent from Topic'it App

Wujen hears no significant thoughts beyond what the guy is saying.

"I'm talking about that attitude right there.  You act as if this is the most ridiculous thing in the world that after jerking us around we save your lives and want to know what the hells is going on.  I can literally feel you rolling your eyes."

"So let me get this straight.  You were hired to receive a package in the middle of the barrens.  You are accompanied by a couple of guys you never met before and know nothing about.  You don't know anything about where you were supposed to deliver the package.  You don't know anything about us, the guys you were supposed to be receiving the package from after jerking us around with a fake message.  In short, you know nothing of value whatsoever and you have no interest in being helpful in finding anything out."

"Is that it in a nutshell?  You have nothing to offer at all, not even an apology for your part in this game?"

He says, "Look, I didn't jerk you around. I just did what I was told and was killed. Then I woke up here, tied up, shaking, cold and probed.

"I was supposed to take the package to a dead drop in Deki-cho. I can give you the location if you really want, but I doubt it would be useful. You can grumble at me all you like, but I am being as helpful as I can be because there is only so much I know. If you want answers, talk to the person who hired us. My commlink should be receiving a call from them at 10 o'clock, assuming we haven't slept through the contact time already."

Torpor removes the commlink from his pocket and checks the time and for any missed calls.

(ooc: Are the other guys awake too?  I'm not getting anything else from this guy that I can think of, and it will be at least 4 hours before I can try again without a penalty.  I want to verify his story, but if he's not thinking of anything but the exact thing he's speaking this is a non-starter.  We are obviously missing something here, it's too convoluted for just a job interview.)

According to the commlink, the current time is 7:15.

The other men are awake and keeping quiet since they are groggy, tied up, and unsure what is going on.

Chougou goes and asks one of the other men what they were doing in the junkyard

Sent from Topic'it App

The first guard says, "I was supposed to guard that guy for the night and my gambling debts would be wiped clean. Last I remember is standing in the junkyard then waking up here."

Sun sighs. "Sounds like a bunch of suckers who got tricked into being decoys." He looks up and addresses everyone with a booming voice, the kind a strict teacher would use to address a class when they misbehaved.

"Alright, how did everyone first get in touch with the people you made this deal with?"

The leader says, "I received a package containing the commlink and instructions."

The guards one by one each say that the same thing happened to them.

"You got commlinks and instructions. What happened before?"

Guard #1 says, "What do you mean? I was living my life. If you mean how I contacted this guy before, I didn't. That was the first and only time we were in contact. Package showed up with trideo instructions for what seemed like a relatively easy job in exchange for paying off my gambling debts and I took it. I figured it was my bookie giving me a little mercy instead of breaking my legs and I wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth."

Over the group commlink:

"Well there are two possibilities here as I see it, either these guys got suckered into this charade and will hopefully get the things that were promised to them, or they are our recent employers and are testing us to see how far we go with suspects.

In either case, unless anyone suspects they are of danger to us I vote that we let them go. This was a setup from the start and it's probably time to move on with our lives. We should harvest whatever goodwill we can from this and maybe try to make these guys our friends. I can even offer them rides home if someone can come along for protection."

Sent from Topic'it App

Sun pulls out his commlink, tries to push a button, flipping the thing over, catches it with his other hand, and starts typing, holding it firmly with both hands.

"I'm with the getting suckered into this, unless WuJen sensed any lies. There's no reason why we wouldn't assume they didn't get suckered in. The empty golden credstick confirms the trickery from one side, and Carl getting contacted to let him know the run is completed, both back this up."