Mission 4A - Mudra She Wrote

Sun just stands there, staring at the ground, one foot on the toes on the floor, twisting it left and right

"Wait, before I forget, I brought your computer too"

Kitaro hands over Emiko's cyberdeck. It's pretty busted up but it looks like it has been dusted and cleaned very recently.

Emiko happily takes the box of chocolates, bows, and listens to Kitaro tell the story. She winces at the part where her throat is cut. Once Kitaro is finished with the tale, Emiko kisses the cheek of both Kitaro and Sun and writes:

> Thank you for saving my life!
> I am eternally grateful

Emiko then holds up 1 finger to say, "one more thing."

> I am set to have surgery soon
> Will get my voice back
> I have information to share

Then she writes:

> Thank you for bringing my deck

"You are very welcome miss Emiko, I will let you rest now. Please send me a message when you are ready to go home and I will come and pick you up."

Emiko gives a deep bow and then climbs back into bed.

When they are done conversing, Sun and Kitaro are escorted out of the hospital. Shortly thereafter Emiko is taken in for surgery. She is carted into the operating room and then given a general anesthetic. When she wakes up, her throat has been repaired and the scarring is completely gone. A nurse calls in the doctor to speak with her and he says, "Well, it looks like you are just about good as new. There were no complications during the surgery and your voice should be in working order once your body has had a little time to heal. You are free to rest here if you feel you need it, but you may leave at any time. Your wounds should heal within a few days at the most. A little faster with medical treatment.

"However, before I let you rest, there is the slight matter of paperwork. You have been provided a loan for the vocal repair and a representative from collections will be speaking with you at some time in the future about repayment. General treatment is usually restricted only to members of Tasukeichi services. A man at the scene of your injury paid for your first month's service and we have taken your vital information, should you wish to continue with us. However, we will need you to fill out some forms agreeing to further payments, should you wish to continue service with us."

He hands over a datapad and says, "If you wish to continue service with us, here are our different plans and their monthly costs. You will be provided basic service for the rest of the month and will be provided with a bracelet or RFID chip when you check out. The bracelet or chip will allow our staff to know exactly what your current health condition and location is at any given time and allow us to respond within 10 minutes or less, or your resuscitation is free. Take a look at the services provided and choose whichever you would like. Otherwise the service will be cancelled at the end of the month."

A chart on the datapad lists the different services and their benefits:

Plan	RFID/Wristband provided?	Resucitation service	HTR Service	Employee Death Fee	Extended Care	Yearly Cost	Monthly Cost
Basic	Yes	¥5,000	¥5,000	¥20,000 per death	¥500-¥1,000 per day	¥5,000	¥417
Gold	Yes	1 free per year	¥2,500	¥20,000 per death	¥450-¥900 per day	¥25,000	¥2,084
Platinum	Yes	4 free per year	Free	¥20,000 per death	¥250-¥500 per day	¥50,000	¥4,167
Super Platinum	Yes	5 free per year	Free	Free	¥250-¥500 per day	¥100,000	¥8,334

On their way back to the community center Kitaro says to Sun.

"Apart from that horrendous scar on her throat Miss Emiko seemed to be alright. Let's hope the operation goes smoothly and we can pick her up soon. I'm sure the whole thing must have cost a lot of Nuyen though, with the reconstructive surgery on the vocal cords and all."

When Sam wakes up from his nap (I'll say he takes a two hour nap) he begins sifting through the data that he was able to grab from the Yakuza system earlier.
((IIRC, Sam got images from all of the security cameras, and he got the data from the maglocks.
Emiko got the sensor data, the personnel files, and some potentially relevant emails.))

He puts together a map of the facility from the images he got from the security cameras, noting any areas that the cameras do not cover (the individual offices, and presumably bathrooms. But also any unintentional dead areas).

He also sifts through the maglock data. He notes different security levels for the various locks on the map that he made. He also makes an excel sheet of the comings and goings of employees. Lastly, he extracts whatever data he will need to forge maglock passes for the various security levels.

He forwards the map and all of the raw images that he captured, and the excel file, on to Torpor, Sun, Kitaro, and Emiko.



Rolling recovery for the nap:
Sam Dekker carried out 7 launched of one d6 :

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Sam Dekker carried out 7 launched of one d6 :

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After Emiko reads Sam's message she writes her own and concludes with attaching the information she found in the matrix.

Afterwards, she tries to rest while she awaits surgery.

Emiko is quite healed up by her stay in the hospital. A little groggy and tender, but fine overall. She heads home for the night and awakens the next morning better than new.

Kitaro also heads to his apartment for a well deserved night's sleep after an eventful day.
He wakes up right after sunrise and does a few quick stretching and breathing exercises.

After what happened the previous day Kitaro wants to make sure he's prepared for anything and decides to summon a spirit should he need assistance.
Being rather disappointed with the combat prowess of his spirit of man the previous day, he decides to try something he has never tried before!

Kitaro takes some time to concentrate and begins summoning a powerful spirit of beast.

Since the Yakuza enforcers saw his face the day before, Kitaro also thinks it's best he changes his appearance a little should they run into them again.
He pulls his hair back into a tiny pony tail, makes his eyebrows thicker and attaches a fake fu manchu beard to his face.

He then casts his spell Makeover to improve any imperfections that might be left after applying his disguise.

After all this is done Kitaro will grab his disguise kit and drive towards the community center to meet the others.

Sam doesn't know anything about feng shui, and after asking around it appears that none of his cohorts do either. So, he spends an afternoon researching feng shui basics.
In addition to his standard programs, he loads browse and search.

Teamwork rolls:
Sam Dekker carried out 10 launched of one d6 :

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Sam Dekker carried out 14 launched of one d6 :

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After he gets some semblance of an idea of some feng shui concepts, he looks up the feng shui expert who optimized the building's qi flow to see if he has some treatises where he might discuss some of his go to feng shui moves.

Teamwork rolls:
Sam Dekker carried out 10 launched of one d6 :

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Sam Dekker carried out 14 launched of one d6 :

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Sams search rolls:

Genereal feng shui:
Sam Dekker carried out 21 launched of one d6 :

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Expert guy:
Sam Dekker carried out 17 launched of one d6 :

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On the way to the community center, Kitaro calls his talismonger contact Madouka Doumeki.
He tells her that he is interested in learning the basics about feng shui and asks if she knows someone who could teach them.

Sam
It appears that feng shui masters tend to keep their secrets guarded closely. Sam can find information about the basic premise of feng shui, but the actual application of it is considerably harder to find. The idea seems to be that there is some kind of flow of energy on the astral plane and that certain layouts can facilitate that flow and bring good fortune. Others can stymie the flow and cause the energy to grow foul. There also seems to be a strong correlation to what they say are the five elements: Earth, Fire, Water, Wood and Metal.

Kitaro

The ork witch Madouka Doumeiki pics up, her face illuminated only by the light of her commlink despite the fact that it is morning and there should very well be tons of sunlight right now. "Feng shui?" she says with a growl, "That's nothing but superstitious nonsense that hucksters sell to mundane folk with too much money and not enough good sense. If it were as simple as redecorating to bring good fortune into your life, there wouldn't be any poor people. I don't know any practitioners personally; not that I'd want to be friends with a bunch of sellout frauds like them. But there's that one famous slitch that everyone's going crazy over. Got her own trideo show and everything. 'The Joys of Tidying up' or some garbage like that. What's her name..." Her gaze turns aside for a moment as she apparently does a quick matrix search then forwards the image to Kitaro.

"That's the one," she says, "Konmari. Her show is basically feng shui for complete idiots. 'Declutter your life! Only keep things that spark joy in your life!' Bullshit! I like my clutter thank you very much. My clutter sparks shittons of joy in my life! I'm a goddamn happy source of sunshine to everyone, my joy's so sparked. It ain't natural to organize everything like that. "Anyway, there's plenty of rumors on the street that she got where she is due to exceptionally good feng shui skills. I dunno if I believe all that, but I've heard from reputable sources that she's awakened anyway, so who knows what she might have done. Maybe did some blood magic bullshit. As you can probably guess, I don't know her and can't get you a meeting with her, but if you're looking to waste your money on that trash, I dunno, do a matrix search on local feng shui experts. One fraud's as good as any other."

At that same moment, Sam is doing just that: searching for local feng shui experts. He finds dozens of businesses dealing with the matter:

Abhaya Artists
Backdoor Bagua
Balanced Living
Bitchin' Bagua
Chi Doctor
Cleansing Cures
Clear Space Feng Shui
Daily Decorating
Design for Energy
Doctor Chi
Dragon Gate Feng Shui
Ecochi
Essential Balance
Feng Shui Academy
Feng Shui Fashionista
Feng Shui Hut
Feng Shui Massage
Feng Shui Master Consultant Services
Five Star Feng Shui
Fortune Becomes Thee
Healing for the Home
Inside and Out Feng Shui
Inspired Living
Lucky Buddha Feng Shui Specialists
Mingmei Institute of Feng Shui
Mothers of Mudra
Phoenix and Rose Feng Shui
Sheng Chi Sisters
Soul Light Feng Shui
Space in Time Feng Shui
Uttarabodhi for your Body
Wind and Water Feng Shui
Wind and Water Play
Ying Yang Yesterday

Sam picks out a few of the better reviewed Feng shui places and forwards their info on to Kitaro and Emiko.
>>>>>> Contact these local feng shuu experts.
>>>>>> Try to get some information from them.
>>>>>> Maybe they have some advice for feng shui ing an office.
>>>>>> Maybe they can see something helpful in the pictures of the garden.

((I don't know how hard this would be to do but I want Emiko to place calls that would not be traced back to herself or the group. Kind of like spammers now use local numbers to make calls seem legit))

Emiko contacts several of the companies on the list and pretends to an executive assistant . She tells the companies that she's tasked to find out what it entails to feng shui the office and garden where she works. Emiko will show the picture of the garden and say, "my boss saw this garden and was impressed. Can you tell me what makes this have a good flow of energy?" If any anyone says they need to see the space in person or questions about the company she works for, Emiko tells them she is only getting information and quotes and will present it to her employer who will take the process to the next step.

Kitaro heads over to the "Feng Shui Fashionista" since the name just speaks to him.
He will there present himself as someone who has recently purchased a new house and is looking to make sure his stay there is a prosperous one by using Feng Shui.

He will try and steer the conversation towards "what to do and what to avoid" especially paying attention to the "what to avoid" part. If there is a book available that looks to have good information for them to use, he will purchase it. He will show the picture of the garden, saying it's the garden of his new house and ask for tips what to do and avoid in this garden specifically.

Kitaro Kitaro goes over to Feng Shui Fashionista and is greeted by a fashionable looking human woman in black. The shop itself is relatively small with white walls, white furniture and various posters of fashion models. The woman says, "Welcome to Feng Shui Fashionista! How can I help you?" She listens to Kitaro's explanation of his situation and says, "Well, we primarily deal with the feng shui of fashion here. If you need to know what to wear to properly align your ki towards a particular goal, I can help you. Homes and gardens are not really what we focus on. I could give you some basic tips, but really if that is what you want, it is better that you pick an expert who is more specialized in your goals.

Emiko
Meanwhile Emiko contacts a few of the businesses and they all seem to say the same thing. If she wants to arrange a time, they can send someone over to offer a free estimate. Without seeing the location in person, it is impossible to say anything as the art is primarily about channeling ki flow in specific directions. A picture provides little information about the directions ki should flow. Emiko gets the idea that they are extremely reluctant to be offering free information to anyone who calls for it as providing the information is essentially how they make their money. And having their foot in the door helps them make a sale better than giving some info on the phone.

Kitaro, being obsessed with fashion himself claps his hands with joy when he learns you can also use Feng Shui in clothing and spends at least another hour in that shop discussing Feng Shui fashion.
He will also buy a book about Feng Shui for clothing and a starter kit if available.

Having had a good time but not learned any useful information he will then check in with his team mates to see if they had better luck.

Not getting the results she was hoping for, Emiko decides to try Sam's request in person. Sticking to the executive assistant theme though, she alters her clothing accordingly and adds a wig and makeup to disguise herself.

Emiko drives to Dragon Gate Feng Shui first and asking what it would entail to feng shui her boss's home. She will show the picture of the garden and ask what makes this garden done so well.

(Emiko will try to persuade the person to talk and hopefully the pheromones will help)

Kitaro is a sucker for anything fashion related and is not good at managing his finances.

He does manage to hide his excitement long enough to at least try and negotiate the price down.

"Say darling, do you offer any kind of a discount for professional fashion designers?"