Mission 6c - The blood of the arcane

Kin looks around the murder scene making a mental note that he'll have to get some gloves moving forward. He'll just have to careful to keep everything relatively undisturbed. He focuses on the bedroom and the common room, sliding and looking under each piece of furniture.

He looks in drawers to the desks or bureaus for any papers or notes that might exist, making sure to take the drawers out and check underneath for anything that might be taped to them.

He looks at the cage of the pet that was mentioned, looking inside and tilting it up to look underneath. He goes through the pockets of any clothing that isn't folded and stacked for any papers or objects they might contain. Any books he carefully flips page by page for any papers that might be inside and looking through for any notes that might be written that look more personal.

From there he looks for any trash cans present in either room, looking for any papers that have been thrown away.

Finally, in the bedroom, he looks under each mattress for anything tucked there and feels around each pillow for anything that might be hidden in them.

He realizes that he's spent at least an hour doing a thorough search of the place. Looking around, the state of the rooms is pretty much the way they looked when he arrived.

Relaxing at home with Little Brother, Edison absent-mindedly decompiles his generalist sprite. The day's events dancing on the forefront of his mind. Murder, blood, carnage he realizes that the only reason he cares to stop it is because he will benefit from stopping it. Anything to firm up his position in this new city. The thought of returning to Porton causes a primal surge of revulsion to coarse through his body.
Now to the task at hand, Edison calls forth a sprite from the resonant depths of the Matrix, a figure emerges. A soldier, eyes radiant with intelligence holding a metal document case and a collapsible shovel, sawn off rifle slung over his shoulder. He's a figure from history, an engineer whose purpose was to destabilize and undermine fortifications.
The cost of compiling this Sprite leaves Edison reeling. He takes a couple of hours to relax with his synthetic cohorts before the real work begins. During this time he realigns his priorities. There is no reason not to believe the Cowboys are anything less then completely forthcoming with their information. He will instead look into any electronic devices that belonged to the victims. See what can be seen.
Edison and the sprite enter into the bonding process of Registration. It's a tedious and exhausting process but in the end the sprite emerges stronger and more stable. His name is Sapper and he is ready to serve.
Bone tired but proud of his efforts, Edison retires to his bed. His future may be uncertain but it's looking more secure all the time.

Emiko responds to Edison's message about going home:
>>>>> OK, see you tomorrow

She thinks about it for a moment and messages Edison and Kin in the same chat
>>>>> How about we meet in the morning for breakfast and go over all the information we found so far
>>>>> I am on my way to meet with Kenshin Dokite's wife

Meeting Kenshin's wife, Emiko bows and says, "Mrs. Dokite, thank you so much for meeting me. I know this must horrible to talk about but I can assure you that my team is working to find who did this and bring them to justice.

Can I get you a hot tea or anything before we begin?"

Once they are ready for questions, Emiko asks the following:

There was no sign of forced entry, was your husband scheduled to meet anyone that night? Did anyone come by the house that night unannounced?

Your husband was a mage, what path was he? Was he open about being a mage? Are you a mage as well? Do you know of any other mages that live in your building?

Has your husband been acting different lately, like was he more tense or anxious?

Was there any signs of rats or burn marks?

Were you home when this happened? If so, did you hear anything?

Edison wakes to the aroma of soycafe, Little Brother had taken the liberty of brewing a pot. Out to the kitchen to find Little Brother oiling Edison's Steyr. Edison thanks him and takes over, reassembling it with machine-like precision. A little breakfast and Edison heads over to the center to meet with the others, Little Brother sharing the skip in Edison's step.

Emiko uses her deck to quickly download all the information she can get with her Knowsoft on demon rats.

((I wasn’t sure if I had to roll for this))

Knowsoft R4 + bonus: 0 hits

Emiko finds no particular knowsoft that is specifically on demon rats in her subscription. It is just too specific a topic. However, everyone has heard of devil rats. They are basically hairless awakened rats that live in sewers and are known to make off with the occasional dog or sleeping homeless person.

"Why would anyone want that disgusting rat as a pet," Emiko thinks to herself.

"Mrs. Dokite, I think that is all for now, you have really given me a lot to think about. If you want to send me a picture of Buu I can keep an eye out for him.  Thank you so much for meeting with me today."

Emiko tries one more group of people.  This time she calls those that know Isei Takata and tries to set a meeting time tomorrow.

Negotiation: 3 hits

---

In the morning, Emiko meets with Edison and Kin to go over the facts she has picked up so far.

"So far I've been able to interview two people. Turns out that both victims were Hermetic mages, that's something of a pattern.  Also, you know how," Emiko checks her deck for a moment, "right, so you know how both Makoto and Mineko were eaten by rats? Kenshin kept a pet rat. Not just any rat either. A devil rat! You know those hairy cousin of those hairless abominations that live in the sewers and are known to make off with the occasional dog or, I don't know, sleeping homeless person?! One of those was their adorable pet. I want to know if more of these mages kept rats too."

Kin looks at Emiko with a shocked expression.

"Wait. Kenshin had a rat? I interviewed a roommate of Mareo Okubo and Mareo just purchased a pet rat for his dorm. It also escaped and can't be found. I can try to ask him what type of rat it was, but I wouldn't hold out too much hope. He was on something when I talked to him, so I would probably have trouble getting an answer out of him if I asked him what color the sky is. Never hurts to ask."

Kin contacts the less than helpful roommate.

"Hey it's Kin, we had lunch yesterday and you were extremely helpful. Just one more question. Do you know what kind of rat Mareo purchased?"

Kin appreciates the offer but turns Masami down. He disconnects the call and returns to the conversation.

"The drug-induced roommate said that Mareo did have a rat. Didn't purchase it, found it. It seems we have a bit of a pattern developing here. He said it was a devil rat, hairless and ugly. I plan on taking a look at all the evidence from the cases to see if I can find anything. Emiko, you've done a great job with the interviews. We need to check out every crime scene for anything we can find and talk to anyone we can."

Kin>>>>> Maybe you can a arrange for me to pickup any evidence Cowboy is willing to release to you? After you and Emiko check out the next interview we can all go to the crime scenes together. One other thing, Can you tell me the name of the place where the rat food was bought. It should be on the receipt you found at the last crime scene

"Emiko I'll join you. Let me make a quick call to the station to check something out for Edison."

Kin call the police station on his commlink.

"Yes this is Kin Tanaka. I'm working the case of the multiple mage murders. May I speak to the officer in charge. I'd like to see if an associate of mine who is assisting on the case can have permission to examine the evidence of the victims and have access to their commlinks. Thank you."

Edison directs the sedan towards Kins' Cowboy connection. Hopefully they can release some evidence that will shed some light on this growing pattern that is being discovered. When Edison arrives he introduces himself as an associate of Kin Tanaka.

Kin

The operator says, "As you should well know, handling of evidence is only allowed to authorized personnel. You will need to come in to the police station and sign off on the chain of custody form. The evidence is not allowed out of the station except for authorized testing, and transport to court until it has been authorized for return or destruction. If you have an expert that you need looking at the evidence, then they will need to fill out an expert witness form for them. They will need a valid ID and SIN, of course. Go down to evidence lockup and the clerk there will help you out with everything you need."

Kin arrives at the police station, introduces Edison as his expert, and fills out any documentation that allows Edison access to the evidence.

Edison provides the clerk with the required identification and folks out any necessary paperwork.

At the police station

Edison offers his fake SIN to the clerk who looks at it dubiously before scanning it. A moment passes, then the clerk places a couple of pairs of rubber gloves on the counter and says, "Alright, paperwork has been filled. SIN checks out. I'll see what evidence has been filed for the case. Be sure to keep those gloves on at all times. Any electronics you handle should be shut down when you are done with them to prevent possible data intrusion and erasure. Have a seat in evidence room A and I'll bring everything out to you. Nothing I hand to you leaves the evidence room. If any of these rules are violated or any of the evidence I hand turn over to your custody is found to be damaged or altered in any way, both of you may be subject to up to 5 years prison as described in statute 918.13, evidence tampering. Any questions?"

None at all, lead on. Edison follows the clerk to Evidence room A.