Downtime after mission

"Hey since I am now part of this team I'm letting you guys know that I have some cyber enhancements that might come in good use!" "Both my eye's and ears were replaced."

((I forgot to respond to this earlier))
Sam finds time between his StarCraft tournament and reading datasofts/finding Waldo to email Hanako and set up a time and place to meet for coffee.

Hanako sends a reply almost immediately, setting up a time to meet in the afternoon, a couple of days from now at a local cafe.

Chougou attaches the satellite uplink to his comm system and gets the van ready to go with 2 Aztechnology Crawlers each with an Ingram Smartgun, his Ares Duelist, 1 Roto-drone equipped with a Colt Government his Festo Pigeon and 4 FlySpys. Hopefully everyone fits without being too snug.

Space is kind of tight for 5 people and all those drones, but at least no one is sitting on anyone's lap. The larger drones have to be stacked on each other a little bit, but otherwise everyone fits fine.

((so I currently have:

Job 1 - Sam, Sato, Tetsu

Job 2 - Chougou, Sun, Torpor, Wujen. I am putting Ichigo here because he's rl friends with Torpor's player (I think, I might be mixing players and their characters around in my head though) and he mentioned wanting to be in the same group ooc.

I am going to start introing the jobs here and give you all a last chance to change your minds about which job you want to be, then I'll be making new threads for each group. I'll assume that you are sharing the job info with one another prior to starting it, if for no other reason than to know what the rest of the group was doing if they were to suddenly disappear or whatever. So everything I am about to post in this thread can be considered IC knowledge to everyone, even if you aren't physically present for the job presentation.

I don't anticipate there being much reason for the groups to interact with one another during the jobs though unless one is in desperate need of backup. As you can probably assume by the place you are going, job 2 will definitely have fighting involved, so fair warning there.))



Cowboy HQ

Sam, Sato and Tetsu enter the main local HQ of Cowboy Sheriff. Tetsu is uncomfortable as he enters as he has had a bit of a past with them and generally doesn't trust the corporation. He does not appear to be recognized, or at least if he is, no one makes any mention of it. Sam is recognized though and one of the officers at the front desk says, "We have been expecting you. Please come with me."

You are taken back to an empty interrogation room and asked to wait a moment. After a few minutes, a uniformed, older human male with a mustache and cigar walks in, followed by another human male in plain clothes. The second human is heavily muscled and appears quite competent at beating the snot out of people. The uniformed man says, "Thank you for coming. I am commissioner Ichiro Kanto, head of the police here in Mingmei. One of our officers recognized your associate from the trid broadcasts as having sniffed around one of our active investigations and is suspected of having hacked into our drones. Don't worry though, I am not here to bust your balls about that. The bad guy was caught, we didn't have to deal with it, and you didn't cause any harm to our people or property. If it wasn't a monster, we would be having a different conversation about due process, but whatever that thing was, we probably weren't equipped to handle and it's one less headache I have to worry about. So thanks. You'll understand if we don't offer an official thanks, as civilians doing our job makes us look bad, but its a big city and we just don't have the resources to handle every little problem that comes along.

"Which brings us to why I brought you here. There is a hacker going about the city causing trouble and doing a lot of digital vandalism. A real pain in our side that we would like to see eliminated but not a large enough nuisance to devote serious manpower to. The suspect goes by the alias "Rokudenashiko", though her real name is unknown."

The commissioner sends each of you a file to your commlinks containing her police record.  

"She primarily appears to be targeting our facilities which makes us rather eager to see her stopped. Officially, she is to be apprehended and brought to us for custody. Of course, if an accident were to befall this individual during apprehension, you would get paid just the same for your trouble. The file I just sent you is all the information we have on her so far. It should be enough to track her down and bring her to justice. Once you have, each of you will be paid 5,000 nuyen."

He points to the muscular man and says, "Nobunaka-san here has also requested to work on the bounty. It is probably for the best that you work together so as not to accidentally get in each others' ways. We can pay up to four people so between the three of you and him, you'll all get paid just the same. No reason for you all to not play nice together, right? Anyway, do you have any questions? If you want more info on the suspect, I'm afraid that file is all we got though."


Crazy Carl's Coffin Emporium

It is evening when the group of you make it to Crazy Carl's place. The same ridiculous neon cowboy signs and AR animations blare into your vision. The automatic doors part and Crazy Carl greets you. "Howdy ya'll! So glad ya responded to my e-mail. It's like I said there, I have a package that needs delivering for a client and he's willing to pay 5,000 nuyen a person to deliver it. Even requested you lot in particular after seeing yer fancy news footage. He was here dropping off some products when we got to talking about the news and I was all, hey I sold you folk that coffin in the news. So he tells me that he wants me to talk to you about delivering this package and so I said, 'Sure, why not?'. You folk seem to be able to handle yourselves, am I right? Should be a piece of cake delivering a little box. And for 5,000 nuyen a head for up ta five of ya, I am sure it is more than worth your time, right?"

He retrieves a package about the size of a shoe box and says, "Whatever you do, don't open or lose it. He's paying premium to make sure it gets to where it is going and well, I can't really tell you who he is, but suffice to say he is not the type of person you want to be on the bad side of, ya hear me? The address is on the package. He told me that you should get a call when ya get there for further instructions. Don't ask me how he'll call you or know when to do so, he just said he would. I don't know what other information I can really give ya, but if you have any questions, feel free ta ask."

While reading through the police files, Sam searches his memory for any time he may have come across someone with this handle, or any other description that might jog his memory. Maybe from matrix games, or from school, or from general dark net hacker circles.

Logic+Will+Photographic memory+Analytical Mind. Not sure if Analytical Mind fits this check. If not, ignore the last two dice.))
[roll ="d6"]16[/roll]

Tetsu eyes Ichiro distrustfully. He reads through the police file. "What can you tell us about her known criminal associate, this Arkane Takechi?"

"Um," Sam says. "It might help to have more details about the crimes she's been doing."

"Nobunaga-san" does not appear to be an officer. He at least is not dressed like one. As police do not normally earn bounties for doing their job, it is reasonable to assume that he is a bounty hunter, or at least is a non-cop currently hunting this bounty.

((analytical mind doesn't really help with a memory check, but that's plenty of successes))

Sam recognizes the name as a sort of hacker/artist who, while skilled at what she does, is mostly harmless. Things he's heard of her doing involve screwing with AR images and replacing them with her own art.

The commissioner says, "Though we have no actionable proof to arrest her for it, Akane Takeshi is an information broker who is very good at covering her tracks. She is known to be heavily into fetishistic body modification. She dabbles in hacking, but prefers to buy and sell information rather than get it herself. She is known to work out of a club called, 'The Back Door'.

"As for Rokudenashiko, as I said, she has been targeting Cowboy facilities and defacing them with her graffiti. The details are all in the file I provided."

"Oh. Uh. I think, um. I think uh. I think maybe you forgot to. Maybe you forgot to send me the file with the details? My. Um. My file only has the one, uh page. Did. Did the page with the details maybe, uh, not come through?"
Sam glances to Tetsu and Sato.
"Did you guys get the file with, uh, the details in it?"

Before the trip to the police station, Sato disguises himself and puts on a cheap, but presentable suit of very unremarkable material and cut.
He uses his facial sculpt adept power to adjust the bones in his face in case there are cameras running facial recognition programs.



During the meeting, Sato is uncharacteristically reserved and lets the others take the lead.  Despite his disguise, he is eager not to attract attention of the cops.  There's only negative benefit from one of them recognizing him later.

Sato gives Nobunaka a keen look.  A tough guy like this should be known in the shadows.   ((knowledge : shadow community))



In his time as a bartender in Mingmei, has he heard of this bar "The Back Door" before? ((knowledge: bars and clubs))

Nobunaka bows slightly to everyone else and meets Sato's gaze with one of his own "Well met."

"It appears we will be hunting together, and I prefer to know who I am working with. so what do you bring to the table?"

Sato changes his mind about engaging the commissioner.  He waits for an appropriate pause in the conversation and then leans forward to speak in a lower register than normal.
((using voice control adept power to disguise his voice))

"Sir, you present several options.  You will find that we pride ourselves on exceptional customer service.  Please do not hesitate to state your most desired outcome and we will deliver it.  Should you wish live capture with a full dossier of proof to hand to your prosecuting attorney, we will aim to deliver that.  Okyaku-san wa Okyaku-sama de after all...."

((Negotiations test with first impression and consummate professional))

To commissioner says to Sam, "At the bottom. The last section. Or did you want specific case files? Because she has more or less gotten away with doing the same thing at a couple dozen locations, which is why we want her found."

Sato recognizes the Back Door as a kind of fetish club for deckers. The type of people who frequent it are all modded in some way, a datajack in the very least, but most pride themselves in being far more modded than that. The club supposedly features several private VR rooms where customers can go to "hook up" with each other. While most people who don't frequent the club assume that is just slang for sex (and it certainly does happen), for the most part it is either a literal cable connection between their datajacks or a wireless connection through their decks. They then use this connection to either explore each others' minds or mingle together in the room's various VR settings. BTL use is also rumored.

Tetsu opens his mouth, about to speak. He then pauses, and takes a long breath. He feels extremely uneasy being back at Cowboy HQ, especially cooped in this interrogation room. He doesn't think anyone recognized him when he walked in, but he can't be certain. He then thinks through the assignment, and the criminal file, and he's not sure what to think about this girl. He looks Nobanuka up and down, and doesn't recognize him. Always distrustful of new people, He decides to let Sato and Sam take the lead, wanting to see where this goes.

In the meantime, Tetsu also does a memory check to see if he knows anything about "The back door"

"Well, uh. I see a list of charges. There. Um. But no. But no. Uh. You're asking us to um. You couldn't find her. So, maybe there's more important details. In the police files. That you um. Missed."

Torpor takes the box from Crazy Carl and trys to get a feel for the material and style as he looks at the address on it,  "Is this pay negotiable? The barrens can be a very dangerous place?" Turning the box over in his hands as he speaks.

Wujen smiles at Crazy Carl's strangeness as he enters the Emporium. "Good Evening Carl.  I hope business is good, but not too good, if you take my meaning."

As Carl presents the package in question, Wujen shifts to Astral Perception to inspect it.  "This does not look like a coffin, Carl.  Can you tell me what it is, or to whom else it might be of value besides your client?  I assume the contents aren't illegal or overly dangerous to the community?"

Assensing
WuJen carried out 8 launched of one d6 :

, , , , , , ,

Chougou waits in the van but would like to have one of his FlySpys go in and hang around the group to see and hear what's going on.

((@Sato - yes but I was running out the door and hit send before I got to responding to it))

Cowboy HQ

The commissioner says to Sato, "Ideally, yes. She is to be brought in alive so as to be properly processed through the correct channels. But if she resists arrest, you do what you need to come back safe. If she were to theoretically not make it back here alive due to unforeseen circumstances, we would not hold you responsible provided that the criminal has been stopped."

To Sam, he says, "Did you get the entire file? There is quite a bit of information other than charges. We unfortunately don't know who she really is yet. That's up to you to find out."

Tetsu does remember anything in particular about "The Back Door" as he has never been to it. ((this would be a knowledge check, if you happen to have a knowledge skill about night clubs, body modification, decker hangouts, fetish scenes or something similar.))


Crazy Carl's

"Can't complain. As a business, I really dig it," Crazy Carl greets Wujen with a chuckle, "A little grave humor there. Anyway, yeah, its not a coffin. I've no idea what's inside either. Given the amount of money he's willing to pay to have you take a box from here to the bad part of town, I figure it's something he rather not have inspected."

He then says to Torpor, "I suppose you could take negotiations up with him when the job is done. I'm just a messenger, so I don't really have much say in the matter. This isn't really my usual thing; I don't typically do deliveries. But he was really adamant about getting you folk to do it and he said he'd contact you when it was all done. He gave me the payment in advance though, so the money is good at least. I can't give it to you until the job is done of course, but I am pretty sure he isn't sending you off to deliver a live bomb or something crazy like that."

The box is not magical. Made of corrugated cardboard and taped up securely with an address for somewhere in the Kita Barrens, it looks like a typical delivery parcel. It has no obvious external security features. Anyone with a knife could get into it in seconds. It weighs about two or three pounds (a bit over 1 kg) and whatever is in there is packaged securely enough that nothing inside moves when the box is shaken. It is roughly 6 by 8 by 3 inches (15x20x8 cm), so about the size of a shoe box for a child's shoes.

Ichigo will remain in the van with chougou he seems a bit nervous.