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Zo! points to Vandor and says “Exactly! Tell me, do you have an agent?
After a full tour of the floor around the event and the demonstration by Vandor, Haastaskin will approach Zo! "I understand you are looking for action heroes. I noticed how you reacted to the efforts of my associate Vandor and I wanted to advise you that adding someone who is grounded as a partner to someone like him would make for more entertainment. In addition, I am quite able to make impressive or humorous moves with my weapons and armor."
“Strong showing! You look alive, but I suppose being alive helps with that!” An assistant near Zo! presses a button and a laugh track goes off.
“Whats your name?” Looking over to the assistant, he says “Make sure to get her name!”
Looking at their doshko, Zo! asks “What could you do with that to impress an audience?”
“Negotiations and occasional public relations. I like to maintain contacts with a wide variety of organizations.” Iteration-177 replies. “I’m looking forward to hearing about how the Starfinder Society is doing since that terrible tragedy.”
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Royo smiles broadly as Chik-Chik talks. “Exactly! So many people allow themselves to become dependent on computers and augmentations. They forget how ephemeral the digital world is, how easy it is for someone to just hack a system and change records.”
“Need something that lasts!”
"Precisely," Chikasa replies enthusiastically. "That's why I find the field of advanced quantum mechanics so fascinating. Take this as an example," he taps his staff on the floor, and suddenly the glammer effect concealing his shirren eye sniper rifle drops, revealing the weapon's true shape.
"If you look at these components here and here," he indicates two pieces around the bolt and chamber of the rifle, "You can tell that these pieces are very vulnerable. Enough time, the right kind of sabotage, or even some ill-placed sand can completely jam the weapon. With quantum technology, though, you avoid all of that." He goes on to give a detailed explanation of how quantum systems work and how they are virtually tamper-proof, all because they are interconnected, physical systems.
In talking with Royo, he attempts to shift it from the practical applications to the underlying principles. You get the idea he is much more into theory over practice.
Royo is much happier as the discussion goes into the actual science rather than applications of it. He adds some historical and cultural details on how some of the discoveries were made.
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After leaving his contact info with Zo!'s assistant, Vandor continues to move through the party, mingling here and there before approaching Naiaj. He gives the gnome his winning-est most charming smile and says. "You must be Venture-Captain Naiaj, I'm Vandor Draak, Starfinder agent. I'm still pretty new but you might have heard of some of my exploits already. he shrugs modestly, "The more experienced agents say that you're one of the most competent Captains in the Society, so I thought, in the interest of team building, I'd introduce myself. Any idea what tonight's big announcement is all about?"
Naiaj makes no concessions to the formality of this event; she wears her usual carbon skin armor, datapad never out of sight and wrist-based comm unit constantly blinking with updates. She wears her gleaming white hair cropped close, and despite her small size, she looks as if she could stare down a team of hardened vesk mercenaries.
“No clue. Not my problem right now, Radaszam is handling this. I’m dealing with the shipment from the drow on Apostae. I have recently discovered what a displeasure it is to work with drow ambassadors.”
She never looks up at you. She is either working on her data pad, using her comm unit, or both all the time you talk with her.
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A little disappointed that his very best smile was wasted on someone who doesn't even look up at him. Vandor looks at the tasks Naiaj is performing on her various devices.
"Apostae huh? Yeah they can be difficult. You gotta know how to handle them. Drow are always scheming and plotting against each other as much as they are trying to screw you over. Anyway, back when I used to uhh.. work in the "shipping" industry the drow corporations always used to hide proprietary tracking devices on their shipments and then used false tracking numbers so that their rivals would never really be certain where exactly the shipments were. I'll bet if you gained access to the ambassador's adminstrative servers, you could just ping the hidden trackers of the shipments your trying to find and get their exact locations whenever you like. Might be more efficient and more accurate than tracking them via conventional means. Here I can do it right from my datapad and send you the updates in real time."
Naiaj actually looks up from his devices for a moment, says “Good idea, I will keep that in mind should other options fail.” before going back to working his comm unit.
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Overhearing Vandor's conversation with Naiaj, Chikasa excuses himself from his conversation with Royo. "It was a pleasure meeting you, sir. If I can have your pardon, I just need to step over here quickly to help my companion with a small matter." He gives Royo and small bow, then steps away and moves in Vandor's direction.
Cutting into the conversation, one sided as it is, Chikasa clears his throat. "Excuse me, Venture Captain, but I couldn't help but overhear that you're working on tracking some shipments. I see that you're juggling devices very effectively there, but I'd be glad to help make your setup a bit more efficient." He asks if he might hold the devices for a moment, then opens the backs of the data pad and comm units, syncs the two devices, and augments the readout illumination. When he closes the devices back up and reboots the systems, they work in concert to give the venture captain and three dimensional, holographic UI that he can manipulate manually.
Iteration-177 is more than happy to continue talking with Seven of Eleven.
Iteration-177 asks them “What sort of missions have they sent you on? Computers are everywhere, so the programming knowledge is always useful. I’m not quite sure what you mean by Parts group though.”
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What was the name of that pop singer that spent all her money on cybernetic enhancements? It didn't really work out for her act, did it?
Darkrunner transitions from the discussion about bionic enhancements to where they appear on pop culture icons, and whether that helps or hurts their careers, or advances the cause of the utility of augmentations in general.
Iteration-177 asks “How did you make use of that on your missions?
Although Darkrunner-42 manages to come up with some examples of celebrities, unfortunately they are not people that Ykris recognizes.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t know those people. I am certain I’ve never bonded with any of them.”
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“Strong showing! You look alive, but I suppose being alive helps with that!” An assistant near Zo! presses a button and a laugh track goes off.
“Whats your name?” Looking over to the assistant, he says “Make sure to get her name!”
Looking at their doshko, Zo! asks “What could you do with that to impress an audience?”
"My name is Haastaskin. And I could leap into battle while wielding this weapon of honor against foes in ways that will leave no doubt about its effectiveness as a tool of great destruction to any foe living or otherwise. Light itself would shatter as it sliced through the air on its way to deliver a decimating slice through anything that opposed its path. "
“Show me!” Zo! says and then starts telling people “Move! Make room! Give Haastaskin room to really show their stuff!”
Zo! shakes his head sadly at Haastaskin’s attempt to feint. “Way too stiff! We need more zip, and some pizazz!”
When Haastaskin swings their weapon around for an attack kata, Zo! Is much more encouraging. “Much better! That gives us something we can work on! Forget trying to feint, just go all out with your attacks!”
Luwazi Elsebo calls the group of you over to her and talks about your progress.
“I think you are very close to getting the support of Zo! and Ykris. See if one of you can figure out a way to seal the deal. If you can’t come up with a new idea of how to impress them, send in someone really good at the skill and hope for the best.”
“With the others, you may want to concentrate your efforts. I don’t know if you have enough time left to convince everyone on my list at this point.”
“Keep at it, and good luck!”
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After helping to reconfigure Naiaj's setup, Chikasa excuses himself and begins wandering around the room again. After a short period sampling finger foods and sipping on a flute of Castrovelian champagne, he finds himself standing beside the symbiotic being known as Ykris. He turns and addresses the CeriCore representative.
"That's an interesting choice of a creature to bond with--a half-elf," he says in attempting to break the ice. "I would think that the hybridization of the host creature would present more difficulty in fully bonding with it. How do you overcome the mutations that result from the host's heritage?"
“Actually, it is really not a problem. If we consider only the biological needs my main concern is a compatible blood stream to carry nutrition and a recognizable nervous system to connect to. For ethical reasons, we also seek out hosts that are willing to partake in the bonding.”
It then starts talking about the process. Evidently the host is aware of what is happening, but has no control over their body. Ykris allows it’s host, someone named Jhireu, a short period of control during which it — in a very bored voice — confirms that the relationship is consensual.
Once Ykris is back in charge, they offer “If you are curious about the process, I could temporarily detach and attach myself to you.”
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Darkrunner politely excuses himself from Ykris as Chikasa approaches, choosing to fully yield the symbiote's attention for his attempt. Having overheard a bit of another conversation with Zo!, he undergoes a sudden, social transformation. The once thoughtful, calm, stoic android's eyes light up and he smirks at Chikasa, just before running, flipping, jumping, and landing in a spot next to Zo!
So, I heard you were looking for an agile performer? How about an operative hacker who can do stunt double work on the side?
Zo! points to Darkrunner-42 and says “This is what I like to see!”
“My show always has room for people that can nail a landing like that!”
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Darkrunner winks at Zo! and flourishes a gracious thank-you bow to the entertainer. As he turns to head towards Naiaj he returns to his mellower, android demeanor.
Greetings. I hear you're having trouble with some shipments. I've been playing with some algorithms that apply neural networks to public shipping data, paired with press releases, to determine where they are really aiming their supply chains. If I apply it to the drow, let's see what results come out.
As his datapad grinds away for a couple of minutes, sending commands to a cloud cluster of services, he continues to explain his process.
The trick is determine the right number of layers in the neural net before looking for useful results. It looks to me like the drow are trying to create the illusion of low supply to put the squeeze on you an extract more money to complete the shipments. Show theme these datapoints that I found about all of their sources and it blows the foundation of their illusion out of the airlock.
He transmits the interesting data to Naiaj.
He leans in and whispers, actually, not all of the data I have access to here is public, but never mind that.
Let me know if that doesn't help.
All in a day for a smooth operator.
The results of Darkrunner-42s data analysis comes back showing that the shipments haven’t left Asposte. Naiaj does not appear surprised by that, but does review the results.
He then looks over to Darkrunner and asks “Have you even considered applying some of this to our own operational logistics?” Highlighting some of the scripts, he says “I would have to verify it, but some of the things you have done here look like they would help our own processes.”
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Yeah, I suppose I hadn't seen the problem very specifically, usually having more.. active missions on my mind. But you're right, perhaps these methods should be applied more broadly. Who else do you know of within the society that has to deal with logistics like this?
Darkrunner, encouraged by Naiaj, continues the logical thread of where else this might apply, requesting that he look up other contacts with which this might be effectively used. Naiaj describes their responsibilities and processes, and Darkrunner decides whether they would be a good fit. In the end they identify a handful of influential administrators, overseeing large bodies of operations.
Naiaj has already gone back to his devices when Darkrunner-42 started to talk.
He does respond a couple of times as the android tries to figure out how to put his analysis routines to work for the Starfinders — usually with a monosyllabic “Here.” as he sends data listing names and positions or other requested resources.
Still, he does look over what Darkrunner-42 puts together and admits “Might work.”
“After this, work with some of those people. See what you can do.”
Good thing the society has people like Arvin to talk with new recruits!