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Alanna slurps (softly) on her WIRED shake, musing, musing, musing on the situation.
As 1dr0meda's monotone comes over that open comm, followed by Emily's text, she gets a little shiver of anticipation. 'Whoa. Yep. That would be interesting.'
>>Well, he does have 5 of his besties around him, so while taking one guy out won't be probs, I need to take them all out, or they'll just pick it up and shoot the thing anyway. Probably. I'm not sayin' I -can't- take out all six, chummer, I'm jus sayin that's what I'll hafta do. =)
Get done what ur gonna get done. When I pop 'em we'll probs wanna leave quick-like.<<
Alanna drains the last of her squishy, her tummy happily processing the protein and caffeine. She crushes the container and stores it in an empty ammo pouch, to be placed in a proper trash receptacle later. She might be just about to murder six men, but she's not a monster.
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The data on the first drive is heavily encrypted with high-security PKI. It's very possible that you could decrypt it, but it would take hours at a minimum without the key from the receiving end in Phoenix. If you're going to send Royce's message, you'll be doing so blind. Ten-Speed's drive would deliver the same sort of data payload, but since he moves freely in the network, you're assuming he would be able to "jump out" at Royce's proxy server and escape into the GDN. Word is that's how other Sentient AIs have done it.
"All flights on schedule according to their tower. It's gonna be the only plane in the air, omae. You've got a ten second window. Get your lock on, bro..." The one with the holo-screens looks up into the same area of the sky. "Five, four, three..."
Inside 413, the server rack finishes its startup as 1dr0meda investigates the drives. Soon, three dozen ethernet ports are lighting up as the rack fires messages internal messages to itself, testing its connections before settling into a soft, dull hum. The screen of the data terminal opens into a standard operating system boot screen, with "Mitchell.Royce.Adm" as the only available login. It looks like he set up the data in the briefcase to make it difficult for anyone else to use the link.
Ghiv eyes 1dr0meda sidelong I believe you believe what you are saying. I also believe that this is more complicated than you know and as a Runner switching sides is bad for business if you wanna live long.
When it comes to stopping the gangbangers Ghiv says If we are going to stop them, then we need to do it now. We can't be anywhere around here when they shoot that plane down....
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Alanna sighs. She might have run her mouth about this, but she always thought they'd just yak their jaws an' wank their jammers around until the group was ready to back her up. 'Just bad luck, I guess. If Derrick were here....'
But of course he wasn't. And any of them could be on any amount of sec-cam footage at this building, which is gonna be mega-tied to the shooting down a fragging air fragging plane fragging.
Long term, omae. Long term.
Her left hand geckos the wall, with just her fingers coming over the top. Her right starts obeying the A-TAC, and just her eyes peep over the top.
>>Bad news, chummers. Our 'now' seems to have grown a 'right fragging' in front of it. Mr. Decker-man says plane is in air, an' I gots 7 seconds to stop them. Now five seconds. Now four I guess I should do something huh? If this is what we're gonna take the fall for, I'd rather not.<<<
'Target Acquired.'
= 12, hit1 w/ raise
hit 3
hit2 w/ raise
= 26
= 16
= 13
1dr0meda makes the necessary connection to start the upload while monitoring what happens as well as possible. "Better back Wraith up. I'll watch over this."
Neon watches the others set up the briefcase and comms gear from the door way, watching the hall for unexpected visitors.
She listens with interest as Wraith describes the activities of the gangers up on the roof, shaking her head, "This just gets better and better. .." she comments to no one.
With a sigh, she nods to 1dr0meda, then sprints down the hall to see if the elevator was still on this floor.
Neon smiles, seeing that the elevator remained. Waiting for whomever was coming with here, she punches the button for the 14th floor.
Ghiv starts towards the Elevator drawing his pistol. This run is turning out to be more than we bargained for.
Emily passes the case to 1Dr0m. In one swift motion, she stands and draws her semi-auto Thunderbolt from under her jacket and loads the first round. A shimmer draws the eye to the tiny pink rhinestones stuck to the body of the gun in the shape of a lightning bolt.
Houston flattens against the doorway to the room, peering out into the hall, "We need to keep someone here to protect our expert here..." she motioned to 1dr0m, "in case someone decides to snatch the...case."
Alanna's fire blasts into the ganger with the rocket launcher, sending him reeling and cursing to the side. The others whirl, scrambling for weapons, as the other blood shouts "Take the shot! Take the f#*#ing shot!" They spread out, glancing around but unable to see where Alanna is yet.
Combat card draw:
1. Alanna - On Hold, act as you please
2. Catorce Gangers - Jack of Diamonds
3. Crips - Nine of Hearts
4. Blood with the Rocket Launcher (WC) - Four of Clubs
5. Other Blood - Two of Hearts
Round 2 in Elevator
Neon stands calmly in the elevator, pistol held loosly at her side, watching the numbers increase on the elevator's display 5....6.....7
Without her realizing, her head bobs slightly to the beat of the soft music beign piped into the elevator.
Alanna's spray of fire lights up her corner of the roof and the confused gangers are at least able to see where she is...
...As she guns down their leader. The other Blood screams loudly in a fury, grabbing the rocket launcher off the ground and standing up to try and take the shot. The two crips stagger from grazing wounds, one of them taking a bullet that doesn't quite pierce to the chrome, knocking him to his knees. The two Hispanic gangers with the beaded necklaces draw sidearms and hike up their sleeves, concealed razorblades sliding out of their wrists at an angle.
One of them is able to make it to Alanna's corner of the roof and tries to swipe awkwardly over the edge at her.
He misses horribly, unable to angle correctly to hit her, but is close to her and reaching for her, making aiming awkward. The Crips take her distraction to try to shake their wounds off.
One of them starts limping in her direction, drawing his stun baton as he goes. Next to him, the Blood tries to make his shot with the hastily raised rocket launcher.
A rocket separates from the hydra launcher, spiraling away into the darkness. It will take some time to tell if it has hit or not. His time window closed, he turns, launcher in hand, and growls.
Combat Card Draw:
1. Crips (Joker)
2. Alanna (Ace of Hearts)
3. Blood (King of Hearts)
4. Catorce (Two of Diamonds)
The other Crip, still limping from the shot to his chrome, tries to shake it off one more time.
He starts limping after his friend, who finishes his run to the edge of the roof and tries to hit Alanna alongside the other ganger.
The edge of the roof illuminates with sparks as he swings the havoc stick repeatedly into Alanna's shoulder, trying to break her grip. The other ganger swings his razor wrist repeatedly, missing and cursing up a storm in Spanish. Behind him, the crying Blood howls, trying to line up a shot with the Hydra rocket launcher.
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Wraith grunts in indignation, trying to maintain her grip on the lofty perch.
The keeps a sure grip on the ledge, and the ground does not yet rush up to meet her.
She gives her head a shake, trying to clear the fog from getting her bell rung.
Her eyes clear and the A-TAC is quick to take in the tactical situation and re-establish targets.
She thinks she's still in this fight, but with a sinking heart she sees the missile shoot off, the contrail blazing out with deadly accuracy.
No need to go balls-out now. Still in it to win it, but there's time to be tactical.
Except for this trog-loving fragger. He SO has to go.
She shoves the gutterpunk in his face. "-This- is for messing up my hair!"
hit (w/ raise?)
That done Wraith giggles, let's the SMG drop and swing on it's lanyard, and climbs down a quick 6".
Ghiv starts towards the Elevator drawing his pistol. This run is turning out to be more than we bargained for.
"Which means it's beginning to look like we made a bargain with the devil."
Houston flattens against the doorway to the room, peering out into the hall, "We need to keep someone here to protect our expert here..." she motioned to 1dr0ma, "in case someone decides to snatch the...case."
"I don't think anyone wants the case as much as they want this line to Phoenix," 1dr0meda says as she watches the data prepare to flow. "And I can defend myself." The android slapped her sidearm and then her sword. "I'd hate for you to miss the party on my account."
1dr0meda monitors the upload and begins to poke around to see if she can learn anything about what happened in Phoenix while she has a connection to the area.
Emily nods to 1dr0m, "Roger." She glances at the elevator. It would take forever for it to get back up. For a moment, she considers the stairs, but that would take a long time as well. Then an idea occurred to her, "Which side of the building are they on?" She pulls up a holo image tagged with the locations of her companions. Houston orients herself to where the fighting is, "I'll be just down the hall if you need me, sweetie." She charges down the hall and aims for the door at the end of it. She lowers her shoulders and braces for impact.
The Crip immediately slumps against the edge, his neck and shoulder shredded by the sudden point-blank storm of bullets, his head hanging on by a thread and subdermal cyber that hadn't been as obvious before. The other ganger, far from looking choked up about it, tries for another swing, dangling down over the edge before you retreat out of his range...
...He mildly nicks your dermals but can't do any serious damage before you skitter back down the side of the building.
Combat Card Draw:
1. Pilot of Commercial Aircraft - Joker
2. Catorce - Queen of Spades
3. Alanna - Eight of Clubs
4. Remaining Blood - Four of Hearts
5. Remaining Crip - Two of Hearts
On the Joker:
Somewhere high above, a fox hybrid growls in irritation and pulls down his tie from his collar, sipping coffee as he checks his early-flight response systems. The back camera flags something closing in...
=10
...Just in time for him to perform an abrupt angle to the left. The missile swerves after his craft, the suddenly-tossed passengers screaming and caterwauling as he tightens his grip down on the manual controls.
On the Queen of Spades: The second Hispanic ganger makes it to the edge of the roof, making a disgusted noise at the shredded crip and pulling him back off the edge, taking his place, his armpits just over the un-fenced edge of the roof with his buddy.
Both miss horribly, their bullets going completely wide of Alanna, landing in the asphalt of the parking lot stories below. The noise of their un-silenced weapons echoes around the surrounding residential area.
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The blow glances off her fashionable coat and she clambers down out of his range. She looks up just in time to see a pair of shots fired almost randomly in her direction.
"Oh ma goodneth. It has been a spell since we had so many fine cahllers. Why don' we take this fine young man out t' dance too."
She takes up her SMG, finishes off the clip in the general direction of the young man who shot at her, then changes the clip.
= 11
Wraith thumbs the ejection button, slams the gun down into a fresh cilp on her belt, then pushes the feeder lever with her left bicep.
"Let's go."
1dr0meda swaps out her combat endgram for one that does less damage to make room for her stealth engram, just in case what she was trying to do would be monitored by a sys op.
Bonus +1 (Cutter Edge)
Result = 9 + 1 = 10
Result = 5
Your data mining is going to take time and decryption to yield anything worthwhile, but you're seeing a lot of the name "Maxwell Linson" already. A quick GDN search confirms that he's one of Nexxon's VPs, head of Mergers and Acquisitions. Packet flagging looks like he's had quite a lot of contact with Royce over the last six months--just about ever since Phoenix has gone dark.
The last of Alanna's bullets slam into the other Catorce ganger, who chokes, and then falls off the edge, his balance lost. He tumbles, already lifeless, past Alanna, trailing blood all ten stories down.
On the Four of Hearts: "Come on!" Screams the blood with the rocket launcher. "We out of our league, man! We done what we came for!" He strides over to the elevator, hammering the down button. The crip at the edge hesitates, before the lifeless ganger hits the ground, punctuating the statement. He swallows hard and disappears from the ledge as Alanna reloads.
The stealth engram is rated +1. Currently running engrams are on 1dr0meda's profile. I can add a spoiler end version of them on her header if you would prefer.
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Wraith skitters back up the side of the building, but at a hypotenuse, so she doesn't emerge the same places she submerged.
She keeps her head down while she gets ready to pop up again, but spends a moment sending a warning to her rescue party.
>>Hola, chummers. Just so ya know I couldn't get them all, and when that door open yer gonna have two or three muchachos right fragging there. So ass soon ass the door car stops, just start shooting. ;)<<
It's unclear if those are purposeful spelling errors, or if Alanna is just very, very immature.
Well not -too- unclear.
Emily's holo-badge suddenly flickers to life where it was turned off before. It flashes twice, and a readout appears in the upper left corner of her vision:
Possible terrorist attack in progress, origin unclear. Loose missile in Denver airspace, apparent target is a commercial aircraft, flight 10Q4Z to Tucson. Ready all units for potential disaster relief.
The holobadge flickers back off, but the messages continue to come in a steady stream on the way up to the roof. More mass messages confirming activity and small, individually bandied messages from cops on the recall roster, registering who is on duty and who's not, who's inside city limits, who's too drunk to assist, etc. You should be sending your own message back to confirm status.
In the intermittent round:
The Blood stands awkwardly in front of the door, the rocket launcher propped up on his shoulder and tears in his eyes. The Crip stands back-to-back with him, scanning around the edge of the roof in case Alanna comes back up.
Neither of them notice that by the time they got to the elevator, it had already been climbing past the eighth floor. Still waivering and waiting, the Blood mutters something just as the doors start to ping open a few seconds earlier than he expected...
Combat Card Draw:
1. Commercial Airline Pilot (Joker)
2. Ghiv (King of Clubs)
3. Crip (Queen of Spades)
4. Neon (Queen of Diamonds)
5. Blood (Eight of Hearts)
6. Alanna (Two of Diamonds ._.)
The fox hybrid closes his eyes, accelerating full throttle, throwing people back into their seats as he continues his ascent. He starts to mutter the lord's prayer as he swerves, but it does no good, the missile lock is finally able to catch up to his plane. The jet is simply too slow to outrun a guided rocket.
= 36, with AP 24 vs. Vehicle Toughness of 20(2): 4 wounds/Instant Wreck.
In the passenger compartment, the screaming cacophony is immediately silenced. The floor falls away into burning wreckage as the plane falls from the sky.
High above, the night sky lights up in an explosion, illuminating the clouds in a bright orange-red flash. Before the sound wave of the explosion can even reach back to you, every single one of you has a holotag message pop up along the top of your TAP display:
EMERGENCY: 797 DOWN OVER DEN. SHELTER IN PLACE AWAIT FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS
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Wraith looks up in shock and awe as the orange explosion takes up the night sky. The sudden movement dislodges some masonry, and she has to frantically scramble for purchase, at one point hanging about the ground only be the pinky and ring finger of her artificial gun-hand.
She's eventually able to get her feet on a solid window-frame and re-anchor her left hand, but the few seconds it costs her nullifies the dramatic and timely entrance she was hoping to make.
As the doors open Ghiv spots the gangers and attempts to fry one's synapses.
Ghiv then dodges for cover behind something, preferably made of a high grade metal.
Keep one alive. he says, businesslike.
Even though 1dr0meda is in the safest place at the moment, the notice of the plane down and her colleagues scrambling to apply some damage control means she takes no comfort in her situation. She keeps focused on the virtual reality revealed by her TAP. Her hacking software is programmed to present various environments based on the information evident from outside the firewall, augmented with information obtained during the firewall penetration. She had found herself in a Japanese villa back when she hacked into Hanzo's TAP because the software that tried to protect him from intrusion had characteristic Japanese coding elements.
When she approaches the firewall that the briefcase is sending its message past, she finds herself looking at the perimeter of a gleaming office cube, all reflecting glass, ringed by a wall with a gate. This suggests she is hacking into a corporation. She is relieved it is not a military system. She approaches the gate as if she is a pedestrian attempting to gain entry into the building. The firewall has an entrance for people with the right password and user identification, which presents itself as an attendant asking to see 1dr0meda's identification and to state the nature of her visit.
She reaches into a pocket and pulls out a wallet with various ID cards. She flips through them one by one, showing the guard. Although the first few do not win the attendant's approval, the look on her face, reflecting information gained with each offered user ID, tells 1dr0meda what she needs to spoof the system. She says, "Royce, Mitchell with a priority 1 message." Her words mimic code she found at the start of the message that began to load into the port. It works. The gates open and she receives an ID badge that says Mitchell Royce. She doubts it will fool a sysop but her stealth engram may make it harder to tell she's unauthorized.
She gets inside and taps the surface of an information kiosk in the lobby. A few commands later, she finds herself in a space that looks like a communication center, with satellite up-links, cables, and pipes, all with information packets streaming this way and that. She identifies the stream that contains Royce's message, which looks like a kind of drone. She grabs onto the next one that flies by with the next packet of information and begins to ride it toward the destination.
She wishes she could split her attention and do some investigation of which plane had been hit, whether Mr. Royce was supposed to be on the plane, and at the same time hack into the security cameras of the building to see what was happening on the roof. But she has limits and chooses to keep focused on their enigmatic employer and his valuable connection to Phoenix.
Emily comes to halt at the elevators (having redirected to them based on new information) and presses the button. She sees the messages popping up in her HUD and the report request blinking on her chest. Houston glances back at the room before sliding out of line of sight to report. Before opening the connection, she manually switches off auto-GPS reporting. Satisfied, her TAP locks in the encryption and opens the channel.
"Officer Houston, reporting. Responding to a 405 in progress, unable to assist."
With that, she closed her communication, but kept the traffic buzzing in the background. The first responders might inadvertently provide information.
"F*(#," she cursed softly, leaning against the wall. With her employer dead, she was losing leads to Phoenix... leads to Valerie. It was then that the continued sounds of battle refocused her attention as she waited for the elevator.
The Blood steps forward, suddenly dizzying under Ghiv's onslaught and staggering back, leaving his blue-shirt friend to pick up the slack. The Crip swings for Neon with the havoc stick as Ghiv dives out of the way...
= 10
= 10
The Crip steps back from Neon, holding his havoc stick, the realization that he hasn't done any serious damage to her slowly dawning on him. He gulps audibly as the Blood still stands woozily, shifting his weight from foot to foot, acutely aware that firing the rocket launcher in close quarters would be suicide.
Neon is hit hard the moment the elevator door opens, her armored clothing protecting her from the brunt of the hit, but the force of the man's attack throwing her to the ground to slide up against the back of the elevator.
Sitting on the floor, her pistol comes up and fires at the Crip who had the temerity to assault her so.
Neon's double-tap pings off the edge of the Crip's chrome, revealing black, networked subdermals below the skin of his right shoulder. He curses and staggers, trying to find his balance.
On the Eight of Hearts: The Blood raises the rocket launcher for half a second before he realizes exactly what a stupid idea that would be and tries to limp out of range, his legs moving shakily and unsurely. It looks like he's realizing exactly how poorly this run has gone for him and his crew.
Ghiv grabs him by the leg, preventing him from leaving. "Dammit, get off me you crazy f!~%ing trog!" He whirls around, trying to break free, but his adrenaline is beginning to make him weak and slippery. His grip starts to tighten on the hydra launcher. "I'm f+!#in' serious, Tomo! LEMME GO!"
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'Target acquired.'
Any more words the Blood had are quickly cut off as Wraith perforates his torso with three rounds rapid.
The gutterpunk still smoking, she calls out to lone Crip. "Hoi chummer! Regardless of your fondness for ramming prone girls with your stick, there are two ways you're gettin' off this rooftop. One involves you telling us just what the fragging frag is going on here. Most likely that won't take long, and we'll be of a friendly mind after that talk.
So, Imma give you a chance to lay down your big dangerous stick in exchange for preferential, bordering on gentle, -possibly- even lover-like treatment.
The other way involves you bein' a big tough guy and getting to the ground like your other friend who spurned the use of both manners and the elevator. Helped by bullets.
Wait, is that too subtle. Okay, okay, if you don't talk we'll shoot you and throw you over the side. Is that more gooder? I'm sorry, I never know when I'm taking the metaphor too far.
Nuthin' personal chummer. Just biz."
As Alanna finishes her monologue, the elevator dings open, letting Emily out onto the rooftop to see the scene. Five dead punks and one who is on the verge of pissing himself. Alanna's Gutterpunk and Neon's Columbus still smoking, Ghiv's hands not quite unfastened from the jeans of the Blood, who slumps to his knees and drops his rocket launcher to the ground. Above, a twisting trail of thick gray smoke still hangs in the air, illuminated by the lights of Denver below, stretching almost from one side of the sprawl to the other.
"J-Jesus Christ, b+@~!,", the Crip stammers, sitting his ass down on the concrete. He half-heartedly tosses his Havoc stick, watching it roll off the un-fenced roof. "Every single one. F-f&$%. This ain't what they told me the Five-Five-Five was gonna be like." He looks around at the scattered bodies, some of which are still actively smoking, and draws his knees halfway to his chest, setting his arms on top of them like they weigh a thousand pounds.
Somebody has gone to great lengths to make it look like this network is occupied, even though it isn't. It's a ghost town, with only one computer doing any real processing on the inside. As you fly toward it, reaching out and grabbing files as they pass you, the building suddenly shakes. A few of the windows change from projecting a facade of an outside sunny sky, to white text on a blue background: "INTRUSION DETECTED". For a moment, as your drone begins to slow, you think its you, but you realize the milling not-androids are facing away from you, towards the entrance.
Through the windows that aren't displaying feedback, you can see a huge, blue-ish shadow of a woman stretches high above, into the sky. The front-guard you fooled a moment ago attempts to halt her and ask for identification. The giant punts him, and he goes flying through the gate, through the little lobby, past the receptionist with her lazy drawn-on face. The additional crashing noise below you lets you know that he likely kept going. The huge shadow takes a step inside the courtyard, looking down across the building--the cube terminates at approximately her armpits. She casts an eye across the building.
Her voice shakes the cube. You get the feeling it would be a good time to take what you've got and log out.
Ghiv says I'll handle this. Won't take long, and then we leave. to Alanna
Ghiv stares into the man's eyes
Ghiv's breathing begins to match the Crip's, his mannerisms, facial tics, posture all match that of the Ganger.
Ghiv continues staring at the man
We aren't going to hurt you if you cooperate. Who paid you to be here? Who was in charge? Tell the truth, I'll know if you lie.
Total rolled =7.
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Alanna's face lights up. "Super!" she says as she vaults lightly onto the rooftop.
She plugs a fresh clip into her SMG and scans around the scene.
As Ghiv mind-f#$!s the Crip, she starts walking among the smoking corpses, making sure they're all dead, and starts frisking them with the eye of a professional and the quick hands of a nimble augmented human.
When she comes to the missile launcher she sighs, hard, like a kid having his only Christmas present taken away. "This is gonna be hella hot. I mean, -helllllzah- hot. I gotta leave it 'cause da fuzz gonna want this.
We might need t' leave the weapons, too. Gang colors, gang corpses...gang war. Provides answers, at least.
I mean, their cash an' trinkets we can take, sure. But guns an' corpses stay."
She's silent awhile, policing up the bodies. Then she asks, "You guys wanna eat after this?"
Logging out rolls, if needed.
1dromeda logs out and continues to monitor the data upload. While she's at it, she checks the status of the files running on the briefcase's auxilliary drive. "Ten-Speed? If you're going to escape, you may have problems going through this link. Talk to me."
If there is no reply and no other issues to deal with, 1dromeda looks around the room, looking for a way to hack into the apartment security system, with the aim of seeing what's on the security cameras.
Result=6+1+1=8
Assuming that get's past the firewall:
To adjust pointing of cameras, if possible and if necessary.
Not that it probably matters, but double aces!
Result = 10 + 9 = 19
Once she's checked out the security situation, she'll start to work on finding out what plane just got shot down and who was on it.
As you hack past the firewall, you realize most of the security cameras aren't installed past the first floor. There may be some footage of your group in the parking lot, but otherwise you're clean even without wiping anything. Probing a little deeper you can see that there are security cameras on the roof which were disabled an hour ago. You loop the parking lot footage just to be safe, and leave footage of the other group arriving in place. You set the cameras to continue looping that footage until ten minutes from now, which should give you plenty of time to leave.
The Crip reaches into his pocket. "I'm not going for a gun, omae," he says despondently as he grabs the fattest blunt any of you have ever seen and lights it. "We were gonna light it up when the run was over. Guess this is close enough." One of his fingertips splits open, forming a spark as he lights it. "I don't know who hired us. She said her name was Discordia." He exhales, a cloud of smoke drifting down over his body as he leans back in place. "We never met her face to face. All holocon. I'd guess some kinda rich b@%@# though, she didn't think nothing on dropping three thou on us. Each. Course, maybe she knew that..." He sniffs, looking at his dead runners. "S&*@ man. Forecast didn't say nothin' about rain." He looks up, taking another drag. His composure is solid but he can't physically stop himself from crying.
"If you're wondering about the colors," he says, tugging on his bandana, "That's how we do in Phoenix, omae. Moses got everybody together." He shakes his head. "Before the city went dark anyways." He takes one more pull, and then the blunt falls from his hands. His head looks up at the sky. His mouth slacks open and his eyes suddenly light up brightly. He stands, though his hands don't reach for a weapon, the lit blunt burning and sticking to the leg of his pants.
"Ghiv Masara. Emily Houston. Unit N-30-N, or Bridget, I'm not sure what's polite in your... Situation. Alanna Whiteangel." He turns to all of you, one by one, his voice speaking with a light, crisp, professional lilt. The ganger tuts, his blank eyes shining a uniform blue, his contact camera lenses shining their flash constantly, making his face light up an unnatural color. "Interesting. Did Royce pick people who had something to do with Phoenix on purpose? I wonder..." His hand snaps up, pointing at Emily.
A holotag forms on her chest, a police badge and a short block of official info. A beam of light from the badge trails upward faintly into the sky. The Crip stares in the opposite direction, towards Alanna, his eyes strobing their flash for an instant. "Houston, you lied on that recall. I don't think you're unable to assist. I think you're in severe distress and engaging the suspects in a firefight right now. Ms. Whiteangel, there's a man with a lot of titles on the other side of town, with a picture of your face and a copy of these coordinates." The ganger smiles, a holotag of a pocket watch forming in his hand, real-time rendering as he raises it and clicks it open. "Tick-tock."
Ghiv takes an involuntary step back, he's never witnessed anything like this before.
We should run. Now. Ghiv says, stepping into the elevator and pausing for only a few seconds to see if anyone else crowds in before rapidly pushing the GF button.
Ghiv sends a message to the others via his TAP This is bad. Does anyone have a Bolthole we can go? Ghiv is of course, speaking of a secret place that a group could remain hidden, at least for a little while. He knows of one, but it was a Zeek spot and he doesn't trust this crew.
"I wasn't going all the way to Phoenix," he says. "Do you think I can make it to the proxy, or could you give me another lift somewhere else?"
"There's something big and bad in the proxy looking for Royce. I wouldn't go there." She plugs the data transfer cable into her bellybutton port to her internal data storage unit. "If you don't mind riding in my stomach, I'll get you to a safe port. Better hurry, as I think the situation is evolving rapidly and we may need to log out of this location presently. Don't worry, I won't make you call me mama just because you rode around in my tummy before being born."
If this won't work or if the transfer will take a long time, 1dr0meda will take the case, smash the computer, and head down to the car.
1dr0meda sends a message to the rooftop contingent: "I handled the local security cameras and made sure we don't appear on the recordings. Transfer complete and terminal terminated. Ready to roll."
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Wraith was only listening to the man with half an ear really, concentrating on looking for loose change/hard and critical intel. The name Discordia was interesting. She hadn't heard it before, but she was new to the city.
When he reaches in his jacket the SMG perfunctorily points in his direction, but just as quickly lowers. 'At least he sticks to the bodily drugs, and isn't a chip-head, or, worse, into 2XS.'
As his voice gets all knowing an' creepifying, she pays more attention. Yeah....this is...not normal. 'Someone with titles? Who the frag do I know with a lot of titles? I don't actually know that many people here. Wait, you don't think.... No, no way. He...he isn't supposed to know me.'
She starts to gain little composure and drift in the direction of the elevator. "Yeah...yeah. I think moving might be a good idea."
Neon stepped from the elevator, watching the Crip , but also noting with professional detachment the fading explosion far up in the sky.
'If Royce was on that plane....bye bye 1000 credits.' she thinks, then begins to eye up the fallen gangers appraisingly, estimating how much of their cyber might be salvagable.
Then the Crip 'dies' before them and begins to speak with another's voice.
'What the f#%~?!!! He....she....it! Knows...about Bridget...about me. So did Royce! Is my life such a f%+&ing open book?'
She was ready to put two slugs into the Crips brain pan, when the thing controlling the Crips body used Emily to bring all of the local constabulary down on their heads.
"We leave now." she said bluntly,turning to leave, then pausing looking the 'Crip' in the eye, "Discordia, I presume? Do you oppose us because Royce hired us or because of Phoenix" she asks, curious despite thier dire situation.
On thier TAP she messages to 1dromeda , "Nice job. Get ready to leave. Someone called Discordia just took over one of the gangers brain and has seriously f$*+ed up our situation."
"Curious little rat, aren't you?" The ganger, or whatever is pulling his strings smiles. "Those two are the same, Bridget. Royce thought he could control my town. I don't like sharing my toys, it comes with being raised in a big family. But look at me blathering on, when you've only got... Oh, maybe two minutes now, until the first wave of cops gets here. Think fast."
A message pops up on your TAPs as the ganger talks.
NOT pre-recorded message, thanks: I've got a friend about five blocks down. Tsu Lin Kennels, coordinates attached, garage is big enough for your cruiser. Keep it quiet, I'd rather not have that know I'm here.
It's up to you how to handle this, but I can't take back that message from your holobadge. It looks like she wiped your earlier response out of the net too. If anybody says they saw your first response they won't be able to prove it. You can run and tell the cops that message was faked--if anybody saw your first reply they'll probably believe it. Or you can stay up here and be a big damn hero when the cops show up. Your call, Officer.
The second comes with an inlaid hypertext of two silver stars--the Deputy Chief. He's been tough, bordering on ruthless since you've been in Denver, but never unfair. Chances are he was hitting the gym while the actual Chief was drinking his age in shots, and he'll probably be coordinating the operation until Chief sobers up to take credit for it.
Houston: I swear I saw an unable to assist from you. Either that was a hack or this is. I'm gonna trust my gut: Every officer within two miles is heading to your location and they are looking for a fight. Hang in there, kid.