Keira has a mission for you if you want it. Something they’ve been saving up for your particular talents.
Or you can pick a region of Spire and I can feed you a few hooks.
You've both been tasked with an...unusual request, but one well suited for your particular skillset. The Ministry has an agent named Laroche working in the Gardens to divert a certain percentage of the harvest earmarked for the Aelfir to the starving Drow of the undercity. At last report, he'd made contact with a human hydroponic engineer named Michael who was helping him build a fruit pipeline out of the Vats.
Laroche was supposed to check in with his Magister (the identity of whom will be kept secret for OpSec reasons) every three days using a dead drop in a mushroom delivery upspire. He's missed his last two checkins, which is highly unusual for him. Keira needs you two to find out what happened to Laroche and if he's dead or captured, find out if his operation is salvageable.
If he's been captured, you may need to eliminate Michael in order to limit Ministry exposure. If Laroche suffered from misfortune that wouldn't compromise his operation, you may be able to make contact with Michael and continue the work. Making fresh fruit available to the citizens of the undercity would be an enormous PR boon for the Ministry.
Because of the deliberately decentralized nature of the Ministry, Keira knows very little about Laroche's operation. She won't be able to make an introduction between you and Michael and doesn't know how he's been making contact. You'll be going in blind, for the most part.
The good news is that there's very little city guard activity in the garden district. The bad news is that Aelfir farming consortiums have hired their own private security to protect against exactly what you're doing.
The other complication is the Dark Famers. Drow farmers who tend to vats of algae and corpse-grown mushrooms by candlelight. They're proud and industrious and they hate the Mage-Light powered hydroponic works tended by the Humans. It's entirely possible that Laroche's disappearance is entirely unrelated to the Aelfir and is instead a product of the Dark Farmers trying to protect their hold as the chief food suppliers of the district.
Karkoush stood at the edge of the pool of light that broke the darkness of the silent warehouse. He held his black steel mask in his long fingers, rotating it as he reflected on Keira's briefing.
"What do you think, Clive? Shall we begin tonight? Perhaps I could attempt a direct entry posing as a gardener and try to get some intel, with you shadowing me? I haven't got my hands dirty in a while."
"Do we at least have a description of this Human?" asks Clive of Keira.
In response to Karkoush's question, Clive says "I'm more than happy to shadow you as you try to mingle with the gardeners; I have no real experience with food production. If you want to leave tonight, I'm fine with that as well."
Karkoush nods, his dark face intense. "This sounds time sensitive. Give me three hours to prepare. I'll enter the compound where Laroche worked then, at seven o'clock. I suggest we spend another three hours trawling for information; it's up to you whether you want to shadow me or go your own way inside. We could then meet up at the Dark Farmer's Rest on Candle Street in the Gardens District at eleven to discuss what we've found out. If for some reason either of us can't make it, we could meet tomorrow morning at ten at your hidey-hole. Sound like a plan?"
"I'm fine with shadowing you, unless I see something that needs investigating, but I'll let you know before I leave."
Clive thinks for a bit then says "As far as a fallback location, let's pick a place in the gardens to rally to, and barring that, someplace a couple of blocks away."
Karkoush cocks his head. "I'd rather leave the Gardens together and meet at the Dark Farmer's Rest tavern a few blocks away to begin with - I think it would be easier, and look less suspicious, to leave separately - but if you want to meet up and leave the Gardens together we can do it that way. I can't help feel that we're inviting trouble though."
Karkoush puts his black steel mask away, taking a much plainer servant's mask from the folds of his robe and placing it over his face. He then grabs a dusty old overcloak and throws it over his shoulders, taking on the aspect of a typical downspire worker drow. He nods to Clive. "Later then." He then turns to Keira. "We'll report back when the job's done."
Keira nods as Clive asks his questions. Karkoush, you notice that her movements are slower, her eyes a little more dim, her skin a map of wrinkles. She's getting older. She's been doing this a long time.
Excellent questions, Clive. For reasons of operational security, there's not too much I can tell you about the minister known as Laroche. Here's what I can safely share with you:
- Laroche may or may not be his real name, but it is the name he's currently using in The Gardens. Michael knows him by that name.
- Michael works for Emberbrook Farms, a hydroponic conglomerate run by humans. It's not certain how Laroche made contact with Michael or what cover story he used. Laroche may or may not have gotten a job at the hydroponic vats.
- Michael knows that he's working with a Minister of Our Secret Mistress, but he also knows not to necessarily trust anyone but Laroche.
- Michael is short and squat, even by human standards. He has a bushy red beard and seems to have a bit of a disdain for the naturally grown foods of the district, especially the corpse-mushrooms of the Hanging Gardens.
Do you have any further questions?
Thusiax entered the Emberbrook compound in his worker's clothes, his hair scruffed, his posture slouched with the weariness of doing the same thing, for long hours, every day till the end of time. He kept a friendly manner about him, though, and sporadically greeted other workers with generic platitudes.
He stuck mainly to the vats, areas where the hard work got done. The higher ups in the offices might know more, but their knowledge would be broader, not about the specific details of the employees, the work, or what was going on.
Thusiax became Max for the duration of the shift, and Max had a seemingly endless supply of cheap cigarillos for his co-workers when they had none. Max, unlike Thusiax, had dull eyes that drifted rather than darted, and his voice brayed where Thusiax's sang, but Max slotted into his role perfectly, drawing much less attention than Thusiax would have.
Clive watched Thusiax enter the Vats and then began making his own way inside, sticking to the tops of the massive mushrooms where possible and staying in the darker areas where not.
Thusiax had a way with people that Clive had always lacked. His master, cursed be his name, had not chosen wrongly for Clive's Durance; He had a talent for drawing the shadows around himself like a blanket and an almost preternatural sense when he was being observed.
1. You hear mention of Laroche's name a few times, a delivery man who suddenly stopped appearing for his shifts and was replaced by a Drow named Lewellen.
2. Michael seems to be relatively well liked, for a human. The vat workers that he oversees speak highly of him. There's some rumbling that he and Duella, his Drow personal assistant, are romantically involved but those assessments are hotly contested.
3. There are guards, mostly around the vats and the loading docks. Workers are searched coming in and coming out of the facility. As far as you can tell, there's neither magic nor human tech being used for security. Emberbrook's human owners seem to be a bit cheap and wouldn't spend the money on such expensive measures when Drow security is fairly easy to come by.
You absolutely can do a compel check, which is the best skill for getting people to spill secrets they might not otherwise want to share. Depending on who you talk to or how you go about it, you'll be rolling:
1d10 for your base
1d10 for your skill in compel
If you can find a way to justify Crime, High Society or Order as part of your questioning, you can get another 1d10.
Take the highest result of as many dice as you roll:
1: Critical Failure: Take double stress, know that we're all disappointed in you.
2-5: Failure: Take stress, don't get the things you want.
6-7: Success at a cost: You get the things you want, but you take stress anyway
8-9: Success: No stress, no worries (for the rest of your days)
10: Critical Success: You don't take stress! They take stress!
Thusiax considered what he'd heard throughout the shift, but apart apart from the sudden absence of Laroche, there was little to pique his curiosity. He decided to dangle out one last bit of bait, to see if he could snare any info about strange or unusual happenings recently.
As Max was preparing to leave work, he struck up a casual conversation with another worker, Kennet, about how great at was to work here, then went on about his last job, where all sorts of strange stuff kept happening. There was even a rumour about a monster in one of the vats there! Emberbrook was totally different. It just seemed so... normal, and nice.
Kennet regards you suspiciously. "What do you mean 'Normal and nice?' You looking to start some trouble? Make it not so nice after all? The others may have taken a cotton to you, but I don't much like strangers."
He doesn't look like he's about to start a fight or call for help, but he's also not really indicating one way or the other about your question, which is a problem.
Max looks a little affronted at Kennet's unwarranted rudeness, but says nothing; he simply gathers his meagre belongings and heads towards the gate.
You now know a little bit about the facility and have a little leverage on Michael. What’s your next play? Do you need any guidance?
Clive simply observed from the darkness as "Max" went about his day, chatting people up as he worked.
The last exchange was the closest that came to violence, but Thusiax took the path of least resistance and left before things got to the point where he would be needed.
Max left the Emberbrook premises and entered the maze of backalleys and lanes that wound their way through the Garden district. He emerged on Candle St 15 minutes later and shuffled into a bar. He ordered two of the cheapest drinks they had, settled into a booth, and waited for Clive to appear.
Clive said "So, that was interesting. I'm impressed that you managed to keep your cool and walk away." from the seat acroos from 'Max' less than a minute after he sat down. "So, where do we go from here?"
Thusiax gives Clive a detailed rundown of what he found during the shift. When he finishes, he takes a great swig from the tankard of cheap beer; Max gives a great sigh of satisfaction, while Thusiax shudders at the taste.
"I think the likeliest angle is Michael. We could probe a little more, get some more detailed dirt on him and this situation with his assistant, then hit him hard for information. Conversely, security is not great at Emberbrook. If we wanted to do a more thorough covert penetration of the site, you could pretty much walk through the place. Hells, I could probably get in and out without being detected. We could go either way, or both. Thoughts?"
As Thusiax relates the story, Clive will share details that Thusiax missed, making it clear that he was shadowing him the entire time.
When asked about where to go from here, Clive will say "What I would normally do is call upon the gods in my mask and walk into his office, then make myself known to him and as he is soiling himself demand he tell me what he is doing, but I understand that this is probably not the best long-term outcome."
As one of the waitresses passes by their table, Clive will swipe a drink off of her tray in as fluid and normal a gesture as he can make it, as if someone taking something off her tray were the most common thing that could be imagined.
Turning back to Thusiax, Clive will say "In all honesty, I think we should talk to the assistant and see what she knows. If you want to try charming her first, that's fine; worst comes to worst I'll have to convince her my way."
Thusiax laughs after the fourth time Clive adds a missing detail to the story. "Lady above, will you stop that! It's unnerving," he smiles.
After Clive gives his thoughts, Thusiax nods. "Soft is better, hard if necessary. I dare say she is the weakest link. If we had more time we could develop her as an asset, but you're right, we may need to use cruder methods. I can approach her after her shift tomorrow, see if I can get her on side. Meantime, do you think you going back in could yield anything useful?"
You follow Duella home. She lives in a clean but old apartment building walking distance to the vat farm.
Do you sneak in? Knock and hope she’ll let you in? Confront her before she goes inside?
(You can roll sneak, compel or compel respectively)
Thusiax knocks on Duella's door. When she answers door he gives a small bow.
"Miss Duella? My name is Master Fillon. I need to talk to you about your boss, Michael. My colleagues and I have reason to believe he's in danger. May I come in?"
She nods and let’s you in, but you’re not sure who saw you enter.
You think you’re clear, but talking so openly carries risk.
She leads you to her kitchette. ”My flatmate will be home soon, you can’t be here when he gets back, so make this quick. What have you heard about Mr. Lonix? Who is trying to hurt him?”
Thusiax steps in, quickly shutting the door behind him. He looks around the apartment, taking in whatever he can.
"First things first," he begins. "This discussion may need to go longer than we have right now. Do you have a particular bar or tavern you frequent? I may need to meet you there later tonight, say, an hour after I leave."
After she's nominated a bar (or some other place if she doesn't do bars), Thusiax gets down to business. "I work for Greymanor Services. We've been hired by the family of one Mr Laroche, now missing, and my investigations suggest foul play. Michael's name has also come up."
Thusiax looks her straight in the eye. "I need you to tell me whatever you can about Michael, and Laroche if you knew him."
She nods nervously. ”I didn’t know Laroche very well. He works for us or worked for us I guess. He disappeared a few weeks ago, stopped showing up for work. Why do you need to know about Mr. Lonix? Is he involved somehow? If Laroche disappeared, why is Michael...I mean Mr. Lonix in danger?
Clive, are you doing anything during this time? It won’t prevent you from showing up to save the day. I want to be sure you’re playing too.
While Thusiax knocks on the front door, Clive scaled the building from one of the alleys and then moved over to her window and slipped in. He then quietly moved from room to room, checking for other people in the apartment or other information.
Alas, the structures of the Garden District are built differently from those of Perch, and you lose your grip climbing in.
You’re a bit shaken up from the fall, but not terribly injured. You’re no closer to getting inside though.
Unfazed, Clive will first look around to see if he was noticed, then barring any observers, he will attempt his feat again.
Much better. You shimmy up successfully and find yourself in Duella’s room. Do you want to snoop around (investigate)? Sneak around her apartment more? Leap out and beat her up?
She nods nervously. ”I didn’t know Laroche very well. He works for us or worked for us I guess. He disappeared a few weeks ago, stopped showing up for work. Why do you need to know about Mr. Lonix? Is he involved somehow? If Laroche disappeared, why is Michael...I mean Mr. Lonix in danger?
Thusiax shakes his head. "I'm sorry, but this is a very dangerous investigation... we're dealing with very dangerous people. It's too late for poor Mr. Laroche, but let me assure you, it's in both your best interests, and Mr. Lonix's, that you tell me about anything strange that you may have noticed going on at work, or about Michael. Please, rack your brain... is there anything you can tell me? Anything at all that you've noticed, but that seemed out of place?"
It's really in your best interests, Duella. You'd rather deal with me than Clive...
Having made it into the apartment after adjusting for the different architecture, Clive will begin going through whatever documentation would be easy to read without disrupting things, specifically looking for mention of her boss and/or Laroche.
Duella sobs. Me and Michael. We’re lovers. You can’t tell anyone, we’d lose our jobs!
She stops sobbing for a moment and looks at you suspiciously. Wait...you said it was too late for Laroche. Do you know what happened to him? Did someone hurt him?
[spoiler=Shadow S&F]
She looks at you like something in your story isn’t adding up, but she hasn’t connected the dots yet.
She has no documents at all in her room, though it’s clear that she has a regular human male visitor overnight. You’re about to conclude this search when you notice a tiny glint in a floorboard. It’s a glass bead, etched with the sigil of Our Hidden Mistress. You’ve heard of especially deep cover Ministers using objects like these to prove their identity.