The group moves past the janitor complaining of stuffy air, and into the building. The closest location in the building is a good 20 floors up. On their way to the elevator, the hallway is blocked by a pair of custodians and a giant mess, the result of a garbage can that has been unceremoniously toppled. Look at all this junk one complains, who would leave such a chaos?
I'm sure it's Hayizok again. Stupid idiot, I'm sure he's doing this on purpose just to spite us.
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Well, well. I will definitely report to the management what kind of mess is going on inside Dayside. You two. What are your names? Show me your badges, I need to know who made such a mess. Shari looks very sternly at this couple, so that they want to escape before the inevitable consequences come...
Despite the solid reliable legend, Shari moves inside so as to minimally get into the cameras:
I suggest not to rush and just walk from the bottom up.
Yes... but... the custodians meekly says as Shari is having a go at them It wasn't us, we're just here to clean it up. Yes, ma'm, will do, ma'm
Meanwhile the group slinks pasts the custodians, avoiding the sight of the camera.
They finally make it up to the twentieth floor, with the server room. Cha'mon's key card hold up just fine, unlocking the doors to the server room.
The server room is a massive server farm, taking up a 50-by-50-foot room with servers reaching the 20-foot ceiling. There seems to be nobody in here.
The data contains survey records for hundreds of planets, including resource information on each planet over several years—often charting individual planetary resources over time. Date codes indicate that the first surveys were undertaken years before Bisserelle was hired and that they continued for several years after their incarceration in the Adamantine Bastille. Dozens of different surveyors participated in these efforts. While planetary surveys are still ongoing, they currently happen with far less frequency than in previous years.
There's a link betweenn Bisserelle’s survey data and Dr. Evaneen Joswin’s seismology research. Dr. Joswin was often sent into the field on worlds surveyed which displayed resource markers for rare kinds of brittle metals. This survey data doesn’t include any information on the construction of a weapon, nor plans to make one.
Just as Seldszar finishes up, there's a from the corridor. Sounds like some canine creature has picked up a smell, and voice speaks What is it buddy? You smell something? Down the hall? Let's go check it out...
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Shari smiles slyly at Seldzar, straightens her clothes and goes out to meet the guard with the most casual look:
Good working day. Irasha Airasim. The senior super-weiser of that glorious company, thanks to which at least something works here. For now. She pretends that she wants to hand him a business card, then looks at him from head to toe and seems to change her mind without giving anything. We have another call about a breakdown, my superiors are dissatisfied with how often your superiors use services under the contract, your superiors are not satisfied with what competencies the technicians that my superiors send here have, and I have to figure out what is happening, find the culprits and thus prevent the conflict from starting before the corporate confrontation begins and all these long lawsuits, you know. Oh. And my ward's blood sugar level dropped. Could you bring something to eat before he passes out and we all have problems? She pronounces the word "all" very expressively. By the way, do you have any idea who is to blame? The poor guy will get a claim for hundreds of thousands credits and will be a beggar all his life, possibly spending years behind bars. But what can you do, that's life. Maybe some security guard spilled coffee on the server? We clearly have traces of coffee in several places here. Bay the way... Hmmm.. What did you say your name is? How often do you visit this place? Shari looks at the guard even more expressively.
Hey, the man with the dog says, looking completely out of his depth in light of the force of nature that is Shari and Seldszar I'm just the security guard. You know, making sure no bad guys break in, sneak around, you know? I'm the reason that server room hasn't been robbed empty, so I'm just going to do my job, you do yours, okay?
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Moving up another twenty floors brings the group to a floor that starts with a rack of white coats, and row upon row of fume hoods labelled with every warning sign chemistry has ever designed... toxic, caustic, biohazard, mystic hazard, flammable, negative energy, radioactive, unspeakable evil, irritant, unsafe for the environment.
Opposite of the fumehoods are workbenches and a few computer desks. Looks like the only thing standing between you and any data on these computer is a researcher ID badge.
There's a shuffling of feet around the corner.
The shuffling intensifies, until a summerborn ryphorian wearing lab goggles peeks around the corner, Hey there... he says burning the midnight oil? Not that there's any midnight around here.
He seems to be not the least bit concerned by the sudden appearance of previously unseen lab workers. The name's Karezen, I'm just working late to finish some experiments.
He seems quite stressed out, but not by the presence of the Starfinders. Rather, it's almost as if he's hoping you guys don't belong.
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"Yeah, I need the overtime pay. I've got kids at home that need to be fed and a no good wife who's only good at swiping my credit card. Enough about me though, what are you doing here so late? Couldn't your experiments wait until tomorrow or is it because you don't want anyone to see you working on them?
Ah, man Karezen says whatever you do, don't get involved in that Nightside business. I thought I left all of that behind when I left my last employer... bad, bad stuff. I'm just looking for a way out, before I 'disappear', catch my drift? So much bad stuff happening lately.
Look, Karezen says I get the feeling you belong here as much as I do, which is to say, not at all. If you are indeed sticking it to Lubose, maybe you can help me escape, before I get 'disappeared'. In return, I can give you this. he says, holding up his ID card, Yours may get you into the building, but only this one can access the secret lift in the CEO's office, that leads down to Nightside. The entrance is hidden beneath the fish tank.
Nightside is the seceret laboratory that is ran inside this facility. Dayside, nightside, get it? Lubose has been running experiment on my old K-BLD collars, and he is using them to control undead. I never thought that these devices could be used for that purpose!
Karezen also provides access to the laboratory computers.
The computer files mention the solvent polyecotane. According to the data, polyecotane is a solvent used for working with especially brittle materials or for very precise work. In this case, in conjunction with a host of other solvents, polyecotane was being used to refine a specific physical material—some kind of rare mineral that was incredibly fragile and impossible to work with in a raw state. However, the mineral is never named, and doesn't seem to appear in any lab samples. Polyecotane and the associated solvents were part of something called “Project Dawn,” however, all further data on Project Dawn is classified, other than it being headed by Dayside’s CEO, Lubose.
Well, I seem to have a particularly poor choice of employer Karezen explains, one that makes his employees disappear once they learn too much. I'd rather disappear myself, if you catch my drift.
Would be nice to be part of some honest research endeavour. I've had my fill of shady research projects that just happen to be funded by the wrong interests...
I can stay here and finish my work, you go investigate the Nightside
The unwritten law of corporate Verces is that the CEO's office is on the top floor. Far above the research and public floors, the CEO's office overlooks the perpertual daytime of the industrial district it is situated in, including the dry cleaner's that so helpfully lended the group their uniforms. Both the elevator and stairs have been set up such that they lead into to a wide, smug hallway with a single capitalist door.
Looks like the Big Cheese doesn't like being watched. Like floor isn't connected to the security system at all
Nothing says Big Cheese like not being disturbed. The doors don't even even yield to the access-all-areas pass that Cha'mon managed to fabricate, instead giving a stoic 'dng' beep that universally signals 'access denied' across the pact worlds.
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Cha'mon Cha'mon has a look around and says, "There's no security system on this floor. I suppose the CEO doesn't like being watched."
Seeing that the all access pass doesn't work, Cha'mon Cha'mon pries open the key card panel and then pulls some tools from his engineering and hacking tool kits.
He winks at Shari, "I'll have this door open for you in a minute my queen."
"On second thought why don't you just open it yourself."
Hey, if you can get me out of here, I'll do all the research for you
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Seldszar proves once again that forgetting your keycard at home isn't a problem on Apostae.
The CEO’s office is extravagant and pristine. It has a desk and countertops made of polished petrified wood and lush golden carpets. The walls are opaque windows that can be made transparent with a touch to offer an unparalleled view of the Drest business district. A single computer terminal is embedded in the desk with a holographic touch display just above the worktop. A single framed holographic image sits on the desk, depicting a happy couple, one a quorlu and one a dragonkin. Behind the desk rests a thick, comfortable, dark red leather beanbag made for a large occupant, and a floor-to-ceiling fish tank filled with hundreds of colorful fish.
The holophoto on the desk depicts a quorlu and a dragonkin, looking happy and in love. The quorlu is clearly Lubose, although they don’t yet have a cybernetic eyestalk, and they look younger by at least a decade. The dragonkin looks quite old, perhaps in their 70s.
Seldszar actually recognises the dragonkin from an earlier dive through the archives: this is Sozirenn, one of the suspected founders of the Organization alongside Lubose themself.
Seldszar manages to get access to the computers system through a simple dictionary hack and some static interference on the keycard system. The desktop provides access to the regular operations stuff for Dayside Inc., including product email records, chat messages, reports, recalls, and financial gains. Nothing here points to anything untoward, but crafty as Seldszar is, he quickly realised this is a fake shell.
Beyond the fake shell is a plethora of information, with two items taking the cake:
Dayside Inc. has been working with an unnamed shadow company owned by one of Lubose’s former assistants, whose appointment seems entirely for show. This assistant’s name is clearly linked to a false identity, but Lubose slipped up and referred to them as “Kebzec” in a few instances. All Dayside Inc. products for the past 5 years have a back door code left in them. This code, when activated, seeks out any passwords and financial information accessible to the household tech and sends that data to Kebzec’s unnamed shadow company. Through this arrangement, Dayside Inc. and their ally have been siphoning credits system-wide to the tune of billions each year.
The group uncovers a file on the weapon being created from the seismologist’s work. This weapon causes targeted earthquakes in an area surrounding the place it’s deployed. The earthquakes are incredibly powerful—literally city destroying. Additionally, this machine can select areas within its range to be spared from the earthquake (allowing them to pick and choose what to destroy with an untraceable weapon that seems natural). This weapon has already been constructed, sold, and delivered to an unknown source as part of something called “Project Dawn.” Based on the project’s objectives and goals, it’s clear that the weapon is intended to be used on a large, densely populated city, which will certainly result in extensive loss of life, likely numbering in the millions. Unfortunately, there’s no indication where they intend to use the device or where the device was moved to.
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The secret door is exactly where Karezen said it would be, under the fish tank. There's a concealed electronic panel on the base of the fish tank meant to scan identity cards
When you scan Karezen's card, the fish tank and its built-in base slide back along well-concealed tracks, and an express lift rises up from the ground in its place, chimes pleasantly, and opens. Inside, the elevator has only two buttons: “Dayside” and “Nightside.”