The Pen is Mightier than the Dragon

The Pen is Mightier than the Dragon

The Pen is Mightier than the Dragon
Part of Call of the Shadows
Date 2085-02-13 GM OrionsRequiem Location London, UK Status Threat Level: Extreme
Factions Involved
ShadowHaven Pendragon Avalon Council The Great Dragon Arleesh The Blackmore Family	Dr. Jykell	Cult of the Horned God	The Mórrigan
Artemisisa Catharsis Delphi Kate	Hyde #9 Mister FourEyes Randoran Blackmourn	Josephine	Mordred(NPC) Mórrigan Le Fey

Summary

In which Artemisia and Catharsis are called upon for the greater good

Dinner Date

Artemisia is continuing to study the diaries that she had recently found when she receives a message from an unknown commcode. The message is a simple location data that can be followed. Fearing a trap in her normally paranoid manner, Artemisia contacts Catharsis who provides Matrix overwatch on the vampire and insists on coming to the underpass of the Council Island bridge where they are drawn to. Beneath the bridge stands a long, ornate dinner table, dressed with fine silverware and ceramic, while also having a large duffel bag resting on the table that Artemisia pulls open, revealing three figures.

Doing some searching, Catharsis is able to determine that these people have been reported as missing on the news. One is a Yakuza member, under investigation for the ownership and operation of several bunraku parlors across Seattle. Another is a suspected murderer who has three open homicide investigations about them, and the third is a hedge fund executive who was suspected of embezzling for certain individuals and defrauding others. Also of note upon assensing them, one was mundane, one was an adept, and the final one was a technomancer.

Artemisia wakes up the yak and begins to threaten him, asking what he knew about Josephine and why she was there. However as it becomes clear that he is actually working for Josephine and was a member of her latest club she blows the head off the yakuza member. Waking up the suspected murderer, she finds out that many of the murders were of Josephine's "enemies" and uses her ability to paralyze people with fear to keep the murderer still but ends up also paralyzing Catharsis and forcing her friend to watch as the vampire drains the essence from the man before cutting his throat and then breaks down crying.

Cathy tells a story about her mom to calm Arti, comforting her friend and allowing the vampire to take some solace in the fact that she has friends who will not betray her.

Cathy talks to Technomancer hedgefund exec and learns that Josephine was upset about investments into something owned by the "Avalon group". The group is some form of philanthropic group based out of London, and is run by the familiar name of Ulric ban Avalon. Josephine asked the hedge fund manager to look into the Avalon group and discover everything he could and try and disrupt their own investments. Deciding to let the technomancer go, Artimesia and Catharsis consider their next moves, but through some clever hacking of traffic cams, discover that the vehicle used to transport Josephine headed to the Space Needle before she escaped.

Arti and Cathy go to the Space needle, and look around the stores in the area, eventually finding Four-Eyes and Josephine's signatures. Though as Artimesia goes through the stores it's clear that she is being messed with as the vampire is taunted by Josephine apparently looking for gifts for Artimesia before taking off from Seattle. Eventually deciding that the two of them wouldn't be able to find any additional leads while in this venue, they leave each other's company for the night and agree to meet up for their trip to London in the next week.

Four-Eyes appears in Arti's safehouse and offers to give her information in return for body parts, trades two of Artimesia's fingers for the information that Josephine will be in London for a week.

Catharsis in Cara'sir

Attempting to repair the damaged relationship with the elven side of her family after the events of In Shadows We Hyde, Catharsis takes a trip to the Tir nation of Cara'sir in order to work with her grandfather and the Blackmore foundation with some of their charitable activities. Upon her arrival at the airport she is picked up by Etain Darejan, a paladin and former Ghost from the military branch of the special forces that now works for Jeremiah Blackmore in his political ambitions for Princedom.

Arriving at Blackmore Manor the decker is informed that she has cousins that arrived in response to learning that she was meant to come to spend time with her grandfather, Brigit and Olwen Blackmore, two full mages that have long roots in noble elven society. Moving to the gardens for a peaceful walk Catharsis is eventually joined by her grandfather, but not before realizing that Etain is watching her carefully and protectively, as well that there are feelings of attraction from the former Ghost. Catharsis and her grandfather discuss the garden, and Jeremiah explains that it was never his intention that a mage use mind magic on his granddaughter, he simply wanted her to be safe, despite the shadowrunner activities.

Catharsis explains that regardless of intentions, sometimes the job is going to be dangerous but that she shadowruns to help people and that is more important. Jeremiah seems to agree that it's important, and that he's proud of her, even if he is always going to worry about her.

After a lovely afternoon with grandpa, Catharsis retires to her room, though is interrupted by the astral forms of Brigit and Olwen who are questioning what it was the decker wants from the family, why she just appeared and started to hang around her grandfather. However they are suspicious of the answer that she simply wants to get to know her family and grow closer to them. Brigit in particular seems to take offense at the idea that it's completely without ulterior motive, and has to be dissuaded from further action by her brother, eventually leaving the decker alone.

The next day Catharsis is wandering through the garden when she is stuck to a statue of her grandmother by Brigit's glue spell, trying once again to interrogate the shadowrunner about what she wants there and what she's trying to get from the Blackmore family. While eventually Catharsis is able to get free of the spell and deliver a scathing psychological evaluation of the suspicious cousin, it is stopped from escalating to violence by the quick appearance of Olwen who seems to be able to calm his sister. Upon returning to her rooms for the night, Catharsis is greeted by a spirit. A small chimera-like beast spirit combining traits of a rabbit, a serval and a stoat. The creature doesn't appear aggressive, and instead is quite friendly and spirited around Catharsis. While there is some initial concern due to the Astral nature of the creature and her previous experience with spirits Catharsis lets Etain know about the spirit, and an astral bodyguard is summoned who lets Catharsis know that the spirit is a Force 1 beast spirit, and speculates that it is free since there doesn't appear to be a summoner link and it's close enough past dusk that a reguarly summoned spirit would disappear. Accepting the new magical friend, Catharsis settles into bed and prepares for the next day.

Upon waking, Catharsis dons her best clothing as well as a new scarf in the form of the beast spirit and heads with her grandfather to the Blackmore foundation. The board is meeting as Jeremiah is looking to expand outside the Tir states and to aid all of metahumanity more than just elves. This is met with some resistance from the mainly elf nobility of the board. However Catharsis speaks to her experience from within the UCAS, and how Tir Tairngire is viewed by the non-elves that live in Seattle and elsewhere.

Catharsis makes some headway, though the meeting is interrupted and sent to a recess while Jeremiah heads down to the lobby on some sort of interruption. It's at this time that Catharsis realizes that there are others that she recognizes here, specifically Hyden Jones who is representing the Avalon Foundation, and an Amazonian woman who introduces herself as Mercedes Salazar who is observing as a guest. Mercedes spends a moment to talk with the beast spirit that Catharsis has, and explains that she is a Beast Way Adept who can communicate with animals. She tells Catharsis that the spirit's name is Loyell, and he was apparently sent to Catharsis by someone that he trusted. She also explains that Loyell is not actually a Force 1, but a Force 9 free spirit that seems familiar to the Amazonian. While this confuses Catharsis about the identity of who it might be that sent the spirit, she is interrupted from the thought by the sudden appearance of Olwen being deposited against one of the board room doors, smearing a bloody Elder God symbol as he himself has been exsanguinated.

Rushing to aid him Catharsis started trying to patch up the injured elf while others rushed around, however Hyden moved away to get aid using his ability to move preternaturally quickly. Coming back only a few minutes later with a medkit that Catharsis set up to help Olwen while the rest of the room panicked. Jeremiah eventually returns in a panic and comes with paramedics, bringing Olwen to the hospital, surviving thanks to the quick actions of Catharsis and her allies.

Arriving at the hospital, Catharsis is decompressing when she is once again assailed by Brigit, who is very upset that her brother is injured and lashing out at Catharsis. Though thanks to mediation techniques and confronting the issue being that her brother was hurt and not that Catharsis did something wrong allows the two elves to talk things out to a peaceful conclusion, with Brigit even admitting that she was just scared and lashing out. She also informs Catharsis that Olwen had gone to hang out with some "low-class" friends of his, a wizgang in the rougher parts of Cara'sir. Getting the address of the clubhouse from Brigit Catharsis makes her way to find Etain so that the two of them can go and interrogate the wizgang about what happened to Olwen.

This is interrupted by Mr. Four-Eyes appearing in the hospital and beginning to taunt Catharsis about her cousin's near-death experience. Loyell begins to hiss and growl at the tormenting spirit, though Catharsis holds him back from engaging in a fight, especially after an explorer is sent to defend her and gets slapped away aggressively. Mr. Four-Eyes also continues to offer information about the whereabouts of Hydes and even of Dr. Jeykll himself in return for one of Catharsis' ears. The spirit eventually decides that there has been enough torment and disappears before the cavalry can arrive.

After checking that Catharsis is unharmed Etain brings the woman to the rougher downtown area of Cara'Sir where they find the gang clubhouse where Brigit had indicated that Olwen had gone. The paladin and shadowrunner find that the building has been damaged outside, and several of the elven gangers are

Goes to Blackmore Foundation, impresses at meeting Olwen exsanguinated and left for dead, Hyden and Mercedes aid Mr. Four-Eyes shows up to antagonize Cathy Cathy goes to confront wizgang & learns about Osheen Cathy meets gram-gram Cathy breaks into Osheen's commlink Cathy has fun family time

Good ol' Londontown

Catharsis & Arti look up things about stonehenge

Arti meets a Templar (Mariam)

Catharsis walks into the catholic church

Arti meets Mercedes Salazar

Cathy makes friends with Diego Lope

Cathy gets invited to the Helix

Cathy and Arti have emotional conversation about being allowed to love

Cathy and Arti meet Pendragon

Cathy and Arti are tasked to steal the The Cullinan Diamond

Cathy and Arti recruit Delphi and Kate for the heist along with three runners and Mercedes

Delphi notices something weird about Mercedes

The group return to Arti and Cathy's room to discuss plans.

Cathy looks up the history and floorplans of the Tower of London as well as the building they have to get into

Arti turns herself and Kate into birds and examine the astral and physical defences of this location

Delphi does a second pass and gets route of the watcher and guardian spirits

Arti sees through Mercedes disguise to see a great dragon beneath.

Arti and Mercedes go to the Westway and find Alice's safehouse. Arti discusses recent events with Branch, a plant spirit

Branch tells Arti that Josephine had been there looking for something but hadn't found it.

Arti confronts someone who was fed on by Josephine and learns that she was communicating with Mr. Four-Eyes and mentioned the next Hyde being in place.

Arti and Mercedes talk about Arti's anger towards Josephine

The group summons the spirit of Thomas Blood who agrees to run distraction.

The Run

Arti flies into a corner tower as a bird while Kate swims through the moat and notices the moat water is salt water, and the moat is filled with Abrams lobsters

The two make their way into the interior and begin sneaking through, avoiding the patrols.

Arti notices Branch is nearby trying to find her, and has been spotted by the guardian spirits

Catharsis sends Loyell to grab branch and distract guardians

Arti and Kate ascend the central tower, opening a window while tricking the vibration sensors. Arti slides into the tower while Kate drops down to try and get into the barracks where the jewels are kept

Arti managed

Arti and Delphi psychometrize the Cullian diamond to some bad results

Cathy goes for a

Rewards

General Rewards:

• 50k Nuyen
• 20 Karma
• 102 CDP
• Up to 120k Nuyen in Electronics, Weapons & Weapon accessories, and London souviners up to Avail 20
• May purchase "Philip" [C2/L2 Researcher] as an optional contact
• Styyles Flamingo [C3/L1 Style Artiste]

Catharsis:

• 100k Nuyen
• Additional 20 Karma
• May buy Prime Datahaven Membership (Helix) at Chargen Costs
• May buy Trust Data, Not Lore at Chargen Costs
• Trust Fund III
• Loyell [C1/L4]
• May buy Loyell up to Loyalty 6
• Optional Contact: Etain Darejan [C4/L3 Bodyguard]
• 1 Arleesh Feather
• May Convert 5 RVP into Ascension Rewards

Artemisia:

• 100k Nuyen
• May buy Linguist at chargen costs
• Additional 25 Karma
• 1 Arleesh Feather
• IG Discount
• Photographic Memory
• May purchase a rank in "The Scourge"

Kate:

• May Convert 5 RVP into Ascension Rewards
• 1 Arleesh Feather

Delphi:

• IG Discount
• May purchase a rank in "The Scourge"
• 1 Arleesh Feather

Game Quotes

"So this probably shouldn't go to Stonehenge right? Like it seems like the key shouldn't go to the gate?" "Yes, I agree, but yet..." "No! Not but yet!" -Delphi & Artemisia after psychometrizing a big diamond