Waves of Despair

Waves of Despair
Part of The Crow of Seattle
Date 2084-08-11 GM Asmodeus Location Discovery Island, Victoria, Salish-Sidhe Council Status Threat Level: Semi-Prime
Factions Involved
ShadowHaven Charon Moonblessed Silver-Tongue Crescent-Slash N-51	Shedim Horde
Ty Vallynn Eidolon Canter Shy Thunder Nu11st@ck	Shedim Unbreakables Horror Shows
Casualties and losses
Thunder had to burn edge.	25 Shedim, 5 Unbreakables and 3 Horror Shows lost their bodies. 19 total were disrupted later by Evanescence.
Initiation/Ascension for some.

Summary

A kink bomb is removed from Charon's head. It isn't easy, as the Master Shedim is commanded to deal with the rogue adept. It fails, which bodes ill for its longevity.

Background

It's not like the body Harlequin arranged for Charon was free of strings. Many safeguards were put in place that she's almost managed to squirm her way out of. Now, all that remains is the final one, the bomb in her head.

The Meet

The meet is hasty and improvised. Charon doesn't have much time before the bomb's internal timer makes it explode due to lack of contact to the central server. It has to be extracted before that time arrives. In a lousy barn barely sterilized and with a delta clinic's top surgeon in tow, the baobhan sith and surgeon begin the process of extracting the prototype cranial bomb from the elf's skull. The team's task is to fend off the inevitable horde that chases Charon to prevent her from accomplishing this very thing. Operating on her on the move is impossible due to the precision required in neurosurgery, but if there's someone to keep the coming wave occupied, there might just be a chance.

The Plan

There's not much room to prepare. Shy sets up on Discovery Island's lighthouse for elevated ground while Canter and Nullstack prepare their vehicles for rapidly repositioning skirmishing tactics. Drones are spread widely across the island for better visual coverage.

The Run

The shedim rise from the ocean, coming ashore from all directions. Larger, charred corpses possessed by siege-breaking Unbreakables emerge, one at first and two later. The waves crash into the defenders, and while Eidolon and Ty Vallynn manage to get air dropped in by Hextech later into the defense, the numbers poised against them are overwhelming. Even with her mentor's direct guidance, Shy is unable to put down the Unbreakable for good until the final hour where Canter has to directly ram her Dodge Rhino at max speed into it, finally causing its body to vaporize into pink mist and force the jellyfish onto the astral plane. Eidolon's arrival marks the end of the unbreakables, his wood pulp bullets disabling their immensely powerful regenerative abilities long enough for Shy's anti-materiel rifle to punch solid holes into them. Even the less special shedim possess regenerative abilities and need to have their heads blown off for their corporeal vessels to collapse. Several break into the barn and tear down wards and mana barriers alike. Crescent-Slash has to defend herself multiple time, bringing Charon to a critical state of cardiac arrest before the team manages to peel the attackers away.

Towards the end, Canter and Nullstack have to personally intervene and help the doctor with the extraction process. Canter helps with diagnosing the bomb's contents, finding it to be an S-K prototype with an orichalcum sheath fortifying some kind of magical effect. The spikes protruding from it are sourced into an integrated biomonitor which observes the body's vital signs for any rapid changes. Reaper, a mycotoxic drug, rendered Charon nearly dead so her aura would remain all but stable. This prevents the more arcane parts of the bomb from detonating, and so Nullstack begins formatting the device and spoofing explosive reports out of it that it's allowed to send to whatever server keeps track of its activities. Nullstack disarms the software and Canter forces the software's defenses to go offline. The doctor is then able to carefully extract the device which is promptly destroyed. Powerful Heal spells regenerate the hole in the elf's skull cavity and Detox purges the mycotoxin, resuscitating her as a wave of the heavy hitters, Horror Shows and Unbreakables lands on the western shore of the island. Moreover, Eidolon's hawk eye detects a jet coming their way, an Avenging Angel carrying a fuel bomb. The opposition is willing to level the entire island rather than let the rogue adept escape.

Shy, however, has different plans and times a precision 50-caliber bullet to hit the drone just as it's in position to crash and detonate on the approaching shedim forces. The bomb is colossal and vaporizes nearly a third of the island's surface, destroying the shedim vessels and forcing them to the astral. The N-51's attempted to bring reinforcements but has been repeatedly rebuffed by SSC border patrols which have been trying to find the shedim forces for days.

Aftermath

Charon, Crescent-Slash and the team exchange a few words and she explains her true identity to the runners. Canter's shocked to see her still around and Charon elaborates that she's the only chance they have of clearing the continuing shedim infestation as well as the fact that the Sea Dragon doesn't place much value on Seattle's inhabitants, so long as the shedim continue to demolish the Black Lodge and its members. She's more caring about 'her city' and wants to stick it to Leviathan by thwarting its plans. She offers to be in touch later, and Crescent-Slash artifices some foci as a reward to the team as well as providing plenty of solid gold ingots that she's managed to secure thanks to her fae charms and Charon's persuasive adept skills.

Rewards (40 x 1.83 Runtime Multiplier = 73 RVP)

• 280,000 Nuyen worth of Gear (70 RVP)
  1. 4 Gold Bars per Runner, market value 60,000 Nuyen per bar, total 240,000 Nuyen
  2. Foci up to F6
  3. Pre-Purchased months of Platinum Skillsoft Subscription from SpinGlobal's Servers
  4. One Krime DeTruck Sports Truck "DeLorean" that used to belong to Charon, complete with a Back to the Future decal on the side with various modifications (273,300 Nuyen)
• Ty cuts a special deal with Crescent-Slash, the Baobhan Sith spirit, to get a F9 Centering Focus + 1,500 Nuyen (21 RVP) as well as learn how to bond it the fae way (27 Karma = 27 RVP).
  1. Ty has to then owe her two great and difficult favors, presumably to serve the Black Lodge in the future. The focus takes the form of a silver ring with an onyx gemstone and Enochian engravings.
  2. His remaining RVP (25 RVP) is spent on ruminating on his experience (50 CDP)

• You can choose to eschew all gear and instead take karma and experience for disrupting so many shedim that the spirit world prays to you in gratitude (40 Karma, 30 CDP, 30,000 Nuyen)
• 3 Karma (3 RVP)
• 2 CDP
• -10 Sea Dragon Reputation
• +1 Black Lodge Reputation
• -1 SSC Reputation
• +1 N-51 Reputation
• Initiation/Mundane Ordeal/Ascension where applicable.

• Optional Qualities at Chargen Rates:
  1. Aptitude
  2. Battle Hardened
  3. Common Sense
  4. Daredevil
  5. Focused Concentration
  6. Tough as Nails
  7. Perceptive
  8. Death Dealer
  9. Guts
  10. Stunt Driver
  11. Outdoorsman
  12. Strive for Perfection
  13. Sharpshooter (basic quality, not Samurai Way)
  14. Samurai Ways at chargen rates

Game Quotes

Amusing quote from game.

Player After Action Reports (AARs)

Nu11st@ck "Well that was hella fun. A bit terrifying to be getting swarmed by so many spirits but its rare that I can just indiscriminately unload fire on multiple targets and not give a dam about it. And that shot from shy, Eid...1.5 mill down the shitter for the SCC or whoever owned that thing. Fuck GOD and fuck their fuel air bombs."

Thunder "Scary waves of spirits, dual critters, undead or whatever one might call them pounded the shores of Discovery Island that night. Feeling under-staffed, we had all hands full trying to keep a complex brain surgery from being interrupted by a seemingly endless flow of scary and quasi-un-killable monsters.
With top professionals on the team, I was very happy and felt honored to get accepted to the run and get a chance to apprentice. Things turned out very much different than I had initially expected. Even-though the experts on the team were super-experienced and did most of the impressive work, I think I added a few grams to the victory-side of the scale in a battle with a close and uncertain outcome. My role summarized: No major fragg-ups, an additional distraction for the enemy forces in a definite numbers-game, a small number of kills.

Eidolon: Most of this op was rather 'easy' from the meat perspective, dealing with more of those shedim and their corpse-possessing fuckery. Once we sent their vessels packing things got considerably calmer. I'm told the astral was kindof full with astral jellyfish at that point though. Thankfully the remaining team members were able to secure the principle and the surgical procedure. Also thankfully Shy and I were able to see and shoot down that bomber drone. Would not have enjoyed receiving that payload as intended. Shame about the island though. Wonder who was telling us to stop, they acted like I should give a damn what they want while providing no actual incentive to cooperate given their excessive use of evil spirits. I'm sure its fine, lots of people tell me not to do my jobs while failing to actually incentivize compliance.