BugBears

BugBears
Date 2083-12-03 GM Eva Location Salish-Sidhe Status Threat Level: Deadly
Factions Involved
ShadowHaven	Major Corp
Ryan Danes Rougarou Prince	Character1 Character2

Summary

After dealing with some unnatural beasts on their base, Johnson puts out an emergency call for runners. Crossing the border, the rapid-response team performed a short investigation to hunt down the culprits and ended up hotboxing and funneling out a series of devious insect spirits.

The Meet

The runners got a series of calls from their fixers, it was a rush job, involving a border crossing to deal with a para critter research facility. Accepting a link to a matrix meet, the runners all met in a particularly seedy corner of the digital world with a stereotypical scientist persona seeming to be rather panicked, blabbering about a disastrous encounter with a series of bear-like creatures which attacked and dragged off a few of the survivors. With an offer of a hefty cash prize for helping the researchers solve their para critter problem, the runners accepted and met up in meatspace on the road.

Seeing that they would have to cross the border, the runners immediately got to work hunting down a smuggling route to take to get to their locations, after some quick map jotting with Prince and Rogarou, the runners got on their way, with M3chan1c steering them safely through the tense perimeter before speeding off to the location.

The Plan

Coming up on the facility, it appeared that there was once a powerful perimeter line set up to defend the location, though, some of the more perceptive members quickly pointed out the large swaths of blood covering the barricades, as well as a nearby researcher waving the group into one of the hutches nearby. Stepping out to question the frantically packing scientists and guards, Prince and Roguaru started their investigation. Witness reports described the bear creatures being covered in an odd, glistening armor they weren't certain of. Going over the description, M3chan1c and Prince pointed out that it sounded like a bug's carapace, a sort of natural armor common in many oddly magical critters.

Pulling up some camera feeds of the facility, Rougarou recognized the creatures as Piasma, a form of awakened black bears with limited magical powers to cause fear and paralysis in individuals. Considering the insect properties these critters were known for, the runners decided to grab a series of bug-spray gas grenades to help keep them back while M3chan1c grabbed a spare under barrel attachment from one of the dead guards splattered across the field.

Working together, Prince and Rougarou spotted a set of tracks heading out of the camp, seeming to perfectly match those of the Piasma, eventually leading the party out towards a cave nearby. After studying the cave, the runners decided they'd hunt down any sort of alternate exits for the tunnel network, with one of M3chan1c's drones heading out with Rougarou, they ended up running into a massive, clawed hole, seeming to be exactly the size of a massive, looming hostile bear-bug whatever. Regardless of the official name, the runners decided a good solution to the problem was strapping a brick of C4 to the roof of the exit and prepping it for a cave-in the moment the runners started firing off bug gas into the cave.

Getting the drones into position, as well as strapping Prince and his sniper rifle onto the railing of M3chan1c's dustoff drone and sending it up into the air with the rigger's sniper drone, the runners sent Rougarou ahead to stand near the front of the cave as the grenades flew, their flamethrower firing up as the screams of hostile bug spirits echoed through the caverns.

The Run

Laying down a heavy blanket of suppressing fire with his hidden drone, M3chan1c managed to blast a pair of the approaching creatures, appearing to be far more than beetle than bear, with blight rounds given to him by his allies, softening them up for his allies. Prince reloaded to some far more lethal rounds before firing off towards one of the afflicted critters, narrowly missing his shot as Rougarou sprinted past the blighted bugs, leaping into the air and barely missing the unaffected one, the creatures around starting to snarl and spit in an effort to strike the runners with fear, though, those on the scene happened to have already dosed up on their Guts for the day and completely shrugged the attempts off. Of course, Rougarou's target raised up their head, letting out a piercing howl into the sky in an attempt to stun those who had arrived on the scene with the fearsome display, failing to do so against their melee combatant.

Picking up for M3chan1c, his automated drone scored the first major hit against the beetles, the laser managing to blast a chunk of shell away, pairing off well with a similar strike from Prince's rifle, blasting through the carapace of the other blighted spirit, sending shrieks into the night. Rounding back on her target, Rougarou managed to get a firm strike, slashing into the beast's body with their magical sword. One of the wounded spirits stood tall, swinging wildly with its claws towards Rougarou, freezing as it was suddenly struck with a fierce counterattack from the swords woman, severing its head, just as its ally beside it was blasted into a puddle of gore from M3chan1c's sniper rifle. Swiveling their aim, Prince scored the final shot of the fight, blowing apart the final bug looming over Rougarou and ending the threat to the region.

Aftermath

Driving M3chan1c's stealth drone inside, the runners spotted what appeared to be a bug shaman inside, knocked unconscious from the gas, after dragging them out, executing and burning them for good measure, the drone got to work pulling out all of the unconscious researchers. Rougarou began to go one by one among the unconscious bodies, attempting to exercise the insect spirits beginning to afflict them. Thanks to the condition being in the early stages, most were able to be exorcised with some persistence from them, with only one stubbornly remaining planted inside, much to the annoyance of the swords woman, though, after dragging the bodies far enough from the shaman's lodge, the spirit simply vanished rather violently from the final victim.

Returning back to the van, then furthermore to the facility, the runners proudly accepted their reward after explaining the situation to Johnson, as well as some proper procedures, should the inhabitation process somehow not have been ended through their actions, the stammering researcher hastily pushed a handful of credsticks towards the runners before starting to direct their staff to tend to the wounded!

Rewards

30k Nuyen (15 RVP)

5 Karma (5 RVP)

Optional:

Poisoner for Prince (5 RVP)

Catlike for Mechanic (7 RVP)

Perceptive for Mechanic (5/lvl)

Game Quotes

"(Bug Spirits) Are evil souls, Dark Souls even"

"Duct tape, WD-40, hammer. The holy trinity."

Prince: Rolls 6 dice. Zero successes. Mechanic: Rolls 14 dice. One success. Rougarou: Rolls 4 dice. 4 successes.

GM, after 10 hits on a sneaking test: "You are the night. You are the forest. You are air and mist."

Player After Action Reports (AARs)

M3chan1c: "You know, heard a ton about these bug spirits being scary as hell, if they're normally this stupid, a little planning aught to be enough to hold 'em off... maybe they're meant to be scary with bigger numbers."

Rougarou God has gifted me with this gift to protect others and i showed it with my blade skills. noting like proving evil demons that they can't match a divine knight like myself