All Those Conquered Eyes and Christmases Alone

All Those Conquered Eyes and Christmases Alone
Date 2080-12-23 GM DrBurst Location Seattle
Belligerents
Shadowhaven Calypso Dr.Trauma Setback Usagi Wolfheart	Black Magicians
Casualties and losses
Setback mortally wounded; made full recovery.	11 black magicians killed in action.

Summary

A recovering BTL addict has gone missing days before Christmas, and a concerned priest hires a team of shadowrunners to ensure she is safe.

The Meet

The team met Rev. Toby Newton in his church in the Redmond barrens. He explained that the church had been providing help to recovering addicts, but one of his parish members by the name of Freda Key had recently disappeared after some worrying conversation about making the neighborhood children happy. The team inquires about her problems, and the Reverend tells them she used to be addicted to dreamchips. He also gives them her address upon request along with a key to her front door. He offers to pay each team member 2,000¥, but the team refuses any pay given the church's poor financial situation.

The Legwork

At Freda Key's home, the team begins examining her living space. Wolfheart examines impressions left in astral space, discerning that Freda had been desperate to please the neighborhood children (and presumably spent a lot of money buying them laser tag supplies), then felt a yearning to use a BTL. Setback and Dr. Trauma rifle through her things to discern that she'd only recently left, within no more than a few days. Setback then remembered that she'd bumped into Freda before at a club in Tarislar, and examining the club's matrix presence showed that it had been exploiting her as a model with racy photos for advertisements. The team also learned that this club was under the control of a circle of Black Magicians, who were using the club's debauchery to generate a background count aspected to their tradition; they planned to increase it even more with a death metal concert that evening. Wolfheart called her fixer Briar, who knew about the club and that it had been drawing power from the Gaeatronics grid that had been powering the Deireadh An Tuarthell, the Tarislar medical center that had stood since the Night of Rage.

The Plan

The team decided to fight the background count at the club by killing the mood. Briar agreed to cut its power by having some people unplug its Gaeatronics tap from Tarislar, but only if they managed to kill all of the black magicians so that they wouldn't start anything with the Laesa. Wolfheart happily agreed to this as they were a wound on the land, and the team mostly agreed after how they had treated Freda. She added to the mood-killing by summoning a water spirit from her stone circle to call down a storm on the club. Once the storm had reached its peak, the team would call Briar to have him cut the power, then storm in and assassinate all of the magicians as quickly as possible before extracting Freda.

The Run

The storm took an hour and a half to brew, but it picked up nicely. Hail rained down on the club. The team called in Briar's favor, and he came through quickly. Once the power was cut and the mood was soured, the team rushed in. Calypso assassinated their leader, and Usagi shot one of them down. Wolfheart projected inside and commanded the water spirit to fight them, which it did. Setback shot one, but then the remaining lodge members focused fire with manabolts and nearly killed her. She managed to toss a grenade as they took her out, severely injuring them all. Usagi, Calypso, and the water spirit cleaned up quickly. Dr. Trauma tended to Setback's wounds, and Wolfheart called in a spirit of man who knew the Heal spell to recover the rest of her wounds. The rest of the team found the black magicians' lodge and destroyed it.

Aftermath

After the threats had been cleaned up, the team found Freda Key alive and unharmed. She was suffering greatly from her addiction. Wolfheart called upon another spirit of man who knew how to alleviate addictions so that she could focus and not experience withdrawal. Despite her clarity, Freda was depressed, not finding the motivation to leave. Wolfheart manifested and spoke to her earnestly, noting that she had spent so much money trying to make the neighborhood children happy. She wanted to help others, but the pain was a lot to deal with. Her words rang true to Freda, but it took her some time to settle down. She soon returned to the Reverend; Usagi extended an offer for him to contact Solace for more help. He strongly considered it.

Rewards

• 7 Karma
• New Contact: Rev. Toby Newton, 3 Loyalty
• New Contact: Freda Key, 2 Loyalty

Player After Action Reports (AARs)

Dr.Trauma

I'm glad we were able to get that woman away from them, she may have issues but no one deserves being used like that in a lodge.

Wolfheart

This was not an easy thing to do, but it had to be done. That lodge was an evil, a blight on the land that I minister. I heard the call of Wolf, who taught me that I should not back down. As the wildfire purges the forest so that it can grow healthy again, so did we purge Tarislar of those parasites. True strength does not come from the exploitation of others. Wolf smiles upon me, today.