A Cornered Animal Fights the Hardest

A Cornered Animal Fights the Hardest
Part of Against all odds - The OtherCon story
Date 2082-02-11 GM Aurora Location Snohomish, Seattle Metroplex Status Threat Level: High
Factions Involved
ShadowHaven OtherCon	EVO
Skimmer Ca1yps0 Nogitsune Harebuck Zenith	Mr. Dumbass Bodyguards 1 & 2 Security Technomancer Security Mage

Summary

Delmura Leorel and other representatives from OtherCon hire a group of Shadowrunners in order to capture an EVO executive as leverage for freeing trapped shifters and SURGE individuals that had been captured by the Megacorp.

Background

See: Against all odds - The OtherCon story

The Meet

Called by their fixers to a small cabin, the runners meet their Johnson, a white wolf Shifter. Nogitsune and Zenith are a bit on edge due to the events of Quarrelsome Quarry, but it seems as though there is no connection to the previous job. The Johnson explains that there is an EVO Vice President who has been capturing SURGE and Shifters and bringing them to be hunted on extra-territorial grounds in Snohomish. She wants the team to kidnap the Vice President and bring him back to the Johnson, additionally they want to avoid killing the bodyguards that surround the executive.

The Plan

The Johnson agrees to leave the team in the location of the meet for planning, and the Shadowrunners begin planning. Nogitsune and Harebuck call contacts that let them know about the extra-territorial grounds that EVO has in Snohomish, and that the target has been doing regular hunting trips there over the last several weeks. It's also made evident that the target is very fond of gold. He also has a wife who is twenty years younger than him, and a secretary near the same age. Given that the team has two SURGE and a Shifter on it, there are a multitude of options on approach, however it does make things difficult in approaching the target. Harebuck suggests that they offer him up as a special kind of game and entice the exec to hunt him and use that in order to get close to him.

Due to his fondness for gold and the fact that he works for a AAA Megacorp, Zenith calls Amrei Veidt and pays 500 NuYen for the 24 hour rental of an S-K persona after he assures her that he's not using this to mess with S-K. However because Amrei is who she is as a person, she hacks onto Zenith's commlink and discovers that he has a daughter, slipping past Ca1yps0's Matrix defenses in order to mark his commlink without him knowing. They discover that the target's secretary goes to a gym in Bellevue every morning, and leaves her commlink unattended while it's done. Ca1yps0 enters the Matrix and begins to examine the host in the EVO ET grounds, and finds that there are signs of the Resonance on the host. Ca1yps0 enters the host and attempts to find files on their defenses, but decides that caution is better, and leaves the host before the other technomancer gets a chance to find her.

Nogitsune leaves the house and, against the advice of the rest of the team, goes to try and scout out the ET grounds in person. Taking on fox form and trying to find a way in, Nogitsune seems unable to get in, and gets a bad feeling. He seeks out a talismonger and obtains a qi focus for Astral Perception. Opening his third eye, the fox sees a spirit patrolling the area around the grounds that spots him. While Nogitsune attempts to pretend to be a normal fox, the spirit assenses him and realizes what he is. Attempting to leave subtly, the fox is approached by an astrally projecting mage and told not to come near the location again. He goes to purchase some additional hunting gear from a nearby store that overcharges him, and he sets up a sniper perch about a mile away from the grounds.

While Nogitsune is scouting, the rest of the team begins watching scary movies in order to cause Harebuck's moodhair to take on an anxious form after coating his horns in gold leaf. To this end, Zenith leaves to take a personal call and signals Skimmer to blindfold Harebuck before Zenith kicks in the door, screaming "Harebuck!" and shooting a round of Extra Explosive ammo from his Ruger Super Warhawk. These work to make Harebuck very anxious and they take a picture in order to sent it to the target to entice him and go home to rest in order to be ready for the next day.

The Run

Zenith is slightly delayed to the run as his daughter is exhausted after a party she threw while he was out. Instead, Skimmer infiltrates the gym in Bellevue where the target's secretary works out. Pretending to be an interested customer, Skimmer is allowed to look around the gym, and finds a blind spot where the cameras can't find him and activates his RPC. Sneaking into the women's locker room Skimmer uses Ca1yps0's help to find the custom lock that indicates the secretary's locker and Skimmer makes short work of the lock, grabbing the commlink and bringing it to Ca1yps0 who hacks into the device. Finding the target's schedule on the commlink, along with some compromising photos that she manages to disarm and copy, Skimmer than runs back inside pretending to be looking for his wife and places the commlink back before anyone can notice that it is missing.

Having all the information they felt they were going to get, Harebuck, using the rented S-K persona, calls the target and discusses hunting with him. Praising his hunting skills and appealing to his vanity, the promise of a golden-horned jackalope is enough for the target to agree to the condition that two "S-K Representatives" are going to join him in the hunt. Zenith calls Black Cat and rents a clean van to go to the hunting ground, tying up Harebuck and pretending to bring him in as a hunting target. On the way in to the hunting grounds, Zenith sneaks Harebuck an inhaler of Jazz and convinces the target that Assault Rifle hunting is a fad in Germany that he and Skimmer are participating in. They go inside and find Tanya having been kidnapped and caged as one of the targets of today's hunt. Through more bullshit about how "Jackalope Aurelius" has a special feature that has it's horns glow if it's hunted in the early afternoon.

Going out to the range and letting Harebuck start running, the target begins to fire wildly with the assault rifle he took from one of his bodyguards, harming the hunting dogs that he sent after the SURGE face. Once they are distracted, Skimmer and Zenith turn on the security team and incapacitate the mage and one of the bodyguards. Nogitsune, using a sniper rifle far away, shoots the bound spirits that come in to try and kill Skimmer for downing the mage. While they take some damage, ultimately the team is successful. Ca1yps0 engages in an intimidation game with the security Technomancer by summoning three sprites to surround them. Including creating a Level 8 Fault Sprite that seems to have a mind of its own.

After dispatching the OpFor, the team knock out the exec and load him into a drone that Ca1yps0 pilots off the extra territorial grounds while Zenith, Skimmer and Harebuck take Tanya from her cage and load her into their van. Nogitsune rushes over and takes the wheel and the runners manage to avoid EVO HTR as they drive back to the Johnson's location.

Aftermath

The team returns Tanya to the OtherCon representatives and receive their payment. Nogitsune leaves and returns to fox form, using a pile of fox treats to gather 8 other foxes around Seattle and going to attack the hunting shop that ripped him off.

Rewards

• 8k + 2k nuyen for job completed, rescuing Tanya, and getting paydata
• 6 karma
• 2 CDP
• +3 OtherCon Rep

Zenith and Skimmer:

• Deulara Leorel (Connection 4) at Loyalty 2
• 2 more CDP

Harebuck, and Nogitsune:

• Deulara Leorel (Connection 4) at Loyalty 3

Calypso:

• Dr. Elijah "Snowflake" Turing (Connection 4) at Loyalty 3

Game Quotes

Amusing quote from game.

Player After Action Reports (AARs)

Zenith

Lots of assholes getting got this month, don't hate it, especially since I keep cashing in on the deal. This guy was pretty nasty biz in the first place, hunting SURGE and Shifters, so it's not surprising that a group that represents those people would want him black bagged for them in order to negotiate for their own people. The team were all solid, Harebuck's new to me, but he's a champion, good sense of humor and a harder skull than a lot of the faces I work with. Ca1yps0's another old runner, and I trust her enough to know that she's gonna put the job and the team first. Skimmer's as impressive as ever, though he showed up to the meet in an elf costume and told me Santa Claus was real. I don't know if that's him telling a joke or if I'm about to negotiate for some presents. Nogitsune still seems kinda broken up about Loup Blanc. I don't know how foxes are about age, but it seems like he might be young if a killing like that breaks him down. Still, everyone's got their drek. Gods know I got mine, so he'll either get over it or die. Hopefully the former.

We dive into the legwork, and get a good amount just from contacts, target's a drekhead of the corp variety and literally hunts people. I swear these people would hunt the SINless if they could. We learn the fragger is on ET grounds in Snohomish and that he loves gold. Figuring if we're trying to get into his hunting party, we might want to be on the same or higher level, I call up Amrei and request to rent an S-K persona for the con. Ca1 was watching my comm, but I still have a bad feeling about it, something, something, dealing with dragons. But these are the risks we take for this job.

Anyway, we get everything set up and Skimmer and I head onto the grounds, the guards don't even so much as pat us down, a benefit of supposed to be hunting I guess. Apparently the fragger's got another SURGE there that he's planning on hunting, so I spin some bulldrek about Harebuck's golden horns to get him out before having to hunt the squirrel. The exec starts spraying bullets down the range, but Harebuck seems to dodge pretty well. Skimmer and I start unloading on the security team and we've got Nogitsune on overwatch, so we're able to clean up without much issue. Exec asks "why we betrayed him" and I shoot him with Stick'n'Shock. That one felt good.

I still got a bad feeling in the back of my mind. So either I screwed up somewhere, or the world's about to frag me. Either way it's not like my Warhawk is ever unloaded.

Skimmer

"Scum sucking EVO stooge hunting shapeshifters for fun... Yeah, not anymore tough guy. We do a bit of digging, set up a false hunt with the guy, and use Harebuck as a bargaining chip. Easy peasy. And any run where I get to shoot a mage in the eye is a good one in my book. Best run ever. We drop security, some spirits and scare off the dogs and call it a day. Couldn't ask for a better run or a better team. Good job all."

Nogitsune

Well it was a job like any other nothing big nothing important we were meant to extract a very important VIP to be used as a bargaining chip for the release of other prisoners, it's hard to keep things professional especially when you have a vindictive side in the mile-long and well I may have to Earn myself an enemy, Luckily enough I've been wanting a nemesis Someone I can destroy their life, ruined everything they hold dear and I can smile at it. For the job I made some errors and had to work away from the team not to give away our plans, it’s was a rookie pitfall, it’s just I been thinking about how I’m not getting any younger. Which made was a good thing to have me far away due to the tail, and dropping those sprites for the team was a good move on my part….But now I have some loose ends to tie up and an enemy to hunt….Nogitsune get to hunt 😊

Harebuck

Friggin jackass took a notch out of my antler! And seriously, it wasn't THAT big of a deal to offer the guy a target. He hunts SURGE and Shifters, so we give him a SURGE he can take shots at. I got shot at all the time in Georgia before I went to college, ain't that scary if you know what you're doing. Have a plan, commit to it, and drive hard at the execution and you'll get through every time.

Ca1yps0

I'd heard about OtherCon but hadn't met any of them until now - glad to have the opportunity to help them out and make some connections. I should start making some regular donations, it seems like they could really use the assistance. The job itself was... an interesting one, to say the least. Kidnap some Evo exec who was literally hunting changlings for sport - it was an interesting choice, picking people lime myself, Harebuck and Nogitsune to work along with ones like Zenith and Skimmer, but we made for a good team and got the job done. Can't say I expected that to take the form of having one of us hunted by the target, but it all worked out. Except for that thing with the fault sprite, that was... concerning. Going to have to do something about that...