Disasterpiece Theater

Disasterpiece Theater
Part of Paradise Lost
Date 2085-09-14 GM Robinton Location Atlanta, CAS Status Threat Level: Semi-Prime
Factions Involved
ShadowHaven	Lone Star
Jessie_DeVux Pacho Herrera Weevil Blackhawk Babylon	Character1 Character2

Summary

Current runtimes:

• 9/14: 6 hrs (both teams)
• 9/21:
• 10/4:
• 10/5:

Background

Trevor Hill, Bostonian and fledgling Fixer, is putting together a team on behalf of his client. Somehow, knowing that Koi is aware of the presence of Redline, a Humanis agent located in the CAS, Hill has contacted her to make an offer since he suspects she would go after the train regardless. Koi, calling on promises made to her by Weevil, Pacho, and Blackhawk, call them in to help while Hill himself contracts in Babylon for some additional support given the relative lack of experience among the runner team.

The mission: get into the heart of the CAS, find out when their pre-eminent bullet train is heading north to Nashville with one Arthur Davis of the Atlantean Foundation on it, and kill him in such a way that it looks like the train had an accident.

Dramatis Personae

• The Runner Team: Jessie_DeVux, Pacho Herrera, Weevil, Blackhawk, Babylon
• The Johnson: Trevor Hill, MIT&T Graduate, Bostonian
• The Target: Arthur Davis, Atlantean Foundation Research Scientist
• The Bonus Target: Redliner, Humanis Agent

The Meet

Koi gets a call from her fixer, Issac, that there is a fixer looking into her and wanting to offer her a strange job. He explains that the fixer is communicating that he feels some 'recent intelligence' she has gained regarding Humanis from All_good_till_it_wasn't will be mutually beneficial to a job he needs done as well. She agrees, and heads to the Bellevue Crab House to meet with Trevor Hill, who explains he is tangentially aware of her target in Redline, a Humanis agent, and that he has a target who will be on the same train.

She calls Pacho, Blackhawk, and Weevil and recruits them into the mission; giving them the address of the Crab House, those runners head towards the Meet with Hill.

Madame Butterfly calls Babylon, letting her know that something about the job seems weird and involves "trains and explosives", and to be careful with how the job goes.

The team sits down to meet with Trevor and begins to discuss the job; however, both Babylon and Blackhawk are able to realize the F9 Shadow Spirit lurking over Koi's shoulder. Trevor explains that the target is Arthur Davis, a research scientist for the Atlantean Foundation, who will be travelling from Atlanta to Nasvhille via a bullet train for a conference. The team discusses various ways of accomplishing the task, with Babylon being wholly against mass casualty options.

Trevor Hill also explains that the first step in any run on the "Crimson Tide", the CAS's premium bullet train, begins with "acquiring" Veronika Shaw, an operational director of the Confederation Rail Company, or CRC.

Babylon is able to convince Trevor to arrange for some transportation and such to get them and their gear into the CAS, instead of any kind of negotiation for extra pay. After stepping out to make some calls, he explains he is able to get them a SKA-008 to get them into the backwoods of Georgia where a stock, if broken down a bit, roadmaster is waiting. Safehouses and such they will need to arrange for themselves. They each one a R3 Burner Sin that is associated with the CAS.

The Plan

The team reconvenes at Koi's safehouse and begins to discuss their plans; Babylon floating to the crew the idea of getting the Arthur Davis out of the train in order to get rewarded from the Atlantean Foundation for saving their guy, hoping to double dip on rewards by getting paid both by them and the Johnson.

Pacho explores the bomb from Koi's background and the team discusses how, based on the data from Humanis, Redliner appears to be well placed in the CAS, often found in the background of many political events. he is not a public figure by any means, but clearly seems to be pulling some strings. The plan at this point is to frame Redliner as "accidentally blowing up the train" and leaving him as the 'cause' of the explosion. Koi considers the forensics of the situation and contributes some ideas on how to make it harder to figure out from forensic analysis.

The Run

Mission 1: Soft Targets

As the team plans their work-vacation, planning road distances for Weevil's Roadmaster and which team is going ahead of the SKA-008, Koi begins some preliminary matrix searches. Koi takes four hours to do a t6 Matrix search and gets the general background / public information. Near the end of the search, she is able to find an ARO of Shaw from an Atlanta club called The Gold Room; the image has all personal details removed but happens to have her image on it.

Weevil and Pacho spend some time working on the Roadmaster making some last minute adjustments. Pacho buys some explosive components in order to have back ups in case of contingencies.

During transit, the "A" (Koi, Babylon, Blackhawk) team has a run in with Koi's shadow spirit trying to siphon Karma from her before the two Aware folks "encourage" it to 'fuck right off'.

The "B" team (Pacho and Weevil) gets stopped at the border into Salish Sidhe and Pacho manages to just CHARM THE FUCK out of the guard and continue moving. At the PCC border, Weevil's SIN gets flagged and pacho has to bribe the guard for Five Grand in order to not burn Weevil's SIN. Pacho's SIN kicks an error again at the CAS border, and Pacho attempts to faux-etiquette through it by serenading the guard to convince her he is a travelling mariachi.

The camera pans back to the "A" team, landing in the underbrush far outside Atlanta. They transfer to the waiting Roadmaster, and go find a roadside motel for the night.

The next morning, Koi does Drugs! Psyche and Khamsa, getting lucky to roll double duration interaction. She also increases her Will (+4) via magic.

Day 1, Day: Atlanta Outskirts

Koi and Blackhawk heads to the train station to do some scouting Babylon begins working on some spell practice and asks Koi to do some matrix diving on the target, Arthur Davis.

Koi finds that the systems of the train appear to be on some kind of WLAN system where the train and train mechanisms are not on the matrix, though the security devices such as the cameras are and are slaved to a local security checkpoint. She finds where the security office is at the train station with six guards and one decker. Blackhawk is able to determine there are a number of watcher spirits present but since it's a public area, there isn't much in the way of arcane defenses.

Babylon, meanwhile contacts one of her Ancients contacts about a local Safehouse. She says it'll take her a few days to arrange one.

Koi and Blackhawk use a Flyspy to get a data tap onto one of the rails in order to try and get some information on the train. Koi finds a number of really strange things - first, the Train system appears to be on a wired LAN and is not at all active on the matrix. As she gets into the Rating 8 Matrix Host, Koi notices some very strange things there - first, there is an above-average number of Patrol IC that are on active patrol and whomever the security spider is seems to be actively checking any kind of inputs through the system.

Koi has just been spotted by a Patrol IC, with an OS Score of 23. A tar baby misses the attack to link lock her, and Koi jacks out with the schedule of the train in hand. The train leaves Atlanta in five days. The two of them get some looks as they head out.

--

Meanwhile, Babylon contacts Freya about some local contact in Atlanta who can check on the bomb and make sure it will actually do what it is supposed to be. The contact she is given is named Crazy Pete, in the Bankhead area who can put them up for a bit and who can look over the bomb plans from Pacho. "Crazy" Pete Simmons who is a 'absent minded professor' of demolitions, confirms that Pacho's plans will create "chunky salsa" but not damage the train itself. Babylon happens to also learn that the bullet train has a hidden inner layer with awakened ivy.

--

The team meets at a local hole-in-the-wall restaurant and discuss plans over some authentic southern wings. They realize that there is an above average level of prepared scrutiny, prompting them to consider why there is so much security. They recall that Redliner is really hard to track down, having almost no matrix presence, and when he is found he always seems to be just a few 'steps' away from Power and Authority. Two tables away from senators and such, handshaking celebrities, etc. Afterwards there is some... extensive... discussion regarding the nature of Koi's shadow spirit and how to prevent it affecting the job.

The team rests for the afternoon

Edge Levels: Blackhawk 5/6, Babylon 6/6, Koi 1/4, Gamora (Spirit) 6/6

Day 1, Night: Atlanta Downtown

Disguise Levels: Babylon 7, Koi 6, Blackhawk 10

Babylon gets tagged by the sin scanner at the door and gets some flak from the guards at the door. She manages to talk the guards into scanning her again and this time her R6 SIN passes with ease. She finds Veronika Shaw in the club and when Koi goes to scan for her commlink, she realizes that none of the patrons appear to have any matrix icons on them. Gamora, the spirit, starts chatting her up and sharing stories about metahuman misogyny. The spirit is able to get the information that she drives a bright red SAAB Dynamit. They also learn her two bodyguards are cybered up with heavy move by wire systems, hand razors, and dermal plating.

The team ends up having to wait about five hours. Babylon heads out and goes back to their motel room, leaving Blackhawk and Koi to deal with planting a tracker on the target's car. After five hours of waiting, Koi gets made as being out of place by the local Lone Star officers who are generally keeping an eye on the area. Koi manages to con her way out of trouble with the local PD by paying to her deafness while Veronika Shaw walks out of the club with her goons and goes to leave. Gamora and the spirits follow the car while Koi gets a bit more attention from the one of the club guards due to an overcast spell from that direction (from Blackhawk).

They're almost away when Koi fails a composure roll but thankfully the Lonestar misunderstands why she is afraid and doesn't stop her from leaving. Koi's Burner SIN from Trevor has been burned.

Edge Levels: Blackhawk 4/6, Babylon 5/6, Koi 0/4, Gamora (Spirit) 3/6

Day 1, Night: Veronika Shaw's House

The team meets up at a cheap hotel as Koi realizes her Burner SIN is, indeed, burned, as is her disguise - an APB out for that disguise's description. Babylon contacts Freya for a R5 Burner SIN, costing 5000, and will take two days to make.

The house is in the "A" Zone Atlanta Suburbs, and is located on the local CAS Government Grid. Koi goes to begin hacking Veronika's Commlink now that she is home and has removed it from her faraday pocket. While Veronika takes her evening shower, Koi hacks her commlink in order to send two encrypted files with data bombs and then wipes her presence off the commlink. Both files have R7 Databombs and R7 Encryption.

Day 2, Morning: Cheap Hotel

With one Edge to her name, Koi considers if she is up to hacking the data bombs off the files and in a moment of rare wisdom, backs down from the challenge. Babylon calls Kathryn_"Aphrodite"_Riviera who promptly declares it a "skill issue".

• File 1: Sexually explicit AROs of Veronika and many other upper level Executives among the CAS and the CRC (Confederation Rail Company)
• File 2: Security Credentials for a location where Shaw works, an offline host site. As well as some heavily redacted information about something called Project: Red, redacted train manifests, and a train schedule that confirms the Day 5 deadline.

The Team regains edge. Edge Levels: Blackhawk 6/6, Babylon 5/6, Koi 2/4, Gamora (Spirit)056/6

Game Quotes

Amusing quote from game.