To the Head of the Matter

To the Head of the Matter
Date 2082-05-15 GM Aurora Location Seattle Status Threat Level: Medium
Factions Involved
ShadowHaven Dan the Van	Renraku
Runner1 Runner2 Runner3 Runner4	Spiders x3
Data on project Cyborg obtained and revealed to the world

Summary

Dan the Van hires Cricket, Shutdown and Trample to hack into a Renraku secret host to uncover information concerning the newly resurrected Project:Jarhead.

Background

A decade ago, Renraku put their plans to implant metahuman brains into drones on hold. Now Dan the Van is sure the project is back underway.

The Meet

Shutdown and Trample arrive on time to find neither their Johnson nor their third team mate present. When Cricket does arrive, she and Shutdown immediately despise one another on sight and quickly set to bickering. One is an ex-military hacker who despises leet-speak and hacker culture. The other is a classic hacker nerd with a disliking for authority. It's a match made in hell and the two are already barely tolerating one another by the time Dan finally arrives - even later to the meet than Cricket.

They are quickly bundled into the conspiracy theorists van and offered a poultry sum of money which evokes Shutdown's open disdain. Dan tries to throw in a subscription to his news service to sweeten the pot but gets the cold shoulder from several of his runners and agrees to up the pay.

The Plan

Plan? It's a data-steal. Cricket and Shutdown will go in quietly and get the data while Trample stays on overwatch in case of trouble, just minding her own business.

The Run

The team find not one, but two nested hosts inside the main host. While Trample remains in the outer, destination host, the other two hackers venture deep into the Renraku matrix system. Shutdown has just about tracked down the files they are looking for when Cricket is spotted and jumped by a pair of spiders and some ICE. While Cricket begins cracking the file, Shutdown takes on the two spiders in the second nested host while Trample keeps the spider in the outer host busy. Trample manages to brick her opponent's deck, but not before ICE puts a trace on her and forces her to reboot. Meanwhile, Shutdown's own deck takes quite a bit of damage, but she manages to brick both of her opponent's decks and dumpshock them out of the host. Cricket decrypts the file they need, and all three members of the team make their escape back into the meat.

Aftermath

Dan the Van enthusiastically posts the Project:Jarhead/ Project:Cyborg data on his blog. The three hackers get paid and go their separate ways.

Rewards

16k nuyen (8 RVP)
5 karma (5 RVP)
2 CDP
Can pick up News Van Dan (Connection 3) at Loyalty 3 for -5 RVP
Data on Project Cyborg
Cricket: +1 Public Awareness for leaving your Resonance Signature in the Host

Game Quotes

Cricket: "Project Jarhead huh? Should be just your thing". Shutdown: "Is that the Project where I stuff your head in a jar so I don't need to listen to your bullshit?"

{{Gamequote|Trample: "That was pretty awesome". Shutdown: "Yeah. It was kinda adequate".}