Bravado in the Bluff
| Bravado in the Bluff | |||||||||
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| Factions Involved | |||||||||
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ShadowHaven Horizon ArgleBargle | TerraFirst! | Green War | Them Runners | ||||||
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Fidem Ramen Shamen Black Samurai Insonia |
Sassy Creep Blockhead PewPew | ||||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||||
| Creep | |||||||||
The Hook
ArgleBargle is in town for a concert. Before things could get underway, all of their gear was stolen. Horizon being Horizon quickly replaced everything; there simply isn't time to find it all when big business is churning. But among the gear was an heirloom guitar passed down from Dietmar Bargle's grandfather to his father and then to him. The band would like the runners to find it and bring it back.
Background
The concert itself was widely publicized. Given that the band is from out of town, it was obvious that they would be bringing a lot of equipment with them. Evan Barnes took this as an opportunity to be his own TerraFirst! cell. He took out a loan with his father's Gladius as collateral. Then he hired runners to steal the gear before it could be moved in to the Seattle Convention Center. His plan was to get some publicity by getting the show canceled and contacting the news media so he could make his statement while threatening to detonate the band's equipment. Unfortunately he didn't consider that Horizon would simply replace everything. In that way it was lucky for him that he did get the heirloom guitar.
In order to pull of his scheme, Evan procured a fake bomb. Unbeknownst to him this fake bomb was actually a very real bomb. Green War had picked up on the operation and saw an opportunity to make a martyr. Someone who was willing to die on a small hill to make a difference. After replacing handing over the very real bomb, the Green War agent re-hired the same runner team to make sure that no do-gooders interfered with the eventual and very public explosion planned.
The Meet
The Haven runner team was summoned to the Seattle Convention Center for a 1 PM meet. They arrive and find Ace Powers in the atrium lobby waiting for them. Given the client, he warns the runners about pictures or posting to social media. Then he leads the group in to meet ArgleBargle. The band is expecting a little more of a to-do, but the runners settle in without skipping a beat.
Niklaus Bargle describes to them the issue - namely that all of their stuff was stolen and there is a particular guitar they want back. There isn't much to go on, but the runners are resourceful, so it shouldn't be a problem. After a bit of haggling, a price is agreed upon and the job is accepted.
With that squared away, Ace Powers has a few words for the group before letting them to their devices:
“I don’t care what you do, just stay out of Horizon’s hair. If we had some more resources, Horizon would be all over this, but we have more important things to do right this second. As it is, we’ll have to look for the stuff after we’ve got the show squared away. If you do find the gear, give me a call so we can pick it up. You may not be working for Horizon here, but make no mistake, you are working for Horizon.”
The Plan
The group begins planning by shit-talking Ace Powers, concluding that he's a clone and not to be trusted. After that they get to work with the apparent plan of find the guitar and return it.
The Run
To begin, Insonia executes a quick matrix search for instruments for sale that might match equipment the band has used. Being so close to the actual theft, there are not a lot of returns. However, they do find one instrument across the bridge in Bellevue. Quickly they head over to check out Tina’s Instrument Emporium and Pawn Shoppe. On the way they notice that not only does the city have traffic monitory infrastructure, so do the news stations. With another quick search on one station, Insonia pinpoints the trucks heading into the tunnel in downtown that leads to the bridge across Lake Washington. This is a stroke of luck, given that it was based on a guess that the thieves headed in this direction. But it works out.
At the Shoppe, Ramen Shamen and Fidem head inside. The manager is a Hanuman with died hair who sits on the counter. Leslie, as she is called, is happy to show them the instrument and with a little bit of monetary encouragement she hands over the address left by Stan Shunpike in Puyallup. This is a fake name of course, which the runners quickly verify. While they are driving, Insonia does another matrix search to stitch together the freely available traffic cam footage from the local news stations into a set of likely destinations for the two trucks. As they return to Tina's Instrument Emporium and Pawn Shoppe, these results return indicating the trucks either; left the city on highway 90, crossed the sound to Vashon Island on a ferry, entered a very posh neighborhood around Norma Beach, or entered a warehouse district in Auburn.