Liberty! Freedom! Tyranny Is Dead!
| Liberty! Freedom! Tyranny Is Dead! | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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| Factions Involved | |||||||||
| Ares Security forces, Bugs? | The Hurricane, Fischer, Firebug, Kris | ||||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
| Kyle Bradmine | |||||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||||
| Two Ares Employees, Yin Gu and Kevin Smith | One Rented Drone | ||||||||
Background
Meet
The Runners all met at an authentic looking Mexican restaurant named Padre’s that only allowed people to speak in Spanish while they were inside where they were met by Kyle, dressed up as a dad with a teenage girl who they both talked in excited Spanish together. None of the Runners could speak Spanish which led to difficulties negotiating. The place was owned by Aztechnology and they enforced the Spanish only ruling with some heavy muscle in the background. The Runners agreed to his price listed on the job posting and Kyle gave them some money up front for planning as well as the same info with a few updates.
Run
The Runners got together and decided to bribe a maintenance man to bring the drone inside with him which they will fill with glue paint grenades. Hurricane would slip inside and provide the best cover that he could, as well as delivering a gift of a pain grenade filled with fish glitter for her desk. Fischer would be a window cleaner that would be providing cover on the outside. Firebug was to make her way inside and infiltrate the facility along with the drone Kris would pilot.
Hurricane made it fairly well into the inside of the building, and even got his package delivered, but things went sideways very quickly after that. The drone that was being smuggled inside by the maintenance worker was quickly discovered to be containing explosives by the guards as it was ripped open and tossed to the side. Firebug made her escape from there, burning a hole in the ceiling and then crawling into the space between the walls. Kris set off the grenades filled with sticky glue on the guards. Fischer was being instructed to stop his cleaning due to increased threat as the cameras had scene a hole appear in the building’s entrance.
Firebug had gotten into position above the booby trapped room and was using low force acid spells to slowly press her way through the ceiling, dissolving all the armor in the structure. She made her way down and then started making a firebomb prep which once it was completed, was almost immediately spotted by a security spirit patrolling due to the increased threat. Firebug waited until the spirit left the location and got the hell out of the building, transforming into a flying animal and bugging out. The run seemed to be botched when Hurricane watched the four targets approaching the board room. Three were walking ahead of and as they got to the door, immediately turned around and went back the way they came. Samantha stopped them, demanding that they enter the room and then pinned one to the wall and seemed to be doing something magical to him which was causing him extreme stress and harm. Hurricane then ran out himself and tried to tell a guard, but the guard simply told him to leave at once as they were undergoing a lockdown.
Fischer had his drone which was descending down to the ground go back to the window outside the 13th floor where he saw that there were two of the targets, Yin Gu and Kevin Smith inside the room looking very distressed at the closed door. Then all of the traps were turned on and started going off. As they choked in their forms, they tried to start breaking through the walls, not taking as much damage from all of the traps as normal people would have but a anthrodrone appeared from the head chair, with a screen for a face which was turned away from Fischer's drone who stood there for a moment before running and grabbing the door handle. The entire room was blown up by Firebug's explosion, including Fischer's drone which was on the outside window. The two people inside were destroyed as well. The Runners made it out of there, partially due to interference and pressure from Kyle but it did not lead in all four being taken out.
Aftermath
The wasp hive has a better understanding that they should not mess with Kyle, but at the same time, another presence within the company has become emboldened and is starting her spread as she survived and there are numerous spirits who she doesn't have to hide from now that she is exposed a bit more. Kyle is displeased with the runners.
Rewards
10k nuyen, 3 karma, Firebug gained 1 Notoriety, Records on File Ares, and owes Kyle a favor
Player Characters
Hurricane
Fischer
From the Journal of Magnus Lasker, dated March 2079
In which, I am reminded of the smallness of man.
Still reveling the afterglow of my jaunt to the Old Country, I was contacted for a second run in less than a week. Apparently Ellie had a regular she now trusted me with. In hindsight, perhaps I should be the one passing stricter judgement on my employment opportunities. Regardless, I was warned: Ellie was clear that the Johnson was either a madman or a sociopath. Still, victory clouds the mind, and I took the job and was directed to an obscure restaurant with little more than a time and place.
As I was making my way, I couldn't help but wonder whether conducting illicit business in mediocre Mexican restaurants was the Haven's modus operandi. As they say, one is a fluke, two is a coincidence, and three is a trend. Upon arriving, however, my musings were harshly corrected. The maître d' spoke only in Aztlan spanish, which, alas, I've not spent the time to pick up. It seemed that the rest of my associates had already bumbled their way into the establishment, however, as the gentleman quickly directed me to the back. Imagine my irritation when the Johnson refused to speak anything else, despite apparently having no inability to do so. The negotiations were less than fluid, and I get the feeling that we were working on an incomplete picture from the outset.
The job was no better: a vague escort task in a heavily guarded Ares facility in the middle of downtown. The Johnson, an insider, provided extensive information on the facility itself, but no actual mechanism for carrying out the task. I still wonder whether the whole operation was a farce or feint. A man with the connections and resources apparently available to our Johnson hardly seems to need to call upon outside mercenaries to take care of inside jobs, and the selected team did not seem entirely appropriate for the task.
But I had---perhaps nonverbally---agreed, and so we began preparation. The runners were a strange crew, a far cry from the quiet professionalism of Ashe, but seemingly potent in their own right. Kris, a wired-up rigger, came with a wide variety of drones and vehicles (which I admit to feeling jealous of). Hurricane, a professional boxer of some repute, brought an abundance of what a brawler brings. And Firebug, a protean pyromaniac, lent her astral powers.
The job was daunting ab initio. Our team lacked any sort of stealth or social charm, so designing an infiltration strategy for the complex was challenging. Eventually, we decided upon a multi-pronged approach, wherein Kris would pilot an Ares drone containing both immobilizing explosives and a lilliputian mage into the facility under the cover of a bribed maintenance worker on the designated floor, Hurricane would be invited into the facility via a contact of his, and I would lock down the exterior under the guise of a window-cleaning crew. For the last purpose, I leased an Ares mule from an associate in Bellevue. As I write this now, I am cursing my decision to do so. Experience is a hard teacher; she gives the test first, the lesson afterwards.
The first sign of trouble came as the maintenance drone was entering the facility. Apparently, no provision was given to chemically sealing the explosives, and their odor tipped off a sensor in the lobby. Security quickly dismantled the hapless drone, along with all semblance of Plan A. In the ensuing shuffle, our mage managed to slip passed the guards. Flustered at the close call, she melted her way through several floors of the building in a dash towards our target. At some point, surveillance must have caught the damage, as the entire complex quickly went into lockdown. And so, with a half an hour left before the designated event was even supposed to start, our team was disorganized at best. Our rigger was completely cut off from the building, his only resource lying in literal pieces. Our mage was incommunicado, shapeshifted as a spider and setting up a magical bomb after triggering security. And our adept was wandering somewhere inside a facility on high alert.
Things only got worse quickly. Exterior drone patrols issued a cease and desist to my ill-fated cleaning drone, hanging precariously on a balcony. Luckily, through a bit exaggerated drone manipulation, I convinced controller that my drone was unsafe to go back upwards. They allowed it to continue its job, under the condition that it left the premises when it reached the bottom---something I had no intention of doing. Shortly after, a patrolling spirit noticed a high-force spell being woven inside the target room, and investigated. Already spooked by the close call at the front door, Firebug panicked and fled the building, leaving the now-discovered alchemical bomb in place. At the time, however, none of us were aware of the incident. Apparently unable or unwilling to communicate the discovery, it was only much later did the details come out.
Now down two runners and dealing with an alerted facility, I was not optimistic. At this point, Hurricane reported finally caught sight of the targets moving towards the trapped room. Unfortunately, the marks were immediately spooked by something in the room---the wayward alchemical preparation still clinging to the door. Hurricane was discovered by a patrol shortly after, so it's unclear what actually transpired, but as my cleaning drone reached the 13th floor again (after I made some "unscheduled firmware updates" to the mechanized gantry it was riding), we discovered that two of the targets had been forced into the room. The two were clearly distressed at what they now knew to be a trap.
Our cover blown, the mission barely hanging together and only half-completable at this point, I watched through silicon eyes at the room being filled with poisonous gas and flying blades. The two targets were surprisingly resilient, but the gas had them attacking walls to get free. At that moment, a drone---which I had apparently overlooked in my initial pass of the room---stood and dashed for the door, activating the still-deadly arcane bomb. The two targets, the room, the window, and my leased drone all exploded violently.
Had I not been suffering from the after effects of dumpshock, I'm sure the sight of a fiery ball of twisted metal sailing 13 stories onto the downtown pavement would have been strangely enjoyable. But the fate of my drone reflected the trajectory of the job all too closely. Our Johnson contacted us shortly afterwards and expressed his displeasure. For reasons I am still uncertain about, he made good on half the job's payment regardless. It only reinforces my questions about the legitimacy of the job in the first place.
And yet I live to run another day. The piercing headache has mostly subsided, and my bill has been settled with the drone lessor. The taste of failure is bitter, but without it, no success would be as sweet.