Genre Savvy
| Genre Savvy | |||||||||
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| Factions Involved | |||||||||
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ShadowHaven Brady Franco Nuyen Press Aegis Academy | Demon King Akuma's Imperial Legion | ||||||||
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Daisy Mittens Delphi Insonia Silver Lining | The Demon King's Spy | ||||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||||
| N/A, unless Delphi and Insonia holding hands counts. | The Demon King's Spy's Secret Identity(?) | ||||||||
Summary
Brady Franco is back with another odd request maybe better suited for white hat deckers. No, the runners cannot count this job as a charitable tax write-off.
Background
(This run is preceded by Great Artists Steal.)
Nuyen Press is coming off of a roller coaster of a year. After winning a lawsuit against Aoi Bungaku regarding many cases of plagiarism and corporate espionage, they've been able to use the settlement money, as well as their extra sales from the publicity boost, to purchase a little slice of a boutique book shop in Downtown Seattle, given that physical print media in the Sixth World are boutique items to begin with. Real estate isn't cheap though, and neither is rent, both on the meat and on the Matrix. Although their brand new Destination Host affiliated with their soon-to-open storefront is operational and ready to go, the "screen door on a submarine" from Great Artists Steal is as leaky as it was several months ago.
Brady Franco, Owner, Founder, and CEO of Nuyen Press, remembering the positive experience had with Delphi, Fennec, and Signal from before, once again asks his assistant Kim to use her connections to reach into the shadows, and once again, Haven runners graciously answer the call.
The Meet
The runners gather at the newly rented Nuyen Press Downtown location, and though Insonia immediately makes the still-green Johnson stutter and pale, Delphi's friendly face quickly brings him back to proper consciousness. A dwarf and a giant walk into a bookstore, completing the set-up to this joke of a run. Brady apologizes for the lack of proper amenities for a woman of Daisy's size, and offers the squad coffee as they gather in a staff break area behind the counter.
"Mr. Johnson" introduces himself first as Brady Franco, and then as the proper moniker - he once again thanks Delphi for her service during Great Artists Steal, and briefly catches her up with the goings on since then, how they've won the settlement and spent the money on expanding their digital storefront operations, as well as partnering with other distributors to expand their case. Things are looking up...! Except for the fact that Brady Franco is more artist than CEO, and has spent just too much of their budget to afford proper security deckers to handle their host. Trusting the Haven runners after his positive experience last time, he asks that they complete three objectives in the foundation of the Nuyen Press corporate Data Host:
- 1: Resculpt the interior. The shutterstock-brand watermarked textures of their current interior are simply not cutting it for an organization that's so rapidly on the rise, especially if they're hoping to recruit new and proper talent.
- 2: Install new Intrusion Countermeasures. The host only came with one instance of Patrol IC, and one instance of Blaster IC. Who is *that* going to deter, especially in a rating 2 host? Oh, and speaking of which-
- 3: Upgrade the host's rating.
Brady Franco is ignorant of such things and what they entail, and offers 4000 nuyen to the runners each for their trouble. The gang briefly discuss Foundation paradigms, and while Delphi fondly remembers a Scooby Doo mystery, Daisy describes the horror of an Aztlan death pit in horrifying detail, both while Insonia fakes familiarity with the topic. Brady Franco, blanching, seems shocked, and asks if that's seriously what's inside his host - to which Delphi reassures him that only some are death pits. In light of the mystery and potential danger of the unknown, he offers the runners an additional 2000 nuyen as hazard pay. He grants the runners access to their host, and the four get to work.
The Plan
Behind the counter of the stock bookstore currently used as their host's sculpting, a door leads to a steep and creaky stairwell descending to the basement level. The door beyond is locked, of course, until the runners place their marks on its surface (and until one runner's mark splits it cleanly in half). Before advancing further, Delphi loads a Hitchhiker program onto her cyberdeck - both Daisy and Silver Lining allow Delphi to have a mark on their personas in order to tag along, though Insonia, choosing not to trust her, risks going alone. After a swift reminder about NOT TOUCHING THE NULL NODE, IT DOESN'T MATTER WHAT IT WHISPERS TO YOU, the four of them float into the abyss beyond.
The Run
Past the threshold where their sensation fades to void, Insonia finds herself entering what appears to be a large, medieval lecture hall, with windowed vistas looking out over a broad mountainscape. All eyes fire toward her as she does - her persona's power armor has transformed into medieval plate mail. Exasperated, the professor, a man with dark hair, dark eyes, and a dark disposition, sighs and asks her what she thinks she's doing wearing armor to class. Insonia, unused to school at all though thinking quickly, informs him that her uniform was dirtied and is currently being cleaned, to which he chastises her, though allows her to take her seat at the back of the class. Clanking up the steps, Insonia spares a glance at the enormous chalkboard toward the front of the room and discovers that this is evidently a college-level class on the fundamentals of "magic," written in quotes in her mind as a swift check of her own knowledge of magic confirms that everything he says is bullshit. As if it's a civilian's uninformed opinion of how it might work, the professor explains that everybody has an elemental affinity tied to one of the four standard elements, as well as an additional alignment somewhere on the spectrum between light and dark. His name, written in the corner, is Headmaster John Dragon Jr.
Elsewhere, the trio of Daisy Mittens, Delphi, and Silver Lining appear at the wrong end of a firing range. Several dozen students dressed in armor fire flaming arrows and lightning strikes down the field of an enormous arena carved of mountain stone, though thankfully none so accurate that any of them are struck. A stern looking blonde girl blows a whistle and calls for a cease fire as she rushes to help them up - Delphi takes her hand, and pings her with a byte of data. The return signal confirms that this girl is a node - the Security Node.
She introduces herself as Lady Hime, and chastises the three of them for being on the wrong end of the field, and they hastily explain that it was the result of a teleportation spell gone awry. She seems shocked that students would have access to that kind of magic, and questions their methods - thankfully, the three stumble their way through and avoid any kind of variance. As she turns to lead them back to safety, Delphi reaches out and palms several shards of crystalized magic against the back of her neck, where they absorb into her skin. New IC is loaded, and a run objective is fulfilled.
Back inside the large circular castle carved at the peak of a mountain, the pair are led by a stoat familiar of Hime's back to the classroom they claim to have come from, where they identify Insonia with a surreptitious tug on the left ear. The four follow a pack of students down the spiral stairs into the dormitory level. Daisy finds a dorm with her runner name on it - Delphi finds one plainly labeled "Dahlia," and feigns ignorance as to why, insisting it must simply be flower themed. They change into proper uniforms, and consult each other with an updated plan.
Insonia updates them on this paradigm's magic system, while the other three inform her that the Security Node has been found and updated. They speculate on the status of the other nodes - Headmaster John Dragon Jr. appears to be a prime candidate for the Master node, while Insonia thinks back and remembers a somewhat brainy student unimpressed with his curriculum that they think might be the Scaffolding node. They split into two teams: Daisy and Silver Lining will investigate the red-haired girl they think might be the scaffolding node, while Insonia and Delphi will pursue the headmaster.
The headmaster's office upstairs is "guarded" by his secretary, Elena Brynhildr - Insonia swallows her pride, and ignoring that these people are now plainly running a fantasy military academy, explains that she wants to apologize to the headmaster. Delphi thinks deftly, and asks to sign a sign-in sheet - after a successful palming attempt, she brushes against the secretary's hand, and discovers that her ping goes unanswered, and that this is not another node. Elena calls for a raven, who flutters away, and after a brief moment, returns with news that the headmaster will see them.
His office overlooks a vast valley, regal and adorned by a brass telescope kept on a tripod and pointed vigilantly at the horizon. His raven familiar rests at its peak. Insonia apologizes for her earlier disrespect, and John Dragon Jr. tells her that he is impressed by her honesty and humility. John Dragon Sr. died a hundred years ago, sacrificed to the void pillar, to protect this mana well from the Demon King Akuma's advancing army - tradition is very important to honor his sacrifice.
Dahlia is also there, apparently. She asks the headmaster to meet next week to, putting it bluntly, brown nose, and to her he once again laughs and says he respects her ambition and honesty. They set up another appointment, and then shake on it - she discovers that this is, in fact, the Master Node, and after a brief attempt, manages to begin the process of growing this meager Rating 2 host into something respectable.
Meanwhile, downstairs in the cafeteria, Silver Lining is able to spot a red headed student excitedly orbiting the blonde girl from earlier, shouting "Lady Hime! Hey, Hime!" at the top of her lungs, as though begging for her attention. They approach, and Daisy quickly stirs up a conversation about her clockwork rotodrone - the girl introduces herself as Idella Crispin, and she's Lady Hime's one-sided best friend. Although she herself doesn't like to be touched patting the drone itself confirms a data trail in the form of a mental, mana-powered link between the two, and following its code reveals the identity of Idella Crispin as the Slave control node, and unfortunately not the scaffolding node they were hoping for.
Idella, however, spills the beans about the clockwork observatory at the mountain's peak, designed to keep vigil over the valley in case the Demon King ever returns, and about how Lady Hime could get all of them up there, if she could be convinced. With some encouragement from Daisy, she gushes about its design, and has the revelation that if Damien Robespierre were to come too, that she would definitely be convinced, even if she would never admit that. To that end, Silver Lining finds the gloomy looking goth kid in a corner of the cafeteria reading a book on Demonology, and talks his way into a candid conversation. He tells Damien that he plans on visiting the observatory later that night, and Damien, bluntly tells him that's a bad idea, and that he'll get himself killed. Silver Lining unfortunately is too intelligent to properly paint himself as clueless, and so Damien catches on that something seems to be funny here. After Daisy arrives and similarly fails to lie to him, Damien bluntly tells them that they have five seconds to tell him the truth about their plans, or else he's taking it to the Headmaster.
Thinking quickly, the two of them improvise a bigger lie to cover their little ones. Students are going missing, and Damien immediately narrows his eyes, asking what they know. They say that they suspect the observatory and the mana void have something to do with it, and that they've been working with Idella on a device that can measure mana fluctuations. Fast talking applies, and Damien appears convinced enough that they might be onto something to acquiesce. They shake on it, and it is discovered that Damien is the Archive node.
The four runners meet later that night at a large locked stone door leading to the final flight of stairs. After some enemies-to-lovers-style flirting between Lady Hime and Damien, she produces an amulet and unlocks the door, where they ascend to the observatory. Now out in the open air so close to the void pillar, the runners resist the temptations it offers: money, power, knowledge, fame, women, status. Delphi shoots some curt glares toward both Insonia and Silver Lining, who both shrug their shoulders and, sighing, once again agree not to enter the Torment Nexus. Nonetheless, it becomes apparent this close to it that the void pillar is, in fact, the Null node.
Once in the observatory, and upon confirmation that this location is the Portal, Daisy and Delphi choose to swiftly establish anchors in the form of small, inked illustrations of doorways in distant corners of the observatory. Though Hime seems disgruntled at the graffiti, Idella convinces her to let them work. Delphi, having prepared seeds earlier, caws softly as a raven, and the hundreds of birds sleeping in the rafters of this place descend upon her like a gothic Disney princess. Of those dozens and dozens, she pings each and finds that at least one of them is the Scaffolding node that they'd been looking for, a raven with a touch of red staining its tail feathers that she had seen in the headmaster's office prior. She loads it with data that she and Silver Lining had worked on previously, using his graphic design knowledge, and after a brief moment where it seems to intelligently regard her, they all flutter away as the seeds run dry.
All three objectives complete, the runners waste no time in looking through the lens of the observatory's telescope and beaming off back into the horizon. They appear in the newly forged surface level of the host, freshly sculpted to appear as an actual publishing house, customized with promotional illustrations and materials of their various works all along the walls.
Aftermath
Brady Franco is ecstatic that the operation has succeeded, and is doubly so upon finding out that there is not, in fact, an Aztlan death pit in the secret rooms of his business's host. After some excited discussion between the runners regarding the true identity of the Demon King's Spy and the will-they-won't-they relationship of Lady Hime and Damien Robespierre, Delphi also agrees to continue visiting the host for the foreseeable months of the future to eventually upgrade it from a Rating 2 location to a more respectable Rating 4. The Johnson asks Delphi to give his best regards to "the young excited one," and "your naga friend." Insonia debates selling all of that information for paydata, though eventually is convinced that having an anchor into a low-level foundation such as that one is a reward that isn't worth jeopardizing. A win-win for everyone involved.
Rewards
The Runners are optionally allowed to place an anchor in the observatory of the paradigm, granting them access to this Foundation in the future. If so, please make a note of this on either the character's wiki page or their chummer file.
Low, 9 RVP
- 4000 Nuyen (2 RVP)
- 2000 Nuyen (Negotiation)
- 5 Karma (5 RVP)
- 4 CDP (2 RVP)
- 2 CDP (Base)
- 500 Nuyen in Nuyen Press Store Credit (Digital Purchases Only, Expires 12/31/2085) (0 RVP)
Optional:
- Brady Franco, Owner, Founder, and CEO of Nuyen Press (3/2) (4 RVP)
Optional for Delphi:
- Brady Franco (3/3) (5 RVP)
Optional for Daisy:
- Secret Forbidden Archive Node Smut (0 RVP)
- Speed Reading at Chargen Rates (2 RVP)