El Diablo Cazador De Hombres
| El Diablo Cazador De Hombres | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of Meatgrinder | |||||||||
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| Factions Involved | |||||||||
| ShadowHaven | Assassins | ||||||||
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FL0W Neznayka Saint Lappland |
Chainsaw Ghoul Ritualist Marksman | ||||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||||
| 1 Burned Edge, several rats and 1 parrot dead. | None | ||||||||
| Mundane Ascension Optional | |||||||||
Summary
The team attempts to rescue some Bravo Company wannabes. It doesn't go so well.
Background
During the Meatgrinder a Peruvian investigator by the name of Brayan Alvarez attempted investigating Amazonia. He never made it back to Peru. Now, the Peruvian government attempts another try at searching the cause of the supposed riots in the ruins of Tucupita.
The Meet
The J meets the team in a vacant diner attached to one of Ingersoll Aquaculture's buildings. She elaborates that a small veteran-founded mercenary company specializing in search & rescue operations attempted to scout out Amazonia's suspicious activities but missed their last report. She is willing to pay a staggering 50,000 Nuyen to each team member for getting them out. The extra price tag is warranted seeing as she has no available intel on what's been picking people off aside from potential marksmen that attacked runners last time.
The team is slightly tentative, but seeing as they've got an Amazonia War vet, Lappland, on their side as well as someone who's worked for this J before, Neznayka, the team agrees.
The Plan
As they're flying over, some extra supplies are packed. HemostatiX wound dressing and medkit supplies for Triage! The team aims to check out the road that the convoy couldn't cross due to a several hundred meter wide cut-off where the rainforest apparently grew over the rainforest dirt road. Having to parachute out of the plane, the team manages without particular issues due to parachuting expertise and spirit assistance. FL0W hits a branch, but his armor blocks any trauma from actually occurring.
The Run
Following the road, the team does find sabotaged military-grade humvees with spilt oil and slashed tires. FL0W's perceptive searching spots a ruthenium polymer coated bomb on one of the seats and decides not to go near it, having known some defusal work before. Nez sends some rats into the forest to scout, but they come back without much of a trail. After some searching, they do find a trail to start tracking and begin heading north. Nez eventually realizes they're heading towards Tucupita and shares the skinny with the rest of the team who grow somewhat concerned.
Several hundred meters from the city line, however, the trail turns sharply west along with a bloodstain that one of Nez's dogs detect. They come across a seemingly abandoned campsite that the team very cautiously explores with Nez's parrot. It doesn't return. Saint, one of the two durable street sams, begins circling the area when she steps into a legtrap and is immediately aimed at by two soldiers who accept her offer of peace and guide her behind some cover. They elaborate that they are in fact the mercenaries sent to investigate and had arrived with 13 men, but only 4 remain--
At least that's until one of them gets shot in the head. Tuwakee, the remaining soldier, immediately gets behind more cover and Saint drops prone. The sniper will from here-on out be a constant threat somewhere in the depths of foliage. Lappland and FL0W spot shambling movement northwest and Saint realizes the encroaching group of dead, shambling bodies. With Saint's bladework, Triage's spirit and FL0W's grenadier work, the group is rather well dispatched of, but Saint gets banged by the sniper once more, thankfully without much effect. A fireball flies in the sky, appearing to act as magical artillery and nails Nez's location almost perfectly, but the street sams manage to utilize a Shield Walk maneuver and get the weaker members to scatter to minimize the damage of the blast.
The team realizes after diagnosing Dutch and Howler, the injured mercs, that they can't move them easily without somehow distracting the sniper. They decide on a daring distraction that Lappland offers to run, charging into the forest. She begins heading into the nearest direction after intentionally getting shot to get a bead on the sniper's fix, only to get interrupted by a heavily-augmented figure in armor and revving a chainsaw. The fight's difficult, an entire grenade belt going off to try and dispose of Lappland's sheer superhuman durability. At last, she's nailed by chainsaws, explosions and sniper fire enough to knock her unconscious just barely. As FL0W catches up to the Movement-imbued unconscious street sam, the chainsaw figure drops a bomb on Lappland's chest and activates invisbility to retreat. FL0W realizes he can't just move her, seeing an AR message atop the charge warning him that she'll perish if the bomb is moved. Trying to be as quick as possible, he attempts to kick it as far as he can before it can be blown up, having Triage's trailing spirit do the same. The pressure plate trigger on the bomb goes off only a few meters away and the shaped charge still hits both FL0W and Lappland with half of the charge's might. The spirit gets disrupted by the explosion. Triage rushes to them to try and stabilize both as FL0W has suffered critical injuries.
Meanwhile, back at camp Saint has begun extracting Dutch and Neznayka guides them into the foliage as the ghoul arrives and executes both Howler and Tuwakee, beginning to follow Dutch's blood trail. Nez's and Saint's stealth skills manage to let them divert the ghoul's search. Nez sends one of her rats out to go to Triage and after losing the ghoul from their trail they start moving as quickly as they can without making noise. Once they arrive, they also see the rat scurry to the site at the same time. Triage is attempting to prepare stretchers from sticks and tarpaulin, having stabilized everyone. Nez prepares to help with her survival skills when the ghoul re-appears, seeking Dutch's head. Saint attempts to fight him off, but another fireball begins soaring in the air. One of Neznayka's rats scurries over to Dutch's body and slips under his partly open armor, causing the fireball to change trajectory. Saint, realizing she can't keep Dutch alive, smacks the ghoul in the face one final time as all three of them - Dutch, the ghoul and Saint eat the fireball's blast. The ghoul retreats, having decapitated and incinerated Dutch, leaving them with whispered German in the wind.
The team decides this was enough. Nez had taken Dutch's commlink and calls this worthy enough of a goal and begins extracting towards the Ghost Cartel air strip they used last time. The first night is painful but Edge and Triage's medical tending helps Lappland and FL0W get back from death's door in a single night. They're sore, but able to move on their own, allowing the team to extract back to Seattle, having survived first contact with the enemy face to face.
Aftermath
The J is non too pleased, but the team hardly cares at this point, having escaped with their lives intact. The commlink appears encrypted - and according to the Johnson, formatted. Neznayka attempts to sus out whether this is true and her suspicions seem to not find any lies on the mysterious Johnson's part. A lucrative, sharp-minded Negotiation roll convinces the J to still give them 16,000 Nuyen for the intel they acquired about the infected, cyberlimb-equipped ghoul and the marksman and ritualist. This is, after all, a treasure trove of intel compared to the nothing she had before. The Johnson disappears into thin air and the team leaves, some far more pissed off at the one-up the enemies got on them, some just happy to be alive.
Run Compensation for El Diablo Cazador De Hombres (Extreme, 30 x 0.77 = 20 RVP)
- 16,000 Nuyen (8 RVP)
- 3 Karma (3 RVP)
- 20 CDP (9 RVP)
- No Chain Link Tattoo for a failed run. Sorry!
- Mundane Ascension where applicable because damn y'all survived
- Optional Qualities:
- Lappland can take Quick Healer at Chargen Rates
- Triage can take Gifted Healer (Treatment) at Chargen Rates
- FL0W can take Tough As Nails 1 at Chargen Rates
- Nez can take Cynic at Chargen Rates
- Having barely survived the explosive trap on Lappland's body, FL0W suffers Thousand Yard Stare 1 due to the harrowing experience of near-death.
Game Quotes
Player After Action Reports (AARs)
Saint
Payday's a payday. Getting out is a win. I've had worse days than this in the Barrens... Not by much, though... Just glad Nez is alive...
Lappland
When I looked into that things eyes, I knew I was being hunted. I could smell death. He too, like I, was anointed by a cruel god. We fought as all fighters must, and I as such I have vindicated myself from the blood stained red shed in Amazonia those ten years ago.
Our fight was not honorable. No glorious deeds transpired. Nothing was immortalized. We fought to the death, and I was surprised I got up at all. I was sure in that moment, that I would be done for. I awoke in a field of wheat, a warm wind blowing through the cliffs with an evening passion that brought a calm sense of safety to my chest. Asuna held my hand, we walked to the beach, where the sun was setting. She asked me to come with her, to go to the light. I wanted so desperately to go with her.
yet in that single moment, when I looked at her, the tears streaming down both of our faces mirroring eachother, it wasn't Asuna's voice I heard the loudest. No, no... something pulled me back. The screams of someone I knew telling me to wake up, begging me to get up. I just wanted five more minutes of this beautiful dream with my friend, with God.
Yet I awoke, brought with cruelty and a cold choke from the humidity. It shoved me back inside my corpse, tearing me from the brink. We had failed. I had failed. Once again, I walked into a forest to die, and once again I awoke, not having died. On the walk back to the airplane I had time to think about what I saw. I figured if I had gone to that great beyond with Asuna I surely would have died. Triage said he saved me, so I think I owe him one.
Now I'm in the hospital, just recovering. One month in a wheelchair before physical therapy. I'll get better soon enough, and then after that I can get reconstructive surgery on my chest and face. For now, I'm just happy to be alive. Priestess said a prayer for me, and I greatly appreciated it. Red Ribbon Brought me some soup and drove me back to my place.
I'll be okay.
FL0W
I nearly didn't come back and what did come back was missing a bit of myself. If I ever see that johnson again I'm shootin the asshole.