The Spice Must Flow
| The Spice Must Flow | |||||||||
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| Factions Involved | |||||||||
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ShadowHaven Anastasia Martella | Hungry Vampire | ||||||||
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Neijing Chersky |
Hungry Vampire Goth GF | ||||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||||
| Both knocked unconscious and shipped to CalFree | |||||||||
Summary
A murder mystery at a remote spice oneiro plantation. After extensive legwork and much pulling of hair, a security adept was fedaykin'd and knocked unconscious, it was determined she was dating the vampiric culprit, then she was used as a hostage to negotiate a peaceful-ish resolution.
Background
Among Ms. Martella's business ventures is an Oneiro plantation in the Mohave, growing the desert-requiring 'dreamsage'. Recently, it had been having disappearances every day or two for several weeks, with security unable to discover the cause, and so outside specialists were hired.
The Meet
Ms. Martella hired the upstairs floor of a fancy club for the meet, a cyber'd up bodyguard letting the runners through at the door. She was fond of Neijing's fine clothing and... nonverbally disdainful of Chersky's rumpled attire. She outlined the disappearances and offered to provide transport with any illegal gear the runners wished. Neijing attempted to negotiate for higher pay and was mildly successful, and also earned herself a hot lady in a suit's commcode.
The Plan
The runners were given a flight out to the installation, reviewing the security footage on the way, finding no visible trace save for some sand disturbed by someone invisible. After arriving, they interviewed various witnesses, one who was near to a disappeared individual reporting that all sound cut out before their companion was snatched without a trace.
Calling Ms. Martella for employee records, they determined that no trolls had disappeared, so evidently something was dragging them off. Using the Search spirit power on a dead employee's picture, they found a corpse buried in a sand dune. An autopsy determined it to be exsanguinated, and Neijing easily recognised the marks of a vampire's teeth, with Chersky rather discombobulated at the, ah, source of this knowledge. Putting this together with the cutting out of sound, Neijing determined that a banshee was the culprit, and a powerful one to have developed that power.
Talking to security guards was floated, but dismissed given the possibility of the vampire being a mind mage.
The Run
Returning to the compound, the runners used the fact that a banshee could not conceal their awakened nature for long to narrow the suspect pool down to Awakened elves. Of the roughly hundred staff, eight alive and two missing were elves, two awakened among those remaining (a cottagecore parabotanist and a goth security adept) and one awakened among the first to go missing (a security mysad who was dating the goth security adept). Matrix searches on the two remaining gathered no obvious changes in their past that would indicate vampiric turning, though it was learned that both were lesbians. The parabotanist arrived roughly when the disappearances started, and the adept arrived some time before.
Viewing security footage and tracking movements, none of the adept's patrols brought her outside during the day, which was admittedly not uncommon given the desert sunlight's effect on normal metahumans, and the parabotanist was outside during the day also, though in fully-covered gear necessitated by anyone without heavy desert-survival augmentations or a death wish.
Investigating the parabotanist's room first (which she shared with another woman on staff) thanks to access codes from Ms. Martella, nothing out of the ordinary was found, including after an astral sweep from Chersky.
The runners then investigated the room the adept previously shared with her missing, presumed eaten, girlfriend, finding various gothy things and, thanks to Neijing's enhanced senses, a concealed compartment containing an old, used blood bag.
Given this clue, the runners planned an ambush on the adept. Neijing entombing herself in the sands beneath her patrol route and Chersky hanging around on the astral to Assense. Nothing untoward of her was discovered astrally, though she did notice Chersky's astral form. Neijing then burst from the sands and Fedaykin'd her with stick and shock, casually planting the shot home despite combat sense's warning.
She was tested with silver and had none of the reaction exhibited by banshees, and also had a great deal of bite scars on her neck. So it was determined her missing girlfriend was the banshee, who'd evidently disappeared off into the wilderness to avoid detection.
Instead of hunting her down, Neijing managed to - via the tied up girlfriend on a commlink - convince the banshee to go to a particular location in the wilderness (thanks to a convincing portrayal of the threat Neijing could pose to even a strong mage), there to be nonlethally disabled via Neijing and brought to Tempest for dealing with the Essence drain addiction.
Aftermath
The disabling went without a hitch, Neijing reported to Ms. Martella that the problem was 'dealt with', and the couple were shipped to CalFree, where Neijing talked with them and offered Tempest's commcode. The banshee accepted it, and Tempest, being Tempest, adopted her.
Ms. Martella was satisfied with the solution, not knowing the 'problem' was alive but contained, and the runners got paid.
Rewards
Rewards for 'The Spice Must Flow' (Deadly):
- 16k Nuyen (8 RVP)
- 500 negotiation Nuyen
- 12 Karma (12 RVP)
2 CDP
Optional, taking from above rewards:
- First Impression for Neijing (11 RVP)
- Analytical Mind for Chersky (5 RVP)
- Closer (4 RVP)
- Anastasia Martella (C6/L2) (5 RVP / 10 CDP)
Game Quotes
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Player After Action Reports (AARs)
Neijing
"I am growing soft. I am not sure I hate it"