Year of the Dragon
| Year of the Dragon | |||||||||
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| Factions Involved | |||||||||
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Children of the Dragon Paz Marionette U3br L33t Kera Candle |
Knight Errant University of Washington Seattle Red Dragons | ||||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||||
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3 Red Dragon Security Personnel A couple display cases 3 Knight Errant Security Officers | |||||||||
Background
A professor of arcano-archeology found an item that has been theorized to complete a 'crescent staff,' (that is a legally distinct entity from a moonstaff) which in turn has been theorized to contain information from the fourth world on an archaeological expedition to Canton. Doctor Engles and the university has been approached by a private collector from Hong Kong interested in possessing the object and were given a generous speaking fees as well as donations respectively in exchange for the object of significant cultural heritage. The exchange would go down almost immediately after the professor presented his findings.
The Children of the Dragon have been following this story and are eager to learn more about the 4th world to prove their world view, they are no stranger to the shadows, as it has been used previously to expedite building permits on their church.
Meet
The runners meet the Johnson at a small coffee shop off of campus, Marionette recognized this woman as a member of the Children of the Dragon that had been inducted into the church's inner circle and versed in the mysteries of the Great Dragon Spirit. He shared this information with the party.
Ms. Bloom, as Marionette knew her, gave a basic description of the type of job, the fact that a private collector was also interested in the item she was interested in, as well as the fact that Knight Errant was providing security. After some haggling Ms. Johnson informs the party about Mr. Engles' expedition to Canton, the fact that UW is holding the artifact, the general description of the artefact and warns them to use enchanting gloves when handling it. After further probing the party learns the Red Dragon Triad is interested in the item.
Run
After the meet, the runners retire to a coffin hotel, with the exception of Kera who goes home to perform rituals. L33t spends time looking into people working on the expedition, into the professor, into the Reds, while the rest of the party racks their brain/racks a 20k NY a month database for information on where UW is likely to store the item. After some thinktanking, the team determines it is most likely stored in a wired storage facility near special selections archive.
L33t determines that the the doctor is being wined and dined and given as many drugs and women as he can handle. He is being held at the university's 'hospitality center' and very recently has been seen with any number of gentlemen from Hong Kong at interviews, parties, press events. They found the names of students on the expedition, they ultimately do not act on this information and instead determine that the best course of action would be creating an Asian synthskin mask and have Candle steal drek from him while posing as a prostitute.
Marionette drops Candle off and parks near the campus, sitting down on a bench by the hospitality center in waiting. She managed to fast talk her way into his bedroom, render him unconscious, or at least satisfied and make an effort to make it appear as though his belongings were rifled through. She acquired his comm and cred stick and made her way to Marionette's car. Meanwhile Marionette had been made by well dressed Russian men. He leads them on a chase through downtown, but they gain on him, they move to cut him off, attempting to force him to crash, but Candle wards them away with an arrow that likely would've hit, had they not evasively driven. L33t is interrupted from his studies of possible Machiavellian dragon motivations to puppeteer a light, turning it red right before Marionette passes by. The UGB G-men don't want to frag with KE, so they take a right on red and attempt to catch up. A couple pilot groundcraft rolls and Marionette had broken away.
L33t gets a direct connection on the wireless off commlink and uses technobulldrek to ignore encryption and databombs, while using his overwatch free direct connection to get into it.
Meanwhile the the comm and RFID tag on the professor are reported stolen, those are no longer able to access wireless facilities. Updating wired facilities would require someone with authorization on staff to update it. From a security risk perspective, risk was minimized by removing his access to wireless enabled secured locations.
The party rests up and decides to go in the wee hours of the morning the day before the presentation. L33t stays in his coffin hotel and does some hacking. Kera makes an ash spirit, but the party realizes bringing the ash spirit on campus is an awful idea. Kera and Candle stay off campus as Paz and Marionette physically infiltrate.
Several lockpicking, sneaking and hacking rolls later, the party managed to enter the storage facility beneath the special collections. They sneak their way past the triad guards and get to the operations room, after very, very much deliberation they flash his RFID tag and gain access to the wired security console. The with the press of a button they unlock the box the item is stored in. This has spooked the triad guards. Gun fights ensue.
After a firefight, and even more lockpicking, the party gets out in roughly a minute, enough time that the party would need an extra stealth check, but not enough for the opfor to collapse on the party. They erase the pepperpunch tags and the tags on the artefact and call up the J. The J has arranged a drop location and the meet goes off without a hitch.
Aftermath
Professor Engles is likely going to have alot of his plate next semester, as suddenly he is being pressured to teach more classes, and there's no sign of tenure or expeditions in his near future.
Candle's new mask's face and her aura have been seen by the dragons. Assets may be deployed in the future to find her.
Rewards
16k NY, 4 karma
+3 Rep to Children of the Dragon