You've bearly managed offloading the new package before you get a call on your collective cell phone (the one for shadowrunning jobs, not the one for drug pickups).

"Hello, this is Brother Witness. We heard you rescued Becka! We've set up a meeting spot to give you your pay. Meet us at 1 Dark St. in Ft. Lewis. There's a non-descript warehouse there, 'Sue Pishis Crates & Boxes'. We'll be there with your money."

(You all can decide how and who goes, but the description of the location doesn't change: )

The location is a nondescript, run-down warehouse amid numberless nondescript, run-down warehouses. The only exception being that the gate of this weary building has been left ajar. No security greets you as you drive up the driveway and park near the loading dock entrance. Peering through a musty window reveals only the dark shapes of crates.

Carver slides back his eye covers and slips as far into thermographic as possible. Everything isn't right about this particular event, but something is so particularly not-right that it's eery. He slides out his knives and preps for a stabbing.

Firefox eyes the meeting site warily before summoning a swarm of watchers.  "Go find where there are people hiding and then tell me"

the bears have shown their ability to out smart and out maneuver the team on every turn so far so Snow just walked into the warehouse.

St. V has a similar attitude as Snow, but not quite as bold.  Now with his full equipment, the troll uses his new understanding of dealing with drop bears to come up with a song to soothe any drop bears that may be itching to... get the drop on them...

"I stalk you, you stalk me,
   we're a happy family!
with a great bear hug and a kick from me to you,
   won't you say you'll slug me too."

Firefox's little spirits fly out into the warehouse. Somewhere in the darkness she hears a *HAUMLP!* (that's an onomatopoeia right there) and Firefox can tell one of the watchers has been destroyed. Still, one of the others returns shortly, "Nothing there! I looked under the drop bear, behind the drop bear, above the drop bear. Nothing!"

Snow and St. V walk on in, like the brave runners they are (albeit, accompanied by their own squad of tiny drop bears). Lights on the ground faintly glow, deepening and defining the shadows. Familiar, metallic voices can be heard;
"... the Drop Bear Inquisitors found nothing. That isn't to say that he was truly innocent."
"Of course, Elder Gyro, they never are. We can allow for no leaks of Elder Ophis's success. His surfing ninja pirate Commandos are too valuable for the world to know of them yet."
"Elder Fistyantilus, I believe we have company..."
"Ah, keen ears, Elder Angelone. Shadowrunners, enter please, tell us what news you bring."

(I assume Snow here will fill in the DBC on the details of the mission. A quick note here, the mission as written assumes Fortuna gets Becka. While it also assumes the characters will fail at negotiating the original job with Fortuna, or in crossing the border to get to his house, it does not say what happens if the PCs fail to deliver Becka, and Becka therefore survives. So congratulations on breaking the otherwise idiot-proof plot. Apologies for the narrative errors forthcoming.)


"The news of the MILD INCONVENIENCING of dear Becka is most upsetting. We do not blame you for your terrorist acts, however. People in your position do as they must, which is why we are certain you will assist us with this final job. We must settle debts, remind the loutish elves of their place in things. Eye for an eye, life for an INVOLUNTARY ROAD TRIP. We wish for you to assist us in killing Fortuna."
"And his family. Don't forget the family."
"And burn down his mansion."
"And kick his dog."
"The Inquisitors will get right on it. They just completed a two-day training segment on animal abuse and how best to commit it. We can..."
"Elder Ophis, your eagerness is pleasing, but this is not the time to discuss such measures. First Fortuna. Expect him to call you in the near future. You see we paid actors to impersonate you and ..."
"Actually homeless vagrants."
"Don't tell them that, Elder Ophis! It will only discourage them. There, there, shadowrunners. We hired the best acting school had to offer."
"For a bottle of wine a day!" There's some more barely concealed laughter.
"... actors to impersonate you and break into one of our own facilities to steal information indicating drop bears are a result of HMHVV."
A few of the elders snicker.
"An obvious falsehood, but we needed bait. Meanwhile, we're sure Fortuna's spies are reporting the successful run, reporting runners matching your description professionally executing it. He'll be wondering who hired you, but even moreso, he'll know your desperate mercenary hearts require you sell the information to as many buyers as will accept. He will be contacting you shortly. We simply need for you to arrange and attend the meet. Set it for the Space Needle during non-business hours. After Fortuna is dead, you will be reimbursed, 2,000¥ per person, plus whatever pay Fortuna brings. Brother PTHHHHT," the speakers of his obelisk hiss and crackle as the elder tries to call out the name, "please bring out the data chip."
While he speaks, another of the short monuments rolls out with a data chip on top.
"Thank you Brother PTHHHHT," again the name melts into a wash of static, giving no hint of its true enunciation. "There, simply set up and attend the meet and you get paid in full. Do you accept?"
This message was last edited by the GM at 15:52, Tue 18 Nov 2014.

Firefox praises her watcher for the bravery of searching under a drop-bear, then proceeds to follow her teammates.  Drop bears she could deal with.  Relatively speaking . . .

After listening to the discussion, bristling somewhat at the "loutish" adjective, Firefox asks some follow-up questions:

"The base reward is for taking care of Mr. F.  If you expect him to make the Great Drop, that'll be extra.  As well, how much do we get for burning down his mansion?"  There had been a few piles of rags that might have accidentally caught on their previous visit . . .

quote:

15:42, Today: Firefox rolled 3 successes using 6d6 with the Shadowrun system with a target of 4 with rolls of 5,2,4,4,1,2. Bargaining.

"Two thousand total I think is fair."
"But what if there are fireworks? I love fireworks."
"Very well. Two thousand if you burn it down, but five thousand if there are fireworks."
"I also love sparklers."
"Two thousand for fire, five thousand for fireworks, six thousand if there are sparklers."
"I aaaalso love watermelon!"

"No watermelon. I'm not hiring shadowrunners to get you watermelon. You can buy your own watermelon."
"Ohh... Okay."

Firefox considered repeating the question about the "great drop", but decided against it.  Getting down the spire of the needle and out was going to be challenging enough without an elf splattered all over the base drawing a lonestar crowd as the elevator made its slow decent.

Carver stares at one of the obelisks straight in the midsection. "For clarification, do you want the fireworks to be on him at the time, or are incendiaries nearby sufficient?"

"I hadn't even considered that! 1,000 extra if the fireworks are attached to him."

St. Velveteen checks his wallet and frowns.  "How 'bout we go for the full amount?  I blew most of my extra nuyen when I invested in my new masseuse.  Those hooves do feel good on the back though!"  Setting up a fierworks show on top of the needle would probably be tricky, but St. V was confident they had the skills needed to get the job done.  Besides, they already had a skilled pyrotechnic on their team.  Or maybe pyro-wreck-it was more accurate...

Carver mutters something about a "culturally significant hat" with firecrackers and sparklers while mounting the mortars somewhere else.

"Well then, it is settled! Brother PPTTTHHHT! give them the data chip.

Remember, for the full pay, you must arrange for Fortuna to meet you beneath the Space Needle, where you will convince him to wear fireworks before setting him on fire and the fireworks land in Salish-Sidhe and set his mansion on fire and also kicks his dog. We'll pay you for any of the goals you manage to achieve."

The smallest monolith delivers a little datachip to you.

"You should expect the call soon! Remember, he believes you have valuable data you're trying to hawk."

"Oh yes, I almost forgot your pay for rescuing Becka! Angelone, bring them their pay."

Another of the monoliths rolls forward, with stacks of credsticks and a little plastic packet. The credsticks add up to 6,000¥ for each of you. The bag contains a few hundred eucalyptus cough drops (+2 to any Body tests against chest colds, +1 vs. halitosis). You can divide them up however you like.

St. V claims a handful of the cough drops, pops one into his mouth, puts the rest securely in his pockets, then grabs his share of the cred sticks.  "Let's get goin' then, huh?"  On his way to the door he says, "I guess we'll need to get a hold of some fireworks then.  Firefox?  I think that's your department, isn't it?"  He figured their resident pyro would know where to get pretty burny things.  "I could prob'ly sew them into the lining of a wind jacket.  Then all we gotta do is get 'im to put it on, then fwooOOOSH!!!"

"I might be able to find a few lying around somewhere"

Though they do tend to get used pretty quickly after acquisition . . .

"Did anyone borrow one of those little hats from his place?"

"Good shadowrunners. Smart shadowrunners. Go, go forth my pretties. FLY!"

One imagines if an obelisk could gesture, this one would be. But it can't. So it isn't.

It waits for a moment to see if anyone flies.

"That means you should leave now."



The party makes it about forty feet outside of the warehouse when Snow's cell phone rings.

"I understand you have something you're trying to pawn off. Care to make a deal? I'm sure I could throw a few nuyen your way for your trouble."

"Also, my house is trashed and full of drop bears. Do you know anything about that?"

(It's Fortuna.)

"Overcome by my charm, I see. It's not unusual. I'll pay you $500 and all of the generic-brand robotussin you mongrels can drink. Meet me at the Space Needle in two hours. And make sure you have the right package this time!"

Fortuna hangs up.

Before he hangs up, Carver yells "it is tradition in my country to wear hats made of festive fireworks to symbolize the start of a new business enterprise!"

OOC: sorry, i back burnered this to think of a response and then it slipped my mind.

"Two hours, space needle, the right package this time."  Snow said into the phone before hanging it up.

"Alright this guy is really getting on my nerves.  What package now? we gave him a drop bear.  then we gave him the drop bear he wanted along with about a dozen other ones and in return he sics a bunch of psychotic runners on us."  Snow pulls out his taser and looks at it with a bit of dismay, "It appears that I dont have the proper package for him.  We are going to have to stop off somewhere and pick up some explosive and a remote detonator.  Reputation be damned, this guy is getting what he deserves."

I would need to roll 25 successes to be able to get commercial explosives within the time limit, so i dont think that's going to happen

Yeah, getting commercial explosives without a good contact is tough. However, non-commercial ones are still viable. And since you're just exploding a PERSON, not a building, the technical requirements are a little more lenient.

"I know a person or two who have their ears to the streets and might know where we could get some explosives on short notice.  No guarantees though.  As for a remote detonator..." he glances over at Firefox and points a thumb at her.  "I thought that was her specialty."  St. V considers calling in a favor with Ms. Loretta Vanderpelt, but also racks his own brain to try remembering if he had ever heard of any local fireworks dealers worth looking into.  Someone who sells the good stuff!

10:56, Today: St. Velveteen rolled 1 success using 3d6 with the Shadowrun system with a target of 4 with rolls of 4,2,2. Street Rumors.  Fireworks dealers.

Firefox pulls out her PDA and rings up Alfred.  "You remember those troll blasters we used at the New Year's party a couple of years back?  Know where I could pick up a couple on short order?  Yeah the sparkly ones with the big secondary.  No, it's ok.  It'll be outdoors this time.  I think green.  It'd be good to match his eyes.  Oh and some of those whistling ones too"

quote:

13:56, Tue 09 Dec 2014: Firefox rolled 4 successes using 8d6 with the Shadowrun system with a target of 4 ((2,3,(6+3)9,4,3,3,(6+4)10,4))

Turning to the the team, she smiled.  "I'll look after the pyrotechnics.  Should have a pretty display wired up in the next hour or so.  Might be good to have a few folks case the site up front in case our Mr. F's mercs are setting us up.  Or our fuzzy friends.  Or someone else not yet accounted for . . ."

Ms. Vanderpelt responds to St. V, "oh, hello my dear! Fireworks? Are you having a party? That's so sweet. But no, you shouldn't get into those. Someone might lose a finger! Sparklers are much safer. Oh, or I know this sweet young lady, she's offloading eighty surplus AK-74s and boxes of phosphorous flare rounds. Would that be better?"

Firefox, however has far more luck. "Yes, ma'am. As you recall, the old estate had an overabundance of, ahem, 'party favors' of different sorts. I'm afraid there is a minimum blast size. The smaller items simply never moved. I can arrange for a few boxes to be available, for you to pull through."

(Cost for this is $600 for the materials for a single hat--they're illegal fireworks and all.)

Can we have one of those bottle rocket radio control rigs set into the fusecord? Because that shouldn't be impossible to rig up and would cost less than 50 nuyen. Well, depends on if we go with the deluxe version...

Those AK-74s did sound pretty tempting, but after checking his wallet one more time St. Velveteen ultimately decides to conserve his money for once.  He would have to wait until this payoff before going back for the guns.  "Thanks, Loretta.  I guess if you could just give me the name of a place with sparklers, that will have to do.  I might be back for those flare rounds though, depending on how well this gig goes..."  Sparklers wouldn't be as impressive, but they sure are pretty!  And the 'bears said they would raise the payout to 6000 if some were incorporated.

I'm sure a techie can wire those up to remote launcher stuff. If someone wants to give me a Hardware roll, I'll use that.

So you guys pick up the fireworks. Anything else you're doing? Who is making the roll for attaching them to the hat?

Carver attempts to help with the wiring up of the fireworks and distracts himself with the electronics kit, making himself an assortment of simple entertaining gadgets like an alarm and a joybuzzer. It comes to a head when he accidentally adds a bottle rocket to the mix, trips the circuit, and strikes himself in the face with the Cantonese incendiary.
Carver rolled a critical failure on Electronics, rolling 1 on 1d6.

After carefully tending to his singed scalp and smokey clothes, he settles on a simpler task - integrating the wires and whatnot into a lovely sun cap he found at the Redemption Marine Depot down the way (also finding a nice tie for himself). Unfortunately, he soon realizes that his only sewing kit available is the suture gun from his medkit. After stapling the hat to the mannequin (not a partially deflated basketball, mannequin) and nearly setting the entire enterprise ablaze again, Carver extracts the frame and decides to let the others do a better job.
Carver rolled a failure on Knowledge: Homemaker skill, rolling a 3 on 1d6

Firefox watches amused as Carver attempts to wire things up before taking over.  If there was one thing she knew, it was how to properly incinerate things.  Or people.  Or whatever . . .

quote:

16:28, Today: Firefox rolled 5 successes using 6d6 with the Shadowrun system with a target of 4 with rolls of 5,(6+6+6+1)19,(6+2)8,3,(6+5)11,5. Pyrology - wire up hat.

Pyrology

That should do it, I think?

At this point, you're working on the remote part. I trust the detonator part is in hand. So Hardware still applies.

BTW, where are you doing this? Whose house are you setting on fire?

Was assuming I'd use an elemental for that.  Much harder to jam.  No metal to detect.  Plus my pet would enjoy the fun. . .

Seriously guys let the right skills for job get used

Demolitions: 07:39, Tue 16 Dec 2014: Snow rolled 3 successes using 4d6 with the Shadowrun system with a target of 4 ((2,(6+4)10,4,4)).

Electronics: 07:40, Tue 16 Dec 2014: Snow rolled 2 successes using 5d6 with the Shadowrun system with a target of 4 ((2,3,4,5,1)).

Given the time crunch, someone else can drive and Snow will do the work in the truck.

So Snow manages to wire the explosives into Carver's funny hat. It looks like sun hat with a dozen rockets soldered to the top. However, with Firefox's negotiations skill, she can probably talk him into wearing it. I'm sure it's fine.

Excellent. Now how do we get reservations for the space needle?

I believe the meeting is for under the needle, which should be a tad easier

Oh, then excellent. We can move to the next scene and I'll see you all at the afterparty!

St. V watches curiously as the others take their turns trying to make the hat look presentable.  He would have offered expert pointers, but his heart just wasn't in it with his craft kit was left back at home.  Some scrap paper and glitter glue could have done wonders.  But as it was, the troll spent most of the ride preparing his gear and making sure everything was still in working order.  There was still a hit squad out there somewhere being paid to take them out and he didn't want to be caught with his pants down.  V holsters his handgun in his concealable holster when they near the needle.  "Everyone ready for things to get hairy?"

Snow hands St. V a half empty canister of NADS (http://www.nads.com/).

"Or if you prefer I know a great little German girl who does great body waxing."

Okay, that product is way less offensive than I thought it would be, given the name.

In reply to Papa Bear (msg # 39):

The name alone is all the comedic value.  of course if you get more into it they always talk about pulling the strips towards your nose with led to the concept of pulling your nads towards your nose.

On reading the OOC text, Carver crosses his legs uncomfortably and tries to focus on getting the glitter only on the hat. Unfortunately, an ill-timed speedbump sends an explosion of craft supplies like a pixie orgy, coating the back seat and making Carver look less threatening and more like a novice joyboy.

So wrapping up another chapter! Probably good that this one fell on Christmas, since it's one of those dull, in-between chapters. Anyway, +1 karma for completing a chapter, +1 Christmas Karma (you may replace it with Hannukkah karma if you'd like, but you have to split the point up across seven days), and a well-earned +1 haberdashery karma.

GM gets 100k Proffessorland FunBucks for proper use of the word "haberdashery"