Tepha raised her glass and clinked it to Rez's.

"To old times."

She took a sip, letting the bubbles tickle her tongue and savoring the fresh squeezed taste before swalling.

"That's an interesting story..."

She went on to talk about how she had met Captain Ledo while he was enjoying the celebrity life of being a war hero. How she had convinced him to explore the stars and skirt the line between law abiding and not and make some real money and see all the stars had to offer.

Ledo had brought on Rig as an engineer but they had needed someone to fill in the rest of the gaps. Move cargo, clean the toilets, gun down anyone who looked at them funny. Rig had been the one that had brought up Silver and next thing you know Silver was the muscle of the group.

"She's a really good shot. I've seen her kill about a half dozen people already. Pirates and assassins so far but even if she is drunk or high all the time she gets the job done. She's saved my life a couple times already. How about you, what have you been up to?"

In reply to Silver (msg # 71):

The Net seems to take a step back.  The posts start to trickle in, mostly running like

That was a prank?  What the hell kinda prank was that?

Ahhhh!  He got you haters gooood!!!

What?  No he didn't.  It wasn't that good a prank.

I did kinda like the Mommy took my gun stuff though.  The little Nero bobble head icon in diapers was cute

Oddly, Nero's numbers spike to a little higher than usual.  Most of the comments are along the lines of buying into it being a prank though not a very good one.  There does seem to be a core though who take his side.

And then this post comes up:

Whether it's good or bad, no one muscles into our turf!  This is your notice:  The BUGGA BOYS R COMIN' 4 U!!!!!

Then the comments and numbers really spike.

---

Rez chuckles.  "Yeah.  Well.  Silver is definitely a bad ass.  I'll give her that."

He's right about the sole.  It's like eating real butter.  Even the salad is delicious.

Rez listens, asking an occasional question or two, but he seems to mostly be absorbing.  But then he says,

"So you've had smugglers an' assassins, huh?  What you're basically sayin' is that your back in the Life, right?"

He refills Tepha's Mimosa.  "Don't take this the wrong way.  I'm only askin' cos we're old friends.  But...are you really cut out for the life?  I know you had a taste when we were together.  But I didn't let you see everything.

"I'm not trying to say you're weak or such.  But there's a reason Silver and I are the way we are.  Do you really wanna end up like us?"

Nero can't believe his good luck. Maybe it was the alcohol talking or the afterglow of a handy or the rush of playing with guns but he was feeling on top of the world. It was finally happening, his chance to go viral.

Nero tapped on that comment to pin it to his feed and recorded a short reply.

"Uh oh...PRANK WAR! Stay tuned Nero-Knights and Bugga Boys, because it is ON!"

His mind was racing with ideas but it was time to get to work.

"BB! I NEED YOU!"

It had been a tense series of negotiations but BB had ended up walking away with another ten grand and a mission. Truth be told as annoying as it was to have to prepare for a prank war at least she was being paid a hefty fee and failure wouldn't be particularly lethal. It gave her a chance to keep her tactical mind in shape and gave her something to do without being too high of stakes.

Plus she had regretted not tackling that flasher when she had the chance and maybe now she would finally get that moment to make some tweenager piss his pants with a gun barrel pressed against his temple.

BB took the money Nero had given her to fortify their room. She went to the nearest electronic shop and picked up a batch of surveillance bugs to set up around the hotel and prepare her stakeout.

With a grin she also swung by a weapons shop and picked up a chainsword. Nothing like hearing that rev up to loosen some punk kid's bowels.


OOC: Purchasing the following with the essentially 15k Nero just dropped on her.

x6 TL11 Bugs         - 1800
x2 Comdots           -   20
Personal HUD         - 1500
Chainsword           -  500
TL 12 Holo Projector - 2000
TL 12 Laptop         - 1000
Intelligent Interface-  100
Recon Expert Software- 1000
Security TL 11       - 1000
==============================
                       8920cr


In addition she'll make a tactics roll to set up the cameras. Covering elevators, stairwells, their doors etc.


13:47, Today: BB Nova rolled 7 using 2d6.  tactics.

Tepha's eyes narrowed. He might say that he wasn't but he was definitely attacking her credibility and she took umbrage to the thought she couldn't hang with the rough stuff. It was more true than not which might be why it stung so much and put her defenses up.

"The difference is that I'm not a naive young girl anymore. I know what I'm getting into and get to say what we do and how we do it. When we were together would you have listened to me if I had tried telling you how to run guns? Besides the goal is just a bit of light smuggling and trading, maybe the occasional heist if a target presents itself. No turf wars...and hopefully no bloodshed. It hasn't quite worked out that way but at least I can say that everyone we killed had it coming. Scum of the galaxy and everyone is better off without them. The moment that no longer becomes true is when I'll reconsider things but until then...it's been fun. Terrifying at times, horrifying at others but it turns out I'm a lot tougher than anyone thought, and a lot better at this life than everyone gave me credit for. I'mm not just a pretty face you know."

Tepha

Rez doesn't have much expression as he listens to you.  Or he does.  It's his 'negotiation' face.  Rez can be as expressionless as Silver can be expressive.  If it wasn't for the physical resemblance and propensity for violence, you aren't sure anyone would mistake these two as siblings.

"I never thought you were just a pretty face.  Ever. So don't think that at all."

He tops off both your glasses, finishing the mimosa pitcher.

"I hope things keep going smooth for you then.  It's just been my experience that when they go spinward, they go spinward hard, fast, and before you can even register they have.  Killin' someone who deserves it is easy.  Killin' someone who doesn't..."

He shrugs.

"I hope you don't ever find yourself in that situation.  That's all I'm sayin'.  If you do, just do whatever you have to to survive.  You can work out the morality later.

"Not that I'm one who can preach.  I'm gettin' outta the Life."

He grins.

"For real and for true this time.  I just finished my last deal.  When I leave Wyltz tonight, I will be a regular citizen.  Well.  A very rich one.  And one who knows where a lot of bodies are buried.

"I'll be honest.  I was gonna ask if you wanted a lift off world.  But it sounds like you're happy.  Good.  You deserve it.  Believe my sincerity or not.  But you do.

"I do wanna ask one favor though.  Can you keep an eye on Silver?"  He frowns and studies his mimosa, then downs it in two gulps.  He wipes his chin with the back of his hand.  "She's not as tough as she thinks she is.  Hell.  Nobody can be that tough."

---

Rig

The lines of code are starting to blur together.  You shut your eyes just to relieve some of the strain.  Whoever built this virus knew what the hell they were doing.

The bug in the ferret/cat thing Tepha brough aboard is one nasty piece of work.  It doesn't destroy anything per se. Instead it attacks defense barriers.

It's like AIDS for computers... Fritz opines.  Honestly, I'm kind of scared to even have a copy in contact with this...

And it's true.  Fritz had downloaded a copy of himself into the test environment to handle the bug.  And it had been a nasty shock.  The infected version of Fritz would have to be deleted.

What's weird is that I'm not finding any attack program inside this.  It just seems to be geared towards taking down defensive barriers.  I'm not sure it would work very well against a data maze or the like.  So it can be defended.  What's more interesting is that it doesn't seem to have a vaccine.

Which is true.  None of the potential vaccines you've tried work.  It seems once a system is infected with this, the only options are keep the system live and hope that it never gets attacked by something else, or flush the whole system and reboot it from square one.

On the plus side, programming the hijacker has been a breeze.  That's ready to go more or less.  You do need to test it in a safe environement.

What next Engineer Rig?

Tepha gave Rez a nod.

"Yeah, sure thing. We'll keep her out of trouble."

Rig wiped his eyes, trying to will the focus back into them.

"Alright Fritz, how does this sound. We combine KittyKat with a standard ransomware virus we can pull from the any number of sources. Hit the system with this to take down their defenses and then encrypt all of their files and demand payment for the decryption key."

He paused and considered the tiny toy they had picked up the virus from.

"Also who in the hell puts something like this on something like that? Ledo said they picked it up at a carnival? That might mean this thing is everywhere and nobody knows it yet. Anyway we sell this and the ransomware to OLF anonymously. We can then contract out anonymously to the OLF to get it installed onto the auditing system. We can use Bixby or some other source to get access to their system and let this do its work. Everything is scrambled unless you pay X to the OLF or whatever demands they want to make.

Only problem is OLF doesn't actually get the decryption key. Files are never unscrambled, or some of them never do. The only thing they get is the altered betting list that shows us putting hundreds of thousands of credits on the winner. Everything else is essentially garbage until it can be decrypted in what...a million years?"

He tugged at his beard in thought.

"Alright we need to get information on what kind of system the audit company is running so we can do a test run on a virtual environment..."

Tepha

Rez walks you down to the hotel's lobby.  He makes a few words of farewell and waves at you as you step out of the doors.

The dome is just about to hit 'mid-morning' hours.  The lights are brightening and the temperature is slowly being adjusted upwards.  The streets are in a slow lull.  It's between the morning hour commute and lunch time rush.

As you are crossing the street to get to the tramline back to the low port, a group of men suddenly rush out into the middle of the street.  You hear a few other pedestriants gasp, and someone screams, "OLF Attack!"

But the men just stop, turn around, drop their pants, and moon everyone at the intersection.

One of them holds up a handheld cam and shouts out, "YOU ALL JUST GOT BUGGA'D BY THE BUGGA BOYS!!"

The men then pull up their drawers and scatter into the crowd.

---

Rig

That could work, Fritz says after some thought.  I can look on the nets for some sample malware products.

He comes back with a list of one hundred twenty six variants after a few minutes.

There are a ton of bugs floating around.  Just on the general net.  It must be due to the Shrimp Fest.

Speaking of.  We will need to move on that.  The race is set to start in two days time.

I would suggest you recommend to Captain Ledo that he needs a team to meet with this OLF contact that Silver came up with.  And also a team to reach out to Bixby to see what we can learn about the audit firm.  Depending on their security, we can try a hack.  But I would recommend a physical intrusion.  It is less likely to leave a trail than a digital inquiry and hack.

---

BB

You watch the mooners disperse.

It's odd you happened to catch the incident.  You had just come outside to the balcony to 'think' (get away from Nero), and just happend to glance down.

You saw the group of guys run into the middle of the street and moon everyone.  Someone yelled something, but you are too far away to hear it.  Though you would guess it had something to do with 'Bugga'.

The room is on the corner of the building.  One of the walls is a picture window and is pressed up to the side of the dome.  It's an open view into the ocean.  The balcony is on the outer corner, curving around, so you have a view of the street below.

Other than room service carts, nothing has come in or out of the room.  And the carts all appear kosher.  No unpleasant surprises except for how expensive a lobster roll is.

Below, out in front of the hotel, there's another commotion.  A limo is pulling up.  There's a rush of pedestriants, which from the video cams that come out, you realize are press.  From out of the limo pour forth four girls in skin tight plasticene dresses.  They're surrounded by body guards and management looking types.

Didn't Perine say something about some musical group coming to stay?  And aren't they supposed to be your neighbors?

Tepha furrowed her brow and shrugged. Kids being kids she guessed and headed back to the ship. The meeting with Rez hadn't gone quite as she had expected but it was probably for the best. A pleasant chat with old friends, a promise to look after his sister.

With everything on her mind she barely even noticed the pranksters as she headed back to the docks.

Rig nodded and then immediately felt stupid. Fritz was a computer on an interface. While he probably was using the cameras to watch him he should probably say something.

"Yeah, my thoughts exactly. We can have the girls meet with the OLF and Ledo and I can work on Bixby. In the meantime find the best bug out there and get it pulled into our little package."

BB glanced over at Nero who was busy talking to his phone followers again. Should she tell him? She thought about just keeping quiet but then the thought of her flush new bank account flashed in her mind. The more money she could milk out of him, the quicker this whole galaxy tour thing would come crashing to an end.

"Hey Nero. I think that band is here...Pany Paws."

She dropped the grenade and leaned back to watch the show.

Pany Paws? Pany Paws!


"PANY PAWS IS HERE! Oh shit! Oh shit..."

He paused, looked at his feed and then smiled.

"Later, I've got a party to go to!"

He killed the feed and went back to freaking out.

"Alright...okay. I need to get in that room. I have to seem cool but not lame. I can't be desperate. Alright...I can do this. HEY BB! CAN I BORROW YOUR CHAINSWORD"

The glare from BB in response said absolutely the fuck no.

"Okay...plan B. Got it..."

He ran over to the phone and called up room service. Booze. Lots of booze. All the booze.

Silver and Tepha

Olga is pretty easy to track down.  She's not even using an alias this time.  Her name is listed in the Hotel D'Orman's registry.  Room 702.

The two of you arrive just as some limo is pulling up to the curb.  Suddenly it's a nuthouse.  Reporters and cam bots come rushing out of the crowd and start click, click, clicking away.  The limo doors open and out come four overly plastic-surgeoned nymphs in plasticene clothes so tight they could be painted on.

I will leave it to your discretion as to whether Silver or Tepha recognize the Pany Paws.  Think of them like a K Pop band in this era.  Their biggest hit is 'Don't Afterburn My Love'.

I'm assuming they have not tried to call Olga yet.  Let me know how they want to handle the approach.  Call her from the lobby?  Try to run in her accidentally?  Etc.

---

Nero and BB

There's a ring at the suite door.  A tired looking busboy is pushing a cart loaded with liquor bottles.

"Is this enough Sir?"

While the busboy pushes the cart in and sets it against the window, through the open door you can both see a middle aged man dressed like he's still in his teens walk up to the door.  He seems to be fiddling with the retinal scanner that will allow access.

He's got an attache that has the Pany Paws logo on it.  He vibes 'manager'.

---

Rig and Ledo

Bix calls back an hour later.  He pops on the screen, almost a literal talking head in a field of inky blackness.  He's gone somewhere and activated a call scrambler.  Anyone listening in won't know where he is or see him too clearly.  They shouldn't hear you at all.

Bix looks nervous.  He wipes some sweat off his chin.

"Shit. I wasn't expecting you to call me so soon.  I was at work.

"I got a little info from an auditor.  They're actually gonna create their own database, then copy it four times.

"Each page from the bookies will feed into one of the databases at a time, then the database will send a copy of that new bet to the other three.  Apparently someone tried what we're tryin' last year and it almost worked cos the bets flowed through one central database to the others.  They almost didn't catch it.

"The other thing is each database has it's own encryption key.  So if a bet is logged that doesn't match the key from one of the databases, it's gonna get tossed.

"I can't get my hands on the keys.  The audit firm is keepin' those under wraps.  Just cos there's not enough bad news, they're gonna finish building and distributing the databases tonight.  The databases will go live in the morning.  Betting starts at noon."

Let me know what questions there are about all that

Bix takes a deep breath.  "I did get the names of two of the auditors who'll have copies of the databases.  I'll leave a hard copy with names and addresses in a secure locker at the port.  Here's the locker number and combo."

There are two names and addresses.

Adele Ofenharm

Galagh du Broxen

Their home addresses are listed.

Tepha and Silver just shrug as they make their way around the celebrities and their entourage/groupies. Neither of them had ever heard of Pany Paws so it didn't register as anything important.

In the lobby Tepha went up to the front desk with a pleasant smile while Silver lurked an alcove somewhere out of the way.

"Hi, I have a friend staying here. What's the extension to dial directly to a room?"

Once they had it they booked a table at the hotel restaurant in a private booth and Tepha dialed up Olga's number.

"Hello Ms. Hykwar? I have a business proposition for you that I think would be most profitable however time is of the essence. If you could, please come down to the restaurant and meet me at my table..."

Tepha gave the location of where they were sitting. The two were dressed so as to appear as any other ordinary tourist attending Shrimp fest. With a trained eye someone like Olga would probably note that Silver was working bodyguard duty for her "client", Tepha. The hope was everything would appear to be standard shady black market sales of arms to terrorists, nothing out of the ordinary there.

BB's eyes went wide but Nero just nodded.

"Yeah. Great!"

Nero then waited by the door, listening to wait for Pany Paws to get to their floor. BB silently pointed out that she had the floor wired with cameras so Nero shifted to just watch the laptop screen instead.

His plan was simple. Wait for Pany Paws to get to their room and then push a cart full of booze to their doorstep and try and talk his way inside with the promise of tons of alcohol as his ticket for entry.
This message was last edited by the player at 20:18, Thu 06 Aug 2020.

Ledo was talking things through with Rig to make sure he had the whole plan square.

"Alright so here's the plan.

1. Tepha and Silver sell our virus to the OLF and leave it up to them to attack the bookies as a whole.

2. We're going to check out these auditors and see if one of them is bendable, one way or another. I think we just straight up offer them a bribe. We warn them of the OLF attack, make sure they're copy is isolated from the others so it doesn't get corrupted. In exchange we get them to insert our fake bet using their encryption key. They end up being the hero of Shrimpfest and getting huge amounts of praise for saving the betting and foiling the OLF, we make a killing on the side.

3. We do what I proposed originally. We each make a bet or two for 100 credits on various racers so there is an easy and early entry in the database for us to hijack.

4. At the time of the race the OLF strike scrambling the bookie systems with the virus. Everything is borked except low and behold the auditor's database copy experienced a lucky glitch, maybe he was in a tunnel or dropped it so it went offline before the attack. Sure it might miss any last minute bets but the majority of transactions are authenticated and usable.

5. Between the race winning and the authorization of the winnings we use the authentication key to adjust the amount on our bet.

6. The race gets authenticated, our bet gets processed and we get out of dodge.

As an alternative if the databases or OLF screw up, we have a backup of the virus we can use to just directly plug into Bixby's system and steal the race organization's cut of the profits. Not as great but hopefully the OLF still takes the blame.

Does that sound about right?"

In reply to Ledo Typhin (msg # 87):

Rig and Ledo

It doesn't take much to scout the two auditors.  They are both working in the same building and both are oblivious to any kind of tailing activity.

Adele looks like the definition of 'spinster'.  She's middle aged, prim and proper, with thick glasses that have to be for show.  Who doesn't get their eyesight corrected these days?  Her robe is business proper.  She'd be pretty if she let her hair down.  Instead, she's got it in a bun so tight, it practically pulls back the skin on her face.

Galagh is a pudgy man of about the same age.  He seems to sociable type.  He greets everyone on his way home.  He's got a wife and two kids.  There's even a robotic dog jumping up and down at the window, following it's 'welcome master' home subroutine.

After they get in, Galagh seems to settle in for the night.

Adele comes out after about an hour.  And she's no longer very proper.  She's let that hair down, and traded in the business appropriate dress for a little black not at all appropriate dress.  Her heels are probably higher than the span of either of your hands.

She seems to be making her way to a night club.

---

Nero and BB

It takes about ten more minutes, but finally the elevator at the end of the hall dings.  From it pours a security detail that comes down the hall, making sure to check all avenues.  The elevator is descending.  The Paws must be coming up next.

Wasn't sure if security being there first might change Nero's plan.  If not, let me know and we will proceed

---

Tepha and Silver

The woman on the other end of the comm elects no video.  Her voice is thick, like she's been asleep or has a head cold.

"Who is this?"  She listens then says, "Alright. Give me twenty minutes and I'll be down."

She must be putting on more than her make up.  About fifteen minutes in, Silver spots a guy coming in who reads thug life.  He's got an ex military gait, scars and tats, and is paying so little attention to your table, it's suspicious in and of itself.

He walks by, sits at a table a little ways away, and pulls out a personal comm.  He must be texting Olga, because two minutes later, she comes strolling in.

Olga looks good.  Real good.  Whoever her plastic surgeon is, he's earning his creds.  She could mistaken for a high schooler if not for the cleavage and slinky dress.

She slinks up to the table, a all purpose smile on her face.

She touches her ear when she gets close to the table.  Whatever the signal means, nothing happens.  Olga smiles and sits.

"Well.  And who do I have the pleasure of talking to.  Hmmm?"

Ledo had Rig keep an eye on Galagh for the evening just in case. A family was a lot of leverage but not one that Ledo wanted to use right off the bat. Meanwhile he decided to follow Adele and "bump" into her at the night club.

Nero knew the drill: it was lame to show up early or be too eager. He was going to let the Pany Paws get into their room and settled for a minute before showing up with the booze cart.

Tepha smiled and glanced at Silver.

"Call me Ms. Gold. I happen to be in a business of acquiring things and more than that finding people who want the things that I have. I believe you may have contacts with a certain ecological organization that would be very interested in gaining some leverage over the local government in order to protect the environment and I believe I have both the tool and the plan to make that happen. Time is short, however. It's an opportunity that requires swift action before it is gone."

In reply to Ledo Typhin (msg # 89):

Tepha and Silver

Olga cuts a glance at you Silver, then settles back on you Tepha.

"Is that so?  Well that sounds interesting and all officer.  But I'm a good law abbiding citizen here for the Fest.  I really don't know what you are talking about.  But I wish you luck with that.

"Is there anything else?  If not, I'll be going."

---

Nero and BB

The Pany Paws arrive in order.  The stroll down the hallway like they're on their way to a fashion shoot.

That is until that manager, who's standing at the door of the suite, says, "Relax.  No cameras around."

All four ladies suddenly seem to sag.

One of them moans, stretching her arms over her head.  "Damn.  I can't wait to get outta these heels."

From amongst the crowd comes a huge sound Phhhhhhhhp

"Oh gross Besa.  Go back down to the lobby and air out before you come in."

"Don't be mean! I couldn't help it!"

They and their entourage pile into the suite.  Except for two large guys who scream security.  They stop outside the suite door.

Nero, you push the booze float down the hall until one of the security goons holds up a hand.  "Can we help you?"

---

Rig

These guys are so domestic, they make cloistered religious sects look untamed and free.

The whole stake out is going along like a night with insomnia when you notice something:  the same gray van has now passed the house four times.

It does the same thing each time:  it drives up, slows down like the driver is looking for something, than slowly accelerates away.

The windows of the van are tinted.  So you can't see who is inside.

---

Ledo

The Boom Chukka Chukka turns out to be as cheesy as the name suggests.  It's a big night club with lots of flashing lights, tons of booze, and lots of people desperate to get laid.

Adele is apparently one of them.  She isn't meeting friends.  Instead she manages to grab a  spot at the bar and sits down, trying her best to look like eye candy.

As you figure out your approach, you notice a guy who's watching her pretty intently.  He doesn't seem like the usual hound though.  He seems more...precise in his bearing.

Tepha gave Silver a glance and Silver gave a nod. Slipping around the booth to the other side to suddenly trap Olga in she slipped out her pistol jamming it into Olga's ribs.

"There, see? Now it's entrapment. Also we ain't fucking cops so cut with the bullshit and give us the name. We're trying to make a shit ton of credits in a short amount of time and don't have time for this bullshit. And if you cut the bullshit, you can get yourself a nice fat cut as well."

The whole time she was speaking she had her eyes on Mr. Bodyguard making sure he kept seated.

Across the table Tepha went pale at Silver's sudden burst of action. They hadn't exactly set up contingency plans ahead of time and this wasn't exactly what she had in mind when she signaled for Silver to handle things.

Nero put on a facade of being hurt.

"You don't recognize me? I'm fucking Nero. THE Nero. Anyway I had a ton of extra booze lying around and figured the girls in there might like a bit of R&R if you catch my drift. I figured it was only neighborly to share."

Rig had an idea. It was probably a stupid one but he had a hunch he wanted to play out. The next time grey van swings by Rig will pull out in front of it suddenly hoping to cause a minor traffic collision.