First Run

On The Run

Runners: Ghost, Kitsune, Polo, Sirius, El Torro, Spirit, Blackout

Mr Johnson I Presume

The Runners each got a call from their fixer, Smiley, telling them he was putting together a team for a Mr Johnson for a Run. They were to meet the Johnson at the Infinity at 21:00 - as he rung off he told each of them to "dress like you know what you're doing!" After a bit of research they discovered that that Infinity was the current hot club downtown. And each of them went to acquire what they felt was appropriate clothing - most of them getting it wildly wrong!

That evening they headed off to the club, Polo politely joining the long queue that snaked round the corner and wasn't moving anywhere! Ghost, dropped a cool couple of hundred nuyen to the bouncers and got inside no trouble, Sirius went in via the back door, dropping 50 nuyen to one of the bar staff. Kitsune, spotting this as he went to join the queue, followed suit, while El Torro got in via the bouncers for considerably less than Ghost had paid.

Once inside the heaving club, where all the beautiful people disported themselves to the heavy beat of a DJ on one room and a live band playing in another, the Runners made their way individually to the bar and asked for Mr Johnson. One-by -one they were directed to the blue room - their commlinks automatically updated with directions and an access code.

One-by- one they arrived in the blue room, to be met by Mr Johnson, a troll in an extremely expensive suit sipping champagne. As asked politely where the seventh member of the party was - a Miss Polo? Realising that Polo had probably failed to get in Ghost decided to go and see if he could fetch her. Wandering outside he surveyed the crowd of bright young things in their swanky designer clubbing gear. Spotting a young ork female in a wildly inappropriate for this crowd, floral print dress - he too ka a punt and went up to her asking if she was Polo? When answered in the affirmative, he slipped the bouncers another 50 to let her in!

Once all were assembled, Mr Johnson told them what he wanted. His employer had had an old-style optical disk containing some rare music tracks stolen he wanted it recovered before it was sold-on and was willing to pay 10k for the simple "snatch and grab" job!

The Runners managed to negotiate an extra thousand nuyen for expenses and took the job! Now all they had to do was find out who was selling the hot disk! Ghost suggested that they go back to his place to compare notes. Polo offered them a lift which most accepted. On the drive back they compared contacts, quickly realising that none of them had any contacts in the music or entertainment business. Ghost however did know a journalist who worked on the Seattle Intelligencer who might "know someone who knew someone". Giving her a call, she promised to have a word with their entertainment correspondent next day . Unable to progress much further, the Runners retired for the night.

Next day about two in the afternoon, Ghost got a call from his contactat the Intelligencer. Their entertainment reporter, Smiffy had picked up a rumour that Nabo, an up-and-coming young ork rocker and his entourage had been out partying the night before and they had been overheard joking about a mysterious email and that "they didn't know Elvis was still recording!"

They quickly discovered that Nabo was actually playing a concert in the Barrens that night before embarking on a world tour, however the gig was sold-out and ticked were changing hands on the black market for over 500 nuyen! They took a quick run down to the barrens to the warehouse where the concert was to take place. It was already a hive of activity as the roadies were setting up and fans had already begun to gather!

Mosh Pit Mayhem

Polo parked the Nissan a fair distance away and while Ghost began trying to isolate the key wireless networks for the gig from the thousands in the area surrounding, the others went in search of ticket touts and to recce the area. Security was pretty high - although Lone Star were keeping well away, troll bouncers employed by Universal Simsense were maintaining some semblance of order as the swelling crowds thronged.

Polo and El Torro managed to get tickets fairly easily , through they had to pay way over the odds to get them. Sirius managed to get hers considerably cheaper by using an influence spell to persuade the tout to sell it to her at face value! They spent the next couple of hours mingling with the crow, buying "Nabo - World Tour 2070" t-shirts so as not to look too inconspicuous, while casing the joint.

Meanwhile in the back of Polo's car Ghost had successfully identified all the likely target networks. in the warehouse area. After browsing through the controls for the lights and sound system and the network controlling the security drones, he finally managed to locate and hack the ticketing subsystem and create new tickets for the runners and flashed the numbers to their commlinks. The others quickly flogged their legit tickets making a small (or in Sirius's case, a hefty) profit.

Getting in was then a breeze. The passed their hardware to Sirius who cast invisibility and snuck in , carefully avoiding the weapons scanners, the others used the fake tickets created by Ghost - which fortunately passed muster. Heading into the gig it was a cacophony of noise, their VR systems being constantly assaulted by merchandising offers from Universal. They met up a the bar, and as Nabo took to the stage began to plan their next move. The cacophony of sound rolled over them and the interior of the warehouse became one massive, heaving, mosh pit which Polo joined enthusiastically.

The back stage area was guarded by more of the troll security, Ghost tried to blag his way in by claiming to be from the record company, but the security guys weren't buying it. Sirius did however manage to get Polo an invite to the after-party by setting her up with the bass player. Eventually Ghost on scanning the area noted that several people in the mosh-pit were broadcasting RFID tags saying "All areas", and passing the word to the energetically pogo-ing Polo, they began trying to swipe them. Fortunately, in the frenetic mayhem of the mosh pit, their somewhat clumsy attempts at pick-pocketing went unnoticed and in short order they managed to obtain sufficient backstage passes.

Heading backstage, the activity was equally frenetic, if somewhat more controlled, as the technicians and record company execs did their thing. Security here was also noticeable. A quick assessment by the Runners showed that these guys,all orks, were pros not hired muscle like the trolls - probably corp. security from Universal Simsense. Body armour was clearly visible under the t-shirts and each carried a Cesca Black Scorpion machine pistol.

Up a metal staircase they could see three offices outside one of which one of the orcs sat on a rickety looking seat. Polo headed up towards him and began chatting him up. Distracted by the young orc female, the guard was far too slow to react to Ghost coming up behind him and pointing a gun at his head. The orc guard sensibly let them in, whereupon Ghost clubbed him senseless.

Inside the office - set up as a makeshift dressing room, there was booze, and other stimulants, all over the place! As they burst in, a young orc and two scantily clad orc girls looked up from the couch they had been "resting" on. The Runners quickly assessed these three half-naked youngsters would not be a threat - primarily because they were completely off their faces and giggling inanely!

While Ghost kept an eye out for anyone heading their direction and Polo kept an eye on the kids just in case. EL Torro and Sirius searched the room - finding Nabo's commlink under the couch! Having retrieved what they came for, they quickly left! As they passed through they mosh-pit they distributed the backstage passes randomly starting a minor riot as nearby moshers realised what was being passed out. As they left the venue, Ghost commed the fake ticket numbers to random people in the crowd, causing a stampede for the entrances.

Once safely back in the car, Ghost began flicking through the mail on the commlinks. He quickly found the message they were after as well as a few pieces of juicy paydata he flogged to Smiffy. Once back at his pad, he began tracing the source of the email which someone had tried to cover by using a series of blind nodes, however he finally managed to trace it back to someone using the handle Zipper.

All Your Base Are Belong To Us

The Runners were joined by Blackout and Spirit, whose own lines of enquiry had proved fruitless. While, Sirius made bacon sandwiches for everyone in the kitchen (after making free with his beer supplies), Ghost constructed an email to the mysterious Zipper saying he was interested in the disk. With minimal effort he managed to spoof sending it from Nabo’s account and sat back waiting a reply. After a couple of hours, having drunk most of his beer, the group began to split up – Spirit, Polo and Blackout heading to their respective homes while the others decided to crash at Ghost’s place.

Next morning, while the others went about their normal day-to-day stuff, Sirius hit the streets checking with her contacts to see if anyone had heard of the mysterious Zipper. In parallel, Ghost prowled the matrix looking for any datatrails Zipper might have left behind. By the end of the day, both had hit some paydirt! Ghost had worked out that Zipper was in fact a hacker not a fixer, and also that she wasn’t a pro – she was tagging sites that she’d hacked with her handle like it was all a big game.

One of Sirus’ contacts – a street snitch – came through with the info that a female hacker named Zipper hung out somewhere called Code Cascade. Ghost recognised the name as that of a hacker joint in Renton where the serious gearheads, hackerz and geek grrls hung out. After meeting up, the Runners decided to head down to see if they could find Zipper. Polo gave Ghost, Sirius and El Torro a lift while Spirit said she would cycle the 12 miles - Blackout and Kitsune decided to take the bus!

The Code Cascade was a geek paradise, full of ancient hardware rubbing shoulders with the latest tech. As the Runners passed the doorway, with the exception of Ghost their commlinks were simultaneously hacked and a list of useful utilities (with download links) to patch vulnerabilities in their systems. After ordering drinks – served somewhat incongruously by Robbie the Robot - they approached the bartender. Pretending to be corp. security types they asked for Zipper, who was duly pointed out to them.

Zipper, tuned out to be an attractive spiky-haired dwarf of Amerindian-Asian extraction. Pulling their corp. security routine again they initially got nowhere until Sirius used an influence spell to get the hacker to accompany them. Bundling her in to the back of Polo’s car, they drove round the streets for a while putting the hard word on her. Sirius even triad a mind probe, but got little other than an impression of the girl's trepidation and faer. Eventually they succeded in convincing her she was in way over her head! She told them she had been asked to route the emails anonymously by a friend of hers – a local bar owner called Loomis. She also told them that as well as the spurious expression of interest from Nabo sent by Ghost, two other anonymous parties had expressed an interest in the disk.

Dumping Zipper out on the street, the Runners made their way to Loomis’s bar – the Coda. The place was a real dive, chipheads squatting outside and pools of vomit in the doorway. While Kitsune went round to check out the back, the others went into the front door. The clientele of the Coda were real quality, various lowlifes, chipheads and gangers. Approaching the bartender – an ork – they asked for Loomis, only to be told they’d just missed him! Spotting a doorway behind the bar, El Torro barged his way past the barkeep – who cried out in panic grabbed a baseball bat from beneath the bar and swung it at the street sam!

Bar-room Blitz

The barkeep soon realised the error of his ways, as El Torro swung round and proceeded to beat him to a pulp.

The gangers (whose colours identified them as the Renton chapter of the Thrashers) in the Coda’s clientele reacted angrily; surging to their feet and grabbing pool cues and bottles a couple pulling switchblades. The other, less violent patrons of the bar made a rapid move to the exits!

The barroom brawl that ensued was fairly brief - brought to an abrupt end when Sirius hit one ganger with a stunball, Blackout tasered one and Ghost pumped a three-round burst into a third. Somewhat stunned, the remaining Thrashers took to their heels and Spirit swiftly locked the doors behind them. The runners then began to search the bar and the upstairs flat in peace, however it quickly became apparent that neither Loomis nor the disc was present – the bartender had been telling the truth.

Somewhat deflated, Spirit, Blackout and Ghost headed out the back fire-exit. El Torro dropped down to the alleyway below from the kitchen window while Polo clambered out onto the fire-escape. The fire escape overlooked an alleyway and the junkyard next door.

Kitsune, having got the word that Loomis wasn’t in the Coda, moved from his hiding place near Loomis’ car. After pumping a couple of rounds into the tyres he headed up the alleyway. As he neared the main street, he spotted a hole in the perimeter fence of the junkyard. Acting on instinct he moved stealthily through the gap, only to stagger in pain as the glowing orb of a powerball spell slammed into him. Kitsune threw himself to the ground, taking cover near a rusting pile of cars, and calling out a warning to the others - Loomis was apparently a mage!

Up on the fire-escape Polo observed the powerball appeared to originate somewhere from the northern end of the junkyard and from higher ground – possibly atop one of the piles of cars.

Junkyard Blues

As Polo hastily commed a warning to the others, they began converging on the hole in the junkyard’s fence Kitsune had gone through. El Torro was first up, taking cover behind the pile of neatly order rusting cars. As the others followed through, the street-sam cautiously edged his way round the rusting cars trying to make out Kitsune’s position where he lay sheltered underneath an old Westwind. Unfortunately for El Torro, the spellslinger was waiting and launched a lightning bolt straight at him – fortunately El Torro’s heavy armour absorbed most of the damage, but he still staggered from the hit and headed for the cover of the cars!

Polo from her vantage point on the balcony managed to track back the source of the lightning bolt to a crane on the far side of the yard. Sirius, pausing only to cast greater invisibility on herself, and seeing what had happened to her colleagues, decided to go the long-way round the yard, keeping a large pile of cars as much as possible between her and the mage in the crane. Blackout, wisely, decided to follow suit. As Polo clambered down the fire-escape and ran to join her friends, Kitsune and El Torro, began worming their way through the piles of cars.

As Sirius glided invisibly between the piles of scrap, she heard a sound from up front of her. She could see two men carrying torches in one hand and what looked like tasers in the other – they appeared to be searching the piles of scrapped cars for something – or someone! Using the advantage of her invisibility be began casting stunball spells at the confused pair as her colleagues manoeuvred into positions around her. El Torro and Kitsune emerged from their spelunking expedition in the piles of cars – EL Torro moving round to where Sirius was and the badly wounded Kitsune heading for the hole in the fence to make her way round the outside perimeter.

As one of the two went down unconscious, the other began speaking urgently into his comm., before he too was stunball-ed into unconsciousness. Polo who had just managed to negotiate her way through the junk to where she had line of sight on the crane was rewarded by the sight of the mage – another ork – clambering out of the cab and begin climbing down the ladder. Polo quickly squeezed-off an explosive round into his back, causing him to lose his grip and crumple to the ground several meters below. Sirius began searching the two unconscious goons, while El Torro moved further into the yard – almost immediately running into another of them who squeezed-off a shot at him. Though wounded, El Torro managed to return fire, hitting his opponent hard. Blackout then moved up silently and tasered him into unconsciousness.

Round the other side of the junkyard, Kitsune found the main gates open; the padlock on them had been cut. He moved across the small car park to the office. Peering through the window in the darkness he could see a figure cowering behind the desk and called up the others, who were administering first-aid to their fallen opponents.

It was the unfortunate Loomis hiding in the office. The club-owner was terrified out of his wits and eventually agreed to part with the disc for a couple of hundred nuyen.

Back in Black

Having recovered the disc and sent Loomis on his way, the Runners retired to their various abodes. Next morning a little snippet on the news caught their attention - the noted record company A&R man Darius St George had been found dead in his limo outside the Infinity nightclub. To their dismay they recognised the pictures of St George accompanying the story as being of Mr Johnson!

Later that morning the call went out to meet at Blackout’s house in his gated community in Bellevue. Kitsune and Ghost didn’t show up, but the others began to discuss the way forward. With Mr Johnson dead, they weren’t going to get paid, and they couldn’t find a buyer unless they could find out what was on the disc – unfortunately none of them had any gear that could play the damn antique! Fortunately Blackout remembered the piles of antiquated hardware at the Code Cascade. Spirit, Blackout and Orion piled into Polo’s car, while El Torro fired up his bike and they headed on down to geek-central.

Once there, they looked up Zipper who introduced them to her friend Sumo – a pimply skinny kid with an antique pair of glasses perched on his nose. Between them the two geeks managed to rug up some gear that would play the disc only to discover it had been encrypted! They then managed to somehow connect the ancient disc player to a commlinks which allowed them to transfer it so Zipper could run it through some encryption algorithms. She managed to crack the first level of encryption but told them there was a second layer that she couldn’t touch – they would need the key! The encryption they had removed allowed the files to be played, albeit in lo-fi quality. The music was a mix of ballads and rockers, Blackout recognised the sound as that of JetBlack the legendary angst-rocker who’d died back in ‘48. This was borne out by the cryptic inscription on the disc “JB- Carrion sessions ‘48” though what it meant by “for enlightenment seek absent friends” wasn’t very clear. What was clear however was if this was a lost album by the rocker recorded weeks before he died, it could be worth millions!

The Runners immediately began some leg-work, discovering what they could about JetBlack, and any reference to “Carrion”. They found out loads of info on the dead rocker including that his best buddies were in a band called The Shadows. They also discovered that Carrion Studios had been a hot recording studio back in the day and decided to pay the studios a visit.

They headed out to the address of the studios, finding the building was now derelict and boarded-up. Judging by the noise, there was still some activity around a stairway leading down to the basement where a peeling sign on the stairway proclaimed “Healy Productions” obviously someone was still using the facilities as a recording studio. Heading down, they were “greeted” by a bored-looking dwarf receptionist, who looked blankly at them when they asked about Carrion Studios. Fortunately however, the janitor overheard them and was more than willing to talk about the old days over a cup of java.

The janitor, Stan and Blackout got on like a house on fire, the old orc telling them that in his younger days he’s been an assistant recording engineer. He’d never worked with JetBlack however, and knew nothing about the sessions. He did tell them there was a ton of stuff from the old days in a store-room at the back which they were welcome to root around in.

The searched the store-room, after a disposing of a pack of devil-rats that had nested there and eventually located a box of record chips from the old studios for 2048. Taking the chips back to Blackout’s place they scanned through them – finding the studio logs that cover the sessions, they discovered that the JetBlack sessions all took place late at night and only one other person was present in the studio - the recording engineer, Delphia.

The Blue and the Yellow

With the only clue left to them - the recording engineer Delphia, the Runners began trying to track her down. Using Blackout’s lounge as a base of operations Ghost began trawling the Matrix – unfortunately even after hours of exhaustive research he came to an end. Delphia was one of the best sound engineers in the business back in the day, supposedly a particular wizard with simsense, however to all intents and purposes had dropped off the grid back in ’61 round about the same time Carrion studios had gone bust, though he did find some information that Delphia may have had a BTL problem. Spirit meanwhile, took a run out to investigate JetBlack’s grave finding lots of fan tributes, graffiti and flowers but not much else. She persuaded one of the guys in the office (with a little nuyen incentive) to check the records and discovered the maintenance on the grave was paid for by a company called JetBlack Enterprises. Reconvening back at Blackout’s they pooled what information they had. Ghost did a little more digging into JetBlack Enterprises discovering it was a holding company based in New Jersey who administered JetBlack’s posthumous royalties on behalf of his estate.

Next morning they decided to pursue a few more lines of enquiry. Sirius hit the streets checking out her contacts with local law enforcement, Ghost tried his contacts at the Seattle Intelligencer while Spirit and some of the others checked out whether Delphia had really dropped off the grid and was now hiding in the down and out community. Eventually Blackout and Ghost independently got leads that led them to the charmingly named Jimmi-the-Fix, a BTL dealer Downtown. Jimmi-the-Fix told them that Delphia now went by the handle Lady Blue and was producing and dealing low-level BTLs out of an apartment in the Barrens.

Heading down there, they discovered the apartment block was guarded by gangers, While El Torro and Ghost and Sirius stood watch, Blackout went to speak to the gangers. Meanwhile Kitsune, Polo and Spirit went round the back in case of trouble. Blackout schmoozed his way past the guards and into a meeting with Lady Blue who, especially after the gift of an expensive bottle of wine, was more than happy to talk about the “old days”. She thought she might be able to put them in touch with someone who could help but she wanted a favour in return – the Runners to pick up a package for her from a Mr Lo, to which Blackout agreed.

The package was to be picked up from the Lotus Card House, which Polo advised was a front for the Yellow Lotus Triad. Again while the others took up position outside Blackout went in – this time accompanied by Polo. Once inside they were subjected to rigorous scrutiny by the Triad enforcers before being allowed to meet Mr Lo and collect the package. As they left the Lotus Card House, Sirius and LT who werr parked on LT’s bike up the road, noticed some activity in a van with blaked-out windows parked across the way – activity that looked suspicously like they were being photographed.
Ghost picked up Blackout and Polo in the car and headed back towards the Barrens. Sudenly they noticed that they were being followed. Swapping places with Ghost, Polo took the wheel. She made no attempt to lose the tail, but started dropping off the others at various locations before heading home. Blackout and Spirit stopped off in a restaurant and had a meal checking out they weren’t being followed before heading back to deliver the package to Lady Blue. Lady Blue was delighted and in return told them that Marli, one of The Shadows, and JetBlack’s best friend was still alive and in the city , and if anyone could help them, she was the one.

A Grave Encounter

Next morning, spurred on by Spirit and Sirius, the Runners headed out to Richmond Height to try and get to see Marli. The reclusive singer’s house looked like an archetypal spooky mansion - like something out of a storybook - and when Spirit peeked astrally she could see ghosts wandering about in the grounds. Although for a spooky mansions there was evidence of seriously high-tech security and surveillance gear in the grounds – including patrolling drones. They didn’t have much luck on the intercom when trying to get to see the singer, but Spirit left a note in the mailbox – referencing the “absent friends” inscription from the disc.

That evening, while some of them were hanging out a Blackout’s (as had become custom). Spirit received a call on her commlink. It was Marli- and after things had been explained to her, the singer agreed to meet the Runners in the morning.

Next morning they were greeted by the reclusive singer in the ornate hallway of the mansion – although Spirit, Sirius and Kitsune realised that were actually talking to a very sophisticated hologram. Marli asked to hear the disc after which she toild them that although she couldn’t decrypt the disk, she knew someone who migth be able to help them out.

That evening, Spirit receioved another call – this time the vouice weas male although she recognised it was electronically synthesided asking to meet at midnight to discuss the disc. Spirit recognised the adrress given for the meeting place as the cemetary Jetblack’s grave lay in.

Heading down to the graveyard. The Runners split into three groups. Spirit, Polo El Torro headed directly for Jetblack’s mausoleum while Sirius, Blackout and Ghost styed by the car with the disc. Kitunse meanwhile tagged along behind, ghosting silently from gravestone to gravestone.
Spirit and the others were met by a tall leather-clad woman accompanied by an elf and a human, both armed, who stepped out from behind the mausoleum. El Toro, working on thermographic noted that none of the three exhibited any heat-signatures.The wman greetd Spirit and suggested that Kitusne may wish to step out from his concealment – she had somehow spotted him despite his stealthy approach!

The woman introduced herself as Risa, saying that she represented Jetblack’s interests and was prepared to offer the Runners double what Darius had offerd them orginally for the disc, plus another 5000 nuyen each hushmoney. Spirit gone on the comm and checked everyone was happy to acept the offer. As she did so a hail of gunfire suddenly erupted from the darkenss, cutting down the woman ah her two colleagues. Almost simultaneoulsy back at the carpark, there was the unmistakable “whump” of a grenade launcher and the hire-car they had travelled in exploded. Sirius, Blackout and Ghost threw themselves to the ground as burning fragmetns of car fell around them. The bad guys were making their final throw of the dice!

All hell broke loose in the graveyard as the Runners returned fire as their shadowy assailants. Two more leather clad figures leaded out from behind the mausoleam, moveing with preternatural speed and throwing themselves at the assailants - teeth bared to reveal long fangs.

As the bullets flew,Sirius began casting manaball spells as the assailants moved towards them firing off another grenade in their general direction as they came. As Spirit crawled forward looking for cover, she noticed the the woman d the two men who had been apparently mown down, suddenly leap to their feet, also baring long fangs as they ghosted into the darkness, joining the battle.
Eventually the Runners began to get the upper hand, aided by what they now knew to be vampiresas, the balance of the combat swiftly swung in their favour and one-by-one their assailants went down. Once the combat was over Risa happily exchanged the disc for a certified credstick.

Friends: Smiley ; Jetblack

Foes: RentonThrashers

World events: