Emergence - Hot property

Dirty Pretty Money

Emergence - Hot Property

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

Hot Property

Another normal last-day-of-the-month in Seattle – wet and dreary and the bills are due!

Round about mid morning the Runners were pinged by Smiley on their commlinks - an invited to a VR conference at midday. Everyone turned up more-or-less on time – though Spirit had a few problems logging in through the layers of encryption. The environment was decked out like a cheesy lounge with a VR construct of Liberace playing a rhinestone encrusted piano in the corner. Smiley breezily asked if they liked his new secure environment, explaining that if anyone bothered to hack the meeting they’d never believe anything serious was happening! Somewhat unconvinced, the Runners asked him to get on with it! Smiley seemed in a good mood, and his persona’s foot was tapping in time with Twelfth Street Rag as he told them he’d scored a “proper” job for them with one of the corps. If they pulled this one off successfully the Runners could be in for a series of corp sponsored Runs – where all the big nuyen came from. After they told them they were interested he said he’d arranged a meet for them with the Johnson at 3.00 at the Truman Building in Downtown.

At 3.00 it was still raining as they exited an elevator on the 42nd floor - proudly proclaimed as the home of Truman Distribution Networks features production unit! As they were escorted down a carpeted corridor their commlinks were bombarded with offers of updates on the latest Hot (and not-so-hot) Truman shows, as well as “feature-rich” apps complete with messages from the show’s sponsors. The immaculately suited young man who had met them at the elevator, showed them into an office at the end of the corridor. Behind a desk Ms Johnson rose to greet them – offering refreshments. She quickly got down to business telling them the job was to head down to LA an baby-sit a chummer called Frederick Grumm at the Downtown Marriot , keep everything low-profile for a couple of days before delivering him to their studios in Denver where they were shooting a documentary he was appearing in. The offer was twenty thou apiece for a couple of days work. They took the job - Kitsune tried to negotiate an expense account but unfortunately didn't’t get far!

As they headed back out down the corridor, Ghost logged-in to the Seattle air portal hosts and booked flights for everyone but Blackout, who said he’d make his own arrangements – preferring to travel Business Class. Polo made a call to her armourer to find out where they could source some “supplies” and was given the address of “The Body Chop” in Wilshire Boulevard– just ask for Skeeter! Spirit, meanwhile suddenly realised she didn't’t have a fake Sin – however a quick call to Smiley soon sorted that, albeit she had to pay over the odds to get one in place before her flight that evening.

At nine that evening they cleared customs in LA, their first visit to the City of Angels and the Pueblo Corporate Council, unlike Seattle it was hot and steamy. Orion hired a SUV and they headed on down the freeway. As they headed downtown, Ghost called ahead to the Marriot and booked rooms for himself, Blackout, Orion and Spirit. The others decided that the Marriott was a bit to expensive for them so she them off outside the Wilshire Motel.

Once they’d booked in to their various rooms ( or suite in Blackout’s case) they wandered round the hotel. The Marriott was hosting a convention of the Transhuman League, and Spirit noticed with some dismay that posters everywhere proclaimed the keynote speaker the following night as - Frederick Grumm - so much for keeping things low profile! Back at the Wilshire , nothing much was happening so Polo took her skateboard and went to scout the area, LT and Kitsune headed across the street to the Bar ’n’ Grill and settled in for the evening. At the Marriot the convention delegates were getting into the swing of the evening’s festivities. All kinds of genetic enhancements, augmentations and body modifications were on display ranging form the strictly functional to the strictly bizarre. Spirit and Orion mingled with the crowds soaking up the atmospheres and trying to get a sense of the event. Ghost meanwhile spent some time surfing the local matrix nodes trying to pin down any paydata on Grumm but finding nothing of interest.

Eventually he headed down to the bar and asked around there before being pointed in Grumm’s direction. Grumm, a perfectly normal looking elf, was deep in conversation with a good looking young woman who’s press badge identified her as Marilyn Barr from MCT Entertainment. Ghost butted in on their conversation and finally managed to get Grumm to show him what he was about – he was a technomancer.

Blackout meanwhile, went on the pull!

Wining & Dining in LA

Next morning after breakfast, Spirit and Sirius shadowed Grumm as he went round the various morning seminars at the convention. Meanwhile Kitsune, Blackout and Ghost checked out the auditorium where the keynote speech was to be held making sure there were no snipers secreted anywhere or explosives packed under the stage!

Around lunchtime Blackout and Ghost headed off to meet Polo and LT at The Body Chop, where they successfully negotiated the purchase of some ordinance from Skeeter, after which they all headed back to Marriot to prepare for Grumm’s keynote speech after dinner.

As the auditorium began to fill up, the Runners took up strategic positions around the room. When Grumm stepped up to the podium and began to speak they scanned the audience anxiously but there seemed little sign of trouble. LT noted that Marilyn Barr was seated in the front row, directly in front of the podium. Fortunately the speech went without incident. About three-quarters of the way through, Sirius noticed that Barr got up to leave and commed Kitsune to follow her. She went up to her room before emerging about half an hour later dolled-up to the nines. Kitsune followed her down to the foyer where she stood waiting outside the auditorium. Five minutes or so later Grumm met her and the two got in a waiting taxi and sped off into the night.

Somewhat panicked by this unforeseen turn of events, the Runners scrabbled around to react. LT and Sirius headed to the underground car-park and fired-up the hired SUV. Ghost went online and immediately began hacking the taxi company trying to find out where the cab was bound.

He managed go get into the cab company’s GPS tracking system an located the cab heading for Beverly Hills. From inside the system he sent a priority call for a cab to pick up himself, Polo and Kitsune and they sped off in pursuit. Blackout meanwhile, flashed the cash at the reception desk and discovered they had called the cab and it was bound for Tedescu's - a swanky restaurant downtown. While Spirit disappeared upstairs to put her glad-rags on, Blackout then laid out an even more obscene amount of cash to secure a table for him and Spirit and called a cab, telling the others by comlink of Grumm’s destination.

Ghost continued tracking Grumm’s cab via GPS as they headed out - the cab was now heading toward the airport. He passed the info to Sirius and LT who decided to continue following the cab towards the airport just in case. The cab containing Ghost, Polo and Kitsune arrived outside Tedescu’s a few minutes later. Realising none of them were dressed appropriately for trying to gen into the LA’s most exclusive restaurant, Ghost took up position outside while Polo and Kitsune headed for their natural territory of the back-alley. Ghost tried to see if he could track Grumm’s comlink – but the folks at Tedescu’s obviously too their privacy seriously the whole building was shielded against wireless traffic. A few minutes later Blackout and Spirit turned up and breezed into the restaurant. The restaurant was dark and tables sufficiently spaced to give an intimate feel, the AR overlay being fed into their commlinks flashed-up the idents of those sitting around who wanted to be noticed. They were given a table near the bar and Blackout anxiously scanned the crowded restaurant, approvingly noting the locations of several simsense starlets, before he breathed a sigh of relief as he spotted Grumm and Barr sitting near the far wall.

He was just starting g to relax as he contemplated the menu being fed into his comlink, when suddenly all hell broke loose. Grumm lurched to his feet, clutching at his throat, while Barr pulled a gun from her clutch-bag and pointed it at him, just as four armed and masked men crashed through the kitchen doors. Simultaneously, the light’s went out and the AR overlay squelched out an excruciating burst of white noise. Blackout and Spirit hit the ground and he desperately tried to push out a message through the noise to the rest of the team outside. As he was desperately scanning for any leak in Tedescu’s defences, he was surprised when the firewalls suddenly crashed under a welter of feedback. Running the noise through his best software Ghost managed to isolate Blackout’s call for help and passed the word to the others, before drawing his gun and heading for the front door.

Out on the freeway, Sirius executed a u-turn and she and LT began screaming back towards the restaurant. In the alleyway out back Polo and Kitsune started heading for the back door of the restaurant, just as two cars screeched to a halt at the end of the alleyway. Polo began rolling a large wheelie bin in front of the door – only to be greeted by a blast of shotgun fire. Kitsune launched himself forward up the alleyway throwing himself forward into a dive and rolled under the car, just as a second blast slammed into Polo, wounding her.

Back in the restaurant chaos was ensuing as the screaming patrons headed blindly in a panicked mob towards the exit. The unknown assailants seemed to be having some trouble securing Grumm and Blackout crawled forward on the ground and picking up a steak-knife from a table launched it in the direction of Barr’s voice, she retaliated with a blast from her gun, the muzzle flash illuminating the scene briefly. Spirit made her way round to the exit, heading for a fire-extinguisher on the wall there just as Ghost came in.

To Live and Die in LA

Outside in the street, Sirius brought the SUV to a screaming halt and LT deployed into the crowd of diners fleeing from the restaurant. Sirius stayed in the vehicle, keeping the engine running in case a swift exit was required. Inside Ghost was peering into the darkness driving the image enhancement on his cybereyes to the max and wishing he’d paid extra for the low-light or thermographic add-ons! In the darkness he could just make out a cluster of figures on the far side of the room. Blackout meanwhile dived over the bar taking cover there as one of the assailants, a dwarf and therefore unhampered by the lack of light, moved to intercept him.
Dobrescu's

Out in the alley, Polo was in trouble. She was trading fire with two street-sams who had emerged from the kitchen, to investigate the gunshots. In the exchange of fire she was badly wounded but not before she took one of them out. Kitsune meanwhile rolled out from under the car and fired off a round at the head of the driver – wounding him.

Back in the restaurant, LT crashed through the doors and joined up with ghost, trading fire with the three bad guys in the room. Ghost managed to take down Barr easily as she wasn’t wearing any armour, but the other two proved tougher opponents. Suddenly, however, one of the bad guys collapsed to the floor screaming, Grumm had managed to bypass the street-sam’s firewall and send a screeching burst of biofeedback through his cyberware. As he did, the street-sam who had downed Polo appeared at the kitchen door calling on his boss to abort as it had all gone so badly wrong. The dwarf female decided discretion was the better poart of valour and headed to the kitchens, LT and Ghost in hot pursuit.

LT crashed through the kitchen door - into a hail of bullets. behind him, Ghost received an urgent plea for help from Grumm. Suddenly all the lights came back on as the technomancer slumped into unconsciousness. Calling on Blackout to help him, Ghost followed LT into the kitchen just as the dwarf tossed a CS grenade at his feet. The CS gas gave slowed up him and LT long enough so that when they crashed through the back door into they alleyway they could only watch helplessly as the bad guys piled into to their waiting vehicles and speed off into the traffic. Kitsune, spotting Polo lying bleeding in the alleyway, dashed forward, dragging out a medi-kit to administer first aid.

Back inside Blackout checked-out Grumm discovering that he was out could – obviously he had been slipped a sedative in his drink! With Spirit’s help he dragged the unconscious technomancer out into the alley, instructing Sirius to bring the SUV round. To the sound of sirens blaring in the distance, they piled into the SUV and sped off. As Sirius navigated through the traffic towards the freeway, Spirit began casting Heal - first on the badly wounded Polo and then the others who were wounded.

Time For a Swift Exit

As the SUV cruised the early evening traffic, Sirius asked the others where she should head. Blackout eventually suggested they head back toward the Marriott in the absence of any other ideas. Kitsune noticed that Grumm appeared to be in a bad way, sinking into unconsciousness and running a fever. He and Blackout did what they could to make him comfortable in the back of the car. Ghost meanwhile was buried in the commlink he'd filched from Barr and was trying to hack through it's encryption.

When they arrived back at the Marriott, Polo, Spirit, LT and Ghost remained with the SUV in case a quick exit was required. they supported Grumm in through the foyer. Blackout managed to convince the desk staff that the technomancer had imbibed a little too much and they were taking him upstairs and managed to get the door-codes for his room. As he did he got a call from Ms Johnson informing them she was aware of the situation and doubling the money if they could still get Grumm to Denver on schedule.

Kitsune took Grumm up to Blackout's suite while Blackout and Sirius headed down to Grumm's room to retrieve his gear. As they approached the door, Sirius noticed that it was slightly ajar and warned Blackout, who ghosted (somewhat noisily) to the far side of the door and, once Sirius was ready, threw it open. There were two thugs armed with silenced flechette pistols inside who appeared to have been interrupted in the process of packing Grumm's gear. A combination of manaball spells from Sirius and a couple of blasts from Blackout's taser soon took them down.

Up in the suite, Kitsune listening to Grumm's mumblings as he dropped in and out of unconsciousness realised that the technomancer was trying to tell him that he'd been dosed with nannites and he was trying to suppress them transmitting his location. At the same time he received a call from Ghost who'd managed to crack the encryption on the commlink. Barr it appeared was part of a strike team from Horizon - and given Horizon virtually owned most of LA they were likely in serious trouble. It was only a matter of time before they were tracked here.

The quickly vacated the Marriott and took to the freeways. They stopped briefly at a 7-11 to pick up supplies - including several rolls of tinfoil which Kitsune wrapped round the unconscious Grumm to help block any transmissions. They decided that it would be best to head underground - Sirius pointing out that LA had a rather spectacular network of storm drains. Kitsune pointed out that given there was only one scheduled flight to Denver next day, which might be a bit obvious, they should make alternate travel arrangements.

On their way to the storm drain network they stopped off at the Body Chop and had a word with Skeeter. With the help of the fixer they made arrangements to fly out of Ontario on a cargo flight, next morning at 10.00

They settled down to wait in one of the larger storm drains, however in the small hours, Kitsune was startled as Grumm suddenly went into a series of convulsions. He woke Blackout who ran some diagnostics using his medikit. The medikit informed him that the technomancer's heartbeat and blood pressure were extremely low but that this brain activity had flat-lined - which the bio-monitor helpfully pointed out meant that he was technically dead - except for the part where he was still breathing!

The monitor also helpfully informed them that Grumm's Doc Wagon implant had been activated and that medical help was on the way. Cursing fluently, Blackout told Sirius to get moving - the last thing they needed was a Doc Wagon High Threat Response team in their face! As Sirius guided the SUV along the culvert, Blackout borrowed Kitsune's combat knife and (somewhat nervously) cut the implant out, tossing it out the window.

They decided to cut their losses and head straight for Ontario - arriving just a dawn began to flush the sky. Grumm seemed no better, despite the stim-patch they'd applied after the meatball surgery. Ghost speculated that Grumm's damaged psyche had taken refuge in the Matrix and volunteered to go find him and bring him back.

Blackout managed to blag his way past security on the gate and they made their way towards the hanger where a faded notice proclaimed the name "Chuck Airways". They waited for a couple of hours - hoping that the tinfoil and the airport radar systems would mask any transmissions from the nannites.

Eventually their pilot - Chuck himself - appeared. A few hundred extra nuyen from Kitsune persuaded Chuck that he needed to make a "emergency takeoff" - despite the protestations from the control tower that they only had protocols for "emergency landings"

Just as he was firing up the engines - a crashing sound nearby announced the arrival of another Horizon strike team, firing wildly from a couple of black vans. Chuck immediately gunned the throttle and headed for the runway, pursued by the Horizon team who were in turn being pursued by airport security. In a hail of bullets Chuck managed to take off - narrowly missing a plane that was trying to land at the same time - and they headed towards Denver and safety.

Friends: Sebastian Grumm

Foes:

Horizon

World events: Rumours of the existence of Tecnomancers begin to permeate the Shdows. Several major corps begin to take notice of the potential threat - and opportunity! Several corps including NeoNET and Horizon set up research programmes into the phenomenon.