On The Run

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

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 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 fixes, and also that she wasn’t a Runner – 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!
 

Friends:    Smiley

Foes:   

World events: