Runners
Thankyou aka Eckhard Roberts
Lafeyette
Ro Tain
Ortega

The team heals up in the underground bolthole they rented from the Captrenos head, Giada. Thankyou hovers on the edge of death, and takes a full week to recover, even with magical assistance. Ro learns some new skills and languages, impressing everyone with her mental acuity. Lafeyette flies in to join them, to help Tobias Cheney free Content Not Found: null, his oldest friend, from Saeder-Krupp’s clutches. He knows the facility he is in, they just have to get inside. Tobias will provide cover, and is arranging a way out for him and PHH after the extraction. He is paying them partly in nuyen or gear, and partly in an introduction to the Exchange, which he is looking to expand to more parts of the Earth.

They do some research and find that the SK building in question is completely smooth-sided, with no visible points of entry, and is located in the middle of a large minefield, ringed by a moat, with good sightlines and heavy surveillance/monitoring. They watch as a helicopter comes and hovers over the building for about 15 minutes and then departs. Unsure what to do, they contact Saul Chronic, who does some digging. Apparently, this facility is a weapons dev and testing spot (not surprising), and usually gets supplies/sends stuff out via chopper. However, they have been out of contact for almost a week (not uncommon, they only send out unimportant communication via wireless to avoid monitoring), and didn’t respond to the most recent shipment chopper at all. Also, they find out that the building morphed into its current form about the same time as the sale of the mellified man, but can’t figure out any connection.

They decide to go full pink mohawk, and blast & shoot their way through the minefield, before blowing open the building using plastic explosives. Hearing that an SK team is also on its way to investigate, they decide to hurry, although they hope to also turn that to their advantage, and maybe avoid getting on the corp’s bad side, if they can make it look like they were doing their work for them.

Runners
Thankyou aka Eckhard Roberts
Lafeyette
Ro Tain
Sem-par
Ortega
and introducing Barnaby “Wombat” Rudd

The team decides to finally take up Saul Chronic on the Istanbul artifact hunt job. While he was there researching his mother’s disappearance, a woman named Joanna Krstic contacted him based on his involvement in acquiring some artifacts in the past. She wants him to track down rumors of the impending sale of a mellified man in Istanbul, see if it’s real, and acquire it if so. She arranges transport for the team, and gets them a place to stay and a stipend, with a bonus for acquisition.

They start looking around, and Saul tells them to get in touch with a local contact, Barnaby Rudd, who is skilled at finding secret info. They meet him in the rare book bazaar, and he helps them locate the sight of the transaction. Apparently some Karavanli are coming into town and unloading a major artefact, but he can’t find who the buyers are, though there are reports of some well-armed out of towners wandering the grand bazaar, so TY and Ro go scout it out, while Lafeyette stakes out the sale site. Laf eventually spots some well-concealed mages and a spirit alongside a large crate, apparently waiting for buyers.

TY and Ro spot 2 different groups: a half dozen Kurds, under the leadership of a former Knight Errant subcontractor named Hamid, and a group of 4 cybered-up mercs who appear North Arican or Arabian. They track the cybermercs to a truck waiting nearby with 2 more inside, and based on their larger group approaching the buysite, decide these are the buyers. Rudd finds Hamid’s commcode and tips him off, while Laf trails the buyers after the transaction concludes. A massive gunfight ensues, tearing through the streets of the marketplace.

The end result is that the Kurds take out the cybermercs, seize the artifact, but are then ambushed by the other 2 cybermercs after Ro tips them off too. The Kurds are then set on by bug spirits, who burst forth from an underground cistern. They take the artifact back underground, and the Kurds stage a fighting retreat as bazaar security is closing in. The 2 cybermercs head after the spirits, while Ro calls in backup from Joanna. They chase the artifact through the ancient Roman sewers (Ro having tagged it with a tracking round), and find the cybermercs torn to shreds. The insects escape into the Bosporus through some connecting tunnels, and Joanna tells them to stick around while she sees if she can track down where they went. Lafeyette assenses Krstic’s team, and finds their auras extremely disturbing. The only lead they have so far is that Ro discovers that some ’Ndraghetta mafia were in town, asking after the artifact as well.

They do some background digging on Krstic, and find out from Jackpoint members that she is a high-level UCAS spook, and probably running it for someone else. The soldiers auras mesh with some rumors of a UCAS-affiliated special forces squad that some on JP think is composed of shedim. SP and Wombat hack into Krstic’s comm and get some info suggesting that she is working for Apep Consortium. They turn to JP again and find rumors that some high level Apep rep in the DC area may be a master shedim, and start to freak out a little.

Ro also hears from Hamid, who offers them 150% pay to work for him instead- he doesn’t want the insects to get it, and their team seems skilled, so he’d rather not fight them too. He agrees to help them double cross Krstic’s team as well. They agree, and Krstic flies them to GeMiTo, where she has tracked the artifact to a Fiere in Milan. She doesn’t seem aware of their impending betrayal. They scout out the market, and find that some of the underground tunnel system has been closed for the day- suspicious? There is also a Europol magical misuse taskforce shaking down talisleggers in the market- suspicious?

They make contact with Giada, a leader of the techwiz gang that runs the subway and arrange transport in for their team, Krstic’s team, and the Kurds, transport out for the Kurds, and a safehouse for themselves post-mission. They head over, and rendevouz with Krstic’s team, again moving with inhuman silence and precision. They find the artifact trade site, and open fire on a large group of orks (apparently fleshforms) and a human mage (wearing a Europol AMMA jacket). They take them out and turn on Krstic’s team as the Kurds help spring the ambush. However, they seem to see it coming and it devolves into a hardfought battle. If they are shedim, they certainly prove their reputation as tough fighters. TY is heavily injured and bleeding out, and one of the Kurds is killed, but they prevail, get paid, and the Kurds leave with the artifact, promsing to keep it secure.

The team tries to stabilize and heal TY, with some success, and check out the AMMA guy- he is bleeding out, and they decide to leave him to die. They hook up with Giada and try to heal TY, who barely pulls through due more to luck than skill. They hole up in the safehouse, and wait for the next job to come along.

Runners
Thankyou aka Eckhard Roberts
Lafeyette
Ramón Ortega
Sem-par
and introducing Ro Tain

The team gets the details on Thom Harrow’s hideaway, deep in the wilds of the Mojave. Jackpoint members have tracked him down and done as much surveillance as possible, including reaching out to the Old Man of the Desert to make sure that their mission won’t be seen as an intrusion. Their will be 4 teams going in on 2 T-birds, approaching on ATV’s and then on foot. They decide to wait for a massive sandstorm to roll in to give them better cover. Luckily, satellite coverage of the area is shit also. The 4 teams are the main team, and 3 support teams (2 riggers and a hacker, 2 adepts and 2 mages, and a 4 person merc team sent by Picador). A runner named Ro Tain will be coordinating the 4 teams from one of the T-birds.

They gear up and roll out, and arrive safely, in the storm. They approach what seems to be a small oasis after the mages scout ahead (1 coming back badly injured). They enter and encounter some barghests, which once defeated are found to have some surveillance gear implanted. So, cover blown, they call in the others and try to find Harrow’s base. They eventually discover a shaft hidden inside a tree trunk, as well as some vent pipes, and blow it open, which also handily vents the poison gas trap in the room at the bottom. They blow through another door and find that facility is pretty well trashed- decks, servers, and consoles destroyed, documents shredded and bruned etc. They push through, finding the top floor abandoned, and descend further. They find Harrow frantically disconnecting medical gear from a grotesquely mutated child. He almost kills Ortega, but him and TY manage to take Harrow out with FA assault rifle fire.

Sempar interfaces with the kid, who is sporting a massively oversized brain, and tries to figure out how to stabilize him, as Harrow seems to have disconnected him from vital supports. The rest of the team finds 2 dead techies in another room, and gets in another firefight with 2 DG operatives who are actively destroying servers. Ortega is nearly killed, and experiences another vision of a spirit telling him that this was his 2nd favor. SP, realizing that the kid doesn’t have long to live, manages to get ahold of The Captain, who agrees to try to pull as much of the dying kid into e-ghost form as possible. The kid seems to be some kind of bizaare bio-enhanced technomancer experiment, but SP gets some useful info: it seems that this branch of the Dawkins Group, under the direction of Ted McNicholson (surprise!), has been tracking and targeting runners, and Jackpoint in specific, due to their complete dislike for following trends. As one of the hardest groups to reach & effect, they are inherently a threat to Horizon’s goals (whatever those may be).

The other hacker finds a bit of data on the trashed servers, proving that they were keeping a close eye on a number of JP members, as well as numerous others around the world, and selectively leveraging info on those runners to others who are tracking them in exchange for various favors and trades. JP decides to keep going after McNicholson, and tells the team they’ll have more work in the near future. But first, Saul Chronic wants them to track down a mellified man in Istanbul.

Runners
Thankyou aka Eckhard Roberts
Serge “Castiron” Merkel
Ramón Ortega
Sem-par

Having received the intel on the GPS location, they arrange transport, using smuggler contacts to drop them off from a low-flying plane, and planning a ride out with a shipping contact of Erika Gwyn’s. After trekking across the shifting, stinking trash island for most of a day, they find a sprawling tent city settlement, labelled as Trashlantis. They see large posses of youth with Ak’s patrolling, seemingly the primary security (aside from the total geographical isolation). They also see evidence of aid shipments: UN and other stencils on crates, tents, etc. The town seems divided up amongst different national groups, almost all of them seemingly climate refugees from island nations and coastal regions. However, the camp seems unified under the security, which seems almost exclusively Carribean.

They eventually find their way to a food stand where they are greeted by a man who introduces himself as Assumpcio, & says that they are expected. He leads them out the back of the cafe shack, into a series of tunnels bored and fused into the heaping plastic mounds of the island. They travel a decent ways, eventually entering into a larger space filled with people workling at terminals and scratch-built ‘decks, while a fused, translucent plastic partition blocks them off from a humming server room. They are greeted by an older male ork, who introduces himself as one of the admin’s of Jackpoint and thanks them for coming.

He tells them that they are being hosted by a group called the Square Circle, a Carribean-based data piracy group. They had begun setting up op’s here as a backup when the new matrix protocols were announced, and were receptive to being one of JP’s hosts, for a time at least, to mutual benefit. To the job at hand: JP’s inner circle has traced the persecution (& death) of members to a backdoor very sneakily established late in Fastjack’s days. It was skillfully planted, seemingly with the aid of some technomancers, but not by Jack. They checked out all the new and recent additions, and a few stood out, a few of whom are relevant to the team. TY checked out, Lodestone seems legitimately dead (and the betrayals outlasted him), and that leaves Rooster.

JP wants them to check into Rooster’s current whereabouts and activities, and either check him off as a suspect, or confirm their suspicions. They track him to LA, where he has been healing up since the Gilgamesh Initiative job in which he lost all of his limbs. They get in with their gear, with the aid of Sonora, and she gives them some intel on Rooster, including a bar he frequents- he seems slow-moving and stiff, but still gregarious as ever, and has been telling many tales of the team’s adventures (although all couched in his usual fairy-tale skin). TY decides to stay in the car, fearing his easy manipulation, while SP sneaks into bar, CI makes the approach, and Ortega provides close support (as Rooster hopefully doesn’t know him).

TY parks nearby, and the team enters, although Ortega is quickly kicked out for possession of a taser. He rejoins TY in the car. SP surveils and begins hacking into Rooster’s comm(s) while CI makes the approach- Rooster is thrilled to see him and regales him with tales and anecdotes, but also connives to get his true purpose out of him, while bringing him to the back room. SP sneaks in alongside them, but bumps Rooster, alerting him, and more importantly, the other man in the room, who SP id’s as the man who has been paying Rooster’s bills: Thom Harrow. Harrow says that he regrets things went like this, as they had hoped to recruit some of the team, and tags CI with a playing card, hard- he seems to share a skillset. SP rushes up to attack with his monofil whip, but misses, and is quickly filled by Harrow’s combat axe. SP goes down, mortally wounded, but once again sees a spirit vision, telling them (in the form of a genie in their ARO game) that they have used their “2nd wish.”

Rooster flees the room, and CI pursues, felling him with a rock, at which time the crowd turns against him. Harrow rushes in and begins hauling Rooster out, while CI delivers a stirring speech to convince the crowd not to kill him- they don’t turn on Harrow, but they chill out. TY and Ortega race around to the front, just in time to see Rooster get sniped from somewhere, seemingly by a gauss rifle, obliterating his head and upper torso completely. Harrow quickly drops the twitching corpse and dives into a waiting car, which speeds off. TY and Ortega decide not to pursue, and TY drives around back to stay out of the line of fire, while CI quickly rifles Rooster’s pockets (after which another shot annihilates what remains of his torso, leaving essentially no flesh components to his body). Ortega dashes through and grabs SP, who seems remarkably stable, given the horrible wound.

They escape, and TY receives a message from Tobias Cheney, saying only “we’re square- T”, confirming his suspicions as to the ID of the mystery shooter. They report in to JP, and SP hacks the various comms that CI pulled off of Rooster while healing up over most of a week. The comms prove that Rooster was the traitor, although he seems to have planted the backdor unwittingly. However, he sold out Lodestone to people (or dragons?) hunting Order of St George members, in order to save himself (Harrow brokered some sort of deal). He also gave dossiers on a number of JP members and other prominent ‘runners, endangering their lives, and getting some killed. This was a massive betrayal, and the various deckers and techno’s loyal to JP have dedicated themselves to erasing all evidence that Rooster ever existed- the best punishment they can imagine for a man obsessed with his image and stories.

He seems to have been delivering all of this to Harrow, who seems to work for the Dawkins Group, a secretive infowar segment of Horizon. Based on work done on the recovered comms and on tracking Harrow, they believe his branch of DG is operating out of a secret facility in the Mojave. JP is planning an assault, and asks the team to join- they agree, especially after they are told that some JP mages are going to make overtures to the spirits there that told them not to work for Horizon (and to stay out of the Mojave).

Things have also gotten crazier in Denver: Jane & Ehran the Scribe seem to have barely prevented an allout war between Harlequin and Ghostwalker in downtown, which had been brewing through proxies for some time, since GW’s return- Jane thinks it has to do with Harlequin holding a grudge about the woman killed during the Watergate rift closing, which he seems to blame GW for. TY is so relieved to hear from Jane again that he barely even processes the insanity.

Runners
Thankyou aka Eckhard Roberts
Serge “Castiron” Merkel
Ramón Ortega
Sem-par
and introducing Lafeyette

The team heads to Vladivostok to begin their investigation. Atlas tells them that he has briefed a local contact with the intel they need, who should also have some useful gear and skills. She is using the name Jane Counterpoint. They arrive & meet up with JC, who tells them that Atlas can’t be directly connected, as they are getting involved in internal Evo Corporation power stuggles, and his boss wants their part to be kept secret for now. They are to infiltrate an Evo subsid, Presnya Financial Services, and run a program on the server there. Based on the info gained, there may be more work afterwards. Should be a low intensity job though.

They scout the place, and it seems like fairly standard security for a money management firm- tight but not first-class, and certainly beatable. JC secures an exit on the roof, while TY and Ortega wait in a hired car a few blocks away with assault weapons in case things go south. CI distracts the door guards (as well as setting off the door alarms) providing SP with the time to sneak in in their chameleon suit. They infiltrate up to the 2nd floor, stealing and copying keycards on the way. They manage to access the mainframe (which is more secure than they expected based on the physical sec), and sneak past the patrolling spider while running the program. Sadly, they are too distracted covering their tracks to also break the encryption on the program and see what its doing. It finishes running before SP alerts the host to their presence, and they sneak out to the 3rd floor, link up with JC, grapple down, and get picked up by TY and Ortega in the car. CI travels separately to avoid suspicion.

Atlas gets in touch after they send in the data, and tells them that there will be more work in town, as this seems to be only th tip of the iceberg.

They also have seen some news reports that the situation in Denver has been getting totally out of control- increased crime and mayhem as Aztechnology makes their move to get their slice back (as the “Law and Order” faction) during Ghostwalker’s extended absence. Rumors on Jackpoint abound that Jane has been sited there, in the company of an older elf (perhaps Ehran the Scribe), as well as a painted elf apparently being involved somehow.

The 2nd stage of the job finds them tracking down the woman who filed the papers of incorporation for a vending company that Presnya is funneling money too, which is an obvious front. After working through an elaborate ruse involving a 2nd woman of the same name and a false residence, they manage to track the real Vinetta Crosby to an office downtown. JC sneaks in, disguised as maintenance personnel, but fails to con the savvy Crosby and is tased into unconsciousness. Before their new friend can be hauled off by security, TY calls up Crosby (while SP skulks though her files), and arranges to come pick up JC and pay for some info, as Crosby seems not willing to die to protect it.

It seems that an Evo department head was using Presnya and the vending service to launder money out of Evo projects to add funding to her pet project: the Dickens Program. Doing some research, and discussing this with Atlas, reveals that this program is dedicated to invesitgating E-ghosts, a long rumored matrix phenomena, widely thought to be a hoax. However, Atlas tells them that they are very much real (at least since the 2nd Matrix crash, he’s not sure about the rumors preceding that), and that the Dickens program has resulted in some of them being decompiled- a permanent death for those living a solely e-life. He tells them that this is what Nikolai Morozov, his boss, needed to move against his rivals in Evo, and thanks them for their service.

He also tells them that if they wish to make a bit more money, they can go on a kind of virtual bounty hunt, tracking down and warning e-ghosts about the threat that the Dickens Program, and certain Evo factions, may present. They will be paid per signature confirming delivery of the warning. Using SYD’s knowledge, they manage to track down a half dozen e-ghosts living in a tribe in a bizaare, concealed code-cavern. They have had to relocate from their usual digs due to the new matrix protocols, but SemPar easily tracks them down- the team sees a nerdy, eager side to SP that they had not before witnessed. TY is weirded out and stays quiet, and it’s all too much for Ortega, who opts to pray in a corner in the Hamburg hideout, fearing the depths of the matrix almost as much as the bizaare slaughter plane.

SP bonds with the e-ghost tribe, lead by an entity called The Captain. JC manages to offend him, and is focibly ejected, impressing SP even further. They warn the tribe of the troubles, and TY is disturbed by the way in which they e-ghosts seem to view themselves as having transcended humanity, becoming something both different and better, as he is struggling to hold onto his last shred of humanity so hard. The Captain tells them that, through friends on Jackpoint , he has put in a good word for them, and that they should expect some work soon. SP couldn’t be happier, and they return to Hamburg to lay low and rest up.

JC re-introduces herself as Lafeyette, and asks if she can lay low in the hideout for a while, having recently been forced to flee the UCAS due to a bad courier run. TY and CI receive a long alphamumeric code in a private message from Jackpoint admins, and when CI shows Lafeyette, it unlocks a message in her data safe, which turns out to be a GPS coordinate. TY determines that it is a spot out in the middle of nowhere in the ocean, but after digging deeper finds that it is where a large, Texas-sized, floating trash island will be in 2 days time. They start arranging transport, and gearing up to go find out what this is all about.

Runners
Thankyou aka Eckhard Roberts
Serge “Castiron” Merkel
Ramón Ortega
Sem-par

SemPar joins the team in Lagos, where they are laying low after the debacle in Asamando. They help the secure the UN team’s safehouse while the team attempts to make secure contact with their superiors and file their report/arrange an extraction. They pay off the local area boys to act as additional security, and heal up. Needing both a ride for themselves, and some funds to complete their own safehouse in the Klabauterbund compound in Die Sickergrube, outside Hamburg, the team calls up Ehran the Scribe and agrees to take on the mission to close the astral rift to the Dark Realm, at the site of Zuberi’s former village, north of the Azanian border.

They load up on exlposives at one of Lagos’ open air arms bazaars and get flown to the site. On the way, they are briefed on the job: they are to protect the 3-elf former Tir Paladin team that Ehran has sent, while they perform the ritual to sever the ties that Qliphoth, the Dark Realm slaughter spirit, has made to this world. This should make it weak enough to “kill”, at which time the Realm should close, ending the blight it has brought on that region, and the longterm threat it poses. Also, Zuberi’s braindead body has apparently reawoken, perhaps possessed by his former master, and rampaged out of the facility, so he may be present as well. SemPar sets up a sprite-based ARO overlay to make it look like he is participating in a videogame to deal with their discomfort with the whole thing, as Castiron guilted them into coming.

They arrive, and the Paladins set up a ritual circle and begin. The team fights off waves of seemingly reanimated corpses (apparently Zuberi’s former village, oddly well-preserved), who seemingly kill Castiron and begin feasting on his entrails. The rest of the team enters the rift after the ritual is complete, and manage to kill the spirit using a massive shaped charge studded with grenades, which SP sneaks into position and TY sets off with a HEAP missile. Ortega, meanwhile, is cowering in fear while being crushed to death in a spirit tentacle and melted by acidic excretions. As the explosive dissolves the horrifiying visages of Qliphoth (which looks like each individual’s runners darkest fear as it turns its gaze upon them), they are all shunted out of the Realm, sustaining major damage. Ortega and SemPar both flatline, and TY is bleeding out.

Ortega, SemPar, and Castiron all have similar dreams in which they are approached by a trusted (and deceased) figure from their past, who tells them that they are now in its debt, for preserving their lives, and will be called upon when the time is right. They, and TY, awaken aboard a military transport, being tended by medical support with magical assistance from the exhausted and drained-looking Paladin team. Somehow, they all survived, although they are disturbed to think of how when they compare dreams.

They heal up and set up in Hamburg for a while, and accept a job from Atlas Park, which will take them to Evo’s hometown, Vladivostok, to continue the invesitgation into the death and digital replacement of Corporate Court Justice Hino.

Runners
Thankyou aka Eckhard Roberts
Serge “Castiron” Merkel
Introducing Ramón Ortega

TY and CI heal up a bit in Seattle before leaving some of the drones with SEATac Sweetie and hiring on with Nomusa Iblis to do some work in Asamando. They apparently want some friendly outside agents to act as watchers for the UN inspection teams (seeing if Asamando is fit to be recognized), and make sure they don’t get into any trouble, or see anything they shouldn’t. They fly over on a diplomatic flight, only to get rushed out towards a prison in the boonies, hearing that the situation has apparently gotten bad! They are to retrieve the UN team intact, if possible, while keeping them from seeing any undue violence, if possible. There will be a hazard pay bonus, but Nomusa won’t be joining them in the field, as he’s busy coordinating.

Ramón Ortega, having fled Bogotá during the Aztechnology crackdown, has hired on through an NGO contact to work security on a UN convoy heading into Asamando to inspect some secret prison facilities. The UN group splits into 5 teams to hit all of the known facilities, with 2 inspectors and 2-3 guards each. RO’s group has himself, 1 other guard, amd 2 inspectors in a small APC. They cajole their way into the prison past the civil militia guards, but the prison admins try to get them back out again. A military chopper eventually arrives and the prisoners riot, seeing that the UN delegation (their potential saviors) are being forced out. Ortega and the other guard hole up in a gym at the prison with the 2 inspectors and try to fortify, but the other guard is wounded in the fighting. Guards, soldiers, and prisoners are attacking one another, and the facility descends into chaos. They are having a hard time getting comms out, as they seem to be getting jammed.

TY and CI arrive, and drop onto the roof. They fight their way through the prison facility (pitch black, lit only by flashing “emergency” strobes), freeing some guards in the top level and killing some prisoners who attack them. CI has his feelings hurt when some of the prisoners call him a “pig”. They seem to be a surprisingly nationally diverse group, and the prison seems overlarge for how many people Asamando could possibly arrest, even with their draconian laws. They reach the first floor and end up in a gunfight with an Asamandan military unit who is attacking the UN position. With RO’s help, they are able to defeat them, saving the 2 inspectors. However, their comms are still jammed, and they hear a loud grinding noise, and notice on the blimp feed that a huge population of feral ghouls have been released (from somewhere) onto the prison grounds, assaulting everyone inside, as the military fires indiscriminately from outside the fences and walls of the compound.

The team finds that their fight has weakened a chunk of floor that seems to lead into some subterranean tunnels traversing the prison, and head down. Encountering large masses of ferals in the pitch black, they respond with gunfire and grenades, although they have to leave the injured guard behind to flee fast enough. CI carries one of the inspectors while the other keeps up on foot. They eventually see the mechanisms bringing the ghouls to the surface: some old mining elevators with meat bait above them, bringing one full load of ghouls up each trip. They descend further, deeper into the caverns and workings of an abandoned mine, which seems to have been used as a feral storing house. They eventually fight their way through, ascending a steep verticle shaft above a pile of broken feral corpses (they seem to be dumped in here), and climbing from there through the mineshaft proper to daylight. The UN team finally gets a satellite signal and calls in extraction from a local fixer, as TY and CI crash from stimpak abuse.

Innocent Dobiri lands in his bushplane and flies them out to Lagos, where they can lay low in a friendly aid office. None of the other teams seem to have made it, so presumably something went wrong at the other facilities too. Horizon is already spinning it as a coordinated prison riot by Azanian human supremacist gangs in the country’s maxsec prisons, with the UN loss of life being a tragic consequence. The 2 inspectors are quietly spreading their tale, while trying to stay hidden and not get killed. They split up to help. They pay the team a hazard bonus and provide medical. Nomusa is unreachable, and the team is told to stay out of Asamando for their own safety. Apparently the UN had some intel that when Asamando gained Corporate Court recognition, they made a deal to trade access to the country’s plentiful natural resources for a steady food supply: unwanted corp prisoners. As this violates the UN’s terms for admittance, they were curious to see if it was true, and it seems much worse: the feral ghoul population of Asamando is much higher that thought, suggesting that the transformation process is less stable than advertised, with a much higher incidence of feral-ness.

This was all too much for Queen Thema Laula’s heart, and she died on the way to address the nation about the “UN tragedy.” Her daughter, Rani Laula, ascended to the throne, eating her mother’s heart in a symbolic act, and declaring a period of mourning days equal to the years of her mother’s reign. Rani Laula also made clear that Thema Laula’s call for all ghouls worldwide to move to Asamando still stands, especially in the face of some of the recent “gossip and lies” being spread about ghouls- it is less safe than ever to be a small ghoul community, isolated from support.

The team feels distressed about the “true” nature of Asamando, and is also distressed to hear that there have been more incidents occuring to Jackpoint members, now including Lyran and Orbital DK, as well as the ex-member Riser (who was recently banished alongside FastJack and Plan9 for possible infection with…. something). TY is stressing out. However, they have a useful new comrade in Ramón Ortega.

Runners
Sem-par
Thankyou aka Eckhard Roberts
Serge “Castiron” Merkel
Rooster

The team holes up and heals in Seattle for a spell after the Patrick Henry Hughes extraction fiasco. TY gets a call from Netcat (through Jackpoint), informing him that she has finally tracked down one of the Gilgamesh Initiative sites referred to in the data from TY’s secret impant. They gear up and head out. Netcat has also made a deal for them: in exchange for passing the data along to a corp she is doing some work for, the corp will provide brand new experimental cyberdecks to the team’s hackers. TY and SP decide to bargain, with TY abandoning hacking to focus on rigging, and trading his deck to SP in exchange for SP’s combat drones, allowing SP to trade up to a better deck. In exchange, they will give the corp (they never ask who) access to all the data & tech they recover, as well as testing data and reports on ’deck functionality.

They reach the scandinavian fjord, and are dropped from a VTOL into the cold water aboard a small zodiac. TY drives it up the fjord, with SP scanning for nodes, and TY using radar sense to help avoid mines. They reach a small fishing village, invisible from satellite feeds, to find it a smoking ruin. About a dozen charred and melted corpses litter the area- it looks like white phosphorous grenades were used, as well as a high-caliber sniper rifle, and possibly an assault cannon. They find a secret entrance to the GI lab under one of the huts, after TY finds a disturbing message welcoming him as a “brother.”

They descend into a sterile, white lab hall, and find 6 doors, which they are able to ID using TY’s knowledge and Rooster’s stock of myths and legends. There is a main GI logo door, a Boedicca door, a Saladin door, a Wumu door, a Tamerlane door, and a Enkidu door. They start in the Enkidu room, that being TY’s codename, and he finds out both how he was assembled, where (here), and what happened to his village: he slaughtered them all, as his first test. They also find a little info on April O’Mally (Boedicca- she was “activated” by Halfman at Long Pig’s mansion, and has since “gone rogue”), and Halfman (Tamerlane- dead, but “being reactivated”). These 3 rooms are all somewhat trashed and rifled through, although the data is only damaged in the Boedicca room- SP manages to set off data bombs pretty much every time, limiting the knowledge they gain. They also find another melted corpse in the Tamerlane room, seemingly tipped out from the nearby healing vat- maybe they were regrowing Halfman and someone stopped them?

They exit into the hallway and come under attack from a ruthenium-cloaked troll-size figure emerging from the Wumu room. Rooster charges in and attacks with his weapon focus sword, and is almost instantly ko’d by a burst from Wumu’s auto-shotgun. Wumu then blasts CI and TY, while they return fire. Becoming desparate, they blast him with grenades, seriously injuring Rooster in the process. They eventually kill him, and he explodes, similar to Halfman. The explosion seriously wounds SP, and leaves Rooster missing all of his limbs, which are shredded to pieces.

They exit, with CI hauling the near-death SP and Rooster out just as water comes flooding into the explosion-damaged lab. TY finds another message asking if he found what he sought, and providing another set of GPS coords. They call for extraction, as there don’t seem to be any active defenses, and stabilize SP and Rooster (as best they can). SP pays for a short hospital stay (being low on money) before limping off to heal up on their own. Rooster gets some medical covered from the job (stabilization, etc), but will need a patron to help him literally get back on his (or any) feet.

The team discusses where to set up a safehouse (leading contenders are Hamburg, Seattle, and Hong Kong), and decide they may do more than one, as they can get away with a less fancy place without Rooster involved. They decide to contact Nomusa Iblis about his Asamando job next, to get some seed money.

Runners:
Rooster
Serge “Castiron” Merkel
Thankyou

The team hears of a few jobs: the Patrick Henry Hughes rescue, which Rooster pushes for, some work in Asamando for Nomusa Iblis, and the spirit killing mission for Ehran the Scribe. Nomusa says things are getting worse in Asamando, and Queen Themi Laula is rumored to be very ill and has not been seen in public in some time. Ehran says that, with some assistance from the artifacts, he has concocted a ritual to sever the slaughter spirit from the Dark Realm, limiting its power. He has also leanred its name: Qliphoth aka “The Tree of Death.” John Caruthers warns Rooster that he really needs the PHH job done like last year, & Rooster convinces the team to help, by arranging to sell PHH to Saeder-Krupp Heavy Industries, as his weapons knowledge from rival Ares Macrotechnology will likely prove of value to them.

TY also picks up some news on Jackpoint. It seems that Lodestone has likely been killed- a scouting balloon near Karavan was reported as destroyed in an explosion, with only a single male elf as a casualty, the other 4 passengers having been spirited to safety by an air spirit of levitation spell of some sort. Meanwhile, Rooster confirms that a massacre site in the NE UCAS backwoods outside of Montreal was the site of LS’ family compound. Although no bodies were found, the amount of blood and DNA evidence recovered suggests that they were likely all killed. The local cops have specualted on a crime connection, given many of the family members’ extensive rap sheets, but JP and other boards suggests draconic revenge. Rooster assures TY that he has also taken steps to distance himself, and it seems that TY faking his own death has held up (for now).

Distrubingly, there are also a number of JP members either reported as being on the run/in hiding, or out of contact, including Jane, Haze, Baka Dabora, Snopes and possibly others. Reports of some near-miss run-ins with trouble, and people on their tails have surfaced, and paranoia abounds. After losing a number of members in the Bogota debacle recently, and with Fastjack seemingly losing his mind (and currently blocked from the board) JP board members are feeling worried.

The team flies to Detroit, and meets up with some local mob (who luckily fail to recognize Rooster or TY as the guys who fucked over their affiliates in Chicago some months back). They get details on where PHH, do some scouting, and bust him out in a hail of gunfire after their subterfuge fails to get them in the door of his safehouse. He agrees to the “rescue”, grabs his go-bag, and hops in their waiting manacoffin. They ditch a tail via TY’s driving and CI’s grenade lobbing, and swap cars with none the wiser. They flee the walled-in portion of Detroit (“Aresville”) and Rooster bribes his way through the checkpoint, though due to CI and TY failing to pull off their parts sufficiently (or maybe too well, with CI imitating a terrible teenager), the border guard insists that Rooster pepper-spray them first, which he does. They retch, cry, and try to overcome disorientation, and head out into the go-gang turf outside to a private airstrip, where they hand PHH (still en-coffined) to the SK folks waiting, and hop aboard their escape craft: a Steelsky t-bird. Job complete!

Except that Caruthers is pissed to hear that Rooster sold PHH down the line, and tells Rooster that he better lose his number, as he has probably just fucked them both. Rooster gets a bad feeling thst Tobias Cheney might be gunning for him now… But, they got paid, and CI and Rooster both get some cool commemorative Qi focus tattoos. They rest up in Seattle and try to decide where to go next- sounds like somewhere in Africa is likely.

Runners
Thankyou
Rooster
Saul Chronic
Sem-par
Serge “Castiron” Merkel

The team has holed up in various squats and hotels in Hamburg while healing up from the dragon fight. They get some small in-town jobs from the local Neo-A’s and the Dutch Penose. Nothing too dangerous, just some smuggling and protection stuff, but it keeps them housed and fed while they are laying low for a bit.

News continues to trickle in from the outside world though:

1. Apparently a number of Jackpoint members were killed in the chaos in Colombia, including Black Mamba & Aufheben, and some other members are missing or injured. It seems like AZT got the jump on everyone, and hit pretty hard and fast. There are also some reports coming out about some unstable nanotech used in reconstruction efforts in warzones. but it’s unclear what is hype and rumor and propaganda and what is real.

2. Aztlan/Aztechnology has also moved back into Denver, with Ghostwalker yet to return from the rift. The Denver Treaty is up for renegoatiation, and it seems like AZT wants to get back in for good.

3. Lofwyr’s long awaited revenge on Hestaby (for destroying SK’s Dubai HQ, and possibly attacking him personally while he was fighting Alamais) has finally come about. Lofwyr seems to have been carefully positioning behind the scenes while staying publicily silent, and has managed to get Hestaby booted from the Tir Tairngire Council of Princes, as well as (more seriously) banishing her from her home on Mt. Shasta, and killing or displacing her followers there, as well as splitting up her hoard amongst other Greats. However, Lofwyr has also possibly lost some influence, having been replaced as Loremaster by Celedyr (although the rumors are that Lof ‘voluntarily’ stepped down).

4. Celedyr’s first act as Loremaster was to declare a moratorium on draconic ‘revenge’ killings of talismongers/leggers/mages/etc. After Dec. 26, 2075, all matters will be considered settled, but dragons have ’til then to take care of any necessary business. So, any members of anti-dragon orders might want to be especially cautious.

5. There are news reports of HMHVV sufferers having a harder time (for instance, worse effects from exposure to sunlight, needing to feed more), and more ghouls turning feral when they transform. Nomusa Iblis offers some insight into it, and tells the team that he may have some work for them down the line.

6. There seems to be something weird going on with Fastjack and some other members of Jackpoint, which culminates in FJ passing control of the board over to a trio of other hackers (Bull, Slamm-o!, and Glitch) and having his own access erased. This occurs after another user, Clockwork, calls FJ out on abberrant behaviour and releases some files he found that FJ had compiled, after which FJ reveals what he has uncovered in his investigation and signs off for the final time, calling on JP users to maintain the code and honor of the board. Apparently there is some sort of matrix or implant-related illness that has infected a few JP members (and others not on the board, likely), including Riser, Plan-9, and Fastjack. FJ says that he and Riser were exposed during a run on a NeoNet facility in the SW UCAS desert. With Plan-9, an implant addict and conspiracy theorist, it is harder to tell when. The illness seems to take control of the infected while they are unconscious, and act using their bodies (as well as their access codes and such)- how and to what end, no-one knows, However FJ wants to limit exposure to other JP-ers, especially after it seems that Riser (a well-known assassin, and member of the Smoker’s Club, as assassin team) has endangered some JP users. People on the site are understandably distressed by all this, and there are many touching tributes to FJ, as well as some cursing him for holding out for so long and possibly endangering them. FJ has also apparently managed to communicate to some degree with whatever is taking him over, and it seems to want to remove FJ’s personality entirely, in place of its own.

7. There are also rumors of some age-extension treatments and other advanced medtech going wrong, but as these usually involve corp of government higher-ups, or the extremely wealthy, it seems things are being kept hush hush. But could there be a connection? There are also some rumors coming out about NeoNet experiments with (or on) E-ghosts and AI’s.

8. Lastly, on Jan 1, 2075, Everyone wakes up to the terrifying reality of the new matrix protocols: corp grids go live, and hacking using existing commlinks becomes impossible. ’links still work to surf the public grid, but anyone who wants the fastest, highest quality matrix access will need to pay to upgrade to a better service, and anyone who wants to hack will need to cobble together a cyberdeck- there are some rumored prototypes in the works at various places, and some tips on JP for banging one together at one, for at least some limited utility.

Mid-winter, early in 2075, with the matrix all fresh and new, most of a year to dodge angry dragons, and disturbing rumors around the world. What better time to be a shadowrunner?

TY recovers from cybersurgery in a squat, after dropping a level of wired reflexes to gain more rigger abilities. CI and Rooster hunt human supremacists in the German forests. Saul does some oddjobs for SK. SP goes off to do whatever they do (break into people’s houses and eat their food and set up backdoor access for future thievery).