Dramatis Personae
Runners
Lodestone
Rooster
UltraBoy!
Tobias Cheney
Thankyou
Atlas Park

While still on the way back to the city from the launch platform, Daedelus contacts Tobias and requests that the team investigate the recent Turing Army assault on it’s warehouse combpound. Daedelus saw it coming, but was surprised at the ferocity and sophistication of the attack, and wants to know who is backing the TA financially (or operating under their name). Tobias agrees, and the rest of the team goes along, although Lodestone is still freaked out about working for a free AI with unknown goals.

Tobias also receives a call from Patrick Henry Hughes, who seems mightily distressed. It turns out that the satellite that they just stole and launched was owned by an Ares subsidiary, which the team didn’t investigate at all. Also, Ares investigators have determined that both an Ares HERF gun and an Ares Thunderstruck Gauss rifle were used in the truck hijacking. And, knowing that PHH recently sold a HERF gun and gauss supplies to a runner contact, they have been pressuring him to bring Tobias in. PHH subtly hints that the line they are speaking on in being monitored, and that T SHOULD NOT come in, were that not obvious. Tobias says he will be there shortly, hangs up, sells his apartment, and prepares to abandon his former life.

After thinking if over a bit, and talking with Daedelus, T decides not to try to rescue PHH at the moment, as it seems near impossible, and perhaps not necessary. Atlas also thinks it unlikely that PHH will be killed, probably just demoted and kept under guard. Daedelus agrees to try to pull any possible strings to help, but warns Tobias that it could end up burning him. Tobias accepts the consequences.

The team then investigates the attack. After Rooster sweettalks (and bribes) some KE officers, UB!, Rooster, Lodestone, and Atlas investigate, while Tobias does some hacking recon and TY runs drone lookouts and hangs in the getaway ride. They piece together that there were 2 suicide bombers, who appear to have had facility access, and that they were followed up by a car bomb that hit the front gate, and then another car full of attackers. The facility is heavily burned, and the remaining walls are covered in explosive scarring and bullet impact craters. There is a lot of destroyed tech around, but Tobias can’t pick up any nodes: possibly they used an EMP bomb (smart when fighting an AI?).

Lodestone tracks the survivors of the attacking party astrally, and working together with Tobias, locates their apparent hideout, a longterm motel in Striking Crane Clan turf. The team heads there, and noticing a bomb on the door, sneaks in through a window. Noone is there, and Lodestone has lost their astral trail. It appears that they filled the tub with some sort of algae, and changed into some sort of astrally masking clothing while inside, and then left again via car, based on footage Tobias is able to pull off nearby cameras. They seem to have used this place as a staging area for the bomb building and attack, as their are empty ammo boxes and bomb manufacture residue about. They also appear to have carefully erased any trace biological material with Cleaner Cleaner, preventing much in the way of further id’ing on site.

Tobias plans to track them further via street cams, and try to locate their next destination. However, the level of sophistication shown here suggests a significantly greater level of professionalism than the TA has exhibited in the past. They report in to Daedelus, and move out, after disarming the doorbomb.