Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
Tabasco aka Cholula

The team starts the day after the lab raid fresh, and begins discussing how to parcel out the info and who to sell it to. After some options and debate, they decide to go with Cehualli for a big payday with some options for non-monetary recompense. He is delighted, creepily, to receive the info and says he is glad they were finally able to work together. He transfers them a large sum of nuyen, as well as a sapphire weapon focus for Dig and a Tarot card for CG- one of the last few they haven’t seen before, the Chief Executive.

The team spends a while puzzling over the card before noticing what looks like a button in the holo-projection. They decide to delay pressing it for now, and Creep stashes it in his leg with the rest. They decide to visit Peregrine next, having requested to be kept updated by him and having received an update message. They head down to the rechristened “The Dom” enclave, and find it looking healthy and somewhat bustling. Aid supplies are being distributed out front and an informal barter market has taken over much of the lobby, alongside a notice board and wall of the missing, similar to the ones that Ringmaster and Deadline have been setting up at other enclaves.

TD tries to get a feel for any creepy/culty/etc stuff going on and can’t detect it, but notices that the people here seem to be working together symbiotically unusually well. Dig and CG take a further look at the leylines, and determine that they seem to be surfacing further, presumably as Peregrine makes progress on opening the vault below. They look bestial in some way, but not quite familiar to Dig, and using his arcanoarchaeology knowledge he determines that the locus was likely a mana spike in Victorian times, that someone managed to capture, use or contain in some way. This rouses the team’s interest to say the least.

They have a chat with Peregrine and he gives them some updates on the enclave and seems his usual friendly self, though his mysterious connections still leave them with some suspicions. He wants to hire them to secure transport of some supplies (food, meds, filters, etc) from a promising new supplier he is trying to establish a relationship with, but he’s been having some trouble in the Down Below from some former ARES/Mafia goons who have started up a protection racket covering some of the main junctions, including the point where the handoff is to be made tomorrow.

The team requests some time to discuss, and Peregrine exits to let them chat. They check and noone seems to be monitoring, though Otters is delighted to find a functional local mesh. They decide they want a share of whatever’s in the vault as payment, and Peregrine agrees, with some limits due to lack of knowledge, once he returns. Creep and Cholula head down to scout the route, and Dig turns into a wolf to help. Using their extensive tunnel maps and Dig’s powerful nose, they plot out as direct a path as possible while avoiding major settlements and intersections.

They head back to the safehouse, rest, and make a plan. The next day they head back underground a few hours early, with Dig and Cholula using a mindlink to stay in touch while each patrolling half of the route and using magic and/or might to keep it clear. The rest of the crew posts up in or near Knight Junction, where the exchange will take place, and quickly spots some plain clothes ARES goons filtering into the crowd. Since the goons haven’t spotted them, they decide to trigger an ambush, and manage to quickly take 2/3 of them out, with the other’s retreating, hauling their wounded and leaving their dead.

Meanwhile, Dig has spotted 4 more ARES goons wearing heavier armor posted up alongside the route, who start racing for the Junction when gunfire pops off. Dig and Cholula give chase and come under fire themselves, and have to fall back a bit, though Cholula manages to get word to the rest of the team and they set up a quick pincer. Dig hits the armored goons from behind with a powerful spell, driving them towards the Junction, where the team makes quick work of them with another fusilade, supported by two other runner types that Otters quickly hires who were scoping out the Junction.

As Creep examines the corpses, he notices that although they have ARES armor, their weapons and gear are all Onotari Arms. He makes note for later. The two other runners, who the team has recognized as the guards they saw via clairvoyance in the suite of one of the two Brackhauses at the hotel downtown, make their exit. A short while later, another well-armored squad enters, hauling some crates on air cushion sleds.

Although they are not branded or obviously labelled in any way, they are clearly SK, or meaning to look like them, down to the slight AGS accent of the one who speaks, though all wear full-face visors so it is hard to tell who is who. The speaking one passes over the goods and says to pass along the message to Peregrine that they consider this all satisfactory and will trade again in future. The other four pop out mobile field stretchers and load up all the enemy corpses and haul them off.

Otters gets the Mule drones to haul the supply sleds, and they carefully make their way back through the tunnels to The Dom without any further trouble. They hand over the goods to Peregrine, who seems quite happy with their performance, and tells them he’ll be in touch as soon as he cracks the final layers of security on the vault for their payment. He also tells them to refer lone/small group survivors to him as needed- he is trying to expand The Dom’s footprint to house more, as well as connecting other enclaves to secure safer housing for those that want it.

The team heads home, rests up, and gets ready to face whatever comes next…

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
Tabasco aka Cholula

The team all debriefs together after their separate missions, and decides that next up they need to take out Bloodripper, as he has gone from violent thrill-kill ganger to fulltime serial killer. They make a series of elaborate plans for trap scenarios and the like, before deciding their best bet is a simpler plan. They find a mostly empty shuttle parking lot in Dearborn near some factories, and Dig hides the van with Otters, Cholula, TD and himself inside under some concrete, using magic, while CG waits in the center of the lot with a ring of grenades strung around him, just far enough that he won’t be hurt when they detonate but close enough to be able to cover any direction that Bloodripper may approach from.

CG also reveals the existence of his own personal VTOL and private Bolthole, sharing the details in case anything happens. Some on the team are quite shocked by this revelation, especially Cholula, though they all also recognize it as a pro move and wonder if they should do the same.

Creep hides under a nearby abandoned car, and CG tells his spirit to start using powers once the fight kicks off. Having a left a note at their safehouse with their specific location, CG sends out a cryptic radio broadcast intended to lure BR to the note, and thus to the trap. After waiting around for quite a while, and believing themselves to be watching carefully, they are surprised when BR suddenly appears at the edge of the grenade circle, having spotted the poorly concealed trap.

CG explains that they’re just for lubrication and exciting fireworks, so BR spurs his bike forward over the line, and dismounts before embracing CG in a crushing embrace. CG’s spirit reports that it can’t see BR in astral space but that a Watcher spirit seems to be following/observing. As the team failed to trigger their ambush when BR wandered in, they scramble to catch up as CG is slowly being crushed to death- BR seems to think this will be a worthy devotional act.

Creep says “fuck it” and shoots BR, blowing off most of his armor, as Dig finally gets it together and gets the concrete moved so Otters can drive the van up and open fire with the HMG. Unfortunately, CG’s spirit uses the accident power on BR and he seems to attempt to protect CG from the gunfire but fails and trips, throwing both of them into it’s path. BR is killed, spectacularly, and CG is badly injured, though the team manages to stabilize and heal him somewhat as they race over.

With that settled, they scrape BR’s remains onto his burning, ruined motorcycle and let it burn. They swing by the Plat Zone to check in with Ringmaster, since it’s been a while, and debrief on all the dark spirit business. They confirm that as a syndicate hitman, pre-Blackout, BR was likely a devotee of Cernobog, and most likely has been manipulated by a spirit of pain and disease named Crepitus into believing that he is sacrificing to Cernobog while actually empowering it.

RM congratulates them on their success effectively ending the shadow zombie threat, though news of Shedim involvement is upsetting to him. Also, he has now taken to wearing a biohazard suit, well-tailored of course, to keep others safe from his HMHVV infection, as he explains he was able to avoid infection and is himself now also a carrier. He offers the same tech to Dig, who refuses, and gently warns the team again about the risk.

They talk about other Spirit threats- Famine aka Mezcallus Negh seems like the next biggest one, and they hope that Crepitus will be diminished by it’s acolyte’s destruction, assuming it doesn’t have others. Luckily, the Mafia got mostly wiped out and the Vory doesn’t really have a toehold, so they don’t think there will be any obvious candidates. They also figure they better deal with Pygmy and Li Wei at some point, who have joined forces under the moniker “The Blood Knights”, claiming to be hooders keeping Detroit free from the corps, which to them entails sacrificing any corpo citizens they get their hands on in blood magic rituals. Effective perhaps, but maybe not cool.

Putting that off for another time, they decide to follow up on a lead from Erika Knowles about some stolen ARES data and tech, and determine that it is likely in the possession of Tilda Aurand, the same doctor they were looking for in relation to the various collared lab animal escapees. On the way, Dig calls Grandma Biyu to float the idea of hosting corpse bonfires adjacent to food giveaways, and she eagerly agrees, since Ringmaster is also throwing in some support.

Biyu explains that due to a new local alliance between the Seoul’Pa and the Reality Hackers and the Triad, they will also be able to make these into the central nodes of further mesh nets as they continue to expand. The team, as usual, worries what all these alliances will look like when things reopen someday, but for now they are doing the best they can. They start tracking down the lab via the hacked collar that Dig managed to salvage, and eventually do home in on the signal- a facility seemingly contained behind and under a streetfront pet store.

Creep heads in to investigate, and works his way down a partially exposed secret elevator shaft. He is almost overwhelmed by some kind of venomous mice, who swarm him as he tries to clamber back out, so Cholula races in to try to rescue, and almost succumbs himself. Using some clever combo’s of flashbangs and smoke grenades, Creep manages to drive the mice hoard back, while Cholula accidentally covers himself in lube with a bad grenade toss.

Dig comes in and Pulses the mice after Cholula fails to Animal Control them and reports that they may be biodrones- which Otters thought was impossible due to size. They get Cholula out, and CG finds a pet wash station to get him cleaned up, while Otters and Dig dissect a sample mouse that Creep retrieves. They find it suffused with nanites, with no other implants visible, and Dig manages to Pulse in time to keep either of them from getting the nanites in themselves.

They regroup and all head down, aside from Creep and CG, who do some recon and keep an eye on things up top in case of a trap. TD holds up a note in front of one of the cameras in the store, which appear hardwired to something below, offering to talk rather than fight, and with the elevator powers back up and takes them down, avoiding the lubed mouse pile at the bottom of the shaft. They enter a wrecked lab, and searching for traps, Cholula finds that the defenses were all turned inwards when they were destroyed.

They find a series of rooms with bashed open doors, all also from the inside. though the enclosure cages all seem to have opened normally…. as they head further in, hall lights turn on and off to guide their path. They check out more experimental rooms, and finding some of the notes it looks like this is where the collared animals all came from. There are various destroyed drones around, which seem like the only facility staff, but which were only able to contain about 1/2 of the escaped test subjects.

Coming to final vault door, it hisses and opens, and they hear a faint crackly voice requesting assistance. They find a brain in a jar on the floor with a small speaker attached, and determine that this is what remains of Dr. Tilda Aurand. She convinces them with knowledge of the escaped subjects, as well as by leading them to discover her body, which is on ice in the back, with the lid of her skull removed like an egg cup. She requests that they remove her from this place along with her body, from which she hopes to grow a wimp clone.

Dig asks why they should bother, and she points out that the server stack is slagged and says she is the only source of the knowledge now. Dig offers to Mind Probe her, but the rest of the team figures it’s better to have a new friend, so he doesn’t. She requests they provide her with a visual sensor, so Cholula slaps one of his surveillance dots on the brain jar and gives her control. Otters notices that she has both a nice deck and rig incorporated, and they see that the jar seems to have rolled free of an anthroform drone when it was wrecked fighting an escapee.

She explains that Otto Hendricks sent hitmen after her when she fled ARES with all her data during Latvian Gambit to this lab that she had slowly and methodically set up in the background over years while planning her escape. That was when she was forced to freeze her original body and transfer her brain to this slapdash arrangement. CG assenses and she is indeed alive, and free of nanites, so they agree to her terms.

She provides them with a magical research paper as initial proof of the quality of her info, and keeps trickling more info to them as they remove her from the facility. This includes intel on various ARES projects- security dinosaur biodrones, Encounter Suits for more safely exploring the Deep Metaplanes, as well as intel about who knew what and when- apparently the Bottleneck portal closer devices, including the massive one that Vogel set off to end Latvian Gambit, were based on tech stolen from the mysterious metaplane of Dis, and the development of the ALPHA merges and the metahuman possessions of bugs on Colony/Vhortas were based on tech stolen from AZT from their cyberzombie research.

This is all big paydata, and the team needs some time to discuss who to pass or sell it on to. For now, they have a quick debate about what to do with Aurand. Dig wants to kill her, as she seems like a pretty objectively mad scientist with low ethical qualms about her actions, plus they’ve got what she knows now. The rest of the team votes to try to help her get a body and make a new ally. Giving her a few options, she chooses to be taken to Moreau for his biodrones expertise, as she doesn’t trust Ellis (a former coworkers) and doesn’t know Leanna Octave, and seems suspicious of her new turn towards nanotech.

The team drives her over to Moreau’s facility, and then settles in to figure out where to sell the data.

Runners
Creep
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective

The team decides to finally follow through on helping Smoach finish off the Shadow Spirit threat in town, partially in revenge for Myrryr’s death. Otters fixes up the van and replaces the wrecked Mule drone with parts from RRR, and finds out that their numbers have been significantly reduced due to some treachery and infighting spurred by a local, now deceased, fixer named Florio. Rubberhead still gets them what they need though, and tells them that they have more shielded solar, chemical battery, and old-school combustion engines up and running for vehicles, drones, generators etc that they are selling around town. The team is also starting to see more local mesh nets up and running after they distro’ed the know-how on the radio.

Following Smoach’s freshest lead, they find a busted up combustion van, that seems to have been on corpse collection duty. 2 bodies left behind are possessed by Shadow spirits, one of whom was the driver who is scarifying his face in the ritual manor while still half-launched through the windshield. The team waits and observes while the 2 spirits extricate themselves and take some medical tools from the van, and then Creep sneaks after them when they leave on foot. Otters and Dig approach and take a look at the crashed van, which seems to have run into…. nothing?

Dig decrypts the hardwired camera footage while Otters secures the scene. The Detective ends up talking to and calming some locals who approached and seem super traumatized. As they calm them, they notice it has an astral effect- some sort of pooling fear dissipates. TD tells the team and Dig gets airborne to take a more thorough astral look, and sees that the path Creep is following the Shadow spirits on is one outer tendril of a web of fear that they seem to be reinforcing- almost as if someone is trying to create leylines or aspect the local manasphere in preparation for a larger invasion.

Dig reports back while Smoach uses his TM abilities to retain comms with Creep as he gets further away. They take another look in the astral and notice that their is Famine feeling coming from the North and West, which seems to be somewhat bolstered by the Fear and vice versa, though their effected areas seem to carefully not overlap. Using Dig’s astral map. Smoach’s surveillance intel, and everyone else’s knowledge of the city, they determine where the Shadow spirits are headed: the locus of fear Downtown, the cities largest emergency shelter, which also serves as the overflow morgue for mass casualty incidents. Reviewing the video footage from the van, it looks like Shadow spirits ambushed it with a invisible barrier wall while the van was full of corpses (likely either for ghoul food or cremation, depending), and then killed the survivor of the crash. A swarm of bats flies in and the bodies rise and take off en masse, leaving the driver and one in the back behind to loot.

Creep sees that the Shadows are trying to terrify and harass any people they come across, and briefly chase but don’t attack them. The team decides that they need to limit the spread of fear, and after all bolstering themselves against the existential dread of what they’ve encountered, aided by a happy spell from Dig and some Guts, they race down to pick up Creep and destroy the spirits. They make short work of their bodies with gunfire, and Dig manages to disrupt their astral forms with spellcraft, and then sees a truly horrifying sight- an awful ravenous bat-like maw visible in the distance near the Scar in the astral sky seems to consume the spirits instead of allowing them to travel back to their homeplace when disrupted, and seems to both gain power and become somewhat more proximate in doing so.

Dig reports this in, and Smoach shares some of his more obscure research, which turned up hints of the Horrors, and something called The Book of Harrow, that Myrryr had been obsessed with. The team, worried, decides they need to cheer up the town before they head to the morgue/shelter, and head to Biyu’s while Dig naps to recover from drain. He stays behind at Biyu’s to rest and learn an astral armor spell while the team distro’s food (to fight the famine) alongside a stirring spiel from TD (to fight fear) and some data chips that Creep loads the 10 best episodes of Rosanne onto (which are received with all the enthusiasm of a religious pamphlet by most).

They do successfully change the vibe a bit with the effort though, and TD can see that they seem to be constraining the spread of the Fear tendrils if not actively pushing them back. After Dig rests they head Downtown to check out the locus. They find it well-marked and signed as an emergency shelter, and it seems not to have been fortified, likely as a trap for desperate survivors to enter. Using their maps and knowledge of the DDB, they determine roughly where an emergency exit should be down there, and decide that they should hit it from both sides in a pincer.

While surveilling, Otters spots someone else also surveilling, so they pull back and used one of Creep’s LRAD’s to tightbeam a message over to the area, after Dig assenses and can’t find anyone, but detects a deathly aura that they all assume means Shedim. Recalling that Shedim have supposedly heavily infiltrated UCAS SpecOps, they think this may be the team they heard was in town, and assume that an enemy of an enemy could at least be a temporary ally? They get a radio call from Marshall Eugene Trapp shortly after, in which he circumspectly offers to pass along a message, and tells them to come meet with him in person to keep if off radio.

They head to his office in West Downtown, and he refuses to confirm or deny knowing of any sort of SpecOps in town, but goes over their plan with them and confirms with Otters that if the runners cover the aboveground exit, Smoach can guide the other team down to the emergency exit, where they will breach and drive anyone inside out into the team’s field of fire. The team agrees, and arms up with some rocket launchers and heavy duty ammo for fighting spirits. They head over and set up their ambush, with Creep making a large lube field while Otters rigs some grenade tripwires at choke points.

Dig hides as a mouse in Creep’s pocket, who has a grenade bandolier and flamethrower ready to go. TD has their flamethrower ready in the van as well, while Otters rigs the van and mounted weapons. They get a stream from Smoach who says he’ll follow the Shedim team in and maintain comms as long as he can. They see the team, very pro, having cleared a space in the survivor encampment around the door, apply det-cord, blow the door, and breach very quickly. They race into a long dark tunnel with flickering emergency bio-lights, all cement block.

After a long eerie traversal, they enter a huge morgue chamber, also badly lit, which the team at first thinks is strewn with bodies, but instead see are all unzipped, empty body bags. Smoach pans around and they see that all the freezer corpse lockers have been opened, with the sliding slabs partially out. It is very creepy, with no bodies in sight, until Smoach zooms in on one of the soldiers checking the body bags, and sees one of them unzip from the inside, from which a corpse sits up and detonates a suicide vest. The feed cuts out. Up top, Creep notices some ripples in one of the areas where the lube has pooled a bit, just before he hears the terrifying sound of hundreds of mostly bare feet running up the dark ramps towards them.

They prepare a bounding overwatch in case they need to advance or retreat, and slam some combat drugs as a huge zombie hoard charges forth up both ramps in a horrifying flesh wave. Otters cuts down the first few ranks with suppressive fire, with Creep supplementing with chucked grenades. The subsequent ranks stumble over the first as they fall, and slide through the lube field into the grenade traps, as Otters follows up with a rocket, and TD reloads the launcher. Dig is frantically trying to disrupt spirits in the astral plane but has to flee the sheer number of spirits that the team has disembodied there.

He continues trying to fry them but see that those spirits that can are taking to dead bats littered around the parking area in an attempt to escape. TD and Creep open up with flamethrowers while falling back, while Otters uses the remaining rocket and suppressive fire to continue scything through the zombie hoard. As they are further thinned out, the team starts to hear and see automatic weapons fire from behind the hoard as well, it seems some of Shedim team survived.

With the Shedim survivors entering and fighting with brutal efficiency on the astral as well as the physical, the team just manages to prevent a mass bat breakout. They may not have got them all but they definitely disrupted a lot, and destroyed the necessary hosts of many more. Dig and TD can already feel the fear locus lessening in power from their actions here. Without any further convo, the Shedim head back belowground, with only Creep spotting two of the less damaged zombies from first wave rising to join them, seemingly providing hosts to some of the Shedim whose bodies were destroyed in the suicide bombing in the morgue.

The team heads home to rest and mourn Smoach’s death, though he at least went in with his eyes open and chose to be there. They find Chew Gum and Cholula waiting for them, saying they have an upsetting report from their investigation into Bloodripper’s whereabouts…..

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
The Detective
Tabasco aka Cholula

The team gets everyone into position and triggers the assault against the OOSG fortified warehouse. Rose is providing TM comms support to boost the range of the TacNET, giving everyone some critical bonuses, while ChewGum and the spirits watch the back for anyone trying to escape towards the river. Otters keeps the van out of sight for now, running the RCC from inside the smuggling compartment, while The Detective rides inside, keeps an eye out locally, and provides leadership and oversight via the TacNET. DIg and SINder set up to provide magical cover for the assault team, while Bard is covering from a sniper perch.

The assault team approaches, with Cholula and the Windsor crew members Signpost, Smaug, and Lunatech easily hopping over the fence that rings the building. Otters’ mule drone gets hung up for a moment at the fenceline while also providing covering fire for the bounding overwatch maneuver. Creep sneaks up without anyone seeming to notice him. As Cholula turns to help out the drone, some panels on the warehouse wall drops and two of the ballistas fire massive bolts into the drone, destroying it. Bard takes out one of their crew with a well-placed sniper shot, while Dig keeps missing over and over with lightning bolts.

Signpost cracks open some more defensive paneling and those 3 slip inside, with Creep sneakily following, and Cholula ascending to the roof. CG opens up with suppressive fire on the back wall, keeping everyone trapped inside with the spirits on overwatch. The ballistas next turn their fire on Bard’s position, and he is hit and drops off the TacNET, seemingly unconscious or dead. SINder seems to be distracted trying to help him, and Dig manages to distract one of the ballista crews with another unusually weak spell, but it provides enough cover for Cholula to manage to light them on fire with phosphorus arrows.

The Windsor crew takes out the other ballista crew, as Cholula comes under fire from a crossbow-wielding knight, and a half dozen other knights charge and dogpile the Windsor crew, wildly swinging their claymore’s in some kind of combat frenzy. One of them seems to be the obvious leader, who Creep and Cholula mark out on the TacNET. They appear to be making short work of the outnumbered Windsor crew, so Creep and Cholula open fire on them as well, revealing their positions.

Dig also launches some spells at those he can see, and CG starts descending from his perch to breech from the rear and help. Otters moves the van closer for support and extraction now that the ballistas are out of commission. Cholula gets hit by a couple of stun grenades and is forced to retreat, and Creep has to fall back outside after two of the knights charge up towards his position. CG’s spirit manages to cause one of them to fall on his own sword during the attack, injuriously, and Dig snags the other one with his magic fingers to keep him from catching Creep.

Creep leaves a grenade behind and detonates it, shredding the knight’s armor. He still charges out in pursuit, and Otters drops him with the van HMG. Dig approaches closer to get into the fight as well and almost gets tagged with some kind of nasty toxin thrown by the leader. It seems to briefly increase his drain, but he feels like he dodged something worse. CG blasts his way in from the back and opens up on the OOSG knights who have been hacking up the Windsor crew.

Singpost looks dead, Smaug is badly injured, and Lunatech also looks pretty hurt but is sneakily hauling herself free over towards the pile of toxic chemical barrels in one corner. She starts fiddling with some tubes and wires connected to them when she gets there while Otters takes out another OOSG knight who tries to come after Dig in the doorway, and CG frantically dodges attacks from the 2 who charge him. The leader manages to counter a powerful spell from Dig, and starts swinging his sword at him after annihilating Dig’s spirit with his mageblade.

Dig dodges impressively well with some assistance from Otters and TD, and manages to hold the leader just long enough with his magic fingers to allow himself to escape to a safer distance. Unfortunately, SINder was trying to use his own spell to haul the KO’ed Smaug out the door to safety, and Smaug is cut in half by the OOSG leader. Lunatech seeing this, and with 3 knights remaining and them team out of good ideas on how to fight them effectively, and with the van damaged from another sword blow, makes a decision, and shouting “to the MOOOOOOOOON” ignites some det cord she has wound around the chemical drum tubing she has spliced together.

CG goes down under the OOSG assault, though his spirit is able to keep one of the knights from stopping Lunatech. Cholula decides on a crazy rescue plan, and takes a running jump off the roof of the van and goes into a sliding dive to grab CG and get them both out the back of the warehouse before it blows. TD grabs Creep into the van as Otters spins it around to put the open door away from the warehouse and the van between Dig and the warehouse.

It blows big and Dig manages to leap into the open side door as the van is blown towards him. CG and Cholula roll free with some more help from the plant corpse spirit, and get picked up. Rose and SINder haul a bandaged and unconscious Bard down, still impaled with a massive ballista bolt, and get back to their vehicle to head home and try to regroup, much depleted. The team heads back to their safehouse and rests.

The next day, they package up their assorted intel, and Dig heads up to Smoach’s to get help interpreting it. He promises they will help Smoach deal with the Shadow spirit threat soon. Smoach ID’s the toxin used on him as “Void Blast”- it apparently messes with channeling, and would likely have done a lot of damage as well if it had hit full on. He also ID’s a key sigil that the team saw on the OOSG bladed as “St. Hubert’s Key” a symbol of a sort of purification- he’s heard some Catholic’s think there is an artifact affiliated that can stave off or prevent HMHVV infection. But this seems darker, like they wanted to “purify” the world of the Infected.

This would explain the noxious chemical cloud over the part of downtown where the fight took place, where some of whatever was in the barrels is still burning, or at least smoking. Smoach also ID’s the sigil on the necklace the leader wore, which is what he used to counterspell Dig, as a rumored symbol of a shadowy group called the “Cult of the Great Hunter”, and explains that he had thought they were just a paranoid internet rumor. Supposedly, they were some 4th World humans who didn’t hide during the transition to magical downtime, and instead spent the time hunting and killing dragons, fae, and others while they slumbered or sheltered in their Kaer’s. As well as, rumors say, continued their work into the 5th World, and beyond, up to the present- though once again, Smoach says this is all just fringe rumor stuff, or so he thought.

With data in hand, Dig flies down to Brunwyn’s yacht, and passes it over. She seems thrilled that them and the Windsor crew took the initiative and dealt with the OOSG, and after Dig fumbles around a bit, gives him some money. She says that she has to rescind a few previous job offers, as some of the people she’s been seeking have been found, either by herself or others, in which case they did not survive. Someone else appears to be hunting the scientists that she’s been collecting. However, she says she can always find work for a quality team, and seems happy with their performance here. After casually intimidating Dig a bit, he leaves and visits Grandmother Biyu, who tells him she has another lead on the mystery vans.

Returning to the safehouse, Dig reports back on all this, and they decide to split the pay between Otters getting her mule replaced and sending a bunch to the Windsor crew. They also get some new updates= apparently Canadian separatists have blown the 3 main bridges from Downtown to Windsor, cutting the SE district off significantly from the rest of town. Cholula is still super stressed about the threat of Bloodripper, so he and CG agree to try to track him down.

The rest of the team decide to finally help Smoach deal with Shadow spirits, and start readying themselves to deal with that threat once and for all.

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
Tabasco aka Cholula

While the crew is running errands for Biyu, Cholula organizes the new gang coop to strike/eliminate the 696 Slayers, who everyone has some degree of beef with, and who seem to be a growing threat to Motor City with their nihilistic embrace of violence, cannibalism, and a growing cult-like adoration of Gorechuk Bloodripper, who also problematically is still magically in a twisted sort of love with Chew Gum. Luckily Cholula is better at strategizing than talking, and comes up with a plan good enough that all members of the coop throw is some means of support, and the mission is mostly successful. The 696’s are wiped out, their current captives freed, their turf reclaimed. BUT- Bloodrippers escapes, screaming out a vow of vengeance on all who oppose him, and Cholula specifically.

With that problem dealt with, for now, Cholula returns the safehouse for a well-earned rest and links up with the rest of the crew before they head back down to the Old Dominion bank Downtown to talk their way in on behalf of Peregrine. They spend some time planning, and decide their best move is to invite the Cutters to join the gang coop, and spend some time getting couriers from the Keepers to deliver a dossier The Detective compiles on the proposal to all the members.

They have a radio call, and find that the different factions all have some different ideas of how voting, decision making etc should work. Some of the more classic gangs have sent a higher up to make the decisions for them, while other newer cooperative orgs have sent elected delegates with pre-approved limits etc. The team gets everyone to agree to assign Ronnie’s Raiders the task of coming up with some proposals for internal governance, which the group (primarily college students and teachers) eagerly agrees to.

For now, they get everyone on board with inviting the Cutters, though it also raises the question of what will become of the coop once the Blackout ends (if the world outside survived), as the Cutters will be the dominant faction locally, and have better international connections than any other member group outside of the Ancients. This is tabled for the time, as a “we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it” problem. The team compiles their proposal for the Cutters knowing what little they know about their local situation leadership, mostly based on an interaction Cholula had during Latvian Gambit.

Once Downtown, they talk their way into the well-fortified bank, finding that even though ARES cut the Cutters loose, they managed to hang onto a lot of heavy armament. After a comically bureaucratic process, they finally get through to Ripper, the local leader. She remembers Cholula, though seems surprised at his updated appearance and change of moniker. Using this friendly lead-in, The Detective makes the deal, though Ripper proves a canny negotiator and TD has to contact Peregrine to confirm a few changes to the proposal.

After all that’s done, they chat a bit and head out, and then get very stressed out when Dig suggests that Peregrine could be a Null Sect member, especially since he’s suspiciously new to town and they haven’t interacted in person. However, they quickly find a friendly dwarf walking in and introducing himself, still using the unidentifiable pan-Euro accent that made Dig initially suspicious. He pulls a power move of getting patted down and then passing over a wicked looking concealed blade that the security missed.

He converses briefly with the team, and then says he has to get to work taking a local census, addressing needs, and taking a look at the vault downstairs that he’s so eager to get to. Ripper had said they hadn’t had any luck gaining access yet. Almost as an afterthought, Peregrine manually lock picks his way into the 7 Sisters message drop, and Otters leaves a note for Astrid Case with their radio code. Taking a look at the astral situation around the bank once they leave, they notice that it seems likely some old leylines converge underneath it, though they can’t get a good feel for their initial aspect or for what might be at their crossing, as earth and/or other magical barriers prevent it.

Following up on a tip from Ripper, they go examine the nearby site of a blood magic sacrifice one of her scouts found. They ID the victim as likely being one of the Jaguar Guards in town with the AZT mage Cehaulli, and get some intel on the crime itself- a prolonged and painful ritual bleeding resulting in sacrifice to power the caster. CG also gets an image of his face using the Mortis Optigram- an Aztlaner man with a face repeatedly tattooed over and over such that none of the individual designs are decipherable. They call it in to Cehualli on the van radio.

He and The Detective chat a bit, and he reveals he had already found and investigated the site, and confirms that it is the work of the serial killer they are hunting, who he says is a Path of the Sun extremist heretic. TD still doesn’t like Cehualli overall, but he seems to appreciate them reaching out and views it as an expansion of their relationship, so he shares some further info, in case the team can track down the killer. They decide not to pursue it for now, but to keep their eyes open.

Back in the van, they get a call from Astrid Case, responding to Otters’ note. After she strongarms them a bit, she gives into their threat to reveal her involvement in the planning runup to the Blackouts, as she says whoever was paying her retainer before missed the most recent payment. In agreement to keep her name out of it, she tells them she was paid a lot of money for about 6 months of prep work, via a shell company she didn’t bother to try to track beyond the Carib League. She did pick ups and drop offs from an office Downtown, near the Senator hotel, but only ever directly interacted with drones or Camden Espinoze.

She gives them the address, but tells them the property was rented by the same shell company that paid her so they likely won’t get much from that. They head over to investigate, and find the office burned out in an intentional arson. Examining the setup, it was obviously rigged to burn professionally, and probably had been set up to go up at a moment’s notice while it was operational. It looks like the office was run exclusively by drones (which are totally slagged), and it seems like office sounds were broadcast over speakers while standees and cardboard furniture would give the impression of a bustling space behind the privacy frosted windows and doors.

Based on their investigation, they determine that this must have been the work of the Null Sect- who else could run this level of scheme, with this result, using only drones, with this kind of funding? It feels like solid inference, even though they lack direct proof. They head back to Biyu’s, and get paid for their investigation, as well as for the assassination. She also cooks them up a nice dinner as usual. She seems at least semi-aware of the Null Sect, and warns them against saying too much about them over comms, even in the Blackout, but compliments them on a job well-done.

They rest up again at the safehouse, and wake to some distressing news: Neverland Candy Shoppe has been torched, with no known survivors. They head down there to see if they can help, and find Lunatech and Smoach looking pissed, but unable to even search for survivors given the ongoing extreme heat of the shell of the collapsed building. Dig summons a water spirit, and Creep uses it to get inside, where they find a torched and melted body pile near the center of the blaze, bearing marks of archaic weaponry. They deduce that this was the work of the Order of St. George, and decide to put an end to them.

They say they will track them to their base, while Smoach and Lunatech round up their crew to support the assault. Dig, as a wolf, starts tracking, and then CG uses one of his spirit powers to make him considerably faster so that wolf Dig can easily pace the van. Cholula also tracks on foot but falls far behind. They find the OOSG fortress, a barricaded riverfront warehouse, with ease, but come under bombardment while parked outside discussing what to do.

Otters manages to dodge the flaming ballista bolts, and they retreat, finding a rendezvous point with the Windsor/Belle Isle crew. With roughly even numbers contributed by both groups, they plan an assault using bounding overwatch, with about an even split between the close quarters and ranged teams. Otters parks her body in the van, to use the HMG for covering fire while sneaking a cloaked Mule in alongside the CQC team.

Cholula gets shot at again while doing some recon, and thus confirms that the OOSG has at least some members who can see and target astrally, which also explains how they made the van so easily. This complicates things a bit, but just furthers the argument to hit them fast and hard. Everyone loads up, tightens the straps on their armor, and gets ready to charge…..

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective

The team decides to hold off on tracking down the escaped critters lab, and Cholula heads off to keep an eye on the 696 Slayers and start plotting the gang coop mission to take them out. The rest of the crew decides to knock out the assorted jobs they have for Grandmother Biyu. They head down to the Long Storage facility first and try to contact Static, the AI landlord, who appears to be absent or offline. They break in, and are nearly overwhelmed by the terrible odors coming out from many units. There are also a lot of obvious signs of looting and other break-in’s.

Luckily, Dig as a dog has an excellent nose and tracks down the unit they are looking for with ChewGum and necro spirit assistance, and they manage to talk their way in without any trouble, despite some home-built auto-turrets that Tator has rigged up. He turns out to be a somewhat chaotic-seeming dwarf with nano-tats, who seems to be a Technomancer who ended up in deep debt to the Triad. He says it was actually kinda lucky since he was in a Farady’ed holding cell when they Blackout hit, so wasn’t effected as many TM’s were, and now can work down his debt at an accelerated rate.

He has the pieces of the previous mystery vans the team blew up, which Biyu seems to have retrieved after they tipped her off. He also has a more intact third van, as well as a cracked-open SpriteLok. He explains that he managed to bust it open and free the captive Sprite onto the local hardwired grid, and when the team, worried for Static, asks if he say anyone else on there, he says it looked empty to him. He also agrees to free the Sprite from the Spritelok that the team recovered, since they don’t have a handy grid to let it stabilize on.

He passes on some intel he’s scraped from the van’s nav and comms systems, and Dig and Otters manage to retrieve a bit more, recovering another few days of Jackpoint logs from the first few days of the Blackout- it seems there is a lot of live information manipulation happening, and confusion as to where is or isn’t blacked out, what caused it, what’s happening etc. Also, there was at least one sighting of somewhere wearing a III Corps jacket who appeared mutated in a fight inside the ARCHology in St. Louis. Based on team file records, the team speculates that the Black Lodge portals used to construct that facility may have been involved….

They also review the info Tator found. It looks like Camden Espinoza, who they previously extracted for Brunwyn, made the offline GridGuide substitution as well as the hardened map devices that the vans use. So the team now has the route, as well as knowing a little more about Espinoza’s role. They also trace it back to Run and Sollars Private Library, where the map Espinoza used came from. They decide to head there later and check that out as well.

They stop by the port and pass along the small mystery package to a somewhat chastened-looking Triad LT, who is missing an ear. They then swing by the container graveyard adjacent, and with a clever idea from Creep track down the seafood container they are looking for via it’s massive heat output from it’s (luckily) still working AC. They manage to get it all loaded into the van as well as a trailer they buy from Rubberhead at the Triple R for this purpose.

Managing to speed by various hungry survivors on the way with no serious problems, the team drops off the seafood and reports in to Biyu, who pays them the first increment and also buys the trailer off their hands. They next head to Casa Aurelius and pull off a quick assassination, blasting the shit out of an elf businessman with CG’s shotgun from the open side door of the van before Otters speeds off while under covering fire from the machine gun mounted on the roof.

With that done, they rest up and then head to the library the next day. Luckily TD and Otters have good reps there since they didn’t call ahead, and TD manages to con The Cartographer into showing them the visitor log by claiming they are trying to help find out who kidnapped Camden Espinoza, as his family has been asking around. They get the name Astrid Case, ESQ, which Creep and TD recognize as being the honorific for a lawyer.

Knowing only one set of lawyers in town, they head to Belle Isle, and find Sahara Jones working for STV, having been left behind in the chaotic ARES withdrawal. Happy to see her previous saviors, she helps them out for free, and tells them Case is a local hardline corp rights attorney with a high fee who works for a boutique firm. She gives them the mailing address they have on file- an old bank downtown. They head there next.

The bank is under control of the Cutters, who took it over after ARES cut them loose back during the bug crisis. It looks like they have a civilian community there also, though the relationship is unclear. Dig notices an unknown number trying to call them, and puts it through. They make contact with the fixer Peregrine, who they’ve heard of but not interacted with yet. They agree to work with him to get an in with the Cutters, make sure the civvies are being taken care of well, and get him access to the basement, in exchange for him getting them the info they need on Case.

With some recon ahead, they start talking through some plans for how to get the Cutters on board, but since Peregrine is offering resources and material support, they think they can make it work without excessive bloodshed, though he seems open to a change in gang leadership as needed.

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
Tabasco aka Cholula

After retreating from the guards’ raking fire during the extraction of Camden Espinoza, Cholula spends some time tracking the mystery vans he saw fleeing the scene on his surveillance cam. He manages to keep pace on the rooftops for a bit with the movement power, but starts to lose them, so he tags one with a detachable shaft tracking arrow, and hopes to pick up the signal again someday. He then tries to get back to the safehouse but gets pinned to the ground with a spear thrown by Bloodripper, who wants to say hi to ChewGum in his own special way.

Cholula manages to start wiggling himself free off the spear, but his dripping fluids seem to have attracted some hungry-looking humanoids wearing lab collars- possibly the same ones the team has been hearing about? Regardless, they seem somewhat intelligent and attack with a pack tactic that proves damaging and effective. Cholula chooses to flee and manages to make his escape, retreating to the nearby Plat Zone for now to heal and rest, before eventually making his way back to the safehouse.

When the rest of the team arrives back from the gang coop meeting, they find him there, and decide it’s time to deal with both the critters and Bloodripper. They have the brilliant idea to combine both into one plan, and head up to 696 Slayers turf, where CG multiplies some food to impress the gangers (and hopefully stop them from killing for a bit, as they seem to have begun eating their victims), and instructs Bloodripper to hunt down the Critters for him.

Bloodripper agrees, behaving in an almost parodically chivalric fashion. He packs up some (metahuman?) meat to go in a tray from the school cafeteria, and the team heads off. They decide to check in with someone about getting paid to end the critter threat, and call up Ringmaster who seems to want them to look into it but is initially surprised they aren’t doing it solely because the critters have eaten some of their contacts, most recently some Keepers. He also tips them off that there have been reported attacks amongst the survivor communities newly moving into the DDB.

Otter zips over to Moreau, not having checked in on him since the Blackout started, and worried he may be involved. She also wants to drop off a radio with him to keep in better touch. She finds Moreau having fortified and extensively trapped the approach to the Bloomfield Nature Reserve, though from an aerial view, she can see paths in marked by small piles of meat, presumably so animals can safely find their way through.

She manages to make contact through Moreau’s e-dog, Buddy, and safely lands. Moreau seems like he’s been spending too much time with the animals and has lost the habit of regular speech, but otherwise “ok”. He does also seem to be feeding the animals metahuman meat and also possibly eating it himself, from those who come to the nature reserve looking to eat the animals there. He put up warning signs so he feels it’s only fair. Otters passes over the radio, and Moreau gives a tip about the rogue ARES animal scientist who might be behind it all, as well as a lead on some hackers who may have some info, the Coquillards.

The team decides to investigate the underground while Bloodripper is on the hunt above. They head down and find some survivor communities, unfortunately Dig has taken the form of a large wolf and terrifies the mostly blind (in the pitch black) guards they first find and some gunfire is exchanged. Luckily noone is badly hurt and The Detective manages to talk everyone down as they explain that Dig is a human shapeshifter and not the beast that has been hunting down here.

After comparing accounts and reviewing the most recent crime scene they can find amongst the poor fortifications and tent and tarp dwellings, they decide that this almost surely isn’t the same critter as the pack aboveground, and start to get worried that Ringmaster might be hunting when he turns into a werewolf. Dig wants to stop investigating and go confront him/protect him, as these civilians are worthless in his eyes, but Otters manages to determine that the behavior doesn’t match up with a werewolf of Ringmaster’s intelligence.

They track some old blood traces deeper into the tunnels, and all take Guts. This pays off when they are able to shrug off some sort of mystical fear, though Otters is partially paralyzed by a chilling howl from below. The largest Barghest any of them have ever seen charges up from the dark and tries to chomp on CG, though Cholula bravely dives in the way, taking the damage. Dig blasts it with lightning as Otters opens up with the guns on the Mule drones, and Cholula manages to drop it with a flaming arrow just before it gets another attack in.

They wait for the white phosphorus to burn out, and then Dig and CG start harvesting reagents while Otters gets what she can from the crispy collar. It looks like a basic RFID tracker with a shock electrode, but most interestingly has a number stamped on it. The team hauls the remains back to the survivor camp to show them that the beast is dead, and encourage them to better defend themselves. Otters rigs up a simple telegraph between two station’s communities, and show them how to do it by stripping old tech, and Cholula promises to come down and train them sometime.

They at least seem to have enough food- crates of old emergency shelter rations from earlier in the century.The team heads back aboveground and checks in with Ringmaster, who also seems relieved it wasn’t him behind the attacks, but spurs them to keep looking. He also tips them off to some animal fights run by ex-Mafiosos down by the Docklands. They head home and rest, but are disturbed to hear in the morning Radio Free Detroit that the 696 Slayers have been on a rampaging hunt across town and residents are advised to avoid them at all costs.

This triggers another discussion about what to about Bloodripper and crew, which quickly gets sidelined when they decide to go to the animal fights instead. There they find another dog with a collar, seemingly a loyal companion to the ex-Mafioso running the fights, after talking their way in by offering to do some vet care. Otters spends a depressing day patching up survivors from the Pit, but they do get some good info- none of the other animals have the collars, or seem enhanced in the same ways as the collared animals.

They get the info from the ex-Mafioso about where he found the dog, with a promise to sell him any more promising animals they encounter, and head up to Vendor’s Row to look for more clues. They check in with G’ma Biyu while they’re up there, who gives them another job as well as a clue- she had her people take out another enhanced dog that was roaming the area and attacking people, and provides the cut collar to prove it. Cutting apparently bricked it, but they get another number.

They decide to use the day old possibly metahuman meat tray as bait in a variety of locations within their search grid, observed by drones, while Creep cuts himself a little and the rest of the team watches his back at a 7th location. Luckily, nothing attacks Creep, and when reviewing the camera footage, they spot mostly various survivors excited to find free meat and asking too many questions. The only one that stands out is some sort of enhanced cat which seems very stealthy.

They head to that location and Dig manages to track it back to it’s lair, taking the form of a great cat and intimidating it while also using magic to make it more docile. It uses some of it’s strange abilities but Dig doesn’t fall for them. Cholula offers to try to knock it out with arrows, but Otters quickly intervenes and manages to lure it out and calm it. Dig hacks the collar and they manage to get the RFID signal, which they can probably use to find link devices if they ever find themselves within range.

Otters delivers the cat to Moreau, to try to rehab it, and they make plans to try to find the location all these experimental animals have been coming from after they rest up again. When they awaken the next morning, they find the 4 critters from the aboveground pack all staked to the ground outside the safehouse with one of Bloodripper’s spears, with a note saying that he thinks they found them all, and that though they killed some of the gang, they weren’t particularly satisfying victims. He also summons CG to visit him.

Guess the team better deal with that soon too! Perhaps they will take Biyu’s advice and turn their new gang coop against the 696.

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective

The Detective manages to convince the other team (possibly one of the Brackhaus’ guards? Likely the one from the roof bar if so) to disengage, as Otters has successfully grabbed the target and spirited him away in the VTOL. Realizing that they are really blown though in terms of attention, Otters, Creep, and CG all sneak out under cover of CG’s spirit’s powerful silence and concealment effects, barely avoiding some very alert hotel security staff. The Detective decides they want their money’s worth, and rushes back to their room, purposefully dishevilling it before taking some Bliss in a filled tub.

The onsite security does room sweeps, and TD manages to bluff just well enough to not get in trouble, since they can’t find anything in the room, but seem suspicious about Creep having left without anyone taking note, as his arrival was noticed. Regardless, TD gets their desired soak and trip, so all is well, enough. When the other team gets back to the van, they find Otters’ surveillance drones waiting along with a note from Cholula that says he “went to check something out” and to leave without him.

They do. Heading for the preprogrammed rendezvous with the VTOL, they find Smaug and Lunatech from the Windsor crew waiting to accept the handoff and presumably deliver the guy to Brunwyn. Dig requests a little time to look into the wrecked deck they also snagged, and after confirming that they weren’t followed, Smaug sets up a perimeter. Dig manages to pull a tiny amount of data off the deck, with Otters helping to write a quick program to collate the fragmentary bits into something useful.

They find a few useful things: the target was a longterm MCT data and device architecture specialist, who had been targeted for extraction before (possibly why he was using an assumed name). He was looking into shared vulnerabilities amongst various devices, and trying to design a new in-house MCT device architecture that would not have the same flaws. He was in a virtual meeting with his bosses when the Blackout hit, his deck bricked, and he flatlined.

Dig also tries to read his mind, but there is nothing there- he seems brain dead or close to it, and only his wife’s careful ministrations likely kept him alive this long. They write up their findings and pass it along with the deck and the guy, which Brunwyn accepts as the pro move it is, offering them more work and sending along their pay, along with the promised “on-time” bonus.

They head back to the safehouse and rest up, and decide to look into Howell’s “unite the gangs and enclaves” mission next. Instead of calling him for more (/any) details, they just dive in, reviewing the intel Cholula has been gathering on his semi-nightly prowling of the city. They make a list of the promising factions to ally, and start making plans and dividing up work amongst themselves. They also decide to resolve smuggling out the Toronto Mayor and his ARES lover.

TD calls up the UCAS Marshal, Trapp, and hints that they have a line on a government official in danger. Trapp agrees to a meet, seemingly also not wanting to give up his safehouse location, they settle on a high end street market Downtown, which the Marshal reports has become somewhat of a trade bazaar during the Blackout. They pass along their intel and Trapp agrees to contact the lovers at the hotel and either keep them safe or get them out, he is light on details. But it seems like the team made a good impression.

Otters decides to do a little shopping while there, and they head down to the most red market-y shop in the area, where they see a classically costumed bandit dropping off some assorted loot. Wanting to know more, they try to approach, but blow it, and the figure rappels away, and they return to the safehouse. They take the next day off while CG summons a new corpse spirit into the body he was gifted by Bloodripper, and Dig has a meeting with his magical order.

Freddy Bales is there first, as usual, and is his usual obnoxious, helpful self. The others roll in, and Dig talks up the gang unity mission a bit more. They all initiate while Otters, who accompanied Dig over, alternates between watching and wandering the mostly abandoned zoo. It seems like the remaining zookeepers have had to prioritize saving the less edible animals.

After the meeting, Marjo-Lin gives Dig the Discipline Tarot card, and they banter about their somewhat at odds Mentors (Dog vs Lion), and ML says that Lion told her that she had smelt Dig in one of her realms- the Hermit’s cabin perhaps? Regardless, the card is a reward for his perseverance in getting Order going. ML also reports that the Keepers have lost some members to attacks from those mysterious collared critters.

After splitting up the job of convincing different factions to show to the big meeting, The Detective contacts Ringmaster, who agrees to host with Marv at the Plat Zone, specifically the Brickhouse, and to distribute a radio to any faction who attends as a reward. TD also gets Creep to make pizza, though he says all he can promise is a sauced flatbread, but CG learns a spell to multiply the matter significantly.

TD contacts the Keepers, who agree to attend. Creep heads out the Metal Maniacs first, and finds them seeming even more post-human, as well as seemingly “upgrading” some local street kids, who are serving as lookouts- it seems they are both expanding and fortifying. Creep decides not to become a Monad, though they make a good case that “our AI brethren need homes right now more than ever”. Leanna Octave agrees to send a delegation to the meeting, though.

Creep then sneaks up to the Blight and finds the Nightmare’s base of ops. This does indeed seem to be veterans of the Urban Brawl team protecting a civilian enclave, and he uses his sneaking skills to impress them into coming, though they say they will only do so if the Maulers aren’t invited. Creep points out that since the Maulers absolutely will be invited, it “could” be a good time to raid their turf, if someone wanted to.

CG gets Sikh Burn to agree to attend, easily, as a rep for the Children of Loxley, who have also been expanding, protecting the Hawala network and mesh net that the People of the Book have been building. Disturbingly, some malefactors have been targeting the mesh tech, as well as sometimes the people sent out to repair it. CG then hoofs it to the Bligh with spirit cover, and convinces the Maulers to attend, using his good rep with them for leverage. They seem depleted and a bit more desperate with Kong’s death and the various defections to other new gangs.

Dig flies around to round up his targets- the Ancients are an easy yes as he helped rescue some of them from ARES prison, though they are still a small faction. He then heads to north Oakland County and finds the student enclave, Ronnie’s Raider, where he once again encounters Freddy Bales, who happily introduces him to some assorted professors and Ronnie herself, who seems like a tech wiz- the enclave has a lot of clever sensors and traps rigged up of various tech levels.

Otters heads west to Dearborn to go another Red Market, and manages to make contact with a thief there who will neither confirm or deny if they are a member of the Ghunday, although the filmic bandit outift suggests they likely are. Otters passes along the invite, which includes the other guests, and gets a bad feeling this may just be a way of telling some thieves who to steal from at what time. Otters also barely spots a stealth blimp, and sends out a wideband appreciation text, but receives no response. Back at the Scar Wood Raven agrees to send some of the Swarm along, though he seems mostly interested in the promise Dig has made of a free power charging station- he has made another bike golem in his downtime, to leave running at the Plat Zone.

With everyone (possibly excluding the Ghunday) agreed to attend, the team links back up and heads to the Plat Zone to set up. Marjo-Lin comes by to perform a solo set as promised, the rest of Glock .50 having left for Denver after Latvian Gambit to start recording their debut for Silversound Records. She seems to have brought all of the Keepers with her, possibly lured by free food. The Swarm rolls up and quickly monopolizes the charging station, with many of them dropping off into BTL stupors as quickly as they can.

The Maulers and Nightmares both send small delegations and make nasty eyes at each other, but keep the peace at the meeting as promised. Marv sitting out front with his assault cannon probably helps. Lady Jain herself shows up on behalf of the Ghunday and seems to take a shine to/be working something up with the Keepers. Sikh Burn trades some tactics advice with the Nightmares, and talks about the experience in Hamtramck and what of the community successes there they can export elsewhere.

The Ancients, Metal Maniacs and non-BTL’ed Swarm exchange Blackout tech and implant tips and tricks with Ronnie’s Raiders, who seem pretty engineering focussed, and Ancients and Swarm talk about high speeds and hot races. Meanwhile, the team watches for trouble, makes sure everyone has food, drink, power etc, and TD circulates, pulling on their rep to try to get everyone to sign up.

With some impressive networking, TD manages to get everyone present to agree to a loose coop- basically they won’t attack (or steal) from other factions who have also joined. Both Lady Jain and one of the Nightmares make some quick calls after, possibly ensuring a backup plan for if the meeting went poorly isn’t executed. With that out of the way, the team parties with everyone present for a while, everyone rocks to Marjo-Lin’s sparse but intense set, and then one of the Metal Manias closes it down reading a posthuman manifesto of some sort, as Creep promised they could.

This kinda kills the mood, so everyone goes home. They call Howell to report success, and he seems surprised since he had a whole job planned, but figures this is still job done overall, so slides them some pay and offers some work as well. The team is getting a solid rep in town, and has good amount of jobs available to choose from, even amidst the confusion.

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
Tabasco aka Cholula

The team does some initial recon on the hotel that the scientist they have been tasked with retrieving was last seen at. Otters flies by with the VTOL, and even with all the digital security obviously offline feels like she almost got spotted. However, she gets a good look at the layout and general vibe- fortified but seemingly still a functional hotel, though with much more overt security than usual. Dig does a flyby as a bird and also gets some intel- 3 mana barriers are up, and he is able to tell that someone inside one of them is also thinking about the team’s target: Camden Espinoza. Unfortunately, someone behind the next mana barrier spots him and he gets slapped with a hit of pure mana before fleeing- at least it seems they were aiming to wound rather than kill! The only thing he saw was a flash of golden eyes.

The team rests up and finishes doing repairs from the last run-in with the mystery vans, and heads to the area late the next morning. They park behind a semi-wrecked Taco Temple adjacent to a news building with a large billboard across the street from the hotel. Cholula scales the building and billboard, leaving a camera set up to watch the parking garage entrance while he watches the front. Otters strings up some drone relays to keep comms semi-functional, and The Detective walks up to the front door, unarmed, and successfully both doesn’t get shot (there are some bodies stuck in the razor wire perimeter) and negotiates for a reasonable price for a room with an obsequious concierge.

Told that guests are acceptable so long as they also check weapons and go through security, TD brings in Creep, who hides a glass cutter, a gun, and Dig (in mouse form) in his pockets well enough to dodge the search. They find an unoccupied room a few floors down from TD’s room and cut one of the windows open, and Otters flies ChewGum and herself in, and then sends the VTOL over to perch on the billboard next to Cholula and await extraction. They split up to explore the hotel, with CG holding down their entry point and keeping comms updates going to and from Cholula.

Dig and Creep do some magical investigation with support from Otters, and manage to figure out that the lowest level mana ward seems to be a large MCT contingent, possibly including a family but with a lot of supplies and security. The highest level mana ward is the rooftop bar, where The Detective heads. They see a troll crooner singing his heart out on stage while looking only a little bored, and meet the Madame who oversees the establishment. Deciding to make a little harmless trouble, TD orders a drink for one of the two people making eyes at each other across the room while pretending not to.

And perhaps most importantly, TD tries to do some casual surveillance on the golden-eyed middle-aged man in the corner, who is attended by two similar looking female bodyguards- 1 appears cyber and one an adept, but TD can’t get a read on the guy at all. TD also gets spotted and summoned over, and goes. They have a brief but largely friendly chat, where they realize they’re looking for the same person, but not necessarily on behalf of the same person. The man tries to hire TD and team out from under Brunwyn, but TD refuses, feeling honorbound.

The man takes it fairly well, but says they will then be competitors on this job, though he hopes TD will give him a chance to hire directly in the future. He then gives a sharp whistle and his 2 guards leap up in unison and race to the elevator and stairs. TD, aiming for cool, stays and finishes their drink before making their goodbyes. Meanwhile, Dig, Creep and Otters have looked into the remaining mana ward and see that it encompasses the penthouse level, which has it’s own elevator key and locked off fire stairs.

Doing some careful, and higher level, magical investigation, Dig is able to spot yet another golden-eyed middle-aged man with two guards- this time a large Black troll with a ton of tattoos and a Vietnamese teen who looks to be a mage. Aiming not to attract their attention just yet, they head back to the meeting room and all debrief together. TD gets a feeling they were followed on the way and finds a hidden camera that they destroy, when they double back to check.

Putting their heads together, the best they can come up with is that this seems to be two people both aiming to appear as the SK archetypal Johnson, Hans Brackhaus. Since both SK and others use this ID for true and false flag ops, the team feels a little over their head and is glad to be working for neither, though the strong hints of SK association that Brunwyn gives off don’t make them feel much better. When TD head back to their room to take a bath and get high, they find a note waiting.

The woman they bought the drink for at the bar is requesting assistance. TD grabs Otters and they head to her room. She explains that she (an ARES financial corpo who took some leave not expecting the Blakcout) and her secret lover (the mayor of Toronto) were having an illicit meetup post-Latvian Gambit but are now stuck in the hotel. Worried about how an ARES association will play right now, the Mayor hasn’t yet left his wife as promised and doesn’t want to be seen in public- hence the glances across the bar that TD spotted.

This woman wants them to smuggle her and her lover out of town, in the hopes of beginning their life together. She seems fairly drunk. TD and Otters asks some questions, and get some useful info from her in exchange for agreeing to help. She takes them, wobbily, to a room that she says always has room service being delivered and dishes carefully stacked out front but that noone goes in or out of. Taking a quick magical look, Dig spots two tween teens, a middle-aged woman tending to someone in a homemade bio-bed, and in the bed itself: Camden Espinoza. He looks fried, possibly brain-dead, and has a burnt-out high-end MCT deck next to him. Looks like someone physically pulled the plug.

The team quickly fills Cholula in and rallies back to grab the guy, getting the VTOL in position near his room’s window. Unfortunately, Cholula spots a figure in camo crawling down the outside of the building, just as the team inside spots 2 more cloaked figures at opposing hallway corners. Cholula manages to narcoject the figure outside, and then Otters rams their unconscious form with the VTOL, breaking their gecko grip and sending them plummeting to their death, which alerts the guards below. Cholula fires off a few distraction arrows around the guards to keep them occupied before being forced to flee, retrieving his camera and Otters’ drones on the way.

Inside, Dig has made a huge magic hand and flicks open the room’s barred door. Creep chucks a couple thermal smoke grenades but throws badly and both roll back towards the team so the scene is chaotic. CG sends his spirits after the two cloaked figures, and manages to delay one with various powers while his cat corpse spirit is destroyed by the other. He blasts out the window in the room with his shotgun while Creep covers the family and Dig uses his magic hand to get Camden and his deck into the VTOL while Otters pilots. TD keeps everyone working together while trying to figure out a plan…. maybe now that they have the guy the other team will give up?

Outside, Cholula quickly scans the cam footage he retrieved and spots something interesting: just after everything kicked off, two of the mystery vans stealthily snuck out of the parking garage, driving off in the opposite direction of the fight before quickly turning in opposite directions off the main street….

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
Tabasco aka Cholula

Cholula has been haunting the streets of Motor City, checking out the developing gang scene. Some seem relatively pro-social, some less so. He begins hunting the most thrill-kill gang he can find, the 696 Slayers, further depleting their numbers from the massive hit they already took from the team (unbeknownst to one another). ChewGum stocks up on reagents (Penelope Bean is still getting a supply from…. somewhere?) and does some investigation into the mysterious critter attacks.

Using some intel from the Keepers and other contacts, he manages to find a site of a recent attack, and with a ritual and some tracking and assensing is able to piece together what happened. Some horrifying looking creatures attacked in a group of 3-4, ripping two civilians apart. The creatures seem very hungry but not malicious. And they are indeed wearing some kind of RFID collar. He pegs this as “needs further investigation” and rejoins the crew, meeting up with Cholula just outside Casa Aurelius’ guarded walls.

Inside, Otters and The Detective approach Corinna (the Nadja Fixer, seemingly in from Chicago) and Eugene Trapp, a UCAS marshal, who are discussing dangerous bounties in town. Otters talks about killing a Wendigo and Corinna extracts herself as Otters and TD chat edgily back and forth with Trapp for a bit- he is some kind of canine SURGE, and seems to make note of their scents.

As the party seems to be winding down, and they have other allies present they can ask for more info on other attendees as needed, they head out. Otters and TD wait in the van while Creep and Dig as a mouse sneak up onto the roof through the vents and then let themselves down in a guard blindspot that TD spotted. They get in the van and slip back into the smuggling compartment for now. After they watch a series of guests leave via various, mostly unpowered, conveyances, the staff and guards finally start filtering out.

They see the guard that DIg mind-scanned carrying a hard case big enough to contain the data cube, but he splits off from the rest of the guards and hops into a matte-black, fully tinted van that pulls up just as he’s exiting the building. Otters leaves the parking lot and posts up in a stealthy spot further down the road, and CG and Cholula set up in outside the main gate to the area, having communicated with the team via stealth VTOL.

They get lucky and guessed right as to the black van’s route, and Otters quickly scoops up the 2 outside the gate as Creep and Dig get back out of the smuggling compartment once they’ve cleared security. Otters tries to subtly follow, with the VTOL aloft to triangulate. As they continue, they head into the ruined area of Downtown, which seems like a good spot to lose pursuers. Seeing the van ahead slow, Otters pulls into a side street and sends the VTOL in for a closer look.

They see one of the white vans with the dishes pull up alongside, both side doors slide open, and somethings get passed back and forth. Unfortunately, the white van as usual gives off a brief burst of signal and seems to spot the VTOL in the matrix, and the white and black vans peel off in opposite directions. After a quick debate, Otters guns it and follows the black van.

Not waiting this time, Otters opens fire, damaging the vehicle. She is also gaining on them, and the other driver, while capable, doesn’t seem to match her level of skill. The back door flings open, and a short human inside fires a rocket at the team van, with Otters managing to avoid a direct hit but catching some shrapnel. Otters fires back and blasts the human back into the opposing van.

Dig magically sends his sight over into the other van, and sees a team of 3, plus the guard, with the human on the floor either dying or dead. They look like shadowrunners but not total pros. As he watches, the guard lifts the launcher and fires another shot at the van- direct hit! Massive damage, but Otters keeps them on he road. Creep and Cholula return fire, lighting both the man and van on fire, as CG orders his spirit to cause the man to have an accident.

Dig also spots one of the mystery boxes hooked up to a power cable, seemingly powering the van, and the team decides they better grab it. Creep crawls onto the van roof as Otters maneuvers into position to see the box clearly. Dig uses magic fingers to yank it free of it’s bolts but it’s still hanging by the power cable, which Creep manages to shoot through with impressive aim just as the guard fumbles his launcher reload and detonates the black van.

The wreck crashes and burns hard, and the team van is almost wrecked as well in the shrapnel cloud. The mystery box, though damaged, appears mostly intact, and Dig attempts to analyze it magically but can’t make much sense of it. There doesn’t seem to be anything living inside when CG assenses, so they head back to the safehouse to rest, heal and examine further. While Otters and the repair drones patch up the van and the golem pedals away, recharging it, the team sleeps and recovers.

In the morning, they call up Smoach and he agrees to come take a look. Dig says he’s got some tasks for the day, and heads off to Stanli the Candyman’s house/fort. The rest of the team reports into Howell and gets paid for dragon investigating and gala info, sending the data device over his way along with a written report on what they learned. He says he’ll examine it all and get back to them about it, but in the meantime he has a client looking to get some of the gangs in town working together.

Cholula is stoked about this since he wanted to do it anyway. TD bites the bullet and radios up Cehualli, and the AZT agent hints that he works for Armando Salazar, the AZT operative depicted on the Hermit card, He provides two tasks for the team, and offers to pay in info, artifacts, or nuyen as desired. One, they are to track down an ork serial killer named Pygmy who has fled here. Two, if they encounter anything interesting ARES left behind or lost in the move, they are to sell it on to Cehualli. TD agrees, for now.

Down at Stanli’s, Dig in bird form gets a tense introduction to a member of the Reality Hackers, who seems to have fled Seattle after killing a demiGOD. Dig, going against the team’s plan, sells this individual the Damien Knight snuff BTL he’s been working, and mixes up some alchemical drugs to go along with it to really heighten the experience for the topline customers. The RH-er trades him a very fancy attack-focussed deck and gives Dig access to an RH gear mefeed, if he ever gets regular matrix. Stanli also reups DIg on some drugs, stoked about this wild new product the he can now peddle to a local populace with a lot of hate for ARES.

Back at the safehouse, the team readies for Otters’ scheduled meeting with Brunwyn Harridan, though Cholula decides to stay behind to keep an eye on Smoach as he examines the device. Smoach manages to figure out what it is: a horrifying prison for a sprite, who in it’s frantic attempts to escape, generates the electricity the device is pumping out even as it’s code degrades into madness. He’s injured in the attempt to communicate, and suggests they need to free it onto a larger grid in the hope that it can stabilize somewhat there.

They share some beers and sad conversation, sitting together and pondering the darkness of the world. Smoach also reports that FTD seems defeated locally, but that the Shadow spirits are likely still a threat, and he has a next lead on where to look, when the team is ready. On the river south of downtown, the team finds the Austrian ork Baritone waiting for them in a dinghy. They hop aboard and he rows them out to a very sleek modernist houseboat, which CG spots as having impressive aesthetic flourishes, and Otters ID’s as also being very fast and potentially deadly.

They are ushered aboard by a German hobgoblin named Geraldo who seems to have weapons hidden all over his person- Creep is impressed. Brunwyn herself gestures them back into a tastefully appointed state room, and is once again dressed to the 9’s, though more subtly than at the gala. She waves away her guards when they subtly inquire if they should join. Based on the whole vibe and a quick chat via mesh network, they assume this is all an SK opp, so good to be careful, though it may be too late as they are already in the room.

After some banter, they get down to business- Brunwyn wants them to grab up some scientists, data and matrix specialists specifically, off a list of names that she has. She will pay well, she states, in a form of the team’s choosing, and a barely detectable tempestuousness crosses her features when TD dares to negotiate. She quickly recovers her charm however, and agrees to a short timeline for the job for bonus pay. TD, feeling like there isn’t another better option, agrees. They get some intel, and Brunwyn tells them where to meet and by what deadline.

They head back out, likely having just made a deal with a dragon, and link back up with the other teammates at the safehouse, where they see Dig’s impressive new deck, which he flew back clutching in his bird claws while using an illusion to make it look like a fish. They get another call from Howell, who seems to have been investigating along some of the same lines as the team, and reports that he got a lot of good data from the gala, but that specifically he wants to know more about a group calling themselves the “Grid Pirates” who seem to be the ones kidnapping TM’s.

They are also likely behind the mystery power boxes, which Howell names a “SpriteLok” based on recovered data., It seems likely they are selling/renting them around town, including to the gala for the event, though the renters likely don’t know what they are and are smart or desperate enough not to ask. The team reports that there is at least one surviving white van, and Howell says he’ll do more digging but likely have more work for them soon. Some of the worst news: the GP’s must have at least one Dissonant or otherwise corrupted/coerced TM and/or powerful sprite under their control, as they would be required to trap the sprites in the devices as the Faraday cage exterior of the SpriteLok is assembled around them….

Runners
Creep
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective

ChewGum heads out to restock on reagents and look into the rumors of strange animal attacks that The Detective picked up. Cholula continues prowling the permanent twilight feeling strangely at home. The rest of the team starts looking into “new dragon in town” rumors for Howell. Based on his initial intel, they head Downtown, with Dig arriving first in bird form. He does some astral investigation and finds some talismongers harvesting reagents, who take a shot at him when they spot a “magical bird.”

He then becomes a man to try to explain, and they take another shot at him, thinking he’s a shapeshifter- these don’t seem like ethical talismongers. He eventually convinces them he’s just a mage, and tries to get some info out of them but fails to catch them in an obvious lie and retreats. Meanwhile, Creep and TD encounter an Order of St. George foot patrol- 2 archers and 2 broadsword wielders in medieval appearing but seemingly modern armor. They approach peacefully and TD makes a judgement call to not try to ape their archaic speech patterns in case they take it as an insult.

The OoSG knights explain that they too have heard rumors of a dragon, and are hunting it as all foul wyrms are a threat to metahumanity. They seem excited to be hunting “worthy prey” instead of merely nests of ghouls and other flesh-eaters. They also obliquely praise strong leaders of a fascist variety to these don’t seem like good people either. Unfortunately, they do seem very well-equipped and capable, the team was hoping they were just LARPers.

They manage to exchange some info though, and get shown a high quality sketch of the dragon on a scroll that the knights say is a composite from multiple “enhanced interviews” with witnesses. After the knights also reveal that they are hunting a nest of ghouls in Windsor that the team figures out is some friends of theirs, they quickly make their exit and plan to warn their allies. Creep and TD finally arrive to Dig’s location on foot, and they track the pair of talismongers down again, with Creep hanging back in case of trouble. TD has better luck socially, and manages to bribe them with a certified credstick for some info.

They’ve heard rumors of dragon sightings from some sketchy street contacts and are looking for any kind of windfall- scales, spit, shit, whatever- anything from a dragon in valuable. They explain that their contacts are mostly addicts and street people of various sorts, and that many members of both groups are ending up Downtown as it’s a bit of an open/chaotic zone right now, with large swaths under noone’s control. They pass along a description, which matches the OoSG sketch, and also say their contacts refer to the dragon as “she” for some reason.

TD thanks them, and after refusing to purchase any of their sketchy wares from inside their voluminous coats, they head out to seek out a street reporter named Miles Two-Go that might have more info. They find him along with a bunch of riggers and gangers hanging out in the Scar zone- Dig is still feeling a bit bad there from the strange mana ebb but not as strongly as before. The crowd here seems to be racing modded vehicles that they’ve attached space rocket boosters too, having hauled a bunch over on horses and carts from the ARESpace/EvoSpace facility out by Knight International.

They meet the man in charge, a troll named Wood Raven, who seems like a philosophical speed demon, but explains he’s trying to give all the riggers and go-gangers in town something positive to do so they don’t totally lose their shit. The team chats a bit with a few Ancients that Creep recognizes from the prison break, and they also warn Lunatech (from the Windsor crew) about the OoSG threat, and she says she has to go make some radio calls. They also manage to get a few other Ancients freed from an obviously annoying conversation with the reporter they seek.

They find that Miles Two-Go is a scoop-chasing conflict zone photojournalist, and another mediocre-to-bad person. He seem full of himself, sleazy, and annoying, though not unskilled. He shows them some partial images of the dragon he’s managed to capture with some bashed together old-tech trail cams he’s rigged up around Downtown. He explains that if he got some kind of crude mesh network up and running he could get the cams to talk to each other and likely get better images as they could retarget on the fly based on each previous cams data.

The team agrees to help him out, reluctantly, but recognizes that they can use and then abandon him at least. Feeling like they’ve got enough for now, they head back to the safehouse to link up with Otters, who has been charging and prepping her drones for the night ahead. They stop on the way to steal some formal wear (black suit and tux) from a prom store Downtown that hasn’t been looted yet. Otters drives them to Casa Aurelius, and they find the exclusive gated neighborhood still has a few lights on, it looks like some industrial generators are powering guard station lights at the checkpoint entrances as well as some street lights and other public features.

if any of the visible mansions that rise over the security wall have lights on, they’re keeping it to themselves- candles, chemlights and the like are all that is otherwise visible. The team heads in- SIN scanners are still down so they breeze through with their gala tickets, with Dig as a mouse hidden in Creep’s pocket, and Creep hidden in the smuggling compartment. They stop at another fancy clothes store, this one seems to be open, and get some accoutrements and additional items to spruce up their looks, though the proprietor seems annoyed at being unable to custom tailor the garments at the moment.

TD successfully navigates the uptight rich lady social dynamic though, and they head to the gala, with Creep and Dig sneaking out a few blocks away. TD and Otters wait in the van til Dig and Creep make their entrance to make sure there aren’t any issues that require assistance or extraction. Dig creates an illusion of some teens setting off fireworks and cursing at the guards before running away, with Creep using a carefully buried flashbang to help sell it. The guards give chase, and Creep manages to melt a small hole in the door just before another pair of guards comes around the building to replace them.

Dig shifts into cockroach form, and squeezes through the welded hole, turning back to a man inside and pushing the door open for Creep. Creep is appalled at Dig’s lack of stealth in doing so, especially since the only reason the fire alarm didn’t go off appears to be the lack of wireless. They sneak up to the 3rd floor and find a weird shielded data cube with no ports and a number of cables running out of it. It looks newly, but securely, installed. Creep tries to get a data tap into one of the cables, but they seem to be outputting electricity only- nothing goes in, and no data goes either way. A mystery!

Meanwhile, TD and Otters successfully enter, passing through a mana barrier after showing their tickets to the bored teens and young adults staffing the gala. The security staff seems much more alert and competent, but still a bit complacent inside. They find a candlelit event room, 3 stories high, topped with a cupola letting in some of the strange starlight. An 8-person orchestra is playing some atonal modern classical that seem to be creating an audio dithering effect, allowing for the feel of a full room of people talking while also creating some privacy for the individual conversations.

They take a quick survey of the room, and notice some interesting individuals around, as well as few friendly faces (Ringmaster, Pretty, and Ellis are all in attendance). Upstairs, Creep and Dig have managed to sneak into the ductwork and navigate to a duct overlooking the gala, and successfully manage to hand off the device they snuck in to TD via sleight of hand, without security noticing anything. However, a few people in the crowd seem perhaps to have spotted it- interesting.

Creep and Dig surveil astrally and aurally while TD and Otters begin circulating. The pair on foot initially spend some not very productive time talking to a city councilor (the lone survivor of the Shadow attack on the council), who is speaking to an empty chair. After TD determines that no entity occupies the chair, and that the man seems to be badly in the grip of PTSD, they make a polite exit. Creep overhears the museum curator and host, Stella Hoargrave, doing her bubbly socialite thing, but seemingly with a bit of a frantic edge. She performs her one tiny magical ability of making small lights over and over with a canned bit about it finally being useful.

Dig spots a few different magical beings in the crowd, but focuses his efforts on seeking anyone with knowledge of technomancer kidnapping. His first spotting: Rose and SINder! A technomancer and her brother, who seem to be thinking a lot about missing TM’s. Also, this is likely the other runner team that Howell told them would be doing the other half of the job while the team carries around the device he gave them. Dig decides not to make contact, but tells the rest of the team that the pair is there.

Otters and TD next approaches two very fashionable elf woman, both of whom might have witnessed the device handoff. The first seems to be a Nadja clone (or Nadja Daviar herself?) and they steer clear for now, but the second woman has eyes perfectly matching the description and image of the dragon! She introduces herself as Brunwyn Harridan, and her bodyguard as Baritone, and seems delighted to make their acquaintance. Otters advertises herself as a local expert, and they set up a meeting for the following day to discuss things further, before Brunwyn gets back to socializing.

Otters then heads over to chat with some professorial looking types, happy to hear that they are discussing hard sciences instead of liberal arts, but fails to insert himself into their convo until TD makes it work. They discuss the rift and the footage Otters got inside the Scar right after it was created, as well as both prof’s theories- Simone Palomer is an astral travel expert and Vinh Trong is a “rules of magic” specialist, carrying a large bound tome mounted to his chest in a modified baby bjorn.

After they say their goodbyes with a promise to continue sharing info, Otters heads off to chat up Red, the vampire, and TD heads over to a mysterious troll woman who seems noticeably unobtrusive to TD’s studied eye. Red seems amiable and he and Otters chat for a bit about threats in town and the worsening situation for the Infected in Chicago. TD finally manages to corner the troll woman, and discovers that it is Patricia Loveland, who agrees to talk after confirming that “the abomination” (aka Cholula) is not present.

Loveland warns TD again about the threat of even “friendly” bugs, and TD tries to counter with more experiential data, which Loveland brushes off, saying she’s read the Jackpoint posts, and disagrees with the Monad comparison. Unable to reach a common ground on BETAS, they agree to leave it there for now and discuss other issues. Loveland shares some info about other party guests as a sign of good faith- her fellow expat DeeCee operatives Cass Wandering Horse and Sahara Jones (now working for STV it seems) are both there, as is an AZT mage named Cehualli and a few other interesting individuals.

Otters helps ID one of them, a buff troll woman, as an ARES heavy hitter named Ruby- kind of a one-woman clean-up crew. Both she and Loveland wonder why ARES left Ruby behind, and who she might be hunting. The whole crowd also turns to watch the final, stylishly late, attendees arrive- a Tir royal throuple, entering ethereally bedecked in high Elven fashion. Otters makes a quick stylistic analysis and guesses they are Tir Tairngire rather than Tir na nOg, but isn’t sure. Regardless, intriguing….

Dig, hiding still and magically scanning, spots the newest member of his magical order, Freddy Bales, introducing an older also visibly wealthy man who could be his father to the 2 professors. Loveland hints to TD of Black Lodge presence in town. The team spots Julia Pesina wandering the crowd with her ever-more battered camera drone Grover in tow, filming guests and getting short interviews, though some guests seems to intentionally avoid her. TD heads over to the AZT mage after Otters confirms with Red that the farm and their neighbors have been suffering some crop failures, and warns them of the corrupted AttakPak snacks.

TD tries to shock the mage into admitting some knowledge of corruption or other things but he manages to get them on their backfoot instead by referencing the team’s extensive recent use of Tarot cards. He suggests he’s just as happy to be an enemy as a friend, and TD chooses friend (for now at least). They have some loaded banter for a while before Cehualli suggests they ought to discuss things further soon, in more privacy. As this convo wraps up, Dig finally gets another hit on his spell: one of the guards is thinking of kidnapping TM’s! Dig ID’s the guard to the rest of the crew and they start pivoting the job over into a kidnap mission.

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective

The Detective, while wandering around and checking in on the city and their contacts, has collected some intriguing new rumors to follow up on. The Keepers warn of strange animal attacks, with the animals all seen wearing some sort of collar. There is a new, well-resourced, fixer named Peregrine setting up operations Downtown. Food hoarding is becoming obvious and may lead to shortages. Blight gangs are running newly amok without Kong or ARES to restrain them. And there’s a hot new snack on the street- AttakPak! TD tracks some of these snacks down and eats half a bag, as well as doing their best to analyze them- they seem filling but not nutritious, perhaps useful but a little dangerous in these hungry times. They do some astral analysis and notice some dark magic on the half-full bag but fail to get further info.

They head back to the safehouse and link up with everyone else, who is recuperating from the FTD ambush, and they collectively debrief. CG offers to take a deeper astral look at TD post- summoning a new plant spirit, after Dig fails to get any useful info. Everyone patches themselves up as best they can and rests a bit while some calls with more job offers come in on the radio. Howell wants them to investigate some dragon rumors and also do some intel gathering at a gala, Grandmother Biyu wants them to acquire an abandoned bread truck and keep looking into mystery vans/TM kidnapping.

Biyu also asks for contact info for the Skins gang, having heard they took a beating during the FTD ambush. She seems excited about the prospect of them teaming up with the Triad to gain some further status/supply/protection in exchange for help moving product, food, etc through the DDB tunnels, avoiding some of the dangers present on the surface, with an increasingly stressed out populace becoming more and more agitated each day the Blackout drags on. Dig and the team agree and pass along the info, though they start to wonder if they may someday be too deep in the Triad’s pocket.

They finally search the Mage on the Hill’s duffel, and find a collapsed masked ward, which likely fell apart when he died. Inside, amidst various dingy changes of clothes and an empty book, they find another one of the Tarot Queens, and spend some time analyzing it and guessing what it might do. They also realize that they once again have all 4 fours in their possession, and after identifying the common “heart” imagery amongst them, manage to activate the set and change the cards into 4 vials. Otters drinks hers immediately and finds herself feeling very loyal to CG. CG then drinks his and feels very beneficent to himself.

Dig suggests that maybe this is some sort of “love potion” so both Dig and TD hold onto their doses for now, awaiting a better use. They rest, and the Golem bikes away, recharging their tech. The next day, after CG summons a new spirit to replace the ones he lost in the ambush, the spirit analyzes the AttakPak snacks and TD as well, and finds traces of Corruption magic on both. This rings a bell for CG, who remembers discussing a famine spirit with Cass Wandering Horse. The team also gets worried about possible connections to Taco Temple, since they still haven’t quite figured that one out.

With food feeling a bit urgent and the gala not for a few days yet, they decide to tackle the bread truck first. They do some recon passes (Otters in a VTOL and Dig as a bird), and find the truck parked directly behind a private school for mid-level corpo kids. It looks like it had pulled up the loading dock the night of the Blackout and then got abandoned. An incipient go-gang seems to have taken over the school lot for their own use, and the team ID’s them as the newly formed 696 Slayers, who seem to be made up of some riggers and some ex-Maulers.

They also seem to have some prisoners, and based on their human skin flag and their Reaver-style vehicle decorations and home-made weaponry, these guys look pretty dark and fucked up. But the truck seems intact so game on! They make a plan and head over once night falls, hoping some of the gang will be out raiding or whatever. Creep sneaks up while the van parks a ways back, but he spots one of the mystery vans cruising by on a side street, and weirder yet, gets a burst of wireless signal from it. He races back to the van and they give chase, with Dig and Morticia getting airborne to assist.

Through some skillful driving and excellent triangulation, Otters manages to track the van down, catching another wireless burst- however, as the team’s devices all ping back, the other van also notices them. They start blasting at each other while Otters gives chase. The other driver seems quite skilled and almost surely a rigger, but not quite as good as Otters. They manage to critically damage the other van and Creep attempts a boarding action but just misses and crashes to the road, which turns out to be good as the other van slows to a halt and then explodes.

The team van is badly damaged, but still functional, so they gather what intel they can from the scene (not much) and head back to the bread heist. Otters deploys the mules and creeps the van up into LOS, while Creep sneaks in again. He cuts into the bottom of the truck and confirms that there is A LOT of bread in there, and then guides Otters in to access the manual controls and get it in neutral, while he sets a grenade trap closer to the gangers. Dig summons a massive beast spirit to help push the truck and then flies over the gangers in the schools quad/field to try to distract them.

He finds them doing some gnarly torture under hot lights that they seems to be running off a poorly-maintained school generator, and uses mob mood to amp up their blood frenzy. After quartering two captives with their combo of electric and diesel vehicles (presumably also charged or filled off the gennie), half of them head out, leaving the other half of the gang on foot. It seems like in a Blackout even go-gangs have to make sacrifices.

Creep doubles back to help Otters after she gets halfway through figuring out manual controls and then gives up in frustration, and finishes the job. Otters sneaks back to the van under concealment from CG’s spirit as CG and TD sneak up to the van, CG steering while TD gets on the roof to act as lookout and support. Creep lubes up the initial push zone to help get it rolling and then manages to yank open the fence gate on the back of the lot, but this causes a lot of noise, and the remaining gangers respond.

The first batch of them to arrive set off the grenade trap and are all killed or badly injured, and the rest take cover while taking the occasional pot shot. Between the 2 mules pulling and the spirit pushing, they get it slowly moving, but CG is initially unable to get his spirit to use the movement power effectively, so Otters repositions the van and cuts down the remaining gangers with the turret, while Creep climbs atop the truck and also picks a few off. Unfortunately one of them seemed to be talking to someone on a big whip antennae radio, so they get worried there may be more coming.

They keep pushing as best they can and are struggling a bit until Otters brings the van in behind to help push, and CG finally gets his spirit to add some magical movement. Now they’re cruising- still very slow, but steady. Unfortunately, TD spots and smells a diesel smoke cloud and they hear some loud engine noises approaching. The leader of the gang, who Dig had ID’ed as one “Bloodripper” from his earlier surveillance, appears to have some cruel looking home-made spears he is preparing to throw. Otters fires on them, as does Creep, and they manage to take a few gangers out, crashing their bikes, but Bloodrippers nails Creep with a spear, near killing him.

TD frantically tries to save Creep’s life, managing to help stabilize him, while providing leadership for the team. CG is keeping the truck on the road, and Dig uses an illusion to distract the gangers, though Bloodripper doesn’t fall for it. Otters tags him with some fire from one of the mules, and Bloodripper takes out the van with another spear. Dig tries to catch the other gangers in a big spell, but it flops, and they are feeling pretty desperate. Otters manages to get the van safely stopped but is stuck inside, since CG can’t stop the truck if they want to get it to Biyu. They inevitably leave Otters behind, with her trying to get the mules in to defend herself as the gangers start cutting into the van with large diesel saws.

Dig, needing a hail mary, tells CG to prepare to shout as loud as he can to leave, and flies down as a bird and chucks his “love potion” at Bloodripper, scoring a direct hit. The gangers keep cutting into the van as CG tells them to go home. Amazingly, Bloodripper responds, calling off the goons and they all peel out back towards the school. Dig flies surveillance for a few hours while Otters patches the van up enough to be able to limp home, with the near invisible mules firing off occasional shoots over the heads of anyone who comes close.

CG and TD arrive out front of Biyu’s and CG slams the brakes for the first time, with TD having to grab the spear impaling Creep to keep from flying off the top. They also share the info they gathered about the mystery van. Biyu seems thrilled and says that she can deal with the bread and truck from here, and offers 3 payment options- they choose the highest nuyen value, though that won’t be immediately useful most places, in honor of Creep’s wishes, and then haul Creep back to the safehouse to try to patch him back up. It looks like he’ll have some permanent internal damage from this one. Otters slowly rolls in with the busted van shortly after, and everyone crashes after a long day.

They take the next day off to heal and patch up, and get gala details from Howell. They start planning outfits and who will attend vs who will be in support roles. They also get the latest news updates from Radio Free Detroit- it seems like they’re stuck here for now, with the UCAS declaring martial law and MET2000 locking down all city exits, but the Blackout Blitzes have continued to provide occasional supply drops, and Otters is thrilled to find that the Trading Post is still semi-operational, and gets yet another repair drone. With everything recharged and repaired, they get ready to party.

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
Tabasco aka Cholula

The team convinces the Mage on the Hill to assist them, though he seems somewhat disgusted by their unique style of banter. However, he swore a pact and must aid when asked, so he will. They also discuss whether to use any other Tarot, and CG pulls out the Queen he was given to summon aid later, if the situation seems desperate enough to pay the currently unknown cost. They take the freshly golem-charged van with 2 Mule drones and the crew all loaded up down to Belle Isle for the ritual/ambush. Unable to reach The Detective, who’s off checking up on contacts, they leave without them.

Upon arriving, they coordinate with the ritualists, who are actively working, and pick spots to set themselves and their allies up for the ambush. They put Myrryr on surveillance on the far eastern point, to watch for what they consider an unlikely approach over the water. The post the Mage on the Hill atop the SE building, CG on the central north building, Creep on the edge of the ritual to the west in hiding, Otters in the smuggling compartment in the van, harwired in, with the Mules within short distance antenna range, and Dig and Cholula atop the central ritual building, the highest point.

They assign the Windsor crew to the north edge of the bridge from mainland Detroit, but tell them to come up behind anyone who comes over it for a pincer. They have Rains and the Skins wait inside the ritual effect area as a reserve to mask their auras, but tell them to keep an eye towards the southern bridge towards Windsor. Then, they wait, with some bird control and flashlight signals planned with comms all fucky as they are.

Shortly thereafter, the Windsor crew reports two buses seemingly running on magic stuffed with Shadow zombies coming from the north bridge, while the Mage on the Hill reports a mass of ghouls with a strange astral signature coming from the south bridge. Creep jumps on the lead Shadow bus and shoots the driver through the windshield, while CG instructs his spirits to use their accident powers on those inside. The Windsor crew engages the second bus in a firefight, pulling it off the attack.

Rains and crew rush out to fight the ghoul swarm, pulling about half of them off, while Otters begins firing between van and Mules into their midst, dropping many but not slowing them at all- they seem to be moving unnaturally, both in terms of their speed and the way they move- it almost looks like the murmurations of a flock of birds. Otters, as an animal enthusiast, makes note to pay attention to this as the fight continues, and incorporates into her targeting solutions as best she can.

Cholula blasts off a fire arrow at the first zombie bus as Creep finishes off the driver and dives off. The bus careens into one of the buildings and a bunch of zombies tumble out, some lighting themselves on fire on the way, though not seeming to particularly care. Otters manages to cut a chunk of them down with auto-fire before the ghoul mob swarms the van, doing a surprising amount of damage. CG activates the Queen card, and flaming sword manifest, with a voice saying that it will protect him.

Creep gets up behind the zombies and flamethrows a few more, before the remaining 5 surround and nearly kill him. Thinking him dead, they carve some strange marks into his skin before rejoining the fight. Meanwhile, the Mage on the Hill has reported that he cannot sense their scout to the east (Myrryr) and fears an attack, and CG heads out to check on her, coming under nearly fatal attack from the FTD vampire leader amidst his customary bat swarm. Dig blasts the bats with a huge spell as a spirit appears and takes control of the flaming swords and starts clearing out the wounded bats.

With the vampire now exposed, Dig and CG’s spirits start targeting it as CG reloads to wood rounds in his shotgun. Unfortunately the Shadow Succubus has used all this chaos to sneak up to the ritual building and gets Cholula to shoot at Dig, narrowly missing due to Dig’s defensive spells. The Mage on the Hill starts levitating over to help and then goes astral to fight the spirit, doing some massive damage before getting one-hit killed and falling to the ground, where his corpse bursts apart. The Succubus then races over and seems to destroy the Tarot spirit, which has badly wounded the vampire.

Dig’s spirit goes astral to defend him and is also quickly torn apart by the returning Succubus. The vampire makes a diving attack directly at CG but misses, clumsily, just as Cholula nails him with an arrow, causing him to crash to the ground, where CG finishes him off with wood rounds, halting his regeneration. As he desicates before him, 3 Tarot cards fall from his pocket- some of the ones the team was missing from the recovery at the Shadow farm! CG pockets them for now and rushes back to defend Otters and the van from the swarming ghouls and zombies, who have almost destroyed while Otters continues chewing through their numbers.

Clinically, Otters is interested to see that the ghouls seem to act more and more feral the less of them that there are, and wonders how this all interacts with the hive mind rumors. But also she is a little concerned about getting peeled out of the smuggling compartment and eaten. With CG distracted, both of his spirits are killed by the Shadow Succubus, who then turns to the ritual building. Luckily their allies seem to be holding to the west, as no further ghouls or zombies have joined the main fight.

The Succubus sinks one it’s shadowy hands into the center of the ritual circle and sends forth a terrible pulse of entropic energy, killing nearly half the ritualists and wounding the rest. Cholula races downstairs and tries to bite it in the astral, just missing, as Dig pummels it with an overcast spell. The Succubus does another negative energy pulse, and seems to be trying to corrupt the ritual itself. This also kills the remaining ritualists besides Jaga and Walker in the Ways, who along with Dig barely survive.

Cholula pulls out all the stops, and calling on his newly enhanced spirit connection manages to land a powerful blow on the spirit, disapparating it back from whence it came. Outside, CG and Otters mop up the last of the ghouls and zombies shortly afterwards, with the van barely surviving. The cloaked Mules proved invaluable though, and Otters is excited about making good use of 3 intersecting fields of fire. They head out to check on allies, and find nearly dead Creep, luckily stabilized by his trauma patch. Cholula manages to save Dig’s life with another trauma patch, though as Jaga and WitW check the other ritualists none of the rest are as lucky- all appear drained of life and unrecoverable.

The Windsor crew, though badly battered, seem to have all survived from good use of tactics and massive expenditure of ammo and spell-power. Luckily none of the ghouls or zombies brought ranged weapons. Rains and the Skins did not fair as well, losing 3/4 of their number, especially since Rains explains that the hive mind has some sort of hypnotic or seductive quality by which they managed to entrance a portion of his crew, who turned on the others. It was a real bloodbath and he had to resort to indiscriminate explosives, but managed to hold back the additional ghoul tide.

They find Myrryr drowned to death in a few inches of water, presumably the work of the Succubus planning to leave a useful host body for another zombie. Those who are survived are grateful to the team for ending this threat and preventing the corruption of the ritual, but the price was high. Patricia Loveland gets back in touch afterwards, recognizing the team’s skill, utility, and sincerity, though still not trusting or communicating with Cholula.

Hearing the night’s report on Radio Free Detroit after they limp back to the safehouse in the damaged van and patch Creep up back to consciousness, they find out that TM’s are waking back up and complaining of headaches, mood swings, and forced Subermersion into the Resonance Realms. This reminds them of the terrifying thing Rains mentioned- those of his crew who were turned by the feral ghoul hivemind started muttering about something “deep… underneath… rising”.

They report Myrryr’s death into Smoach, who seems to retreat into his Bug City survivor PTSD-protective space, and vows never to let anyone get close to him again, while he plans to dedicate himself to hunting FTD and other nefarious forces in her memory. The next morning, the Tarot sword, whose ephemeral flame had gone out when the Succubus slew the spirit wiedling it, starts flaming again, and CG hears the voice say that he is once again under it’s protection, still unsure of what the cost will be….

Creep tries again to convince everyone to stop doing jobs to help people and try to get paid, so they start looking over their jobs list for good opportunities of what to do next.

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
Tabasco aka Cholula

After ensuring there are no more attackers at the Platinum Zone, Otters figures out how to hook up one of the mule’s partially charged batteries to the dead van and get it running long enough to get back to the safehouse, where Dig immediately goes to sleep to heal up from damage from the fight. The rest of the crew frantically tries to contact people via radio, succeeding in eventually getting ahold of most of the people they had previously built HAM sets for.

They then check on Zennia at the bar, and find that it’s shot to shit and there some bloodstains around. Creep finds that all the messenger birds on the roof have been burned by an area spell also. They track some drag marks through Hamtramck and find a wounded Sikh Burn guarding the People of the Book burial society- he reports that Zennia didn’t make it but that he and some Children of Loxley managed to fell the attackers.

The team heads inside and examines the body- the ritualists there have stabilized them to prevent further possession, and the team sees that three more shadow zombie assailants have been cut apart by Sikh Burn’s flaming sword. As well as Zennia, the bartender and some patrons were also killed, though it seems like she was the target, as ChewGum uses a creepy spell to review the last thing she saw- muzzle flash in a dark room.

After the team gets ahold of the WIndsor crew, they also hear that some shadow zombies made an attempt on Howell, but his biodrones and the timely arrival of some assistance from said crew held the attackers off. The team puts together that there was a coordinated hit on a bunch of different fixers. After hearing Julia “Deadline” Pesina return to broadcasting on radio with the matrix down, they also hear that some other fixers, community organizers, and street docs who they didn’t know were also attacked or killed, including the entire civilian government of the city (with potentially one missing survivor). Technomancers seem to mostly be comatose or non-communicative, and lots of e-life forms are missing.

So it seems like the shadows either knew what was coming, or took quick advantage of the opportunity. The team spends the next day hiring out some remote research on alternate power generation schemes, and Otters manages to rig up CG’s scooter as a pedal-power generator, with instruction passed along from Run and Sollars archive via the Windsor crew. She calls into Pesina to share this info also. Dig spends the day crafting a golem to pedal the bike, and start charging the van, though first they power up all the drones and the team’s tech. Creep, and the the others, are very disturbed when he looks outside and see that not only is it still dark when it should be daytime, but that the stars are wrong. The Detective heads out to check in on the Keepers and other contacts.

Dig turns into a horse and Otters crafts a quick saddle + bag, and Cholula hops on. They head out to Grosse Pointe to see if Leanna Octave survived. Creep uses his magnet hand to cling to the top of the VTOL, while Otters hot rigs it from inside to run aerial surveillance and backup. Creep has done some quick and dirty antenna repairs so they have LOS comms and about 100m signal otherwise. They reach the Metal Maniacs clinic and find the usual bunch of cybered-up weirdos out front, though there are less than usual.

Heading in, Cholula finds Octave examining and disassembling some corpses for parts- she explains that whatever the pulse was was super damaging to Monads and anyone else running a lot of nanites, so their numbers are bit depleted. It doesn’t seem like they were hit otherwise though. She bemoans the loss of their SIN business income, and says they’ll need supplies for upkeep before long. Cholula tries to pry for more info on the SIN stuff but doesn’t get much, and decides to continue not telling her that he is part bug.

As the gangers outside are starting to eye Dig a little hungrily, Cholula makes his exit and hops back on, and rides Dig over to Vendor’s Row to check on Grandmother Biyu. Creep and Otters split off to check on Ellis. Biyu and the Triad seem pretty dug in, and are bolstering their defenses further. She explains that they were attacked but that the attackers were “dealt with” and doesn’t provide further info, though she confirms they were more shadow zombies when asked.

She tells the team to start looking into food security as her people are doing, as that will likely be an issue soon. She also tips them off to a few mysterious rumors- someone has one or more working vans in town, and they’re using them to snatch up technomancers. Biyu also wants the team to extend an offer of safety and employment to any TM’s they come across on her behalf, saying she wants to start a local “sector”, whatever that means.

They head back to the safehouse, though Dig insists on stopping to steal some food on the way- Cholula guides him past a guard with a shotgun and Dig uses magic fingers to fill his saddle bag up. They raid the Tin Can food supplies when they get back too, and find other regulars there doing a sort of wake for the recent dead, and drinking all the booze. Meanwhile, Creep spots a bunch of scattered individuals standing slackly throughout the Scar zone, with no discernible pattern, as they fly by. They land in the skyway level of ARES former HQ tower, the lower levels being fortified, and find a slightly tense Praxis waiting for them with some other Deso Angels.

Praxis asks if they’ve seen any bugs around, and they report they haven’t, realizing that the Deso Angels here, being Mantids, need to eat bugs at least occasionally- uh-oh! One of the other members mutters something about how they should’ve left when they could, but the DA’s guide them further into the building where they find Ellis and some other Betas. They discuss the attacks, and Ellis reports that they came under attack from a bunch of seemingly feral ghouls here, except that they also seemed to have some kind of hivemind- she suggests checking in with Pretty out of the farm to see if she knows more.

Ellis also speculates that the shadow spirits, or some other entity, may have made use of the lasting effect of the Scar to somehow twist astral space, explaining the permanent twilight and strange stars. She is also not sure where the stars are from, but confirms with Creep that they appear fixed in place- there having been no visible relative movement. She also tips them off that they found the corpses of a huge amount of the new Alphas, drained and desiccated underground, and wonders if Vogel used them in some kind of massive sacrifice- but also wants to know where the original Alphas that she had put Vogel in touch with wound up.

They speculate a bit that possibly they secured transit to Vhortas/Colony, which could explain why Otters was able to see empty insect plane corridors when she briefly got a drone into the rift. Regardless, without further evidence they’ll have to leave it a mystery for now. They decide to push the battery range on the VTOL and zip over to the farm, finding Rains and Pretty holding it down with other ghouls and some Bee cult Betas, but with a massive burning corpse pile on the lawn.

They were also attacked by shadow zombies, and wonder if the shadow spirits left something behind- the team immediately gets stressed about the Coin of Woe in their possession. They suffered some casualties but managed to fend them off. They were also attacked by some Infected-phobic rednecks using old bio-diesel farm trucks, but managed to fight them off too. They also seem worried about food security, and are trying to organize with their friendlier neighbors- they say the militia types seem to have come from further out near Ann Arbor.

They fly back to the safehouse and the team debriefs on all the info. They also hear on Deadline’s nightly broadcast that more militia tried to demand tribute from the Platinum Zone but that Marv blew up one of their trucks with a rocket launcher and they fled. She shares Otters’ pedal-power generator plan as best she can over the radio, and also reports that a lot of sprites, AI’s and other e-life forms are likely trapped in offline hosts and devices, so that if anyone is out there hard-wiring and encounters any, to please free them or deliver a device with them on it to the Plat Zone for protection.

They make a few more radio calls, having also left parts and schematics where needed on all their visits throughout the day, and confirm with their assorted allies that they’re on for the big trap tomorrow, and ChewGum visits Penelope Bean, who is really excited about embracing the Hawala system with the nuyen exchange not running. She also agrees to pass along a request for aid to the Mage on the Hill, if she can find him. She otherwise seems her usual chipper (/appropriative) self.

They rest, and on awakening the next day decide to use a couple Tarot cards in hopes of some additional aid before they head to Belle Isle for the ambush. Creep activates the “Higher Power” card, and gets a non-transferable one-person ticket to Zurich Orbital, which will bypass SIN scans (though not weapon scans). Initially a bit annoyed, he realizes eventually this could lead to a big payday for him, so ends up a little happier. Everyone takes turns messing around with the Threshold card, until Otters accidentally activates while walking though the door to try it outside.

The door becomes black void, and Otters steps through. She finds herself confronting a sort of mirror version of herself who says “REMEMBER” and Otters begins to remember what happened in Florida, and then just “nopes” back out the door. Seeing that the void remains, Dig jumps through, and confronts a mangy, toxic dog- a real lone wolf, who tries to force him into a paradigm shift. He resists, proving his loyalty to Dog and the pack, and initiates. He also realizes this was likely a confrontation with the Dweller on the Threshold, and the he should know be able to project to other metaplanes.

As the door remains, Cholula jumps though, with Creep attempting to follow, though Creep bounces off the suddenly solid surface. Cholula sees all his parent there: a Beetle Queen and 2 humans- they seem about to tear each other apart but he manages to do an incredible leadership maneuver and get between them and talk them down. He emerges feeling better integrated with his bug self, and finding that he is no longer Blighted. Creep tries again to go through but the void dissipates and he stumbles out into the street.

They become suddenly aware that they just activated multiple Tarot cards in their safehouse and partially outside and get a little stressed about who might have noticed. But they are interrupted before they can spiral too much by the arrival of a bald grizzled man, dressed in rags, carrying a single duffel bag, who says “I heard you requested my aid” – this seems to be the Mage on the Hill- but can they convince him to assist them?

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
Tabasco aka Cholula

The team freaks out after acquiring all the data as both Creep and Cholula start to enter anaphylactic shock from the spore exposure. Luckily the rest of the group’s full seals hold, and they manage to get them out via some quick-thinking and a near grenade disaster from Otters. They navigate back out via the train tunnels but have the feeling that something might be following them. Once back aboveground, they contact Dig, who recommends quarantine until they can make sure the spores aren’t contagious.

Jaga helps set up a sealed treatment area at the safehouse, and monitors them with Dig for a day while drones work on patching them up, but luckily they seem to be improving and non-contagious. They heal up for another day while Dig fills them in on happenings aboveground, and they all decide where to sell their score from the last mission. They end up selling all the experimental tech to Zennia, who pays well and seems eager to sell it on, and all the data to Ellis, who is eager to receive it and requests first look at anything additional they find.

The team then decides to start looking into how to take down the local Fear The Dark chapter for good. Dig researches the Higher Power Tarot card, and with some help from Fargus Sol determines that it doesn’t do what they likely need it to for these purposes- i.e. beam sunlight directly in a focused point. They think about planning some kind of ambush at the upcoming “Bye, ARES!” block party that the Plat Zone is hosting, but that’s coming up too soon.

After consulting with Walker in Ways, they settle on a different plan- WIW and their shamanic group will plan out a massive cleansing ritual to expand the magical cleanup they’ve been doing on the river outwards into the rest of the city, slowly expanding over time as they cleanse new areas. Dig, CG, and Jaga will assist with this. The rest of the team, and a bunch of other hired assistants, will provide recon and security around the site, and watch for FTD/fight them when they arrive.

The team uses favors owed by Julia Pesina to report on a piece about this upcoming ritual and spread it around, to make sure that FTD hears about it. With a few days to wait until that happens, they stock up on gear (wood pulp bullets and the like) and finish healing and patching armor. They all head over to the Plat Zone party in their street gear, with Otters bringing her new array of drones, freshly out of their boxes, in the van. CG, The Detective and Creep take up surveillance positions just in case anything kicks off after grabbing food from CastIron.

Cholula dances while assensing, vibing on the energy of the room. Otters monitors comms to watch from suspicious traffic while Dig keeps an eye on the matrix, and both of them notice a lot of posts pouring in, seemingly notifications of the death of various East Coast deckers and TM’s. Ringmaster calls them back to the situation room, where they monitor a disturbing thread on Jackpoint right up until there is a disturbing inaudible rumble, and bright flash, and all the lights go out.

Checking things further, it seems like the power is fully down, and a lot of batteries are fully or partially drained. Before they can determine anything else, gunfire breaks out outside. The team outside engages with a group of 6 gunmen, which they quickly realize are shadow spirits inhabiting disguised corpses, who are firing indiscriminately into the crowd. They manage to take them out though Creep and CG are both near killed, with Cholula also joining the fray.

Inside, Dig just barely manages to get in front of the swing of a monofil whip that an invisible assassin had intended for Ringmaster, getting badly injured in the process and splashing Ringmaster with his blood. The assassin chops Otters’ gun in half after she ineffectually fires before Dig manages to fell them with a massive lightning bolt- Dig approves of this show of pack loyalty. Unfortunately, Dig is a carrier for HMHVV so warns Ringmaster of his new lycanthropy risk- certainly much better than dead.

Otters, frantic about the lack of matrix connection and drone feeds, races outside to the van, weaving through the frantic crowd and finds the locks engaged and powered off, so has to hardware her way in. The drones are all powered off but seem to have some varying level of charge left, though no way to recharge if drained at the moment, and the van seem drained but otherwise fine, aside from antennas which seem universally fried. Otters is having to find all the clunky manual controls since usually all of this done via ARO.

Dig and Ringmaster, using magic and charisma, manage to start organizing and calming the crowd, and the weary Latvian Gambit vets present get back to work trying to figure out what happened and what it means. The team all eventually joins up and speculates a bit too, as they hear gunfire, screams, and breaking glass all around the city, and are able to see the stars for the first time in a while (or for some, probably the first time ever). Otherwise the night is only light by muzzle flashes and bonfires…..

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
Tabasco aka Cholula

The team heads into the DDB to begin their multi-phase series of jobs down there. They spend most a day navigating a long series of deadly traps after reaching the site of their showdown with Otto Hendricks, and attempting to explore deeper into his area. Luckily with careful drone recon, good sensor use, and some quick-thinking, they take minimal damage and clear/mark a mostly safe passage to a back entrance to the lab, which they manage to access.

Unfortunately, they then to blind a gun turret by throwing a sleeping bag over it and it fires, detonating some C4 strapped to an adjacent wall and triggering a cave-in. They spend another good portion of a day excavating their way back into the lab to find it in a state of disarray, but they do manage to salvage some useful info, while also potentially exposing themselves to deadly toxins.

It seems that Hendricks (whether initially on ARES’ behalf or on his own initiative) had been manufacturing some experimental weaponry based on spores, toxins, and modified acids, and providing it to GreenWAR cells, possibly for false flag operations, possibly to make Vogel look bad, given his past ties to eco-activist groups. The bio-containment on the experimental weapons lab failed due to the explosion/partial collapse the team triggered, luckily all of them except Cholula and Creep have full seals on their armor, and Creep is running an internal air tank…..

They continue digging around and find a few former SCIF chambers, now rendered non-secure by the structural damage, where people were doing old-school offline paper-based research, data collation, and investigation, into two primary areas of interest: what’s up at the new ARES HQ site in Atlanta (they seem to have semi-secretly bored a huge shaft underneath it) and what is up with ARES’ metaplanar activities. It seems likely based on all this that ARES has/will have a new portal to Vhortas and their fortified base “Colony” there, in the shaft underneath their new HQ, as the construction of that began shortly after their space station portal was shut down.

ARES also is using a lot of materials to build the HQ that have no clear sourcing- could be standard corp shell games, or could be a metaplanar origin there too. The team also finds a disassembled portal closer, with some notes about it. The magical part of the payload is missing (either removed or expended) but the notes suggest that even Hendricks and crew didn’t fully understand how/why these worked. There is also a suggestion that ARES was attempting to find a way to use bugs as magical batteries, and an explanation of how Firewatch members were chosen for service at Colony (awakened members) or for turning into ALPHAs (mundanes).

This is all good paydata for some various Johnsons, so the team decides to return to the surface, collect Dig from whatever animalistic magic quest he went off of, get paid, and patch up themselves and their armor before heading back underground for the next stages of their missions.

Runners
Creep
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
Tabasco aka Cholula
ChewGum
and guest appearance from: Erika “Scully Beyonce” Knowles

The team briefly rests at the missing runner’s basecamp, and then makes a plan to head back in to try to hack the military base using Dig’s planted data tap. Using the radar sensor, biodrone surveillance, and electronic warfare scanning they manage to avoid getting spotted while Dig gets a hack going. Miraculously, Dig manages to grab some data before getting spotted by the active security, and they pull his plug just in time as some alarms go off. Otters speeds away from pursuing vehicles with sensor guidance, and then sneaks through the fog.

They successfully evade their followers, and Dig uses an illusion to distract most of the surveillance and comms blimps outside the fog while Otters sneaks them through farm fields back onto the highway. They return to Detroit, and review the data on the way. It seems like the attack they witnessed was carried out by a cadre of vampires with no insignia, many of whom died in the attack. But the target seems to have been a structure housing an “anomaly” a bit below ground level that was adjacent to the comms HQ. They don’t find any more data on that, but do discover that 2 of the runner crew were captured by the military and are being interrogated to see if they had any advance knowledge of the attack.

They package everything up and send it on to Ringmaster, who pays them well. Cholula also finds the Hermit 6WT card stuck in his armor, presumably from the body pile he was pulled into, and after briefly examining it, Dig activates it. It pulls the team to a cabin that seems to exist on some other plane, with a bed for each of them, some crystal lights on the walls, a single door, and some ominous blood stains. They find an hourglass carved into the floor under one of the beds, and looking outside get the feeling that large predators are fighting other large predators in the dense woods and other environs surrounding the cabin.

Dig almost runs off into the wilderness before Dog reminds him that it is dangerous to go alone, and they close up the cabin after getting worried the light might attract attention. The beds are all quite comfortable, though Otters is worried since neither her drones nor the van transitioned with them. They go to sleep and as soon as Dig loses consciousness, they all find themselves back in their van, feeling well-rested. They get back to Detroit and head to their safehouse after dropping off Erika Knowles to report into Ringmaster.

They check in with some contacts and pick up some potential work, and catch up on the news from around town. ChewGum has been busy in their absence, tracking down leads on work and being gifted a tarot card of his own, from the People of the Book, who tell him it will summon a powerful defensive spirit, but that there will be a cost to the summoner. They add it to Creep’s stash, and decide that next up they will head underground to pursue a few jobs at once- the Betas are looking for lost ARES research, Zennia wants experimental tech, they need to break up Fear the Dark’s local chapter, and they need to chase down those Shadow bats.

They get an updated map from Rains and Pretty, who are busy setting up and fortifying Long Pig Farms’ new operation in town, with the help of the Bee cult, some of who are also transitioning to Betas currently. They also check in with Fargus Sol about Arleesh’s feeling towards Betas (cautiously optimistic) and their new Tarot info. He also sends them some money and suggests that they may have found themselves in the Hunter’s Realm, a super-predator breeding and hunting ground that is also used as a metaplanar survivalist prison- the meaning of the hourglass they found being a magical tattoo depicting the time a prisoner there has left to serve.

They gear up, and prepare to head underground!

Runners
Creep
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
Tabasco aka Cholula
and guest appearance from: Erika “Scully Beyonce” Knowles

The team continues their investigation at the missing runners’ basecamp. The limited autopsy capacities reveal horrifying and unknown genetic fusion techniques that leave no surgical scars. Knowles takes some samples for later, as the rest of the crew reviews the runner’s logs she was able to retrieve using a provided crypto-key from their erstwhile employer. They decide to continue further in, using the runners’ data on military security ops as a baseline.

They find a huge corpse pile ahead while scouting with the biodrone, and Cholula investigates on foot, and is almost pulled in by another chimera with huge gorilla arms and empty voids where it looks like some cyber-eyes might once have been. They get in a disturbing fight with two of the “gorilla” chimeras, two more “flying squirrel” chimeras, and a hidden sniper, who Otters manages to take out with the van-mounted HMG. Luckily the team mostly avoids damage, though one of the squirrels escapes.

When checking the corpses after, they seem to mesh with what they’d previously see on the autopsies performed at the base camp. The mods are all extreme and seamless, in an unexplainable way. Then they find the sniper’s body, who has been given some large lens eyes, and is wearing what seems to be a WWII-era Russian winter camo uniform, and using era appropriate gear as well. Knowles confirms that the Nazi’s certainly had an interest in the arcane, and there was a major Kaer beneath modern Chernobyl, so it’s possible someone could have stumbled in and been preserved to the modern day, but that doesn’t explain the changes.

They examine the body pile, and find that it is a mix of runner corpses and National Guardsmen, mostly PA with some OH mixed in. There are also a lot of unassigned limbs and other body parts, most of which have some amount of cyberware, badly damaged in the crude and violent removal. Some of these parts could be III Corps but there isn’t enough to be sure. They take more samples for later analysis. The bodies also show signs of predation, as if the various chimeras have been feasting on them, and seem to be rotting at a much decelerated rate- about 1/10 what would be expected, which lines up with the reduced rate of aging Knowles had noticed on the shark-lion corpse, as well as how an elderly Russian sniper could still be alive.

They head further in and the signal degradation is getting bad enough that Otters has to pull the biodrone back in. They spot some mil patrols with the onboard radar and via electronic warfare, using stealth tags the runner team planted to supplement their perception. They manage to sneak within 1/2 km of the fortified base walls and get some looks, and Creep and Dig (in mole form) sneak closer. Creep gets up to the walls, and reports that the security construction the runners had reported on seems to be basically finished- razorwire perimeter, sensor strewn killing ground, then fortified high wall with guard towers and klieg lights.

Dig digs his way down, and finds that the further down he goes the better the mana feels. He rests a bit low down before tunneling back up inside the base, and spots a construction drone. Unfortunately a mole with a data tap in it’s mouth is a strange sight and a guard spots him and starts to give chase. The van is having to constantly maneuver to avoid patrols and is occasionally losing comms with Creep, who is acting as a relay to Dig on the inside, though Dig can’t respond due to his device being too weak to punch through the jammers the base is using.

The van and Creep detect 7 hypersonic, baffled aircraft zip by overhead towards the base, and Creep warns Dig. Dig manages to use the distraction of some ensuing gunfire to escape the guard pursuing him and slip the data tap onto one of the construction drones before fleeing back underground. The van picks up Creep since they lost comms to Dig, and does a circuit around the base, dodging patrols, as they try to figure out what is happening. Otters sends out all the fly-spys on autopilot, hoping some will return with some info. Only one makes it back, but it does gather some useful intel.

The team (except Cholula and The Detective, who remained at the body pile due to Cholula being badly effected as a dual-natured being) all feel a massive explosion that seemingly occurred somewhere underground. The lone surviving drone confirms that a non-descript building next to what looks like the main HQ/comms center has collapsed on itself, so it seems like the explosion took place under there. Creep hears about half as many hypersonic aircraft leave as arrived as gunfire continues. The whole thing took about 11 minutes in total- real pro, whoever it was.

Dig emerges aboveground after waiting a while, somewhere outside the perimeter but not sure where he is. Scared and feeling a bit hopeless he waits a little more until Creep luckily picks him up on sensors again, and Otters scoops him up in the van. They head back to the body pile and manage to track down The Detective and Cholula, who have retreated after Cholula lost it a bit from the spookiness and his reduced abilities, though TD managed to keep him from totally running off. They all return to the runners’ base camp to think about next moves, with Dig pushing for further investigation via data tap and most of the team leaning towards exfiltrating.

Runners
Creep
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
Tabasco aka Cholula

The team preps to head out to Site 000 to start their investigation for Ringmaster, and spends some time massively upgrading the stealth, sensor and mobility capabilities of the van to try to be ready for whatever they find there. Chew Gum, having heard in Ringmaster’s briefing that the area seems bad for spirits, decides to sit this one out and spends some time harvesting plants, tracking toxic magic (finding some power areas), seeking Li Wei (finding some blood magic traces but no hard evidence), seeking out bat swarm sightings (they seem to be flying in and out of the Detroit Down Below), and taking care of some personal business.

The rest of Ringmaster’s briefing consists of recovered logs from a PA National Guard unit that was first on the scene and seems to have also gone missing. He also has some reports from Asgard Data Haven of a runner crew hired to go in a bit after that, who reported in a few times before vanishing. And last, he has an agent on the ground he wants the team to make contact with if they can- codename: Scully. She was following up on the runner team’s reports but has also been out of contact for around a week. The other big news is that Ellis took the team’s advice and posted on Jackpoint, introducing the concept of Betas to the runner world, at least. Also Long Pig Farms is relocating to Detroit, fleeing persecution, and The Betas are working with some ghouls to make better clonal stock, as they need the same quality of body to inhabit that the Infected due to eat.

The team pays Grandmother Biyu for some SIN upgrades to make sure they can travel, and she hires them to look into who else is making high quality SINs in town, when they’re back from their trip. Otters smuggles Cholula out past MET2000 hovercraft in the sub, and drops him at the rendezvous point, and the van gets out past more MET2000 border guards doing magic scans (seemingly checking for bugs) with the rest of the team aboard. They pick up Cholula and head to the Bravo Company training complex in central Ohio to brush up on some squad tactics before the mission.

They all learn a new tactic to help with moving under fire. They decide to sleep there as Otters and others are worried about highjackers on the highway amidst the auto-haulers, though Dig mocks them all for giving in to fear. They eat some bland nutritious mush in the morning (explaining why all the mercs were so excited about Castiron’s cooking perhaps), and head out. Driving past the exits towards Dutchville (a relatively newly incorporated town built around a Wuxing shipping subsidiary), they find all the exits closed and guarded by UCAS MP’s- small groups but still.

They also notice that Dutchville has been scrubbed from digital maps and GridGuide- as if it never existed. So they navigate using geotags, and Otters slickly takes the van off-road in a blind turn between two auto-haulers. They activate their active camo, signature masking, and vehicle radar, and cut across farm fields, bypassing fences and army surveillance/comms blimps as they travel. Cholula and Dig start to notice a bad magical feeling once they hit about 12km out from their destination, and start to really feel the effects at 10k.

Creep, keeping a close eye on the radar while Dig monitors army comms traffic, manages to help Otters steer them around the limited patrols on the way in. Right at the 12km mark, all the fences and everything suddenly cuts, along what seems to be a lengthy curve. The level of the ground drops about a foot, cleanly, and Otters eases the van down onto it’s tracks onto the seemingly freshly exposed dirt- there are some other vehicle tracks and a few footprints, and a dense fog ahead starting at the 10k mark. The fog seems to dome upwards, and it looks like the army is using aerials/blimps to keep a comms line open- as the team watches, they see some light flashing in the upper area of the fog dome near the center, which The Detective things is some kind of IF/F sequence, presumably to verify that comms coming from within the obscuring fog haven’t been compromised.

The team prepares to head in, and begins. Otters keep her new biodrone aloft as a spotter, while everyone else carefully peers around with various modes of perception. Spotting some kind of shape in the dense fog, they head towards it, and find a lone desiccated stump. Searching it, they find a hardened data chip, which after Dig breaks the encryption, contains more comms logs from the missing National Guard unit. They report on bad astral feelings, and something following them. The team, spooked, continues. They find another irregularity another few km in, as well as spotting sensor shadows of their own, and getting worried something may be following them as well. The fog is giving back a lot of weird readings, and something is playing havoc with their navigational systems, so Cholula is mostly dead reckoning.

They are also losing comms access to the outside, which also should obscure them further from army blimps, so good and bad. They send an initial report to Ringmaster to report they are going dark, and he wishes them luck. Approaching the next object, they find a small clearing in the fog, where a strange grid of pairs of combat boots it set up, 13 columns by 7 rows, standing in perfect parade formation as Cholula spots. Creep and the mule start knocking them over, which achieves no effect, but they do notice that all the boots appear like unique pairs- similar make/brand, but a variety of year of manufacture, level of wear, etc. The Detective tries one on and finds it damp from the fog but nothing else of note.

While knocking over boots, Creep eventually finds another comms chip from the Natl Guard, which Dig cracks. They get more reports of feeling hunted and haunted, and manaspace growing worse- which Cholula and The Detective confirm. Signal is getting worse too as they get closer to the epicenter, both seemingly at a steady rate, so Otters pulls the biodrone in much closer. They are all getting pretty worried at this point, as the sensor shadows are also showing up in the astral, and the Natl Guard reports having some of their people MIA.

They press on, and Cholula steers them towards a feeling of water ahead, where Creep detects a slight dip in the landscape. They find what looks like the bottom portion of a dried up stream bed, but as with everything else it seems like about the top 12 inches is gone. Creep spots a hardened milspec case carefully place in the center, and opens it, finding a 3rd chip. Dig cracks it, and they get what seems likely to be the final log from the Natl Guard- they report firing on shadows as more and more of them vanish into the fog. They also found what seemed like a local landmark but turned out to be some sort of astral effect or illusion as the stream was gone in realspace. They also report having travelled much further than they should have to reach it.

While the team is stressing about this, a horrifying sound comes from out of the fog, and Otters is paralyzed, while the others are variously effected. Luckily, Otters was already jumped in hot to the van and drone, so still has some capacity. Creep peers around and then jumps back just in time as what looks like some sort of terrible hybird seemingly swims through the air at him, biting with the head of the shark, while it’s lion’s paws pull it along at alarming speed. All of this attached to the torso of a troll, wearing a shredded military uniform. Cholula misses with a fire arrow, Dig misses with a machine pistol, and Otters opens up with the van machine gun.

A hit! Unfortunately, this thing seems to have some kind of hardened exterior- the gun does a lot of damage but it seems to soak quite a bit of it, though not like a spirit would…. Also unfortunately it seems to recognize the danger from the van and pummels it badly, nearly wrecking it in one hit. Dig pulls out all the stops and blasts it with a lightning bolt as it start to shove itself into the van through the open side door- the mana here is weird and sludgy and irregular, but Dig manages to control it well enough to do some more major damage.

Otters, desperate, turns the machine gun on the van itself, shooting through the roof to hit the beast inside, and manages to fell it before it can kill anyone in the van, though the van takes more damage and is on it’s last legs. Everyone’s paralysis gradually wears off as Dig shoots the thing over and over with his machine pistol, to make sure it stays dead. While collecting themselves, they hear a voice call out, and after exchanging some confirmational chatter, find out that this is “Scully”, aka Erika Knowles, who Creep explains they know of through a convoluted link of runners in the team file, from her Boston days.

She seems happy to see them, and suggests they get back to her base camp with the body to talk further and do some analysis. They manage to navigate there, though doing so in the fog is quite confusing, and Otters is glad she’s been leaving a breadcrumb trail on an offline map to try to follow back out later. They find that Knowles has set up in the somewhat shredded basecamp of the missing runner team, and has another partially dissected hybrid on one of the cots. They haul out the one in the van (massively heavy), and she cuts it open, showing the team how the strange head and limbs seems perfectly grafted the host body, seemingly a troll torso, with some kind of advanced tech- this is beyond 6th World bio-surgeons, as far as she knows, as there is no surgical scarring, or sign of exposure to known mutagens.

She also fishes out some dog tags from the creature’s stomach, and everyone else things he must have eaten a soldier, but she explains that swallowing one’s own dog tags is often a soldier’s last desperate act in the face of certain death, hoping that their body can later be ID’ed and perhaps returned to their family. Disturbingly, the tags are neither from the National Guard nor III Corps, but from the Aztlan national army from about 8-10 years ago. Knowles says all of this lines up with her analysis of the other hybrid, though she didn’t retrieve ID from that one. She plays the team a helmet-cam video that the runner team recovered on one of their recon missions, which seems to show III Corp finding themselves enveloped in fog as comms go down, and they come under attack from unknown forces.

She says she also recovered more logs from the runner crew, which she offers to share with the team, but first they brief her on the updates from Detroit- the Scar, the Betas, etc. She is a bit overwhelmed but luckily they confirm that she herself isn’t magical, so she won’t spot Cholula out, while she takes in the info. She seems very serious and driven, but thrown off by her time in the fog- neither of her hardened chronometers are in agreement, and neither align with the team’s estimate of what day/time it is. They decide to rest and patch up the van before heading further in, or bugging out to report what they’ve found so far…..

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
Tabasco aka Cholula

Creep catches up with the team after one of his occasional “wander around and get the lay of the land” multi-day solo adventures. There seem to be no ALPHAs left anywhere that Creep has seen- which is disturbing to say the least, as the bug-killing manatech device didn’t have infinite range, as proven by the Bee cult’s survival by the Blight. That said- less ALPHAs and no bugs seen, so that’s good in it’s own ways. The team speculates a bit as to what this all might mean. Cholula gets a call back from Jaliyah Angel in Seattle that the ASPS is sending a Shedim specialist, Patricia Loveland, from DeeCee, to look into the Shadow spirit corpe possession issue, at the team’s request.

Chew Gum also follows up with Cass Wandering Horse, the contact he was given by The Walker In Ways, who are both also looking into local magical weirdness post-bug. Cass has a lot of tips and rumors, but not alot of hard info, as he explains he is also fresh in from DC. He seems to be a NAN political operative who left when things started heating up along the borders, though he may be interested in some political realignments in Detroit now. However, he gives some good tips for a promise of future info or services rendered, and the team starts digging.

They look up 3 of the spirits/ancient gods Cass had mentioned, and do some info trading around town to find out more where they can. They get some good leads but no hard evidence, and check in with Ringmaster, who confirms that he will pay for further investigations into any/all magical threats in the city. He also confirms that the job to investigate the missing III Corps at Site 000 is still a go, so the team plans to leave for that once they get the sub back (as they will need to smuggle Cholula safely out of town, as he is detectable as a bug, which surely someone will be looking out for).

They call Loveland, and share a lot of info re: Shadow spirits, possession vs inhabitation, gateways vs portals vs rifts, belief powering magical potency, and the like. This all seems promising until Cholula outs himself as a Beta, without much of an explanatory lead-in, and Loveland cuts the call, texting the rest of the team that they’ve been compromised. They hope she’ll come around after further digging on her own, as she is also connected with Old Crow, Jackpoint etc amongst other runners resources.

Otters manages to get a Fly Spy into The Scar above downtown, and before the drone fails from acid and other elemental damage, she manages to get faint footage transmitted of what looks like barren insect tunnels, which both Ellis and Cholula verify look like Vhortas, minus the biomatter. Ellis hints at strange overgrown ruins in Vhortas that are the only locations the teeming masses of bugs won’t occupy, but neither Ellis no Cholula are able to comprehend why from their limited memories.

Ellis also shares info about the other end of the Daedelus space station portal that ARES was maintaining until the team shut it down. ARES was able to establish a stable fortress, called Colony (Damien Knight was never one for clever names it seems) using some very advanced magic, this is where the original Beta’s live- though these are all Firewatch members sent to the insect plane on the principle that if bugs can inhabit humans here, maybe humans can inhabit bugs there? Which seems to have had some limited success.

However, given the endless nature of the plane, Ellis doesn’t think they’d ever be able to “defeat” the bugs- so she isn’t sure what these empty tunnels signify, though it could be an area of Colony- perhaps the magitech device from Vogel linked up with something on the other side. Apparently, according to notes Ellis was able to recover, ARES had managed to stabilize Colony enough that non-merges could safely live there for some time, though she is not sure if they have survived since the space portal was closed (or if another has been opened….). Based on the Manus Ruinae containment lab that recent former team members raided in Seattle, this all certainly seems possible.

Ellis is also worried about what happened to the ALPHAs, and reveals that what Vogel asked her to do was broker contact- she isn’t sure that it occurred, or what was discussed, but she had enabled Vogel to access the ALPHAs secure comms network. She had been hoping to discover some means of saving or stabilizing them, but no luck so far. She still hopes to find a way to allow the original Betas from Colony to return, which they currently can’t do due to evanescence issues. Regardless, she wants more data and suggests to the team that a lot of ARES offices, black sites, and also the HQ could make good targets for raids if they want that kind of work, there’re plenty of other at it currently.

They also discuss the situation undergound, and get worried about what threats still lurk in the Detroit Down Below now that the bugs are gone, since Ellis reports that some ghoul allies have recently gone missing. They discuss a variety of different hypotheses and theories about it all, before finally getting the sub, fully repaired, back from Goober, and getting ready to get underway out to Dutchville.

Runners
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
Tabasco aka Cholula

The team recuperates from the Shadow spirit raid, and gets some investigation updates from Smoach and Myrryr, who also accept a Tarot card as payment. They’ve ID’ed the Wendigo, and got some more info about what occurred- it looks like the strange orb was a portal to the Shadow plane (or at least one of it’s moons), and the one of the two spirits likely escaped through or was on the other side when the team attacked and closed it. It’s unclear if this spirit took some of the Tarot cards with or if they were expended in opening the portal. Castiron brings in a bat that he managed to bring down from the swarm, while he was fleeing in fear of the Wraith. He also returns half of his pay, since he feels like he didn’t help much.

S&M pass along a strange artifact, known as a “Coin of Woe”, which can be created by Shadow spirits by draining the essence of a living being- this coin is gold, showing that it was drained from a metahuman, and has Iva Linus Hathaway’s face on one side. Cholula holds onto it, and dedicates himself to finding a way to free her or return her to some form of life, though his initial research doesn’t seem promising. S&M also warn that although those coins can sometimes be used as metaplanar currency, their possession is also a serious crime in many planes.

CG examines the bat, and finds that it seems to have been possessed by a shadow spirit at some point, similar to the “zombie” corpses they encountered at the farm- disturbing! However, he prepares it and he, Dig, and Jaga cleanse their safehouse of magical taint, and rebuild their magical lodges. CG also resummons two of his Necro spirits, one into the bat. The team decides they need Jackpoint access to further their research abilities, so they put together an info file on the truth of Latvian Gambit with a lot of combined knowledge from themselves and the team file, and get Old Crow to agree to upload it as a membership application once he is clear of the city.

ARES and the UCAS are engaged in escalating back and forth over the disaster, and Vogel gives a major and provocative speech, ending with the revelation that ARES will relocate their corp HQ to Atlanta in response to the UCAS provoking them, and tries to place the blame for the “terrorists” behind Latvian Gambit at the feet of the UCAS for not reporting their activities and breaking up their cells. The team plans to possibly further refute much of this info when they themselves aren’t in ARES’ backyard, though the boards are already going wild.

Otters finally finishes building her first biodrone with Moreau, and The Detective does some bliss in their tub while catching up with the Keepers. The mafia bug infiltration con seems to have had some major effects- lots of infighting at the port, and a lot of dead bodies turning up nearby/in the river. Also- someone seems to be surveilling The Detective’s apartment- wearing a high end camo suit, so the Keepers haven’t gotten a good look. The Detective forgets to report this for a while, as they are high.

The next day, when they think to mention it, Cholula is finally back to full health, which required eating a lot more meat than usual (and having some interesting new thoughts and memories), he and CG head up to The Detectives zone with biodrone support, while Dig as a dolphin and Otters in the VTOL head down to try to retrieve the sub. Otters is able to spot the camo suit man with the biodrone and provide a targeting solution to Cholula, who KO’s him with a Gamma-Scopolamine arrow.

They zip tie him, and haul him into The Detective’s apartment, after taking his external comm and a bunch of kidnap supplies he has on him. They wait an hour and then question him once the truth serum kicks in. He caves pretty quickly and reveals that he is the recent ex-husband of Lindsay Turpentine, and that the family knows that The Detective is responsible for Michael and Carol’s deaths. The Detective tries to dodge blame for this, not fully inaccurately, but the man doesn’t believe them. He thought he could get back in Lindsay’s good graces by kidnapping The Detective and delivering them.

They debate about what to do, before questioning him some more and finding out that he’s been live-streaming the whole encounter. Dig, from afar, panics and tells them to get out of there, which they ignore while Cholula debates the ethics of killing him, since via his code he doesn’t really deserve to die. He fills up the tub they have him in, jic. They keep talking for a bit while an increasingly stressed Dig tries to convince them to leave every time his dolphin form surfaces and gets comms back.

Eventually Cholula agrees, and flips the still paralyzed man over, face down, in the full tub, and leaps out the window. CG and The Detective leave the normal way, with The Detective trying to gather up essentials on the way. They just get clear as a missile flies down and obliterates the building. Yikes! They all regroup at the Hamtramck safehouse while The Detective mourns the loss of their disguise collection. Meanwhile, Dig and Otters have a relatively easy time retrieving the sub, and buy some supplies to do a quick patch up job on it. They load Old Crow aboard to smuggle him outta town, and send it to Chicago to get more fully repaired by Goober, with Otters piloting the first leg of the trip past the ARES cordon which is still nominally being enforced.

The team all get a call from Kong up in the Blight, who wants them to look into a kind of culty group of farmers whose area has recently been added to his turf (he seems to be expanding). The team does some research and doesn’t find much, so does some recon and finds that it seems to be a group of Bee spirits, mostly good merges, that are distributing non-magical food to the surrounding area. Still- creepy and worth checking out. They call Ellis, who confirms that Bees often try to live in harmony with the surrounding area but are suicidally defensive. She says they could be good candidates to join the Betas since they already prioritize some of the same principles and communal attitudes.

The team calls up Kong to see if a peaceful solution is good with him too, and he says he’d prefer bugs get killed but that so long as the team gets them off his turn he doesn’t care much. They approach the church/farm lot, and The Detective has a lengthy convo with the Pastor, who turns out to be a Bee Shaman. They eventually bring in Cholula as proof of what the Beta option could look like, and the hive discusses, eventually agreeing to go along with the plan.

The team gets a bus from Kong to transport them all out to the now-empty shadow farm, and arrange for some of Ellis’ people to meet them there. They then also call up Pretty and try to set up a ghoul/bug farm coop, or at least get that started, since it sounds like Long Pig Farms may be looking to vacate Chicago in the increasingly hostile to the Infected environment there. They also report in on the info they learned about Fear the Dark, and Pretty pushes them to go after the vamp that escaped and hopefully finish off the local chapter’s leadership.

The big news when the team wakes the next day is that ARES didn’t just move their HQ- they fully left. They abandoned tens of thousands of local low-level employees and bailed basically overnight on the whole city. Horizon PR is desperately trying to spin the move in a positive way, but it seems ARES’ internal turmoil isn’t fully resolved- this does not seem like the plan Vogel presented, although it could also be a response to the info the team leaked on Jackpoint, especially with the UCAS announcement that they are rescinding the Business Recognition Accords in order to investigate just what happened in Detroit, and to III Corps.

CG, worried about a repeat of Chicago, checks in with Ringmaster, who says he has a lot of work for the team if they’re looking- a lot of the mercs have left, and he needs people looking into all sorts of local issues, as well as what happened to III Corps, if they want a trip out of town. The team also calls up The Walker in Ways, and gets contact info for someone named Cass Wandering Horse, with WiW telling them that they are also concerned about the spiritual future of Detroit, and that Cass has been doing some investigations along these lines, though he also has his own agenda….

Plenty to do! Back to work.

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
and reintroducing: Tabasco aka Cholula

The team keeps partying for a bit at the Platinum Zone, though they announce that the party will have to end in the next day or so as stocks are running low and Marv needs to resupply. The team decides it’s time to raid the Shadow spirit farm, get revenge for Iva, and get their Tarot cards back. First though, Chew Gum needs to start setting up a new lodge and prepping a fresh corpse vessel. So they decide to figure out what to do with their safehouses. Since they’ll soon be fighting the Shadow spirits that are the ones who know the locations, they decide to enhance the security (and comforts) of the Hamtramck safehouse and ditch the bolthole in Windsor. Creep flirts a bit with the AI landlord, Rutledge, who seems potentially interested.

Dig inquires again about hiring others to assist with the mission, and this time Ringmaster has some suggestions- he also wants intel on what the Shadow spirits are up to beyond Tarot, if anything. The team winnows down the potentials list and sends out job offers to those who look promising. They call in their favors with Ellis to get some assistance from the Betas/Deso Angels, and hire Old Crow and Sikh Burn with the promise of Tarot card payment, and also SINder and the bounty hunter duo Charlie Foxtrot and Moondog for cash. Walker and her dog Tofu turn them down, not interested in payment and trying to help their community area, and Smoach and Myrryr offer recon/investigative assistance but are not combatants.

Jaga comes along for healing support, and Ringmaster manages to scrounge up a decent van that the team buys to replace their busted one. Cast Iron also hires on for cash, though he seems worried about the dark spirits and says he hasn’t been in the field in a while. The team makes a plan, with Old Crow’s tactical input proving quite useful, and they plan to start the attack late the next day. First, Tabasco decides to take Ellis and Praxis up on their offer of change, and against many on the team’s advice, merges with a Goliath Beetle spirit who they were able to save while it was injured, and who accepted their offer of sanctuary.

Tabasco upon returning, finds that though he still has his own, human, memories, he also has memories of his time amongst a teeming mass in Vhortas, before being pulled through by a shaman to fight in this battle, being injured and separated from the horde, and being approached by an inquiring mind of a type it was previously unfamiliar with. As Tabasco’s new insect half wakes to full sapience for the first time, he finds that he feels he needs a new name, and requests that everyone now call him Cholula. Responses on the team to this development are mixed, but everyone adheres to the name request.

They meet up with their hired support near the farmhouse by Ypsilanti, and see a bat swarm flying back towards town as they approach. Foxtrot and Moondog get creeped out by Cholula and bail on the mission, saying that they know the team is good with the Plat Zone so they won’t make trouble, but they don’t want any part of whatever “this” is, though Cholula tries to explain. Otters opens up with the van HMG on the barn on the property as everyone else approaches, though Cholula and CG both get mind-controlled and fire at each other, luckily missing.

A Wendigo and a mass of what looks like trid zombies pour out of the barn, all badly injured, and Creep hits them with the rocket launcher, along side more fire from Otters in mule drone and van. They cut down the mass quickly, with Sikh Burn and Cast Iron going around and making sure they all stay dead. Dig start watching for mental manipulation while preparing to cut off TacNET access/shut down weapons as needed if so, and intervenes a few times. As they breech into the house, the spirit retreats into the astral, where it comes under attack from dual-natured Cholula and the Betas, Deso Angels, SINder and Old Crow.

The team all manages to shake off the fear that the spirit tries to emanate out, except Castiron, whose bad past experiences with dark spirits sends him fleeing for a time before he regains his composure. The Shadow spirit starts taking damage and is forced to defend itself, as other team members start sneaking inside and reclaiming some of the Tarot they’ve seen scattered around in what appears to be a ritual circle. Otters also manages to shoot and destroy a disturbing obsidian orb that is at the center. This seems to weaken or distract the Shadow spirit momentarily, and also forces a vision of one of the Shadow moons into the mind of CG and Cholula.

They press the attack in the astral, with one of the Deso Angels and one of the Betas killed and the other 2 badly injured, and both SINder and Old Crow flatlined with Jaga desperately trying to keep them alive. Cholula is the last down, not quite able to finish the spirit off, at which point it manifests and Otters one-shots it with the HMG. Jaga asks The Detective to choose healing priority, and they split it up as follows: Dig tries to save Cholula, but it’s dicey and unclear if it will take. Otters loads Old Crow into the VTOL and zips him back to the Plat Zone, which saves his life but harms his magic. And Jaga manages to stabilize SINder, who seems physically ok but mentally scarred by the experience.

Sikh Burn, meanwhile, wildly slashes at wispy shadows in the main house, fearing spirit regeneration (correctly), and Foxtrot and Moondog finally roll back up, Dig having called them back for extra money in a moment of desperation. They help confirm the place is clear, and the team calls in Smoach and Myrryr for investigative help, with CG and others assisting. It seems like the spirit they fought was a Wraith, the Shadow warrior class, and very deadly- S&M are impressed they survived. They got most of the Tarot back, but all the cards with bloody handprints, along with a few others, are missing.

Checking the “zombies” they find that they were seemingly possessed by low-force Shadow spirits, and were being cursorily patched back up/reassembled- so this is where at least some of the bodies have gone. Checking the Wendigo, they find a scarified “Fear the Dark” across her chest, and worry about who might have escaped in that bat swarm. S&M confirm that the second Shadow spirit, likely a Succubus, was recently at the house, but is not currently around/detectable, so seems to have retreated, fled, or just been out. But, for now, victory! They pay everyone out, and head back to the safehouse for the first time in a while to rest.

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective

Dig heads off to attend to his magical order while the rest of the team is poisoning Michael Turpentine. He barely makes it through some active combat while disguised as a bird and masked, but does arrive intact. The 2 members of his order trickle in, along with a preppy, affable, new potential named Freddy Bales. Bales has to step in a few times to provide additional instruction where Dig fails in the moment, but they all successfully take on animal form, though only Dig and Bales manage to initiate, as the other 2 weren’t properly prepared, Dig not having told them to expect that as a monthly component of the meetings. They all take off, and Dig focuses on internalizing some things he learned about instruction from Bales.

Everyone else rests up and stocks up on some gear at the Platinum Zone, with Creep getting a rocket launcher and Chew Gum learning to cast spells from Li Wei, who encourages him to grow his power. They receive the bounty payment from ARES for killing Otto Hendricks, routed through a series of cutouts as promised, and split it up once Dig returns. Tabasco, still in a weird mental place, bows out of the subsequent mission to seek further upgrades, to be ready to take revenge on the Shadow spirits. He also prefers to stay at the Plat Zone and fight ALPHAs than go to bug vs ARES central.

The rest of the team gets the call in the morning to go grab Carol and get him to ground zero- the bugs have a huge new crater just in front of ARES Tower, and are pouring out in what looks like a suicidal final attack. ARES forces have fallen back to the Tower and surrounding plazas and are waging a desperate defensive action, but could be overrun. The various merc forces are effectively unable to reinforce as they are fending off ALPHAs (and trying to save/rescue the civilian populace, unlike ARES). The team heads north, with Otters in the VTOL, Dig in bird form, and the rest on foot. They also call Ellis and their ghoul allies to warn them to stay away from Downtown/out of the astral due to an unspecified “mana threat”, and tip off the Irregulars as well.

Under The Detective’s guidance, they use some small unit tactics to safely avoid entanglements on the way, and find a somewhat gray-skinned Carol waiting in the irradiated van. They all hop in and plot a route, with Creep’s extensive knowledge of the city from his nighttime prowling providing excellent navigation.They exit the NGZ to the north of the nuclear blast zone and swing around west, entering back in through Irregular controlled turf in Zone 4. From there, they cut into Downtown from the west, with Otters carefullly sneak-driving to avoid trouble.

Otters flies CG in the VTOL up to a forward vantage point to get eyes on, and Dig accompanies as a bird. Dig decides to snag an ARES comm from one of the many corpses, so that ARES hopefully won’t shoot the van as it approaches, and CG provides sniper cover against some spirits as Dig gets it and flies away. However, some ARES drones almost spot CG so he as to hide for a bit before Otters can fly him back out, he got good overview info of the battle ahead though.

Dig and CG head back to the Plat Zone to help there, worried about the mana effects of the device in the van. Otters, with Creep’s help, hides her body in some rubble and remote pilots van and VTOL from there. She also uses the electrochromic coating to make the van look like an ARES vehicle to match their stolen comm signal. Unfortunately, this attracts some ARES stragglers in the neighborhood who try to get to the van for a ride to safety, pursued by bugs. Otters gives them some covering fire from the HMG but then speeds off, and the ARES survivors are quickly cut down.

Getting closer to the battle, Otters switches to full speed approach as the few square miles around the Tower are basically flattened rubble piles and mounds. It’s rough driving, but Otters is managing, partially using the VTOL to have an overhead view to steer from. She dodges the blasts of some stray ARES shells, though the van takes some flack damage. They manage to speed right up towards the crater, as a large amount of bugs split off from the main assault across from them and race towards the van. Otters uses HMG suppressive fire to corral them into a close center, while Creep leans out the side of the speeding van and launches a rocket into the bugs’ midst, holding on with his magnet hand and The Detective supporting.

They smash through the remaining bugs and Otters pulls a bootleg turn to swing about and stop, flinging the back doors open. Carol has been loosening all the bolts on the device’s frame, and with the help of the mule drone, hauls it out to the crater edge. Just as he does so, a massive insect emerges right behind him. Creep fires his last remaining rocket, and barely misses, still doing a decent amount of damage. Carol chucks some FAB grenades into the crater while running forward and pulling some ripcords on his armor, which starts emitting a stream of FABIII. He calls out to the team that they must trigger the device!

Creep races out and with The Detective’s encouragement, Dig’s previous explanation, and Otters providing covering fire from the mule and the van, manages to input the trigger sequence correctly on the first try. He dives back into the van as Otters revs it and peals out, having seen the 10 second countdown start. They gun it as a far away as they can before the detonation, which peppers the van with shrapnel, along with a following shockwave that flips them and wrecks the vehicle- luckily not badly enough to severely hurt those inside.

There seems to have been some kind of EMP effect as well though, as comms go down and Otters loses connection. Luckily the effect field seems fairly limited and she has a good view through the more distant VTOL of what happens: after the initial explosion and shockwave, some kind of rift opens in the sky about the Tower and plaza and some sickly green energy pours through. When it touches the energy emitting from the increasingly unstable area where the device was, a second magical shockwave pours out. This seems to kill smaller bugs where they stand, and paralyze or send into paroxysms the larger insects. Shamans appear to be driven mad and are easy targets for ARES sharpshooters, though Otters also spots some amongst the ARES troops falling and seizing- either bug infiltrators or mages, presumably.

This magical wave also hits at the Plat Zone, and both CG and Dig take some damage that feels like bad drain, while also making them somewhat nauseous, though they manage to shake it off. They do some others around them who were more battered fall, and help get them down to the medical area, where Jaga, though puking, is helping to heal and stabilize. Back at the front, Otters picks her body up with the VTOL, and then locates the van crash site via dead reckoning and regains point to point comms with Creep, the mule and The Detective. CG and Dig get the Quicksilver camera airborne to get some magical pics of whatever just happened, and get a few usable plates of the rift and immediate after-effects.

They initially plan to head back to the Plat Zone, but instead decide to do one more recon on the battlefield. From a distance, they see a lot. ARES troops are casually executing any surviving bugs and shamans, the bugs seemingly unable to move or defend themselves and the shamans stumbling, maddened, from the crater. There is much cruelty from some of the troops, though the majority appear to be just mechanically slaughtering. They see Carol also crawl forth from the crater, arms raised and shouting something, holding a commlink in one hand. The matrix appears to be down but the team’s devices all seem to work, so they try to get a message to Carol that they can come grab him, but give up on this after he is quickly surrounded by ARES forces.

Shortly thereafter, an armored platoon shows up, which looks to be Zone 4 and 6 survivors, having cut through the remaining ALPHAs to get here. General Ritter (aka Grey Ghost) emerges and confabs with some other ARES leaders on the ground. Tensions seem high but he distributes some info that seems to calm things. At this point, a heavily armored Arthur Vogel emerges, seemingly have claimed control, suggesting the Knight has indeed died or been incapacitated. The armored command of the conventional ARES forces at the Tower seem to refuse this transfer of command to Vogel and open fire on the newly arrived troops, but it seems like Ritter was prepared for this possibility, and the fascist Downtown commander Danforth and his loyalists are quickly gunned down.

Vogel gets Carol free and they shake hands, but amidst the chaos and confusion, the team sees a figure in blood-spattered heavy armor walk up behind Carol and calmly shoot him the head repeatedly. This figure rips off their helmet, and the team sees it is Carol’s brother- Michael Turpentine! Screaming something about “betrayal” as far as they can tell, he continues shooting Carol’s corpse as he himself is gunned down and turned to pink mist by Vogel’s bodyguards with their railguns. The team, shocked, pauses to reflect for a moment, until Creep realizes that Carol was how they were going to get paid, and against better advice, heads over to Vogel, who luckily recognizes him before Creep is destroyed by railguns as well.

Vogel seems at least put out by Carol’s death, but also very busy, and confirms that he will ensure the team is paid before sending Creep on his way, quickly muscled out of the inner circle by bodyguards. However, Creep manages to slickly pocket the commlink that Carol was holding. They all head back to the Plat Zone, marked as friendlies by Vogel’s command (it seems that all Irregulars have been). Hearing celebratory shouts and gunfire from the battle zone, Dig and CG were hoping for the best, and as the rest of the team arrives and new trickles in of bugs dropping citywide, and ALPHAs either killed or in retreat, a massive party starts.

Dig takes a celebratory BTL to celebrate, and plans to accompany The Detective back to their safehouse in Oakland County so they can do some Bliss and take a bath while Dig keeps an eye on things. The rest plan to stay and party. First, though, Otters shares the VTOL footage, and Creep shares Carol’s comm. Dig manages to hack it even while high, and they find that it is basically a high-end burner through which Carol had been communicating with his brother. It seems like it started out with Carol trying to provide anonymous help, but his bro figured it out, and eventually used it to track Carol’s location and kill him.

There is an attacked vid file that Dig opens, which shows the cybereyes perspective of Michael as he psychs himself up in a bathroom mirror to give Damien Knight the chess piece. He is talking initially about how this can secure him a permanent board place, and also get Carol safely back on the corps’ good side. He heads into an ornate conference room past two muscle-bound, oiled up teen bodyguards. Knight greets him as he enters, almost calling him Carol again before correcting, and asking for help getting into his battle armor, which “must have shrunk since last time.” As Michael moves to present the chess piece, Knight begins hacking, and his veins start turning black and bulging out as he falls to the floor.

Michael panics and tries to catch him, but then has to defend himself as the 2 guards outside rush in and assume he did this (which he did, though he doesn’t know it yet). He kills the two teens, seemingly horrified, and then seems to put 2 and 2 together. Sensing that Carol has been working at cross purposes, he starts strapping on what he can of Knight’s armor and looks into another mirror, vowing revenge, as Knight’s body dissolves into the carpet behind him, before the feed cuts.

Dig suggests they make a snuff BTL of Knight’s death/a brother’s revenge, but the rest of the team convinces him to hold off for now, though Otters confirms it will be a best seller for sure. They share some info with Ringmaster before getting into serious partying, and Dig and The Detective take off, with Dig getting the first look at The Detective’s strange shabby chic abode. They stop at Grandmother Biyu’s on the way so Dig can tip her off that now is a good time to make a move on the mafia- any dead can be claimed as bugs, and their mages were surely effected by the mana blast wave, and with Knight gone they’ve lost their best ally in ARES. Ravenheart approaches CG and asks if he has seen Li Wei- apparently Wei’s blood magic got the better of him while fighting off a major ALPHA assault earlier in the day and he hasn’t been seen since. A rogue blood mage is a big problem, though Ravenheart would like to help him if possible.

After the partying, everyone crashes. The next day Dig and The Detective return, and the matrix starts gradually coming back online- not just the local net but the whole deal, it seems that ARES jammers are offline for the first time in a while. The team gets their remaining pay from Vogel, and also sees that Jackpoint is back up! A new group called the GOD-Slayers claims credit for helping end the embargo, alongside many thanks to the Nexus and Asgard Data Haven for assistance and secure backups. The big news, as well as Detroit and the death of Knight (assumed in battle) and the return of Vogel (previously thought dead) is “what happened to III Corps?”

From the currently available info, it seems like the entire III Corps, plus everyone else within a large radius around Dutchville, PA, all vanished off the face of the earth. There were strangely/conveniently no satellites overhead when it happened, and noone on the boards has been able to get sat feeds overheard since. Attempts to send drones have failed, so intel is low. But speculation is high. Perhaps something to investigate? However, the boards are warning runners not to try to leave Detroit JUST yet, in case whoever is controlling the satellites that enforce the cordon haven’t stood down yet.

The situation in the UCAS as a whole looks a bit dicey- Colloton has pulled back military forces to defend important installation and major cities, in the wake of the III Corps disaster and what’s happening in Detroit, and this has left some borders vulnerable, which the CAS, NAN, and other bordering nations are all too happy to exploit. Detroit also seems to have suffered badly- civilian casualties are estimated to be around 150k so far, and that doesn’t even include the SINless, DDB dwellers, and Irregulars from out of town. ARES forces also took a bad hit, though they aren’t revealing any internal info, external estimates are putting their losses at 60%+ of their military and auxiliary capacity. But- there have been no signs of bugs in the NGZ since the device went off, so Latvian Gambit may have kind of worked?

Otters heads out with mule and VTOL to salvage what she can from the now-less-irradiated van, and finds scavengers picking over the battlefield all over, with more official ARES salvage ops nearer the Tower. However, there seem to be less bodies around than there should be… and the rift is still glowing green above the Tower. Otters manages to save the concealed turret and HMG but the rest is a wash, either wrecked or already picked over. She heads back, the mule dragging the expensive turret and gun. When she gets back she reports the weird missing corpses, and CG and some others go out to investigate, grabbing a few corpses they do find to analyze.

With Ringmaster’s support, CG gets some space to do a ritual of bones, and finds that all the corpses were touched by some kind of corrupting energy, not strongly enough to have an effect, but strongly enough to leave traces. The thing it feels most similar to is Shadow magic. Examining the Quicksilver plates, they also see a massive Scar through Downtown, centered on the blast, that seems to be a powerful mana ebb or dead zone. When the team talks to their ghoul friends (yay functional matrix!) the ghouls report that Downtown is kind of a no-go zone for the dual-natured right now- bad vibes. Dig also calls Freddy Bales to thank him for his assistance during the magical order meeting, which Bales is his usual affable self about.

They decide that first off, they want to hire some assistance and go after the Shadow spirit farm and get their Tarot back (if they can), and then maybe help Ringmaster with all his new investigation needs, as he seems worried about the rift, which reminds him of the Watergate incident that brought Shedim to our place, as well as interested in what happened to III Corps. Also maybe help Biyu against the mafia, maybe help the ghouls against Fear The Dark, etc. Many jobs available, and maybe the city is finally free of bugs and checkpoints! It definitely seems like, for now, ARES is defending their HQ and licking their wounds. However, with all the bug tunnels, sinkholes and collapses are common, so travelling the city is far from “safe”.

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Tabasco
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective

The team spends a bit more time going back and forth on the bounty question at the Platinum Zone while also putting together their gear needs list to fight the Shadow spirits who stole their Tarot. They get another call from Carol and finally answer. He tells them he knows they’ve been dodging his calls and have been in touch with Ellis, but that he has a 3-4 part offer for them from Vogel, who he says is finally positioned to make his move. They agree to hear him out, and he says first off, Vogel has a message to pass to Ellis- essentially, offering amnesty for her faction if she gets on-side ASAP and answers a few basic questions satisfactorily. The team agrees to pass to along, at least.

Next, Vogel has two jobs for them, the first is to pick up a large device that it being air-dropped in shortly, stash it somewhere where it would be difficult to access or track magically, and leave it there with Carol. An optional stage 2, which they also accept, is to pick Carol and the device up from this location and get them into the center of the ARES vs Bugs fight Downtown at the moment of Vogel’s choosing, he thinks it will only be a few days from now. The team negotiates pay, and gets all the relevant info.

2nd job, Carol doesn’t know any details, but Vogel has prepped an info packet they can examine before negotiating pay, though they have to agree to the job before they can see it. They do so, and he passes them an encrypted file that MAMA has the key to decode. It seems they are meant to use Carol’s brother, Michael as a trojan horse of sorts to get a toxin attack in range of Damien Knight. Further assistance incoming via drone once they agree to terms. They negotiate with Carol for a major payday, and he takes off.

The Detective calls Ellis and passes along the message/warning, as well as Carol’s current contact info, she thanks them for it and says she’ll ponder it, quickly, and decide what to do. The team decides to use the van to conceal the device (and Carol) in the radioactive zone on Vendor’s Row, and head to Triple R to get radiation shielding upgraded, as well as add a concealed turret for the upcoming Downtown run. While they upgrade, Otters flies Tabasco in the VTOL, along with bird-form Dig over to the drop site, way on the west side in some farm country near Livonia.

They arrive and spot a half-size shipping container dropping down with 4 small corner chutes deployed a short while later. Unfortunately, they also spot an incongruous swarm of bats hanging out in the area, seemingly keeping an eye on them and the crate. Otters flies Creep over as well while they debate what to do. After some attempts to influence the swarm with spirit powers are counter-acted, Tabasco decides to take action, and shoots a bat. He is then quickly felled by a massive spell, and fall out of the tree he was perched in.

Creep tosses him in the VTOL and Otters zips him back to the Plat Zone for healing, as Creep pops some smoke grenades before nearly getting felled by another spell. Dig finally spots the caster- a powerful high level initiate is in bat form amidst the swarm, and with that Dig and Creep retreat inside the crate. Unfortunately this lets off a tiny moment of astral visibility to the strange and powerful magical device within. It looks similar to an ARES portal closer from Project: Bottleneck, but significantly modified. Dig analyzes it with his magic a bit, and gets spooked again.

They hear a voice with a Germanic accent outside the door, as Creep welds it shut from the inside and Dig holds it closed with magic fingers. The voice offers them power and safety if they hand over the device, which they refuse. Creep threatens to set it off rather than give it up, which the voice seems to believe. It asks where they are taking it and on who’s behalf, and Creep answers honestly, without explicitly identifying Vogel. The voice seems satisfied and says so long as they don’t deviate from their plan, he will merely watch, but that if they try to pull a fast one, they will have an issue.

The van finally arrives to find Creep and Dig still hiding inside (the crate seems EM shielded and they have lost comms inside), and they get the device loaded into the van and head out of there. They park it in the rad zone, fine-tuning their placement to maximize the effect while ensuring Carol and the van will survive without too much effect. Carol arrives, and Otters passes backup control to him in case of a comms loss. They then head back to the Plat Zone on foot, and start working on the next job.

Step one- they need an intact pheromone gland from an original ALPHA. They spend some time monitoring comms frequencies until they hear a promising alert for ALPHAS nearby from a spotter. They call out as “engaging”, and head out, using some tactics to proceed quietly and set an ambush. It works surprisingly well with The Detective providing some critical leadership. They take down the new ALPHAs before they even can respond, though the lone original ALPHA nearly kills Dig with a burst from their Excalibur. The team manages to finish them all off, and Creep and The Detective start burning the other corpses, while CG and Dig carefully extract the gland, Dig once again using esoteric magic to perform skills he doesn’t seem to possess, and declaring himself a surgeon.

They head back to the Plat Zone and debate whether to try the next step themselves or not, eventually deciding to contract it out to Stanli the Candyman. Dig flies over with the gland, and passes it off. Stanli takes a look at the instructions, and seems legit surprised. The team pays him extra to tell them what they are crafting, as they are also paying him to forget the whole thing after. He explains that essentially he will be able to extract and refine some pheromones from the gland to make a targeted toxin, so that when whoever they inject it into comes into smell-range of the target gene markers they will emit the tailored toxin.

Once they have the toxin, Dig flies back, as Stanli smokes some läes to forget. A drone delivery arrives, with a business card with Michael Turpentine’s number on it, and a small fancy box. Opening the box, they find a black chess king piece. Creep and Dig manage to put together that likely is the piece given to Aurelius, the ARES founder, in Big D’ Will, with the rest of the set given to Knight. Supposedly Knight has been seeking to acquire the piece in the years since the last of Aurelius’ line died, but has not succeeded. Putting it all together, they realize that giving this piece to Michael will allow them to get close enough to dose him with the tailored toxin, and that this piece will ensure Michael a meeting with Knight shortly thereafter.

They remember that Hendricks controlled the ALPHA breeding lab for some time, and ponder if he altered their genes to specifically want to target Knight if they encountered him, or if someone else did… regardless, they have their job to do. The Detective calls Michael’s private line, and arranges a meeting in the fancy Downtown hotel that he and some other corp higher-ups seem to be living in during the fighting. The Detective goes alone, smuggling in a flyspy that is being hot rigged by Otters, and with others on remote backup, watching through the Avatars linked tattoo that CG possesses.

Michael already seems hyped and a little drunk when The Detective arrives, and Otters manages to slip the drone past the observant corpsec onsite. The Detective goes along with Michael’s bro-y vibe, and gives him a big backslap just as Otters tags him with the drone’s injector, which seems to have been the perfect distraction, though Michael seems to be coming down with something a bit as they continue drinking. The Detective passes over the piece, and the team is a bit horrified to hear on the comms how desperate Michael still is for the approval and corporate success that has destroyed his family, especially as he casually reveals Damien Knight’s human-centric metaracism- mistaking him for his brother, etc.

Regardless, Michael seems well-satisfied, believing that this will ensure Knight remembers who he is and trusts him, and he tells The Detective he won’t forget them and what they’ve done for him. The Detective feels a little bad, as they know how this is likely to end, so gets out of there quickly, with Otters managing to sneak the drone back out as well. With that done, they just need to amass personal gear and wait for Vogel’s call to deliver Carol and the device….

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Tabasco
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective

Upon emerging from the tunnels and regrouping, the team finds that the Desolation Angels had managed to hold back a larger ALPHA assault, though a few got past, and they suffered some casualties. The injured and unconscious on the team get hauled to the triage center in the basement and treated, while the rest merely rest up. When everyone awakens, Praxis offers Tabasco the chance to join up with Ellis and them as a full time bug hunter but he turns it down for now. The team then gathers and begins discussing what to do with the info they have. Lacking some situational context, they report in to Ringmaster and Rifleman.

Rifleman thanks them for the mapping data and tells them that the Irregulars were able to make some good raids with it, though in response the tunnels have been flooded with some kind of modified Seven-7, making it very dangerous to operate underground for the moment. Which has also made the ghouls and BETAS/Deso Angels even more valuable allies. He leaves them with Ringmaster to discuss how to get paid.

Ringmaster tells them that there’s a large bounty for proof of Hendricks’ death, but it is through ARES, so he’d have to use a series for cutouts to get it, which would eat into the payday. They could also go to Vogel, though the pay would likely be less, but it would allow him to make some moves ahead of ARES knowing of the power vacuum underground. In the end, the team fills Ringmaster in, and then sells the info to Ellis, in order to let her make some moves herself for her new faction. They get significantly less pay but tighten their bonds with Ellis.

They then try to call home to make sure Iva is ready for incoming repair work, but noone picks up at the safehouse! Otters flies Tabasco up there in the VTOL and does some surveillance on the way- looks like bugs are falling back to Downtown fully, as are ARES forces as mercs and Irregulars try to kill ALPHAS and save civilians- the big battle may be reaching a finale! On reaching the safehouse, they find the entrances covered with magical vines, but no other obvious issues, though they can’t get in.

Dig flies up in bird form to join Tabasco as Otters drives the rest up in the van, carefully, to avoid combat encounters. Tabasco inquires with Zennia, but she says part of what they pay for is privacy, plus the neighborhood seems kind of edgy and post-combat themselves. Chatting further, it turns out there were some desperate bug breakouts, followed by the poison gas, and though they were contained, there were some local casualties and noone has seen Jaga- unusual but she keeps odd hours and wanders a lot.

The team, recognizing Jaga’s green magic as the source of the vines, manages to communicate their good intents and is allowed in past the magic barrier, after CG slips through and reports it looks like a major brawl took place inside. There is a lot of blood, Dig’s golem is shattered, and CG’s lodge has been desecrated, seemingly by shadow magic. They find a badly injured Jaga in a seed pod that seems to have preserved her, and Dig manages to heal her with a massive spell.

Questioning her, they find out that Iva seems to have been mind-controlled into letting the Hands of Fate into the safehouse and guiding them to the Tarot cards. By the time Jaga realized what was happening, they were already fighting the golem- they came in concealed and under a large area silence effect, making it extra creepy, but she says there were multiple metahumans and at least two massive shadow spirits in the astral. Quickly analyzing the scene before fleeing, they see at least 5 distinct blood traces- likely Iva (who is missing), Jaga, and 3 others.

Most of the blood seems to have come from one individual who looks to have been sacrificed to ruin CG’s lodge. The team flees back to the Platinum Zone, since Dig and Tabasco are both still badly injured, and they pay to get their armor fixed there. They rest again, and discussing next steps decide to hire Smoach and Myrryr to look into this further, and also make sure they didn’t get attacked too. S&M seem glad to hear from the team, their office was ransacked but they had taken precautions and their card is safe. They agree to investigate, and suggest that based on HOF SOP, Iva may still be slowly dying somewhere, if it isn’t already too late. While starting their investigation at the safehouse, they find a sketch of the 10 of Blades in Iva’s area, altered to have her face, and suggest the team think of places she might be. They head north to check the spot where they found Roderick.

It occurs to the team that they haven’t checked the bolthole, and they call into the radio there, hearing what sounds like knife actions and blood dripping. Tabasco insists on being flown down there immediately, with Dig accompanying in bird form, masking himself as best he can, worried about a trap. Tabasco rushes in, but unfortunately seems to have fallen under a dark influence and finds himself compelled to shoot the suspended and badly cut up Iva with a white phosphorous arrow, surely killing her. He still tries to apply a trauma patch, but lights himself on fire in the process. The team triggers the narcoject in his auto-injector, which they had added in case of mind control, and Otters rigs his body out of there back into the VTOL.

They call the landlord and have another humorous convo where she seems fine with their misadventures so long as they pay for the damage, as the rental market is in a current slump due to the crisis. They say they’ll get back to her but arrange for ghoul-based body disposal once the fire goes out. Knowing that Tabasco won’t be able to handle what he did (even though it wasn’t his fault), the team comes up with a lie- Iva was already dead, and Tabasco lit the unit on fire in anger, and asked to have his memory (and the footage) erased.

Otters calls up Howell, who helped her forget some of her past in Florida, and he provides an intro to a local dealer/info broker named Stanli the Candyman. Howell warns Dig that Stanli is forgetful but loves setting traps. Dig approaches carefully, avoiding various dangerous and deadly traps, and has an odd convo with Stanli, who seems to have started smoking some of the laës while waiting for Dig to arrive. He sells him a vial of the injectible variety and also some other drugs, and they does Tabasco, back at the Plat Zone for now til they figure out what to do re: safehouses.

Dig proposes that they can’t let themselves be bullied, and keeps almost giving up the lie to Tabasco, but Tabasco seems willing enough to go along with it that they all manage to keep it together. Eventually, everyone gets talked into Dig’s plan, which is to hunt down the Hands of Fate/shadow spirit and get their Tarot cards back. Jaga, Dig and CG do a massive ritual to track them down, with The Detective being flown around Detroit in the VTOL as the spotter. They eventually track them to a dilapidated farmhouse way outside of town near Ypsilanti.

Not wanting to rush into an incredibly dangerous situation, they start making lists of necessary gear and the like. Meanwhile, Tabasco heads out to Metal Maniacs where he gets hand razors installed and pays one of the gangers there to buff him like Iva used to. They accidentally trigger his orgasm switch while doing so, which is a weird experience for him. Creep hides the remaining 2 tarot cards (sealed up) in his leg waste compartment, and heads up north to try to get his parachute back from the jailbreak mission.

When he arrives, he sees that new go-gangers have taken over the whole area around the Blight, and the jail is badly burnt down. He chats with some Ancients, including the 2 the team rescued, and they confirm that anything flammable at the jail is long destroyed. Oh well. One of the Ancients, who seems magical, warns Creep that some kind of dark spirit is pursuing him, and gives him some tips on how to ditch it. He accepts a ride from them back to the north edge of the NGZ, and hides out near the nuke detonation site for a while to ditch astral tracing, then sneaks back to the Plat Zone, where he gets a biopocket installed to hide their remaining few major arcana from astral sight.

The team continues to go back and forth on whether to cash the ARES bounty before it’s too late, since CG gathered some bio-samples of Hendricks’ exploded corpse, with Dig adamantly for it, Tabasco adamantly opposed (ARES killed his parents, as he says) and the rest of the crew vacillating between. However, they need to gear up for this shadow spirit raid….

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Tabasco
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective

Tabasco returns after helping protect the Platinum Zone from bug assault, which also further cemented their alliance with Ellis and Praxis. The team debriefs a bit and talks Dig out of making a potentially sketchy deal with Grandmother Biyu to get a much better deck than he can afford in exchange for having a constant info channel open to the Triad. Dig instead borrows money from many on the team and gets a decent deck. Tabasco upgrades one of his arms, going obvious to get more capacity for mods.

After doing a few more assorted sabotage and magic fly-by’s to keep pressure on the Mafia at the port, the team decides to head into the tunnels and deal with Otto Hendricks once and for all. Given that bugs are locked in combat with the newly arrived MET2000 reinforcements, along with all the previous combatants, and that this is luring far flung ALPHAS back to the city center, the team figures noone will be looking for an alpha strike on the Henricks himself, so they hope to sneak in.

They decide to use the tunnel that emerged near the Plat Zone as an entry point, and spend a while training and gearing up for the mission as sounds of heavy combat continue all around them. They head down, and using drones and spirits, manage to bypass a few initial traps, including tunneling around an alarm ward by magically reshaping concrete in an old subway station. Otters reports back to the Plat Zone on progress until her drone doesn’t return one time, and they worry they are surrounded. Dig, in wolf form, is doing an impressive job astrally tracking Hendricks based on his and CG’s ritual prep.

As they enter a large multi-chamber area, seemingly a major old underground station, a massive magical barrier drops down behind them- a trap! 4 massive spirits manifest and attack the team, with the team managing to avoid taking serious damage and felling 2 of the spirits before coming under attack from Hendricks and his bodyguards, wielding Gauss rifles, which shred Tabasco’s armor badly. They get in a brutal throwdown fight, but are making progress when some ALPHA’s. lured by the strong bug magic being thrown around, breech through the magical barriers since Hendricks is distracted with the battle.

Hendricks’ bodyguards appear suicidally loyal, and keep taking hits for him, though they manage to fell Tabasco with their railguns. CG and Dig’s spirits manage to keep the rest of the team reasonably safe, and the ALPHAs make quick work of the surviving bug spirit, though they also shoot Otters’ prone body as they enter, not bothering to stop and confirm their kill, luckily for her she had upgraded her armor before this mission. CG snaps the small bone charm he was given by Li Wei, which summons a Blood Spirit, and he and Dig send a spirit each after Hendricks.

He quickly banishes the blood spirit and destroys Dig’s spirit with astral combat, and the ALPHAs destroy both of CG’s necro spirits, a bad day for spirit rep for both of them. Dig and CG flee the ALPHAs further in, chasing Hendricks and his lone remaining guard further underground. The team fells one ALPHA up top as CG takes out the final bodyguard, and Dig manages to trap Hendricks with an embarassing/overcast magic fingers grapple. DIg holds Hendricks prone, while Otters’ drone, Creep and the ALPHA all attack him.

Unfortunately, it seems like he had one final plan and detonates a mine he has built into his armor, nearly killing Creep and Dig, damaging the ALPHA, and destroying the drone. Creep and CG manage to take down the ALPHA as it tries to KO and infest Dig, who barely survives. Otters salvages what she can from the mule, and CG distros some Buffout so that the team can haul Tabasco out. They race back up the tunnel as quick as they can, hoping the flyspys that Otters sent back ahead would have reported any obstructions.

They get lucky, and safely reach the Platinum Zone, where Tabasco is revived, though he looks much the worse for wear, and the rest of the team heals up a bit, before debriefing.

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Tabasco
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective

With the Blight still hot and aggressively guarded post-prison break, the team heals up for a few days, and the contractors for the job go their separate ways. After everyone is basically back to normal, they decide to pay Kong to keep the van safe til they can get it out, and pay the Maulers to smuggle them out through the McKenzie Arcology, which goes smoothly. They travel back to the safehouse on foot, except for Dig who goes in bird form, and manage to gun down two fresh, hungry alphas who attack them on the way, without any significant damage to themselves.

Dig insists on solving the mystery of one of the 6WT greater arcana: the Avatars. He does decipher how to resolve it, but tries to participate in bird form and misses out on the boon. The other 3 participants (Chew Gum, The Detective and Otters) all gain a visual only shared sensory connection with the other 2 that, after some experimentation, seems able to bypass magical defenses with ease. They experiment a bit more and plan to use it for recon until it runs out. Unfortunately, it does magically link them also and makes them a bit more astrally visible.

The team does some planning and recon for the heist for Howell;s mysterious Johnson, and finds that the artifact in question is a Tzuri Group Janus statue of some sort, a recent loan to the private museum in Grosse Pointe’s ritzy Casa Aurelius gated neighborhood. The Detective uses their good SIN to gain access and tours the museum, under the effect of a catalog spell ritual from Dig and Chew Gum, though they are forced to let the spell go when they trigger some passive museum security and are confronted by guards. Overall, the place seems quite chill however, and they quickly make a plan to sneak, bypass the detected security features, and replace the artifact with a well-made copy, hopefully leaving noone any the wiser for at least some amount of time.

In other news about town, ARES has apparently dug deep in their remaining coffers and secured the services of MET2000, one of the world’s largest merc corps. They are expected to arrive within the week, which may dramatically change the situation on the ground. Otters, on behalf of the team, also shares some intel and info with Ringmaster – specifically discussing Ellis and her trustworthiness, given her altered status. The Irregulars are debating an offer to unite or at least collab with the BETAs and Desolation Angels, and seem to legit value the team’s input.

They also warn that Carol and Vogel are very much still looking for Ellis, so the team should expect contact at some point. They discuss Kensington and the Comeadai network, and Ringmaster fills them in on the Black Lodge’s likely involvement- from what he could tell, Kensington was a former member of the Seer’s Guild, a powerful Euro foretelling org, which is heavily infiltrated by the BL. What was done to him also seems like a classic BL punishment/experiment, and they are definitely invested in the secrets of the Seelie Court, so it feels feasible.

Armed with knowledge and a plan, the team prepares to make the imitation artifact and get the heist down before the arrival of MET2000 changes the situation on the ground. The heist goes pretty well, with the team first making contact with the small local Seoul’Pa presence via Chew Gum in order to upgrade some SINs. Creep gets his good enough to get into Casa Aurelius, and heads in carrying Dig’s hacking rig. He stashes it in a tree near the museum, where Dig flies in in bird form, and puts on his custom animal form trodes with his magic fingers.

Dig manages to hack the cameras on the museum and make it look like Creep left, while Creep actually hides in a utility closet. Once the museum closes, Creep sneaks around and lets Otter’s mule drone in, after Otters drops it off with the VTOL. The mule drone sneaks to the third floor and disables the automatic security shutter, while Creep carefully bypasses the physical and digital security, and swaps out the near exact replica that CG crafted, also swapping the digital sensors and trackers attached.

Unfortunately, Dig doesn’t really understand the matrix, and GOD comes down on him, destroying his deck and badly injuring him. He leaves the area, and Creep and the drone hide inside overnight while the team figures out a plan. The next day, the Detective returns to the museum at opening while Dig, in bird form, uses a spirit of beasts to control animals from around the neighborhood to rush dozens of cats, dogs, rats etc into the museum , causing some chaos, during which Creep and the drone sneak off, with Otters flying the drone and artifact away in the VTOL.

Otters makes the drop off to Howell after flying through some toxic zones to ditch magical traces. The team then connects with Grandmother Biyu so Dig can learn some new spells and try to get a new deck. The rest of the team quickly determines that she is a high ranking Triad, and they get down to biz. She wants to take turf from the mafia while ARES is on their back foot, and offers the team whatever level of involvement they want. After some debate, they agree, and begin planning a disinformation and sabotage campaign.

While that happens, Ellis warns of a major upcoming bug assault, and Tabasco manages to help fend off a direct attack on the Platinum Zone, while the rest of the team helps prep defenses in Hamtramck. After multiple ARES positions collapse, some under shelling from their own command Downtown, MET2000 dramatically drops in with gravjets and starts pushing the bugs back and holding the line. Luckily, ARES has had to also call in all backup, so Otters finally gets the team van back from the Blight, and notices that there seem to be some incipient go-gangers starting to build up bikes and war rigs and preparing to leave the Blight as well….

Runners
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Tabasco
Otters aka Roadkill
The Detective
and some assistance from: Leonid Svaja and The Brokenheart

Leonid, having come to town for bonus pay with the Irregulars and looking for some side work now that some of the funding has dried up, gets recommended by Kong as a freelancer in look of work to help with the prison break. Noticing the team’s imperfect grasp of social skills, he also suggests hiring on the washed-up boy band star/face/adept The Brokenheart, Kamizan 0 to fill those gaps. Brokenheart got stuck in town after a con appearance got crashed by Horizon hired goons and he had to lay low with a fan for a bit and got stuck inside the wall during Latvian Gambit, and he’s out of drug money so he’s desperate for work.

Dig heads out to meet up with Grandmother Biyu to learn some spells, and finds what looks like a small Triad setup to cook and feed people during the crisis. They seem to be operating pretty freely in the dangerous Vendor’s Row so that implies some power at least. They have a slightly esoteric conversation as Dig realizes that Biyu is teaching him the spells as she makes him help cook. She also says she has some work for him- she needs to acquire some territory in town which is currently possessed by others. Dig agrees and says he’ll circle back soon.

The team all links up, arranges pay with Praxis, and gets access to a Desolation Angels bus they can beef up and use for the prisoner rescue. They add run flats and a ram plate, and get Leonid and Otters hooked into the rigger interface. Chew Gum does some astral surveillance on the prison while the 2 riggers do some drone flybys and Creep and Tabasco scout the neighborhood. The team has to remind Tabasco to cover all his extensively buffed and shiny cyber to avoid detection. Otters heads to Run and Sollars and gets some info on the building- an old and not very updated structure. They make an initial plan for entry and start acquiring the necessary gear.

They get a rocket launcher and a bunch of EMP’s from The Trading Post, and fly to the Plat Zone to acquire some C4. Dig turns into a mouse and rides in Creep’s pocket, along with most of the EMP’s, 7 flyspys and a miniwelder, while Creep gets dropped on the roof of the prison by the VTOL and infiltrates the old vents. They spend a night sneaking around and surveilling, and manage to use the mouse and flyspy’s to get messages to the prisoners they need to break out, hoping they can also get a few more if they get the chance. In the morning, Creep sets the C4 (which Leonid had pre-shaped) above the facility spider’s rigger cocoon, and tells the team it’s go time.

Leonid, having mounted the rocket launcher on his roto-drone, and waits while Tabasco climbs up the side of the toxic Chrysler Valley to cut the perimeter fence. Brokenheart heads up to the front gate and starts performing and jumping around to magically distract the guards. He pulls 3 of the patrollers off, which gives Tabasco enough time to cut the fence, though he attracts the attention of 4 exterior rail drones and 1 remaining patroller. Creep falls back in the vents and detonates the C4 as Leonid launches the rocket. They blow open the side of the admin wing and take out the spider in one go, and then Tabasco comes under heavy fire.

He retreats into the building with Chew Gum getting flown in by the VTOL and dropped inside also. Otters sends the bus over to back up Brokenheart with it’s newly mounted LMG, as the guards out front are coming back to their senses. Creep drops down from the vent as Dig summons a spirit, and they quickly take out the 2 on shift security mages. They get in a gun, magic, and EMP battle with the drones and sec guards, and the bus almost gets wrecked before Otters can pull it back. Leonid hot swaps back to an assault rifle on his roto-drone to provide cover fire, while CG uses his corpse spirit for long distance powers on exterior guards and Otters starts heading over in the mule drone.

With some massive pulse spells and lightning bolts, followed up by prodigious gunfire and arrows, the team manages to take out all the surrounding guards, thinking there are likely only a few deeper in. Tabasco is nearly killed and is hopped up on slap patches to keep going. Otters gets into the detention wings with the mule drone, which is nearly destroyed in an ambush. The team manages to take out the two guards firing from cover while Dig uses his new mind probe spell to learn the secrets of the facility from the lone living captured guard, as well as his deep personal feelings, before killing him.

Brokenheart heads in, talks the last guard into surrendering, and walks him out as CG’s spirit further compels him to flee and not call backup. He does. They start cutting through the locked down cell bolts, as they fried the spider’s controls so can’t digitally open doors. Otters and Leonid get drones airborne, and spot KE reinforcement coming their way, so they have to hustle. They just manage to free the 6 Desolation Angels, 3 Razorboyz Edge runners, 2 Ancients, and assassinate the one First Union member before the backup arrives, and Otters and Leonid race towards the Blight, laying down suppressive fire in front and behind.

They smash through the border gate, destroying the bus, and tell the people aboard to flee into the Blight as they team cover them. Otters then drives deeper in, hiding the van, as KE forms up at the entrance but seems reluctant to pursue. The team has really burned themselves with ARES but gained a lot of good rep with locals and gangers, and makes a good chunk of cash as well! Onto the next job!

Runners
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
and introducing: The Detective

With the disturbing news about the disappearance (or at least the disappearance from sensors) of the UCAS Army III Corps, as well as the nearby town of Dutchville, PA, the team has a mildly fraught morning discussing possibilities, exit strategies, and survival plans. Otters is glad she got her reflex augment surgery in beforehand as this is likely to make things even scarcer and more expensive. Chew Gum returns from learning a new necromantic ritual from Li Wei, who seems a bit creepier than the team file had previously suggested. He also buys a Mortis Optigram off of Smoach and Myrryr who say that they just kept it around on the off-chance and can’t actually use it.

Meanwhile, across town, The Detective finally emerges from their depressive state/bath after grieving Locke’s death for a week. Absent their protege and source of street intel, they feel it is perhaps finally time to get back out there themselves, work the angles. Having also caught the radio broadcast about the III Corps mystery, The Detective is hooked and on the case. They can only think of one obvious place to turn initially- the team Locke was running with before their death. The Detective chooses Tabasco to reach out to, based on the limited psych workup they have done on the crew from Locke’s reports.

Tabasco, quickly feeling a bit out of his depth, brings most of the rest of the team in on the call, absent Dig who is sealing the mafia hole up and currently unreachable. They all agree to meet The Detective and suggest the Tin Can bar, which Locke seems to have not told The Detective is right in front of their safehouse (score one for team norms). They debrief a bit back and forth, commiserate about Locke’s untimely passing, and discuss some ongoing mysteries: Tarot, Fear The Dark, III Corps. Most of the crew claims to not be in the world saving business so The Detective pays them a decent consulting fee for the info share.

An urgent call to a meeting at the Platinum Zone comes over the bar’s radio setup, and Marv manages to punch a message through to The Detective with an invite as well, so they all load into the team van and then drive down. Otters does some impressive sneaky driving while the others keep lookout- they see that the 77th Independent Rangers are policing their zone as well so they have their Irregulars transponder ready to broadcast if needed, but don’t get spotted. It looks like the large pack of ALPHAS on the north edge of Downtown have been driven off or moved on, also, leaving devastation in their wake.

They reach the Plat Zone with no trouble and start to head inside but get halted by security who recognize Chew Gum’s corpse spirit host as one of the would-be assassins from the last big meeting. They go to tackle the spirit and luckily Tabasco intervenes and explains before CG is able to try to use mental manipulation powers on the guards, as Tabasco remembers there is constant magical surveillance as well. They check their corpse spirit at the door and head in. They get ushered over into the Brickhouse side through knocked in interior passages along the block, it seems increasingly fortified every time they visit.

Waiting there are the Irregular command: Ringmaster, setting up an AR projector deck, Ravenheart looking calm and collected, and Rifleman, all keyed up, Marv greets The Detective as they enter but is otherwise hanging back for this. Once enough Irregulars have arrived, Ringmaster starts the presentation. Bad news: not only has III Corps vanished or dropped off sensors (both worrying), Jackpoint, The Nexus, Frozen Shadows, and Asgard Data Haven all appear to have been taken down. They present the last batch of messages that Electric Blue was able to pull before getting badly dump shocked, and it looks bad- a coordinated attack shortly after the III Corps news came through.

Without easy outside access to funding, recruitment, and buyers, Ringmaster warns that Irregulars will be seeing reduced support and pay, though they will continue to do what they can. Most of the mercs grumble but hang with it- this was a volunteer position after all. Some of the locals and some of the out of towners bail, resigning their commissions, but most stay. Although they can’t really afford even those losses, Ringmaster sells it as a further loyalty test: now everyone knows that the ones who remain are there for the right reasons and will have each other’s backs, whatever comes next.

Tabasco tries to broach some speculations about what caused all this, and gets shut down on doing it publically, but Ringmaster tells everyone to share any intel with leadership- they need to be on their toes and not engaging in wild speculation at the moment. Still, plenty of rumors are circulating the room, from the plausible to the truly outlandish. The team also notices there are more ghouls mixed into the Irregulars than previous- more arrivals from Chicago perhaps? They head to the back to share their suspicions with the leadership.

When in the back, Ringmaster seals it up and tells them it’s a newly installed Faraday cage. He also runs a white noise machine and scans everyone for bugs, as well as instructing everyone to disable recording and comms. They all do, and the team suggests that the attack on the boards was likely the fault of the Null Sect. They hardwire a copy of the Null Doc to Ringmaster, who confirms that he has heard of the NS, though the team has more specific info on them than he does. The Detective sits in the corner taking frantic notes: another mystery! The rest of leadership is unfamiliar, but gets brought quickly up to speed, with Ringmaster reinforcing the team’s dire warning about ANY digital transmission involving the NS.

They get some more intel than was shared publicly as well, and are given a month-long codebook, to go old school with radio encryption. Creep secrets it away on his person, and they are told to destroy it if they look likely to be captured or killed.Most of the other Irregular units will just get daily code books with their assignments for the day, but some of the more specialist crews and farther flung operators are getting longer term ones to reduce travel risk. While the team is driving back they have an internal discussion about what to do with The Detective, since they already know so much.

They sit down at the Tin Can and gets some drinks, with Tabasco getting Iva to fashion him a drinking pipe/horn to get around his junkyard jaw “drinking problems” (i.e. cutting up glasses and mugs). After some further interviewing, they pass The Detective the team norms, which they eagerly sign, and the team adds them to the team file, with a warning that they can’t just instantly rabbit hole on all the info and need to also do some work. The Detective agrees, and seems to think they just won’t sleep for a while maybe. On the night’s RFD broadcast, they hear that ARES has cut loose The Cutters, after their leader refused to throw a bunch of her people into a meat grinder suicide mission in the Downtown tunnels. They’ve pulled back from positions around the city and taken over a large old bank Downtown as an HQ. Tabasco tries to call his “uncle” Don Michaels, and finds out that he’s too late- Michaels was killed in the fighting.

They all crash at the safehouse, and awaken to a meeting request from Ellis. Heading north, they sneak out of the No-Go-Zone, with Otters once again showing off her skills. They reach the Mackenzie Arcology overlooking the Blight, and enter. The Maulers look to have taken back their turf after the Cutters pulled back. Otters exchanges brief nods and chat with them, confirming that the smuggling tunnels under the Arcology into the Blight are still open if needed. They use the access codes Ellis provided to head up a few floors and head into the unit they were told.

They find Ellis there, along with Praxis, who noone on the team had seen since late Chicago, and who is the only Desolation Angel present. Also there are Pretty and Needles from Long Pig Farms and a few more ghouls the team doesn’t know, who look like heavy hitters. Everyone is armed and armored but not showing any aggression. Ellis invites them to sit and they do. She asks that they hear her out, and then if they’re willing to work together, Praxis will offer them a job. She begins.

Ellis explains that she has found an alternate path forward for both metahumanity and insect spirits: the true voluntary merge. She says that as it can only be entered willingly by both sides, it differs from any other previous merges, though she modeled the concept off of the Desolation Angel mantid merges, which are voluntary but still largely consume the original host, leaving some memories, personality etc intact and present but not exactly in charge. Ellis says she is terming the new process the “BETA” to counter the macho/destructive ALPHA program.

Chew Gum gets suspicious and assenses both Ellis and Praxis, and sees that their auras look weirdly similar, though in Praxis’ case the bug aspect seems dominant, whereas in Elli’s case both seem equal. CG also notices Ellis drop her impressive aura making to let him see this. Inquiring what exactly she did, she explains that she was forced to merge with the nymph sample that previous team members secured for her in Chicago, when her lab was raided and the current team wasn’t able to get her out in time. She explains that she had planned to appeal to Vogel for continued funding and protection while she kept investigating her “alternate path”, but that now she has moved completely beyond that and believes ARES has nothing to offer her.

Also, while she trusts Vogel more than anyone else who might end up in charge, she doesn’t think he really has what it takes to cleanse the corp of it’s internal evils to the extent necessary. She does explain that she can replicate the BETA process on others, and plans to, though she reiterates that it requires willingness on both ends- ALPHAS were willing humans with forced bugs, initially, and now are something else, and worse, with their ability to breed, which she admit was a terrible feature to include. And standard bug is an unwilling host with a willing bug. She compares it to being more similar to Monad-ism, in terms of synergistically merging personalities. CG concedes that this does appear to be astrally accurate, but the team has some intense internal discussion about what to do.

Deciding that even if they wanted to (which most don’t but some do), they couldn’t take out Ellis and survive, they decide to take Praxis’ job for now and discuss more later. Pretty also explains that Ellis is continuing to help develop sustainable ghoul food in her free time, and the ghouls seems to treat her a bit reverently, as she also tipped them off to ALPHA edibility. Praxis explains that with the Cutters pulled back, ARES’ private prisons are notably understaffed- there’s one main facility they brought the gangers they rounded up to, and have been recruiting out of for tunnel rat missions. Praxis wants the other Desolation Angels out, and suggests the team could make some new friends by freeing others as well, if they want.

She also explains that she has no desire to kill Ellis, even as a dedicated bug hunter who needs to consume bugs to breed. She seems to be of her right mind and speaking freely as far as the team can tell, and seems to have fully bough into Ellis’ plan. Tabasco also asks the ghouls if there are ghoul gourmands who would like to feast on specific ALPHA parts and they seem interested. So for now, the team leaves, and starts planning a prison break!

Runners
Creep
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill

Otters rejoins the crew, having gotten Moreau sufficiently set up at the Bloomfield biodrone reserve for the time being. Tabasco needs to spend some time prowling the city and getting a feel for the vibes again, so takes off for a bit. Chew Gum continues to help out the local area and communities that he and Jaga have connected with. Dig and Creep convince Otters to make an appointment at the Run and Sollars Private Library to look for some tunnel maps. Otters, having used their resources before, does so, careful not to mention his connection to the 3 who were there the day prior, when they trashed the place a bit and killed some Shifting Pyre guys who were legit clients.

Otters VTOLs over, and sees that the library is still being defended by the steampunk-y runner crew, who he recognizes as a hacker gang called The Coquillards. They’re loosely French-Canadian nationalists, which explains why they didn’t come to the big meeting at the Plat Zone, as they believe Windsor should split back off from Detroit. Luckily, this means they aren’t familiar with Otters’ new crew, so she doesn’t run into any trouble there. She does share some intel with their leader Prospero about the UCAS Army III Corps headed their way, which they appreciate.

Then Otters spends a while researching and finds an old KE training map about Detroit Down Below navigation, as well as some intel suggesting that ghoul communities might be good to reach out to. She also finds the name of a library volunteer “Daiyana Dimeeko” who seems to have annotated some of these files most recently. Dig keeps working on re-building his ritual circle in the long storage bolt hole, while Creep catches up on some flatvid reruns off his hard drive.

They link back up and decide to reach out to some of the ghouls they know, and radio over to Smee at Neverland Candy Shoppe. Smee tracks down Rains for them and a few hours later they chat on the radio, and make an agreement to trade the ghouls for updated DDB/tunnel maps in exchange for helping the ghouls deal with whoever is behind Fear The Dark locally, and with pushing out good PR about the ghoul community here.

Rains puts them in touch with a Chicago ghoul named Pretty who is in town looking to see if Long Pig Farms could take advantage of the chaos and move up here, and the team arranges to meet her at the Plat Zone that evening. While travelling around the city the team notices that a merc corp, the 77th Independent Rangers, seems to be significantly bolstering ARES forces in Zones 1 and 5, but combat seems to have settled down a bit in both areas.

They arrive for the meet at the Plat Zone, and find the area further expanded and fortified. Pretty is waiting for them with a small mixed group of local and Chicago ghouls who they don’t know, and is made up to appear as “baseline human” as possible- more effective at a distance than up close where it gets a little uncanny valley, but she explains that it helps her be a point of contacts with local normies and civilians who aren’t necessarily used to dealing with ghouls, ARES having kept the large underground community fairly secret.

She shares a PR doc that previous team members had helped write in Chicago with the current team, some of whom recognize it from the team file. She says it helped a lot in the Bug City wrap up times, but without the bugs as a unifying threat, those in power in Chicago are using fear of infection (and FTD) to make ghouls and vamps the new bogeymen to justify their crackdowns in the CZ as the corps continue to rebuild and reclaim there. It’s still a good party, but maybe not for the Infected anymore.

She tells the team to feel free to share that doc around, but that they have a few more specific jobs in mind to trade for the underground maps. She suggests looking for wealthy vamps or other secret cabals who would benefit from using Fear the Dark as a fearmongering tool- since a lot of lone wolves claim the name, they’ll likely never be able to stop them entirely, but if they can cut off the head of the org, locally, it should go a long way.

She also wants them to track down Ellis- apparently Ellis had a dead man’s switch which sent a message to the Chicago ghouls about the viability of eating ALPHA flesh, and Pretty wants to return the favor, especially as Ellis had hinted at possible further ghoul food developments she was working on in her free time. As far as Pretty can tell, Ellis was grabbed by the mafia, then grabbed by some organleggers and stashed at the port and then captured by maggots when they breached the stacked human smuggling cargo containers from underground.

Dig’s been getting some looks from various people at the Plat Zone as he is only wearing illusory clothes to make his animal form transitions easier, so he mods his illusion so that his shirt reads “Choose to Believe.” People seem to have larger concerns but Otters gets a little worried about how this would go over in more polite company in the future. Regardless, the team agrees to the job, and Pretty says the ghouls will have some transports ready for any other hostages the team can rescue from the maggots, to bring them to the Plat Zone to get checked out for Inhabitation and generally healed up.

The team heads over to the port and finds it fully and openly under mafia control. Dig goes up to talk to them and they seem weirded out by him and his nakedness but intrigued by his proposal, til Otters jumps in and uses her good rep to get the Mancino family fixer Mr. Friday to intervene. He seems to recognize Dig and Creep from a previous bad run-in with the mob, but Otters is solid enough and the plan seems to their benefit so he agrees. The team agrees to seal the hole after they’re done (with magic) and track down the traitorous infiltrators that Friday says were involved in the initial collapse. He charges the team a bit of money on principle but they pay up, and repel down the large crater in the midst of the piled stacks of isontainer in The Yards. The mafia has it ringed with autoguns and sensors, which they don’t turn off as the team rappels down, an eerie feeling.

They find the wreckage of 2 stacks of isotainers that dropped into the large hole, and evidence that it was blown open rather than tunneled. Looking inside the containers, they find evidence of longterm people holding/smuggling- racks of cheap bunks with restraints and IV’s. Dig, in dog form, plus a spirit he summons, plus all the drones manage to sense a few trails, and correctly ID which one the hostages were brought down, while Creep uses his navigation implants to orient them while travelling in the pitch black tunnels, a mix of man-made and bug dug.

They eventually track their way to a massive old storm overflow cistern, filled with about 100 captives, who are overseen by 4 ant workers who are slowly walking through the crowd feeding them some kind of goop. The captives seems more sedated than restrained. As they watch, 2 beetle warriors emerge from the opposite tunnel and grab 2 of the captives and lead them off somewhere- likely for inhabitation. They make a quick plan, and Otters doubles back with the spirit guarding him to set up 2 C4 charges, while Creep sneaks through the crowd of captives to place the 3rd.

The team sneaks past another worker spirit in the tunnels while doing so, lines up their shots, and then hits the detonators and triggers their ambush. They manage to drop all 4 worker spirits before they can respond, and successfully fully or partially collapse all 3 tunnels they were aiming to. They debate trying to winch the captive back up through the mafia-guarded hole, but hearing some angry digging sounds from beyond the collapsed tunnel areas, decide to take a faster but more dangerous route. Otters zips down the new tunnel under the water, which looks like a recent bug connection to Otto Hendricks’ old turf in North Windsor, and though it is leaking it isn’t collapsed yet.

She pauses to plant some explosives at a weak point while Dig throws up some concrete spells to further hold back bug pursuer and the spirit and Creep get the captives moving. They seem quite docile so once they start going it isn’t too hard to get them all going along, though the team is only able to save 80 out of 100. They blow the tunnel just behind another concrete spell and fell a terrible water pressure rush in, washing away the pursuing bugs and eventually shooting a little geyser of water out of the concealed basement exit they find in Windsor.

They call up the ghouls to pick up the survivors for medical care, and one of the survivors comes over and removes a magical diguise- it’s Ellis! She thanks the team for the rescue and says she’ll go with the ghouls for now and debrief them later. They ask her what happened to the nymph and she tells them not to worry about it. The team, having previously committed to letting her make her own choice between ghouls and Vogel, and with Dig unable to read her aura, let her go.

Pretty and Rains seems satisfied, and send the updated maps, with the promise from the team that they will continue to help with the FTD and PR issues. Now they just need to track down and kill Otto Hendricks! On a few nights worth of Radio Free Detroit, they hear a couple updates: it seems like the local situation has entered a kind of stalemate, with ARES (Knight) vs. Irregulars vs. Bugs (+ Hendricks’ ARES assets) vs. ALPHAS, where ALPHAS are the terrifying wildcard who prefer to fight bugs but will fight anyone. There are reports that Zones 1 and 5 are relatively safe for Irregulars as long as they are running ID, as the 77th Independent Rangers have repeatedly refused ARES orders to fire on fellow mercs, so long as they aren’t firing at them first.

Dig calls around looking for someone to teach him the Mind Probe spell, which Myrryr seems to regard as deeply unethical. Smoach agrees to help though, and gets him a contact from someone in Vendors Row, if she’s still alive, named Grandmother Biyu. The team is awoken by an unscheduled update on the radio- the UCAS Army III Corps, as well as a town in western PA that they were near, appear to have vanished. Jackpoint, Nexus, Asgard etc are all freaking out trying to figure out if it’s a new camo system or something more sinister, but it seems something is definitely afoot…..

Runners
Tabasco
Creep
Dig

After Locke’s tragic death, Chew Gum takes some time to compose an epic poem in their memory, and also reports to the team the body of the Hands of Fate assassin in their safehouse has some weird magical traces that could use a closer look. Otters heads out to clear her head as well, and gets busy helping Moreau get all the rescued biodrones settled and rehoused. The remainder of the team starts looking into what’s up with this assassin, and enlist the assistance of the PPI’s Smoach and Myrryr, uncovering that as well as Myrryr’s skills at using bird messengers, Smoach is a technomancer, so they have some unique comms abilities in the present crisis. They convince S&M to come to the Tin Can, since the team’s group mobility is limited in Otters’ absence.

They trade notes with S&M about Hands of Fate, Roderick Kensington, and the Tarot, with Tabasco semi-accidentally revealing waaay too much info about the team’s knowledge, involvement, and possession of the Tarot. S&M are totally hooked by the mystery, however, and agree to help out. The team loans them one card to help their investigation while S&M try to track down Kensington, who they fear may be dead. The team give S&M one of their remaining radios.

Meanwhile, Creep checks in (awkwardly) with the radio operator at the Plat Zone, and hears that the Windsor runner crew lead by Rose left a message for them- they have something they think the team will want, and told them to get in touch when possible. Knowing that Rose is also a TM, Tabasco figures they can get ahold of them once in Windsor, and Dig wants to head to his magical lodge at the Bolthole there anyway to try to use a ritual to track down the Hands of Fate.

Dig flies down there in bird form, while Tabasco is piloted down in the VTOL, setting up one more radio at the Bolthole as well to keep comms up with Creep in Otter’s absence. Creep joins them, also via VTOL after finishing his comms checkins. Dig casts the ritual with Tabasco as the focus, with a spirit assisting. They quickly spot 4 individuals, fairly close by, thinking about the Eclipse card, that they know Kensington possessed. They scout the rough area the thoughts popped up from, and with some intel from S&M over the radio, find out that it is an obscure physical documents collection/private library called Run and Sollars.

Tabasco also calls up the Windsor crew, and they trade them the final radio for the items they found that they thought the team would want- maps of new bug tunnels recovered from Hendrick’s former north Windsor stronghold! The Windsor crew says they’re looking to set something up on Belle Isle proper once the fires go out from the wrecked ARES airbase, and is doing some preliminary scouting. They once again affirm that they prefer to get paid, but thought this was too important of intel not to share, and trust the team more than the Irregulars at the moment, as a somewhat known quantity.

S&M also report back that they found Roderick Kensington murdered deep in some toxic woods in the Auburn Blight. He had been strung up between 2 trees, and repeatedly shallowly cut, and likely bled to death over hours, though whoever did it didn’t stick around. A bloody handprint is smeared on his chest, likely in his own blood, and his stuff is trashed. No sing of his Tarot card or his notes on the Tarot (or the team), also. They say they need to do more analysis at a lab, away from the toxic magic zone.

The team then heads over to scout the private library, and Creep sneaks into the massive vents on the old building. He spots 4 individuals consulting documents, with 2 librarians occasionally bringing more over. He ID’s one of them as the leader, though their insignia, such as it is, is subtle and not obviously corp, merc or gang. Dig bribes one of the librarians to let him in the front door, but the leader of the group of 4 sees through his illusory clothing, as do some of the others- and wondering why a naked old man with an eyepatch, collar, and rocky deposits projecting from his skin just wandered in, decide to take a closer look.

The leader flips down some goggles, and tells the other 3 that Dig “has some traces on him” and to grab him. The 3 rush over to dog pile Dig, which they do, but he shifts to a cockroach and escapes before they can inject him with…. something. Creep takes out the leader with a couple shots, but not before the leader uses some enchanted knucks to badly hurt Dig’s spirit. The other 3 flee after Tabasco badly injures one of them, after breaking down the front door with a crowbar. Tabasco manages to slip a tracker on the injured guy as they flee, and follows at a distance.

The dwarf librarian is very upset by all this, and berates Creep and Dig, who shifts backs to human form to loot the leaders corpse, and grab a bunch of the documents they were looking at. The dwarf seems to be calling in backup, so they leave a little money for the damage caused, and flee. Tabasco tracks the fleeing 3 back to the same building that the Bolthole is in (Yong-Dundas Long Storage), and finds they have a smaller unit a few floors up from the team’s garage- popular safehouse spot apparently. The 3 zap his bug before dashing into the safehouse, seemingly just as a precaution, not because they were aware of it, so it’s good he also kept eyes on. Creep hangs back and spots a team of steampunk-looking runners who show up to secure the library. He hasn’t seen them before, meaning they weren’t at the big Plat Zone meeting, so who are they?

Creep and Dig rejoin him, and Dig magically looks inside. They seem to be packing up their op, and discussing next steps. They say that the intel from “Fivecoats” was right, and that more than just the Eclipse card is in play locally. One of them is packing maps and other material from the walls into a hard case while the other treats the wounded 3rd man. Unfortunately, they have a glowmoss strip over the door, which Dig’s spell activates, and they go into overdrive since they know someone is onto them.

Creep shoots through the door, but misses, and almost gets tagged with both barrels of a shotgun in response, before killing the wounded guy who was using it. Tabasco dodges a full auto burst and stuns one guy with a narcoject arrow, while Dig’s spirit tries to put out the fire the 3rd guy starts to destroy their documents inside. That guy starts Dig’s spirit on fire with a phosphorous grenade , so Dig dismisses the spirit, not wanting it to suffer, and kills that guy with a massive lightning bolt.

Tabasco makes a quick choice and hauls the KO’ed survivor out, letting all the doc’s burn, and the team vacates the hall as some fire protection shutters slam down and heavy duty ventilation kicks in. They head a massive lightning bolt crack down out of the sky somewhere to the west- it doesn’t seem related to them at the moment but does seem odd. They retreat to their unit with the captive, and wake him back up after restraining him. Tabasco tries to intimidate him and totally fails. Creep and Dig have a much better time just having a pretty normal convo with him, and trading some intel after promising to let him go. It turns out these guys are from a group called the Shifting Pyre, who are trying to destroy the Tarot, as an evil outside influence from the metaplanes.

They seem to view spirits and everything else metaplanar as a threat to the sanctity of Earth, though not opposed to magic in and of itself. This guy is just a street level “Dealer”, the leader who they killed at the library was a “Cutter” (mid-management) and this guy doesn’t know who gives the Cutters their intel, outside of whoever “Fivecoats” is. However, it seems like Shifting Pyre doesn’t like Hands of Fate either, and says they’re some kind of dark possession spirit who want the cards for themselves- exactly the kind of danger that means the cards should be destroyed.

Deciding this guy knows too much, Creep shoots him in the head and kills him with no warning. They decide they better clear out of the Bolthole just in case, and Dig dismantles his magical lodge as Creep sprays C-squared all around. Tabasco then thinks to maybe just call the landlord and see if they’re cool or not.A static-y image of a woman called Rutledge answers, and charges them extra for the damage but otherwise doesn’t seem too bothered, explaining that the team is lucky they did this in a low demand time. She seems like she might be an AI. Dig starts setting his lodge back up, bummed that he wasted 8 days by taking it down….

The team all returns to the main safehouse after resting one night in the Bolthole and not healing very well there. They take the next day off, mostly just conferring with S&M about the nature of the Hands of Fate (Shadow spirits? something worse?), and getting the autopsy results from Roderick Kensington: someone had used some kind of magic to wipe his mind, and turn him into a Coimeidiai, or something similar, which is what caused his burnout, and likely his prophetic ability and mental instability as well. Interesting….. Dig examines the documents that the Shifting Pyre were examining, and finds that they were looking into possible magical intersections and power sites, as well as any rumors to lost collections of arcana that might have disappeared in Crash 2.0. He then return the docs to the library, anonymously, along with a further payment in way of apology.

On a few nights of Radio Free Detroit, they hear that an engineering PHD named Ronnie Griggs has shared some vibration sensing tech to help warn people of bugs tunneling, after hearing of the deadly assault on the Second Chance enclave. The Plat Zone, Tin Can, and elsewhere are building and distro-ing as many as they can to try to keep people safe, as well as trying to get them down to an easy mobile scale so less of their patrols while disappear into bug tunnels. With this new tech coming out, and more (deeply unpopular) “tunnel rat” missions occurring, the bugs seems to be pulling back a bit to the central hive under Dowtown, with the ALPHAS more of an above ground threat, day to day.

Also, that huge lightning bolt apparently fried a UCAS Spec Ops mage who was trying to lift the magical cloud cover to get intel out, and perhaps in response, the UCAS government has announced that the Army III Corps has been fully mobilized and is head to Detroit to pacify the local situation “by any means necessary”…. eep!

Runners
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
and a sad goodbye to:Locke

The team checks in on Tabasco’s healing process, and finds him mostly conscious at least, but still in bad shape. He plans to stay in touch via comms relay from the VTOL while the team checks out the ARES biodrone facility for Moreau. They get in touch and head over to Moreau’s position, and see what looks obviously like 2 shod and 2 unshod Alpha footprints leading into the facility, where they seem to have basically kool-aid-manned through the fence and wall. Moreau equips them all with dart guns to try to capture and rescue any animals they can, and says he has plans for the building if they can maintain it’s integrity.

They head in, worried about what they might find. Otters stays back with the van and accompanies via drone. They find some wrecked sec drones outside, and some bloody smears and drag marks inside. A perimeter hall wraps around a central core, which when they enter, they find filled with cages and enclosures, with various animals in various states of modification within. It looks like the Alphas tried to Infest some of them, but the animals (perhaps thankfully?) did not survive the transformation, leaving horrifying mutated corpses, and an awful smell, though the industrial extractors seem to still be working well so it only registers up close.

Worse yet, they spot a ritual circle carved into the ceiling, centered on an elevator shaft which seems to have a lot of unnecessary components attached. While exploring they are surprised when an unarmored Alpha bursts forth from under a pile of animal corpses in one of the cages and assaults them. They manage to take it out, and Otters runs in with some white phosphorous grenades provided by Moreau to burn the corpse and stop the regeneration. They continue exploring the top level of the facility, worried that the elevator is an obvious place for a trap. Astral space definitely seems buggy in a way they couldn’t detect from the exterior, also.

As they find a corpse pile (some of the metahuman guards, but definitely not all), they come under heavy fire from outside, through the loading dock. 2 more Alphas charge them, one armored, one unarmored. The unarmored ones, being more visible, are even more horrifying somehow, with their misshapen and mutating flesh pulsing and bulging, various bits of different bugs visible across the surface mixed with the once human features. They get in a brutal fight in which much of the team is badly injured, and Locke is felled and stabbed with an ovipositor. Chew Gum, acting quickly, blows the downed Locke’s head off with his shotgun before they can transform, a sad and sudden end for the talented investigator.

The team pauses briefly to mourn once they finish the Alphas off, and burn all the bodies, inclduing Locke’s.They head outside and see where these Alphas tunneled up from below, on an angle that looks to intersect with the base of the elevator shaft. They tranq as many animals as they can inside, and get Moreau to start hauling them out, deciding they’ll likely need to do some mega-damage to whatever lurks below. Creep heads down the tunnel, with the drone swarm. Creep hangs back a bit while the drones make a first pass, and uncover a scene of true horror.

The remaining armored Alpha is standing guard as the newly mutated facility staff feasts on various animals and metahuman corpses, seemingly fueling their transformation. More upsettingly, there is what looks like a stable portal, likely to Vhortas, that seems very similar to the team file notes on the portal on the space station that ARES had previously been using to instantiate the Alphas. They also see surgical bays, staff housing, and another tunnel leading off towards Downtown.

Panicked, Otters sends the VTOL to the Platinum Zone with a report on what they found, and Rifleman loads up a hard case with Ravenheart’s approval, when it arrives back, it contains one of the mini nukes that the Irregulars seems to have salvaged from one of the ARES APC’s that were carrying them. Creep sneaks it down to the basement, and gets it tucked in behind the portal, arming it and leaving a few smoke grenades to go off to add confusion to cover his exit, and then legs it. Luckily it wasn’t set to an immediate detonation, and he gets clear in time.

Dig seals up the tunnel exit with concrete, and the team all hauls out as many tranq-ed animals as they can. The massive explosion rumbles the earth, pancakes the building, and launches Dig’s concrete tunnel plug flying far away. Luckily, this all seems to have severely curtailed the radioactive spread, and likely amplified the explosion. Briefly checking astral space, Dig and CG confirm that the buggy vibe seems gone, annihilated by an overwhelming radioactive shredding that has destroyed the local mana sphere. Portal closed, but at a cost….

Luckily Dig and CG got a good look at the ritual circle in astral space, and think they could perhaps ID the caster. Otters sends a report in to the Plat Zone and they get paid. They also call the Detective to report on Locke’s death, which greatly saddens them. Dig and CG both contribute some funds to the Keepers, who Locke had just begun to hire and befriend, and also compose a memorial poem, which Otters also forwards to the Plat Zone.

Dig, in bird form and CG, in the VTOL, travel over to the bolthole safehouse in the storage facility and do a lengthy ritual to locate the caster of the insect portal ritual. They confirm that it was either Hendricks himself or a close associate based on where traces crop up around town, but he seems to be underground and likely behind some sort of magical defense. They think they could track him using this, however. They report this into the Plat Zone as well, and get paid. The rest of the team rests, heals, and repairs gear, with Iva frantically patching their armor.

They hear on the night’s Radio Free Detroit broadcast about Locke’s heroic death, and also some even worse news: there’s been an Alpha breakout to the West as well as the North. Some bugs tunneled up into a mostly SINless survivor enclave, and Alphas followed them in, slaughtering everyone inside. Also, Julia “Deadline” Pesina continues her reportage on the ghoul situation locally, and finally is able to ID the ghouls working to use the ferals to nefarious ends: Fear the Dark is in town! The slogan “Eat Locals, Fuck You” has been found at multiple bloody feeding sites, where they preyed on civvies trapped at home. This is a perversion of the popular Irregulars slogan “Eat Local, Kill Fucks!”, originally popularized by the neo-anarchist chef Castiron.

Otters also checks in with Howell about the completion of the job for Moreau and they settle up for that. Howell has another job, not a rush this time, to pull a museum heist amidst the chaos. Otters runs it by the team and they agree to get to it when they can. Disturbingly, as they all return to the safehouse on their rest day, they find that Dig’s golem has torn the arms off an intruder. Worried who it might be, they flip the body over but don’t recognize them. A scrap of paper falls out of their pocket as they shift the body though, and they find one of Roderick Kensignton’s journal entries, about the team and their possession of Tarot cards.

They decide they better look further into this, and add it to the list. Tabasco, finally not dangerously radioactive, gets flown over to the Metal Maniacs clinic and ushered quickly back into the surgical suite, where Leanna Octave once again tries to convince him to become a Monad, but settles for doing some radical implants, including a full cyberskull with junkyard jaw and some orthoskin to replace what’s absent. The team is collectively a bit horrified upon his return to the safehouse, aside from Otters, who is her usual chipper self.

Having gone for a stylized skull, Tabasco has a weird moment looking in a mirror when he realizes he can no longer take off his mask and cowl. The sharpened scrap metal jaw is also pretty extreme, to be fair. However, he’s feeling the post-surgery high and is excited to be back on his feet and ready to rumble. The team takes a moment to figure out which task to prioritize next…

Runners
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
Locke

The team kits out with the rad-resistant gear as best they can, with Tabasco and Otters’ mule drone getting the upgrades. Chew Gum plans to accompany them as near as possible to the hole to provide support and overwatch, while the rest of the crew secures a spot for Tabasco to hang out away from others when he emerges as he will be radioactive for some time. They head over to Grosse Pointe and Creep remembers a promising, poorly guarded lockup, where they steal a kayak with an outrigger and put out to sea in it. Creep and Locke hang out and chat while Dig flies above, keeping an eye out. He sees the wreckage of some watercraft that have tried to run the ARES cordon, unsuccessfully, and warns the boaters to stay well inside the perimeter.

CG holds back on the north edge of Zone 1, as his spirits are unwilling to go further- even astrally examining the irradiated Zone 3 causes them all light nausea, but they shake it off. They provide concealment as long as possible, and CG covers with his rifle. Otters, circling high above in the Dustoff guides in the mule drone, while Tabasco sneaks alongside. They find an old rusted car with a camo tarp over it parked right up next to the hole, and some tracks suggesting that between 2-4 people dragged one or more heavy items from the car into the hole. Tabasco becomes instantly fixated and abandons the primary mission to focus on this.

They descend into the hole, spotting the 3 ruined but not fully destroyed APC’s, still stuck in their side tunnels. Otters has to stop at the edge of her effective range before reaching the blast center due to rad damage and bad signal, but Tabasco, boosted by Stitches’ drug cocktail, pushes on. He stats experiencing some very disturbing side effects- hair falling out, skin blistering, hallucinations, but reaches the epicenter, and finds the wrecked bits of the other 3 APC’s. A path has been pushed through and the tracks continue.

He loses his astral sense of taste and feels blood pouring out of his gums, but he pushes through, and spots which tunnel the tracks head down, seemingly due south, before turning back. All of his teeth fall off and his skin begins to slough off as he begins to enter cellular death. He starts running for the exit as fast as he can, his cyberlimbs carrying him most of the way, with Otters (via the mule drone) getting him the rest of the way, and jumping into Tabasco’s cyberlimbs using previously granted permissions to use his grapple hand to get out.

Fortunately, while hanging back, Otters remembered to complete the primary mission, and retrieved a damaged data core from one of the command group APC’s for the Plat Zone to dig into. Otters drags Tabasco free of the high danger zone with the mule, then zips down in the Dustoff, loads Tabasco in, and manages to stabilize him through some miraculous medical checks with the Valkyrie module, and Tabasco’s strong natural resistances. However, all of his skin and external organs have sloughed off and he is in bad shape. The drone covers him in medical gel, as Otters heads back to the safehouse, leaving the mule a ways away from everyone for a day or two til it’s safe to fix.

CG stays behind to keep an eye on the mysterious car, but fails to spot when someone moves it, and decides toxic mages must be involved, if they were able to get both in and out of that terrible area. The Dustoff drops Tabasco in the kayak, and Dig tries to magically heal him but fails. The Dustoff circles at a safe ditsance to not take more damage from the rads, stopping in once an hour to maintain treatment. The rest of the team decides to chill at the safehouse for the night, and Dig shows off some cool illusions. Upsettingly, there is another earth shaking explosion from the south, but no mushroom cloud this time at least.

Creep goes on a solo recon to check it out, while Locke befriends some street kids who call themselves The Keepers and seem to collect mangy strays. From Creep’s recon, supported by a Watcher spirit from Dig, they determine that what they likely witnessed at the hold was evidence of toxic mages allied with Otto Hendricks using explosives salvaged from the downed ARES bombers to blow open a new front in the bug vs. ARES fight downtown. Luckily, this doesn’t seem to have pulled in the Plat Zone, so no worries there at least. The team reports all their intel in, and gets paid a decent amount, with a hazard bonus for Tabasco,

While relaxing after everyone is back, they get a frantic call from Jaga, who says that a new group of refugee arrivals to the area came in with one suspicious member, who apparently got lightly grazed by an ALPHA but seemingly escaped serious harm. After carefully examine, they confirm Jaga’s worry that the person was infested by the ALPHA in the same way they tried to do to Tabasco, and that the process seems to work incredibly fast. Jaga has contained the patient in a mana bubble, and Dig enters and lethally lightning bolts. This does seem to halt the transformation, so that’s good.

After confirming that this also took care of any astral traces, they send the body to the Plat Zone for some additional pay. They also call Carol to warn about Hendricks having gone full toxie/bug, and get some more cash, as well as a reminder that Weathernight wants them to look into dangerous infiltrators in ARES corporate. The team rests after listening to the nightly Radio Free Detroit broadcast, and hearing some more propaganda in favor of pro-social ghoul factions, including the surprising news that ALPHAS, as opposed to most bugs, make good eating!

The next day, Otters checks in with her fixer Howell, who is also her BTL-A sponsor. They check in about how that is going, and then Howell hires the crew for a mission on behalf of Moreau, the strange man at the zoo who wanted to join Dig’s Order but wasn’t magical. There is a secret ARES biodrone research facility outside of the No-Go Zone that Moreau has eyes on that was recently breached, and he wants to save any animals they can. They accept the gig, and Otters calls up Moreau, who is keeping an eye on things at the facility for now.

He tells them it looks like something broke in, not out, and it looks likely to be ALPHAS. Having already been worried that there could be a bug portal somewhere locally, and knowing this facility was likely one of Hendrick’s, the team decides they better hurry over there and shut down whatever is going on. Tabasco regains consciousness, but seems likely to be in for a long recovery, so he bows out of the next mission, and punches in a call to the Metal Maniacs, which luckily is close to the water in Grosse Pointe, so he plans to paddle over when he regains enough strength.

They hear the night’s Radio Free Detroit as they prep to head out, and apparently a lot of Chicago ghouls are answering the call, and requesting sanctuary if they help deal with the bug threat, with Presbitero’s “anti-infected” campaign apparently gaining enough steam in Chicago to make in untenable to remain there. With the recent influx of Neo-A’s as well, it seems like a lot of the weirder elements of Chicago are being forced out as the rebuilding corporatizes, though the spirit of the dance is still strong there…

Runners
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
Locke

First thing, the team decide they need their van back, and that the increasingly chaotic fight may have created the opportunity they needed. Otters does overwatch from the Dustoff while Creep and Locke head over on foot. Unfortunately, Locke gets spotted by an alert ARES gunner holed up in a ruined building, and nearly felled with an auto burst. Creep manages to chuck some smoke grenades out and they make their escape, with Otters providing some pathfinding for them and hot pickup via the van once she gets the drone close enough to leapfrog in and hot-rig it out.

They get back to the base, and convince Zennia to set up a radio at the Tin Can, but convince them not to use it too much to avoid attracting unwanted attention. Zennia brings them a little further into her circle of trust, showing them up to where she keeps her birds on the roof and revealing that they are messenger birds! She says the team can bring them with on missions when needed to send offline messages back to get relayed, but says that Myrryr (a Pidgeon shaman) is one of the few in town who can get birds to flew to destinations as well as back from.

The team head north to Vendor’s Row to finally see what happened with that nuke, with most of them doing overwatch while Creep sneaks up to the blast site accompanied by the fly-spys.Radioactivity is real bad, as is astral space- Dig and CG have to hold way back, and the Wealth vibe that had previously dominated the area is now overlaid with a nasty toxic aspect. Creep hangs back at the edge of the blast site after getting some visuals, and acts as a comms relay to the drones until Otters gets the Dustoff positioned high up over the blast zone. From what they can tell, something tunneled up from underneath the reserve line, and one or more APC’s entered/fell into the tunnels.

Otters pushes the drones further in, having to max out her signal strength on her RCC to counteract the bad interference.She finds blasted wrecks of 3 APC’s down some side tunnels, and the team recognizes these as part of the command group of the reserve force from previous recon- seems like a targeted tunneling attack! She pushes the drone a little further and finds the blast’s epicenter, getting some data before it fries. It is likely the worst background count area any of them have seen, and it looks like 3 more APC’s got stuck in the main tunnel further in and detonated as either a failsafe or desperate last resort.

The team surmises that the Alphas up here, already amped up from the pheromones let loose by other Alphas in combat, likely fully broke loose after the tunnel break out and nuke detonation, as the ARES reserve line seems to have totally crumpled and fighting seems rampant throughout the district. Not having any ability to get better data currently due to the high rads, they head back to the safehouse to regroup. Iva is still working on patching up the van armor, after having needed a long sleep following a long day patching up Tabasco and Locke’s armor. CG heads over the Magic Bean, has a weird convo with the new age proprietor Penelope Bean, and orders a summoning focus.

Otters then flies in the Dustoff down to Windsor, surveying the extensive damage to Hendrick’s former position on the north shore, and drops another radio off with the ghouls at Neverland, who seem eager to dispose of more bodies the team may come across. Otters return with this info, but decides to swing by the Plat Zone on the way to get paid, and gets some followups and further intel while there. She also sees that a bunch of Neo-A’s from Berlin and Boston have answered the call and come to town, and a big crew of radical bug fighters/Black Star/Midway vets from Chicago have rolled in as well. They’re setting up heavy duty anti-air defenses on/around the Plat Zone, and Otters also spots some merc patrols headed out- the leadership seems to be trying to integrate mercs and runners into small squads with perhaps mixed results.

Otters reports in, gets paid, and hears that they need a tunnel rat to physically head into the tunnels off Vendor’s Row and try to pull any surviving data from the not fully obliterated APC’s- the command group might have useful intel. Also, some toxies or possibly members of Hendrick’s force have been spotted trying to salvage explosives from the various downed bombers, and Otters get the impression that Vogel/Carol managed to get a message through to the bomber wing commander to get aloft just before the attack, which was ignored by the main base command, to their extreme detriment.

Tabasco, overhearing all this, volunteers for tunnel rat duty, surprising many, and Stitches and Rifleman send Otters home with some equipment to help Tabasco and Otters’ new Mule drone get into the radioactive zone while minimizing risk and exposure.Otters flies back with all that and starts modding the Mule while Iva tunes up Tabasco’s armor. Tabasco gets flown over to the Metal Maniacs clinic and gets a few mods that Creep reco’s for navigating an underground tunnel system, and also snags a MM bandana for Iva, a gang memorabilia collector, as the local implant junkies seem to have formed a street gang around the clinic.

Otters starts flying herslef over for some mods as well, but overhearing the bizarro transhumanist banter dominant at MM decides better of it and turns back, which gets a chuckle from MAMA, which also worries Otters a bit. With Tabasco loaded up and ready to go , the team rest up and prep for another mission north, while listening on the radio to the day’s broadcast- Julia Pesina, using her new street named “Deadline”, on “Radio Free Detroit”, giving the threats and recon update to any and all listeners. It seems ARES forces have been ordered to hunker down and hold position, so most of the civilian rescuing and bug fighting is falling to the Irregulars so far. There’s been some cooperation from ARES forces in a few Zones, especially the ones with heavier casualties and more command level losses, so the team gets some good ideas of where to distro the next few radios. However, a few other Zones, including Downtown, have gotten extra fascist and paranoid, with summary executions common, so travelers beware….

Runners
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
Locke

Locke rejoins the group after the chaotic shadow meeting, and they all split off to socialize a bit and make new contacts. They see Carol rush out after exchanging info with some of the movers and shakers. Tabasco tries to make friends with Rose from the Windsor crew, which initially goes well until he loudly announces that she is a technomancer, which she would prefer is kept on the DL. The Windsor crew leaves soon after this, and seems a little skeptical about the top down command style proposed, but overall on board for co-oping.

Dig starts speculating to some of the waitstaff about what it will be like for future archaeologists to excavate the nuclear ruins of Detroit, freaking everyone out, until Otters notices and distracts him for a bit. They both hang out with Tofu the dog and Walker, the blind adept staff fighter, and chat a bit about the situation. CG claims one of the bodies of the dead assassins for his future spirit needs, and talks to Ringmaster about the value of allying with ghouls, specifically the Skins, who helped them out. Ringmaster seems amenable and asks the team to set up a meeting. They are told they can recruit others to the cause as well, but they’ll need vetting at HQ.

Creep and Otters both notice a surprising lack of gangers present, which both enquire about. Walker tells Otters about the major roundups recently, and the Cutters weren’t invited for the obvious reasons. Creep also gets some info that they were mostly reaching out to pro’s when setting up the meeting, so if the team has useful gang contacts in the Blight or elsewhere, they should use them to bring more people in for the cause. Otters also helps Electric Blue set up a comms station with spare parts salvaged from the Numbers Station, to cut down on the young TM’s massive work load.

Locke chats with Julia Pesina, who seems hopped up on pain meds but amped on her reportage plans. She offers to pay for scoops and hot tips, and thanks the team for saving her, and says she will have to thank the Skins as well after Locke hypes up their role in the rescue as well. CG links up with Castiron and trades him some odd plants and ingredients that Jaga helped him find for some freezer access for the other corpses, and Locke calls the ghouls to tell them to come get them when they get a chance.

Otters quickly buys a mule transport drone, CG straps his claimed corpse to it, and the team heads out on foot (or wing, in Dig’s case) for the safehouse. They aim to bypass the loose Alphas they saw on the way down, but Otters botches it and gets spotted. They get in a brutal firefight, but due to Tabasco’s incredible armor, manage to avoid taking any damage and get some great data and some alpha samples. Tabasco licks one of the Alpha corpses to try to get some astral info, which works, but he almost gets stabbed with a post-mortem ovipositor and is covered with eggs which quickly hatch and start crawling into the seams of his cyber limbs.

Thinking quick, Dig fries Tabasco and the bugs with a lightning bolt, which luckily grounds out through Tabasco’s cyberlegs, not doing major internal damage. Still, he’s pretty hurt, but seems to be free of infestation. Otters flies Tabasco back to the Plat Zone in the Dustoff drone while the team keeps watch for more trouble and burns the bodies. Tabasco gets ushered into a decontamination unit and drops off the samples. Otters then flies herself back to the Plat Zone as well, and gets pay from Ringmaster, and then reverses the process to fly Tabasco and herself up the safehouse.

The rest of the team hoofs it up there and rests up, repairs armor, restocks ammo and the like. Locke fills everyone in on The Detective’s investigation into 2 Tarot cults that may have gotten operatives into town. Jaga helps CG do his corpse ritual. Iva patches up Tabasco once he’s back, and Otters finally gets into the guts of the med-drone (very impressive) and sets it about providing medical assistance to everyone resting. Otters and Locke, not otherwise occupied, head up the roof when they hear more explosions to the southwest.

Otters panics and thinks it’s for sure the Plat Zone, but makes contact with them and confirms it isn’t. She gets drones up and follows Locke’s fears, finding that Damien Knight Int’l has extensively exploded as well. It looks similar but larger scale to what happened on Belle Isle to the airbase there. Otters follows the airports bomber wing, who look to have gotten airborne just ahead of the attack, as they make a bombing run over Otto Hendrick’s position in Windsor, devastating the North part of the area along the river. Some anti-aircraft fire responds along with some spellcraft, but the bombs look very effective.

Lacking long enough landing strips, the bombers split, with some ditching into the water while the pilots eject, some flying over the town seemingly looking for clear stretches of road, and a few trying to flee the cordon around Detroit. Otters watches in shock and terror as the ones trying to escape are cut down by an orbital laser as they reach the edge of the magical cloud cover, leaving surely no survivors. Otters live streams this all to Ringmaster, who as usual requests follow-up’s and more info. She also sells the data to Carol, who once again proves the stronger negotiator but doesn’t aggressively take advantage.

The team all wakes up/finishes healing and reconnects- time to figure out what to do next, lots of opportunities for work!

Runners
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill

Locke announces they’ll be sitting this one out to make contact with some local allies, look further into the Tarot and Prophecies, and similar. They stay behind at the Platinum Zone to make use of their comms. The rest of the team prepares to head out, though Marv tells them to return by the next evening, as they’re planning a “big meeting” of some sort that the team should be at. They head out after debating what to look into first.

They cut around the main battle sites successfully, swinging out into Dearborn and finding only isolated bug outbreaks nearby. Luckily for the team, this means the underequipped KE troops guarding the Zone perimeters have their hands full, so the team easily bypasses them. Noticing a ton of air traffic at Knight Int’l Aerospaceport, they make a brief diversion to surveil. it looks like since that massive detonation at the FOB on Belle Isle, ARES has rerouted their air support, refueling and resupply here. The ground crews seem understaffed and frantic, and it looks like they’re running midair refueling flights as well to try to keep their drones in the air.

Useful intel! But back to the task at hand, the team continues South, and cuts over Grosse Isle into Windsor, swinging southeast to the park area where Otters instructed the sub to drop Julia Pesina off. Otters gets some pings from sub equipment but can’t make a direct connection, and when they arrive, Dig (as a dolphin) finds some of the sub’s armor and sensors have been blown off and are floating nearby. No sign of the vessel itself, so they hope it survived whatever happened here. Looking around, Creep and Otters piece together that Pesina seems to have crawled ashore and then been grabbed by what looks to be 2 shoeless ghouls.

The team tracks the ghouls back to a necropolis in central Windsor, and while surveilling from the perimeter see that the place is crawling with ghouls, with a high proportion of ferals. This is a recent change, as the team had scoped this place out for threats a few weeks back before renting their bolthole garage space nearby. They spot one friendly seeming ghoul approaching them, and Creep makes awkward contact. The ghoul, dressed as a pirate, introduces himself as Smee, and says that he saw a woman get carried, semi-conscious, into the cemetery, and offers to help. The team accepts.

Smee explains that he is a “Topsider”, one of the rare ghouls tolerated by ARES to live above the surface. He says most residents of Detroit are unaware of the quite large ghoul population that exists underground (who he calls “Downsiders”). Tabasco gets hung up on the Top vs Down distinction, convinced there are better linguistic options. Smee continues: the Topsiders want to ensure that the local populace doesn’t view ghouls universally as a threat (though some certainly are), so if the team will agree to put in a good word with their allies, he will introduce them to a ghoul gang called the Skins. The team agrees.

Creep and Otters sneak into the cemetery, though Otters quickly falls back when she notices some of the ferals sniffing around after her. Creep follows Smee to a mausoleum where they find some decently armed and armored ghouls waiting. Creep is introduced to their leader, Rains, and notices that they all seem equipped with a mishmash of KE gear and some seemingly prototype weaponry. He doesn’t enquire further, but the team has heard rumors of the KE tradition of needing to get a ghoul skin in the underground to join Firewatch, so presumably this is the other side of how that can go.

Rains agrees to the deal that Smee made, and the Skins and Creep head over to where the ferals are preparing to feast. Otters pilots the VTOL in for a quick rescue and some medical attention. The Skins breach through the back wall, grab Pesina, and chuck her in the VTOL, while Creep blasts a feral trying to grab hold of it as well. He sneaks back out of the cemetery and Smee tells them where they can contact him again if needed.

Otters checks on Pesina via the drone’s internal medical feeds, and finds that she is injured, but luckily not infected with HMHVV. She seems pretty drugged and out of it, so they have a brief convo and then he sends her to the Platinum Zone, giving Marv a heads up that she’s inbound. The team continues North to figure out what happened on Belle Isle, but come under attack from some of Otto’s troops, who are guarding their Southern perimeter as well as the Northern side. Otters almost eats a Gauss round, but Tabasco dives in the way and takes the hit, before the team retreats while CG’s spirits cause trouble for the soldiers shooting at them.

They do a bit more recon, and determine that roughly half of the visible forces in Otto’s area seem to be illusory, so they find a better place to sneak through, ditching the spirits for now since they are too magically obvious. They reach the bridge to Belle Isle and find it bombed out, though still barely crossable by pedestrians. CG barely dodges a sniper round before the team makes it the relative safety of the Isle.They find it a smoking ruin- the ARES air base seems to have been fully ignited- fuel, weapons, etc burning at such an extreme heat as to destroy the structures on hand and effectively cremate the personnel caught in the blast.

Doing some magical investigation, Dig finds that some number of personnel were killed before the explosion and piled up, and that much of the damage was done with Gauss rifles and other bizarro science weapons, so they suspect Otto’s troops were behind this- the illusion would be good cover for secret troop movements! They also find that the explosions were triggered by planted charges and not aerial bombardment, so it doesn’t seem likely that the forces here were overrun, especially given the lack of any sign of bugs. The eastern half of the isle seems in better shape, with some park buildings, wilderness areas, and water treatment facilities still largely intact, though currently seemingly unoccupied due to the toxic smoke from the chemicals still burning at the temporary airbase.

The team sneaks north again, finding the bridge once again too damaged for vehicles but traversable by pedestrians- seemingly designed to helped bugs and/or special ops more so than ARES military with their reliance on groundcraft. They cut around the main battle site Downtown, which seems to have contracted a bit, and find the other Zones have kind of sprawled out into multiple small/scattered engagements, some of which are quite mobile. They also barely avoid some loose Alphas rampaging around south Oakland/North Downtown before finally reaching the Platinum Zone.

Heading inside, they find the place filling up for the “big meeting”. They spot Carol, and grab a booth to catch up. They sell him the Malakim info as promised, and he shares some of Vogel’s plans, as well as giving the team another job- to look into some high level infiltrators in ARES known as “68G”- could these two things be connected? Creep also accidentally gives up the info about Otto being behind the destruction on Belle Isle, and Dig has to remind him about info exclusivity etc. Carol gives them a hefty payout, and they head over to talk to Ringmaster, giving him the recon report from the day. He doesn’t seem overly distressed that Carol knows about Belle Isle, but the team gets the impression that may not always be the case.

He also pays up, and gives them a few follow ups and updates, and is impressed by their extra recon re: ghouls, the airport, Otto’s illusions, etc. The team also sees Pesina up and about, quietly narrating events to a cam drone while stomping around in a medical boot. She gives them the “let’s talk after” look. Everyone starts to hush up as the meeting begins. Locke and Otters are a little surprised to recognize the woman they smuggled in, now out of disguise, as Colonel Anne Ravenheart, the former head of Firewatch, now leader of the Freewatch bug fighting org, last seen in Chicago under attack from ARES. She is accompanied by Li Wei, the man they smuggled in with her, who is wearing a red crystal cybereye, which Tabasco thinks is likely a blood crystal, a new addition since Chicago.

She introduces herself, as well as Ringmaster, Rifleman, and Marv, as the leaders of this meeting, and gives her spiel- they need to unite against the bugs, and defend this city and it’s people against them and against ARES/Knight’s foolishness. Dig and Creep notice a dog one of the other attending runners brought with is growling at a sweaty, bearded street sam, and Creep goes to tackle him, luckily giving the dog just enough time to prevent him chucking a vial he had concealed in his hand. Tabasco and CG leap to action just in time to prevent another street sam from opening up on Ravenheart with an implant cybergun, and (via inhabited dire rat) chomp down on the arms of a mob hitman looking guy as he tries to pull the pin on a grenade.

All hell momentarily breaks loose- the woman who brought the dog chucks her staff straight through the bearder sam’s head as Creep tussles with him, Rifleman quick draws and drills the cybergunner right between the eyes, and the mob hitman manages to pull the pin, but the explosion is contained inside CG"s spirit, though it is destroyed in the process. Everyone else has weapons out and is in a massive standoff, til Dig does a thought recognize and spots two more potential assassins who are headed for the door. He alerts the crowd who quickly gun them down as well, before Creep tries to get everyone to chill, fails, and then Marv does the same, successfully. He tells them that this is what their enemies want: everyone so busy fighting each other they can’t unite for the common good!

Ravenheart continues her spiel and explains that she understands that many runners won’t be used to working under a command structure but that it’s the best way to run something like this, and that no this is not the Shadow Chapters, which people are right to be suspicious of given the news out of Seattle. One of the street docs from downstairs stabilizes the mob hitman, who is missing his forearms, and after some quick drug and magical questioning, Rifleman reports that Otto Hendricks has taken out a contract on himself, Marv and Anne Ravenheart. Ringmaster doesn’t look upset to have been excluded.

The team makes some new contacts, including Walker, the blind staff fighter, and her dog Tofu, and also sees a few more members of the Belle Isle crew that they’ve worked with a few times. They prepare to chat with Pesina and figure out next steps.

Runners
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
Locke

The team, pausing to allow for Jazz crash to wear off, plot out their route to the next numbers station. While waiting, Otters and Locke do some analysis on the data Otters scraped while jamming the last stations and drones, and confirm that it looks like the drones were being used as a back channel/off-matrix comms relay to allow the stations to communicate indirectly without blowing their cover/being directly traceable. Worried that this will have blown their chance to find another station intact, they plan to rush along. Otters convinces Tabasco to carry her so she can stay hot in the VTOL and do some route mapping and then some long distance surveillance on what the explosions in the distance are….

Otters spots some ARES military deployments seemingly surrounding and slaughtering bugs pouring out of the craters that the explosions have opened. It looks like the the Alpha deployments are working well so far, with what appears to be a high kill to casualty ratio. Their support teams seem to be taking minimal casualties, and the Alphas appear uniquely destructive, almost frenzied. From what Otters can gather from the VTOL, it looks like the ARES detachments in the outer zones are looking to push the bugs back into the tunnels they’ve opened into the underground and follow them in, forcing them all to emerge from the major bombing site downtown, where the main (and most elite) ARES forces are. Interestingly, they don’t spot any Firewatch members anywhere, and given that the Alphas are all wearing modded Bug Stompers, it looks like the entire elite corps has been transformed into these merge monstrosities.

The team swings wide of the major engagement sites in the outer zones, heading south, and manage to avoid the poorly equipped KE patrols holding the outer perimeter. Unfortunately, Dig is unable to get his tech locator spell to work- either the gear is gone, or he’s too beat. Otters also is unable to find the expected broadcasts, so it seems like the Numbers Stations have switched protocols or gone dark in response to the team’s attacks. Feeling pretty tired after pulling an all-nighter, they head back to the safehouse. Unfortunately, Chew Gum gets spotted by a KE patrol, who open up with a machine gun mounted in their back seat. Creep manages to chuck some smoke grenades in the way and the team escapes, eventually, finally returning to the safehouse.

Dig instantly crashes while Otters does further drone recon, and the rest of the team pushes North to do some more recon on foot. Otters sees similar engagements in the rest of the zones, ARES forces looking successful so far at holding the line, and starting to push the bugs back into their tunnels, as the Downtown meat grinder continues. South of the river, bizarro science soldiers, seemingly Otto Hendricks loyalists from the R&D division, wielding modded Excalibur magitech guns, look to be ready for any breakouts that direction, though it looks like the bugs are fully north of the river at this time. The other zones all seem to be in a similar state as Otters does a quick flyby.

To the north, the on foot recon team gets a vantage at the Vendor’s Row area and gets some good intel- this looks to be the reserve force, deployable via VTOL’s, but they look to be bored and waiting for the most part at the moment. Many of the businesses (restaurants, brothels, etc) on Vendor’s Row look to have been allowed to remain open to keep the waiting reserve forces fed and entertained. The team does get a better look at the loadouts- it looks like squads of 6 in modded APC’s, with a containment chamber for the Alpha’s taking up half the space in the troop compartment. The reservists at least look to have one portal closer/tacnuke per squad as well- a distressing amount of explosive power!

Creep and Tabasco also sneak closer while Locke and CG provide overwatch and manage to overhear some chatter- getting some important stats updates on how the battle is going etc. CG also notices an astral aspect towards Wealth here, and Tabasco feels quite comfortable in the area. They head back to the safehouse, and Otters pulses a data packet to the Platinum Zone before they all crash. Waking first, Dig heads over to the Zoo in case anyone shows for his Red Magic Order meeting. He sees that Moreau seems to have taken charge of keeping the animals safe/fed during this crisis, with the minimal staff who remained onhand. After a short wait, a Watcher spirit shows up to excuse Norman from attendance, saying the University is locked down, while Marjo-Lin dashes in shortly after.

They schedule the next meeting, then send the Watcher back, and Dig teaches Marjo-Lin to shapeshift, though she makes Dig transform out of bird form first, as she says that Lion will only allow her to take feline forms. She cracks some jokes about Dig being naked etc which mostly confuse him. She seems to know Moreau and says she’s gonna stay at the Zoo for a while and study the big cats, so Dig heads out and flies back to the safehouse as a bird. The rest of the team is just starting to get moving as he returns. They check their messages and find that a few updates have made it- Chessick sent a retainer to help a colleague, assuming she can get into town, a journo who wants to try to document the situation on the ground.

More upsettingly, they get some major updates from the Plat Zone- apparently things have taken a turn for the worse for ARES in two major ways. First, the desperate bugs seems to have tunneled faster and farther than ARES expected and there have been breakouts behind their main lines, leading some of their forces to be attacked from flanks and rear if not fully enveloped. Second, the Alphas seem to be unable to leave their combat rage, which in areas where ARES has been successful, means that they turned on their support crews and handlers, seemingly content to rip through whatever is at hand. The pheromones from this have lead to Alpha attacks amongst the reserves as well, and there is apparently active combat up on Vendor’s Row.

The team decides to head in to the Plat Zone, get some on the ground recon, and figure out next steps. They check in with Zennia at the bar, and find many locals having a lock-in “end of the world” party. The team convinces them to all conserve some water, and head up to the roof to help Zennia start filling some tanks, just in time to see the distinct mushroom cloud of a tacnuke going off to the North. Rushing inside they all take some iodine that Zennia had stashed, but she explains that the explosive will have limited range and spread, giving the infantry size charges and the still weather. When the team looks overheard, it seems ARES has pulled something similar to Boston and pulled in some cloud cover, keeping it magically in place to conceal what happens here.

The team heads out and quickly encounters some Children of Loxley, who have fought off a small bug breakout. They heal up the wounded and send the dire cases back to Jaga at the safehouse for more attention, and then head in to check out where the bugs broke out. They find a slaughtered family, a 3rd dead bug, and a small tunnel chiseled up through the basement’s slab. Dig seals it with magic, and they report to Zennia and the CoL to tell people to guard and seal off basements and tunnels. They see Sikh Burn and some others going house to house to check for other breakouts, and no sign of KE locally.

Otters also gets ahold of someone behind the CoL to talk strategy, and chats a bit with someone named Alfredo, agreeing on an info trade. Alfredo seems to have some former ARES ties but seems quite bitter towards the corp so seems safe. Otters inquires about the Numbers Stations, and gets the feel that Alfredo isn’t involved but has some ideas who might be- some old-timers with a grudge, former corp special forces for CAT, a megacorp almost ran that ARES (and some other corps) devoured between the two Crashes. Locke calls The Detective, and gets some distressing talk about bugs and cities dying, but also passes along the Numbers Station info and finally gets a name for the mysterious fourth faction: The Malakim, having renamed themselves after dark angels from their former named, The Seraphim.

They head to the Plat Zone, and find Marv collecting intel from locals who are reporting in, Rifleman trying to keep on top of the tactical situation on a digital map spread over multiple shoved together pool tables, and Ringmaster eager to chat. The secretive dwarf hints that the Null Sect are behind the intense matrix blockade, though Dig massively misunderstands so Ringmaster has to clarify a bit. Using a way over-taxed onsite technomancer, he manages to get a data packet out with the team’s info, brokering a sale and getting them a sizeable chunk of change. He also arranges for them to train some small unit tactics, and offers them a few more jobs.

While training, Locke recognizes one of the instructors as the Asian man they helped smuggled in, who introduces himself as Li Wei. Tabasco also gets offered the opportunity to do some training himself, as he seems to know the ropes pretty well. The rest of the crew trains with Mama Dot, who Creep knows from Seattle, and who seems to have answered Rifleman’s call for aid, leaving her store in her son’s hands. All a bit better educated, they head back upstairs (having also seen a large, well-equipped clinic in the formerly secret basement) and get the latest from Ringmaster: they are to find out what happened with that nuke up north, and they are to find out who is behind the latest upsetting update.

Someone, just now, has bombed the ARES forward operating airbase on Belle Isle, with massive explosions taking out much of the ground fleet of planes and drones there, plus destroying infrastructure, fuel and weapons depots, and killing personnel. As this will significantly advantage the bugs, Ringmaster needs to know who’s behind it and what their next play is. Otters then uses one of the favors they took as partial payment to get access to the team’s sub’s feeds and controls via the TM, Electric Blue. EB says they’ll have to make it quick, as the matrix security keeping Detroit locked down is no joke. Otters manages to punch into the sub, but finds an unexpected passenger: Julia Pesina, the journo Chessick paid them to help.

Otters talks through the sub speakers to Pesina, and makes a plan to run her ashore a park peninsula in Windsor, that Otters and Locke have used as a smuggling spot before. However, she will have to trust to autopilot to manage to job since direct piloting for that long will prove impossible. Pesina provides some encouragement based on Chessick’s reco, and says worse case, she swam in college. Feeling bolstered, Otters does her best to quickly input the requisite commands before getting dumped, to find an even more fried looking Electric Blue saying he kept it open as long as he could. So another job: rescue to journo from the landing site! Luckily she said she still had a few days food and water, and it’s warm and muggy out but not deadly hot so in the tree cover should be fine so long as she can keep her head down…

Runners
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
Locke

The team gets the debrief on the situation and what’s needed from Marv, Rifleman, and Ringmaster- basically, reliable comms and recon. After consulting with The Detective, the team shares their numbers station suspicions, and get the go-ahead to try to gain the use of them through whatever means. Intel on ARES movements, positions, and activities is also quite useful. They stay for the concert, which closes with a duet with a holo of Jonny Silver, symbolically giving ARES the finger by celebrating the victory of the anti-corp forces in Denver who saved the Nexus back in the day. However, 2 members of Glock .50 are absent, either unable to make it cause of checkpoints and curfew or something worse, including Marjo-Lin, from Dig’s new magical order.

The team heads out, with Dig flying off in bird form to start using magic to look for a numbers station in the next zone scheduled to broadcast. The team swings by their safehouse to restock on arrows from Iva and crosses the last checkpoints with moments to spare. They camo their van as a delivery vehicle, and park outside an affiliated business, laying low for a bit while triangulating the broadcast as it goes out, and avoiding KE entanglements. Once the KE patrols move away/die down a little, Otters does some fancy sneaky driving to link up with Dig at the target location.

They do some drone and astral recon, and Tabasco sneaks up onto the roof. They spot some well-concealed hardwired sensors and antennae, and Dig decides to disable one as a bird, getting a bad shock for his trouble, and attracting the attention of a stealth drone which grabs him and pulls him into it’s body. He uses an lightning spell inside it to break free, but takes more damage and retreats. Meanwhile, Otters rigs Tabasco’s arms to use her superior tech knowledge to bypass the other sensors without tripping their electrical defenses, though not being a hacker, if anyone is watching the feeds they’ll know they are down.

Tabasco carefully creeps down to one window of the target unit, but since he and Otters (via flyspy) both spot turret HMG’s inside both windows, is reluctant to go in. Dig lightning bolts the window to get things going, as Otters can also see a human sized heat source inside blowing the tech. Dig zooms in as a bird and flies between one of the guns and the heat source, as Tabasco drops from the roof, fires an arrow while falling (taking out the other gun), and lands unharmed due to cyber-legs.

Dig avoids getting hit, but the turret gun shoots the shit out of the older man who was inside, as well as the last bit of tech he hadn’t fried yet. He then quickly explodes, seemingly some kind of failsafe or last ditch defense. Dig fires the last turret and leaves again, while Tabasco, Creep and Locke enter to investigate. They find a strange scene- the front door of the apartment is wired to blow with a massive outward facing shaped charge, and there are 6 months worth of rations on-hand, it looks like they set up early in the month.

They find a calendar with the current date marked (the start of Latvian Gambit?), and manage to salvage enough tech bits from all the fried station to make one radio from parts. There are three broadcasting stations, one receiver, and two code machines running in parallel- a decrypter and encrypter, seemingly how they are passing the messages around. They salvage what they can, but between their delayed entry, machine gun fire, and explosions, it’s not a lot- mostly deductions.

They decide to skip the next broadcast zone and try and beat the schedule to get to the 3rd station in the broadcast order before it’s time to broadcast, hoping to catch the messages mid-stream. Knowing what they know now, they have an easier time finding the place, which has a similar setup. They plan it out a little more carefully this time, and using Tabasco and Otters (via drones) use radar feeds to the TacNet as targeting info for Locke and ChewGum to blast the 2 turrets with their sniper rifles.

CG and Dig’s spirits both zoom in and try to disable the somewhat older man they find inside, successfully confusing and nauseating him. Creep slips in and finishes off the one turret that survived the sniper barrage, and Tabasco races in and restrains him, but unfortunately doesn’t listen to the others’ advice to get him out of the room, as he quickly explodes. Creep is nearly killed, Tabasco is badly damaged, as is Dig’s spirit, who he dismisses out of respect. They also once again lost the code machine, where the guy was standing.

They do however salvage all 4 radios this time, find another similar calendar, and a similar amount of rations etc. These operators all seem to be barricaded in, and both used a stylized angel wing icon. Locke and Otters think back and realize they’ve seen these around town occasionally, associated with anti-ARES graffiti, all of which is quickly sprayed over or washed off. They get out of there before the KE cars making sweeps can respond to the explosion and head out. Dig and Otters try to convince everyone to go back to their safehouse (in their current zone), but Tabasco makes a compelling argument that they need to hit the next station before they have time to find out what’s going on and respond.

Seeing as the team spotted two more stealthed drones watching them (before jamming and shooting them), whoever this is may already be onto them, but Tabasco convinces everyone to go along by suggesting they just try and talk to the occupant of the next one rather than busting in, and all agree to flee any combat, as they are not well-equipped for a fight at this point. Dig fixes up Creep magically as best he can, and they wait for the Jazz crash to wear off of Tabasco from the fight before heading out. As they push south on foot, sneaking around in the dark, they see a glimmer of light on the horizon and hear some loud explosions, sounding like demolitions or artillery from the direction of Downtown….

Runners
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig
Otters aka Roadkill
Locke
and goodbye to:
Carol
and Creature

The team spends a while trying to figure out what to do about Ellis. Dig attempts to use his new “hacking box” to investigate the drive that Creature found in Ellis’ lab, but fails to cast the spell he needs to do so and decides to go to sleep instead. Tabasco gets Iva to patch up his shredded cyber-armor while the team discusses next steps. They scan the drive as best they can, and finding nothing worrying, check out the files within. They find a text note that says “sorry, they’re breaching, can’t wait” and an attached video file. The video file shows Ellis seemingly disabling the facility security to give the team access, while also preparing the pod in her lab to get rolled out. She gets overridden when the hit squad shows up and starts gunning down security, and starts trying to figure out next steps.

As a cutting torch from the hit squad starts piercing her lab’s bulkhead door, she looks to the camera and says that she doesn’t trust either Otto or Knight’s plans, and thinks she found a different path, before flipping a bunch of switches, and crawling into the pod alongside what looks to be a bug nymph spirit. They embrace each other as the pod closes again, tilts towards the wall, and a retrofit rocket blasts it out through the side of the facility. The feed cuts when Creature comes in and yanks the drive.

They decide to get in the sub, hope to avoid FAB, and get down into the river, though hours have passed as this point. CG manages to use assensing both to avoid the FAB and follow the pod’s path down to the river bottom, where it looks to have plowed in pretty hard and shed some plating and exterior bits. Following some drag marks, they track it to where it appears to have been winched out of the river into some woods. Carefully heading ashore, they find the pod itself camo’ed with some tree branches and debris, and some evidence that fight took place. However was involved used a liberal amount of Cleaner-Cleaner, and seems to have had a mage do some cleanup on the astral as well.

They report in to Ringmaster, and are told to gather what info they can and continue, but that if Ellis merged with the bug this is now a termination contract. CG uses his spirits to search out her last known location, and finds that however encountered her on the river bank took her over water to the large Docklands port area. They head there and Creep sneaks around a bit, finding that her last known location was a loading area for cargo containers, with mechanized cranes and huge stacks of isotainer all around, as well as ship and truck loading zones. So she could be nearly anywhere, and whatever she is in seems to be blocking further attempts to astrally track her.

Tabasco calls up Remo, who reports that there is something bad afoot in the Detroit matrix: lots of killer ICE, etc, so Remo refuses to help hack the port, and warns the team to be careful. Lacking a hacker, they decide to report in first to Weathernight, hoping Vogel might be able to salvage something out of this, before reporting their failure to Ringmaster. Weathernight convinces Carol to finally come in out of the cold (not that it took much doing), and he tells the team he’s stepping back to more a fixer role, and buys them a new van as a parting gift. Carol also calls RIngmaster and explains that they failed, but that he passed the info along to the “3rd faction” who he confirms he works for, without ID-ing Vogel, though Ringmaster as usual seems to know a bit more than he lets on. He agrees to an info-sharing agreement on this one particular gig, as a possible avenue to a future alliance. He also gets the remaining team members some fake merc SINs to allow them to continue to move about town, in exchange for the info gathered.

When they get back to the safehouse from the port, Creature also announces xe is leaving, along with Shan and Shun, to help maintain the Sea Dragon’s gains in Chicago amidst the corporate push back into the former CZ there. They take the sub and head off, with Tabasco briefly debating going along with as both he and Creep ponder what exactly they’re still doing in Detroit. CG and Dig have made some more local connections they’re invested in, and Creep is learning his way around the city, so they decide to stay. Creature seems more likely to return in a “day-to-day” capacity than Carol, though xe will be more geographically distant in the interim.

Dig, waking up from his nap, hears all this and informs the team he recently met a driver at the Zoo, who seems to do some shadow work on the side. They call up Otters and get her to come take the van for a test drive, very much impressing them. In Tabasco’s best attempt at OpSec, this all takes place in front of the Tin Can, instead of out back, directly at the safehouse. They sell Zennia the FAB suit they found in Ellis’ lab, but Creep proves to be a poor negotiator, so they quickly realize they’ll be neeeding a face. Luckily, Otters just met one, the face/sniper Locke, doing some smuggling jobs, and has actually just gotten a call from Locke to look into a mystery for The Detective, Locke’s mentor.

There are some strange broadcasts occurring around town, and The Detective thinks it might be a numbers station or similar, and wants it looked into. They’re too deep into a Zen binge to do it themself, so has enlisted Locke’s assistance. The team agrees to help Locke with this job in exchange for their help with a job they need a face for: getting the local rap collective Glock .50 to agree to sing to Johnny Silver’s “Silversound” imprint on Perianwyr’s label. Otters calls her Keepers contact Arda, who passes along the number for another Keeper who is also part of the loose G50 collective: Marjo-Lin. Recognizing her as one of his new magical order members, Dig makes contact, and after allaying her initial suspicions, she listens to Locke’s pitch and passes it onto the rest of the group.

They get back in touch shortly, agreeing to the terms with two addendums: they want a celebratory gig at the Brickhouse, and they want a meet and greet with Silver himself. The team gets the gig set up easily via Locke’s connections with Marv, who seems to view it as a good opportunity for a secret meeting that he invites the team to. For the meet and greet, the best they can get through Zennia is an agreement that it will happen sometime, when Silver is available, as he is still on the run from the Wild Hunt at the moment. G50 agrees, so job done! Zennia pays the team the signing bonus and seems to have taken a shine to her new safehouse renters, as they are proving adept at closing contracts for her.

They next all head out to check out the numbers station mission, as an exchange for Locke’s help. The team kinda fumbles around for a while before semi-accidentally revealing to Otters and Locke the existence of MAMA. the RCC/TacNet CCOB hidden in the van’s smuggling compartment, and a few other big/expensive secrets. However, once they give Otters access to the RCC, the mission goes a lot faster, though Dig did manage his spell this time and got some good data from it as well. They find 7 broadcast points on different frequencies, and spending some time on it over the day, figure out the schedule as well. However, Locke is unable to decipher the code, so they might be using a one time pad or similar, which would make decoding incredibly difficult. CG also harvests some interesting toxic-adjacent plants up in the Blight that Jaga had recommended as interesting culinary additions for Castiron.

As they all link back up with the van to compare notes, they spot and hear a number of KE drones and cars travelling the city, as well as receive matrix broadcasts, that there is a shelter in place order starting at midnight for the duration of an ARES “special military operation” training period (an unspecified duration). Remo manages to get a message through to Tabasco with a screenshot of Jackpoint post telling users there to “keep an eye on Detroit in the next few days”, as well as a linked video what looks to be a hacked weather satellite that JP was using to do just that getting shot down by a ship coated in Void Black.

In a bit of a panic, the team decides to quickly bring Otters and Locke into the team norms, files, and secret knowledge, and after they both agree, do so. Locke quickly disappears into a Tarot and secrets hole, and is almost non-responsive while sponging up info. The rest of the team decides to head for the Brickhouse for the G50 show ahead of the curfew, and see what this secret meeting is about. They are unable to get any matrix comms out of the city, though comms inside still seem to be working. Otters is very stressed about an AI with self-editing capabilities living on the teams TacNet but otherwise is very excited to be included.

Reaching the club, they are ushered into a back room, with some stairs leading underground, into the warded area CG had previously spotted from outside. Marv, Ringmaster and Rifleman, as well as some other mercs and runners, are poring over screens and info, and Marv ID’s a technomancer in a hacker’s crash couch, hooked up to IV drip, as their current means of getting info in and out. He says they have a lot to talk about, and invites them to grab what seats they can amidst the chaos and get down to biz, then enjoy the show, then head out to get to work…

RUNNERS:
Chessick Allens-Whitehill
and introducing:
Otters aka Roadkill
and Locke

Chessick, having learned some lessons from the reopening of Boston, where the corps crashed back in and undid a lot of the good work that runners had done building communities during the Lockdown (at least aboveground) has been working to keep the same from happening in Chicago. He has also as usual been documenting the casualties and losses suffered by the civilian populace, as well as the various figures who live along societies edges. With some Neo-Anarchist contacts in town he has also been trying to help runners, gangers and others in Detroit to survive the ARES crackdown there. Having lost connection to the city as ARES tightens their hold, he is looking to make some new contacts there and set up a new smuggling pipeline.

He takes a contract to bring a package in, assured that Detroit fixers have found some runners to meet him and get him safely to the delivery point Meanwhile, in Detroit, Howell has called up Otters and told her he has a transpo job for preem pay, and The Detective has instructed Locke to assist with this task as well. Both fixers were contacted by the PPI duo Smoach and Myrryr on behalf of an outside third party, and both runners are told that if they pull it off, this could be the start of a hot new smuggling pipeline, much needed in these tight times, especially for those who don’t want to live fully under ARES’ thumb.

Chessick hires some smuggler contacts to take him across Lake Erie from Toledo over near the ARES cordon, and waits there for contact. Locke and Otters meet up and do some scouting to choose an ideal spot to get him to shore, and choose a nature reserve in South Windsor. Otters uses a delivery drone to get a biofiber bag and wetsuit out to Chessick, and also to help him ashore after he proves to be a truly shit swimmer. Locke times all the patrols out and figures their patterns, but with the delay due to Chessick’s bad swimming has to take out a drone with their sniper rifle.

Chessick and Otters do some quick thinking, and use a burner comm for a distraction for pursuers, while using the ambient life in the nature preserve to try to lose any magical trackers, while Locke watches their backs and leads them out. Using the van provided by Howell, Otters impresses the other 2 with some quality sneaky driving over to the Green Groves water treatment plant, while Chessick makes sure cameras and other sensors don’t pick them up on the way, and Locke provides studied encouragement.

They deliver the mystery package to a gender-fluid eco-shaman named The Walker In Ways, who says some cryptic things about maintaining and balancing the local manasphere, and bids them well. They all crash at their safehouses, and get contacted by their fixers again the next day for a followup gig. It seems the first delivery was a test run for this, the true mission. They are to use similar tactics to get 2 people ashore with noone spotting them, and making sure to lose any magical pursuit as best they can. These two need delivering to a runner bar called the Razorboyz Edge in The Blight.

They pass along a message for the sub dropping the two off to park outside the ARES cordon in Lake St. Clair and wait for them to make contact. Chessick and Otters team up to boost Otters’ signal, and she takes over piloting of the sub to steer it in, while Locke provides thorough updates on ARES patrol patterns, and Chessick hacks some nearby stores and signs to create some distractions. They get the 2 passenger hustled into the van, and Otters once again does some impressive sneak driving, with Locke on lookout and Chessick keeping them off feeds and sensors.

They reach the Oakland County Zoo and Locke puts her specialty skills to use, taking the group near, through, and around a series of animals and enclosures to obscure their astral traces, especially via some access tunnels under the aquarium. Thoroughly “greenwashed”, they load back in the van after Chessick checks it for trackers, and head to McKenzie Arcology bordering The Blight. Chessick and Locke manage to negotiate a better deal than Otters has ever managed on her own to use the tunnels underneath, though luckily Otters knows the tunnels well as she manages to navigate them around some traps set by The Cutters, who seem to have taken over much of the turf from the Maulers, the traditional gang in charge.

They safely sneak the two passengers over the bar and drop them off. The Asian man seems very dangerous and tightly coiled, and the Dakota woman seems calmer but also quite powerful, or used to command at least. They refuse to ID themselves but say the team impressed them, and they may be in touch in future if they need their skills again. They also hint they’ve heard of Chessick and tell him to keep up the good work. They tell him the sub is available for him to return to Chicago, and he heads out, confident they can at least get supplies to their Detroit allies in a pinch. Locke notices that the 2 passengers are wearing subtle disguises, likely enough to fool AI facial recognition, but thinks they could recognize them again if they seem either of the 2 out of disguise.

The other 2 go their separate ways for now, but feeling they have a good thing going, vow to work together again soon….

Runners
Carol
Creature
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig

Chew Gum and Jaga make some friends in Hamtramck with the People of the Book Burial Society and others, and CG uses this as an excuse to get a little more intel on the mysterious Children of Loxley. Carol receives a “condolences” message from Vogel, at some risk, who also suggests it might be time for Carol to come work for him directly since things are heating up. Carol wants to do this one last job with the team and then plans to make his exit. Creature, having given Shan and Shun the tour, also seems to be planning to leave to return with them to Chicago and focus on cementing the Sea Dragon’s position there, as Detroit already has too many dragons looking at it:Ghostwalker has agents on the ground looking to push for a Free City, Arleesh has an agent in town stirring up trouble, and Lung is apparently looking to make some moves into town from Toronto via the Triad. Plus, the bad bug vibes everywhere….

Shan and Shun arrange to rent the sub from the team for a few days in order to transport themselves to Chicago and then send it back. Dig hears back from a few more promising people about his Red Magic post, and manages to found a 3-person Order based out of the Oakland County Zoo room he rented from the rigger Roadkill. The two acolytes are a street-smart tough kid and a strict hermiticist academic, so an interesting combo so far. Creep scopes out “lay low” spots around town, and he and Tabasco head over to an unlisted cyber clinic after getting some names from Smoach and Myrryr. They find the former Probe/DeeCee transhumanist Leonna Octave running the spot, called the Metal Maniacs Clinic, which has amassed a small crew of aesthetic enthusiasts. Creep talks to them, planning to make fun of them, but actually has a nice convo about esoteric implants.

They both get some surgeries scheduled, with Creep adding a few more survival-focussed mods, and Tabasco clearing up some essence hole room to fit in some combat mods. Octave tries to sell them on more extreme mods and embracing maximum implant culture, but they demure, for now. Dig and Jaga help CG replenish one of his spirits, making a new rotting plant matter mass to twine about himself. Tabasco and Carol get a call from Ibn Hassan, offering work if they happen to indeed be in Detroit. They accept, and get a gig to drive the mafia loansharks out of Hamtramck in order to let the Hawala networks there fill the gap.

CG arranges a meeting with a local runner named Sikh Burn, a combat mage who fights with a flaming zulfiqar, and who maybe used to run with the CoL. After feeling him out a bit, SB agrees to put CG in touch with a man named Alfredo who he says is the tactical coordinator for the CoL. CG and Carol set up a deal with Alfredo to smuggle in a bunch of guns, armor, explosives, and other materiel in exchange for them working to drive the mafia off, a goal they already believe in. They seem to look more favorably on the team being in “their” neighborhood after this.

Having passed a few days and given Carol time to process his dead dad feelings a bit, they decide to crack down on the Ellis job. They look into Ringmaster’s dossier, and seeing no better option, decide to riskily contact Ellis directly, though in code. Carol uses his knowledge from the ARES space station to send her a message posing as her former lover, and she responds in a way suggesting that she knows what’s up and will help them help her. They roll over to the facility where she works (and seemingly can’t leave), and use their ARES SINs and van electrochromic coating to get into the lot. Spotting some passive magical security, Dig and CG stay in the van.

The rest of the team sneaks in through a side door, which unlocks, just as they approach. They find the drone guards inside temporarily disabled, with a map to Ellis flashing on their ARO projectors. They proceed further in, losing comms with those outside. The team outside spots another runner van similar to the hit crew they went up against on the Zoo/Jones extraction, and CG does some astral recon- it seems like they learned their lesson from last time, and left a guard and spirit with the rigger this time. The guard opens fire on the team van with a minigun, damaging it badly. Dig starts magically driving, as CG uses spirit powers to befuddle the rigger and gunner, but comes under attack from the spirit.

After some magical speed control and dramatic crashes, Dig and CG emerge victorious but the team van is almost wrecked in the process. Meanwhile, inside, the team gets into an intense fight with some sec drones camouflaged as vending machines, taking them out, but hearing what sounds like another team breaching into the facility along a parallel path to theirs. They continue in, getting into a running gun battle with facility security. They manage to turn building security on the other team, and loop around back behind them to try to get the drop. Unfortunately, amidst all the chaos, something triggers Ellis to decide to take her chances and trigger her own escape plane.

The team is surprised to see a large capsule blast through the facility walls and start sinking into the river outside, trailing various fluids. Creature sneaks into the lab it exploded out of, and finds no sign of Ellis, but does recover a hard drive that says “README” and one of the FAB suits before escaping before the goons in the next room can recover from the phosphorous arrows and lube grenade combo and start shooting again. Tabasco and Creep dive into the river to follow the capsule, but Creep can’t swim and starts drowning, so Tabasco has to save him instead. Creature debates following but doesn’t want to get the drive wet, and and head spotted a leaking FAB pipe in the lab and so is worried about that too.

Carol races back out to take over driving the van and get out of there as Dig runs to the river and leaps in, turning into a dolphin. He luckily also spots some leaking FAB trailing the capsule and abandons pursuit, not wanting to risk it. He swims to shore, and sneaks back to ground, meeting up with the drone he purchased to carry his belonging when in animal form. Tabasco and Creep also get to shore and sneak back to the safehouse using some of Creep’s new knowledge, worried their ARES SINs might be burned.

Carol picks up Creature with the drive, and races off with CG in the van as well. Unfortunately, he feels he didn’t drive fast enough and is worried about fast response tracking them, so they find an obscure spot to ditch and split up, also sneaking back to the safehouse on foot. It turns out it was good they did- when they are all about a block away a drone detonates the van with a missile, they can feel the heat even from where they are. Close call! With everyone reunited, it’s time to analyze the data, sell that suit, and figure out how/if they can get to that capsule….

Runners
Carol
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig

With Jones in the VTOL asserting that she’s been running “comms off” since DeeCee, the team decides to still not take any chances, and links up with her on the roadside, jamming her just in case, before heading to the Kiss Me Quick. Carol and Creep decide to stay there overnight and continue to examine Roderick Kensington’s lunatic manuscript to stay awake, while the rest of the team heads back to the Tin Can safehouse to rest up. CG convinces everyone to swap the walk-in freezer for a permanent ritual space, and gives them all the debrief about what’s he learned about the area and who he’s made connections with.

Carol and Creep find an illustration of what looks to be a Tarot card in Kensington’s notes, and the team spends a while speculating what it might mean. In the morning, the same crew of local runners (Smaug, Lunatech, and SINder) show up to collect Jones on behalf of Weathernight, and Carol negotiates for some pay. She says she’ll be in touch next time they have another job for them, and Carol and Creep head back to the safehouse, deciding to rest a bit during the day while the rest of the team figures out some logistics and personal agendas.

For one thing, the sub has arrived from Seattle. The team decides not to offer Shan and Shun space at their safehouse, so Creature volunteers to show them around and give them the lay of the land. Iva has a SIN from Vogel, and Dig purchases a license for his construct, so the only one they have to smuggle in is Jaga, and the van is well-equipped for that. CG puts in a call to Rubberhead and pays for access to a quiet dock that night out near the airport in Windsor. They pick everyone up and get them back to the safehouse with no trouble- Iva is excited to get to work in her new dev lab, and Jaga begins setting up the greenhouse.

Meanwhile, Tabasco and CG decide to go investigate the Platinum Joytrolls club, with Tabasco heading straight in (after being stripped of weapons) and CG investigating outside. Tabasco quickly gets made by the owner Marv, who seems to know an uncomfortable amount about him, and tells him to return the next night with whoever he wants to bring from his crew for a longer convo. CG gets spotted and also spots a neo-anarchist German gnome named Castiron, who after being impressed by his ogre belly provides some info about the area- the whole block is owned by Marv and informally referred to as “the Platinum Zone”, composed of the titular strip club (trolls of all genders and body types!), to the Brickhouse (a legendary venue), to some restaurants, cafes, and apartments. CG spots some warded underground areas as well but doesn’t get any info about those.

Dig has headed to the Oakland County Zoo to seek out Red Mages, but finds none. However, the area would be a great power center for such an order, so Dig decides to try to build one up. He makes some awkward matrix posts, and rejects the first response from someone who seems like the wrong sort of animal enthusiast, and awaits further replies. He does meet a Zoo employee named Roadkill who seems quite enthusiastic and helpful, though not very knowledgeable about magic. She implies she could help move product or other things if Dig needs, and they trade contact info. She also agrees to rent Dig time in a rarely used loading dock once a week for his magic order, assuming anyone else ever shows up.

They head back, agreeing to return tomorrow, and everyone awakens the next day wuith CG, Dig, and Jaga all having had weird shared dreams again. Dig is not sure if this was enhanced by the strange crystal his talismonger insisted on selling him, which he insisted wouldn’t do anything. This time, the dreams show two different underground cities, one teaming with bugs (and as Roderick had said, too many shamans and not enough Queens), and one seemingly a massive, lovingly-tended to ossuary, including bones appearing to be from bug hybrids. Disturbing! They decide to use the hair they acquired to track down Roderick and ask more questions. With the help of a massive spirit from Dig, they find him and discover that he has a Tarot card in his possession.

They show him a few of theirs, but it isn’t until Dig describes the shared dream that Roderick is willing to show them his. It’s a card they haven’t before: The Eclipse! This also seems to be the same card illustrated in his notes. He claims the card gives him visions. The team briefly debates taking it by force, knowing how valuable it is, especially on the Seelie Court, and Creep once again speculates that this guy might be a former Coimiediai, based on some various info in the team file. For now they decide to leave him be, after he starts getting suspicious of their lengthy, silent convo.

They head back south and pick up CG, who had split off for the morning to do some Grave Binding for the People of the Book interfaith burial society. This will justify his presence, and the presence of his magical lodge, in Hamtramck, if the team needs that cover story. They all head back to Platinum Zone for the meeting, except for Creature, who is still off with Shan and Shun discussing what the Sea Dragon might want to get into/out of Detroit.

The team is once again disarmed and ushered back to a meeting room by a Boston survivor with a strong accent. They find Marv waiting for them casually carrying an old autocannon- Carol tries on some jibes about the old model and Marv mostly plays along. He is accompanied by a wiry and somewhat tense human man dressed in specifically unmemorable casual wear, and a very nattily dressed Black dwarf who is fully bald. Marv says there’s no need or introductions until they clear a few things up, and that the team isn’t leaving til they have this convo. Creep blusters a bit and Marv says everyone can still leave as friends but it’s cards on the table time.

The trio quickly reveal that they know a good bit about the team- the dwarf seems like the intel guy of the 3, and knows Tabasco, Creep, and Carol’s history reasonably well, he seems less familiar with CG and Dig, though he’s aware of their Tzuri Group ties. After the team all confirms that they are aware of multiple ARES factions and the infighting therein, and that they aren’t loyal to either Knight or Otto’s factions, the dwarf seems to suggest that he’s aware that Carol at least is working for another faction, though it’s unclear if he knows about Vogel or not. The team seems to pass whatever kind of test this was, and the trio agree to share some info and hire the team on for a job.

The wiry human introduces himself as Rifleman, who Tabasco had previously messaged on Jackpoint about the mysterious gathering of mercs in NW Ohio. He explains that he and some other like-minded individuals are trying to field a small force in town to try to limit the damage of Latvian Gambit, which is bound to be a total clusterfuck, especially for the civilians in town. It seems like the team knows a bit more, specifics-wise, about what ARES has planned, overall. The dwarf intro’s himself as Ringmaster, and after some back and forth, suggests that he is working for/with Arleesh, which gets the team on-side a bit more. He explains that their theory is that Otto never stopped being a bug shaman and has managed to effectively turn a significant portion of the corp towards the bug agenda from the inside, slowly and over years, only now openly moving to take control.

The job they want the team to do is to extract one Dr. Ellis! Only Carol has met her, but the others are familiar from the team file. Ellis has apparently been integral to Otto’s plans and would be a valuable intel asset, but they assume she’ll be well-protected and that Knight will likely be after her as well. The team agrees, and Ringmaster sends over a dossier with her location details and the intel they’ve been able to gather. Before they can discuss anything further, the server knocks at the door and passes Rifleman in an infochip. He slides it onto the screen in the corner, and the team watches the breaking news.

A massive explosion shook ARES HQ tower in Downtown moments ago, reportedly killing the entire Board of Directors except for Damien Knight himself, who has now assumed total control of the corp, saying that in honor of their memories, he will not appoint a new board, merely an emergency advisory group (which seems like it will have no real power). Listed amongst the dead in the bombing is Carol’s dad, Michael Turpentine II. Tabasco tries to offer some comfort, but too quickly, and Carol dashes off to be alone in the bathroom for a bit, where he turns off the TacNet and does some novacoke. Adding confusion, Michael III, his brother, was named to the advisory board, a major promotion.

Ringmaster buys some drinks for the team, and tells them to try to get Ellis soon. Although ARES PR has labelled this as a terror attack, he thinks it was almost certainly Knight deciding to take the shackles off and begin operating with no real oversight, which implies things are about to get bad in Detroit. They also get a message from Vogel offering condolences to Carol and telling them that things will be accelerating quickly from here, with Knight apparently increasingly paranoid and prone to outbursts.

Runners
Carol
Creature
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig

The team, flush with their payday from Weathernight, decides to focus on making some connections and finding one or more safehouses. After debating for quite a while, they decide to go all in with Smoach and Myrryr, PPI, and call them up. They have a fruitful convo, and trade some info. First off, S&M tell them they got some initial results from the sample from the strange Underground critters the team encountered while stealing the dragon egg. These seem to be Petrophages, rare deep metaplanar beasts that transform their prey to stone before crushing and consuming them with their wide teeth. They prefer magically active targets, which explains why they focused on Chew Gum. S&M ask to send off the sample for further analysis, saying they have some contacts at a privately funded lab who can probably get more data. The team agrees, and Tabasco makes a quiet note to dig further: could this be Toast’s mysterious “ex-corp scientists” lab that he read so much about on the shadowboards?

Carol carefully warns S&M about the forthcoming bug threat, without providing specifics, and okays them to quietly warn their networks to keep an eye out four trouble. S&M seem surprised that based on Carol’s info, a wandering street preacher in the Blight seems to have predicted some portion of what’s coming. The team decides to track him down after finding safehouses. They get a rundown from the PPI’s on safehouses by style and district, and choose two: a climate-controlled garage unit in Windsor out near the airport, and a spot behind the Tin Can blues bar in Hamtramck. They rent the Windsor unit through the limited AI that runs the facility, and drive over to give it a quick once over. Dig plans to set up a ritual circle there.

They head to Hamtramck, and find the pink-bedecked dwarf fixer Zennia expecting them. She orders shots (seems like a hard party-er), and reveals that Myrryr is a pigeon shaman, who keeps some birds on the roof, along with some of Zennia’s. She says with all the sweeps ARES has been conducting and the difficulty of getting into town, there haven’t been a lot of runners needing her services of late, but the team agrees to talk business the next day after resting up. They put in their “build to suit” requests for the space, and for now just rent a double wide trailer in a fenced in lot out back of the bar, where Dig quickly passes out from Long Haul, having looked progressively more and more haggard.

They all luxuriously rest, and wake up the next day (absent Dig who is still passed out). Chew Gum wanders around Hamtramck, making contact with the People of the Book Joint Faith Burial Society, where he has to spend some social cred to get them to trust him as his magic looks pretty creepy at first. Once he explains that he can help with the Grave Binding ritual to allow them to bury their dead intact, instead of following ARES’ cremation requirements, they seem much more enthused, and he makes a few new friends there, as well as getting some further info on the area and the city.

Meanwhile, the rest of the team meets with Zennia over breakfast, a few of them getting rare real eggs from the barkeep, who makes them promise to keep quiet about the chickens he keeps on the roof- for tenants and trusted patrons only. Zennia fills them in on a few open contracts she has, but seems to be trying to stay out of the ARES infighting, perhaps correctly fearing the high lethality incumbent to those runs. They agree to look into her jobs if they get the opportunity, and head up to the Blight to track down the street preacher. Finding a local clinic and making a donation, they get some intel on a recent sighting, and manage to track the guy down near the toxic-smelling Black Creek.

He seems pretty out of it, but after they awkwardly pay him too much money, he shares his “thesis” with Carol (mad scrawlings on a variety of surfaces, in various directions and languages), and also delivers some worrying prophecy, predicting that something lies beneath them which will soon devour them all, and also reciting Hansu Prophecy 9 verbatim. So they aren’t sure how much of his “prophecy” is original, or where he’s getting it from, but eventually they ask one too many questions and he scarpers. Luckily he agreed to provide a piece of hair in case they need to track him down again, after they promise not to do “anything creepy” with it, as Tabasco has confirmed that though the man himself is not magical, there is something magical on or about him….

They head back to Hamtramck, and get a call on the way: Weathernight has another job! She fills them in on a DeeCee fixer who got mixed up in the ARES internal war and apparently fled town, headed for Detroit, just ahead of some assassins who took out her boss as well as the senator she had blackmailed. Weathernight expects this fixer, Sahara Jones, to arrive in town the next day, but doesn’t know via what means or where exactly, and explains that everyone wants her and what she might know: if the team can’t take her alive, they are to make sure she doesn’t survive for someone else to acquire.

The team spends a few hours researching the strange thesis they got from the street preacher, but it seems quite discordant and not overly useful, so they head to bed. Dig finally wakes up the next day, and the team fills him in. They seem very fixated on the thesis still, but Dig decides it’s the ravings of a madman, and that they should focus on the job, and gets the team on track. Chew Gum is still off on his wandering and helping the people adventure, so they proceed without him. After some research into the target and some recent political intrigue in DeeCee (including a threat to rescind the Business Recognition Accords as a power play against ARES’ extraterritoriality), they check the old team files, and find that some former members actually had some run-in’s with Sahara Jones when they were running in DeeCee.

Based on this, and some factional analysis, they determine that she is likely under Otto Hendricks’ sway, willingly or not, and is heading for his protection, which means she will likely be coming in under mafia protection, as they have a rep for safe people-moving (the local Mancino family doesn’t traffic, as a rule). From the docks, the quickest and easiest spot to stash her would be an ARES parazoological facility that Hendricks controls via his R&D department, so the team decides to head over and scope it out. Tabasco, deciding any tiger cage is as a good as another, also brings the rest of his mom’s ashes. He heads in to the public part of the zoo to scatter them, and does so successfully this time, though some excited kids quickly run through and kneel in them to get their faces right up on the plexi window into the enclosure.

Meanwhile, Dig has down a thought recognition spell with the image of Jones, and found 4 hitmen thinking about her in a “closed” nocturnal mammmals wing of the zoo with a good sightline to the parazoological facility dock. Tabasco and Creep prepare to sneak in and take out the hitmen, while Carol hangs back to pilot van and VTOL, and Creature and Dig (now in muscular dolphin form) wait underwater near the docks. They put in a call the CG that things are about to go down, ping their location, and wait for Jones to arrive….

CG rolls up to the parking lot on his bike and sidecar just as everything kicks off- the mafia smuggler boat is approaching the docks, and the kill team is setting up weapons in the closed exhibit. Creep and Tabasco sneak up on the snipers through some employee-access passages, but don’t quite get there in time to stop them taking out most of the mafiosos as they exit the boat. The snipers are prevented from taking out Jones by a large water spirit allied with the mafiosos. CG and Dig send their spirits to start attacking that spirit, while Tabasco and Creep fell 3 of the snipers with non-lethal rounds.

Dig, in dolphin form, keeps trying to sink the mafia boat to prevent escape but repeatedly fails, and it is sunk by some holes shot in it by the snipers. Creature takes out one of the 2 remaining mafiosos in water drake form, and Carol knocks the other one into the water with the VTOL, where Dig savages him with his huge dolphin muscles. Carol convinces Jones to climb into the VTOL over the speaker and zips her out of there, as CG goes over to deal with the sniper’s getaway van that Carol spotted in the parking lot. CG decides to skip the non-lethal option, and uses a terrifying combo if spirit powers and shotgun to befuddle the rigger inside and then silently blow his head off.

Tabasco and Creep exfil under fire as the sniper team wakes back up from stim patches etc, and begins rallying. However, with some slick driving from Carol and all the useful stealth features on the van they manage to get out of there without any further trouble. Creature and Dig leave via water, with Dig turning into a bird a little ways away to link up with the team, and Creature taking public transit back to the safehouse.

Runners
Carol
Creature
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig

The team begins the day by checking the local feeds, and find them very throttled under ARES control. There doesn’t seem to be an independent media other than some freelance bloggers, and the local shadownet is pretty anemic- mostly missing persons posts and tips on how to avoid getting caught up in the sweeps. However, the team still catches wind that their high profile extraction yesterday has gotten ARES interested in them, so they decide to get an electrochromic coating on the van, and keep Carol out of sight for now, since he was the only one the ARES corpsec saw.

Tabasco calls up Smoach and Myrryr, PPI, and dropping Vermont’s name makes a new connection in town. They provide the name of a repair shop/parts emporium that can fix up the van, and a rigger named Rubberhead who they can make contact with there. Chew Gum heads over to do so, fearing he’s too disturbing and memorable for a subtle recon mission. S&M also agree to analyze the sample CG got from the strange critters the team encountered underground that had the petrification powers. Tabasco, wanting to make new friends, warns them about the Seattle area dragon danger, but they seem snagged by the mystery are onboard.

CG wanders Rigs, Rims and Ratchets (“The Triple”) for a bit before paying off a local tout to show him to Rubberhead, who quickly agrees to work with him. and seems to be a smuggler by trade, affiliated with the Technicolor Wings syndicate, who Kit had worked with a bit on CarBoxing in Seattle. They get the van sorted, and CG buys a new small vehicle with sidecar for himself and his spirits. The rest of the team is doing recon on the Golden Microchip club- based on Nyssa Hallas’ intel the spot some high end security, but it seems like magic is their weak point (an ARES classic). Dig gives Carol a clairvoyance ritual which allows them to scope out the inside of the club, and also does some astral recon while still at the Kiss Me Quick monitoring the extractee and his dogs.

There is a single watcher spirit observing the club, only 2 entrance/exits (one of which is emergency only), good fire suppression systems, and modern, small/efficient vents. So the team decides on an unconventional plan, and aims to execute this evening upon the target’s arrival. They buy some injectable laxatives from a medical supply store on the way back to the safehouse, and meet up with CG. They take the van and Dig, while CG wards the safehouse and keeps an eye on things. Scoping out the ARES Orchard housing complex, it essentially looks like an arcology-sized sprawling campus. Tabasco heads in using his fresh ARES ID and scopes out the public areas with a visitor pass. No easy way to get to the target via that means, but Dig has an idea.

They summon the stealthed VTOL, and Creature rigs up a multi-part explosive: one high ex, one frag, and one chloroform, all daisy-chained. Xe also shows Dig how to start the short timer on it. Carol pilots the VTOL up to the target’s window and crashes it through, with Dig inside. Dig crawls out, naked, and tells the surprised woman he is here to get her out for Vogel while running a jammer to foil surveillance. He hands her a knife and tells her to leave a bio-sample and then sets the timer. She stoically cuts off a finger and then climbs in the VTOL. Dig transforms himself into a shrew and climbs in as well, and Carol pilots them back out as the room explodes behind them. The chloroform seems to have possibly ignited and a noxious cloud is spewing forth, without looking like they did much damage outside the room- right on target. THey hope this “biohazard” plus some DNA left behind will confuse and slow pursuit efforts.

Still jammed, Dig and the target climb into the smuggling compartment, and Carol slowly drives away. They get pulled over by KE, but Carol manages to talk his way out of it by playing the “good corp citizen”, and all their ID’s scan, so they are on their way. They get back to Kiss Me Quick, and this extractee seems to know the drill- she points the jammer at herself, bandages up her missing finger, and climbs into one of the body bags, zipping it up to her face. She says she’ll keep an eye on the dogs while the team heads out on the next leg of the job, and DIg leaves some old flatvids playing to keep her entertained.

They head back to the club, and execute. Creature gets in line, well-disguised, and Carol and CG wait nearby in the van to spot the target. Creep, Tabasco and Dig (in bird form) wait out back. After a few VIP arrivals, they finally spot their target exiting an air cab with his security detail. Creature manages to do a brush pass and inject him with the laxative, while playing it off as if xe were just drunk and stumbling. Xe manages to talk xyr way away from security and loops back around to the van. Meanwhile, out back, Tabasco is scanning back and forth with another clairvoyance from Dig, and quickly spots the target rushing into one of the bathrooms.

Dig begins shaping concrete to open the wall up, while Creep prepares to grab the target. Unfortunately, a woman barges in to the bathroom, seemingly thinking that the target has something planned. He’s totally confused, but the team decides not to investigate further, and Tabasco knocks her out with an arrow as soon as the wall opens enough, surprising both the people inside. Creep grabs the target and tranqs him, stuffing him into the VTOL while he’s still shitting himself. DIg, in bird form still, flies back to the safehouse. Tabasco takes public transit back, and Carol drives the van crew. Seeing that she hit her head in the fall, Creep slaps a trauma patch on the woman in the bathroom, and then sneaks off himself.

Tabasco, Dig and CG stay at the Kiss Me Quick with the 3 extractees, keeping the first and last slabbed and zipped up, and leaving the 2nd one conscious since she is very hepful (and was the only one who knew she was going to be extracted ahead of time and was onboard). The rest of the team heads back to the Black Creek coffin motel, but are woken in the middle of the night by some suspicious sounds, and manage to bail just ahead of a raid on the building. While sneaking off, they spots what looks to be Cutters out of their colors, with a small crew of Desolation Angels seemingly on the lookout for mages and bugs amongst those the Cutters are rounding up and scanning.

Meanwhile, Weathernight has called the KMQ crew and told them to expect a team of 3 runners to manage the pickup, who quickly arrive- an ork named Lunatech is driving, while an elf mage named SINder and a dwarf with draconic cyber-theme named Mr. Smaug handle the physical end. Tabasco, CG and DIg help run jammers and haul the extractees to the waiting van, and are excited to meet some other runners in town. This crew also seems excited about some new talent in town and they exchange contacts. The pickup crew rolls out, and both halves of the team link back up. Tabasco debates whether to contact Don Michaels and try to find out what the Cutters are up to and if the team is a specific target or not, but for now they get paid, and need to make some more local contacts and find a new safehouse.

Weathernight says to take a day or two to get settled and she’ll have more work for them soon.

Runners
Carol
Creature
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig

The team peruses the dossier from Vogel on the drive in, and sees an impressively militarized city before them. ARES troops, many in what looks to be nearly brand new armor, guard checkpoints through the 8 meter high border wall (lined with bio-fiber), and a state of (soft) martial law has been declared- by entering the city, they are told they are agreeing to be subject to immediate corporate corporal punishment at any security forces discretion. However, once they enter the city itself the mood seems less dire. The populace seems to (mostly) be accepting that this is merely a criminal round-up and sweep and ARES joint forces training exercise.

The team drives around a bit to get a feel for the city- their new SINs seem to work just fine, though they do get thoroughly checked at the Zone crossings near the city core, which seems to be where ARES is preparing to launch and contain Operation: Latvian Gambit. Creature, Tabasco and Creep leverage their memberships on Jackpoint and ShadowSea to get invites to d.matrix and Frozen Shadows, the two more local boards, and get some additional insight into the various neighborhoods and where to find some safehouse options. They head to Vendor’s Row and meet Weathernight at an excessively generic sandwich shop that disconcertingly only sells noodles.

She’s doing a remarkable job at a light disguise to make her look like she could plausibly be working for a different corp, without being so obvious as to attract attention. Once they are in the restaurant, she shoos the cook away (after he delivers some mediocre food to Chew Gum), and gets down to business. Vogel has determined that as well as himself, Otto Hendricks also appears to be vying with Damien Knight for power within ARES. Worse yet, Vogel has detected the working of a secret 4th faction, but has no idea who they are, or what their agenda is. Given this, he needs the team to extract certain promising executives, to make sure they remain safe and intact during the transition and his ascent to power.

Weathernight gives the team the first 3 names, and limited dossiers on each, as well as her take on where each should be extracted for maximum chance of success. She offers a large payday given the difficulty of the task as well as the short timeline. The team agrees, gets some money upfront on Carol’s suggestion, and heads out. They scope out the safehouse that Weathernight suggested be used as a stash spot for the 3, and plan to get their own personal safehouse in the Blight. They decide to do the targets in reverse order of expected difficulty, and go after the one they need to grab on the go first.

They head over to Grosse Pointe to check out his house- a decent shoreside mini-mansion. Spotting a groundskeeper walking the dogs, they decide to kidnap the pets as a way in, while Creep sneaks into the house to retrieve a ritual sample of the target. Creature buys some raw meat, and Dig, in bird form, flies by the dogs to rile them up while CG uses control animals to get them running full tilt. CG also uses a powerful confusion on the groundskeeper, causing them to drop the leashes as they stop understanding gravity. The dogs continue racing after the meat/bird and leap into the waiting van, where Dig transforms back into human form and eats the meat while staring the dogs in the eyes to cow them into submission, which he succeeds at.

Meanwhile, avoiding cameras and alarms, Creep has carefully snuck into the house. He finds evidence of a recent divorce or split of some sort, and also retrieves a solid ritual sample from the main bathroom sink drain. He slips back out and into the van, and the team heads for Hamtramck, having heard there is a good pawn shop there which will sell illicit gear to those in the know. Reaching the Trading Post, Creep uses the appropriate password from d.matrix, and gets the drone attendant to get him a directional jammer, some longhaul, and a few other supplies. They drop Dig off at Kiss Me Quick (the stash spot), and head Downtown to wait for the target to get off work.

Dig makes a ritual circle and uses the ritual sample Creep got to locate the target, which is good since Carol and Creature were fooled by a disguise that ARES was using to try to trick any observers. Carol posts a well-composed “found dogs” message, and quickly gets a call back from the target. With some confusing hinting back and forth, the target signals cooperation with the extraction on the promise of his dogs being returned to him unharmed. With the correct target info, Carol frantically tries to keep up with the target’s convoy amidst heavy Downtown traffic. They lose them for a tense moment, but regain them just after the Zone crossing checkpoint. Pulling up alongside, they trigger their planned ambush near the port, figuring they won’t get a better chance, as it’s the lowest security area along the route.

CG causes the KE officer on the lead bike to have an accident while massively magically accelerating the first car behind him, which crushes both officer and bike, while the engine whines and the car slews out of control. Creature hits car 3 with a lube grenade, which causes it to crash into car 2 (carrying the target) when car 2 slows to avoid car 1. All three end up colliding. Creep pops smoke and thermal smoke grenades, as Carol rushes out of the team van to car 2. He pulls the target out and chucks a flashbang in, closing the door, as the slightly stunned guards struggle to respond. Creature launches a chloroform grenade at the guards as they all exit their vehicles, and CG uses accident on them now that they are visible, effectively preventing them from returning fire.

Carol races them out of there, while Creep flips the plate and false transponder chip to new ID’s. They swing back by Hamtramck, and grab some body bags and slab, finding the target and his dogs all pretty annoying. They drop the target off with Dig, and Tabasco stays at Kiss Me Quick as well to keep an eye on things. They slab the target and put him in the bag, with another jammer pointed at him as well, and keep him inside DIg’s ritual circle to block magic tracking. Dig takes some longhaul to keep this going for a few days while the rest of the team grabs the other targets.

CG calls in a favor with the Seoul’Pa fixer Sung Yi to do some hacking subterfuge, and she pings a few times at various locales in Chicago with a spoofed ID meant to look like the target, hopefully pulling ARES’ attention that direction. Dig and CG both ask around a little about potential contacts in the Red/Necro magic fields and don’t find much initially but get some good leads. Tabasco considers lurking around town as he likes to do to get the local crime scene report. But for now, the team (minus those at KMQ) head to the Blight and get a cheap/anonymous coffin for the night, with Creep staying in the van outside.

They wake up the next day, and plan to do some club recon, in prep for snatching the second target that night, while also looking into the corporate housing that they have to grab the 3rd target from.

Runners
Carol
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig

Tabasco gets a call from Emdachat Fahd, who tells him not to come by his condo- an anonymous caller warned tenants to vacate the building and then a dragon flew by and torched Tabasco’s unit. Other tenants who suffered losses are being compensated but Tabasco’s unit is to be left burnt and open to the elements “as a reminder”. Tabasco really wants to get out of town. Creature remains in hiding from KE for the time being, and Chew Gum and Dig dismantle all the ritual circles and lodges at CG’s Puyallup safehouse to get prepped to get out of town.

They decide to make some arrangements, and convince Shan and Shun to ride the team’s sub the long way around and meet them in Detroit. They try to convince a few others to come with as well, but only Iva Linus Hathaway takes them up on it after Vogel promises her funding for a weapons/armor dev lab and a job in his future ARES. Tommy Vermont also gives Tabasco contact info for a pair of paranormal PI’s in Detroit. Carol negotiates with Imaginary Annie for the final payout for calling Free Seattle correctly, and gets a big chunk of money- Annie seems to have leveraged the team’s info into a position of considerable power as a local fixer.

Dig decides to send his concrete construct along in the sub as well- it’ll be a little cramped but not too bad.The team hears from Miranda King, and gets the updates on her investigations into Spinrad’s assassination. Someone cleaned up thoroughly- the Feng Shui “construction team” turns out to be a high-end crew from GeMiTo, who were all found dead in their safehouse in Redmond, and the lawyer died of an unexpected stroke. Suspicious. She also provides a private number for Jonathon Blake to the team as a favor, the team doesn’t tell her what exactly it’s for.

Carol calls Blake, and they engage in a tense negotiation. Once Blake confirms that they already sold the data from the Journal, he says that’s unfortunate but that he has an idea for how they can still ensure their friend Maggie Magnusson’s freedom. He requires the team’s info on Dis (from the moon), and also requires all their data from their observation of the Entropy Circles- Aradia had told Aunt Clara about both of these and she had passed the info on to Blake. Carol reluctantly agrees, and the team preps for an evening of recon. Blake seems to know a lot about the team as well, so not much chance of running from this.

Dig makes a few watchers, and Carol sends over the drone swarm. Tabasco and Creep collab and determine that there are 3 possible locations for the next entropy circle, based on the pattern of the previous ones. The team finds Jaga waiting by the lake as well, causing some strange vines to grow out of the toxic lake. She agrees to help them with the evening’s activities, and the team splits into 3 pairs to also observe the 3 potential sites.

Carol and Jaga spot some furtive figures approaching their spot, and having seen noone at the other 2, the other 2 teams converge. Jaga conceals them while Carol observes and assembles his rifle. 7 toxic druids (who Tabasco recognizes as the fatberg harvesters from Redmond) start walking a ritual circle and burning toxic reagents, once ensuring they are unobserved (they don’t spot the team). Once the circle is mostly complete, a dark SUV pulls up, and a few people get out. 2 goons in suits emerge from the back with a drugged up person dragging between them, and another goon emerges from the front with a device- this looks to be one of the “portal devices” that the APEP Consortium rift jumpers have been using, but looks like it isn’t powered up right now. Creep notices it has a small orichalcum rod in it that they didn’t see in the last (used) one that they found.

As the team watches (and takes aim, and sneaks closer), the druids complete their circle and open a portal to what looks like the toxic plane of Miggon. Life is leached out of the area inside the circle by the poisonous miasma of that realm, and the drugged sacrificial victim dissolves in front of their eyes. The druids channel the power of the sacrifice into the waiting device, with the orichalcum rod seemingly storing the power. As the ritual closes, the team springs their trap. With judicious use of his spirits’ accident and concealment powers, CG is able to prevent the enemy from acting effectively, and the team makes quick work of slaughtering everyone.

They quickly flee the scene, and send Blake a nicely written summary with all the relevant feeds attached. They also hire a courier from ACE to deliver the quicksilver camera plates that CG took of the ritual (after taking photos of them for themselves). Blake reports that he finds their work satisfactory, and will release their friend once he receives the plates. The team decides it’s time to go, and picks up Creature from xyr hiding spot in Puyallup.

Creep insists on buying everyone Taco Temple on the way out of town, forgetting that he can’t eat. The team stops at a spot in Renton, planning to head out of town through a remote border crossing mostly used by hunters and loggers in the Tiger Mountain Wilderness area. Unfortunately, it seems the Puppet Master Killer somehow divined their location, and another Marry Me… fan/suicide bomber detonates after dashing into the van, shredding the team’s armor and coating the inside of the van with tacos and human flesh bits.

In a panic, the team heads for the border, and ends up having to bribe their way through due to the KE warrants out for Creature. However, the SSC border guards seem happy to fuck over KE and take some money for what are otherwise clean-looking SINs. They comment on the state of the van but Carol does his best to cover. They head out on I-90 at high speed, amidst the auto-haulers and long distance rigs. They notice a spirit following them, which swaps with another spirit at sunrise. Dig goes astral and questions it, and it seems like the border guards likely sent a spirit to keep an eye on them, since they pretty obviously seemed like runners.

They pause at a rest stop to let Dig use a water spirit to wash themselves and the van, leaving a horrifying pile of human remains and tacos mixed together in a slurry in a disused field at the edge of the rest stop- a fun investigation for whatever unfortunate someday discovers it. They head back out, wanting to reach the UCAS border before resting. Tabasco buys a second car, and gets ripped off, to see if they can trick the spirit that’s following them, but it just moves to a point between the 2 vehicles. They reach the Sioux Nation border, and the van clears easily with their good fake SINs. Tabasco and Creep get searched after telling the border guards that a spirit has been following them, which makes the guards suspicious. They totally destroy the interior of the car, but as they actually don’t have anything illegal, they just confiscate some of their drugs.

Both cars power on through another day and finally cross back into the UCAS, finding a motel in SW MN to rest up in. They take a full day to sleep and recover, and then head for Chicago, where Tabasco trades his (now shredded) Americar for van interior repair and armor repair to Goober, who seems excited to see Carol and Creature, though surprised at so many other new faces on the team. He shows them the Battle of Chicago Memorial and park, and tries to sell Tabasco a jetpack, but after a disastrous test flight, Tabasco decides not to buy. Goober also reports that the survivor support group he’s been doing with Lothan has been really helpful, and takes the team to Freaktown to replenish their drug supplies.

They see some exhausted party-ers there who seem to only be on their feet through extensive substance use and have a somewhat horrifying ecstatic visage- but, as Goober says, the dance must go on…. They also get some updates on the situation in Chicago. The CZ has been renamed the “Reformation Zone”, and the ASPS has been working to formalize the dance rituals and limit casualties. 3D and Hoodsville managed to drive Null seeding out of their host using some knowledge shared from Howard and Philips INC after their anti-Null work in Seattle, but the Chicago deckers took heavy casualties. Also, Mayor Presbitero has found a new target to use for his fear-mongering agenda now that the bugs are gone: the city’s Infected population, using Fear the Dark and other bogeymen as justification for cracking down on ghouls, vamps, and others as the city gets further rebuilt and corporatized- though the RZ still feels like a party.

With their van newly kitted out with a wide selection of mismatched interior panels, including some asorted carpeting, they load back up and head for Detroit. As they approach, they get sent the new ARES SINs that Vogel promised, and get some info packets from his agent on the ground, Gloria Weathernight, who gets them some updated maps and demographic details, and tells them to meet her at a cafe on Vendor’s Row. Seeing the 8 meter tall wall that encompasses the sprawl, the team prepares to head into ARES’ home town, hoping to wrest control of the corp over to Vogel and put an end to this bug nonsense.

Runners
Carol
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum

The team awakens to some happy news: Free Seattle has passed! So Stuck won’t kill them, and Annie is satisfied with their work. Tabasco sends Stuck some celebratory cupcakes and Stuck sends back a slightly creepy thank you note hinting that he knows that Carol is alive. But otherwise all seems well. In response to this, there’s a bunch of corporate maneuvering: Shiawase is officially approved to take over the ACHE, leaving Renraku scrambling to hold onto various other contracts around town, as they see this as a threat. They delete Takuto Nakagawa’s digital persona backup as punishment, since he failed his assignment. Karen King ends up in charge of the local ARES branch, as ARES enacts a major force pullback to Detroit from all around the UCAS. She attempts to begin pragmatically securing maintenance contracts on all the gear the UCAS military may leave behind if Seattle does indeed break free. Horizon and the PPG both benefit from local contracts, and much is made of the safe and exciting “new Matrix” that DelaMar will be launching soon.

It seem that between ARES causing trouble and Free Seattle, plus with DeeCee, Boston, and Chicago all still under the construction, the UCAS is a bit on the ropes and unsure which crisis to focus on. The team also hears of various other factions moving into/out of/around Seattle to take advantage. Telestrian gets some good contracts, and tightens their ties, a bunch of GreenWar operatives start massing around town, and the Sea Dragon dumps a literal ton of gold on the deck of Chuck Beale’s boat after summoning him to a meeting in the Sound, which almost swamps his small craft, and offers her Matronage to the Free City, seemingly deciding it is a done deal. Various corps and nations also publicly signal their backing, and Gov. Potter quickly dispatches “unofficial” Ambassadors to these and other locales, looking to leverage the momentum, and the UCAS’ distraction.

The team also hears that a lot of vets and mercs, especially old-timers and pro’s, have been leaving town, which makes some sense with the referendum done, but also not a lot of sense with all sorts of new contracts likely available in the chaos. They do some digging and find that a Jackpointer named “Rifleman” has been quietly recruiting trusted mercs to come to his/Bravo Company’s training facility in NW Ohio. Tabasco reaches out, but Rifleman says that due to the team’s corporate ties he can’t use them at the moment. The team assumes this means that these mercs are planning something against ARES or in Detroit, as their staging area is fairly nearby, and just across the Michigan border. They do a little research, and find out that Bravo Company has long been an enemy of the Headhunters (the Tan Robes’ mercs), and have actually worked with some past teammates, so they decide to keep this all to themselves for now.

Tabasco, having had his mother’s remains cremated, heads to the Ft. Lewis Zoo with Creep and tries to scatter her ashes in the tiger cage, as this is the last happy place he remembers going with her. However, zoo staff quickly intercepts him, and convinces him to pay a large amount of money for a memorial plaque on a bench nearby instead. He still has about half the ashes which he holds onto for now, but he spots some zoo staff vacuuming up the ashes he already scattered, as they seem worried about tigers consuming it and developing a taste for burnt human (or maybe just cause of the chemicals). They rejoin the rest of the team, and decide they should probably rescue Maggie. Creature tells them xe will be laying low for the moment at Chew Gum’s safehouse to get some protection from magical tracking, since KE is on xyr trail.

As the team has no leads, and no hackers, Dig offers to stay behind on the next job and do a tracking ritual to locate Maggie (or his last known location). The Coven of the Crypt delivers some ritual samples collected from his safehouse. The team also decides to hire Tauren to do some matrix digging and try to figure out where Maggie was grabbed and by whom. When they tell him they suspect Black Lodge involvement, he raises his fees to cover a mage summoning a spirit to watch his back while he hacks. With that out of their hands for a while until those 2 get results, the team decides to finally tackle Shan and Shun’s job in the Underground, which will also give them a chance to return the library book.

They meet up with Shan and Shun at the Big Rhino, and agree on payment before they’ll provide many details. What they need the team to do is head into the Underground, travel a ways into the Depths, and use the provided mule drone with a thermal lance to cut through a specific section of wall. Inside they will find an item (which they will not provide more info on) that the team will need to grab and carefully place in a large padded case (also provided). They will then transport the case to a warehouse at the Tacoma docks and hand it over and get paid. They agree, and all decide they don’t really want or need to know what the item is anyway.

CG and Creep head into the Ork Undergroud from Puyallup with their gear and weapons, and get to a meeting spot with no trouble, having hired a Sprawl Scouts guide and tipped well. Carol and Tabasco head in from the Big Rhino and retrieve the drone, case, and a hand drawn map from a stallkeeper at the far edge of the Tourist Highway market. They link up with the other 2 at the very edge of where the matrix signal reaches, all disguised as Evo construction workers in case they need an alibi. With some impressive navigation from Carol, they follow the loosely accurate map into the Depths.

After a while of descending shafts and squeezing through narrow tunnels, they encounter some Rutra smugglers, but Carol and Tabasco greet them in Or’zet which seems to satisfy them, and then they recognize CG, though they are disappointed not to meet his weird “dog” (since Dig stayed behind). The Rutra warn the team about a vampire trap that they think might be a Fear the Dark cell, and Carol manages to navigate them around it, reaching their destination. They find a dry stone archway in the wall, which looks quite ancient, and the air from inside it is considerably warmer and more humid than the cold, fetid air they’ve been travelling through, though it remains pitch black.

They head inside, and find themselves in a cavern whose height they are unable to determine, but they see the spot they are supposed to cut through across it. They head over, and find an ancient carving, which they do their best to document for Dig to examine later. It depicts some humanoid figures worshiping some sort of serpent. There are also two statues on either side, although on further examination, they don’t seem to be statues at all- they look to be vampires who have been turned to stone! As soon as Creep makes this realization, they come under attack from above, with many tentacles lashing out to attack CG and his spirits.

One of his spirits is instantly disapparated, and CG feels a disturbing paralytic effect creeping into his core but manages to shake it off. The team returns fire and spreads out, with Tabasco lighting one of the tentacle creatures on fire, helping with the illumination. There seem to be 3 of them, and the get in a pretty gnarly fight, though the creatures don’t seem to understand how guns work at first, to their detriment. The team eventually disposes of all 3, which curl up on themselves and turn to stone, though CG and Creep manage to collect a small core sample of one. They were strange blobs with a a large multi-level rotating maw filled with teeth that look designed to crush rock. None of the team have any idea what they are, so they document the best they can, and start the drone cutting through the wall.

The drone uses up it’s full battery doing so, but succeeds just as it powers down, and a smoking oval of the wall drops out and shatters (the ancient carving destroyed), and even warmer, more humid air rushes out. The team finds themselves stepping into a thoroughly modern vault, seemingly intentionally kept humid, and well lit with what look like grow lights. There are heaps of wealth and treasure stacked and piled along the walls, and a heavy security door on the far side from where they cut their way in. But the object they came for is obviously the large, dark egg sitting atop a pedestal in the center of the chamber, which Tabasco licks and distressingly confirms, is a dragon egg.

The team, now in a bit of a panic, carefully puts the egg in the provided case, and Creep sprays C-Squared all over the vault to eliminate bio-signs as best he can. Tabasco blows up the drone with an explosive arrow, and starts as much else as he can on fire in the cavern with white phosphorous. They flee as fast as they can, with MAMA assisting Carol in retracing their steps. They mange to avoid complications, and check that the case blocks assensing- it seems lined with bio-fiber, so working reasonably well, though the signature inside is powerful. They head back to the surface in Downtown, and rent a boat, taking the Sound down to Tacoma and meeting Shan and Shun on their warehouse dock. The two changelings don’t appear to be in a panic about the nature of the item, and Carol fails to renegotiate.

However, they say that they heard the team was planning to leave town soon, and they will happily help them relocate if they are so concerned. The team thinks this might be a good plan. They head back to Puyallup but then think better of it, and dismantle CG’s magical lodge to leave less of a trace, and leave Creature guarding Dig while he keeps seeking Maggie. They call up Eletheria, and get approval to sleep out on Blake Island tonight under the Sea Dragon’s protection, and find some reasonably comfortable Quonset huts set up for them to use. Menehune are still exploring the sea caves and Merrow and some free spirits are setting up their little areas, so it seems like the island is coming well along.

Carol and CG quickly duck back into the Underground and head to the Watering Hole, following ThinkTank’s instructions, and make connection with Ned Reardon, a Lorekeeper from the Vault of Lore. He takes them to the VoL via some secret tunnels, and shows them TT’s memorial bench (troll-sized). He accepts the book, and says that Mr. Bookbinder has been in touch from the Astral Library at Alexandria to set up a linked depository at the VoL. They seem to have been flourishing under the Sea Dragon’s patronage and Ned says they’ve been helping with the search for a lost city. He offers them both one opportunity to research in the VoL in thanks for completing TT’s task, so they both do some digging into topics of personal interest, and then head back to Blake Island.

The next morning, they get a few important pieces of news.First off, Tauren confirms that a very pro team seems to have grabbed Maggie in transit to his safehouse from the Uni, and that they look like unmarked Centurion Security. Which lines up well with Dig’s info: Maggie’s last astral trace is at the entrance to Jonathan Blake’s driveway in Bellevue. So they have an idea of where he might be at least, but it is a hard target…. Second, Kalanyr and Urubia, the two Redmond dragons, apparently went on a little bit of a rampage last night, and have promised to compensate those injured/those who lost property. Carol, worried, tries to check the safehouse feeds and finds nothing. He scans back to the last thing the Hunter-Killer drone saw, and it looks suspiciously like the shadow of a dragon. So his jet ski likely also got fried.

Kit calls them and asks what happened to the safehouse, and after they hint that they don’t really want to know, take over rent on the Puyallup safehouse at Squick’s Vaults and publicly cuts ties with the team- they say that they’ve gotten too dangerous to what Kit is trying to do with the Shadow Chapters and that Kit can’t afford the distraction amidst some complex negotiations. Kit says it was a good run but it’s time they fully parted ways, and wishes them well. Luckily, Creature and Dig were in Puyallup, and the team all had their mission gear on them and the van with them, so no major losses, other than the safehouse itself- onto Finn’s Safehouse #5 it seems.

Third, and most shocking: Johnny Spinrad was assassinated! The killer took a seemingly impossible blind shot through a solid wall, hitting and killing Spinrad instantly. The team digs in a bit, and finds out that Spinrad was closing on an acquisition of a local high end cyber boutique- on brand for his company. This was why he was in town, and showing them the good times with Aradia.The assassin was killed trying to escape, but shapeshifted and KE/Spinrad security haven’t been able to get an ID yet (according to the available info). However, the team recognizes the shapeshift as one of the Tarot images that ThinkTank had sold to a group of assassins some time ago. The sniper wasn’t magical, so Carol thinks they must have had someone on the inside to align their shot and make sure Spinrad was in the right spot.

They call up Aradia, who says she’s on the run, headed out of town: apparently security kicked her off of Spinrad luxury island almost immediately after his death, and she is still worried about the Black Lodge coming after her, especially with both safehouses gone. She says Spinrad seemed unhappy with his home life and was a known philanderer, but she didn’t see him get up to anything unusual while she was around him. She wishes the team luck and goes dark. They call up Miranda King, and Carole reveals that he is still alive, which she seems pleased by. After sharing some info and feeling each other out, they find that Spinrad “let King go” with a sizeable severance package two days before his death, she thinks he suspected something was up but she doubts he thought it would be lethal- he likely just wanted someone on his side outside the official realm of the corp. She’s putting together a team to look into his death from her new base in Bellevue.

The team does a bit more research, and call in a favor with Remo to get some hacking help. Tauren has gone into hiding also, as he is worried the Black Lodge may be chasing him after his previous investigation for the team. Remo gets them info on all the attendees of the meeting at which Spinrad died, and also some other building info. Conferring with King again, they agree to share info in equally, and King also hints at big paydays for solving the mystery. As best they can tell, a Spinrad “construction” team set up the meeting room, but seems to have also weakened the wall that was shot through, and placed a magical item to weaken the present wards. The corp that Spinrad was trying to acquire is really into Feng Shui and harmonic design, so the meeting room was very specifically laid out, so Spinrad’s position would have been known to anyone who knew the layout. And the lawyer present for Spinrad was a longtime consigliere of his wife, Gabrielle al’Thani’s family, and had apparently brought along a special pen, a gift from al’Thani, for Spinrad to use in the signing. There was also a Telestrian strawberry wine present, which may have some connection to the Tarot/Hansu prophecies.

As she inherited the bulk of the shares (many of the rest going to Spinrad’s daughter from a previous marriage), al’Thani seems like the likeliest perpetrator, but the team has no proof, which King would need to make any kind of move. She says she will keep digging, and asks the team to share any further info they find- this definitely all feels like a setup. Spinrad was lured into a false sense of security by a warded room with no windows, and left all his security outside, so this is feeling like a very elaborate, pro, and long-in-the-making plot. The assassin also seems to have undergone significant brain programming/modification. They also hear that a kidnapping attempt against Spinrad’s daughter was narrowly foiled by undercover security at her Swiss Alps boarding school- someone had foreknowledge of his death and was after the heir!

To add to the chaos a bit more, it seems Spinrad was acting as an informal bank and launderer for the international Mob, and with his death his widow seems to have disavowed any knowledge of the scheme, so a lot of mobsters are suddenly scrambling to withdraw any funds they can from casinos and other fronts in a panic. This, on top of the bug infiltration of the N’Drangheta, ARES’ dwindling support as they turn their focus to Detroit, and the mob’s losses in the recent Syndicate War have left the Seattle mafia significantly weakened, and the other syndicates in town are definitely taking advantage.

Carol checks in with Vogel to see if Spinrad’s death will change their plans at all, and Vogel says that between that and Free Seattle passing, it has likely only accelerated the timeline, so Carol should get his team to Detroit asap. Vogel will put him in touch with an on-the-ground operator who can pass along messages, as it will be dangerous and difficult to communicate directly once inside ARES’ hometown. But Vogel says he has some important work for Carol to tackle, starting with some extractions of some essential personnel he wants to make sure survive what is to come…. Which is perfect since the team needs an exit plan from Seattle, pronto. The plan to check out the entropy circles this evening, try to figure out how to help Maggie, and then bail!

Runners
Carol
Creature
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig

The team rests up after the stressful last minute last mission, secure in the knowledge that at least Stuck isn’t trying to kill them. They all decide to sleep at CG and Dig’s safehouse in Puyallup, and Carol has to try pretty hard to pretend that it is a cool, normal spot (boiling ash wastes, reagent harvesters, scrappers and rotting plants for neighbors). However, they figure that CG’s magic lodge might offer some protection from any further Black Lodge surveillance, so seems like the safest option. Carol manages to rally Tabasco a little bit from his panic/depression/confusion. Tabasco heads out early in the morning, having called in a favor with Tommy Vermont and Jimmy Kincaid, who use old KE connections to help get his mom’s body released to him. With Emdachat’s help he has a small ceremony and says his goodbye’s. Then, to pay Kincaid back, he informs the team he’ll be busy for a day or so helping him with a job, and will report back later.

The rest of the team checks comms and gets some news: Aradia has taken shelter on Spinrad’s Lux Resort Island in Lake Tapps to hide from the BL, after getting worried about the tail that Nyssa Hallas spotted. Spinrad has also curtailed his public appearances and upped his security after that. Kit is off working on Shadow Chaps business, and is trying to subtly encourage other cities to oust Dawkins Group-corrupted leadership and add at least one Monad to every leadership group, as they seem slightly harder to effect with the reprogramming due to the multiple/blended personalities they carry. Disturbingly, Maggie Magnusson has gone missing- Creep checks in with the Coven of the Crypt and Elijah, and both confirm that he’s missed planned meetings and not shown up at his usual haunts. Does the BL have him? The team plans to investigate further.

On top of that, Creature is contacted by the Alley Cat Express dispatcher, Wizard, and warned that KE has an arrest warrant out for xyr- the mage that assensed xyr recognized xyr as a drake, and xe has a pretty unique appearance, so ACE has to “officially” cut ties, but wanted to pass along the warning. As the team heads out to the van to start looking for Magnusson, CG, familiar with the environs, spots a small surveillance drone watching them. He uses animal control to find a nearby raptor, which dive-bombs the drone. When it makes contact, the drone explodes, blowing off the birds foot and causing it to inelegantly crash into the nearby building. Dig heals it and gets it airborne again, though missing a foot. He debates making a concrete replacement limb, but decides it’s probably best not to. He also rides his new concrete homunculus around a bit, delighting Creature.

Fearing that the drone was also the BL, the team uses a bunch of Creep’s C-Squared to scrub down the safehouse, and Carol and CG purchase Hunter-Killer drones to patrol both this and the Redmond safehouse to watch for (and destroy) future surveillance drones. Worried about what this all means, though, they decide to hold off on looking for Magnusson in case he’s revealed anything to his captors, and instead do one of their Underground jobs. CG also leaves another message inviting Jaga along to the investigation of the Entropy Circles in 2 days time. Carol convinces the team to do the book return job first, since then they can make a single trip to the Underground to return the book and do Shan and Shun’s job down there, whatever that entails.

They do a little research, and find out that the man, Tigran, who checked the overdue book out from the Astral Great Library of Alexandria is a known collector of esoterica on Anderson Island, an almost entirely private enclave of the extremely rich and elderly. They also find some creepy rumors about him, and contact another Anderson Island denizen, Kaden Becksworth, who has beef with him. Becksworth explains that he wishes to hire a team to investigate Tigran due to some connections to some missing persons, and that they can combine efforts. He says he will tell his cook to prepare dinner for 5 guests so that the team has an excuse to visit, but that they shouldn’y bring anything visibly alarming to the island as it will alert his various neighbors’ suspicions.

Wanting to have some options for carrying the magical book back safely, CG buys a bio-fiber bag, abd Dig suggests a detour to the Fort Lewis zoo so that he can learn to shapeshift into a kangaroo. Creature is thrilled, and everyone else agrees a trip to the zoo sounds fun. They strap the Zodiac to the roof of the van and head over, all wearing civvies or light armor, and with weapons concealed or broken down in the van. The enter through the MP-secured checkpoints, and find the zoo most pleasant. Dig learns what he needs about kangaroos, and Carol spots someone watching the team. He sneaks off and observes as the team leaves, but the watcher spots him so he decides to approach for a casual/pro “I see you seeing me” type chat. Unfortunately, it becomes apparent that someone is remote-rigging the watcher as Carol start to talk, and the watcher explodes, sending Carol flying and shredding his armor.

As a number of civilians were also caught in the blast and a rare turtle exhibit was damaged, much chaos ensues. Carol ditches his shredded armor, and tries to steal a zoo sweatshirt from the gift shop, but is spotted by an alert teen at the till who shouts “thief!”. Luckily CG intercedes and has a spirit conceal Carol while he uses his cyber legs to leap over the fence near the exit and sneak back to the van. The only thing of note he got from the watcher before they exploded was that they had on a “Marry Me…” shirt, so they do some MAMA research with the face image, and find that she was one of the more vociferous hardcore fans who were decrying the team for shutting down the servers (at Alice’s lab) and who believed this was sabotage/some kind of false flag by a competing game.

They decide to continue the mission, though Carol feels a little vulnerable with no armor at all. Luckily he brought his diving gear, just in case. They Zodiac out to Becksworth’s dock, setting the van to loop around on GridGuide till they return. Becksworth greets them with drinks, and they eat a nice dinner in his 3 season porch while they discuss the mission. He explains that he has sent the staff home early and that he has sufficient ECM running that they can talk freely, and tells the team how he is rich enough to live here, but moral enough not to like the culture- he tries to enforce some kind of pro-social code on the island, and has found runners to be the best tool to do so, since the local KE branch is regarded as the ultimate chill reward for desk jockeys to ride out their careers at. He doesn’t condone murder, but will edge up to the line in order to achieve his goals.

He provides the team intel on how to gain access to Tigran’s property and get into the mansion itself, though he says that the esoterica wing has been inaccessible to him. He explains that Tigran had a guest from out of town recently, and hosted a small dinner party with some close friends, and that the disappearances started soon after- staff and off-islanders, but still. He says that the debauched locals have been known to hunt runners and other for sport, engage in snuff parties, and other such heinous activity, so he assumes something bad is happening. He wants the team to document what is up and get him proof, while retrieving the book. They agree, and head out. Dig flies over in bird form to surveil, and spots 2 huge dogs patrolling the grounds. He uses animal control to get them away from the team’s planned entry points, and get them distracted digging for something.

CG and Creep approach on foot, sneaking through the island’s tastefully dense woods which separate the properties. They climb a try and hop over the spiked fence, using CG’s spirit concealment to avoid detection. Carol, using scuba gear, and Creature, a natrually good swimmer as a sea drake, take the water route, and sneak up from Tigran’s dock, using the code Becksworth provided to access the ornate gate at the top of the stairs up from the water into the yard. Disturbingly, they spot clawed drag marks heading into the property, and Creature confirms they are metahuman, and seem to have been buffed out/painted over a bit, but not well enough to fully conceal on close examination. They also find some massive dog turds in the yard. Carol starts to shove some in his pocket to analyze later before CG rushes over to suggest they just poke through it with a stick to see what they find.

They find some metahuman bone fragments, as well as what looks like chewed up cyberware screws/mounting plates etc. This explains why the dog’s are still so distracted with their digging and appear to be fighting over some large bones, perhaps. The team enters the mansion through the conservatory window that they were told was loose, and easily avoid the maintenance drone that is watering plants inside. Sneaking across the grand foyer, Creep spots that this whole place seems to be reassembled from disparate components of multiple other fancy structures- the owner’s rep as a collector is apparently accurate. Spotting a warded area, they assume this will be the collection they seek. Dig offers to sneak the team through, but isn’t super good at it, so CG stays outside to stand guard with his spirits.

The rest of the team enters a large, fancy library and collection room, and Dig uses his catalog spell to seek the Book of 9 Gates. He finds where it is supposed to be, but it and 5 other magical tomes are absent. Carol hears some faint chanting from below, and focusing in, identifies 6 chanting voices and also Tigran, seemingly chatting to a sacrificial victim about how it’s a shame they have to die, but immortality has a price! Creep, wanting more intel, looks around for a vent leading down, and finds one cleverly concealed in the fireplace. He sneaks down it and sees a real horror show: 7 cloaked figures consuming a sacrificial victim while a pile of bodies rots in the corner, and it quickly becomes a horrific orgy. He reverses the direction of the vent fan and heads back up.

Dig uses his new concrete spell to cover over the secret door to the basement that his catalog spell also found, and Creep starts a massive fire in the fireplace. With the vent fan reversed, this quickly floods the basement with smoke, and they team hears some panicked voices and coughing from below, as well as some rattling and banging from behind Dig’s concrete barrier. Carol notices 3 voices begging someone(s) else not to leave them, but the team is still surprised when 4 vampires snap out of mist form in the room with them. The vamps also seems surprised to find the team there, and a fight breaks out. Carol panic launches a lube grenade, splattering essentially the whole room, and Creature manages to catch 3 robed vamps in a web as well. The one remaining vamp levitates to get clear of the lube, and launches himself at Carol, pulling two memory blades to attack. Carol frantically dodges as he, Creep, and Creature all return fire.

The other 3 vamps all return to mist form and start to float away out the door to the foyer, where CG awaits them, and uses his Fear and Deathly Aura powers to send them fleeing further into the mansion. Dig begins to chase them with his huge wad of magical concrete, aiming to trap one. The flying vamp is eventually felled by a grenade from Creature, though this also destroys much of the room and injures the team in the confined space. Creep, noticing that the vamp seems to be regenerating, grabs one of his swords, and is badly shocked by a defensive system, before using it to decapitate the vamp, ending the regen. Carol puts on his respirator and rushes into the basement to grab the book. Weirdly, it is much less horrific than what Creep saw- some kind of illusion perhaps? There is only the one sacrificial victim, and they show evidence of 4 vamp bites but no cannibalism. The other 3 robed chanters all seem to have suffocated. Carol debates taking multiple books, but based on their size and weight decides to just grab the one.

Upstairs, CG kills one of the mist form vamps in astral combat, while Creature fries another in drake form with an elemental blast. Dig tries to capture the 3rd in concrete, but the vamp, seemingly misunderstanding his powers, frantically tries to shift back to human form and is bisected by the closing trap. Having killed everyone in the house, the team decides to leave. They control the dogs again, who merrily chase each other around, fighting over a human spine they dug up, and head for the exit. Creature, in drake form, swims back to Becksworth’s incredibly fast and grabs the Zodiac to pick everyone up, as they all hear some sirens approaching in response to the gunfire and explosions. Becksowrth asks what happened and Creature sends a video file, after which Becksworth will no longer make eye contact and seems disgusted.

They pilot the boat back towards Seattle proper, but spot some drones approaching from ahead and behind. Luckily CG’s powerful spirit is still concealing them, but the boat is fully visible. Dig turns into a bird and ditches them, and Creature decide to swim off on xyr on also. Carol frantically tries to get back into his diving gear but tips it all overboard and almost falls off himself. The remaining 3 decide to swim for it in a group with spirit assistance (plus silence and concealment), and they all manage to make their way to Ketron Island, where they eventually sneak aboard the ferry back to the mainland and get back to the van. A success (of sorts)! Now to return the book…

They also link back up with Tabasco, who reports that he provided some overwatch (along with other runners) for a meeting Kincaid brokered to end the syndicate wars. It seems that Urubia and the Triad were kind of behind the whole thing, using the chaos to bolster their own power, and in Urubia’s case build up a whole new multi-gang syndicate in Redmond and begin buying her way into Puyallup. Nobody seems fully happy with the outcome otherwise, but the killing had gotten out of control and was effecting bottom lines, so a tentative peace seems best for all parties, especially as everyone figures out the changing situation re: Free Seattle, with the Referendum outcome announcement coming tomorrow!!

Runners
Carol
Creature
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig

With Creep’s fresh memory of the Black Lodge mental cryptographic key, they head straight to the UW campus and meet up with Carol, Elijah and Maggie to begin cracking the journal. Tabasco takes up surveillance on the roof while Carol and Creep help decipher. The rest head back to Chew Gum’s safehouse to meet up with Jaga The Walking Witch, and Chew Gum brings her a UW colored bouquet from the botany department. Dig and Jaga verbally spar a bit as per usual, and Jaga and Creature talk some life philosophy. Dig heads to bed, but then wakes back up to get Jaga to teach him a spell. CG shows Jaga his small arboretum, and she gives some tips for more vibrant life, while allowing for the decay that he needs for his practice.

They all sleep, and compare dreams in the morning- even Creature gets some overflow at this point, and they worry what the sunken city, the avalanche, and the eclipse might portend. They warn the team that something bad may be coming, and then Dig begins crafting a concrete homunculus with their assistance. They notice that there seems to be a huge area detection spell passively scanning Seattle, which they fear is the Black Lodge. They also warn the team about this, but not before it may have effected Tabasco up on the roof- the rest likely are safe inside various magical wards. Iva Linus Hathaway comes and visits Tabasco with some coffee and they discuss experimental arrow design for a while.

Meanwhile, the journal team has made some impressive progress with Creep’s implants and stolen knowledge, Carol’s experience on the metaplanes and Seelie Court, and the overall expertise of Elijah and Maggie. They uncover hints of Black Lodge infiltration of the IOND after the “debacle” in DeeCee. They find out the Keymasters relocated from DC to St Louis, and that the BL has a significant footprint in the ARCHology there, and may be importing metaplanar materials for construction. They find hints of some sort of opposing group of human supremacists called the “Theran Society” who want the Horrors to return to cleanse the world of magic and metahumanity. They get some hints at some other projects and recruitments in progress also.

The team warn Maggie and Elijah about the likely danger, and Maggie seems spooked though Elijah is cavalier as usual. They quickly sell the info to Eletheria, having heard that the Sea Dragon is highly involved in the “Free St Louis” movement and the ARCHology there. Hoping that this will get them clear for the moment, they decide to rest up a bit and see what happens. Before long, they get a call from Margaret Telestrian asking them to break into Chuck Beale’s office and get a little preview of the Free Seattle results before she commits her vote (she claims to be the last holdout to not tell Beale her final stance).

She provides a lot of building schematics and info, as well guard and security info, and offers a bonus if the team does the job immediately, otherwise it needs to get done by the next day. They accept, and Creep slams some drugs to stay with it after the all-nighter. They grab a few more B&E tools, and Dig begins a massive lightning bolt ritual with Tabasco as his spotter. Tabasco heads Downtown and finds a good perch with a view of the government building rooftop and Beale’s office.

Creep gets smuggled onto Council Island again and sneaks to John Abernathy’s chopper, clinging to the bottom with gecko gloves and magnet hand. Creature follows up with ACE, and the dispatcher Wizard and one of the runners Gentry, who xe met at OtherCon, hook xyr up with a courier run to deliver snacks and stims to the KE HTR team on duty at the building. Recognizing that the included Psyche is surely for the building security mage, Creature carefully poisons it without a non-lethal seizure-inducing toxin, to add some distraction. CG uses one of his spirit’s animal control powers to get a couple angry hornets into the snack package as well.

Carol and CG circle the area on GrdiGuide in the van in case backup is needed. Creature parkours the package right up the doors, and gets sent back to the guard room, but told to come straight back out. Xe delivers the package, but the excited KE guards get the included hornets extra riled up in the process. They quickly deal with the distraction, but Creature manages to copy one of their access keycards in the chaos. One of the guards has a PTSD flashback to Chicago and accuses Creature of being a bug, and won’t lower her weapon til the mage confirms that Creature is not a bug. Creature sees that the Psyche is delivered to the mage though- good deal.

Creature exfils, and Creep manages to sneak past the warded door upstairs when it is dropped to let Abernathy and his party in. Beale greets them and brings them down to the big meeting room on the 11th floor. Creep uses the keycard that Creature got to get through the security door onto the 12th floor, and heads towards Beale’s office, avoiding cameras. He just manages to crack the lock and hurriedly leaps over a pressure plate inside the door onto the heavy desk, as the mage has a seizure and triggers a medical response, with a few KE guards rushing onto the floor with a crash kit.

Creep pokes around a bit, having avoided detection, as Creature rejoins the van crew. Creep finds a desk safe, and uses the handprint Kit stole from Beale at the intro gala to bypass the first security level, but biffs it on his first attempt at bypassing the lock. He uses the handprint again to verify his ID and manages to crack the lock on the second try, quickly snapping pics of all the docs in the file folder labelled “Free Seattle”- Beale is old school and uses paper records. He just has time to finish, close the safe, and dive under the desk, as Beale comes up, greeting the KE guards on the way (who seem to have stabilized the mage).

As Beale enters the door, a sniper round takes out a chunk of his selection of nice liquors halfway across the room, and he drops to the floor in panic, luckily not seeing Creep also hiding there. Tabasco gets another anonymous text saying “4 o’clock, 13th floor”, and turns to spot a well-concealed sniper under a tarp on a window washing platform. He sees the sniper fire a round but can’t figure out what it hit- Creep reports no more impacts in the office. Dig uses this opportunity to let off his lightning bolt, and completely destroys the sniper and the platform, sending the remains of both plummeting to the ground far below.

The KE guards quickly usher Beale out of there while covering him, and Creep uses this chance to quickly swing out the shot-out office window, and gecko glove around the corner. Unfortunately, he’s slipping a bit in the rain. CG gets one of his spirits to offer some support, and Carol rapidly launches the VTOL from the van, using all it’s stealth mods to scoop up Creep without triggering the building’s rooftop turrets. The team scatters quickly, though Tabasco stops to see if he can get any info from the fallen platform/sniper, but no such luck. They contact Telestrian with the info, and get paid, and and also sell it all to Annie, as per their agreement.

Tabasco calls Tommy Vermont and asks him to look into the whole sniper thing, and Vermont uses some old KE contacts to get some info. Officially, nothing happened- a rogue lightning bolt killed an unfortunate building maintenance employee. Unofficially, there was a high-powered sniper duel over Downtown today- both snipers were killed, one shot, one by lightning. The one killed by lightning was a merc/assassin named Horza, and the other was an ex-ARES employee named Susan Hayes who’d been on the run since killing her husband (also an ARES employee) during an extraction attempt by another corp. Tabasco is devastated, as he clearly recognizes that this was his mom, though he manages to play it cool with Vermont.

He reports into the team about what he’s determined, and says he’s headed back to his safehouse alone to take some time with it, and that they should do the next run without him. The team tries to talk him out of it, but he says he needs to think a bit. In other assassin news, an Egyptian Old God cultist tried to poison Layli Red Feather, but failed in his attempt, and was later hunted down and killed by Sioux Wildcats trying to leave Seattle, causing a minor diplomatic incident as they Wildcats aren’t supposed to operate outside Council Island. However, it mostly serves to make KE and the UCAS JTF look further incompetent as they didn’t catch the assassin themselves.

The team also hears that Tauren got a team to dig further into Romeo and reveal that he had done some sketchy false flag attacks using human supremacists in the leadup to Prop 23, confirming Tauren’s suspicions. He helped to get Prop 23 passed, but his methods were too fucked. Word of this spreads around, further burning Romeo and blunting the shit he’s been talking on the team. The Mythfits also managed to gain some intel on the Sons of Snohomish and their affiliated clinics in Snohomish, and uncovered disturbing experiments on giants to uncover the source of the “reversion trigger” and try to make it deployable.

Runners
Creature
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig

Carol continues to lay low for a bit, preparing to decamp for Detroit once Vogel is ready. On that front, there’s been some news: ARES has begun some major matrix upgrades in Detroit, which Vogel says are likely a cover to justify “outages” during Operation: Latvian Gambit. There are also a lot of kill contracts being offered for ARES mi-level execs and scientists, which Vogel says is Otto Hendricks covering his tracks from Bottleneck/Pyro/Apex ahead of Latvian Gambit’s kickoff. Don Michaels also tells Tabasco he’s headed to Detroit along with a lot of other Cutters, to start doing some “street cleaning” on ARES’ behalf. Tabasco tries to warn him about bugs without warning him about bugs, and hopes they don’t end up on opposite sides of a future fight. He asks him for any last minute gear that the Cutters need to leave, but it seems like they’re loading up all their equipment for the mission.

Tabasco is happy to report that he got revenge for the Cutters who went missing up in Snohomish. He doesn’t bother to tell Michaels that the revenge was secondhand and accidental, and Michaels seems to appreciate the closure before he leaves town for an uncertain amount of time. The team also hears from Aradia, who has a disturbing report: someone has fully cleared out the Sisterhood of Ariadne clubhouse and scrubbed it. She warns that if the Black Lodge is looking into what happened it could go badly for the team. She also reports that she has made some good advance prep for Jonny Spinrad to party while he’s in town, and that Jonny has apparently been having “some trouble at home with the missus” and is looking to cut loose- which Aradia is all in favor of. The team notices that she seems to have taken a bit of a harder turn again after opening up a bit to community with the Sisterhood.

Aradia also wants to examine the blade fragment, and uses Pyschometry for a few hours to take a look. She learns a lot about the blade’s forging, use, and breaking, and confirms/further fills out the team’s existing info. She also reports that the blade fragment is made of valuable materials if they were to melt it down and separate/refine them, but it might be dangerous to hold onto. The main crew decides that at this point Chew Gum and Dig need to either be in or out, so they offer them the team norms and permanent places on the crew. Both accept, and the crew heads back to Finn’s Safehouse to celebrate. Tabasco, noticing that the team name suggestion box is full, suggests they vote on a name, and they do so, settling on “Hired Power”, which Carol approves remotely.

Chew Gum heads back to his safehouse in Puyallup the next morning and is bummed to see that Jaga stopped by while they were out, and left a note on a leaf. He and Dig call the Watering Hole again to leave her another message to make a specific plan to meet up. The crew decide to try a ritual- they now both want to track local Black Lodge activity, and decipher the code book they retrieved. They head to Blake Island to seek a safe place for the ritual, and decide to cast it on Creep. given his sneakiness and good mental abilities. Creep calls on Shiawase Daigou’s good will and gets connected with the Delta clinic again, where he gets an attention co-processor to help deal with the overwhelming amount of magical info he’s about to receive.

Aradia helps with the ritual, seemingly having developed a grudge against the BL. She also reports on night one of partying with Spinrad (fun and wild), and Tabasco tries to help out a friend, Nyssa Hallas, by recommending that Aradia take Spinrad to Club Penumbra at some point. The team also spots some more Menehune Dwarves seemingly exploring the sea caves on Blake Island, confirming the CG and Dig that the Menehune Underground are also likely working for the Sea Dragon, as rumored. The ritual goes well, and Creep finds himself with a massively expanded mental perception of a very specific thought in the minds of others: the strange language from the BL code book.

They split Seattle into 6 grid sections, and Tabasco and Creature protect Creep in the van while cruising around, seeking hits on the thoughts the ritual aimed to identify. The rest stay on the island to maintain the ritual. They get 3 hits throughout the city, and start with the friendliest one: the alchemist Squeamish. He trades some info with them, and confirms his limited knowledge of the BL script: he explains that it uses magical cryptography, essentially a ritual done on all participants to be able to read each others’ code. He says they should be able to crack it if they can scan it out of anyone else’s mind who was looped in. He also explains a bit about the Rogue Lodge, and the local power broker Jonathan Blake, who seems to be the mysterious “JB” hinted at on Aunt Clara’s comms. Blake apparently had his owns son killed after he leaked some BL into to the runner Axis Mundi, who is also now missing.

He also gives them some news updates: the Aztlan-er fixer Izidor Kurtlanik was gunned down, along with his bodyguard Achilles Serifim, in an attack by the Iron Templars, in which one of them was killed. The survivor then tried to hit Dewei Tao as well, but was foiled as he had apparently gotten spooked and hired 2 very pro bodyguards: Danger Sensei and Shieldmaiden, who easily felled the already wounded assassin. Carl Derrick was poisoned in his hotel room (one of mine, chuckles Squeamish), leading to a minor PR kerfluffle when his wife said that she hoped that “that awful sinful city WOULD leave”, contrary to the official UCAS position that Derrick was meant to represent. Two Chimera assassins also got into a massive firefight downtown with the Red Samurai guards of Takuto Nakagawa, and essentially everyone was killed when one of the Chimeras detonated some kind of backpack bomb rather than be captured. Based on the CBRN cleanup crews, it seems this could have been a mini-nuke or chemical weapon of some sort. Renraku announces that they luckily have a digital persona backup of important high level execes, so Nakagawa will be able to complete his duty to the corp and the Referendum.

The team does some research and decides that Blake is too hard of a target: Mayor of Bellevue, head of Centurion Security, and former spymaster for Dunkelzahn before falling out with Nadja Daviar: too hot. So they decide to go after the third ping, which came from Council Island. Tabasco gets a bunch of stun arrows and captures 11 sea birds with Creature helping keep them calm and sedated til ready, Dig assumes the same bird form, and CG uses animal control through a spirit to make the flock follow Dig on a recon flight over Council Island. Dig uses a smaller version of the same spell again, and sees an Eastern Euro man on a comm call under a tree. He heads back after getting spotted by magical security on the island, and spends the night making an impressively accurate sculpture of the man’s face.

Creep, worried about Takashi getting too powerful (he seems to be benefiting greatly from the direction that Shiawase is taking the Spirit of the City in) pays him a visit and they do some meditation and conversation on the meaning of leadership etc. Takashi explains that mutation is purely consensual now, and a more arduous process than before without Nightmare’s Chemosh artifact around. But he says this is all for the good. He seems as before to be living by his own personal code. Creep leaves still concerned but feeling maybe a little better. Tabasco leaves a message for Jimmy Kincaid, and is surprised when he calls back. Kincaid is a classic drunkard PI, and fills Tabasco in on some of what’s been going on with him/Puyallup. He also accepts Tabasco’s offer of assistance, and asks him to pass along a message to Margaret Telestrian.

Tabasco does so, warning Telestrian to tell High Prince Evan Harris to stay away from Seattle., in exchange for not releasing info that could damage Telestrian/Tir Tairngire’s standing post-Referendum. Tabasco makes clear he doesn’t know what’s happening and is just delivering the message, and Telestrian seems to enjoy his bluntness and lack of guile. She tells him if he hears of a sword fragment with Sperethiel script he should tell her. He calls back almost immediately and reports that he has it and offers it for sale, the team having gotten what they can from it and worried about keeping it longterm. She pays up, and also offers to get the team day passes to Council Island after Tabasco asks. She also ID’s the sculpted bust of their surveillance target as Tibur Dobos, some kind of political operative from DeeCee. The team does some research and it seems like he has been thoroughly scrubbed from the matrix. Based on some old info on Jackpoint, it looks like he is Black Lodge, and has an ongoing interest in the ACHE.

They decide to get smuggled over instead, and hire Sounder for the job. Dig stays behind to provide spell assistance from a distance. They infiltrate south on the island along the same path as the last time they were here, not having gotten spotted or tripped any defenses then, and find the setup is only slightly upgraded since. They reach the edge of the woods, and Tabasco and CG hang back to provide long distance cover and escape assistance, while Creep and Creature follow their guidance over the TacNet to sneak up to the edge of Embassytown and find the man they seek. They find him finishing a meeting with John Abernathy, and Creep manages to do a brush pass and inject him with narcoject. Creep quickly slams one of Clara’s potions and mind probes Dobos while he is out.

He gets some info but is almost instantly forced to retreat when Dobos jerks back to consciousness (likely an auto-injector) and summons aid. Creep sets off some smoke grenades on a different path to cover his and Creature’s retreat, and they reach the treeline and get back to the rendezvous with the subs without issue. He was able to get the cryptographic key they needed but not much else, but that was the most important thing, so mission accomplished! And his attention co=processor should allow him to work on transcribing the code book, so that’s all good news. Next up, back to the University to start translating!

The team also gets the news that the Call of the Void cult killed another astronomer who was worried about the asteroids they’re pulling onto a collision course, which spurred Arleesh and Dyna Mite to action. They hired Kukulkan’s crew, who made the necessary phone calls and arrangements and got Buttercup, Lady Xoc and the other necessary parties involved. They ask the team to get them a meeting with the Sea Dragon to offer their assistance in dealing with the ones that are prophecied to hit the oceans. The team agrees, and the K’s Crew offers to share info on lesser Horrors and other existential threats anytime. So that’s Prophecy 10 resolved and the planet saved! Hopefully…..

Runners
Carol Turpentine
Creature
Tabasco
Creep
Chew Gum
Dig

Dig and Creature do some bonding by riding each other in various shapeshifted forms, non-sexually. Their animalistic natures seem to fit well together. The team gets some updates from previous members: Kit has managed to link up with some local Brokerage X operatives (Gina and 3 Card, the brains and muscle, respectively, though both have a lot of financial knowledge) and set up insurance for the Shadow Chaps locally. Teams will opt in or out as a group, and will trade paydata/early tips etc to BX in exchange for BX covering a certain amount of medical per runner per run. Aradia reports in that she is keeping busy doing party prep for Spinrad’s arrival- rumor say he has a big business deal or acquisition on the table and needs everything to go real well, but also wants to party outlandishly.

More disturbingly, Aradia says that noone at the Sisterhood of Ariadne has been answering her calls today, as she was supposed to go by later for another ritual lesson but is too busy with party planning. She asks the team to check in on them. Chew Gum also chats with Dig about strange dreams, as he has also started to have them, and they seem to overlap with Dig’s odd dreams a bit more than would seem usual. Creep and Creature take the van out to meet up with Dig and CG, not wanting to share their safehouse location just yet, though Dig seemingly unaware of the implications tells them all that he could easily find them if he tried. After some tension he agrees not to, for now, but Creature promises to let him try once they approve him for full membership.

They all load into van and travel (mostly via GridGuide) up to Snohomish. They notice that Kit has left the drones and RCC in the van for team use, but has removed the Carboxing arm and rigger interface, presumably to set up a new rig for themself. Reaching the SOA clubhouse, they do some external investigation, as something seems to be off and some unusual magical signatures are detectable from outside. They find no life signs inside, but a warded area appears to be the intact (likely their ritual chamber). There are a suspicious number of cars present, including a slightly concealed dirt bike out back. Both the front and back doors appear to have been breached while locked. After using his rotten possum’s Deathly Aura to try to spook out any stragglers, they carefully enter, searching for traps. The only one they initially find is an explosive under the dirtbike’s seat.

From the investigation inside, they determine a few things: one lone attacker entered through the back, and seems to have been a very fast and efficient killer, using a mix of quiet weaponry. A separate team entered through the front and appears to have been more methodical and used some kind of harpoon guns (some Witches are still pinned to walls and furniture, and appear to have been executed if not killed by the initial shot). The lone killer and the group seem to have intersected at the ritual chamber, where the surviving Witches made their last stand- unfortunately the Witches were all killed, and the team accounts for them all, except the top half of one which was cut off completely smoothly and seemingly somehow sealed or cauterized without burning. Her top half is also missing, as are all the assailants. There is also a sizzling cut through the otherwise intact ward around the ritual circle- the team is confused as the ward should either have failed or healed.

However, they also find the top half of a sword inscribed with a strange script, some burnt toxic reagents, and a satchel with an expended device that looks sort of like an explosive but doesn’t seem to have blown up. Creep speculates that some sort of portal or magical effect is likely responsible. Looking around a bit more, Dig uncovers a secret door in the floor, and after disabling some traps, the team heads down the revealed chute and enters a small tunnel. Chew Gum finds an ornate key around Aunt Clara’s neck, and Creature uses it to unlock the door at the end of the tunnel, but is badly electrocuted. Creep manages to knock xyr free, and they tumble into a small office. Searching it, they find a lot more tech than anywhere else in the clubhouse, including a high end commlink, an offline terminal with a digital whiteboard, a journal, some hermetic reagents, 6 alchemical potions, and one Tarot Card.

Creep opens the journal, which bursts into flame. He manages to put it out but is badly burned. Dig drinks one of the potions and feels like he gained some kind of heightened sense but can’t figure out what. They check everything else carefully for traps and then haul it all out of the basement and to the van, with CG concealing them as they exit. CG also has a spirit make a silence sphere, and then snipes the bike out back to set off the explosive trap so that noone will unexpectedly trigger it later- a real civic-minded guy. Recognizing that the journal is in some kind of code, that they aren’t hackers, and that none of them know whatever language is on the blade, they decide to seek help. Dig feels his extra sense going away and manages to focus and figure out it was an astral clairvoyance potion.

First off they head down to Lady Zelda’s Lore Galore store in Puyallup, as usual she talks their ears off but does provide some useful info- as Creep had speculated, the code in the journal looks somewhat similar to the text in the Voynich Manuscript, and Zelda concurs, suggesting it is likely an internal cipher used by the Black Lodge. She warns them about the dangers of messing with this group, and also ID’s the rest of the potions- all detection and mind effecting stuff, so Dig holds onto them. Creep and Creature remember there’s a Vault of Ages in the van so they chuck the potions in to preserve them.

Next they head to Severinus de Cloet’s cart, as she has hinted to Elven royalty ties in her past, to better ID the sword fragment, which Zelda said was Sperethial. Severinus seems a little spooked and drops it after examining, and says this was a blade supposedly crafted by experts in magical weaponry on the Seelie Court for a legendary assassin who later went rogue: Teachdaire, aka The Messenger. Supposedly the blade is able to dispel magic and is exceptional as piercing magical armor. This possibly explains the strange unhealing slice they found in the warded ritual circle at the Sisterhood’s clubhouse. Severinus warns them further about The Messenger, but seems relieved that he may have gotten shoved off into some metaplane- she says that he has killed multiple members of elven and Seelie courts, so hopefully someone will take a chance to get revenge….

They next contact Tauren and request some hacking help, but warn him there are probably some traps. He agrees and says he’ll work fast, but will bring in a couple others to help. They all rest for the night, and CG and Dig have another weirdly similar dream. Creep and Creature both get Kit to patch up their armor from the run. The next day it looks like Tauren pulled an all-nighter, and he requests some extra pay for medical expenses- they lost a few files, but recovered most of the data, but it was VERY well-protected. He says that it looks like Clara was the lone user, and appears to have been reporting to a handler ID’ed as “JB” on a number of different areas. One was the use of the Sisterhood to foretell various events, possibilities, etc, and the potential for recruiting various members someday. Another was new connections with some useful shadowrunners. The 3rd was a pressing investigation into a newly acquired photograph of the previously unknown plane of Dis.

There is a lot of back and forth with JB about what this could mean, and it seems like the primary consensus is that this could give them a serious leg up against their opposition in this area. After some digging, the team is able to ID this opposition as the APEP Consortium, newly acquired by MCT, who locally operate out of a magic research facility atop Cougar Mountain in Renton. Clara’s last report is that she is planning to use her Sisterhood to do a large ritual to try to gain more info about Dis, and JB warning her to be careful, as their adversaries are very jealous of their current advantages in this area. JB and Clara never directly confirm that they are Black Lodge, but the sense of superiority and unspoken human supremacy that comes through says enough. The team realizes that they didn’t find the Dis pic anywhere at the clubhouse. Creature also recalls that xe has seen harpoon guns before: the Rift Jumpers who attack the team when they were leaving the OZ hyperplane to go to the Library of Alexandria. So are the Rift Jumpers connected to APEP? Who are they?

They next contact Elijah to get help cracking the code in the journal. They head to his temporary basement office at UW Downtown, and find him with a few full-limb casts on, which he explains away as “Antarctica being interesting this time of year.” They get down to business, and he has a mini-me version of himself (some sort of Homunculus) close the door and fetch coffee. He seems very smart and just mildly condescending if he ever feels like they’re wasting his time. The team trades him a bunch of Dis info in exchange for help with the strange device and the journal. He examines the device and explains that it looks like someone has re-jiggered one of ARES’ “Project: Bottleneck” portal closers to reverse the polarity and use it to open portals instead. He says he thinks they would be imperfect, inaccurate, and very temporary. The tech doesn’t look totally finished, but nonetheless- very interesting! In combo with the burnt toxic reagents they found, he explains that you might be able to control portal size/shape etc a bit.

For the book, he calls in a colleague: Prof. Maggie Magnusson (with the team’s approval). Maggie and Creep chat a bit, having met at the Crypt, and then Creep, Creature, and CG are dismissed as they aren’t really much good at helping with the book and it’s a small office. Dig stays to assist. They don’t make much progress on the book, and Elijah suggests reaching out to some AI contacts of Maggie’s to speed it up, but the team rejects that idea for now. Dig asks for help learning some mind reading spells, which Elijah agrees to, in order to try to find the magical cryptographic key that might crack the journal quicker. The rest of the team decides to look into the Tarot card. Following some clues, they end up at the Numismatic Museum of Seattle, Downtown, and buy tickets.

They find the coin hinted at on the card, and “near” it find a huge glass jar with some trace magic, filled with tens of thousands of rare-ish dimes. The curator claims that is a world record collection of dimes, and seems to be a coin pervert. The team tries to figure out how to heist it, while Creep sneaks into the basement to try to find out who the unlisted donor of this item is. With some miraculous searching, Creep finds out that it was Dunkelzahn himself. They head out for now, planning to possibly return later to steal the thing but not quite sure how to proceed, as they guess it would weigh close to a ton. For now, they link back up with Dig and discuss next steps- it seems they’re waiting on the translation of the book, so CG and Dig reach out to Jaga, the Walking Witch, to suggest a sleepover, to bring the 3 Tzuri Group traditions together and see if their various dreams continue to align, and what that might mean….

The team also gets some new from around town: Romeo has been talking shit about them since they burned him with ARES, probably permanently, and he will not be working with them again. Annie has been doing some quiet damage control though, and she hopes this doesn’t harm the team’s rep too badly. Rahel Juric of Omnistar released the bunraku parlor info about Carl Derrick (UCAS rep), and also the info about Reed/ARES trying to cover it up to blackmail Derrick. This gets the public pissed at both ARES and the UCAS government (for being so in the pockets of the corps), playing into Omnistar’s hands nicely. Reed tries to do a damage control press conference, but is killed by a sniper. ARES tries to blame the whole thing on her and sweep it under the rug, announcing that their longtime political head for Seattle, Karen King, will be taking over their place on the Referendum.

The missing CAS rep has been located- the Blank Verses team managed to find a ship with his corpse aboard a ship docked at the local Proteus aquacology. It looks like the Null assassin Hitsec Burn corrupted or unleashed an AI aboard the vessel, which killed and experimented upon the passengers. The BV didn’t head further into the Proteus facility, as it was outside their job parameters, especially as they already had multiple casualties from the run. The BV spread the word about a mad AI on the loose on the ship, nd possibly in the facility, and a minor panic starts- likely what Hitsec was after primarily- bad press for AI’s.

Gregory Bear-Killer also went after his target: the Horizon rep Thomas Muir. Muir’s bodyguard, Sutun the Pillar of Ankara, managed to hold back a toxic wolf but was killed by acid while wrestling it. Muir himself had a surprise adept awakening and manged to fight off and subdue Bear-Killer, who was arrested and is now detained on McNeil Prison island. Horizon plays up Muir’s “good guy with magic” heroism, which is very popular with the masses, especially given his “awe shucks” vibe at the press conference he insists on concluding after the attack.

Runners
Carol Turpentine
Creature
Tabasco
Creep

Goodbye to:
Kitten Caboodle aka Kit
and Aradia

and Introducing:
Chew Gum
and Dig

While the team is busy hiring out tons of runners, a couple new ritualists roll into town. Chew Gum, a Necro Mage affiliated with the Tzuri Group’s Black Magic school, and Dig, a Beast Mage affiliated with Tzuri Group’s Red Magic school, have both found themselves in Seattle after ending or finishing their formal instruction. Dig has been having some prophetic dreams (a blood eclipse, an avalanche, and some underground cities) that have brought him here, while Chew Gum is seeking money, connections, artifacts and power, and heard Seattle was a good spot for all of it.

They link up, and get to know each other a bit. Both are very strange. Dig seems to be a homeless shapeshifter with some rock-skin SURGE qualities, while Chew Gum is a pot-bellied Ogre accompanied by some Necro spirits housed in a mass of rotten plant matter worn as a bandolier and a rotting possum. They get along just fine. Following up on some Tzuri Group leads, they decide to investigate some happenings in the Underground.

They bribe some Skraacha to watch CG’s bike (with sidecar for Possum and DIg, who is in dog form), and head down into the Umbra district from a Night of Rage memorial in a public park, which contains a secret entrance. They send some of their spirits off to search for signs of Green Magic, as they heard a fellow former student went rogue and may be down here. They eventually come across some Rooters members, who CG makes a good impression on, after convincing them that “his dog” isn’t laughing at them. Dig uses a mindlink spell to stay in communication with CG while in animal form.

The Rooters give them a bit of the lay of the land of politics and power struggles in the underground, and tell them the Green Mage they seek is a weirdo healer named Jaga, The Walking Witch. They follow the Rooters directions to bypass the main tourist/developed area, and cut around to the Ork Underground to the north. They pass through some construction zones that look to be SK and EVO sub-arcologies in the process of being built. Reaching the Ork Underground, they encounter Big V’s Monument, and eventually find their way to the Watering Hole, where CG once again overcomes his and Dig’s bizarre appearance by virtue of speaking Or’Zet (and being able to down Hurlg and Big D Hot Sauce with no trouble).

The barkeep uses an alchemical token to summon Jaga, and she walks in a few hours later. They converse, and she reports that she has been having her own versions of Dig’s dreams, seemingly filtered through her Green Magic perspective. They squabble a bit, as their fields usually do, but CG helps keep the peace. They agree to work together on some investigations, but Jaga makes clear that she won’t help them if they’re working against the “true” Underground at any point- take from above, not below and all. She also tells them about some other interesting locations to find (and avoid) down here. This includes the Ghoulberg area (good body disposal, but make sure you don’t get snagged too- helps to make some infected friends) and the toxie Druid cult harvesting the fatberg out in Redmond.

They also notice the barkeep gives her a human sized Hurlg mug, a rare sign of respect to a non-Trog in this establishment. She also seems to have replaced a former cyberarm with an animate plant matter arm, and has a small humanoid plant familiar of some sort that follows her. She seems to be kind of evenly somewhere between CG and Dig’s relative power levels. CG also makes contact via a bar terminal with Sung Yi, and info broker with the Choson Ring, one of the local Seoul’Pa’s, and proves his nationalist credentials sufficiently to get a test job: fuck with the Yak in a meaningful way and they will help him out and give him more work. He agrees.

They leave the bar and continue their investigations. They head to the Dwarf Underground, the ritziest area, to look into rumors of Menehune Dwarfs working some kind of excavation project. Sung Yi already tipped them that the Menehune are likely working on behalf of the Sea Dragon, so they tread carefully, plus they inevitably attract plenty of attention from the guards (Hard Corps mercs) who police the zone’s borders, and who insist on confirming magically that CG isn’t a shedim. They get in, but are under constant surveillance while there. They use their spirits to find the nearest large collection of excavating tools, and confirm that it is somewhere down under the bottom of the central elevator shaft of a new 10-story deep hotel.

The concierge confirms that the Penthouse suite (the lowest level, with a private elevator) has been indefinitely rented, and will not allow them access to any areas without renting a room, which they obviously can’t afford (the concierge has correctly assessed this). Dig checks it out astrally with his Watcher spirit, and finds a massive magical barrier blocking access to the bottom of the shaft, which also is laced with some impressive illusion spells to block sound and visual without being obvious about it. So it seems that whatever the Sea Dragon has the Menehune digging up/out/etc is down there, but will remain secret for now.

They head back to the surface and get a call from someone telling them that since they’ve been poking around, they might as well come have a chat. She invites them to her yacht, and suggests they head there immediately. Not having any better leads, they do, with CG riding atop Dig (in horse form) at an impressive pace through Downtown. This gets them noticed by any magically aware individuals watching, and they don’t do much better with subtlety at the docks, where they startle a man when Dig transforms back to man form, and then use a spirit to trip him into the water, where they watch while he drowns. Luckily for the man, some other boaters rescue him just in time, but CG and Dig are filmed and shamed on social media for standing by and doing nothing (though noone seems to realize they were also the cause).

They head aboard the yacht, and meet Eletheira Windtaker, correctly assessing that she is a Sea Dragon rep herself. She tells them (essentially) to stop poking their noses in, but suggests that the SD will reward them well and maybe share some info if they start working for her. They agree in principle, which seems sufficient for the time, and Eletheria gives them some contact info for some local runners she’s been using for a variety of jobs, who she suggests linking up with. For now, they head north to meet up with the Sisterhood of Ariadne and talk ritual magic, having a few forecastings they wish to attempt.

Meanwhile, the team has cleared up their jobs list quite a bit with subcontractors, and Kit has decided to retire from day to day running in order to focus on fixing and managing the Shadow Chapters. Aradia also takes her leave, in order to focus on her personal magical development as well as her investigations into Entropy circles and the Shades night club. Both promise to stay in touch with developments from those areas, but won’t be available on the regular for day to day runs. Aradia’s first stop is the Sisterhood of Ariadne, to do a ritual to learn about some of the assassins in town, where she encounters Chew Gum and Dig. They agree to help with the ritual, recognizing Aradia as one of the team they were supposed to seek out, and Aradia offers to connect them with the rest of the team for payment.

For payment to the Sisterhood, Aradia offers the mana plate photo of the door to Dis on the Moon, which Clara and the others eagerly accept. For all their grandmotherly vibes, their ritual chamber is quite nice and put together, and they decide first to focus on the legendary assassin Teachdaire, as the team decides to try to cooperate with the Moonlight Thorns to take him out. The ritual works, and tracks TD to a farm safehouse in Snohomish, but he has some kind of magical protection that cause about half the participants to forget ever having seen him (including the 3 runners). Luckily, Clara and the other team members, who were observing via TacNet, do remember, so not a total bust. But scary! He looked right at them as if aware of the ritual!

They also do some digging into some other assassins, and offer to help John Abernathy (as unpleasant as always) survive against the Wrecking Crew, a thrillkill explosives trio. They recommend a few bodyguards, and he chooses to hire Dynamic Solutions (“for the optics”), which proves useful, as the Executive Protection team does their job, engaging in a massive fire(/explosives) fight with the in disguise Wrecking Crew as they “sealed cracks” on the bridge to Council Island. The JTF and NAN military on either side of the bridge also got pulled in, but luckily due to some good planning from OrkCEO, civilian casualties were minimal and fatalities were limited to combatants. Unfortunately, the bridge was badly damaged and is closed for the time being, but Abernathy survived, ensuring his “leave” vote.

The team checks in with Romeo, who hassles them some more about doing Free Seattle jobs, as the referendum is flying by. They decide to do a twofer, and take Major Brenda Reed’s job with the goal of sabotaging her by feeding the info to Rahel Juric. Tabasco does his best negotiating since they don’t want to risk putting Carol on the call, and gets an OK promise of pay from Reed, to manufacture some blackmail on Carl Derrick, the weak-willed UCAS congressman, by taking advantage of his predilection for Bunraku parlors. Reed gives them his favorite in-town place, his schedule of visits, and his preferred type, and tells them to take it from there, so long as whatever they do is bad enough to give her permanent leverage for getting him “out of it.”

They do some recon, and get a good security head count and idea for the building exterior. Creep pays for a membership (after verifying his age) and does the same inside. Small building, lots of guards. They contact Las Muñecas to tip them to what’s going down and offer an opportunity to rescue the 6 “dolls” kept onsite. LM agrees. Dig uses magic to program the AIMAD, freaking everyone out, and leaving it so that Creep will just have to run the program. Creep buys some gamma-scopolamine, and heads back into the parlor, renting the room directly under the one Derrick always uses for the same amount of time as him.

Once the team observes Derrick arrive, Creep waits 15 minutes, then crawls down the dumbwaiter from his room and up the one into Derrick’s room, making good use of his linked camo skin and suit, and KO’s Derrick without any trouble. He runs the AIMAD on him a few times to make sure it sticks, and then heads back the same way he came, leaving before things get chaotic.

The rest of the plan springs into motion: without Kit present, the gloves are off! So Tabasco KO’s a Yak guard with an injection arrow, and Carol retrieves the arrows and breaks their neck, and then steps back out of the way as Derrick’s driver races towards the back door. Chew Gum causes him to have an accident, slamming into another Yak guard who rushes out back and going flying through the windshield. Tabasco and Creature KO these two as well, and Carol retrieves the arrow again.

Derrick comes running out back, screaming, with Yak on his heels, who start firing as he peels off in his car, abandoning his driver. The Yak try to grab the driver and head back in, but find the back door locked somehow. They send runners to other Yak bars in the same strip, but Chew Gum and Tabasco kill them both, and Carol splashes lube grenades in the alley to add to the chaos. Feeling that they’ve done enough, they exfiltrate, but Tabasco spots 7 stealthed VTOLs taking off from the brothel roof as they leave.

They report into Reed and send her the footage, and she seems satisfied and pays up, though she asks if it wasn’t a bit of overkill, though she doesn’t seem to mind. Not sure what she’s referring to, they check the news and find reports that an organized crime brothel went up in flames, with multiples bodies already recovered inside. Checking in with Las M, they hear that the rescue went well (all 6 dolls recovered and into hiding/recovery in their network), but that a local contractor was a it enthusiastic. They put together that Yoko Aruki was on the job, and is continuing her anti-Yakuza firebug style.

However, this also nicely fulfills Sung Yi’s request, so Chew Gum advances with the Seoul-Pa. They sell the info about Derrick, as well as the fact that Reed was behind it, to Rahel Juric, who also pays up, and then tell Annie that they did this, but don’t tell Romeo. They figure this is a good test of how he responds, in terms of getting a feel for him, and Annie overall approves the strategy. They also get her to negotiate a deal between the Yak and the Skraacha for ACHE smuggling once Shiawase takes over, on behalf of Shiawase Daigou, as the team is so unpopular with the Yak right now that they can’t possibly do it themselves.

They also hear the a Songbirds assassin named Oscen, a poisoner and thrown weapons expert, made a move on Margaret Telestrian (likely for not being a pure enough elf). Luckily, the Moonlight Thorns werewolf Saroosh was onsite, and saved Telestrian, but was killed in the process, though not before he also killed Oscen. Without Saroosh around to help though, what will happen with Teachdaire?!?!

Runners
Carol Turpentine
Kitten Caboodle aka Kit
Creature
Aradia
Tabasco
Creep

After the confusing paydata selling day, with a lot of new feelings about what to do next, their relations with others, etc, the team decides to try to fortify the local Shadow Chapters by hiring a bunch of runners (for a small fee, of course) to do a bunch of the various jobs the team has amassed during their time in town. They also hear some worrying rumors about some very angry Marry Me… megafans who are are displeased about the team’s revelations. 6 out of 16 (in total) of the reprogrammed Shadow Chaps members are successfully deprogrammed, the rest die via the allergic shock trigger that was also implanted to prevent tampering. Shiawase is holding one of the 6 survivors for study by their MFID branch, but promises it’s “catch and release” and won’t be a regular habit.

The team does some research on local runners, figuring out who are the crews to know, who’s got good rep, etc.This includes all the teams they met while distributing VDH’s hoard, a useful reference, as well as some others they’ve encountered in their time here and in Chicago. With this list in hand, they compare it (the teams on it’s capabilities) with their list of available jobs, and assign out one to each team, with the explanation that this is a test run for the team to join the Shadow Chaps, which will bring more work. The team decides to keep certain Free Seattle/high secrecy jobs for themselves, especially as Kit wants the Shadow Chaps to remain officially neutral on Free Seattle and able to work either side, with Wei and Snow agree with.

Takashi and his Rusted Stiletto mutant recruits storm the Aqua Arcana lab facility and free the captive Merrow, as well as various other critter subjects kept there. The mutants remain reasonably restrained and only eat some of the staff, though at the request of the Sea Dragon, they make a horrifying video of them eating alive the project head in front of all his cowering coworkers, with the announcement that Merrow are under the Sea Dragon’s protection, and experimentation upon them will not be tolerated. Remo helps Creature with some research, and Takashi is able to shuttle the Merrow to one of 3 spots of their choosing: Enatai Beach Park on Council Island (already a free Merrow gathering point), Blake Island (the Sea Dragon’s recent acquisition), or the water-entry level of the Beaux Arts arcology in Bellevue, after Eletheria purchases a significant portion of it for their private use.

Next up, Kukulkan’s Crew is sent to investigate the Halloweeners, at Shiawase Daigou’s suggestion, and figure out what they’re up to trying to corrupt the Spirit of the City. They confirm some info that the team had provided from the early, early days of the team file, when Eion Smash had snuck into Glow City to observe a ritual done by Nightmare, the gang leader, and found himself mutated for his trouble. Asking if they should continue, the team decides to throw in some extra assistance and hires the New Assets to back up K’s Crew, though Picaro, the young ork adept on the crew seems gung-ho to go either way. With some injuries on K’s Crew and casualties amongst the new recruits to New Assets (Tommy Talon explains it was a test run anyway), the runners prevail and manage to destroy the statue of Chemosh that was being used to power the mutation rituals, corrupt the local Spiders, and attack the Spirit of the City. After a hard battle, they also manage to disrupt Nightmare, who seems to be some of Cancer spirit, likely from Miggon.

Imre Dahl’s crew is hired to look into all the assassins in town, and their on-call hitman, By the Numbers, gets a solid report back, backed up by their deckers and mage doing some research. They get names and likely targets of all the top tier assassins working, and manage to strike a few from their “concerns” list based on them being hyper-focussed or specialized on things the team doesn’t care about. They also spot some good possibilities for turning certain assassins against each other. Tabasco pays out of pocket for a side job, and hires the same crew to take out a Shedim merc/assassin named SIN who is in town. Unfortunately, By the Numbers is killed in the process, and this crew refuses to join the Shadow Chaps, and Dahl says not to contact them again.

Beltfed’s team takes on Rooster’s job, and successfully steal the secret rites of the all-Dwarf Stonecutter’s Guild and pass them along. They also report to the team that this is likely Rooster up to something on the Seelie Court, as the Stonecutter’s Guild and the Court’s Zhigul Makers faction are deeply connected. The team doesn’t know what this will entail, but files it away as potentially useful.

They hire the Coven of the Crypt for a few different jobs- looking into who owns Shades, who owns Fenris Nacht, and the Sons of Snohomish. They bungle the Shades job a bit, but confirm that it has unusually good, though not overly threatening security, and that Imre Dahl’s crew is involved somehow (too bad the team already burned that bridge…). They have better luck at Fenris Nacht, discovering that an ancient dragon-hunting order is behind it through a series of LLC’s and shell corps. The Sea Dragon violently takes over ownership, which most of the patrons accept, as she is obviously a strong hunter. Yoko Aruki and a bunch of sea drakes lead the assault, and they mount the heads of the local ownership (and any onsite who resisted) in the secluded alley leading to the entrance. Nyssa Hallas is satisfied with this info. The SoS turn out to predictably be a human metaracist org, with ties to some of the metaracist doctors from the destroyed Paladin clinic network in Denver. The team finds some old notes in the file about that. They’ve opened a new clinic in town, which will need dealing with. They also seem to be doing false flag attacks on humans under the “Sauron’s Legion” banner, in order to drive recruitment.

Grappler’s crew (who Carol knew from Chicago) gets tasked with sabotaging, false-flagging and overall making the UCAS JTF look bad, to popularize their pulling out. The team at Kit’s insistence request a “low lethality” plan, which costs more and is harder, but the team pulls it off with style. This greatly pleases both Rahel Juric and Shiawase Daigou, who gives them yet another job: Renraku will almost surely get various “x-guide” contracts for De La Mar’s new matrix relaunch, and he wants a sleeper agent inserted to make sure that Shiawase has some backdoors and kill codes in place, just in case. The team recruits a cocky and eager young hacker with some social/con skills named Kid Code, who agrees to the longterm assignment, and they successfully get him inserted and set up in his new position. Shiawase Daigou is most impressed with the team and their rapid results.

Howard and Phillips INC is given the job of looking more into the K-Code and the Null Sect, as well as this digital Horror entity that De La Mar has codenamed “Blackout.” They mostly just confirm the info the DDLM gave to the team, especially re: K-Code, but do discover some local Null connections that the team didn’t know about, including an infested host in Redmond that might be a worthwhile target. They also confirm the presence in town of the Null assassin Hitsec Burn, and report that they had a lot of gear fried in their investigations. They report that it seems that Null attacks are down in areas where DDLM’s new matrix is live (Boston, Chicago) but escalating in other places, suggesting they are attempting a pressure campaign to speed the transition. The team give H&P the Null Doc to help them keep safe in future.

Tommy Vermont and Las Muñecas set their trap as discussed: they put out word in some places they know Kellan Hunter will hear it that Natalia is a Monad, and sit back and observe. Hunter manages to kill Natalia after stalking her for a few days, and takes her eyes, and Vermont and the LM’s take him out (perhaps a little excessively, but best to be sure), ending that serial killer threat to the city, as well as shutting down the Death Ships pipeline. A matrix-based member of the Nadja Fixer Network named Sofia also contacts the team and thanks them for their efforts, having received proof of Natalia’s corruption and activities from the LM’s. She’ll be taking over the Seattle beat for now in Natalia’s absence.

The Mythfits are given the job of looking into the First Union smuggling org, and discover that it is a forced conversion recruitment Monad operation, which deeply upsets Kit. It also proves useful as a way to recruit other smugglers and go-gangers to take revenge, and the local FU chapter is basically wiped out, though with pretty high casualties on the ganger side. The Mythfits luckily only require some hospital stays to get back on their feet after a gnarly brawl.

With all these new crews signed up for the Shadow Chaps, and only one real failed job amongst the lot, Kit plans to start recruiting more fixers, street docs, etc to begin building the full network. The team also has to figure out what to do with all the assassin info. Miranda King from Spinrad contacts them on an old number of Carol’s asking if she was correct in recognizing them from Chicago. Aradia gets in touch to maintain Carol’s fake dead status, and agrees to work with her. First off, she does an interview on Kit’s Shadowcast “The Bolthole” in order to start building relationships between Spinrad and Monad communities, since they don’t like that EVO has the market cornered at the moment. She then hires Aradia/the team to begin prepping an epic night (or more) out for a certain VIP, who she will not confirm or deny is Spinrad himself.

They also hear that the referendum is officially starting, and will last for exactly one week. Creepily, Horizon is deeply involved, conducting opinion polls and surveys the whole time to gauge the populace. The team better get a move on to make sure things swing their way, and not let any of their preferred delegates gets clipped! Happily, they also got a list of high end bodyguard in town, and can recommend their services.

The team also hears from Su Cheng, and learns that due to his secret manipulation, Jimmy Kincaid has brokered a peace deal between the Ancients and the Triad to secure an arms smuggling deal, basically granting them the power that Cheng was worried about the Laesa/Yakuza having. Unfortunately, someone seems to take exception to this (or something else Kincaid did) and severs his arm, destroying his last bit of magic and cutting him off from his ally spirit. Hearing that she’s been appearing randomly around town, Aradia and Tabasco astrally track her to an apartment/office registered to a pair of people finder/bounty hunter/bailbondswomen named Skip and Trace. They try to offer assistance consoling the spirit, but S&T seem to have a pre-existing relationship with her and say they have it under control. Aradia tries to snoop a bit more astrally and gets KO’ed by the very emotional spirit. Tabasco leaves a number in case they can be of future help, and then carries unconscious Aradia out of there, successfully taking the hint. But who went after Kincaid and why?