[Shadowrun] Chapter 1 - An Unexpected Request

[Oath]

Zephyr:
The professor nodded slowly, looking up from his work. It'll probably take a while but I can look into this for you. Since its a favor, work will have to come first of course, but I'll get to it as soon as I can. If anything weird happens I'll be sure to let you know. I'm no spring chicken, and don't really want to get hurt over something that I don't need to. He took the staff and set it against the wall behind him. Take care, Zephyr.

Obtained the reagents that you wanted.

Roland:
Craig let out a hearty laugh about Roland's fears, and then looked at the picture and then shook his head. "Can't say that I've heard of the dude, but from what you've said it definitely sounds like he's in my field. I'll try to peek around a bit and see what I can find. I'll let you know what comes up as long as it isn't anything that needs to be classified. The kinds of people that have too many secrets don't tend to sit well with me either. Probably in the department's best interest that I look into this guy. If he has so many secrets, hopefully he isn't dumb enough to try to kill a cop. Not so sure if I can say the same thing about your anus though." 

Takumi:

Do I have any work? Nothing seems to stand out but if you're that hungry we can probably find something. What are ya lookin' to do?"
Shinji was pretty straight forward, it seemed as if his hands were a bit full at the moment.

[Mysticsage]

Zephyr nodded and returned his uniform to its resting place before heading out and back home, prize in hand. Once he got back to his apartment he sighed as he looked at the space from the door way. He only had gotten the apartment a few nights before and it still did not quite feel like his home yet. The two room space had a fair amount of room for a single bachelor with its dark synthetic woods and marbles and from his spot on the thirtieth floor of these apartment multiplex he had a good view of the archeology and other major landmarks of downtown Seattle. Slipping off his shoes and shrugging off his jacket he moved into the space proper the emotional reminiscence of the night before still clinging heavy from Kiera's pain even after cleansing it.

He moved over to the small kitchenette and pulled an empty mason jar with a plastic stopper and poured in the contents of the shopping bag of herbs and put back the lid and placed it on a shelf for safe keeping. He grabbed a mug from the cabinets and grabbed an insta-tea bag not looking to get in the expensive stuff and poured water in the cup with the bag before heading off to his room. He sat cross-legged on his bed and activated his comm-link and took a sip while surfing the web.

Opening a window to Shadowsea he logged into his account as his little capped owl popped into life as he scanned through Shadowland looking for anything to catch his interest in his filters. Not that he expected to find much if he was going to get a job at his current state it was probably coming from Kyoko or Owl directly through a vision quest which could be anywhere from a dream to a splitting migraine As he glanced over to his closet in his augmented reality the display of his ruined costume along with price points. He would need to find a new armorer to put it together after the last time that it was torn to shreds. He needed it to be more durable then the last time maybe survive two bullets and an an angry grip from the night after. He chuckled at the idea of that and decided to open up another window while his persona kept him up to date.

The Shizino Private Investigations opened up and he scanned through their recent achievements and collars. Michelle Shizino their star consultant and darling daughter of one Kenichi Shizino the former star of the Renraku red samurai detective force before a case went bad and he was sent to Seattle before being removed from the family at the age of 30. He found love and the strength to find his own family and his own private enterprise. His Daughter followed in her father's footsteps though from his experience she was far more flexible in her thinking and while the father was a major threat he found from personal experience it was the duaghter who could make things a great deal more complicated for a runner when she was running the plays. He had run into Michelle a number of times as she fancied herself an expert on thieves and runners of his varity and he couldn't help but say this flower of justice had him more then a bit smitten. How she tried to so hard to stop him whenever she could really made his heart thump. They had built up quite a conversational style over the last year and a half.

But he closed the window knowing he would need to make a fair bit of nuyen and work done before he could truly feel comfortable going toe to toe again. It was rude to meet a lady half dressed if you could help it. She still was in the dark to his identity thanks to his magic and he wanted to keep the fun they had going as long as he could

[pringerbeam]

     "Alright, keep in touch."  Roland stood and clapped his hand on the detective's shoulder before making his way out of the police station.  He hopped into his car and took a moment to take his gun out and re-holster it before driving out of the parking garage.  Roland stopped at a convenience store and pulled out his comlink.  Hmmm... finally have some money coming in.  Should think about what I need to start stocking up on.  He looked through his meager inventory and made mental notes as he strolled down the aisles of the market occasionally absentmindedly reaching out to grab assorted food articles.  Definately need to stop by Shinji's tomorrow to get some spare guns...  Got some first aid supplies...  Oh need to get some tranquilizers...  With his arm full he made his way to the counter where he spilled out his purchases before the shop attendant.  "Will that be all?"  Roland paused at this and pondered a second.  "You know what, I think I will treat myself.  Can I get a pack of Wuxing Reds?"  The attendant nodded and tossed a pack of cigarettes into the plastic bag with the rest of  the purchase.  Roland nodded to the attendant.  "Thanks chummer, take it easy."  Making his way home,  Roland ended his day with a bowel of instant noodles with krill paste and one of his favorite cigarettes to celebrate business finally picking back up.

     The next day Roland made his way to Shinji's.  "Hey Shinji, I have a bit of a shopping list.  I need some hardware: a couple of throw away guns and a nicer piece for when things get a bit hot."

Shopping List
5x Streetline Special (holdout pistol)
30x Holdout pistol regular ammo
1x Savalette Guardian (heavy pistol)
50 x Heavy pistol explosive ammunition

Healing Check for if the day goes by without incident
This dice roll has been tampered with!
Rolled 8d6 : 1, 5, 5, 1, 3, 4, 3, 3, total 25

Edit: Messed up ammo count

[InhumanRonin]

Takumi cleared his throat before he answered Shinji's question. Anything that can help me make up for my actions the other day at the lab. I know I let you down quite a bit with my actions. And if it helps lighten the load a bit i can contact the others I was with if you have anything for them to take care of. Takumi takes a small bow and nervously awaits Shinji's answer.

[Oath]

Roland

Shinji has a bit of a grimace as you list what you'd like to buy. "Well.... I can probably get you 3 of the Streetline Specials, all of the ammo you want for it, your Savalette Guardian and around 30 of the explosive rounds. But those last two will take a couple of days. You can either pick it up here, or we can deliver it to you, your choice. In the meantime, you can help yourself to a drink while I have someone get your small arms together. He waves over one of the younger looking suits and gives him his orders. While you are having your drink, you see Takumi bowing down to Shinji.

Roland buys 3 Streeline Specials, 30 holdout pistol rounds, 1 Savalette Guardian, and 30 Heavy pistol explosive rounds. Savalette Guardian and heavy pistol rounds will arrive at Shinji's establishment (Negi's!) in 2 days.

Takumi

Well, if nothing else its nice to see that you take your work seriously. One of the older guys is a bit paranoid at the moment. You see, he was caught in bed with the daughter of one of the Russians. Maybe you can go give him some security detail to help scare off anyone that might be thinking about revenge? Though one lesson you may want to learn sooner rather than later, is that it is a bad idea to volunteer Roland for anything. Shinji smiled, and pointed over to the bar, where Roland was enjoying a drink.

Zephyr

While you were searching ShadowSea, a thread caught your eye. [JOB OFFER]Looking for Thief to Assist Me.

The name of the poster didn't seem to be one of your normal contacts. Went by the name of "Mister Barrel" They claimed that their most recent design for an unspecified product had been stolen, and they are looking to hire someone to get it back. More details available upon request, or so the post claims.

Machiavelli

Machiavelli sat on the sofa in his suite, searching through ShadowSea. Various thread titles popped out at him. Drug Lab Explodes!? Was it an Honest Mistake? Or Something More Sinister?!

Sounds like what I was just involved in... He opens the thread and posts.

That's what happens when you use from your own supply. Can't expect some people high as a kite to do anything right these days.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Also your title is shit.

TEAM LOOKING FOR DECKER PLZ

Hm.. could always use some more cash. Let's see what these guys are about.

HAI THERE! WE ARE A TEAM OF VERY EXPERIENCED RUNNERS LOOKING FOR A NEW DECKER AFTER OUR LAST ONE HAD AN UNFORTUNATE ACCIDENT!! WE HAVE A VERY GOOD TRACK RECORD AND VERY LOW CASUALTY RATE. LAST DECKER HAD CLAIMED THE TURRETS WERE DEACTIVATED AND JUMPED OUT IN FRONT OF THEM TO PROVE IT. NOW HE IS DEAD.  PLZ JOIN US WE NEED A GOOD DECKER FOR OUR NEXT RUN!!

Machiavelli typed up his response. Why are you yelling?  ʅฺ(・ω・。)ʃฺ？？ If I had to run with you, I would be afraid that you would alert everyone in the building with your inability to control your volume. Hard pass. Good luck finding someone dumb enough to go with you though. ⚈ ̫ ⚈

The next thread that caught his eye seemed promising. Reports That Aztechnolgy is Developing a Dangerous New Prototype!!

The contents of the thread weren't anything he didn't already know, but he figured he should check just in case. Nothing stood out but since it was out in ShadowSea now, some of his contacts may have heard something. He set to work sending out some more messages to people that he knew.

[Mysticsage]

Zephyr found the post intriguing he still was recovering from that last major job and Kyoko would kill him if he spent himself even more before he had full access to his powers, but he was curious. And he figured there would be no problem if he simply checked out the details of it all right. What could go wrong with simply dong a bit of window shopping? He opened up a private chatroom with this Barrellman and wrote a quick note.

Private Chatroom created-

>Kn1ghtwing: Heard you are looking for a locksmith? I might be able to give you a hand depending on the details you have my attention.

>Kn1ghtwing:Have a full service team on call within the Seattle area. Prefer subtly and reclamation over brute force methods willing to negotiate on payment.

While he waited for a response he looked at his closet and then thought better of it. Better to keep that bird in the dark for as long as he could. The sooner he started getting flashy all the wildlife in the woods would take notice of him again. He had managed to mostly stay off major radars before now. But that was because he played smart no need to go rushing back to the cloak now so soon and begin to build his notoriety to fast..

[pringerbeam]

    "Alright, I'll pay it all up front.  Here's some of that sweet nuyen you just handed over the other day."  Roland pulled out his comlink and transferred the money to the usual account.  He then sat down at the bar for a drink as he waited for his goods to show up, whiling away his time checking up on assorted sports feeds on his comlink while he sipped away at a cheap beer.  He kept to himself  mostly occasionally making small-talk with the yakuza members grabbing a drink in between whatever tasks Shinji had them running to and from.  A voice perked up his ears though and got him to spin in his bar-stool to watch the proceedings.
     "Oh boy Chopstick, you're on dick guarding duty.  Lesson Time!  Don't let your cock cross the battle-lines otherwise you have to go find the low guy on the totem pole so he can hide your sausage long enough for the enemy to lose interest in cutting off your dick once they realize they have had penis on the brain for an uncomfortable amount of time."  He took a sip on his beer and rather loudly and poignantly smacked his lips before continuing.  "Ah...  Don't you worry Chopstick, just got to put in your time and eventually you get to be the guy fucking the farmer's daughter then getting someone to guard your cock.  Have fun!"

[Oath]

15 Minutes ago

>Kn1ghtwing: Heard you are looking for a locksmith? I might be able to give you a hand depending on the details you have my attention.

>Kn1ghtwing:Have a full service team on call within the Seattle area. Prefer subtly and reclamation over brute force methods willing to negotiate on payment.

Just now

<Mister Barrel: Don't really care what you call yourself, as long as you have the skills for the job. A former partner involved with a certain business has stolen plans that I created in an attempt to claim the money and fame for himself. I am more of a traditionalist, and they are drafted on paper. Still have your attention?

[Mysticsage]

>Kn1ghtwing: [b]I assume you are part of a corp? Why not have internal affairs deal with this kind of issue? If its a new product then they won't want to lose it. And your partner will most defiantly want to jump ship for a more comfortable pension.

>Kn1ghtwing:If your looking for outside assistance you have my interest but I'll need information about your partner and appropriate payment. Especially if you are not corp reliant your partner will most defiantly attempt to sell as soon as possible to the highest bidder, .

>Kn1ghtwing:Which will be one of the corps. And once they have their hands on it and paid a pittance of what you deserve neither of your names will be worth a damn. So if we have a hope of getting back your work then we need to be aware of the possible clock. Things get exponentially more difficult and expensive once corp security is involved.


>Kn1ghtwing: I don't want to be bleak just realistic about what you are facing. So if its simply money then it might be worth just outdoing your own work for the future. If however, you want this back for other reasons then lets hear the basics. Who's your partner and what did they take? And when did they take it? And who have you been in talks with to sell your product?

>Kn1ghtwing:[/b] We'll decide on payment once i get a good understanding of what's going on. This Job is no good for you if you end up paying more then you have and my team needs the nuyen to make up for the obvious possible complications[/b]

Negotiation roll
To get info before accepting job and figuring out payment

Rolled 11d6 : 6, 1, 5, 4, 2, 6, 3, 1, 6, 2, 4, total 40

[Oath]

<Mister Barrel: I'm a freelancer, and my former partner has been bought out by a relatively minor corp, you won't have to worry about some of the top security in the world bearing down on you or anything like that. They aspire to be one of the big fish and think that my plans will allow them to get there. However, I don't feel comfortable discussing the actual specifics on here. You know, its a private chat but can't always trust this to be 100% secure. Do you have a secure line of communication that you would be able to use to continue this discussion?

[Mysticsage]

>Kn1ghtwing: I'll send you a commlink number in an hour Mr, Johnson.

--Chat End--

Zephyr moved off the bed and quickly ran down to the nearest stuffer shack. He would have preferred to meet in person and get Kyoko more directly involved. But without a fixer in between who has done all the proper research and checks for the gig he could not trust it. Espically with corps involved it was better to keep himself at a somewhat more comfortable distance. The man was probably under basic surveillance, like checking his movements and numbers. But they probably wouldn't take the time to listen to every call or his matrix search if he truely kept everything on paper.

Buying the cheapest burner comm he could find and then took a bus a good half hour away from his apartment that he would be that much harder to track. He eventually stumbled across a coffin motel rented a room then sent in the number for the burner to the chat.

Zephyr spends 200 nuyen for the room and the Meta link comms

[Oath]

Zephyr

Around 5 or so minutes after sending the message with the commlink info, you receive a call. A deep, unnatural voice comes over the link. "Is this Kn1ghtwing? This is Mister Barrel."

[Mysticsage]

Zephyr could feel the close walls of the coffin hotel and held his breath slightly. "Yes Mr. Barrel, now you have your secured line so lets talk specifics shall we? Let's start with the questions from before." He tried his best to keep his voice even and not allow the small spaces catch his voice and carry it back over the line. This thing was cheep so he did not trust it to do a better job then attempting to talk through a piece of string. "We'll talk payment options after I hear the whole thing."

[Oath]

The voice continued to come over the line heavily modulated. My former partner has been bought by Verrill & Wynn Inc. a small business that is on the uptick. I've created the blueprints for a new security system that had been gaining favor among quite a few companies, and many offers were coming my way. However I would prefer for everyone's sake to withhold the names of the innocent. My former partner is one Edison  Croyle. The plans were stolen while I was asleep last night. Anything else you would like to ask?"

[Mysticsage]

Zephyr took a moment before responding, "No, I think that's enough for me to get started. But in regards to the retrieval you have quite the pickle. Designs like those lose value like a painting or a good magic trick. The more eyes that have seen them the less valuable the end product. And the second someone has found the key to breaking your system it becomes almost completely obsolete for the big buyers. The simple act of possibly losing your designs would completely destroy any prospect of selling the system to anyone. No one wants a insecure security system after all.

What's even worse is that any team you send it will have to make sure that hey destroy or steal any prototypes or copies of your work for the same reason. Truly only one copy of those designs can exist meaning that my team will not only have to take any physical research but any and all digital files as well. Which is far from impossible simply another wrinkle. Not to meantion once everything is gone he might simply blow the whistle to ensure any deals you have falls through. And as a freelancer you cannot afford to pay what I need and risk losing it all in the end regardless.

So with that in mind lets talk payment especially since we would need to do this job as soon as possible ."