[Scan this: the logs from our commlink tac-net really help me when I finally get around to journaling these 'runs. Given the incriminating details, I should probably get NVISIGOTH to hook me up with some wiz encryption, but I'll just make sure to store the only copy on an external chip until then. That way, there's nothing on my comm, in case it's hacked...]
I was a bit surprised when Charlotte called so quickly after the last 'run, but I was happy the team would get some more work, since we could all use a little extra cred after I blew 3k¥ paying for info during the last job! Word was that Charlotte needed muscle and fast: a Denver associate of hers has a team in the area who got pinched running an extraction job and needs us to take over on delivery.
Charlotte mentioned her fellow fixer had called in a favor, and she intended to make good on it. While on conference call with Charlotte and the rest of my crew, I decided to make sure we all knew what were getting into, so I asked a bit about the nature of the "favor". For some reason, it made a difference to me whether we were risking our hoops for cred on account of a solid friendship or no-nonsense bit of business. Charlotte made it clear that this was all business, and I can scan that. Plus, the 5k¥ she was going to pay each of us was enough to convince me I needed the job.
Fortunately, the rest of the team wanted in as well, and while N was not available (off his meds, I heard...), Charlotte took care of the staffing issue by reconnecting Kraner, Rock, and I with some old familiar partners: Gunther and Hawkshaw, my favorite trolls! Big as boulders, twice as tough, and way sharper than the stereotypical trog ganger - these are the guys you want on your team! Hawkshaw spends his days working the P.I. gig, so he's resourceful and has some hacking skills, plus a few useful drones; a splash of subtlety in an unlikely package! Gunther fits the "freaky" theme we tend to have all too well: a gay Austrian troll loaded with cyber from his days working as a bodyguard to techno musicians who now manages bands by day and runs the shadows for thrills to "vade through ze seas of blood," as he puts it.
With everyone on board for the 'run, Charlotte shared the data, and we got to work. The extraction job the Denver team was on went south, and they got pinched by some corp's security. Half their crew was dead, most of the rest were at the hospital, and the last two were holed up with the package, a small sealed aluminum case (easily portable by 1 person). Our job was to insure delivery of the package (we'd find out where when we contacted the Denver team); seeing to the remaining members of the Denver team was secondary to delivering the goods.
Armed with the address of their safehouse at Midnight's, a ork- and troll-friendly restaurant in Touristville on the fringe of the Barrens, we headed into the area. We met up a couple of blocks away at a nearby joint, Lyla's. From there, we got a feel for the area: Midnight's was below street level in a corner shopping arcade. As Charlotte had told us, the place was closed for the night, but they were supposed to answer the door when we made ourselves known and gave Charlotte's name.
I went for a quick astral scouting mission and found nothing much outside or just inside the front door of Midnight's that set off the willies, mundane or mystical, so we decided to move ahead, cautiously. Proceeding as a group, we were all eyes-on, and that alertness paid off when Hawkshaw spotted a balloon drone hanging out across the street from Midnight's, up above the buildings and with sensors aimed at the door. Since he couldn't hack the drone's controls, Hawkshaw sent up his own balloon drone to scout out the area and found us a dead end back alley entrance, with nobody watching it. Trickster always tells me the best plans start out backwards, so I figured we were on to something...
As we made our way around back (taking the long way to avoid the drone out front), Kraner and I set up a few spells - the dwarf got all reflex-y and armored, while I decided to go invisible. Meanwhile, the rest of the team made ready with the weaponry. As we approached the door, I invisibly backed up Hawkshaw as he announced us and dropped Charlotte's name to get us inside. The big pot-bellied ork that answered was looking all business, so I decided against pranking the chummer while I was invisible - even though it would have been hi-fraggin-larious!
Once we got inside and into the kitchen (between the back room leading to the alley and the restaurant area out front), I dropped my invisibility spell and we assessed the situation. Things were definitely bad for the Denver team: of the five people in the kitchen, only two of them were from the aborted 'run - the other three were ork workers from Midnight's. A quick meet-and-greet brought us up to speed: Delia (a human woman) and K-9 (a male ork) claimed the data had been good and the extraction of the case went smooth, right up to the point that the security response arrived early. Fortunately for my team, these two had the case, and we were in a position to take possession and continue the mission.
Unfortunately, K-9 was in bad shape, so Rock made with the wiz first aid and Kraner cast his wiz Heal spell to help the chummer out. Delia handed off the case and said they'd be good laying low at Midnight's if we took the case and drew the heat off, so we agreed to make tracks. Just as Delia was finishing up a conference call with us and Rumble, the ork smuggler who was taking delivery of the goods, Hawkshaw's drone alerted us to the arrival of an armed truck in the back alley - the game was on!
Our quick and dirty plan came together: I was going to exit carrying the goods with Invisibility up and everyone else would be in the lead, with Gunther and Rock aiming to drop the enemy drone. We got off to a good start when Gunther geeked the drone with one explosive ammo burst, but then the drek hit the proverbial fan! Right on cue, sniper fire rained down on our location, but big Gunther managed to dodge both shots - thank goodness for the cover provided by Midnight's below street level entrance!
With the heat on (just how I like it!), our team leaped into action. Gunther took off down the street towards the sniper's position, laying cover fire and drawing attacks the whole way. Rock popped off a thermal smoke grenade to give us still on the stairs some extra cover. Kraner cast his wiz-bang Detect Enemies, finding four in the truck in the blind alley behind Midnight's. alley (one was a mage projecting astrally) and another one in the sniper nest. Hawkshaw ran around the outside of the shopping arcade toward the entrance of the blind alley, adding to the scatter and keeping an eye on the truck. I ran with package back towards Lyla's, where our bikes were waiting, keeping up my Invisibility spell to avoid drawing fire. Five runners on our team, four different locations, with everybody on task, and a group of five enemies set to take us down: Trickster brought us more than a little excitement!
Fortunately for us, we were expecting the whole job to go off the rails from the moment we accepted, so we had a few tricks waiting for the opposing team. Of course, they were pros, too, so they started off by sending two of theirs into Midnight's, crashing through the back towards the front. After Kraner reported detecting their motion with his spell, we all heard the big truck engine fire up in the alley.
Meanwhile, Gunther reached the street corner opposite the sniper's position, pinning down the enemy location and making plans to "deal vith ze problem" (as he would put it). Rock headed back down to the stairs to guard our exit against the oncoming and saw two enemy trolls barreling through from the back of restaurant, intent on ultraviolence. To bad for them, since our man Rock was, too. Rock nearly geeked one with his first burst from the trusty Ingram Smartgun, dropping him with the second, null sheen. Kraner blasts the other troll with a Manabolt, throwing his mojo around for some serious pain.
Before I was even halfway back to Lily's, Gunther had taken a nasty close shot from the sniper and vaulted up three flights of stairs into the parking garage while the sniper's gun was jammed. Rock geeked the remaining troll inside Midnight's with another couple of bursts and Hawkshaw managed to shrug off shots from the sniper, whose shots sounded like he switched to a pistol after jamming his rifle.
Just as I was rounding the corner of the block and running to cross the street, I heard Gunther mutter something (threat? insult? whatever...) in German over the comm as he made it to the sniper and lit the sniper sammy up with two close shots from his boomstick (the shotgun, that is...), severely wounding the enemy. At the same time, Rock and Kraner make their way back through Midnight's to deal with the truck out back. Kraner disabled the van with a Powerball, and Hawkshaw tossed a flash-bang grenade from the back of the alley to dispatch the driver, opening the way for Rock to get up close and personal. Back in the garage, Gunther double-tapped the sniper, dropping him with the first round before geeking him outright with one point-blank in the face.
Magic intel from Kraner had alerted me earlier that the enemy mage was projecting and making his way towards me, so I had looked astral and summoned up an Air Spirit to help me deal with him. Right about the time I thought we had this one in the bag, the enemy mage's fire spirit manifested right next to me - drek! Lucky for me, my man Rock ran out the back door of Midnight's and geeked the mage with another two bursts from his Ingram. Unlucky for me, fire spirits like giving me hell (literally!) on account of my smokejumping past. That's what I get for disrupting too many of them fighting the wildfires back home. Trickster says my aura smells of doused flames, and that tends to upset the fire spirits - that's why I pay extra for fireproofing my armor! As it turned out, I am a lucky slot: the fire spirit decided to leave me be after the mage died, which released the bindings on it. Just like my girl Nat always says: treat your spirits right, people, and they'll wreak havoc on your behalf - treat them wrong, and they'll leave you in a pinch!
As Gunther troll-bounded back down the garage stairs, Kraner threw a Clout spell at the driver, knocking him out so we could wrap things and get on our way. Kraner's quick Mind Probe tells us that the enemy team was hired by a Mr. Johnson wage mage to retrieve his hermetic thesis, originally stolen by the team sent by Charlotte's Denver associate. Too bad for him: Hawkshaw and I delivered the thesis to the smuggler Rumble, while Kraner, Rock, and Gunther hung back to salvage the sniper sammy's secondhand cyber, courtesy of Kraner's convenient Turn to Goo spell. (That's a trick worth learning!) Charlotte delivered on the 5k¥, and Rock's street doc contact put us in touch with a chop shop who hooked us up with another 8640¥ to split. With 6728¥ in take-home pay uploaded to my credstick, I knew I would be calling Natane soon for some spell formulae; it's time for this little shaman to learn some new tricks!