Date 27/01/2060, Location 40.01686, 48.86843

The truck pulled out of the clearing, back onto the battered and bumpy track, bouncing its way down towards the main road. The moon shone through the bare branches, casting rays of diffuse white light onto the potted surface. Marius fired up his internal commlink and made a call – first to his friend Anatoly in Tbilisi. The phone didn't even ring – just went straight to a dead tone. Marius checked the number and redialled, but got the same result. Apparently Anatoly had changed his number at some point, or something had happened to him. Marius being officially "dead" had some drawbacks, it seemed – he missed out on the gossip. He tried another number, that of Georgi Koralov, his talislegger who was also based in Tbilisi. He rang, and Georgi picked up after two rings. Fortunately Marius and Georgi had already had "the chat" about his supposed death.

"Georgi, we're heading for Constantinople, from Baku, and I was thinking about swinging through Tbilisi to come and see you. We're in the market for work, either way, if you have any?"

"Hmm, I don't have anything that needs shipping that way at the moment, and nothing really to come back. Unless. Hrmm." The line went silent for perhaps fifteen seconds. Marius waited, letting the truck roll gently down the track and steering around the worst of the potholes.

"I do have one possible thing. But I warn you – it's a hot job, very hot. You'll definitely need magical support – I'm guessing you have that shaman with you still?" Marius confirmed they did, and then Georgi continued, "Well, if you're up for it, then sure, come on over and we can have a chat. It will be a hot job though – this one is definitely not going to be smooth sailing. But pay is appropriate, I'm sure."

Marius arranged to meet him at the Café Regal, in the centre of Tbilisi – a place they'd both been to before with business, meeting at 13:00. Just as he was about to hang up, Marius thought of one more thing.

"Oh hey, Georgi – have you heard anything about Anatoli Chevenny?" There was a snort from the other end of the phone.

"Anatoli? Let's just say he got himself involved with some bad people and got in a bit of trouble a week or two ago. He's pretty much disappeared – trying to lay low, I guess, and avoid them finding him. I'll see if anyone knows where he is, and let you know tomorrow…" Marius broke the connection, as they reached the bottom of the track, turning onto the side road and heading down to the valley bottom and the main road. As the truck idled down the slope, the intercom fired up, and Marius spoke.

"So, Kai. I take it we're heading to Constantinople now, right – to see my contact and get some fake IDs set up? Via Tbilisi first, to go meet with my talislegger, and see about a possible job?"

Kai pulled up his pocket computer and zoomed out on the map, checking distances and terrain, then nodded agreement. He turned and poked Hunter in the ribs.

"Plot us a route, would you – main roads as far as you can, but avoid any trouble spots." Hunter nodded and started checking the route, looking for various alternate paths to Tbilisi, and on to Constantinople. After checking the news, information about the country on some matrix sites and discussion with Marius, they agreed that the coastal roads around the Black Sea were likely to be the safest and fastest routes, with the least chance of trouble.

Five minutes later, Hunter had the first leg of the route plotted and had thrown the details over to Marius and the auto-nav, bringing them to a retail park on the south side of Tbilisi where there should be room to park up for a few hours. The journey was around four hundred and fifty kilometres, and would probably take five to six hours, depending on trouble – getting them there about 06:00. That gave them a few hours of sleep, then some time to head into town for the meeting. Marius accelerated smoothly and the truck swung off the side road, heading north-west on the main road, accelerating to about ninety-five kilometres per hour.

Aswon and Kai moved into the back, Kai climbing into his rack and pulling a blanket over him, trying to get a bit of shut eye. Aswon got near his hammock, and realised it was full of guns – rifles, pistols, spare clips – all piled in a heap.

"What are all these guns doing in my hammock?" Hunter appeared in the doorway with a smile on his face.

"Gimme a minute. I was just sorting them out. Don't worry." He squeezed through the doorway into the back, and moved the guns, splitting them into piles on the table and then sorting them into storage boxes. Whilst he was waiting, Aswon sighed and moved back into the front of the truck, to find that Nadia had quickly moved into his spot, and was curled up with her feet under her, taking up the entire space. He glared at the back of her head, then headed into the back of the truck again, and waited for Hunter to finish sorting out the pile of liberated firearms they had acquired over their journey. Eventually, his hammock was empty and he was able to climb in and pull a blanket over himself, and interlace his fingers behind his head. He closed his eyes, and relaxed, letting the swaying of the hammock as the truck drove along the road, lull him.

"Oh, this smells good. I can definitely use that."

The rumble of the road and the engine noise droned in the background.

"Ahh, I see how they've done this formula – very clever. The impulse is all contained in the hoof print!"

The back was quiet again, and Aswon and Kai drifted towards sleep…

"Ohh, these herbs are perfectly preserved, excellent quality!"

After a few minutes, they both fixed Tadibya with a glare, until she realised that she was still making lots of random noises whilst she examined her new purchases. She looked up with a guilty expression on her face, and then put the new stuff down, and climbed up in her bunk too, curling up into a tiny ball like she normally did.

Whilst the back of the truck settled down to sleep, in the front Nadia stirred against the unmoving form of Marius. Glancing around the truck, she saw Shimazu in the front right seat, and Hunter in the back left. She looked from one to the other a few times, then drew an almost imperceptible breath and climbed into the centre back seat. She kept an arm in touch with Marius, almost as if he gave her confidence, then turned to Shimazu

"Hello. We haven't really chatted much, but now seems like a good time."

Shimazu turned towards her and stared at her for a few seconds with a blank expression on his face.

"Ok." Shimazu's voice was flat and uninflected, and he gave no change of expression or body cues. Nadia tried again, asking a few more questions – but each time Shimazu answered it was a perfectly polite – but flat, closed and minimal answer. After she had asked him half a dozen questions, Shimazu reached down between his feet and pulled out the small bag that was nestled there, and removed the set of lock picks and a few practice locks, along with the data slate holding the "how to pick locks" instruction manual.

"Here. This might interest you." He handed over the items to Nadia, who peered at them, examining each in turn. When she looked up to ask Shimazu a question about them, she found him turned away from her, staring out of the window into the darkness. She looked at him for a moment, and decided that she was unlikely to win him over that night. Instead she turned towards Hunter.

"So, hi. Um. Do you want to talk?" She sounded a little defensive when she asked, expecting similar treatment from the large ork, who had shown little interest. However, she was surprised when Hunter turned and gave her his full attention, and started to chat with her. To begin with, he asked her how she normally dressed, and did her makeup – and then started to offer some advice on how she could change her appearance. He kept asking her for words in Azerbaijani, and then explaining more concepts. They chatted away for the next hour, and Nadia realised with a start that at least half the conversation was now taking part in her native tongue. She stopped and looked at Hunter with an odd expression.

"I learn fast. Very fast." Hunter didn't mention the extensive bioware enhancements of cultured and tweaked material inserted into his brain directly into the centres that controlled the learning and assimilation of knowledge.

They continued to talk, and Hunter continued to pick up the local accent and nuances of the language, and was soon sounding as natural as Nadia. By about 03:00, Nadia was spending as much time yawning as she was speaking, and Hunter told her to get her head down. He, in turn, climbed through into the back, gave Aswon a nudge and crawled into bed himself. When Aswon climbed through into the cabin, he took over the watch from Shimazu, who also headed to sleep. Marius pushed on, keeping the truck moving as they drove up into the lowlands and mountains of the trans-caucaus ridge. They kept up a steady speed, the huge engine providing more than enough power to keep the truck at full speed up the mountain roads.

Traffic was remarkably light, and they saw very little else on the road, either good or bad. The weather held, and there was no ice or snow to slow them down on the route. Neither did they encounter any toll booths, bandits or police inspections, nor other unexpected troubles and they made good time. Around 05:45, the pulled up in the shopping centre, a large retail centre a little way to the south of town. The large car park was nearly deserted, with only a few cars parked up near the McRonalds burger joint. Marius jumped out of the truck and stretched, working his muscles and getting the blood flowing around his body again, waking Nadia in the process. Aswon joined them and they headed in to grab some breakfast, getting a large selection of soy-muffins and some hot black soy-caff.

They sat and enjoyed their breakfast in relative quiet, watching as the first few employee cars for the other stores limped into the car park, and headed in to get their own breakfasts – some of them eating as the team did, and some just buying several cups of coffee and trying to wake themselves up. Once they had breakfasted, Nadia and Marius returned to the truck, and Marius made to settle himself down. Nadia insisted on tucking him in, and settled down next to him, actually picking up the book on lock-picking and making a start on the first chapter.

Shortly after dawn Tadibya awoke, yawned and then started to summon a new spirit. Still half asleep, and running a little low on sleep, she didn't perform at her best. A spirit answered her call, and agreed to guard the truck, but she appeared to suffer a little from her lack of concentration. She grabbed a coffee and some painkillers and settled down for some breakfast, too, though, and twenty minutes later appeared to be back to usual.

Aswon grabbed Tadibya and suggested they go for a ride, scoping out the local area and checking on the town. Once Tadibya was feeling back to normal, they grabbed one of the bikes from the rack on the back of the truck, and headed north into town.

Tbilisi was an odd mix of architectural styles. In places it was very similar to Baku – low-walled buildings, roughly made from local stone and brick, rendered with a muddy coloured plaster and with rooves of tin, they appeared to be close to a hundred years old and generally in a poor state of repair. Row upon row of these were found, in large districts with narrow winding streets, lean-to garages and intermingled factories and businesses. Then, for no discernible reason, a modern building thrust from the ground in a mix of plasteel and glass, with modern security measures and automated systems proudly on display. Several of these modern commercial or residential towers would lay along-side the road, then it would shift back to the primitive and low tech huts. There was no rhyme or reason for this, and no pattern that could be seen. However, the modern developments showed that someone was investing money in the area, which meant that there was going to be service industries to support them – and presumably a seedy underbelly too, with goods and services that could be of interest to them.

As they stopped at a corner and examined the split between ancient and modern they heard labouring turbines ahead. Tadibya killed the engine and they both listened, heads rotating as they tracked the noise through the low clouds. By the sound of things it was a multi-engine jet, labouring hard. The engine noise fluctuated and then faded slightly, then rose again. Aswon spotted a wing tip emerge from the cloud, at a thirty degree angle, the strobe on the wing tip flashing. By the looks of things, the plane had come in over the ridge of the mountain, then dropped and banked hard, on approach to a runway somewhere over to their east.

They set off again, and followed the road into town. Again, there was a startling mix of old and new, intermingled at random. None of the new buildings were the truly massive arcologies or redoubts that could be found in western cities, but there were still towers that must have been forty or fifty storeys high, rubbing shoulders with five storey brick buildings with ornate iron grillwork on their verandas. They drove around a bit, seeing early morning businesses such as bakers and street cleaners at work, some local police patrols and the very early birds from offices starting to head in. They also saw a large military vehicle, a truck very similar to their own but with a soft canvas cover rather than a hard top, loaded down with troops. They all appeared to be in full combat gear, carrying rifles and a few heavy weapons. Aswon tried to spot the flags or unit IDs as they passed, but couldn't quite make them out.

In the town they found the Café, and realised that their chance of parking anywhere nearby was going to be zero in the middle of the day. A scout around revealed a couple of car parks nearby though, so they would have no more than half a mile to walk, at the most. They also spotted a few trams doing the early morning rounds, the cars moving quietly on the tracks as they wended their way through the city centre. There didn't appear to be many buses, and they had yet to spot a rail station at all – but the tram system seemed quite comprehensive.

After a drive around to get the feel of the place, they headed back, Aswon suggesting a different road to try and get a view of a different part of town. After twenty minutes of riding, they discovered another interesting detail about Tbilisi. It was apparently nestled in the valley between several large mountains, and the roads led out along the valleys in radically different directions. The steep-sided hills tended to constrain the houses, roads and civilisation to narrow ribbons, with very little choice for traversing from one valley to another. The city centre was at a conflux of a dozen separate roads, and once you started travelling up a valley, there were few places you could cross over to another, short of travelling back to the centre and trying another "spoke". Eventually they found a cross route and got back onto the southern road leading back to the shopping centre and the truck.

Arriving back at the truck at around 10am, they found Kai just waking up Hunter, asking him to run some checks on the local area. In particular, he was looking for stories about heists and jobs that could make life difficult for them, as a noticeable bunch of "out of towners". Hunter connected up to the matrix and ran a search, spending a while looking but not finding anything specific – at least not beyond the basic low level crime that was part of any city. Meanwhile Kai was looking at the borders and route mapped out for their journey to Constantinople.

The major worry was the ongoing guerrilla war between the Kurds and the Turks – their route took them pretty much through Kurdistan no matter which way they went, unless they looked at a major diversion of thousands of miles. That meant travelling through contested territory, running the risk from both sides. If they didn't disguise the truck, the Kurds would probably think they were a Turkish unit and launch an attack. With small arms, they were unlikely to cause any damage now they had increased the armour on the truck – but they were bound to be in contact with other units, and could likely rustle up some heavier weapons given time. The Turks, on the other hand, had access to generally heavier weapons and were better equipped as standard, and if they saw them might think the Kurds had captured a patrol or stolen the vehicle. Either way, it was likely they would both shoot first, then ask questions.

At around midday, they fired the truck up and started the drive into the centre of town. They quickly discovered that daytime traffic was as bad as most other cities, with frequent jams and tailbacks at intersections. Worse though, was the attitude of drivers, which was decidedly territorial and somewhat suicidal. Regardless of the size of the vehicle, if a driver was even a nose ahead, they considered it fair game to just swerve from lane to lane, or to cut someone up. Marius had grown somewhat used to being able to use the truck's size and origins to help push through traffic, and was unprepared to deal with someone in a small Lada playing chicken with him – and apparently not knowing when to flinch. Progress was slow, and even though they were not moving that fast most of the time, everyone buckled up as Marius had to slam the brakes on with alarming frequency. By the time they reached the centre of town there was a fairly low-level constant muttering in guttural German coming from the speakers, which made most of the team smile.

They reached the car park, and an ancient-looking wizened man emerged from the cabin and shuffled up to the truck, babbling at them in Georgian. They managed to translate with a little effort that he wanted to charge them extra because of the size of the vehicle, and that it was going to cost fifty Nuyen for parking. Marius dug out a credstick, and waved it at the man, who retried his reader and keyed in the amount, ready to take payment. Marius leant over though, and pushed the "tip" button, putting an extra fifty on the bill, before slotting his stick. The old man's face lit up with a beaming smile, revealing a toothless grin amidst the deeply lined and mottled skin, and he thanked Marius profusely. As the team got ready for the walk into town, he could be seen returning to the cabin, and emerging a minute later with a chamois leather and some cleaning products and heading to the truck, to the approval of Marius.

Kai looked around the team, doing a quick check. Nobody had anything heavier than a pistol it seemed, which were secreted under jackets and inside coats. Nothing that should attract the attention of the local police, for sure, and they would probably not have any issues with weapons scanners. Even if they did get rumbled, a small bribe might be enough to take care of things. They set off and wandered in to the centre of town, doing a little sightseeing along the way and enjoying the easy walk through the crisp January air.

They arrived at the Café with a few minutes to spare. Kai, Hunter, Shimazu and Nadia looked around with interest, whilst Tadibya and Aswon were mostly comparing it to the scene from earlier that morning. The Café Regal was set on the space between two fairly main roads that both arrived into a busy square or plaza. The roads angled in, not quite triangular, but with the front definitely narrower than the rear. The front section was given over to seating, with folding chairs and tables scattered around the place, cordoned off the street with folding fencework made of lightweight metal grilles and decorative plaques with the names of local beers shown in faded paintwork. The café itself was a solidly built stone building, about five storeys tall. The bottom two were the café itself, with wide windows and doors leading to the interior with more tables and chairs, a long counter and the kitchens. The top floors appeared to be offices, accessed via narrow stairs on each of the main roads at the rear of the property. The seats were half filled, but nearly all of the tables were covered in the remains of lunch, plates mostly cleared and covered in scrunched up napkins and dirty cutlery. It certainly explained why Georgi had told them 13:00 and not 12:00 – they had obviously just missed the lunchtime rush.

Tadibya was looking around with a slightly distant frown of concentration – gazing into the astral plane rather than the physical. She saw the odd watcher spirit, and a few elementals in the centre of town, but astral space was pretty quiet for a major population centre. Certainly it was far quieter than Baku or Tashkent, which were roughly the same in terms of being the capitals (or former capitals) of their countries. She shrugged a little – there must be a reason, but she had no idea what it was. It was enough for now though, that she couldn't spot anything magically active that was trailing or observing them, and there didn't appear to be any active threats against them.

Aswon was glancing around the place looking at the high buildings, balconies, ornate stonework on the older buildings and the myriad positions that he could have set up in to provide overwatch for a meeting like this. He studied the area as carefully as Tadibya had, looking for the tell-tale signs of a sniper perch or a surveillance station, but didn't spot anything. That wasn't to say there wasn't one of course – just that he couldn't see one in the high-density area.

Marius had gone over to a large heavy-set man, who appeared to be in his late forties. He had a dark complexion and eyes deeply recessed into his face, made more pronounced with the massive dark curly beard and crop of wiry-looking black hair on top of his head. He wore a battered leather jacket with most of the buttons done up, in deference to the weather, along with a pair of western style blue jeans and some heavy work boots. A slim cigar was jammed into the corner of his mouth, and he was sitting at about the only clear space in the café, with two tables pushed together and seven free chairs clustered around them.

Georgi pushed himself up and out of his seat as he saw Marius, greeting him with a hearty handshake and a slap on the shoulder, then worked his way through the line as Marius introduced him. The handshake was firm and strong – not quite a crushing show of dominance, but definitely not a pro-forma show of politeness or social convention. With each handshake came a smile and a nod of the head, along with a few seconds of eye contact and it seemed to be a meaningful thing for him. Once everyone was greeted, he waved for them to sit, and passed the menu around to them.

"It is good to see you again, Marius, it's been a while. And to you, my new friends – welcome to Tbilisi. You are welcome to look at the menu, but I would recommend the Sava for you all – it is particularly fine here."

He watched as people nodded, and then called for the waiter, and ordered eight plates of Sava and a round of coffee for everyone. When the coffee came it was incredibly strong, bitter and black – served in tiny little cups. Georgi sipped at the scalding liquid and smacked his lips in obvious appreciation. While they were waiting for the meal, he made small talk, asking about the weather where they had come from, admiring Aswon's teeth, asking about the journey over. The team played along, asking how "business" was, what was going on in the town, what the weather was like here – all fairly innocuous questions. Nadia sat quietly, soaking in the conversation and listening carefully, all the while sitting close to Marius.

Dinner arrived about ten minutes later, and was deep bowls of some kind of meat stew. The meat – or soy substitute more likely given the price – was tender and tasty, being in a thick vegetable broth with small potatoes and sprigs of green garnish scattered over the top. Steam rose from the surface in the cool air, and everyone tucked in before it got cold. The meal was hearty and filling, and surprisingly tasty, and conversation was limited as they consumed their fill. As they neared the end of the meal, chasing the last dregs of Sava around the bowl with bread, Georgi started to quiz the team more seriously.

"So, Marius I know. No problem. This I guess is Tads, your shaman. You others, hmmm." He looked at Hunter, Shimazu, Aswon and Nadia. "Muscle, yes. Good muscle. But near or far I wonder. Hmmm?" This time his considering noise had a definite note of interrogation to it. Aswon, Hunter and Shimazu glanced at each other, with varying levels of amusement and mild annoyance at being categorised thus. Shimazu broke the silence first.

"I tend to carry my sword, and provide close-in protection. Georgi nodded, then looked to Aswon.

"Ahh, then I guess that makes you the long-range muscle. Wiry and good physique, hmm?" Aswon just nodded.

"And I cover mid to long range, close if needed," said Hunter. Georgi turned his gaze to Nadia, who glanced to Marius first, then Kai, and then spoke up when she'd received a tiny nod from them both.

"I do logistics and maintenance. And…. that's it." For a moment she sounded like she was going to say more, but decided against it.

"So! Good! Know I know you, know your team. This is excellent. Now, Marius knows Georgi, so you must all know me too. Georgi arranges for things to move, from here to there, magical things. This is no surprise to you I think. But Georgi moves high-value things, with significant risk. Things that need guarding by teams, not groups of individuals. You understand?" He looked around, waiting for nods or signals of acknowledgement from them.

"So, the job is to collect something in Constantinople. There will be hmmm, perhaps four things. Each thing about the size of a large cleaning robot. Things will be hot, very hot. You will need strong magical defences to hide them, and there is good chance that you will be chased and attacked. This much is certain, I say. Now, normal obstacles, border guards and such like – a small bribe would suffice I think, perhaps fifty to a hundred Nuyen per head. But there is risk, much risk, from the things. Pay is good though…"

The team looked at each other, then Kai piped up.

"Can we have a few minutes to discuss this?"

"Of course. I am almost out of cigars, so I will go buy some more." Georgi showed the almost empty box of cigars, the result of him chain-smoking them through the meal and subsequent chat. He got up from the table and headed into the café to hunt fresh supplies.

Aswon waited until Georgi was not quite out of hearing range and then announced clearly "Well, I have no problems with the job, so I'm in."

The rest of the team waited until he was out of earshot, and then set to with the discussion. Tadibya was first to speak.

"I'm really not sure I can make a ward high enough to protect this cargo – whatever it is. I can summon spirits to protect us, and spell cast, sure. But if this thing is as magical as he says it is, I'm not sure I can hide it."

"You're the spirit-talker. You'll be fine." Aswon smiled at her, revealing the large canines implanted on either side of his mouth. "I have faith that you can protect these things, if you put your mind to it. My main concern is the distance we will have to cover through contested territory – potentially dodging attacks from both sides."

The conversation flowed back and forth – discussing the route, the number of bribes. How dangerous this could be for the team, and how likely they were to engage in combat. How much it would cost them in fuel for the trip, and how much they would need in bribes. It was decided that if they took the job, they would want Georgi to provide some of the money up front in cold hard cash, so they could use that for the bribes, making it harder to trace them. Kai did a quick check around the table, and found that nobody had any serious issues with the job, nothing at least that would stop them from taking the contract on.

Georgi returned from the café, lighting the first of his new pack of cigars with the embers of the last, and sat down at the table. He quickly looked around the table, assessing the body language and mood, and then turned to Kai.

"So, you will take the job then? You are happy for more details and to discuss pay?"

"Yes. We're sure we have the skills to cover this, and the equipment needed, so let's get some more details on what we'll be moving, and how much the contract is worth."

"Excellent. Well, the pickup will be a collection of magical parts. I have another team who have a line on a golem, and they assure me they can capture and disable it – but they could not move it. So they will obtain the parts, and meet with you. You will then carry the parts here, back to Tbilisi and deliver them to me. For the delivery run, I will pay fifty thousand."

Kai listened to him, his face impassive and revealing nothing of his thoughts. Despite their best efforts though, some of the rest of the team winced a little. Kai leant back and rearranged some of the cups on the table, his hands moving to offer some distraction whilst the rest of the team got themselves back under control.

"Well, fifty thousand is a good starting point, but if this is going to be a hot pickup – and it sounds very much like it is – then we're going to need a little extra. Otherwise the cost of fuel, bribes, repairs and replacement ammo is going to eat through most of that, before we cover any magical protections and consumable supplies needed."

Georgi sat back and stroked his beard, pulling the hairs straight with his hand and letting them spring back into place.

"I see. Well, this is indeed likely to be a hot pickup, as you say. I could perhaps go as far as to offer sixty five."

Kai and Georgi continued to negotiate between them, sipping coffee and discussing the various pros and cons. After another ten minutes of gentle negotiations, they agreed on a price of sixty five thousand, with one third up front, two very low level magical sustaining foci if the team had to grab the gear in a hot-pickup, as well as sustain magical attack during the transport, and they would ensure their drop off to Georgi would take place somewhere in the hills above Tbilisi, with no active pursuit – though Georgi would try and help them with any pursuit when they were back inside the boundaries of old Georgia.

Having worked out the final details, Kai and Georgi exchanged handshakes over the table, and toasted each other with another cup of the bitter black coffee. Georgi paid the bill for lunch, and slid over a certified credstick and some local paper currency to Kai, who quickly scooped it up, passing it to Hunter under the table. Moments later, they rose from their chairs, and handshakes were exchanged once again, before they started to file out of the seating area.

"Oh, Georgi! Did you catch up with a number for Anatoli at all?" asked Marius.

"Ahh, yes, I'd completely forgotten. Yes, I've managed to dig him out – or at least a contact number. Here." He pulled out his phone and fired the number across to Marius. "I'm not sure you'll find him physically – he's still laying low. But you should be able to talk to him."

Hunter checked the credstick and found it had twenty thousand Nuyen on it, and there was a further five grand in cash of local currency and some bearer bonds and other non-traceable funds.

The team assembled, and started to walk back to the car park to retrieve the truck.

Kai turned to Tadibya. "So… magical golems. What do you know about them?"

Tadibya shrugged. "Not a lot. Yet. I guess it's time for some research on the journey over there."