Hi Craig.
Hello Craig.
Great.
Yes.
Doesn't like us unless we're nice to him.
How is your day Craig?
How is your day?
He gets cranky on us.
Craig is giving us a silent treatment.
You know, you know the reason why people used to talk to plants and rocks and stuff, right?
It's not because they're superstitious, no.
It's because the rocks and plants used to revolt whenever they were treated poorly.
They would fucking unionize.
Maybe like fuck you.
But also if you say nice words to plants they grow faster.
Has that been experimentally verified?
No.
I'm pretty sure the correlation there is that the people who talk to the plant care more about the plants than they take better care of it.
Yeah.
Anyway, Shadow Crossfit.
Yeah, what was she saying?
I'm sorry, I can't do Shadow Crossfit.
You're not into the culty thing.
I can do Shadow Walk.
How about that?
I can walk.
How about hiking?
I want a Shadow Hike.
Listen, Paul, if you want to just take us all on like an Amazonian Shatter Run where it's all like Wilderness based, I'm just saying it's an option.
Shadow Cartrip.
I know it's a kidding.
Shadow Cartrip.
Well, you know, our team just happened to end up in the Florida Keys.
No, no, no.
The team got hired before us to maintain the trees and stop the forest fires.
Why would you hire Shadow Runners to take care of trees?
And then we have to investigate a murder mystery and the killer was actually a sentient glowing crab that lives in the nearby lake.
I think they're only looking crabs.
Sorry, I'm just going to shoot the crab.
Anyway, Shadow Run.
At our wrap.
We left the team at Fred's.
Just leaving Fred's to go to the nightclub thingy.
Yep, Cecile had gotten into the van and taken the wheel.
And Kirsten had gotten on the back of the bike with D&R and Boxer was still headed back to the van if I remember right.
Yep, pretty much.
And Grace was also still in the van.
She hadn't gotten out of the van.
Yeah.
Oh, then can you run that by me one more time?
The last bit there about the van.
Grace, you were still in the van, right?
You never really left the van.
Did you?
Not physically.
She rejected out of the van.
I have Queen and the Hedgeham on.
All right.
So you guys are headed to meet this fixer who apparently knows something about your situation and is potentially able to help you with it.
And he's contacted you through Kirsten.
He wants to, he set up a meeting and he's asked that you all join him. And I think there was some question.
Grace was feeling a little bit of anxiety regarding that situation.
It's not on top of my head, but I know she expressed some concern and how this wasn't really piecing together in her head.
That was it.
Okay.
Well, in any case, traditionally, we start with an opening scene and tonight will not be different than that.
So here goes.
Seattle in February isn't pleasant.
Mix in the sixth world's ever present pollution and it gets worse.
Our camera pans down through the morning, driving mix of rain and sleet, each drop leaving a gray and greasy residue onto what appears to be a modern corporate campus.
In spite of the season and the weather, the buildings and grounds are well maintained with neat pedestrian pathways.
On one of these, a perfectly aligned cohort of men and women of all metahuman variants and ages in neat black running suits with gold trim are jogging in unison.
Their leader is an older human with a military physique and haircut.
As he bellows out cadence, the cohort responds as one, the camera zooms in on a young human woman, her face shines with pride, her blonde hair is tied back neatly into a tight shoulder length ponytail.
Both her demeanor and her perfect hair appear impervious to the grim moisture soaking her from patriots.
The camera zooms rapidly back out and across Seattle's jewelry skyline, then plunges into a more industrial neighborhood across a parking lot in which a single blacked out roadmaster sits through a set of faux western saloon doors under an unlit neon sign and into a large space decorated in the trappings of a poorly remembered and idealized neo-western barn replete with pseudo sawdust strewn plastic plank flooring and badly taxidermied glass.
The camera zooms in on a young woman with a taxidermied paracritters on the walls.
In the center of the dimly lit space, an orc hangs suspended from his bound wrists.
His head hangs down and dark blood is drooling from his split mouth.
His knees have sagged and don't support his weight.
In a circle around him stand several black clad figures.
Their postures are relaxed, their weapons at ease.
Before the orc stands a slight Asian woman dressed in an impeccable pencil skirt, well-structured jacket and pink blouse.
In her right hand she wields an evil looking knife.
It is not long or oddly shaped, but its dark sheen and thin blade resonate with intent.
Dark blood runs down the blade across the woman's hand and drips into the faux sawdust.
She says, we traced her comlink to this location.
Where is she?
The orc moans.
I swear, I don't know nothing more.
They was here and then they left in a grid guide.
That cat woman come back and got her bike the next day.
They had a talking horsey and it was nice.
Please don't hurt Kirsten.
She's just a girl.
The Asian woman hisses in frustration.
She wipes the blade on the orc's shirt and then it disappears underneath her jacket.
She stalks off towards the door.
One of the figures in Black Armor steps up and places the muzzle of a heavy pistol against the left armpit of the orc and pulls the trigger.
The pistol bucks and the orc instantly slumps.
The camera follows the small Asian woman out of the door and zooms into the sky.
Yeah, she was nice.
Great. Perfect.
Quarky.
This is where I have to give some bad news.
I am going to have to finish that poster real quick.
I'll be back.
It's going to be a while.
Yeah. Do you guys remember that character?
I do.
That was the first week I showed up.
Yeah.
I didn't have a character yet.
He was a bit slow but he deserved better.
All orcs and trolls kind of saw.
That's racist honey.
That is very incredibly racist.
Waste racism when you can't stop me.
Oh my God. Horse racism.
Yeah.
The thing is Cecil and I had talked about this later.
Veronica and I had talked about this later.
Veronica never changed the code.
Every com link has a specific identifier and code.
She was still using it.
When you guys were at the bar, she never changed that code.
So anytime she logs into the matrix through it, she's being tracked.
So unfortunately, she was tracked to that location.
In the meantime, she's taken care of that.
Sort of a bit of background.
All right. While we're waiting for Veronica, I guess I'm going to take a quick break too.
I'll be back in two minutes.
Tea break.
Yep. Tea break.
Welcome back.
Anyway, are we going to do the funny gaming thing?
Shadow run.
We thought, is it beginning?
It's beginning.
Oh God.
We went through the opening scene and we got through the opening scene.
We got through the opening scene.
We're driving to the jazz bar.
Yep. Kirsten drops Cecile and the rest of the team, the pen.
So, D&Dare, you get, well, you're not really super tech involved, right?
So your com's like super basic and in your pocket and probably not connected to you in any way.
So Kirsten's just sort of yelling at you, giving you directions.
The location of the meat is actually in Tacoma.
I believe last session, I might have said that it was in Auburn, but in any case, we're going to have to edit that out.
So she drops you a pen.
The location is in Tacoma.
It's a jazz club, a jazz and blues club called Samovar.
Can I repreview this?
Can you do what?
Can I read reviews of the jazz bar?
Yeah, absolutely.
There is apparently, it's sort of an inside kind of place where A, you can't get in unless you know somebody and B, when you do get in, it's got the reputation of hosting both up and coming artists.
And bands that are sort of niche and not so well known, but you know, very highly regarded within the jazz and blues scene.
And every now and then also has larger, more well known acts performing.
But again, it's never a, there's no cover and there's no entrance fee.
It's more of a club in the strict sense of it being a club with members, a very specific membership.
And it is definitely rumored to be connected to the shadows, which is not surprising given that it is known to be owned by a well established fixer in the Seattle shadow scene, broke up skillful.
So it has an odd reputation.
It's the kind of place that people are dying to get an invite to, but nobody really knows how to get an invite to.
A lot of angry reviews about being turned away at the door.
A lot of angry reviews about being turned away at the door, not knowing even how to find it, you know, the kind of thing like, how are we supposed to get there?
You know, nobody knows where it is.
But you know, and then in the mainstream, there's a lot of, there is actually some concern or voice, you know, that the fact that it's associated with shadow runners and potentially terrorists type of thing.
It all adds to a more of a little bit of mystery and, you know, sort of adds to the cache of the place.
Yeah.
Grace, how are you?
What are your thoughts currently on the meeting?
Of this person broke up skillful and it doesn't really piece together in her head. She is only following along and an attempt on the off chance it feels at this point that this is going to provide a meaningful and viable resolution to the crisis.
Let's call it for her and her friends.
Because they're kind of in a spot.
And Grace is looking for work, right?
No, not really. She does what she does.
Her personal enrichment and the experiences it provides.
A part of that means that she has to be able to have new yen, but not at the cost of her life.
Whereas, whereas Boxer is far more open to work, especially shadow type work.
And Deion Dare is probably sort of in the same situation.
I think Deion Dare has probably done some work in the shadows recently, but like the last little bit she's probably just been investigating on her own.
Yeah, you're looking for your first major contact in the shadows.
You're looking for your brother and you actually used to be a cop, a detective. So certainly, at least peripherally aware and knowledgeable of the shadows.
In any case, the drive to Tacoma is relatively uneventful.
It's nighttime now and Kirsten sitting on the back of your bike is giving you directions.
And as you enter Tacoma, which is down by the docks and is a very blue collar industrial area, similar in some ways to Auburn, but a little bit more has also had some upscale investment from corporations.
So there's, it has its own sort of skyline.
And, but that's not where you're going tonight apparently as you follow Kirsten's directions and as the van is following you guys, you're entering more of a seedy or blue colliery type of area with a lot of older industrial buildings and warehouses.
The area is full of bars and you know looks like local food joints and maybe some other less savory establishments.
And then your convoy, your small convoy pulls off into a side street between what appears to be an old, possibly abandoned warehouse and an ancient looking concrete industrial building.
That's, you know, discolored from decades of acid rain, the concrete or the plasque is blackened and there are no lights or anything the whole place is sort of dark and dim and the little alleyway that you guys are pulling into is completely unlit.
And you, as you enter, drive further down the alleyway, you come to a, what looks to be sort of a loading dock and service area behind this large industrial concrete building.
And there's a, there are some low light above a couple of doors, obviously there's a large roll up type door where the trucks would have pulled up and offloaded and as well as a, at least one door that's more metahuman sized.
You see several large, several figures standing around the door and in the pool of light directly under or over the door, you see a, looks like a smaller human female standing smoking a cigarette.
And so you guys pull up there, Kirsten gives you sort of the tap on the shoulder telling you to pull over into the, into the loading dock area and motions back towards the van that this is your, your destination.
So you'll park the van and get set?
I think Dean Dare probably parks the park service by click right in front of the van like the perpendicular to the van, I guess you could say.
Yeah, that's like the exact same direction as.
All right, as your vehicles pull to a stop and you start getting out, you see the woman in the light by the door sort of flick the cigarette with a practice move into the darkness.
The other figures standing around her are obviously a security team.
There's about eight of them.
Hmm, the seal goes ahead and walks in or attempts to walk towards the woman by the door.
Well, no, she's just walking toward the door.
Yeah, the woman's between you and the door.
Okay.
She's, she's a little bit smaller than you are.
Have a picture which we are going to show you.
How about the rest of you guys?
I think Dean Dare is not following behind Cecile.
She's kind of motioning for, what's her name, the NPC we have with us.
Kirsten.
Kirsten, she's like, come on, Kirsten, you're taking it in and so it's walking forward.
Yep.
Kirsten's gotten off and taken off her helmet and she's got it under her arm.
And Grace, are you staying in the van or are you getting out?
I'm trying to stay in the van.
Eventually, as a, she might like crack the window just a little bit so that she can try and listen into the conversation that's going on.
But once they actually get in, she's going to actually project and follow them from there.
Okay.
So Cecile, as you get closer to the woman, you see that obviously she's surrounded by several, several heavily armed figures.
There's a camera mounted above the door and it looks like a couple of other censored type arrays behind you, Dean Dare and Kirsten.
And I imagine Boxer, are you following along as well?
Yes.
Okay.
So the four of you get up to the woman.
The security people are watching you, but they're not in any other way reacting to you.
The woman doesn't get out of your way or anything.
She's standing there and she looks at Cecile and Boxer and then at Dean Dare and she says, I'm Nadia.
Good evening Nadia.
Shall we go inside or Dean Dare?
Look, sir.
I know Kirsten.
Kirsten, you're not coming inside with us.
Kirsten looks a little disappointed but doesn't say anything.
And then Nadia looks at Boxer and Dean Dare and Cecile again and she says, I believe we're missing one of your party.
The horse?
I think Dean Dare just says the horse and looks back at the van.
Isn't she coming?
Nadia glances over at the van and says, yes, the horse.
Good.
You green person, go get the horse then.
You think you have the confidence to order me around Norm?
Right.
Okay, you too.
I'll get the goddamn horse.
Thanks.
She goes back and gets goddamn horse.
Nightingale very much refuses to physically leave the van.
There is probably a little bit of a scuffle.
Eventually she agrees to manifest right out of the gate and walk as a wispy.
Very much, she looks exactly like a spirit.
This unusually well put together paracrider, except it's ephemeral and almost translucent,
but not quite, at least not enough to really matter wearing a cloak and practitioner's cap,
but nothing else.
She can be sensed and she can sense conversation and stuff, but she's not physically there.
It's more to put their hands through her, she would just be passing right through.
Is she astrally present?
She's actually perceiving an astrally present.
She doesn't actually have her physical senses, but it's a direct psychic connection that
allows her to understand what people are intending with their words, for example.
As the moment you manifest in that way, you see that there are two watcher spirits hanging
around close to you as well as two spirit of beasts, and that there appears to be a fairly
robust manabary around the building.
The woman that the rest of the group has been talking to is magically active as one of the
security people.
I'm going to make an ascending check just to see the full story of how magically active
they are, I suppose.
Okay, so go ahead.
Ew, I forgot the table.
Got the book open here somewhere.
Yeah, I just had this table open.
Class of the magical subject.
The subject's essence and magic being higher or lower or equal is three.
Say that again, please.
So the important thing is I can sense cyberware implants, the class of the magical subject,
including if they're like a magician or an adept or what.
If I've seen their aura before, I may recognize it regardless of physical disguises, since
she's always a sensing.
That's some kind of possible.
And also the general state of the subject's health, their general emotions, and yeah.
All right, so you are ascensing her.
Yeah.
She's, like I said, she's magically active.
She's probably in your range from a magical ability and power standpoint.
Don't forget her emotional state.
She's, yeah, she's not.
Unfortunately, you would say that she's more bored and maybe somewhat annoyed.
And, you know, as you look around yourself, you see the two watchers spirits.
They're just little balls of, look like little balls of fuzzy electricity bouncing around,
but they don't seem to be in any way, you know, focused exclusively on you or your team as
well, and neither do the spirits of beast.
The spirits of beast appear to just be patrolling the perimeter of the mana barrier.
I see.
How long is it at this point?
That you guys have been there.
How long, I mean, it just took you, you know, less than a minute to walk up to Nadia and
her to introduce yourself.
The time would have been, how long did it take Boxer to persuade Grace to manifest?
She probably would have done it very quickly, but I don't imagine Boxer would have been
aware of what Grace was going to do.
So she wouldn't have suggested it.
So Grace would have to process it on her own while basically being told you have to physically come here now, you know.
Yeah.
So you guys have probably been there less than a minute at this point.
And, you know, Boxer goes, gets Grace.
And Nadia manifests as this sort of ephemeral being and Nadia is watching all this happen, probably as Boxer walked back to the van.
Nadia reached back into her jacket and pulled out another packet of cigarettes and lit another one.
And is sitting there smoking sort of in that posture that you see in the picture that I attached.
And she's sort of waiting for you guys to get all come up there.
Well, it appears the horse is here.
Yes, the horse is here.
I suppose we'll open the man of barrier shouldn't be a problem for her then.
That's fine.
If you want to wait out here, she seems to address the words towards Grace.
If you want to wait out here physically, that's fine.
I would prefer that.
Is she a sensing right now?
Can she tell that I'm not physically there?
Because I was thinking that she might look kind of like a normal spirit, if that makes sense.
You can't tell.
Well, I guess you can tell by her words.
Well, I would be able to tell because when she's a sensing, when she's actually perceiving, she would be dual-natured.
Yeah, either that or she's the watcher spirit or something else has communicated it to her.
I see.
Grace is just going to say, yes, I would very much prefer that.
Nadia just shrugs, flips the rest of the second cigarette that she's lit that she's barely smoked back off into the darkness.
She looks at Kirsten and says, well, Kirsten, like I said, you can't come in tonight.
So I would appreciate it if you would just either wait here or wait in the van with your friend.
Kirsten doesn't say anything. She just nods and walks back to the van.
Weird question. How far did she flick the cigarette butt away?
Probably just over the edge of the loading dock.
I think nine for later.
I think D&J would probably step down off the loading dock to make sure the cigarette butt is out.
Okay. It is fairly drizzly and rainy, so nothing's dry here.
But you step down. The security detail watches you, but nobody makes any kind of move to intervene or anything.
Nadia watches you.
I think as D&J steps up, she says, wouldn't want to start a fire.
You see a small flicker of a smile flitted across Nadia's face, and she just nods and motions towards the plastic steel door, which opens before you.
I think D&J would probably push past Cecil at this point.
Excuse you.
So D&J enters first, and then Cecil is behind her and Boxer and Grace.
Yeah. The mana barrier has been moved or something, right?
You're basically being allowed to pass through it.
Well, she's just going to do that. We're walking with Boxer.
Yep. So it opens in front of you. I think the barrier is probably there enough or whatever kind of barrier it is there that both Grace and Cecil feel a distinct sensation of having passed through either a ward or a mana barrier.
And on the other side of the door is a large barrier room, and on the far side of that is another plastic steel door very similar to the one that you just walked through.
Nadia sort of is leading the way, and the exterior door closes behind you.
You feel a sensation of air pressure changing. Why don't you guys all make a perception check?
Would I even make a check? Does that have my physical senses?
No. You don't need to make a physical check.
Okay.
Yeah. So Boxer, you're fairly hyper aware. Your combat experiences are cluing you in here.
This is sort of an airlock chamber. The back doors closed behind you. The door ahead of you is still closed.
You feel the air cycling in the four corners of the room.
You see camera and sensor arrays as well as what look like automatic weapon turrets.
Nothing bad is happening, but you can tell that these are fairly sophisticated and extraordinary security measures that you guys are passing through.
D&D and Veronica, you're basically seeing a large room, the doors.
You feel the pressure change, and you're probably attributing it to the fact that the big door just closed behind you.
You probably see the camera arrays and things like that.
But other than that, it seems like a fairly standard sort of hallway with another door, which Nadia looks back at you and nods and then opens the inner door.
And this door, when it opens, now you suddenly are hearing music. You're hearing jazz. You're hearing a woman singing in a very low and slow voice,
accompanied by what sounds like a fairly standard jazz quartet with a bass and a horn and probably some percussion instruments.
You don't understand the language that... Go ahead.
Do I recognize it? I have a one point in music.
Yeah, go ahead and let's roll it.
Is it actually being sung by a person? Or is it on recording?
Nope, it is being sung by a person.
And it sounds like some kind of probably 20th century Brazilian jazz. So she's probably singing in Portuguese.
Good to know.
Oh, I have Spanish. Obviously, it's not a perfect intelligibility.
No, it's probably close enough where you probably can pick up some of the words and intent.
Cool.
But as the door opens and go ahead, D'Andre.
Has D'Andre heard this song before? She's old as fuck. So if this song was ever popular, then she'd probably know it.
It's possible. Maybe it does sound familiar to you. Did you hang out in Brazil a lot?
Probably not.
Well, I mean, could be, right?
Yeah.
So, you know, the second door is opened up and you get this burst of music coming through it.
Not really a burst. I mean, the voice is very low and slow and just sort of melodic and harmonic.
But as the door opens, you see that it's just another dark hallway in front of you.
And at the end of it, you see some dim light filtering through what appeared to be some heavy red curtains.
And Nadia just keeps walking ahead of you.
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