[IP] Panzerknacker Options

[Volker]

[ Spoiler ]

Big sorry! It's only one more crazy week than I will be able to post as reliably as ever. From Monday on, bnc's back to game a 100 %. Roughly.
Speaking of: have we lost SgtQuikfix for good? Special K seems somewhat more silent than ever.

If Slobbertooth doesn't wear any VR goggles, bnc instead uses the drone's visual sensors to see things herself. She stores photos of everything Slob unearths, taking care to keep the names on the ID cards legible. When the letter is revealed, bnc quickly draws a snapshot and forwards it to Kito, whom she knows to be a Spanish native speaker.

"Honey, can you translate this for us?"

As soon as Anna warns Slobbertooth, bnc's focus is back to the situation. She quickly looks around for anything that might support. First priority, is the way out clear? All relevant doors unlocked? All relevant cams deactivated? If so, second priority: What might keep Ramirez. Is there anything on the way that could bar the way or draw his attention?

[Jack_Spade]

As far as bnc could gather there was nothing preventing Slobber's retreat, but likewise there was nothing preventing Ramirez from reaching his destination - unless bnc used the Mark on the host to use a direct connection hack to the elevator and slow it down a bit.

Kite took a moment to answer:
<<That's some heavy stuff. I'll need some time to translate the letter properly, but the short version is that Z tells Ramirez how to perform some kind of ritual at the "longest night" at midnight. He tells him to make sure to use the other ritual beforehand that he taught him which gives him "life abundance". There is some other stuff I don't understand, might be magic instructions. But it clearly says he is supposed to use the blood of the "mercenary" and make sure to clean up afterwards.>>

[Gilga]

Anna texts "30 Seconds!" as she sees Ramerez and when he turns his back to her she assenses him trying to see what she can learn about the man.

[ Spoiler ]

Assensing(aura): 13d6t5 4

[Jack_Spade]

Anna took a good look at the man's aura, but curiously she couldn't find any trace of blood magic in his aura, nor did she recognize him as a particularly highly initiated adept. To her sight he looked at best like an awakened with one initiation at best. His aura otherwise looked healthy with no hint at cyberware or any kind of drug abuse.

[SquirrelDude]

Slobber fingers twitched as he weighed his options, but ultimately he decided on his plan.

"I'm leaving the room,but some spare time would be appreciated."

Slobber threw everything but the bible back into the safe, closed it, and left it on the number he found it on. Slobber stowed the bible in his jacket pocket, holstered his pistol and quickly retreated from the room with the drone under his arm.

[Volker]

[ Spoiler ]

I don't have any marks anymore, since I rebooted my deck.
As I'm not sure whether I can still access the direct connection or not, I let you roll the opposed rolls.
Hack on the Fly: 17d6t5 8
Control Device: 15d6t5 5

Wakata, sempai!
bnc enables an authentification routine and quickly generates a fake profile the host recognizes as a legit user. Once she's in, she forces the elevator to stop in every floor, just as if some kids had played a trick on it.

[Jack_Spade]

The trick worked and Slobber had no trouble leaving the room.
Ramirez arrived - visibly annoyed - and vanished into his room.
Only five minute later he appeared again in the lobby, wearing a different suit jacket and carrying away a lunch packet with him.

[ Spoiler ]

Just bought 2 hits for the hotel system and one for the elevator to resist control. Since you are rebooting again afterwards, the overwatch is no problem

[Volker]

"High five, sempai. So what exactly is it you got here?
Shall we return to the base?"

[Jack_Spade]

Mike chimed in: <<Yeah, a bit of debriefing would be nice. Kite is working on a better translation of the letter as well as the bible. It seems to be called Sancto Sangre, Holy Blood.
bnc if you are free from your overwatch, you might want to do some research on that.>>

[SquirrelDude]

"Yeah let's get out of here. That room was giving me the creeps and if we got in a fight, Wolf wouldn't let me leave without finishing things.

"I took Ramirez's bible out of his safe. Not really sure what it's about but it had quite a few references to blood in it, and might be related to that note."

[Gilga]

>> I think that we'll join. Justin is just not into having fun, better regroup. I liked the way you handled it, Slob, less fuss than how I handled it. Show me how to use this gear when you have the chance.
"The flowers, I wonder if they are there yet." she thought.

All in all, it seemed like most legwork was done, she hoped that next time she would be paired up with someone more appreciative of the opportunity of sharing a hotel room with a pretty woman. Flatline's stoic nature was as reassuring as a kick to the groin. Anna needed little assurance to her looks - but she did want to be perceived as entertaining to be around.

[Jack_Spade]

It was early evening when the team finally found itself back together at the safe house. Mike had taken care of cooking and produced some kind of stew which seemed to have chilie as its main ingredient.
To their surprise they were joined by Dr. Schmitt midway through the meal. He nodded to the team, but ate only a small portion. When the meal was nearly finished (Hank had thankfully provided a tub of ice cream for desert), Schmitt spoke up:

"Alright, I've read Mike's summary of what you did today, but it would be good if you could tell me in your words what happened, what you saw and what your thoughts were."

[Gilga]

Anna said quite seriously "For once I discovered that their maid bots make for excellent security, with ultrasound and heat vision and what else... and they also clean!" and then laughed softly. Shortly after she added
"On a more serious note, I think that Kynos might be in danger from Zola or Ramirez. He is not 'Blood' and these clearly only trust Blood, hence the decker. Add to this the fact that they do not like him and that Kynos is placed in a very delicate place as a personal bodyguard - they might try to literally terminate him. Perhaps we should find a discreet way to contacting him and share some of our observations with him. We could pose as bounty hunters for Blood mages.

[Jack_Spade]

Schmitt said: "Duly noted. Those Maids where actually the basis for the Secretary Anthro Drone.
As for the mercenary: This is good news. If we do this right, we might be able to turn an obstacle into an asset - that is if we can convince him to betray his boss at a time that is convenient for us.
The shortest night will be on December 21st, so we have a little while until then.
But before we go further, what has the rest of you noticed."

[SquirrelDude]

Slobbertooth tried his best to be methodical about what he'd seen between bites of food

"Spoke with Shanita and Leggio from group 2. K has all of their commlink info in case there is something we can do with it. The team has total faith in Leggio, and trusts Zola as much as is necessary for their job, but they approached us when they heard we represented a company who might be hiring. The team has seen action, and put down a spirit before, but it required them bringing out heavier weapons. They use Browning pistols with laser sights, and keep FN HARs in the back. The team is now banned by the local government from bringing out the big guns unless they are specifically given permission to do so. No word from Zola, no assault rifles. He'll give it at the drop of a hat, though.

"Kynos is hated by the team, which puts him in better standing there than with Ramirez. The tin man is a sociopath, who broke one of their mate's legs for laughing a bit too much. The team is grateful that his contract is going to be terminated soon. They didn't know the date.


"After that I paid a visit to Ramirez's room. The place gave me the creeps. Clean as a whistle but it reeked of devil rat excrement. Opened up his safe and found a bunch off creds, some kind of magical instructions, and this-"

Slobber put the bible on the table.

[Gilga]

Anna said surprised "You didn't... " She was green with envy as she did not get to steal anything in her B&E.

[Jack_Spade]

Schmitt raised an eyebrow: "Well, that is certainly something. Of course now we have to think of a way to bring it back before it is missed. Oh well, better make the most of it. Kite if you'd be so good and scann the think in detail to see if there is anything hidden in it and get a good image of every page. Books like that are often used in a book cipher. Very secure as long as no one knows which book you use."

[Volker]

<@all <im free. ill do som research while the others are going home. cya>>

[ Spoiler ]

Matrix search: Matrix search: 14d6t5 3
I hope it's not modified. 2 do of the 3 hits are the last two rolls, so if I suffer a penalty, I'm down to one hit. Please tell me what I find.

At the meeting, bnc sticked to the dessert. Heavily spiced dishes were to her belly what a nailed club and high speed were to a skull. Only the club worked faster.

"Kite, maybe we can inspect that thing together. Your Spanish skills and technical skills combined with my skills in analyzing and research could make a difference. Will you meet up with me after the meeting?
I myself don't have an awful lot to add, as I wasn't there. We have a remote controlled gas grenade implanted in Pierce's appartment, and we checked out that there is no magical defense in case of Darrel Vandemark's. Still, we should not be careless as we found indications of a blood rituals being performed on him.
Also, I found a shift six days from now, when both Pierce and Vandemark are at work. Inconveniently, that means it's going to be a morning shift, 6am to 2pm."

[Jack_Spade]

bnc's findings

[ Spoiler ]

bnc had had little trouble finding out about the bible. Sangre Sancto was the main work of a heretic catholic priest living some 300 years ago in then Mexico. The book shows an unhealthy obsession with blood of every kind and interprets nearly all stories in the old and new testament under this aspect. Father Diego died in flames on the stake and his book has become in the recent 50 years something of a primer on sacrificial magic and is rumored to have been an important part triggering the (in)famous Ghost Dance.
An often quoted piece from the book is the sacrifice of Abraham's son and gods split second intervention, allowing Abraham to sacrifice a ram instead. Some scholars have taken that to mean that you can do blood sacrifice magic safely if you keep yourself to animals and magic critters.
More important is, that the book is considered quite rare and collectors pay up to 5000 Nuyen even for bad copies.

Kite nodded at bnc: "Sure, I'm glad for all the help I can get. 18th century Spanish isn't really my forte."

Schmitt nodded: "Yes, these blood ritual thing is worrisome. At the very least we will have to content with very, very motivated opposition. Still, knowing about the stuff is half the battle.
Kite tells me that we have footage of Vandemark and his girlfriend/date. If she has been intimate with him, she might know about his security measures and if he has a bio-monitor we need to worry about.

The shift isn't too much of a problem since it's on a weekend and the bank is closed then."

[Gilga]

Anna frowns "Day shift is difficult, due to a chance for collateral damage. I am not sure how comfortable I am with that thought. On the plus side, there is traffic so it may delay intervention."

[Jack_Spade]

Schmitt replied: "The whole operation is predicated on not being detected, so there should be no bystanders in danger in the first place. But in any case we'll hit them just after the shift change while it's still dark outside. That should lessen the risk even more."

[Gilga]

Anna said "Seems reasonable, how long in and out providing anything goes smooth ?"

[Jack_Spade]

Schmidt shrugged: "Hard to say. But I'm working on that question. We'll have a chance to train moving through the bank soon - which reminds me that I have to get going soon.

I'll leave you to it."

[Volker]

bnc summarizes her findings and makes them available to the team, before going to the meeting.

"I don't know any Spanish, alas. You'll have to do the translation, if need be. What I can do, is try and find some translation online. I'm pretty sure that Anlgoamerican world has an interest in these contents. With luck, I might be able to dig something out."

[ Spoiler ]

In order to speed things up, I'd like to already roll my Matrix Search check: Which of the following modifiers apply:
Limited Interest (Threshold 3)
Hidden or Actively Hunted and Erased (Thr. 6)
Intricate (-1 dp mod)
Obscure (-2)
On another grid (-2)
I guess, it'll be obscure, on another grid and hidden, isn't it..?

"Regarding Vandemark I'd like to suggest a different approach. I'll simply check myself. If he's got a monitor online, I'll see. If it's not online, it can't do any harm. Mommm.... yah, I just updated my agent to check on him in an irregular pattern, up to 72 times a day. If nothing shows to be online, we don't have to worry. Just to make sure, Anna-darling, I'll describe to you how to identify a biomonitor on the astral plane. It's not easy to spot, but you can train on me. Once you figured it out, go there and check his aura. Even if that thing is offline and only goes on in case of apocalypse, you'll spot it.
If we go after his girl, he'll see us coming. And nothing raises more attention than playing with his favourite toy.

Gerhardt, what kind of training do you have in mind. A digital simulation?
Also, you said you'd look for a plan of the whole facility. How far did you come in this regard?"

[ Spoiler ]

I'm not entirely sure if the last question is still current state. If not, assume that bnc is better informed than I am and ignore the question please.

[Jack_Spade]

Dr Schmidt replied: "Digital is good but no replacement for the real thing. No, I'm talking about a real life test run on a model. I'm not quite finished yet, but I have a very promising young man at hand that already has worked for me on previous occasions and who will be able to help us out. I'll introduce you to him soon.

As for the girl friend: You are right that we shouldn't "make a go" at her. But making friends with her and going for a heartfelt talk about men in general and her boyfriend in specific might unearth some valuable intel. I'm sure Anna can find a way to make this happen with your help.

Oh, before I forget: I'll have to borrow Flatline and Krestov for my next part."

[ Spoiler ]

Since bnc has enough time to search, she can find translation fragments within a day or so. The bible itself is - as expected and previously described - full of pretty gruesome interpretations of bible stories.
As noted in http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?show...t&p=1335821
there are quite obvious hints at how you can prepare blood sacrifices with willing mundane helpers that work themselves out to exhaustion - the trumpets of Jericho are one notable find, where the bible explains that to take down the walls with an earthquake the trumpeters needed to exert themselves to near death until their lungs bled.
If someone took the time to forensically go through the book - bnc suspects - one could recreate the ritual that was used in the great ghost dance.