IC New Beginnings DAWN Options

[Crossbow]

The Piri Reis Map is the fifth item on the auction block. The intermediate items have gone for numbers in the 6-7 hundred thousand nuyen range with bidding moving up steadily in the 5-10 thousand increments. Initially there are several parties bidding, that quickly whittles down to two interested bidders. As each auction ends, the winning bidder rises to go and pay for their purchases.

When the bidding begins on the map, it seems to follow the same pattern, will several parties quickly making 10,000 nuyen increments to the beginning price of a quarter million. Jane decides to try and make a bold move as the price approaches 500,000, she rises and bids for the first time, "One million nuyen!" The broker is taken aback at the sudden increase but smiles and recovers quickly. "That is one million nuyen for the Piri Reis Map by the mysterious elven woman in the sixth row, are there any other bidders?" Several collectors in attendance immediately wave off, and the seconds stretch as the runners wait in anticipation.

"One million, 25 thousand."

Torley looks around to see the red haired elven woman that Samriel had been speaking to when they entered the artifact viewing at the palace (see page 12 of this topic). "Million Twenty-five from the Tir Tairngire representative." The broker looks back at Jane, who drops into her seat, "That was the whole bankroll." she whispers to Torley as she waves off the broker. With the tension broken, several other big players are back in the hunt as the price jumps 25 thousand at a time.

[pbangarth]

Torley looks at Jane and barely manages to hide a look of disdain. He marvels at her lack of auction experience and, more so, her puny bankroll for one apparently so talented and connected. She must have come down in the estimation of many in the room. "That was it?" he manages to say quietly and with an even voice. He turns his attention to the remaining bidders.

To the team, he messages, <<We are out of the running for the item. Bigger bankrolls than ours win out. Will keep track of who gets the item and advise.>>

[Necrogigas]

O'Connor smirked, *I'm getting my way, and if it goes bad I don't take the blame.* He turned to Starlet, "Looks like we're playing offense in the scramble. Any tricks you got for tracking this map?"

[Crossbow]

'I had 48 hours to call in favors and liquidate assets to be able to put a bankroll together, without starting rumors or bring even more opposition, all from half a world a way from my regular contacts and with a shitty matrix, if you think you could have done better, feel free to enlighten me." Jane looked pretty upset at herself, in spite of this speech, but she recovered quickly. "This is going to be over very soon, go ahead and queue up for the elevator, so you can give the rest of the team as much time as possible to prepare once we know who wins."

As Torley follows her instructions he sees the auction come to an end with Aztechnology, the Apep Consortium and the Nubian in the loose robes, representing the Great Dragon Celedyr, being the only bidders left. In the end it is the Nubian, whose name you hear is Medjay that wins the map with a bid of 2.1 million nuyen. As Medjay moves to the payment room Torley sees the ripple of activity it starts, on this floor at least, as others get in line behind him, and ahead of the wizworm's flunkie, and others people are suddenly moving to corners to hold whispered communications with people that are not present.

At the garage level, every other vehicle with a driver has suddenly been readied and those not driving are holding conferences or talking on their comms.

[farothel]

Sammy hadn't expected much else when she had seen from Torley's camera who was there. While she wasn't sure who was bankrolling Jane, megacorporations and great dragons had notoriously deep pockets.
"I'm not sure," she said to O'Connor, "even though it's magical and I've seen it, tracking items is really tricky. And we will have to wait until the item is out of this building, as I'm sure there's wards around it. If the real thing is even here and not in the palace where we saw it last. I must say I'm not all that happy we have to go up against a dragon flunky."

She has a look around for the people who had arrived with the Nubian. That was going to be the competition now and they deserved an extra check.

[Crossbow]

Medjay had arrived in a rather standard issue high class corporate car, not a Nightsky by any means but certainly a luxury model, likewise his crew was fairly standard high end security. No mages, but they two men sported some mods, probably smartlinks and comms, and a vehicle control rig for the driver.

[pbangarth]

Torley messages his teammates, <<If my video feed didn't make it clear, one Medjay representing Celedyr is the winner of the item. See if you can tell anything from their team downstairs. I'll try to get something up here as I come down to you.>>

He shakes his head, and holds a hand to one ear, as if he is having technical trouble. He steps slightly to the side to 'rectify' the problem, and lets any between him and Medjay go ahead. He tries to get himself into the elevator load that includes Medjay once the 'technical problem' clears.

Well, that idea gets squashed right away. Losers don't get to ride with winners. Oh well. Torley gets in the next batch of elevator riders and contents himself with seeing if he can learn anything from the others in the elevator. He listens first to see if any conversation is worth joining.

[farothel]

<<His security looks very limited,>> Sammy texted back, <<but I don't believe any of it. He probably has half an army out there. No way a dragon flunky giving out that much money would have so few security. Say, what's Celedyr's metahuman form? Anybody know?>>

[Crossbow]

The other elevator occupants are the teams from Aztechnology and the Apep Consortium. The ride down is silent as the five of you stand with backs to the wall and stare at each other.

[Necrogigas]

O'Connor stood at the ready, doing his best to not fidget or pace. The scramble would start soon, and they were at a severe numbers disadvantage. He did have an idea though. He asked Starlet, "How indepth can commands to spirits be? If there's vehicular combat, we could have your spirits drop the tear gas and smoke grenades into cars, but I don't think they'd know to pull the pins. Can you tell them to do that as apart of the task? Or would task one be pull the pin, task two place in car?"

[Crossbow]

Both corporate teams bolt for their groups when the elevator doors open. When Torley exits the doors close and the car shoots up it's tube. By the time he reaches the rest of the team, all of their comms chirp, "Medjay is in the elevator, keep me in the loop and DO NOT READY OR FIRE A WEAPON ON VICTORIA ISLAND."

[pbangarth]

Torley laughs at that directive. As he gets in the front passenger seat of their car, he says, "Looks like the real party starts off island. I can't drive worth drek, so I hope one of you can. I like the idea of spirits making trouble for the other teams. If the grenade idea seems tricky, there's always the spirit power to cause accidents. If we are close to another vehicle, I could mess with the driver temporarily as long as I can see them. Same with Starlet! Huh. You OK with having the steering wheel, O'Connor?"

[Crossbow]

The seconds stretch out, as a couple of dozen eyes watch the elevator. Is it taking longer than it should? A few more seconds tick by as groups contact people upstairs to find out if Medjay actually got on the lift.

Something is definitely wrong.

[pbangarth]

Torley suggests, "Looks like he had another way out. Should we book it out of here and catch his vehicle heading out?"

[farothel]

"He probably took the elevator up and airlifted out," Sammy said, "that's what I would do. Head to the airport and get the hell out of here as quickly as possible."

She called up a watcher spirit and set it to look for Medjay. Those were the best at tracking, despite being stupid otherwise.

[pbangarth]

"Huh. Why didn't we think of that?" Torley is getting frustrated. With himself; with his boss.

[Necrogigas]

O'Connor took the driver's wheel and set course for the airport until Starlet's watcher reported a sighting. He chocked down his resentment towards Starlet for once again ignoring a direct question he asked her. It wasn't the time or place to teach the bitch manners.

He commed their boss, <"The target didn't come down to the garage. Everyone is getting ansy down here. Starlet believes he airlifted out. She has a watcher up, and we're making our way towards the airport until we get a sighting.">

He whispered to Torley, "Despite the illustrious Starlet dismissing me as beneath reply, I still think my grenade idea has merit. Perhaps you could rephrase and present the idea as your own, Her Eminence may grace you with a response."

[Crossbow]

"There is no helipad, he had to go down. Maybe he didn't stop in the garage?" Is Jane's reply, and she is right, the watcher comes quickly back to Starlet to report that Medjay is speeding away on an okada from the front of the building.

Because of O'Conner decisive action he is able to get out of the garage first ahead of the other vehicles, but he can see that won't matter much as the okada is weaving through traffic. As the other teams spill out behind you, you see four men, wearing the tell-tale Aztechnology armor, take off on foot
at a steady jog toward the Eko Bridge. They’re moving faster than the taxis and cars idling on the crowded enclave roads. The Apep group emerges from the garage heading in a different direction, riding fast-looking motorbikes and weaving through the idling cars.

[pbangarth]

Torley leans out of the car window, amplifies his voice with his Voice Control power, projecting it forward to the cars blocking them, and in Yoruba Commands the drivers in front of his team, "PULL TO THE NEAREST SIDE".

He looks to O'Connor and shrugs. "It was worth a try." He then turns to Sammy and says, "Do you think O'Connor's idea will work? Using your spirit as a grenade-dropping drone?"

[farothel]

"What idea," Sammy asked, "sorry, I was a bit distracted getting a good read on the magical ability of our adversaries. Grenade dropping spirit. In theory, it can work, but I've a fire spirit ready and you don't want something that's essentially on fire to handle explosives, so in this particular idea, no, we can't do that. But the spirit can cause accidents or if all else fails, blow stuff up on its own. I think we best also get going on foot or using motorcycles, this traffic isn't really going anywhere."

[Crossbow]

Torley leans out of the car window, amplifies his voice with his Voice Control power, projecting it forward to the cars blocking them, and in Yoruba Commands the drivers in front of his team, "PULL TO THE NEAREST SIDE".

That was an INCREDIBLY bad idea. Torley's command has caused at least three wrecks and a half a dozen fistfights, as well gotten the attention of a cop or two. It also does absolutely nothing to help your progress or hinder the opposition at all.

[Necrogigas]

O'Connor angled their vehicle to block those behind as much as possible. He exited and began a foot pursuit, while looking for any bikes or okada that could be commandeered. He commed Frosty, <"Target is zipping away on an okada. We're currently pursuing on foot. Ahead of us are an Aztech team, also on foot, and an Apep team on bikes. All others currently behind us.">

[pbangarth]

Torley leaps out of the car and follows O'Connor, scratching his head and wondering whether he has screwed up the whole process. Nah, he thinks to himself. Clearly this drek would have happened anyway. Wasn't my fault.

[Crossbow]

There is quite the commotion left at the garage entrance when the team abandons the car, which is exactly what Bullet Storm wanted. They dive into the commotion that Torley created, with BS and Lil Homie leading the way. Medjay's okada can be seen making a left turn ahead, while the Apep bikes, after a moments consideration, continue on their original path towards the Third Mainland Bridge.

Lil Homie pipes up "He is heading for the Go-Slow! This way!" as he cuts through an alley. Leaving the chaos behind the three of you reintroduce yourselves to your meat bodies as you try to keep up with the scampering street urchin while maintaining a resasonable pace on foot.

Minutes later, the Eko Bridge comes into sight a block or two away, the familiar slow traveling flea market already audible before it comes into view. From your angle you can see that Medjay has abandoned his vehicle and the brilliant white of his voluminous flowing robe is a streak of steady movement on the bridge. The Azzies have made it to the start of the bridge ahead of you and are already pushing their way through as well.

Jane comes across the comms "Okay Devils, looks like you are in a horserace and the airport is the finish line. Regardless of who wins, Lagos is not going to be a fun place to be a paleface, if you get my meaning. I am going to get with Innocent Dobiri and arrange our extraction, you guys try to get that map from Medjay. That map is the most important thing and it needs to be intact, so don't go blowing him up or riddling him with bullets, understood?"

[Necrogigas]

O'Connor pursued the target with haste, "Starlet, speed us up or slow him down. Torley, once we're on the bridge, start a riot as we pass. I don't want any more of the competition getting off the island by this bridge."