The Found Arcana – Chapter 6 [IC], Continuation of https://www.rpgplayroom.net/forums/topic/the-found-arc Options

[Tecumseh]

<<AM, you noticed an agent running silently in the library>> Mato points out. He has no doubt that AM remembers, but it helps to talk through things 'out loud'.

<<The Duchess was there with Katya, who was under her ruthenium polymer cloak. There was a program carrier module soldered into the terminal. You said it contained the smoke and mirrors program and an inert agent program, all of it running silently. That's obviously unusual.>>

<<In light of this new connection to the library system, we should probably talk to Thorbjörn.>>

<<We have a lot of Russian connections here, between Igor and Katya and now Winter Storm from Yakut. It seems that Igor is more likely to be an alcoholic than a criminal mastermind, but I wouldn't put it past someone to be manipulating Igor and his relationship with Invictus. Let's tailor our approach with Igor accordingly.>>

Mato thinks about Katya responding to the shots at the greenhouse. She clearly had no love for the disrupted spirit. He wonders if her ruthenium polymer cloak could have allowed her to solder the program carrier module onto the library terminal without being noticed.

He'd leave Winter Storm for Jawsey. Jawsey had a way with spirits.

[Beta]

Jawsey started speaking "Invictus, he" then stopped, looked around, stepped closer and in a lower voice he carried on in passable Russian "Igor, focus! Invictus was supposed to come to my room last night to explain things more, but he never made it. They say he was disrupted. Now and all sorts of problems are coming to light. Questions are going to be asked. Who was where, who did what. Invictus trusted you more than anyone else, you must know what needs to be done."

[ Spoiler ]

He has Russian 6, linguist, and intuition 5, so 12 dice with the language and 'could get a job with it' level of skill, so I figured it should count as passable. A dice roll just to be safe speak Russian: 12d6t5 4

[Jack_Spade]

Igor frowned and replied in the same language, sounding a lot more sophisticated: "I don't know what he would have told you. The spirit certainly did not trust anyone. It was a snake charmer and entertaining, true. But you couldn't trust it. Invictus would have sold his own mother for the slightest advantage - if it had a mother. It certainly didn't feel bound by anything short of a spirit pact. Cheating bastard. If it did get disrupted it probably earned it by betraying someone's trust. I told Thomas years ago to sever ties with it.
Now if you excuse me, I think I need an aspirin and a Bloody Marry."

Jawsey noted that the man was truthful enough, but in a hurry to end the conversation.

[Tecumseh]

Mato doesn't know what's being said but he runs Igor's response through his social software to see if it can help gauge his reaction.

Maybe it's the language, maybe it's the booze, maybe it's the speedo or the body hair, but neither Mato nor the software produce any meaningful results.

[ Spoiler ]

Charisma 4 + Intuition 6 + Social Software 3: 13d6t5 1 hit

[Beta]

Jawsey switches to English, just a little bit louder, so that Mato will know things are not working on the con "Maybe he was misleading me, maybe I mis-understood ... He was supposed to come tell me more, but then he got disrupted." Then more quietly again in Russian "I think he was up to something very devious though. He is a spirit, so maybe not for wealth? But I think there was something he wanted, something he needed humans to help with? I thought you would know where he might have hidden something. I suppose he just fooled me."

Then he steps back, and in English again, asks "Would you like a Detox spell, to help your morning along?" To the team he sends <<Blast, either he doesn't know, or he is too careful. But I've tried to leave the idea in his head that Invictus might have hidden something, so if we can keep at eye on Mr. Kaminsky, one way or another, maybe if he does know anything he'll reveal it that way.>>

[Jack_Spade]

"A spell? From you? I'd... rather not." Suddenly his voice became fearful as if he remembered something: "You should drop this. There is nothing good that can come off it."

[Beta]

Jawsey flexes his hands, and teases in English "No spells? Are you sure? I have quite a few that I could cast on you, some of them are rather interesting ..." He adds an only slightly mad looking grin, then suddenly shifts tracks and languages, asking urgently in Russian "Which bitch has you worried?"

[Tecumseh]

Mato steps forward to block Igor from leaving easily. "Who's 'the bitch'?" he presses sternly.

Mato doesn't have the most intimidating silhouette but perhaps between his uniform and Igor's vodka haze he can put on the airs of authority.

"Who can't be trusted?"

[Jack_Spade]

Igor froze like a deer in the headlights.
"I... I shouldn't have said that. I mean, I wouldn't want to slander anyone." He paused, looking at Mato and appeared to notice the chrome for the first time.
"It's just... Komarova. I overheard her cursing Thomas and his Manservant. About a month ago. I know Invictus tried to butter her up - as he does with the maids. And well... she let him live and actually had a conversation with him.
Don't tell her that I said that. That babuska is crazy"

[Gilga]

AM notifies her findings to the team -->>> So the ring can contain a spirit? I am over my head here.


>> Thanks for remaining me about the agent.
she texted and then tried to locate it again.

[ Spoiler ]

Matrix perception: 16d6t5 4
Matrix perception: 16d6t5 9

[Jack_Spade]

AM found the Agent, but it was inactive again. A closer scan told her, that it indeed was the source of the malfunction and likely the reason for the manipulated file.

[Beta]

"Maybe she held a grudge -- someone shot Invictus with Blight, and she was in the vicinity. Did you have conversations with her too, or were you scared that she wouldn't let you live?"

<<I'm tired of bouncing from person to person to person, but I don't see any way of jumping ahead. Do we move on to her next?>>

[Tecumseh]

Mato steps aside to let Igor pass.

<<I agree>> he replies to Jawsey's comm. <<It seems like we're going to daisy-chain our way through the entire household. But that's the job.>>

<<I thought Katya's presence was suspicious. She said she 'heard' the shot - even though van der Bloom said the computer reported it as a silenced shot. So how could she have heard it from inside?>>

<<But at the same time, she didn't smell like cordite or gunpowder so I don't think she was the gunman. It's possible that she was distracting Invictus, talking with him while the shooter lined up the shot and took it. And she certainly wanted me out of there quickly enough, telling me to go perform an audit of Blight rounds in the armory.>>

<<Motivation? Sounds like she doesn't like Pike, maybe doesn't want the Duchess and Pike to get married. Maybe make Pike look bad with a theft and a killing right under his nose? Or maybe it's a power play to make Cunningham look bad, since they're at odds.>>

Mato sighs.

<<Jawsey, what do you want to do with this lead on the free spirit, 'Winter Storm'?>>

<<AM, van der Bloom said that three of his sensors picked up the shot. Do you think you could triangulate the location of the shot based on input from the three sensors?>>

[Beta]

<<Winter Storm is a piece of work. One of those spirits from Yakut who thinks meta-humanity should stay in its place -- that place being under the heel of the spirit world of course. For all that I like spirits, and think they have a place in society, I can' endorse that view! It is greedy to grow in strength though, so open to spirit pacts. If we need to, that could be a route.>>

[Gilga]

AM sends Trouble to watch over Kurt's reaction, while she examines the agent for marks, and the file to see if there is any record of the hacking attempt. and asks Kurt >> Kurt, the agent in the library just hacked a file, removed some of this content and it has something to do with the mess yesterday. I know because there is some glitch causing it to cook the AR-tag you sent me to fix yesterday. Yes, I am better than my deck indicates.

I don't want to sound accusing - but it makes you look bad, and by association it makes me look bad. Now I am a poor, and desperate tech-person and cannot afford to fail. I am sending you my findings, and I need your brilliance and expertise on it. We need to find out who hacks our system, it is getting ridiculous.

[ Spoiler ]

Matrix perception: 16d6t5 9
Matrix perception: 16d6t5 4
Assensing: 10d6t5 1
edge for Troble 1 left.
Assensing: 9d6t5 4
he'll know if Kurt is hiding something. He'll take a perception test just in case.
perception: 10d6t5 2

AM Triangulates the data using Van der Bloom's data and concludes that it is inside the greenhouse as they already knew, and that likely near the roof. "Shot was in the greenhouse, likely above. Let's speak to Katya. I don't think she is the thief because the Duchess trusts her, but she knows more than what she told us, and now there is a ring missing.

[Jack_Spade]

Kurt replied grumpy - apparently not a morning person - but honestly: <<I think you are forgetting your place. I'm still your superior!
Alright I'll check.>>
When he called back, he was a lot calmer: << Hm, I found the hack you told me about. That agent is a product made for the Russian military. Last generation, but still very powerful. Someone used a dongle to provide it with attack capability to crack cryptolocks on the files. The fact that, the agent was placed in the library terminal instead of using a dedicated is puzzling. That's something a spy without its own hacking abilities would do. Crude, no style. But effective after a fashion.>>

[Tecumseh]

"Russians," Mato mutters to himself once the team is alone again. Then he switches to Matrix communication for better security.

<<Our Russians are Igor and Katya. Igor seems to think Katya is crazy, and he might be right. His alibi is being stone-cold drunk last night.>>

<<Katya is suspected of being ex-Speznaz, Russian special forces. If so, that would fit with her having a last-generation dongle. We also have Winter Storm in the mix but that doesn't really scan for me.>>

<<I'm a little rusty on my Asian history, but the basic gist is that the Siberians declared independence from Russia in the early 2030s - Russia was still reeling from the Crash of '29 - with the help of spirits and shapeshifters. It was only later that the separatists figured out that the spirits hated metahumanity and civilization, leaving to various forms of oppression and civil war for the better part of the last 50 years or so.>>

<<Long story short, I have a hard time believing that Katya would collude with Winter Storm in any way, and vice versa. Most Russians - and especially the Speznaz - would resent and oppose the Yakut separatists. And it's a stretch to believe that a spirit-supremacist like Winter Storm would work with a cybermonster like Katya. Not impossible, especially if Katya's gone merc - biz makes strange bedfellows - but a stretch.>>

<<Let's go talk with Katya but keep in mind that someone could be framing her. Someone like Thorbjörn has the expertise to put something like this together and make it look like someone else did it. Plus, you know, we haven't talked to him yet and it's pretty clear we'll have to speak to everyone in the house before this is all over.>>

<<Jawsey, my only question is at what point should we reach out to Winter Storm? Does it make sense to do it now and get some intel, or is that a last-resort sort of thing because of the spirit's position on humanity?>>

[Gilga]

She texts Kurt >> Okay, we stopped the hack but now who had access to the library terminal. Did you send anyone to maintain it? We better find out who did it before things get really bad for us. Someone here is likely a double agent.


>> So still no suspects or a smoking gun. but let's go talk to Katya to the very least this makes her look bad, and it is clearly framing her because she would have been smart enough to collect the dongle once she finished using it. Who else could it be?

AM tried to locate Katya in preparation for confrontation.

[Jack_Spade]

van der Bloom replied: <<No, that terminal hasn't been serviced by me or the wire boys and maids in quite a while.>>

[Beta]

<<We can't be 100% positive that Igor's 'alibi' is solid. The alcohol poisoning looked mild by this morning. Someone could have detoxed him last night, he could have gone and done things, the downed a few more shots. That said, let us move on to Katja. As for Winter Storm, I admit I'm not eager to talk to him. I will, but let's wait until after talk with Katja.>>

All the same, Jawsey looked at the info that Anna had forwarded, curious about how they were supposed to contact this free spirit. Did it indicate where the spirit was, for that matter?

[Jack_Spade]

Finding Katya wasn't easy with her tendency to move around cloaked. But the team could be sure she would be close by the Dutchess once the hunt started today.
Of course, they could also just call her - or try to hack her commlink to get her position.

[Tecumseh]

"Let's go find Katya," Mato agrees.

"She can be tricky to see. My radar sensors should be able to pick her up to about 50 meters or so. Failing that, my cyberware scanner should work, but that's more like 15 meters.

"I presume your astral sight will work as well. Is there a spirit to track her down or do we just want to call her?"

He looks to Jawsey.

"Do you want to take the lead or should I? I'm wondering if your Russian will help... soften her up."

Mato smiles wryly. He knows very little could probably soften the cyberbeast, but sometimes the sounds of your native tongue can work wonders.

[Jack_Spade]

The problem with radar was of course, the multi layered walls as well as the many other occupants of the house not allowing to identify any one individual from afar.

[Gilga]

AM searches for Katya's comlink to text her.

[ Spoiler ]

Matrix perception: 16d6t5 4

[Jack_Spade]

Through access to the internal network, AM found the commlink number in no time.