The Found Arcana - Eighth Interlude [IC], Enter Tamarind and Raven Options

[Thanee]

"You must have some pretty strange clients at times. Are there even turtles that live in the desert?"

"Anyways, my first instinct, if I find myself in this situation, would probably be to wake up. But let's assume it is for real."

"With a spell or with the help of a spirit, I could easily do it, but let's also assume, this isn't possible for some reason."

"I don't think I am strong enough, if it is a big turtle, which is kind of what I am imagining right now."

"So, I would shovel away some of the sand on one side, so it is easier to flip the turtle around, or maybe the turtle can even manage by itself. Also, I would give the poor thing some of my water, which I hopefully have, because otherwise I would have way more serious problems out there."

[Beta]

"So let's talk about a hypothetical: You walk through a desert and you find a turtle lying on its back. The sun is hot, it's struggling with its tiny legs, but there is no chance it can right itself. What do you do?"

Tamarind thinks and strokes Beauty while Raven talks. When the other woman is done then Tamarind tasl

"I check the matrix to see if there is a signature associated with it, as that could change a lot. Is it someone's drone, if so can I tell whose? Is there a trap underneath it, is there a camera watching, that sort of thing. If there is no further information there, then it may matter if I'm working or not, because if I'm working there may be orders that guide me one way or the other. If there is no matrix information and I'm on my own judgement, well I still don't know if it is a spirit, there are some that are mischief and can look quite realistic, so I'd be careful. I'd start by sending in one of my smaller drones and trying to talk to it. All evidence pointing to it just being a turtle, I probably Have Stitch approach it, and take command of his arm to carefully turn the turtle over. And then because Turtles don't belong in the middle of the dessert probably we take it with us until we get to somewhere more suitable to let it go."

"That sort of word painting and 'then what do you do' reminds me of games my grandmother told me about, that were popular when she was young, where a group would all sit around a table and have sort of collective make-believe, without even an AR overlay or anything, just the power of words, where they would make up a world and talk out the adventures of characters in there."

"Earlier you asked about armorer skills. Sorry, not personally. It shouldn't be too hard to get an autosoft for Stitch to be at least competent at it, if you need someone to take care of your collective armory. In the past I've been with organizations that were big enough to have specialists of various types, including that. I can re-load small weapons reliably enough, but I'm really not an armorer."

[Jack_Spade]

Bobby nodded, as if making a hashmark on an imaginary checklist

"Next question: You’re now in the desert walking along in the sand when all of the sudden you look down, and you see a tortoise, it’s crawling toward you. You reach down, you flip the tortoise over on its back. The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over, but it can’t, not without your help. But you’re not helping. Why is that?"

[Beta]

Tamarind goes quite still at that question, looking off into a corner of the room, while Beauty stares at Bobby. (meanwhile Tamarind brings up the visuals from Beauty onto her contact lenses so that she can stare at Bobby without staring at Bobby)

"Presumably because I have orders to do so. Ones that I felt I had to complete rather than leave the organization. And if this sort of question is how you usually operate I don't know that I'd be a good fit in your organization."

[Gilga]

AM’s first reaction to Bobby taking over and skipping the intro is frowning, but since she has no idea what job interviews are, and she does not like attention. It only takes her a brief moment to realize that she is more grateful than anything else; she lets herself relax and is eager to learn how job interviews are done. In the meantime, she holds the teacup in her hands, enjoying the heat, and she starts drinking it before it gets cold.

She is surprised when Bobby, who has no patience for introductions and stories, decides it is very important to ask about turtles. Like Turtles?! he wore pants to ask questions about turtles but not to study.
She tries to wrap her mind around how it is all relevant and the end goal.
... and out of all things, both ladies would save a random turtle, but why? she struggles to comprehend. "Why don't they ignore the turtle and let some predator feed its babies with turtle meat.”

Do people feel empathy toward helpless turtles? How is it relevant who flipped the turtle?... and how come Bobby, who killed a cute deer himself, thinks that saving helpless turtles is normative? I really am wired differently than the rest of them, I just never realized it because I never did job interviews.

[Thanee]

"What's the difference between a turtle and a tortoise?"

"Again, assuming there is no trickery at work. Only reason I can think of right now would be survival. Though, I honestly wouldn't know what to do with it. Is there some way to get water from it? Or is its meat edible? Is the shell itself useful, especially to get water. That would be the main concern, when you are in the desert, after all. I've never been in the desert, though."

[Jack_Spade]

Bobby nodded: "Good answers. Turtles are usual living in the water, while tortoises live on land - and on occassion in deserts, like the desert tortoise of the Mojave desert.
You are both alright in my book. Just wanted to make sure you aren't meat puppets or replicants or whatnot.
Any of you allergic to animal hair of any kind? Vegan? Fruit - especially strawberries?"

[Beta]

Tamarind re-engages visually with the room, and answers in a more relaxed way.

"I'm fortunate to be allergy free so far, and I have never really had the luxury of being picky about food. And by the way I'm capable of taking my turn at cooking and turning out something fairly edible. I spent a lot of days in various low amenity camps where cooking was a part of the job. Do you share cooking here?"

She makes a mental note to add a cooking autosoft for Stitch to her shopping list once she has some money to spare. She has wanted one for a while, but they aren't available commercially and she just hasn't chased one down in the hobbyist market.

And then, because she has been here a while and it is time to see how her hosts are behaving, she launches her agent in her datajack+ and gives it the usual command to use her RCC to access the matrix and then to start scanning Tamarind and all of her drones for marks.

[Tecumseh]

Mato's clothing is closer to Raven's than Tamarind's. He appreciates Tamarind's self-awareness with the small, brown, and lumpy comment.

"My name is Miguel Ángel Torres. I usually go by my initials, which spell Mato."

He's an ork in his mid-20s, although that makes him seasoned by robustus standards. He's maybe 5cm shorter than average but he's also much leaner. He doesn't have the barrel chest or prominent shoulders that orks do. From behind, he might even be able to pass for a human or a thick elf, but from the front his prominent brow and strong jaw clearly mark him as an ork. His skin is bronze, reflecting his half-Sioux, half-Aztec heritage. His black hair isn't military-short but is short enough that you couldn't pull it in a fight. His black matte cyberarms are clearly high end.

Mato's aura is a fright. In addition to the missing arms and legs, he's an emotional black hole. On top of that, he's been banged up recently and is still on the mend. But, on the bright side, he's relatively free of turmoil. He looks calm, neutral, as he passively watches and listens.

Good, he thinks to himself. Bobby's doing what I hoped he would and putting them in uncomfortable situations. They're responding suitably given their respective backgrounds.

"I wouldn't call us a front, per se," Mato interjects when Raven uses the term. "We have a financial backer, perhaps with an agenda of his own, but in the last six months we've received no commands or orders."

This somewhat ignores Razak's instructions to help Cutty set up his gym, but this is minor enough that Mato is willing to sweep it under the rug for narrative convenience.

"We're not laundering money or running a hidden enterprise; we're operating a private business with positive cash flow that would pass an independent audit. We offer grey-market services on the outskirts of society, neither completely legal nor illegal. This lets us keep a foot in both worlds at once. As such, we need assets at both end of the scale." He looks meaningfully from Tamarind to Raven, who seem to embody the polarity of the scale nicely.

"We're in charge of day-to-day operations. We do things the Sioux way, which is to say communally. We share the chores evenly, including cooking and cleaning. Everyone is the boss and nobody is the boss, savvy? Everyone has a share, and everything gets split equally. Is that acceptable?"

Before Tamarind and Raven can answer, the mischievous BusyBuddy buzzes in the room, ostensibly to clean. This compact cleaning drone with two caterpillar-tracks vacuums, wet/dry sweeps, mops, polishes, and shampoos an extensive variety of floorings. Sensors in the drone analyze flooring composition and condition to provide optimal cleaning results. It should know better than to interrupt, but a sprite has been having fun with the Central Home Node (CHN) every since the 50-year anniversary of the Crash of '29 last week.

"Now celebrating NINE days without an explosion _hahaha" the BusyBuddy cackles while vaccuuming the hardwood and wet-mopping the carpet. Mato scowls and looks tempted to kick it aside, but refrains.

[Beta]

Beauty looks atBusyBody with some alarm, but Tamarind cracks a genuine smile. "Aren't you a saucy one! Do you have a name? And would you like some friends?

She looks up at the metahuman occupants of the room and adds "If you want a clever drone you have to allow some quirks. But of course you need to provide guidance or how do they learn?. This is certainly not the general view about how drones operate, but it is undeniable that higher rating pilot programs are prone to developing quirks.

[Gilga]

It is not the cleaning bot that has quirks. It is likely some mischievous program that takes refuge in our home node. Since this one seems friendly enough, we just live with it. She comments and is happy that Tamarind has gained some footing.

We are more a commune than a workplace. I assume it gets easier with years of military service, but it took some adjusting for me. It feels good to be a part of a closely knit group, so it is worth it in my experience. she says, sipping from the tea again. We're also thinking about moving somewhere... More comfortable, but we have not started working on it yet.

[Thanee]

"I like the sound of that," Rachel replies, when AM mentions 'comfortable'.

"And I did not quite expect to be treated as, you know, equal. That would be way more than just acceptable. Appreciated," she says to Mato.

The BusyBuddy's interruption irritates her a little, but as it does not seem to be much of a concern overall, Rachel quickly relaxes again. Spirits, sometimes, are mischievous as well, so this is something similar most likely.

[Beta]

Sprite? Nobody had warned her of a sprite roaming the location! But maybe that was the point, to see how well she managed her security.

Tamarind made sure that she had Encryption running, then ordered all of the drones in her swarm to take turns rebooting. And she followed the sequence of shut downs and re-connections on her RCC, making sure that nothing skipped its turn. Then she checked Beauty over for marks herself, as a back up to her agent.

To cover her distraction she made some small talk. "More comfortable? But you have a house already! That is so nice. I grew up in Butte Below, in a rock pocket. It was comfortable and dry, but I did always dream of having a house where you could look out the window and see real outside. I've obviously lived in a lot of surface buildings since then, even a few that were houses, but always as a temporary thing. Never anywhere that I got to decide 'do I want to open up curtains or blinds in the morning to look outside? And what colour should they be?' And things like that. So to me this already looks pretty nice."

"I have rented a room and garage though. So I'm not desperate just for a place to stay.". She doesn't add that she doesn't have enough money set aside for next month's rent, yet. She'll figure something out, one way or another.

[Gilga]

AM asks Tamarind "You seem to know a thing or two about security, how would you secure this property? Redmond is not a good neighborhood, we have gags, organized crime, thieves, vandalists, robbers. You get the gist."

[Tecumseh]

Mato's poker face holds but his aura might reveal a hint of relief that Tamarind and Raven didn't pick up on the BusyBuddy's jest about explosions.

"Yes, we're expanding," he says. "To date we've been residing on premises, but with additional headcount comes additional needs for both living space and working space. We will maintain this building as our office but reside off-premises."

He hadn't put thought into how much to push the communal living. He had only expected one referral from Razak, not two. Does it make sense to allow investigators to live elsewhere? Or would that undermine the camaraderie and esprit de corps that seemed to work for the first six months?

Although it didn't work so well as to prevent Jawsey leaving, he thinks to himself. He decides not to push it as an official policy.

He turns to Raven and considers her beauty for a moment. His aura seems unmoved; his enhancements may have robbed him of such organic responses. He addresses her directly with a question:

"A hypothetical," he begins. "A dragon takes an interest in you and invites you to live with dragon and its Awakened followers in the lap of luxury. Everything top-of-the-line, everything paid for. A gilded cage, so to speak, but perpetual comfort. What would you say to an offer like that?"

Raven may reasonably suspect that this is not a hypothetical. Having grown up in Seattle, she will be familiar - by reputation, if not by direct experience - with Urubia, a dragon who treasures the Awakened and treats them like precious pets. The Funhouse is her lair, five apartment buildings deep in Redmond that are much as Mato's hypothetical describes.

[Thanee]

"Do you guys know any, like, normal questions?" Rachel grins.

"Anyways, I would have to lie that it wouldn't be tempting. I have been down in the dirt and I did not like it there. I am doing better today, but far from where I want to be. So, yeah, I would probably consider it. But it is not a complete offer, it certainly would depend on the circumstances and what would be expected of me, and what kind of freedom I would still have. And, of course, there is a dragon involved. Can't say I have had any experiences with them, but there is this saying... Never deal with a dragon. I guess, it is better to not get involved with them. But it would be tempting, as I said."

[Tecumseh]

Mato blinks languidly at Raven's response.

<<Let's keep her away from the Funhouse>> he DNIs the team, belatedly realizing that Jawsey is still on the distribution list. He shakes his head slightly at the oversight.

"Allow me to disabuse you of any notions of - or expectations for - normalcy," Mato tells Raven. "We are strangers in a strange land. We live and work where tricksters play. Occasionally, we play off that ourselves. As the saying goes, there is opportunity in chaos."

He turns to Tamarind. Luckily, Urubia would not want to poach her, he thinks to himself, already wondering where they're going to find their next mage, preferably an ugly, uncharismatic one.

Mato is opening his mouth to ask Tamarind a question when the power goes off throughout the building.

"How embarrassing," he mutters to himself.

"Ms. Pandey - Tamarind - might I trouble you to look at the circuit breaker? It's right this way, next to the hot water heater."

[ Spoiler ]

This is an opportunity for Tamarind to fix an issue as simple or as complex as Jawsey thinks she can handle.

[Beta]

Oh dear, it doesn't sound like Razzamatazz gave them a very detailed background file.

"Oh dear, I'm afraid that Captain Razak may not have given a very clear idea of what I've worked on lately. To be blunt I've been on the ground crew for smugglers, either at refueling stations or terminal points. On the one hand it is very mundane, refueling, putting on camouflage nets, checking maintenance readouts, sometimes loading and unloading."

"On the other hand it is an ongoing struggle to stay unobserved. You would think the flights were the weak point in smuggling, but smart enforcement targets ground support. Abandoned buildings that are repaired, traffic going to what should be nowhere, likely landing spots that have been cleared. You have to be sneaky and subtle not to get spotted, you have to observe yourself to see what others might see, you have to take care with your signal intelligence. That is what I'm mostly good at. Spotting small things, not being noticed. Not security exactly."

"But I guess I know at least as much as most people. You can't make anything perfectly secure. Don't provide too much temptation. Make it likely that whoever does something will be identified. Make it likely that an identified person will be caught . Make people fear the consequences of being caught. There are different ways to do all of those, but classically that means don't show much wealth and don't make enemies and secure all entrances. Have obvious and hidden cameras and motion sensors and other alarms. Have people at home or have drones, and have a person or software live monitoring everything, all with proper instructions on how to deal with various scenarios. Extract vengeance on those caught in some way that will attract attention."

[Gilga]

What can AM say? She would have happily joined Urubia herself. She has no prejudice about dragons; dictators are dictators regardless of race. Having access to the person in charge means a lot, but Urubia has never been helpful in any way. She was charming and fun, and AM wanted the woman to be her friend - but she never once solved a problem or did her a favor. So she could not feel that the dragon lady was a contact. People have a give-and-take relationship, but Urubia seems to lose interest once she can't get the queen and subject relationship. Not that AM thinks she is interesting enough for an immortal dragon, Iktomi is, but how well does she embody him? She is not even a particularly strong sorcerer, just experienced and hard working. Perhaps the most offputting thing about joining Urubia are the sad faces of the Crimson guards. They always seem annoyed and miserable and desperate for Urubia's attention. Urubia does not give them attention; they are already in her pocket. The dragon likes the conquest rather than a relationship - perhaps this is why AM did not join.

She listens to Tamarind and says, "You are sort of expecting to fit in as you are, but there is no growth in that. We are problem solvers, not smugglers. Don't look to the past, look to the future. Life is a series of riddles to solve, so look into the next one. Once you start using your shiny and highly modified drones in here, we WILL have a security issue. As you said yourself, drones show wealth."

Then the power goes out. AM is uncertain if it is one of Bobby's tests or a glitch. Both are possible she guess, normally she wouldn't give it much thought as elves are comfortable in the dark. Humans often don't but Tamarind must have like a million sensors on Beauty, and Raven has astral sight that also works in the dark. She sits and pours another tea cup waiting to see what will happen.

[Thanee]

When the light goes out, Rachen pulls a small flashlight from her pocket and turns it on, making sure to point it towards the floor.

"How long do those usually last?"

The light-out does not seem to be bothering her much, in fact, she probably thinks it's pretty normal.

[Gilga]

She texts the team with her DNI ribbon under the heavy shirt >>She'll run into Urubia one day or the next. If Raven joins Urubia, I'll look for a mundane face rather than an uncharismatic mage. Negotiation skills are worth gold, we got by well even before Jawsey turned to a functional mage.

Since the timing seems off to AM, she asks
>> Is it part of the interview or an actual blackout?

[Jack_Spade]

Bobby nodded:

<<How about we look for a sensible mage who knows not to meddle with dragons. In the meantime she'll do.>>
Loud he said: "Blackouts happen in this part of town pretty often, but their duration is pretty variable. With any luck it's just a little spike and not another devil rat gnawing on the wires. Another reason we are looking for accomodation elsewhere.
I'm pretty sure you know that already, but if you work with us you'll share our friends... and our enemies. And since we find out things for people that other people want to keep not found, we get a healthy dose of the latter.
We do equal share of most other things, but mainly pay of course."

[Tecumseh]

<<And here I thought it was Iktomi's doing>> Mato responds to AM.

Out the window you can see lights on in other nearby buildings.

"It's not the gangers shooting the transformer this time," Mato notes. "Nor Gaeatronics shutting down a line tap.

"Likely just a circuit breaker but, yes, a devil rat in the wiring is not out of the question. And, to your question, Raven, this is not common. Utilities in Touristville are generally stable, but exceptions occur."

<<I'd rather have a boring magician than a mundane face. AM, I think you're selling your own skills short. You have a natural, approachable charisma and your negotiation skills are professional. And when you are magically enhanced, I think your talents exceed even Jawsey's. You're more of a leader than you give yourself credit for. For the good of the whole, we should put you front-and-center more than we do.>>

"To Bobby's point, this is a usually zero-sum game. And so, yes, our success comes at the expense of someone else. But that's true in any capitalistic system: we need to compete.>>

This is all very cold and business-like. Mato doesn't seem to have internalized his recent incapacitation or taken it personally. Is moving beyond it just a professional move to avoid unprofitable entanglements in the past, or is he missing the necessary emotional capacity to process what happened to him?

[Beta]

As soon as the lights went out Tamarind checked with her patrolling Pellipers (Pelican delivery drones, currently sporting imitation Taco Temple colours), which showed that the rest of the neighborhood was still lit, and that there was no obvious assault going on. She pulled them into a tighter patrol pattern, at the risk of them being more easily spotted as not being on delivery duty.

The she had her van briefly crack open a window, and asked Uncle to fly out. She AR road the spy eye to the building's front door and used its ultrasound sensor to check that there were no unseem objects there. Then she increased the glow from her RCC to give some low level of light and navigated by that to the window--she had noted earlier that they could be opened. And she did so while calling Uncle up to join her.

Once Uncle was hovering above her head and the window was closed, she asked "and in which room is the water heater? She left Beauty riding her shoulder on autopilot, and instead but an AR overlay from the ultrasound to what she could see visibly.

Once she has directions she heads off, keeping appropriately paranoid. Not that she expected a house invasion, but rather some test of her abilities with who knew what surprise waiting for her.

[Gilga]

>> Written like a true believer!
She comments on the comment about Iktomi. Even if he was cynical, the Trickster never takes himself too seriously. Otherwise, he would not be the loser in most of his stories. Iktomi teaches her that success is far from guaranteed, even if you are a force of nature.

Mato's following text message leaves her with conflicting thoughts. She enjoyed being Jawsey's sidekick. She felt the pressure when Jawsey was away - and now Mato suggests that they don't need to replace Jawsey because they got her. AM needs to think about it. She does not pride herself on her social skills. She is an elf, and people expect her to know what to say. They don't want to hear about shy elves or socially anxious elves. She just did what she needed to do as society expected of her.

The main thing that bothers her is the stress of holding negotiations when there is a lot of money on the table, and that money is the difference between life and death. On the other hand, now she owes Bobby money, and the worst he'll do is annoy her to the point she wants to die. After all, the harsh man spent a week as a Crow, and AM had to hear him inside the privacy of her own thoughts. It was not pleasant in any form, and a lesser woman would have lost it by now. Yet as annoying as he was, Bobby did not pressure her about the debt. Bobby is not the Mafia, so perhaps now the stakes are lower, and maybe she can handle it.


>> Thanks, Mato. You are very kind, but we're building castles in the air. Raven did not defect to Urubia.

She also feels the two guys are taking their warnings harshly. They have perhaps a single enemy, Carnevil, and even that is not guaranteed. He did not mean to send Mato to the hospital but to scare them and perhaps destroy some of their property in an 'eye for an 'eye' manner. After all, they lost him money. What they don't have is enough allies in Redmond to feel safe.

"Enemies are perhaps too strong. I'd use rivals as we keep it professional and try to keep antagonizing people to the minimum necessary to get the job done." she says softly.