Charm City [IC] Options

[Thanee]

Selina nods towards Bongo. "Fiona will also stay with the van, just in case."

She takes another look at the girls to judge their sizes. It won't matter too much, as she can certainly make pretty much anything fit.

Towards Tubesnake she says: "We won't be long."

"Some drinks and snacks might also be a good idea," she comments as they stand in front of the vending machines, though Selina is mostly looking for some usable clothes.

[pbangarth]

Bongo concurs. "I'll do the food, you do the clothes." He selects an assortment of items, for all of them not just the girls. The most nourishing he can find in such an establishment. And maybe something that helps ease a hangover. He has experience with those.

[sunnyside]

(OOC: For clarity is Fiona inside or outside the van. Otherwise I think either Koekepan could elaborate on the arcade, or you can just spend appropriate amounts of nuyen and head back to the van).

[pbangarth]

"Remember to keep the receipts, Selena. Hopefully the team agrees to allow for expenses out of our pay."

Bongo waits for Selena to make her selections, and then returns to the van, sharing quick energy with the two women and the rest of the team.

[Koekepan]

The arcade is a pretty typical managed environment. It's not quite as locked down as a gated community, but it's a corporate investment and as such it is well-kept, architecturally manicured in the same egregiously artificial way that a theme park is, and tightly monitored to keep undesirables out. On the other hand, the mere fact that someone passes through in the quest for vending machines is uninteresting because it's close enough to the heartbeat of the city that that is a common occurrence.

The vending machines themselves offer everything from hot and cold beverages, hot and cold food items and bottom-tier electronics to clothing and umbrellas. From the corporate point of view it's ideal because it's a quick, low overhead transaction. That makes it very easy to bounce out, grab a compressed protein on a stick and a fresh coat, and hit the road.

[Thanee]

As Selina makes her decision, she mostly looks out for the fabric, and roughly the size, as she is fully aware of her own capabilities to change pretty much everything else. It's like buying raw materials rather than a finished product for her. For Sophie, it is mostly to wrap the girl into something presentable when they deliver her back to her parents. For Nari, on the other hand, the shaman is a bit more considerate, as that girl clearly can use some happiness in her life. She wants to make her a set of clothes that are really enjoyable.

[sunnyside]

Sophie is still resting in the van unconscious. But her vitals are still looking good, if anyone looks. From outside the van Fiona isn't seeing anything amiss either.

Angel pings Bongo <<Hey. So, I won't really touch anything. But if you give me access to the medkit I think I could just keep and eye on her. I'm looking it up and it says that many medkits can even be operated remotely. Not that I would. That's what I meant by the not touching things... But still.>>

(OOC: Since the place is downtown and not looted, there are probably some excessing but concealed security measures, but you're paying the smallish tab, so presumably not a problem).

Nari is still crying, but has shifted to doing so relatively quietly. While the others are making selections, she looks at the back of her hands, which are still covered in some sort of body paint that isn't smearing much.

She says to tubesnake. "Is there any way to clean up in here. Any way to get a little privacy?"

[pbangarth]

Bongo returns with snacks and drinks. Clearly, Sophie can't get any of that yet. They'll have to wait for her to wake up. He hands a selection to Nari and says, "Here. get yourself some food and drink. You'll feel better. Tubesnake and I will keep our eyes elsewhere while you put on what Selena brings for you.

"Tubesnake, you got any of that hand-cleaner-in-a-can tradespeople use? Nari's got some kind of body paint to remove."

<<Sure, Angel. Good idea to keep tabs on Sophie. >> He allows access to the medkit to Angel.

[Koekepan]

""Sure thing. Check the shelves, one level up, on the right hand side. There's a label for Personal Sanitation. If you open it, right up front you should see a jar of waterless degreaser. That should take a moment, but then you can use the sanitiser to do a clean-up round. It's propanol-based, so it should do a good clean-up. In the same drawer there's also a box of shop rags. Good clean fibre, they will help.""

Tubesnake looks around with the AR view of the sensors. ""Everybody ready to go soon? I'll need an address again once we take off.""

[sunnyside]

Even with everything being as insane as it's been, the rote social training is still there as Nari says "Thank you" to Bongo in a relatively normal way. Still that edge of tears sound in her voice though.

Once she isn't being looked at, Tubesnake and Bongo can hear Nari messing around with cans and rags in the small space between the shelves and workbench in the back of the van. She's a little taller than Tubesnake. So she can't just stand up tall the way he can in his van, but she's sounds like she's managing.

(OOC: I've been figuring a low roof height for passengers but a high roof van overall, with the difference being taken up by stuff to make the shops conveniently work. Like a tig welder where the welding gun is on a spooled tether in the ceiling you can just pull down as needed and things like that).

She does manage to get out "Thanks for the supplies. This is a real mess. I'll try to do the best I can to get the floor nice. " This gets her back to crying, but at least not as much.

If Tubesnake or Bongo turns around or Selina returns it'd be pretty obvious that she's having a hard time with this, and doesn't have a great way to get the paint off her back.

[pbangarth]

[OOC: Would Selina's Makeover spell clean off that stuff?]

[Thanee]

When Selina gets back, she puts some of the clothes at the side for Sophie later, and hands what she got for Nari over to the girl.

"Nari, listen. I just got some clothes that we can use, but there is a lot that we can do with them. You need to help me a little here, though. I am a professional fashion designer, actually. Well, that, and a mage. Shaman, to be precise. Don't freak out, this is nothing like the situation you were in earlier. I know a few spells to clean you up, and also to change the clothes to almost anything. There are some limits, of course, based on what we got here to work with. But most importantly, we need an idea of what you would like. What kind of clothes do you like to wear, what colors, cut, something like that. I can show you what it would look like with a simple illusion. Here, how is that for example?"

Selina than creates a rather obvious image of Nari wearing a cute dress.

[ Spoiler ]

Trid Phantasm F1, just to be able to show the image.

[sunnyside]

Nari stares at the conjured image. A bit of that happy look from earlier creeps back, but then darkens. She gets her manners back and says. "Thanks. Thanks a lot. I'd like to get cleaned first though. And...maybe something with pants? Can a jacket happen? I really liked my jacket..."

Somewhat contrary to wanting to get clean she sets down the towl and wraps herself in the tarp again while she and Selina talk behind Bongo.

There are a smattering of folks around, taking advantage of the late night option. However nobody seems to be paying any attention to the van.

[Thanee]

"Alright, let's get you cleaned up. This spell only works, if you allow it. So, don't fight against it, okay?"

Selina uses her Makeover spell to help Nari get cleaned up, maybe add a little polish, if she wants to.

[ Spoiler ]

Makeover F4. Can just buy 4 hits on the spell, with Fiona's help (Aid Sorcery), which should be enough, I suppose.

"Pants and a jacket, sure thing! How is this?" Selina changes the image, and works with Nari to also get her engaged with the process and hopefully taking her away from her sad thoughts. Pants, jacket, cut, colors. Once they have settled on something, she can use her Fashion spell to actually change Nari's new clothes to what they have come up with.

[pbangarth]

Bongo resends the address Brewster gave them to the team members. "Let's get Sophie back to her parents and get the contract done. Then maybe we, or I, can take Nari to some place safe for her."

He muses whether Rose could help in that regard. Maybe a lot to ask someone he just met, but surely she would understand the predicament of a girl who had been abused.

[Koekepan]

""All aboard? Flight 714 is headed for takeoff on the way to some place nobody has told me yet. Remember to stow any loaded weaponry and keep a sharp eye out for any fly-alongs. We ready to fire up the turbines?""

[pbangarth]

"We're to take Sophie to her parents staying in a houseboat at the docks where Brewster keeps a slip or two. The address should be in the feed I just sent you. I'll let Brewster know we are coming so the parents can be ready.

"I hope Sophie is awake by the time we get there."

Bongo sends a notice to Brewster. <<On our way with Sophie. She is unconscious at the moment but OK. Let her folks know we are coming. >>

[sunnyside]

Nari eventually gets into the magic despite herself and her circumstances. She and Selina work spend some time on the outfit. The jeans, top, and jacket start off fairly basic with a standard cut, but having lost all her stuff she's interested in some pattern around her ankles on the jeans and fox themed art in the fabric of the jacket on the back and the upper left in the front, and that takes a bit of sorting out as it starts shaping up Selina even gets a smile out of Nari.

On the coms Angel tells the group. <<People are weird, but I like the medkit interface! As far as I can tell her vitals are good, but I guess magic might be weird when it knocks out you>>

Brewster replies shortly after that, his replies coming quicker now <<Good Good. I'll do that.

From some of your earlier concerns, her being unconscious might be quite convenient. Things are quiet at the docks, hopefully you aren't brining any trouble?>>

[Thanee]

Once Nari seems to be happy with the result, Selina will drop her illusion and get to work on her clothes to match the image they collaborated.

[ Spoiler ]

Ok, let's go with Fashion F6 to make Nari's clothes extra nice.

Spellcasting 11 hits (LOL; guess only 6 count, though) no Drain

Nari's affinity to foxes gets Selina thinking and she takes a moment to focus her senses into the astral and ask Fiona to take a closer look at her aura as well, helping her ally spirit in the process, who is way more adept at understanding them than the shaman herself.

[ Spoiler ]

Selina Assensing Teamwork for Fiona 1 hit

Fiona Assensing 7 hits

[pbangarth]

Bongo replies to Brewster, << No pursuit as far as we can detect. Heading there now. >>

[Koekepan]

Tubesnake quietly pulls into traffic once everything is sufficiently buttoned up for it to be safe. No fancy routing here, unless there's a report of something following.

""Hey, anybody in a position to assess what's going on in the apartment? Maybe now his game has been figured out, he's running out of town. Oh, and yeah - could we try identifying his party participants?""

[Thanee]

<< Not really. Going back there astrally is too risky now that they are aware. And there is still the ward, which either takes time to get through, or will immediately alert him. >> Selina replies to Tubesnake's question.

<< The only one who might have some options is probably Angel. >>

[sunnyside]

While the rest of the group gets to enjoy the relative comfort of Tubesnake's Pilot's driving, Fiona has to keep "running" in order to stay in the van in the astral. Fortunately there isn't much traffic in the astral and movement is fast.

If you have time, you can find a lot in an Aura. Mages working for the police with relatively weak gifts can manage quite a bit over time. What you really need talent for is to spot what you aren't looking for.

Nari's aura isn't very interesting, except for the residue from manipulation spells and a level of exhaustion and intoxication, but that was expected. Simply mundane as far as they can tell.

However Fiona manages to spot from the corner of her astral vision that something seems off with Sophia's aura. Moving over and starting more closely at it, there's a little thread forming within.

Ritual magic. Not very far along yet.

Between being on overwatch and the moving frame of the van it'd be really hard to have been using a spotter. Fiona is pretty confident there isn't one.

While Fiona is dealing with that in the astral, in the physical world Nari seems impressed with the clothes. "Wow. They look great. Especially considering what they were a moment ago! That'd be quite a story to tell people. I'll wear this jacket all the time!" She gets a bit sad again, but not nearly as much as before. "I'll leave out the other stuff." She sets about getting dressed, keeping her fox ear headband, which has been the only constant through all of this.

In the Matrix Angel replies <<Sorry Mr. Snake. I logged out of everything and tried to cover my tracks, so I don't have log in access anymore. If they haven't changed comcodes I could get back into stuff. But they know they got hacked. If the Tourmaline figured out the cameras don't show you guys showing up or leaving with Nari they'd know those systems were messed with too, so IC and Spiders are probably on alert and busy dealing with all that. Frank didn't have a lot of cameras and stuff anyway, mostly we were relying on your drones. >>

[pbangarth]

Unaware yet of the ritual magic link forming, Bongo is settling a bit. "That looks nice, Nari." To the group he messages, <<Should we send an anonymous report with imagery to the authorities? Probably won't do much, but a little harassment might slow Frank's activities for a while. >>

[Thanee]

"What do you mean, you leave the other stuff? The rest of the clothes? Take it, please!" Selina says to Nari.

<< Frank is not quite giving in, it seems. Fiona just informed me, that there is a ritual spell being cast on Sophie. This will still take a while, hours, before it takes effect, and Fiona can, at least, offer some protection against it. But there is no guarantee, of course. >>