Adam
Wednesday 5/14/70 17:32:09

Adam Lear was sitting with his roommate John Wain in the lounge of their dorm watching the large-size trid unit. They were happy to occupy a sofa near the rear of the room, since the area up closer to the image was occupied by a hairy group they personally dubbed the Earthens. The natural-fiber-clad Earthens were glued to the latest media speculation about the recent annihilation of the Tate Modern in London, which had indeed been a bummer since Adam had kind of wanted to see that place after a presentation on it in his art class.
A lot of the news - certainly the flashiest part - revolved around a sort of war trid files sent in by various groups claiming credit for the blast. Or denying it. Seems that Terra First had been the first (no pun intended) to take credit. And then Terra First has sent in a second (?) clip denying it and blaming it on Green War, who they said was trying to frame them. Green War came back with "Why would we frame you for something we'd be totally proud of doing if only we'd thought of ourselves," which was followed by a torrent of ridiculous clips from every self-absorbed eco-group in the world condemning WHOEVER was behind the blast for the loss of innocent life. And on and on and on....But to the Earthens it was about the most important thing in the world, as the spoiled college kids went on and on about whether it was morally justified to take a life to save the Great Mother.

And just as the trid amused them, so they amused Adam and John.

When the broadcast ended and they were filing off the the sweat lodge they'd jury-rigged in the dorm basement, one of them, an unwashed little dwarf girl, pounced on John for eating a burrito. "Meat is murder, you fucking piece of shit asshole," she spewed. John calmly responded to her invective with, "Uh, it's soy," to which she shot back "But you WISH it was a cow, you speciesist scum!" And on it went.

As John sat and weathered the Earthen storm, Cal sat down next to Adam. Cal was the nominal leader of the Earthens on this end of the University of Washington campus, and much better spoken than some of his followers. He often made it a point to chat with Adam. "You know, you're a talented guy, dude. You should consider putting all that personal mojo you got goin' on into a worthwhile cause."

Gee, wonder what cause that might be. As Adam thought up a witty reply, he noticed that he and John were running late to meet a guy at their favorite sports bar, the Ram's Head. A Greek (system, not country) acquaintance of Adam's had asked him to meet there. No idea why, but Jeff was definitely from a rich family, and he was good for dinner and the beers.

Jonathan
Monday 7/7/70 08:07:00

Jon could barely see through the haze of his 4th of July Weekend (why did people still celebrate that?) hangover, but he'd been in Alister Connolly's office many times before - enough to have memorized the floor-to-ceiling view of Lake Washington, the mahogany desk with inlaid terminal, the real wood floor, protected from the iron-studded feet of anitique furniture by handmade Sioux throw-rugs. So he transferred any energy he might have used registering visual images to concentrating on what his boss was saying.

"Now this next little assignment is just a tad more risky than some of the others, so I thought I might have Rafael back you up on it....You don't want his help?....Well, I KNOW you are capable, but it just seems so risky....Oh, you are a cocky one, aren't you?....Well, I am definitely going to have some support people n standby, just in case....well now you are just being pig-headed, Jon. There's more at stake here than just YOUR neurons, you know - this has to come off without a glitch....Yes, yes, I know I always say that, but it's always true....Well, actually, no, the paydata is actually worthless....Because it IS important, Jon, just because it is. Why do you always have to ask so many questions? Why can't you just do as you're asked for once?....Oh, you do think you're something, don't you. Well, you're not THAT valuable here, but since I will accede that you have some worth amongst our humble ranks, I will tell you that it is basically a null-value file that we mailed to their system. We just want you to see if you can get it back for us....Yes, yes, yes, we want to test their security - they ARE our rivals, Jon....Illegal? Such a strong word from one so tender of years. You just run along now, all the details are already at your workstation."

As Jonathan staggered for the office door, Alister called - "And I need it by 2200 hours tonight!"
Null sheen, thought Jon, since I'm meeting Jason and Guile at Penumbra at eight anyway, and I'm not gonna let a little thing like work hold me up.

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 17:04:00

"It is to compensate my future husband for properly maintaining me throughout our blissful life together, and an indication by my father of the style to which I am accustomed and in which he expects my beloved to keep me," said the little Pakistani girl Caittie was chatting with. A DOWRY! What a wiz concept. A little old-white-spud in the culure department, though. But she didn't say that to her new friend Anoor. "Wow, that is really cool. And of course every culture is equally good." She wasn't sure what that meant exactly, but it sounded true and they hammered it into their heads at school often enough.

"Who are you talking to, Ace?" Ohmigosh - had she been talking out loud again?

"Sorry Anoor, gotta go," she said in English, letting the Urdu-soft she'd borrowed from somewhere translate for her. Everything she said on those programs always came out stilted, especially with the non-Euro lingos, but they got the point across, letting her talk to people all over the world.

She needed to reassure her dad (again) that she wasn't crazy, finish repairing Mrs. Nakamura's commlink, and do her homework all in the next couple of hours, so she could hook up with Alex and Lisa at DDR before it opened.

Harriet
Tuesday 7/1/70 13:42:43

A rare sunny day in Seattle. The sun beat down on Harriet Hojnacki's head as she jumped down the steps from the lead architect's trailer. She put on her hardhat to give herself a little shade, but it didn't help much. But it didn't matter much right now, because she was still feeling good about the praise she'd just received from Mr. Van Buskirk - well, he kept insisting she call him Cody. He'd really taken her under his wing lately, which could make all her career dreams come true - she'd certainly worked hard enough. She didn't even mind that he'd asked her to come here to the Hirotomo Building site later tonight to make sure the latest concrete pourings had been done properly before work resumed tomorrow. He was definitely nice than any other human supervisor she'd had.

And then Andy had to ruin it. He walked up to her and tried to give her a kiss, right where everyone could see, right there in front of the boss's trailer, damn him, RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE BOSS'S TRAILER. She was sure it was on purpose, damn him. Why did all this racial crap have to be such an issue anyway?
"Heya, babe, why so cold all the time lately?" She did feel bad - it wasn't his fault - he was actually a better guy than almost anyone else she'd dated - and he had this thing he did with his tusks...
"I was thinkin' we could toss back a few tonight at my place, you know, like how it USED to be and then all of a sudden wasn't." Looking at him there, all dusty and with his shirt tied around his muscular waist, she was almost tempted. But that was the animal in her, and giving in to that all the time was why most of her people never got anywhere. Besides, she was meeting Monica for dinner this evening before coming back here.

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 17:05:15

The teenage girl at a makeshift workbench gives a soft sigh as she looks up from the broken commlink she was supposed to be working on. 'I have to remember not to talk outloud when speaking on the Matrix...', she chides herself mentally as she works the kinks in her back out, raising her arms straight above her head while inter-twining her fingers and stretching. After she finishes stretching, she looks over to see a man smiling over at her from the other workbench in the room.
'She is growing up to look just like her mother. I wish Freya was still here to see how beautiful her daughter is becoming.', Mark thinks as he looks at the girl.
"I'm just thinking back on some stuff they taught in 'Culture Studies' today, Dad. Did you know in Pakistan, the wife's father gives something called a dowry at weddings to the husband? It's interesting that they still follow the same tradition that started so long ago.", Caittie says while looking over to her father.

The smile fades as Mark hears three words out of all that she says. Dowry, Wedding, and Husband. His face takes on a more serious tone as he sits up in his chair and crosses his arms infront of him. "Is there something I need to know, Cait? Has my girl gotten that serious with a boy without me knowing?!", his voice rising a bit with a little bit of nervousness in it, as he put his hands palm down on the workbench.
Seeing where this was going, Caittie waves her hands infront of her while saying, "Nonono! Nothing like that is goin' on! I was just thinking of how different thier traditions are. Thats it, honest." A small nervous laugh escapes her mouth as she puts on a big smile. "Dad, once I found the right guy for me, I'll be bringing him to you for your 'Fatherly Inspection'. Just try not to scare him too much!", she says as she lets a true laugh out to defuse the situation.

Mark looks his daughter over with an examining eye that fathers have and sighs a little. He shakes his head a little and runs his hand through his hair as he stands up, pushing the chair back. He walks over to his daughter and puts a hand on her shoulder and smiles as he says, "I know you will. I'm just worried you might be growing up too fast and you can't blame me for that. Now finish up Mrs Nakamura's commlink while I clean up the shop and do inventory."
"Yes, Dad", Caittie replies as she turns back to the broken piece of electronics and starts to try and repair it.

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 17:15:30

Caittie sits back after repairing the commlink that Mrs Nakamura brought in. Following the first step of troubleshooting, she did a visual inspection of the commlink and saw that a transistor had come loose due to a combination of shoddy soldering and being dropped from Mrs Nakamura's purse. A quick resoldering into place and everything checked out good.
"Dad, this one's fixed! I'm going upstairs to do my homework, then I'm headed out with Lisa and Alex.", Caittie yells into the front of the shop at her father as she heads up the stairs to her room.


Tuesday 8/12/70 17:50:25

A loud breath of relief can be heard from inside Caittie's room as she rubs her eyes. Even though tonights homework wasn't as much as usuall, it still feels like it took forever. She checks her commlink to make sure it saved correctly and, seeing it safely stored, walks over to her closet. Hmm... what should I wear tonight? It's going to be warm so..., she thinks to herself as she puts a finger to her mouth. Finally deciding on what to wear, she reaches into the closet and pulls out some cloths. A few minutes later she is standing infront of a mirror checking out how she looks.

Looking back at her is a good looking seventeen year old female elf that stands around 5' 6". Her natural firey red hair is offset with dyed pink highlights, and is tied into a ponytail that goes down to the small of her back. She has two pink bangs that go down either side of her face, framing it, showing off her piercing green eyes and light freckling that she got from her mother.
She is wearing a pink t-shirt that matches her highlights, blue-jean cargo pants, and tan suede work-boots. She has a cheap commlink straped to her hip, a pair of glasses, and a metal necklass that belonged to her mother. I think this will do nicely, she thinks to herself as she continues to examine herself by turning to the side.

Confident that she looks good, Caittie goes back downstairs and finds her father still cleaning the front of the shop. She walks over to him, leans up, kisses him on the cheek and says, "Bye, Dad. I'm headed out to meet up with Lisa and Alex. I have my commlink if you need me." Then heads towards the back of the shop to where the garage is. Before she leaves the room, she can hear Mark say, "You better be back before 10, Cait! You have school in the morning!" The only response he heard was a, "Yes, Dad" any father might expect from a teenage daughter.
Before she even got to into the garage, Caittie sent a mental command to the Dodge Scoot to unlock and start-up. The "New" feel still hadn't warn off the beat up Scoot that her father and uncle got her for her last birthday. It was a breath of freedom that ment she was growing up in their eyes. Thier only condition was that she wear a helmet, and she didn't mind, she had seen the news about accidents too many times. Caittie snapped her helmet in place, gave the mental command to the garage door to open, and started driving to DDR to meet up with her friends.


Tuesday 8/12/70 18:12:10

Parking at the back service entrance, Caittie sends a message to Beth and waits for the backdoor to unlock. Once she hears the tell-tale click, she opens the door and walks into the storage area where the spare tables, chairs and cleaning supplies are kept. She walks the familiar walkways untill she hears familiar voices in a large open area.
She walks onto the dancefloor to see an older female elf talking to a pair of teenaged humans. "Alex, can you clean up the balcony and cat-walk. Dont forget to wipe down the railing. The supplies are where they always are. Thanks", Caittie can hear the elf say to the male human. "Sure thing, Beth", Alex replies as he walks towards where Caittie is.

"Well, well. Look who decided to show.", Alex said with a joking tone and a wide smile. "Yeah, yeah.", Caittie replied as she walked past. She looked back a little at him as he went into the back room. The track team has done him good...
"Lisa, can you check the fridge and restock if needed? Remember, no sampling though!", Beth said with a sly grin to the female human. "Aw... Your no fun...", Lisa replied with a slight frown that vanished as soon as she saw Caittie. "Heya, Caittie! I'll see you in a few to chat.", she said to Caittie while waving as she walked away from her towards the bar area.
"Hi, Beth. How are you doing today?", Cait asks Beth as she walks up. Beth turns and says with a smile, "Better now that I have more help. You guys don't know how much I'm in a bind since Larry got hurt. Without you guys here, I would have to reduce my hours that I'm open." She frowns a little and more says to herself than Caittie, "I wish I could hire you guys and pay you, but laws as they are, I can only really let you hang out without drinking."

Shaking her head, Beth looks back to Caittie and says, "Well, since you are here, can you clean off the tables over there and then sweep the dancefloor? We have a while till we open, but it needs to be done." Hearing that, Caittie says, "Yes, Ma'am!", while snaping to attention and saluting.
"Get a move on, then!", Beth says with a smile on her face and chuckles some. Caittie laughs a bit as she grabs a cleaning rag and heads over to the tables and starts wiping them down. Beth shakes her head a bit as she wanders into the back office to do whatever she does back there.

Adam
Wednesday 5/14/70 17:33:00

Adam smiled at Cal's compliment, and nodded his head over at the dwarven girl who was going berserk on his roommate. He laughed, and jokingly said to Cal, "... if you ever find one, let me know, okay?"

As the rest of the group started to file out towards the basement, Adam remembered that he and John were going to meet Jeff at the Ram's Head soon, so he stood up and stretched his arms above his head. He decided that in order to speed things along, he was going to need to divert the little dwarven hippy's attention.

"Ya know, even though John put beef-flavoring on his soy-ritto..." This remark drew a glare from his roommate, who was still fighting off the dwarven girl's attacks. The reality was that both Jon and Adam had nuked a couple of burrittos while the Earthens were watching TV. Adam just happened to get his in the microwave first, which meant that he had finished his before the program ended, and, fortunately, wasn't still eating it when the girl looked back at them. Somehow, Adam didn't think her reaction would have been quite the same, even if he had been eating one. "... maybe you could put that energy into something that would help more people. A fund-raiser or something - like, to help out the families of the people that were in the Tate."

Adam looked back at Cal, since he was the Earthen's leader. Adam suggested the idea, because he thought it might get the dwarf's attention, but he knew that if Cal liked the idea, the rest of the Earthens would pretty much go for it too. "That would be something I would be interested in helping out with," he added to Cal. Whoever blew up the Tate, and whatever their motivations were, Adam was pretty sure that Cal, and most of the Earthens agreed that it was terrible that so many people died. Most of hte student body probably felt the same way, and Adam was sure that at least a dozen similar ideas were floating around the various groups on campus - college students seemed to jump at the chance to get involved in big causes.

Having drawn the dwarven girl's attention away from John, he added, "We could talk about it more later, though. John and I have to get running, we told a friend we would meet him for dinner, and we're already late."

As the groups exchanged goodbyes, Adam grinned at John. "I think she likes you."

Harriet
Tuesday 7/1/70 13:48:49

"She's been yelling at him for five minutes now, what'd he do?"

"Probably told her she looked good or something."

"Women!"

"Kid... just don't say that anywhere she can hear... and remember the walls have ears."

"There aren't any walls yet."

"Exactly."

"Err... Why does Andy put up with it? He's the Foreman right? Now one messes with the foreman? I mean even the Architects listened to Andy I saw that."

"Kid... yer new here.. lemme check... yeah, everyone's on break. Here's the skinny. Architects gotta make nice with the foreman, make the crews think they can give feedback to the foreman, foreman gives it back and forth to the Architects. That's just modern corp style."

"I knew that crud, it's all newsie feel good, I meant that tusker woman laying into Andy... She's -still- at it! And he's just standing there nodding like an idiot!"

"That's Harriet, the best damned line crew and ball buster in the plex. Look, they go way back, Andy hired her onto his crew a dozen years ago. Some stuff happened, no one likes to talk about it, but I can guess. He's been the mouthpiece and crew chief, and she's been his enforcer ever since."

"Enforcer, granted she's a tusker woman, but she average size for a Tusker."

"Kid, it's not all about muscles. She can run every rig on the site, and take apart and jigger pretty much anything. Of course, she don't do anything like that cause it would likely cause a project delay."

"So what she do, yell at you all day?"

"Nah, she does that if she likes you... usually she just walks right up to you and breaks something."

"What, like toss a Soy Beer at you?"

"Plastic bottles don't hurt you. I meant break you."

"Break me?"

"Starts out little, like a toe or a finger first time, second time she does an arm or a leg."

"C'mon, how she do that?"

"With a big smile on her face, like she likes it."

"Sick. But really, what she do, bite your fingers with those big tusker teeth of hers?"

"Usually grabs whatever's handy, with me she brought the hammer."

"Hammer?"

"Ten pound sledge, brand new, just walked right up and unloaded on my little toe. Neat as you please right through the safety shoes. Didn't even hurt really."

"It didn't hurt?"

"Nah, too quick, I tried to swing at her, but I just fell right over. You need your little toe to balance you know."

"You walk okay now."

"Well, I got a new toe didn't I?"

"So how come you still work with her?"

"Well, first of all, she was right."

"Right about what?"

"I was a lazy prick. Secondly..."

"?"

"She put that hammer ever so gently between my legs while I was on the deck and said that was next."

"Why the hell you here?!"

"See that truck over there?"

"The hot pink 'Pussy Wagon' with holographic porn projectors?"

"Yeah, nice rig isn't it? Anyway, I got that with all the bonus money we get on any job she and Andy runs, never missed a deadline, always make the bonus. Extra 30 to 60 k a year in bonus money."

"All because of your little toe and not being a prick anymore?"

"Nah, I'm still a prick, just not lazy. Damn, she's still yelling at him. We'd better get back to work before she stops."

Monday 7/7/70 8:10:08

Jon sipped his mocha and meandered into his small office, located two floors down from Alister's, on the third floor with a small window looking out over the parking lot I.M.D. shared with the two small software companies in the Pine Ridge Office park in Bellevue. He looked out his window and took a couple of ticks to just get his head on straight before connecting to his terminal and getting the details of his assignment for this morning. Once he got himself geared up and in the zone he'd be ready to roll, he could feel the excitment that always came with each challenge, but he wanted to take the time to enjoy his morning coffee.

Time to get to work.

He lowered himself into his leather recliner closed his eyes and accessed his internal commlink and called up some of his agents in preparation.

3-PO run on commlink Elite and monitor incoming traffic. All messages not marked Emergency to be held until further notice.

The 3-PO agent would monitor traffic and keep him from being bothered while he was working, and since it would run from the Erika Elite he had clipped the belt of his slacks it would even take up processing power he might need on his tasks.

He loaded his other two agents R2 and Padawan into his persona to have them available, along with the normal slew of programs he figured he might need and then spooled the fiber optic cable from his terminals port and clipped it into the datajack tucked just behind his left ear. The fiber optic cable was a necessity, since the data terminals that had access to any of the secure storage at I.M.D. were deliberately not accessible wirelessly for security reasons. It made access a pain if one didn't have a datajack so Jonathan had one installed when he'd gotten his commlink installed.

He set his coffee down and mentally cued up his task queue to see what exactly Alister wanted him to do this time.

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:35:00

Finished with their chores, Caittie and Lisa went up to the catwalk to help Alex. The catwalk was pretty high up over the dance floor - it was actually just the main catwalk - there were some secondary, much narrower grillwork paths extending over different parts of the club. Larry used them to get around up there and rehang lights. But they weren't very safe - a week ago he'd fallen off and broken both legs.

So they stayed on the main catwalk helping Alex clear all the dust away - the lights go so hot that it was a fire hazard if too much dust was allowed to accumulate. Most places had drones for this sort of thing, but Beth didn't make more than just enough to live on with the place. Not a lot of budget for extras. Which always sort of surprised Caittie, since the place was pretty well known, and always packed.

They could see Beth doing something on her main terminal down below, when they all heard the back door open. "Dammit, did one of you leave the back unlocked?" Beth shouted up at them, but didn't bother listening to their reply - she was already shouting, "Hey, we're closed," and reaching for something under the bar. But then a different look came over her face - and from that moment on she never once glanced up at the kids.

Entering the room were three men. They looked a little silly. One was old and big and his head was a totally bald mass of wrinkles. He wore a double-breasted pin-striped three-piece suit. The second was young and used too much product in his black hair. His suit was the same as the other guy's. The third guy, a human like the other two, was even bigger than the first guy. He had long black hair in a pony-tail and was wearing a ridiculous gold track suit. When she saw them Beth eased away from the bar, her hand coming away empty.

The first guy spoke. "Well, I think youse had plenny o' time ta reconsider our offer. Now I hope we don't have to negotiate with you in the manner we did with Larry."

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:35:30

Up on the catwalk, Alex and Lisa's eyes went wide at the realization the Larry hadn't actually fallen, but they kept chill. Down below, Beth was saying, "Listen, all I can tell you is what he told you - we understand how biz is done, but we're already paying the Balducci Brothers, and there's not way we can pay 40% twice a month - we'd just be out of business and you'd have to collect from an empty warehouse."

The old guy sort of chuckled - a quiet, high-pitched whimpering sort of sound. "Got some lip on her, ain't she?" he says to the younger one. "Now you listen here, bitch - this ain't the Balduccis' turf, and you got no business paying them off. We're gonna get around to them in due time, and...."

"Well," Beth interrupted, "I hope you do it soon, since although they're the same sort of good-for-nothing inbred wops as yourselves, and although whatever I paid them they haven't done a damn thing to keep pricks like you all out of my place - for all that, you go up against them and they'll kill you. I know it and you know it, and that's exactly why you're not EVER going to get around to dealing with them."

Beth took a deep breath, and sort of looked surprised at herself. But the boss pointed a finger at her - "Don't NOBODY talk ta Louie Fish-Breath thataway, NOBODY!!!"

There was an odd silence, during which Louie stood there with his finger pointed, and the younger guy sort of glanced back at the big pony-tailed guy. "I SAID," repeated the mobster, "Don't NOBODY talk ta Louie Fish-Breath thataway, NOBODY!!!!!"

Tracksuit-guy sort of jumped. "Oh, thorry bawth," he lisped. Approaching Beth, he growled, "Don't NOBODY talk ta the bawth thataway, NOBODY!!!" Beth tried to scurry away, but the huge meatball of a man was unnaturally fast - like a big slab of steak being electrocuted, he sort of twitched and surged toward her with amazing speed and in the blink of an eye had her by the arm and was looming over her face, a thin line of spittle hanging from his lips, catching the light, threatening to fall into her eye.
Then his ham fist crashed into her mouth and all of a sudden he didn't seem so ridiculous anymore. He raised the fist again.

Adam
Wednesday 5/14/70 17:34:00

Adam's suggestion seemed to hit the dwarven furball in just the right way - she stopped haranguing John and affected a thoughtful pose. In fact, all the Earthens seemed to think it was an idea worth pondering, with the exception of Deerwalker. She was a tall, blond human girl with a willowy figure and model-worthy features. It never seemed to occur to her that some animal had had to die to provide the buckskin attire she always wore, but then considering how little of herself she chose to cover - well, maybe that was her own way of saving at least one or two critters from anal electrocution. Adam was pretty sure she was one of Cal's harem - in fact, he was pretty sure that was really the only reason Cal was mixed up with these people - Happy Hunting Grounds, as it were.

In any case, while the others were emoting positively about helping the Tate victims, Deerwalker sneered derisively and said, "Fundraiser? We've GOT all the..." - and that was as far as she got before Cal gave her a look that would stop a bus. But he didn't miss a beat - "Yeah, brau, that is an outstanding idea. Right on. So I WILL be getting back to you on that - but if you gotta go right now, you gotta go. Catch ya later." He offered Adam his hand and was off. If Adam was any judge of character, he really would be hearing from the guy again about the fundraiser.

As they headed off for the basement, Adam and John heard one of the hippies musing - "But, like, how can we be sure none of the money we raise will go to the families of the ones that, like, really deserved to die?"

All they could do was shake their heads and sigh as they headed out to meet frat-guy Jeff Bennett at the Ram's Head down the hill in the University Village mall.

Harriet
Tuesday 7/1/70 13:55:09

As her anger cooled and her scolding died down, Harriet could see that Andy was hurt. Dammit, why couldn't he just chill for a while? But her dreams just weren't his.
He had gone from being an older brother, when she was just out of the tunnels, barely 15, but big. Then, as she had matured, he'd become much more than her boss and mentor. When he'd taught her all he had to teach, the relationship had lasted, but her eyes were always looking much farther down the road than his. Of course she still had feelings for him - feelings she would not let sabotage her achievement of her goals.
Anyway, given tonight's dinner with Monica at Big Rhino - and the fact that Monica despised Andy - plus her need to come back to the site later in the evening - spending time with him after work today was simply out of the question. He didn't take it well, and lashed out to cover his pain.
"Yeah, that's it. Might as well just use me an' then spit me out like you do everyone else. Hell, maybe I oughtta just warn your precious Co-dee what he's got to look forward to..."
A dangerous look from Harriet made him think better of that line of reasoning, but then he took a different tack - "Whatever," he said, turning to get back to work, "you're not the only one that knows how to make points with the smoothies."
She was opening her mouth to ask him what the hell he meant by that when the sound of wrenching metal and the cries of men commanded their attention. One of the aluminum scaffoldings surrounding the rising steel skeleton of the Hirotomo Building had somehow torn loose of its moorings, maybe under the weight too many men. Now, as she and Andy ran to the scene, they could see two men hanging on for their lives from a dangling section of the structure, a deadly 15 meters or so off the ground.

Jonathan
Monday 7/7/70 08:10:15

Turned out that the node Alister wanted Jon to rape and pillage was an outfit called Matsuki Precision Instruments. He'd seen their location a number of times surfing the Seattle side of Lake Washington. Big black glass-looking thing, all tinted and opaque. No idea who they were hooked up with, but it must be someone, because the node was clearly marked as extraterritorial. That would mean no restrictions on their ice. Good. More fun that way. He might even be tempted to have a bit of a look around once he had Alister's supposedly null-value pachage....

Adam
Wednesday 5/14/70 17:34:00

Adam couldn't help but notice "Deerwalker's" little slip. Normally, given that she was an exceptionally good-looking woman, a fair amount of his attention was directed her way. In fact, if he wasn't sure that Cal was into her, he probably would have made a move by now. So, when she seemed to be the only one not "into" his idea, he took note.

Whatever it was that she was about to say, Cal seemed to know what it was going to be and didn't want everyone else to hear it.

Adam shrugged it off. Cal seemed like a cool guy. Adam didn't know if it was Jon, the other Earthens, or even himself, who Cal didn't want to hear whatever Deerwalker was going to say (probably all three) but Adam didn't want to push it. Adam figured if Cal didn't want people to know - he had a reason. Maybe he could smooth-talk it out of him later.

So he smiled, and nodded understandingly as he shook Cal's hand. "See ya later, man."

As he and John walked away, Adam couldn't help but try to finish Deerwalker's sentence. What would make sense there? 'Fundraiser? We've GOT all the...' All the what? Money? Certainly they don't have ALL the money. That's just rediculous. I have some money right here... and those Earthens don't dress like they've got a lot of money. Hell, that's why they were over at our place, watching out trideo. But what else would make sense in the context of not wanting to have a fundraiser to help people out? Adam looked over at Jon to see if he seemed to notice, or seemed to be thinking about the comment.

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:36:00

*THUD*
The sound of his fist smashing into Beth's face didn't register in Caittie's brain. She gripped the handrails of the catwalk for dear life, but for some reason, she couldn't figure out why. All the muscles in her body were tense and starting to ache due to the ammount of stress put on them, but she wasn't doing anything. Her breathing was slow and labored, like the air around her was heavy liquid being drawn into her lungs through a straw.

The man reared his arm back for another blow, but stopped for a second to look at his work. The twisted smile on the man's face was truly horid to look at. He enjoyed this, oh how he enjoyed this part of his job. As he finished apraising Beth's growing bruise on her face, he actually blew a kiss at her as his fist rammed back down.
*THUD*

Caittie felt her stomach lurch a little at the sound of the beating. A little farther away, Alex was the first one to break out of the trance. His face twisted into a form Caittie had never seen before, pure seething rage, but she didn't even register it.
"This is crazy! I have to do something... Something to stop this!", Alex wispered to Lisa and Caittie through clenched teeth. As he turned towards the exit of the catwalk, Lisa quickly grabbed his arm and clung to it like Caittie was clinging to the handrail.
"You can't go down there! You might make things worse or they might kill you!", Lisa pleaded. "Dont go!"

The man pulled his arm back one more time, again inspecting Beth's face. Before it was once pleasing to the eye, now... You would flinch the first time you saw it. Her left cheek was red and a bit of blue was showing through her skin. Her right eye was almost swollen shut and a little blood was seeping through the space between her eyelids. The look on her face just begged him to stop as she let out an almost inaudable whimper.
Hearing this, his smile grew to hidious perportions as he drew his arm back even farther and sped it down towards Beth's face again.

*THUD... CRACK*

The sound of Beth's jaw breaking echoed off every wall, every table and every chair in the club. It rebounded a hundred fold and everyone heard it like they were right next to the jaw when it broke. Then there was a time where silence reined in the empty club, but it only lasted a second as an ear-splitting shriek ran rampant through the club.
"SHREEEEEEEK!"
'I wonder who is screaming... They sound so helpless...' Caittie thought as she heard the screaming, but couldn't tell where it was coming from. It finaly occured to her that SHE was the one that was screaming...

Harriet
Tuesday 7/1/70 13:55:18

"'!Zuk!", absently noting in passing her use of Or'Zet under stress, Harriet punched the all channels button on her command radio as she watched Andy sprinting at full speed to the base of the scaffolding, bellowing as he ran for everyone to clear the likely debris. It was easy enough to spot, several lunch pails shattered their contents over the pile of broken pre fab concrete strewing someone's spaghetti and tomato sauce meal in a sickeningly graphic illustration of what may come next.

"Need a crew on north side 5 and 6 NOW!.... Mitch your closest. Move it!" she paused momentarily as a dizzying array of ARO guides flashed into vision during her survey of the building framework. Spotting what she needed, she then made her no longer needed hand movement to activate the data highlights. Barely noting the details, she ran the projection through high speed compression work plan, then stopping as she came up behind Andy, busy moving people out of danger, she barked into the open channel, "Crane 3. Drop the load right now, and swing the line over to the north side."

"But... my cert... if I drop another ..."

Icily, "Drop it NOW! If I have to come up and do it then I am going to string you up by your balls and use your damned head as a wrecking ball, then I will dock your pay and fire you before I proceed to kick your ass off of this lot."

Sometime during her tirade a small pop followed by a very loud crash signaled the availability of Crane 3 for rescue operations. Over the channel there was a moan of the crane operator, "120 k...." as a segment of a central support column cracked as it thundered into the ground.

After a quick check, and a flash of pride at Andy's ability to take charge and get everyone clear, she slapped him on his shoulder approvingly before hurling herself at the base of the scaffolding and dragging her 2 meter and 150 kg frame up the scaffolding at speed.

"No one is dying today unless I say so."

... gonna hurt anyone who makes a crack about my fat ass...

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:36:40

Caittie's sudden scream startled Lisa, who recoiled, lost her balance and tumbled with a sream of her own off the catwalk - Alex reacted instantly, thowing himself toward her. Landing across the hard grillwork on his belly knocked the wind out of him, but he still somehow caught Lisa's desperately outstretched wrist, leaving her dangling and flailing precariously a good ten meters off the dance floor.

Down below, the commotion did not go unnoticed. Gold-tracksuit paused in his beating of Beth, though his thick left arm still gripped her right shoulder, holding her sagging weight. All three thugs looked up at the kids. For moment they just stared upward, trying to take in the new and totally unexpected scene. It was like the whole violent ugly scene just froze, and a collection of random details assailed Caittie's panicked senses. The sweat beading on the bald leader's head. Lisa's frantic screams as she tried and failed to reach Alex with her other hand. The collection of wifi nodes lighting up Gold-tracksuit's body like a Christmas tree. The oily smell of the younger guy's pomade. The cold tightness in her own chest as she realized that after screaming she had stopped breathing. And the even colder, tighter feeling that came with seeing her friend Beth so brutally beaten.

Adam
Wednesday 5/14/70 17:34:10

Alas, John was a clever guy but he never worked hard at reading between the lines of things the way Adam always did. Right now he was looking outside hoping not to see any rain clouds. He hated getting wet, and it was a twenty minute walk down the hill the University Village. Of course they could take their bikes, but Adam knew his friend would make some excuse to get out of that - he hated riding his beat up Dodge Scoot alongside Adam's sleek black racing bike.

No rain, so they walked. Inside the Ram's Head, Jeff was already sitting down with a microbrew, and he ordered two more from a passing waitress when he saw Adam and John enter.

"Hey guys, glad you could make it. How's it goin', John?" Adam instinctively knew what neither Jeff nor John were even aware of - that greeting them both together, and then greeting John separately, was Jeff's attempt at politely end all further contact with Jeff. He was dismissed while present. Adam was constantly fascinated by these little things people did to one another without their even noticing it. And he always used it to his advantage.

"So anyway, Adam, you actually don't seem like a guy who needs cash, but I've got this thing I need done. We need done. I'd - we'd - consider it a really major favor, and we did scrape together some cred to go with. Sort of a go-between kinda thing, if you're interested in hearing more."

Harriet
Tuesday 7/1/70 13:55:31

As Harriet concentrated on reaching the two people hanging on for their lives, she got a better look at who they were. No wonder they had overloaded the scaffolding - they weren't members of her crew. It was that pasty-faced inspector from the city that kept coming around making a nuisance of himself, and his ork flunky. They were both in a tough spot. Fifteen meters up may as well as been a hundred in terms of survivability. The human - it would really smooth completion of the job if she got on his good side, and kill the job if his cronies downtown were pissed off about his death - he was hanging on to a smooth piece of pipe hanging down vertically. He had a pretty good grip, but it wasn't helping much - inch by inch he was slipping and there wasn't much he could do about it. When he ran out of pipe...
The ork - definitely very low on the bureaucratic food chain - also had problems. He only had one hand on a horizontal strut, but it was a very jagged piece of metal, and she could see it was cutting into his hand. And to make matters worse he was starting to panic.
The crane was swinging her way, but it wasn't exactly built for speed, nor was it equipped as a rescue device.

Adam
Wednesday 5/14/70 17:34:10

Adam smiled and sat down at the table, positioning himself to be equidistant from both Jeff and John. Adam was a little surprised when Jeff immediatly got down to buisness. It wasn't that Jeff hadn't invited Adam out to "just hang out" before, but something about their dinner-plans today made Adam quite sure that Jeff was going to ask him for a favor. Maybe it was that John was invited. The fact that Jeff was using the word "we" and already offered money for whatever it was didn't make Adam think that it was going to be the sort of favor he'd enjoy doing, even for a friend. But his curiousity was definatly peeked. Man, people sure are being very cloak-and-dagger today.

Before saying anything else, he gave Jeff a confused look, "by 'we' I suppose you mean the rest of the frat?" Adam peeked around the bar quickly, to see if any of the other guys from Jeff's frat were around - and cought the eyes of a few good-looking girls. Pulling his attention back to the table, he asked, "what sort of a favor do you need?"

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:37:00

Caittie's mind was going in three thousand directions at once, with the total effect of emotional shutdown. Her subconsious was registering all the events that were happening, but her consious mind was going haywire trying to make it all make sense. Her vision was pulling out away from her and dimming like a black hole was forming infront of her face. The breath had escaped her lungs and wouldnt fill back up. The only thing that kept her standing was the fact that she couldnt move any of her muscles due to them being tight on edge.

"C..., .el.. m.! ..t .v.r h..e!" Caittle could hear something but it didnt make any sense. At least the horible sounds have stopped, thank God..., she thought.

"CAIT!!!"

As if a light switch had been thrown, all her senses snapped back into order and she looks around in a wild panic. Her breathing resumes at a rapid pace as she takes in everything and her mind finally makes sense of everything that had happened.

"CAIT! I cant hold on for much longer!"
She turns towards the voice and sees Alex lying on the catwalk floor while holding on to something below. She looks around real quick and sees that Lisa isnt on the catwalk with them. "Oh shit...", she excaims as she dives down beside Alex and sees Lisa dangling by one hand.
"Lisa, grab my hand!", she tells her friend as she reaches down. Thier hands miss a couple of times before they both get a good grip on each other.
"You got her, Cait?", Alex asks after he sees them grab each other. "Ok, pull her up on three. One... Two... Three..."

Harriet
Tuesday 7/1/70 13:55:35

Very conscious of his toes curling reflexively in his steel toed work boots, Kanga focused on the ARO controls of the self elevating construction crane. He'd already popped the explosive safety charge, which would automatically require a Crane Operators Board Certification review. Along with dropping 120 thousand nuyen worth of central support column pre fab, now irrecoverably damaged and sitting on the pile of dirt on the South side of the lot. He raised his hand to wipe his sweat, suddenly cursing as the crane responded to his hand movement. Jumping back into correct posture he corrected his motion, but the lift line, already twitchy from having a few tons of load explosively dropped, started vibrating even more unpredictably as he tried to swing it over and around the building to the North side, where without direct view he was going to have to attempt to line it up with some scaffolding platform. It was going to be a challenge to do with a free line without a weight on the end to steady it.

Kanga was going to do his best though. The last two times he'd screwed up Harriet had come over personally and done the remedial training. Luckily the second incident hadn't been a repeat of the first one, something entirely else had gone wrong. Harriet had actually been his sponsor for certification, and the reason he was still running Crane 3 despite racking up a critical number of points is because she had vouched for him. The alternatives to screwing up weren't worth considering. He felt his inner thighs tighten.

...

Andy watched Harriet climbing the scaffolding, unconcerned with the fact she was free climbing, no safety line at all. He punched the blue button summoning a medical team to the site as he watched the unfolding events...Who the heck is up there?... no matter how hard she works out, she's always got that big butt... damn it... concentrate... what's wrong with me, I should be happy she's getting into management... gotta let go... damn it, wrong thing to think right now...

"Hang on, hang on..."

Monday 7/7/70 08:11:00

Jonathan settled a little deeper into his recliner and felt that rush that comes when he's about to do something dangerous. It made him grin in anticipation.

Jonathan activated his sim-module with a thought and just as quickly his VR world formed around him.

He stood on a landing pad, it hung suspended in amongst the red-yellow clouds, no planet visible below merely more clouds. The clouds shifted and moved with ethereal winds creating whirls and patterns in the clouds. The landing pad’s dull gray-silver metal attached to the rest of the structure via a long narrow bridge notoriously lacking in guard rails or any other safety feature. His home node’s structure consisted of a multi-level series of inverted tear drop buildings done in gleaming jet and neon blues. He took a moment just to savor the VR landscape, he’d spent long enough on the programming of his reality filter that he invariably took a moment to enjoy it. He gave himself at least a full second before getting back to the task at hand.

“3PO, you will stay here and monitor incoming communications, standards protocols. R2, you will come with us and watch the ship.”

The gleaming droid icon of 3PO bowed and intoned its response in a prissy high pitched male voice.

“Yes Master Frost. I am fluent in over 3,000 communication protocols and will be happy to assist you in any of your communication needs. I. . . .” Frost waved him to silence.

The R2 droid icon rolled dutifully and silently toward the waiting ship, a long gleaming chrome dagger shaped vessel. Frost moved towards the waiting ramp near the front, his black cloak flowing behind him like a cape.

“Come my young Padawan, we have a mission from the Emperor.” He said to the young man dressed in the padawan student’s brown robes and cream tunic. The programming codes for him weren’t hard since Jonathan had grossly plagiarized digital images from the Phantom Menance movie by George Lucas.

“Yes Master Frost.” The agent nodded, rat tail bobbing, and fell into step one pace behind him and to his left.

Jonathan boarded the ship and it sealed itself with a quiet hiss, and almost immediately they blasted off the landing pad and out into space, star lines forming in Jonathan’s view screen. The trip didn’t take long, the node he was trying to access had a very public commcode and was open to VR visitors.

In his view their ship was soon flying over a series of small domes set up in a jumble on a gleaming black sand desert, the hut’s done in dirty gray with flashing adverts indicating what each node offered by way of product or service. The airways were filled with ships coming and going into the dozens of landing pads that surrounded the network nodes, the sky a chaotic stream of data moving to and from the network. Jonathan brought his ship into an open landing pad, and strode down the ramp with his Padawan agent on his heels. R2 sat dutifully at the top of the off-ramp, one arm extended with its little electro-shock device and a sensor dish protruding from the top of its dome.

“Let no one track this vessel back to our access node R2. You have my permission to destroy those you cannot divert.” R2 beeped an assent.

Jonathan moved off with Padawan following, a simple flip of his head and shrug of his shoulders sufficient to settle his robe’s hood perfectly about his head and shoulders, masking his features but for his mouth and chin in all its gleaming neon blue and black glory. He knew that the hooded robe cast his features in inky black shadows except for the gleaming neon blue of his pupils, eyes the same color that appeared on Innovative Matrix Design’s corporate logo for anyone smart enough to pick up on that clue. He slid his hands into the sleeves of his robe and moved into the virtual cityscape of nodes.

The cityscape teamed with icons. Users, programs, agents, all moved about the narrow twisting streets connecting the various buildings, one to another. Each building was a separate node in the network, each one a challenge to his abilities. The icons in his reality were represented as various aliens, the two-tailed Twi’leks, fish-like Quarren, droids, fur covered Wookies, and the white clad StormTroopers and Clone Warriors, all had meaning. He loved the variety, the sounds of the aliens moving through the buildings, and he consciously put aside his forebrain knowledge that each icon merely represented a huge volume of code and accepted this reality.

Jonathan brought one hand out of his robes and now with a gleaming metal vambrace that hadn’t existed a second ago settled firmly in place on his left forearm. He manipulated the buttons on the device and suddenly a handful of small flying drones appeared in from behind a building, forming up in a swirling hexagon in front of him. With a touch of a button he sent the seeker-exploit drones off to gather data about the nodes, seeking a way inside.

He was a ghost in the systems, flitting from node to node, barely skimming the surface of each while his drones engineered their way into the system. He examined the shops, mostly advertising machine parts and specialty gear, looking for a discreet way into the data base he needed. It took him three hours before he and his drones had gathered enough data to create the necessary passcode.

Jonathan entered one of the nodes, this one selling widgets of some kind, and walked boldly through a side door into an alleyway between buildings, following it deeper into the network system until he reached his destination. A larger building, this one square, done in the ubiquitous off-white and tan colors, occupied a central position within the network. The building was windowless, and the doors were all closed and barred. He walked up to the thick metal door and examined it, taking a blank swipe card from a pouch at his belt. Finding the slot for the card next to the door he passed the card through the scanner while waving his hand mysteriously over the device. To his Padawan agent he said.

“Remember, the Force imbues everything, it surrounds us, permeates us, it exists in all things.” He looked down at the scanner and smiled when he heard the door click open, accepting his passcode.

“Even in this machine.”

Adam
Wednesday 5/14/70 17:34:20

"Uh, yeah, WE is, like, US, you know, the Kappa Sigs." Adam had not 'rushed,' so he had never been required upon pain of public wedgy to memorize the Greek alphabet backwards, but he did know that Jeff was referring to the Kappa Sigma Alpha fraternity.
Jeff continued, "We've got this sort of feud going on with the Phee-Gees..."

"That's Phi Gamma Delta, right?" John interrupted, in a way that only Adam could know that he was totally mocking Jeff.

"Yeah, that's right. Good job," Jeff replied condescendingly. "Anyway, we got this sort of war going on. We dinged 'em good a couple times, but things've kinda escalated and now we're worried it might spill over into the Spring Blowout. No one wants that. Some of the sisters are so worried about it they're threatening to bring in the Pan-Hellenic Council. That is one sanctimonious bunch of busy-bodies we don't want poking around. So, like, we already invited the Phee-Gee officers over for a peace talk, like, you know, over a couple of kegs, and, well, this is what we got out of that..." he says, holding up scraped and bruised knuckles.
"It's like, we just can't see eye to eye with these guys. So I was on the phone with Sally at Tri-Delt, and in her Human Resource Development class they're, like, studying how unions and managers bring in outside mediators when they can't just can all the striking bastards, and we thought, like, that could be a great option. So, like, you are perfect because you're from outside the Greek system, but you sort of SEEM Greek anyway..." That was where John spit beer through his nose.

"Oh shit, sorry. I'll just go get a rag or something."

As John leaves the table, Jeff asks, "What's WITH that guy? Anyway, whaddaya say? If you're up for it, Sally can set up a meet for tonight."

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:37:05

Summoning everything he little body had, Caittie helped Alex pull Lisa to safety.
By now, however, the mobsters were reacting.
"Hey, you kids, come the fuck down from there right NOW!" shouted Louie, pulling a big pistol out of his double-breasted pin-stripe. He gave a glance to the young guy, who immediately looked around the room, spotted the ladder that led up to the catwalks, and headed for it. Meanwhile, Gold-tracksuit just sort of stood there holding Beth, apparently paralyzed without someone telling him what to do.

Beth just moaned. She seemed somewhere in a gray area between unconsciousness and being fully awake.

Harriet
Tuesday 7/1/70 13:56:02

Although Harriet climbed the side of the building's superstructure with the agility of a - well, she wouldn't appreciate the analogy - but despite her speed, it seemed to take forever to reach the two bureaucrats. At only two meters to go, she felt a whoosh behind her as Kanga's free line swung onto the scene. One meter to go, but she wasn't yet sure exactly what she could do once she got there. Almost....
And the pasty-faced smoothie finally lost his grip on the perpendicular pipe. For nauseating split second he fell - and then in desperation grabbed the only thing in reach - the ankle his assistant. The young ork shrieked in pain as the added pressure on his flayed fingers pulled the jagged metal right into his philangal bones. The pain hadn't yet overcome his will to live, but he was past caring about his boss, and started trying to desperately kick the clinging human loose.

Harriet was now level with them, about half a meter to the side, her own position far from stable....

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:37:10

All three of them look over the edge of the catwalk down at the man who was yelling at them. He waved his gun around towards them and pushed the younger man on the back to get him moving.
"Ya, you damn kids! That means you! Get the hell down here, NOW!", the boss yelled again, his face getting very annoyed with this turn of events.

Up on the catwalk, they all looked at each other with fear. Alex stood up first, slowly. "I think we should do as he says... Dont want to make him madder than he already is...", he told the girls as he reached down to help them up.
As Caittie stood up and dusted herself off, she quickly pressed a panic button she programed into her commlink that called Lonestar. As they slowly walked to the ladder and climed down, she could hear another person inside her head.

"Lonestar Emergency Response. Sgt Fonz speaking.", a voice said.
"We need help at the DDR Dance club! Three men are beating the club owner up and they have a gun!", Caittie sends to the voice.
"Understood. Please stay on the line and we will send help as soon as we can.", the voice replies.

Adam
Wednesday 5/14/70 17:34:20

Adam had to make a conscious effort not to laugh when John blew beer out his nose. That has got to burn. Sorry, buddy. He managed to keep a straight face, but when Jeff asked what was up with John, Adam let his demeanor slip.

"He's a cool guy.... Just not as..." Adam looked to make sure John wasn't within earshot. "... comfortable in social situations as you and I are." Adam then wanted to shift conversation away fom Jeff's opinion of John. Adam was pretty sure Jeff wouldn't approve of a lot of people that Adam considered friends - it was just John's misfortune that Jeff invited him along tonight. Of course, Adam thought it was good for John to get out a little bit.

"About those Phee-gees.... I think Sally is definately onto something, there." Adam was fairly familiar with the concept. "I don't want the Spring Blowout ruined any more than you guys do, so I'd be happy to talk to these guys for you - but I hope you understand that this is going to require concessions from both frats." Adam smiled at Jeff. "I mean, you know I'm on your side, man - but if the Phee-Gees think that I'm on the Kappa-Sig's side, Sally's plan won't work."

Adam sat back thoughtfully, "So, tell Sally I'm up for it, but I'd like to meet with her before the meeting with the Phee-Gees to get her impression of the situation, and to go over more of the details of this kind of HR strategy." In reality, Adam felt pretty confident that he understood the strategy, but any time he could arrange to spend with attractive sorority girls, would be time well spent.

As for the Phee-Gees, assuming they didn't want Spring Blowout ruined any more than the Kappa-Sigs, talking to them about it without resorting to punching them should be a relativly easy matter....

Harriet
Tuesday 7/1/70 13:56:03

No more time. It was one of those problems you could work out to your satisfaction given enough time. Only there wasn't any. Pick one to save, which one? That was easy, keep herself alive. Pick two, that got quite a bit more complicated. Pick three, Harriet couldn't think of a way to do that. Everything was there right in front of her, making it happen should be easy. The frozen moment seemed to last forever, and not long enough at the same time. Kanga's line swinging asymptotically nearby, Andy's hoarse voice still screaming "Hang on!", the large drop of the ork's flunky blood poised in a ball as it's begins it's inevitable fall in the grip of gravity, the free foot on it's last arc to connect it's steel braced toe against the wrist of the Inspectors fear enhanced grip, the inspector looking straight at her as she reached out for....

and everything started accelerating, no time to think... Monica won't like this... but they aren't my crew...

Monday 7/7/70 11:15:01 Mysterious Node

Jonathan gathered his dark cloak about him and prepared to enter the formerly secured node, his Padawan marching in step with him. No one seemed to notice his entrance, he could detect no alarms being sounded but he reached deep into his robes and produced a small wheeled droid, a narrow rectangular 'cleaning' droid designed to dart about on the path he'd tread, destroying any evidence of his passage, or at least so confusing the trail no other hacker could follow it. He set the droid down at the entrance to the node and activated it. With series of beeps and bleats it darted off down the street.

Inside the node appeared as a dark circular room, appearing almost forty meters in diameter, filled with machinery, computers, and equipment along the edges. Cat walks and ramps conected the various levels of equipment and alcoves to one another and the large dark pit in the middle of the sphereical room. Several other icons moved about the various areas, appearing as smaller humaniod aliens with round little bodies, white hair, and porcine features tending the equipment. Directly to his left as he entered the door was a data terminal with viewing screen displaying an area map. Across the top of the map with a line connecting it to the central area, was the text designation, 'CARBON FREEZING CHAMBER'.

Jonathan couldn't help but grin, he'd always loved the dark brooding air of the carbon freezing chamber scenes, even though the lightsaber duel in the original movie blew chunks.

Back to biz chummer. He reminded himself.

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:37:20

Staying 'on the line' was no problem for someone with Caittie's gifts - she simply decided that if Sgt. Fonz said anything else she'd let it through to her consciousness. But he must have been pretty busy because although he seemed to have left the line open, he wasn't saying anything anymore. That didn't matter really - she was sure she would hear sirens any second now - she'd spent a lot of time watching the Star channel - her uncle was a cop and she liked policemen - and on the Star channel the police always arrived right away. She guessed it must be because of their scientifically engineered patrol design, plus liberal use of astral mages on patrol.
But she had other things to worry about right now. She and her two friends carefully made their way along the catwalk and to the ladder, all the while casting worried glances at poor Beth. Caittie really felt like the sirens should be in earshot by now, once she got to the top of the ladder. She really didn't want to go down it, what with the greasy younger guy waiting at the bottom. But Alex led the way and she and Lisa followed.
Once they reached the bottom, Beth was sort of coming around, moaning something. Caittie didn't know how much time had passed, but STILL no sirens?!? Then the greasy guy grabbed her and Alex by the hair and dragged them to the middle of the dance floor, shoving Lisa along in front of them with the toe of his alligator shoe. He threw Alex to the floor really roughly, and Caittie saw a bright flash of anger in her friend's eyes.
The bald leader spoke - "I dunno where youse brats come from, but I ain't got time ta teach ya proper manners right now. I wantcha ta just watch what happens here now, in case ya got any ideas about rattin' out Louie Fishbreath."
He turned to gold-tracksuit, still holding Beth with his fist poised to strike. "Proceed."

Harriet
Tuesday 7/1/70 13:56:10

Cornelius was having a bad day. It started as usual with complaints about his coffee making skills. Which was totally bogus, the coffee maker was fully automated and serviced by an outside entity. Blame the city for skimping on the services contract. It was probably one of those mexi halfers recycling the filters by rinsing with waste organic solvents that was to blame for the horrible coffee. He never drank it himself after seeing the inside of coffee vendors delivery and maintenance van, but he made sure to give his supervisor a fresh cup every morning. It hadn't killed the supe yet.

And he had just missed another chance. If it hadn't been for that tusker woman the supe would have been a pile of bloody mush. And despite the short cut hair under the hard hat and the typical jeans and plaid shirts of a construction worker you couldn't hide that the tusker was a woman. One look at that posterior as she scaled the building scaffolding couldn't hide her hips and figure from anyone, even if you were hanging for your life from a jagged piece of metal. Her reassurances in Or'Zet had been endearing, but his frustration and panic hadn't been from his fear of falling. The pain in his hands were nothing compared to utter frustration he had felt when his supe had finally slipped off of his length of pipe to then only save himself by grabbing Cornelius's leg. The worst part, it was his own fault. If he hadn't tried kicking the supe on his way past, then his leg wouldn't have been there to be grabbed in the first place. His scream had more to do with the supe not falling then the extra sharp jab into his hands as the extra weight had jerked on his grip.

Then she had arrived. All cool and calm after climbing 5 floors free style. Some idiot down below screaming to hang on, like Cornelius would do anything else! Smooth as you could want she just snatched some cable out of the air, it hadn't been there a before, and hooked it to her belt. That's when he'd finally connected. It was incredibly satisfying crunch as his steel toed boots slammed into the supe's wrist. And the supe had immediately let go and started falling. It felt good. Especially if you knew hard it was to concentrate on kicking at your own ankle with a steel toed boot while hanging from scaffolding that was shredding your hands as you swung in the breeze five floors up.

He'd screamed again right away when he saw her snatch the supe's hand just as he was accelerating down. Everyone else had gone silent in that moment, even the jerk screaming to hang on. He'd even started crying a bit when the tusker woman swung the supe over to the main building and secured him. That was probably the last chance he had to make it look like an accident. He was thinking about that being his last chance when finally all that blood finally did it's work and acted as a lubricant. The next scream had been one of real panic.

But she had secured the supe by then and grabbed his leg, which he supposed was only natural. Cornelius had been swinging it close by, though he had been intending to kick the supe off of the side as he went by and take him with him. That didn't work either, the tusker woman being pretty strong, managing to hold on to him as he ended up flipping over and banging his head as he hung upside down. The crowd did this loud gasp as his hard hat went tumbling down, though there was that one little squeek he had picked out over the audible gasps. Probably the supe.

After all that the work crew finally showed up, and all he could do was stand there shaking in frustration in having lost this last chance to make it look like an accident. The damned supe was now fawning over the tusker woman, probably wanted to take her home and cuddle like a baby in her arms while leaving Cornelius to do all the paperwork involved in industrial accidents.

Cornelius sighed and simply nodded at the supe's instructions for the accident investigation knowing full well the frayed securing line coming loose had been no accident at all.

Adam
Wednesday 5/14/70 17:37:00

"Sure thing, dude. I'll get her on the horn right now." Jeff's gaze shifted for a moment, and right then Adam's favorite waitress Tyisha showed up with three big platters of food - Jeff must have ordered for them. Returning to the table, John's eyes popped out of their sockets at the sight of the big slabs of REAL steak and garlic mashed potatoes (or maybe he was just ogling the starburst array of navel-piercings radiating across Tyisha's ebony washboard of a stomach).

Picking up his knife and fork, Adam couldn't help wondering what Cal and the Earthens would think. But since none of them would be caught dead in here anyway....

"Great, Sals, let me just send you over," Jeff caught Adam's eye, and at that moment Sally's icon appeared in his field of vision wanting into his PAN. He accepted the call and was immediately bombarded by all that was Sally Huffington.

"Adam! It is sooooo grrreat that you are going to do this for us. You will DEFINITELY have the gratitude of the entire Pan-Hellenic Council if you - oh, sorry - when you pull this off." She lowered her eyes conspiratorially - "And that is not to be underestimated." Damned Greeks - they all thought they were the only ones in the world that knew how to network. Still, a favor from them wouldn't exactly suck. "Anyway Ads, I think you and I should meet right away, like, TONIGHT, and - oh, hey, do you want to see my new tattoo?" - her icon was replaced by a digital image of an unidentifiable patch of tanned skin sporting some sort of hideous animated image of a dancing baby - "Isn't it soooo retro? Anyway, tonight I want to meet and give you the OBJECTIVE story on what's going on between the Kappa-sigs and the Phee-gees - no way you'll get the full picture talking to anyone else. Come by the house at 9, 'kay?" Icon unregistered.

"What'd she say? You gonna hook up? I mean, uh, you know, meet?" Jeff asked.

Before Adam could reply, much less take a bite of his cooling mashed potatoes, Tyisha's icon appeared in the corner of his eye, followed by a quick text message. "Real glad u came in 2nite. Need talk ASAP."

Monday 7/7/70 11:15:05 Mysterious Node

Jonathan examined the data display, easily finding the data packet he'd been sent to retreive. With a short nod to his Padawan agent to follow he turned and proceeded along the cat-walks towards the file location deep in the heart of the node.

As he moved down the corridor an icon appeared in front of him, moving to stand directly in Jonathan's path. It appeared to be an Imperial officer, complete with color coded insignia on chest and shoulder and the stupid little peaked hat they always wear.

"Who are you?" He challenged as Jonathan approached. "What's your ID number?"

Jonathan paused for a nanosecond, debating between pulling his lightsaber and dispatching this pesky icon or using his stealth program to try and glide past. Buried this deeply in the network he decided stealth was preferable. Besides, he could always cack the little code-monkey later if he needed to. Again he drew the blank ID card he'd used to get into the system but didn't actually give it to the other icon instead he merely held it up and then waved his other hand in front of the icon's eyes.

"This is the ID you're looking for." Jonathan intoned.

"That is the ID I'm looking for." The other icon repeated leadenly.

"Move along." Jonathan said, allowing himself a smug smile.

"Move along. Move along." The officer icon repeated, stepping aside.

Jonathan continued on his tasks, eager to get to this 'null-value' data packet and get out.

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:39:20

Ten meters infront of the group, the look on bruiser's face was enough to retch your stomach. The scene before them was the same as when they were on the catwalk, but that much closer to the eye. They didn't have enough time to do anything as they saw the bruiser's arm swing down one more time into poor Beth's face.
*THUD-CRUNCH*
The sound of Beth's nose being flattened under his fist fills the air, but she didnt seem to notice anything as she just limply 'stands' due to the bruiser holding her in place. Blood soaks the front of her face and rolls down onto her yellow shirt, making a sickly orange/brown color that spreads as the drops rain down.
The thug looks to his fist and sees the blood splattered all over it. He smiles as he brings it up to his face and takes a lick of the red liquid. As they see this, Lisa bends over to the side and makes some retching sounds as she tries to hold in her dinner.
The boss just slaps his hand over his face and drags it down as he shakes his head. "I tolds ya to stop doing that, idiot! Clean yourself up!", he yells at his underling as he turns his attention back to the group. Behind his back, the thug shrugs and wipes his hand on a clean part of Beth's shirt, then stands there waiting for more instructions.
All the while, this display of violence was having an opposite effect on two of the teenagers. Caittie was shaking from a mixture of feer and anger welling up due to the beating, while Alex was almost on the verg of charging the boss in a rage. Only the gun in the boss' hand and the bruiser were keeping them in check.
"Please, stop! Why are you doing all this!?", Caittie tried not to yell at the boss. 'And where is the STAR!?'
"Yes... Why are you doing this?", Alex echoed in a chillingly calm and quiet voice.

Adam
Wednesday 5/14/70 17:37:00

When Tyisha walked over, Adam greeted her with a smile. After all, his host was on the phone and his friend was cleaning up in the bathroom - but even if he had their undivided attention he would have taken a moment to greet her. The sight of the food in her hands made him do a bit of a double-take. As the corner of her mouth began to smirk, Adam wasn't sure if she caught that his reaction was do to the food, or if she mistook it for him sneaking a second look at her stomach. Adam felt better when John returned and had almost the same reaction - although he was far more obvious about it.

The arrival of the real meat reminded Adam of what worried him earlier. Jeff was really prepared to soften him up for this task. There was definatly something he wasn't telling him - probably because telling him would make him change his mind. Still, maybe he was just really grateful.

"Great, Sals, let me just send you over," Jeff caught Adam's eye, and at that moment Sally's icon appeared in his field of vision wanting into his PAN. He accepted the call and was immediately bombarded by all that was Sally Huffington.

"Adam! It is sooooo grrreat that you are going to do this for us. You will DEFINITELY have the gratitude of the entire Pan-Hellenic Council if you - oh, sorry - when you pull this off." She lowered her eyes conspiratorially - a bit of body-language that wasn't lost on Adam.

"Anyway Ads," Ug, "Ads"? Well, at least she's given me a pet-name. Something made Adam think that she probably gave everything pet names. Adam wondered what she called Jeff. "I think you and I should meet right away, like, TONIGHT," There we go... hey wasn't it supposed to be my idea to invite myself over?

"...Come by the house at 9, 'kay?" Her icon blipped away before Adam could even respond. She was either in a hurry, or didn't want to give him a chance to reconsider. Either way, things had worked out about the way he had planned.

"What'd she say? You gonna hook up? I mean, uh, you know, meet?" Jeff asked.

Before Adam could reply, much less take a bite of his cooling mashed potatoes, Tyisha's icon appeared in the corner of his eye, followed by a quick text message. "Real glad u came in 2nite. Need talk ASAP."

Glancing away from the icon, and back at Jeff, Adam smiled and answered him. "Yeah. I'm gonna stop by her place at nine. I assume I'll be meeting with the Phee-Gees shortly after. I'll give you a call after that, and let you know how things went."

He looked around the bar for Tyisha, while sending back his response.
"Sure. @?"

Harriet
Tuesday 7/1/70 18:32:00

Even at this early hour, Big Rhino was its usual frenzy of boisterous activity, from sloshing of raised beer steins to the twitches and scurries on the plates - Harriet didn't really go for the 'traditional' ork cuisine - she liked her food good and dead.
Monica already had their table staked out in a relatively quiet corner, her "ORC Horde: Corp Takedown '68" T-shirt discreetly worn under an expensive blazer. They embraced. "Hoi, cerri! How's the building biz?" Monica asked, taking her seat. Small talk followed, neither wanting to start any substantive conversation until the waiter had come and gone. After ordering talk turned to their workdays. Monica went first, talking about some meetings her office had had with some TerraFirsters about possibly working together to stop zoning permission for an Azzie plant up in one of the greener parts of Snohomish - which also happened to be near one of the more successful new ork agricultural communes. She didn't ask Harriet any questions directly, but Harriet knew her sister wanted to tap into her knowledge of building permits and construction zoning and whatnot. When talk of the day turned to Harriet, she naturally mentioned the near-fatal accident.
Monica acted casual, but her response was too quick - Harriet knew she'd been waiting for this moment to pounce - "Oh, yeah, saw the whole thing on the trid. How you saved that ujnort before one of your own kindred."

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:39:23

"Just shut up, ya twerp."
Alex's voice did get quieter, but he didn't shut up. He was saying something - over Lisa's sobs, Caittie thought she heard the words "Beth" and "kill" but couldn't make much else out. But through her tearing eyes, she saw something bright, something fiery appear beside Gold Tracksuit. It was like a man burning alive - and it grabbed the huge thug by the pony tail, pulling the Mafioso towards its blazing body.

Harriet
Tuesday 7/1/70 18:43:00

The synthropod had half slipped off of Harriet's plate before it finally flapped it's tail propelling itself out of the tangy citrus tomato sauce in a back flip. A small saucefall of droplets traced it's arc of it's passage as it sloppily landed next to the plate on the scarred vinyl tabletop. Harriet smacked her hand down on it, smashing into a thin paste of artificial soy based crab meat. Moving her hand to her mouth and licking off the sauce, "That's what -didn't- happen."

Unfazed, Monica lifted the left side of her mouth revealing more of her tusk in her typical questioning look.

With a small sigh Harriet continued, "Look, that pair of idiots, both of them were lucky. They ignored the warning on the safety load. I swear it was like they were looking to die. When I got up to them I didn't have time to figure out who to save in what order. I just grabbed whatever was closest. The stupid soft.. -human- lost his grip first, not that it was easy hanging on to that tus.. -ork- with him screaming like a little half.. -boy- and kicking around wildly like that. I have no idea how he held on with his hand cutting up like that and swinging his legs like crazy. Though it's lucky he did, cause I for sure thought I would have to jump and catch him till he swung his leg close to me. Anyway, like I said, I didn't really think it through, just grabbed whomever needed to be grabbed first."

Monica commented, "Didn't think? That's what you always use as an excuse not to help."

"And I don't care what kind of meta they are, I was going to catch em... though I would have had trouble with a tro... ll. Not because they were a troll, but because damn are they heavy."

Monica winced as she chewed on her synthetic crab like product.

"Anyway, it turned out better that I did save the human, and I think even you can't say I shouldn't have tried to save everyone. Turns out he was the city site inspector."

Dryly, Monica interrupts, "Saves paperwork not having the inspector die on site?"

"Actually it's less nonsense when someone dies. It's all pretty clear what the benefits and distributions are, when someone is hurt but is alive, there's all sorts of sliding scale crap and evaluations that need to be done."

After some mutual messy eating Harriet asks the question she's been wondering about, "Where's Morris?"

Monica shrugs, "Said something about needing to look for some black bird, a maltese one."

"Where does he get these personachips from? Monica, you've got to talk to him too and get him to stop, he'll get into trouble. For all the crap you give me about helping out the kindred you sure do a hell of a job with our own brother."

Monica frowns and waves a piece of faux fish at Harriet, "I would much rather help those who both need and want to be helped. Morris does not want our help. Anyway, he's fine, and probably going to be fine, everyone he hangs out with looks out for him."

"They just laugh at him, they don't really care about him... crap, I'll have to check on him tonight, I can get an hour or two during shift to check on him."

"You're working tonight again? When are you going to stop working so hard for the humans exploiting you?"

"I am working for me.. me me me, not them. I'm going on shift tonight so we can overcome the project delay from today's inspection and make sure we hit the bonus targets. Anyway, this kind of stuff comes with my promotion."

"Ah yes, your reward for working so hard is more work for the Man."

Harriet flipped a piece of popcorn shrimplike fried food at Monica.

Adam
Wednesday 5/14/70 18:32:00

Stomach way too full, Adam stopped in the men's room before heading out back. Tyisha's message had come back, <Meet out back, B4 Dsert>
So, his belly full of steak, he mosied around back while John and Jeff drooled over the dessert menu. There was Tyisha, smoking and looking less cool than usual. "Need your help, Adam. It's my chummer Shwen. She's mixed up with some real bad types. And when I asked myself who could help us, I thought of you. You always know exactly what to say to people."

Harriet
Tuesday 7/1/70 18:52:00

"All right, all right, I give up," Monica laughed. "New topic - MEN. Are you or are you not still doing the big rohodo with Andy? He's a jerk, but at least he's got fez, and I'd much rather see you with him than that smoothie supervisor of yours, what his name, Collie? Covey?"

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:39:34

Caittie's eyes widened as she beheld the firey being. Wiping her eyes, thinking they were playing tricks on her, she looked back up to see the bruiser being pulled off-balance. 'What... Alex... can he do that?', she thought as she looked over to her friend.
Alex was breathing heavy and had sweat forming on his forhead. You would have thought he just did a 100m sprint by looking at him. There was a faint glow in his eyes as he whispered, "Now..."
The sound of a man yelling in surprise and something hitting the ground grabbed everyones attention a split second later. Looking towards the noise, they saw the thug being pulled towards the firey being as it moved its other arm to grab the bruiser by his left shoulder. Smoke waifed off the thugs hair where the being had grabbed it, the smell filling the air burned into Caittie's sinus.
The two men in suits turned towards the source of the light and noise with looks of amazment in there eyes. "Boss...", the younger suit lightly said with blatent fear in his voice as he took a step back. The older man raised his gun towards the being, a snear enveloping his face.
By this time, the being had grabbed hold of the thug by his shoulder and pulled him in closer. A voice that plainly couldnt be meta-human cut through the air, "Burn!"

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:39:38

Gold Tracksuit was screaming as his hair and clothes caught fire, but he was fighting, too. He failed to break free of the engulfing flames, but he was striking back with all he had.
Alex was clearly exhausted, and Lisa was just freaking out more than ever before.
Greasy-haired guy was clearly too confused to do much, but Louie kept his head. He'd been about the shoot the fire thing when Gold Tracksuit straightened up and started fighting back, bellowing all the while like a beast. He blocked Louie's shot, and then Louie saw Beth lying on the floor struggling to get up and away.
"Dats right - kill the mage and the spirit goes away!"
Then all Caittie could see was his gun, its node superimposed over it in her vision, as he leveled it directly at Beth's head...

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:39:41

*Thwump*
Alex looks over towards the noise beside him and see's Caittie's body lying limp on the tiled floor. To him, it looks like she has just passed out due to all the stress. In his mind, he cant blame her, he feels like he might pass out at any minute too. He then returns his attention to the action at hand, unable to muster any energy up.
To Caittie, it felt like her consiousness was being yanked a great distance, but before it actually went anywhere, she saw herself standing before a locked door that connected to a large keep. Her face showed a visage of grim determination as she brushes some violet hair out of her eyes.
She looks around at her surroundings, listening for something. Then she reaches behind her back, pulls out a scroll and unrolls it infront of her. She takes a deep breath and then proceeds to yell at the fort, "By command of your lord, you will drop your ammunition container!"
Louie was just finishing up his aim at Beth's head when, to his utter amazment, his gun ejected his magazine. He watched it fall and clatter to the floor. He growled a bit as he started to bend down to pick it up.

"Furthermore, your lord commands you to reload your chamber!", Caittie continued to yell at the fort.
Louie had almost reached down to the fallen magazine when his gun ejected a bullet that almost hit him in the face. Snarling he finished picking up his magazine and then looked over to his subordinate. "Don't just stand there like an fraggin idiot! Shoot her!", he yelled at him.
"Lastly, your lord commands you to engage your safety protocols!", Caittie yelled again as she rolled up the scroll and hid it somewhere behind her. In the meat world, Louie's gun engaged its safety, but he was too busy to notice right away.
The younger suit reached into his suit, pulled out his pistol and readied it.

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:39:41

Meanwhile, Charred Gold Tracksuit was flailing frantically at the fire-being, his arms pumping with a tortured, panicked fury augmented by his wired reflexes. Even as his clothes burned, cooking his flesh, he pummeled the spirit until at last it relinquished its grip on him, retreating a step visibly diminished from its former glory.

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:39:44

Caittie's body tingled as she regained control of it. She moved a bit to look around and saw the younger man pulling a pistol out of his jacket as his boss was messing around with his own gun. Sirens were starting to fill the air from a distance and were coming closer as each second passed.
In the background, Caittie could hear screams of pain as the bruiser fanned the flames that were consuming his cloths. In his panic, he forgot waving your arms around only made the fire worse. He had enough state of mind to fight though, as the being of fire charged in again with its searing touch.
Taking note of the younger man and his gun, Caittie felt the usuall pull on her consiousness as she once again entered the digital world.
Opening her eyes again, she saw another keep similar to the one she was standing next to. With just a mere thought, she was now standing next to the new keep and listening to the wind. Nodding she reached behind her back to pull out a scroll and unroll it. She then took a deep breath and...
*BLAM* *BLAM*
"By order of your lord, you will drop your ammunition container!"

-----------------------------------------------------

Alex looked on at his elemental fighting the bruiser. He was surprised it lasted this long since he wasnt that adept at summoning. The bruiser looked like he wouldnt survive the fight, but he kept on beating down the elemental. The only reason Alex looked away was because he heared two deafening shots being fired.
He wrenched his vision towards the noise and saw the subordinate with his gun out and smoking at the barrel. Before he could do anything else, the magazine dropped out of the bottom of his gun and clattered to the floor.
Wondering what he was shooting at, Alex followed the direction of the gun and saw Beth... or what was left of her, in a bloody heap on the floor. Blood and greymatter covered the floor and wall beyond her, caused by two deadly headshots. Alex's face became one of absolute terror and forced himself not to regergitate whatever he had in his stomach.

-----------------------------------------------------

"By order of your lord, you will reload your chamber!", Caittie yelled out at the keep. Feeling that everything was done that she could do, she returned to her senses and started to look around.
Over the sirens, she heard the sound of brass hitting the ground and bouncing. She followed the sound and saw the young suit looking at his smoking gun, scratching his head. Her eyes widening, she looked downrange and saw Beth's body. She just layed there looking at it, the lifeless eyes that only the dead have.
An unearthly groan from the dying elemental played harmony to the writhing bruiser. His screams of pain and agony giving Caittie some small comfort of justice as he continued to burn in his own clothing.
"If I ever get this thing working again, YOU KIDS ARE DEAD! YOU HEAR ME! DEAD!", Louie's loud voice echoed through the empty dance club.

We have to get out of here!, was the only thing to go through Caittie's mind as she looked at her two friends. Grabbing Lisa by the arm and dragging her up and out, she yelled for Alex to follow. All three of them ran across the dance floor towards the closest exit, the front entrance.

Caittie
Tuesday 8/12/70 18:39:50

"Dammit, cops. O'Malley'll have our heads if we get picked up. We gotta get outta here."
"But boss, those meddling kids saw me cap the mage chick. They's witnesses!"
"Fuhgeddaboutit. They won't last a week anywhere in this town. Now put Sal out of his misery and let's go!"
The young gangster looks at his useless pistol, wondering how he is supposed to put anyone out of their misery. He shrugs and follows his boss out the exit closest to their car, while the three traumatized kids scrambled for the other door. Soon the room was empty except for the lifeless Beth and the writhing and screaming Sal.

Adam
Wednesday 5/14/70 18:32:00

"You always know exactly what to say to people."

Adam smiled and laughed, "People always say that...." Then he looked very serious and leaned up against the wall next to Tyisha. "For you, I'll do my best, though. What kind of people are we talking about?"

Harriet
Tuesday 7/1/70 18:52:10

"Cody Van Buskirk." Harriet snatched up another piece of deepfried popcorn shrimplike processed food and held it up. "What's with both you and Andy?"

"Me and Andy?"

"Both of you think something's going on with Cody."

"Only natural. Why would some softie top management type grab some low life crew person and move them into the office except to take advantage of them."

Exasperated Harriet crunches the finger food once and swallows quickly, "I am good at what I do and I work hard. I went through the recruitment process just like all the other candidates. All open and above board." raising her hand to forestall Monica's impending comment. "And yes, I am actually making less money salaried, which is a minor money saver for them, my long term earning is much higher. I'm already earning options. In a few years I'll be way ahead, and be earning excellent retirement benefits. Much better then the local 3219. Pretty simply, by getting me into the office staff they tie me to VB Construction for every project. They couldn't be sure of having me on site if I was in the local. I make sure the projects always hit target. You know how much I make in bonuses, imagine what the company makes. Now I get more of a share in that."

"You haven't even mentioned Andy's name? What's wrong? You normally can't resist flinging that idiot's name in my face to make me squirm, and I just admitted he has fez!"

Harriet looks down on her plate, and stymied by the lack of food on it, reaches for another helping of plastic crab legs filled with ocean salt processed crab like soy food in red sauce, muttering, "It's the rules."

Monica stares across the table at Harriet.

"Rules? ... your c'rzon for whom you have punched my face, torn out my hair, scratched my arm and made my life miserable for the last ten years. The mhadi who has stood at your back, has the fez to stand up to you, the jul'ncr'n who led you and your crew through a the legendary two hundred hour shift to finish the Brandeis Building Project on schedule... you aren't seeing him because of some stupid union and office rules? P'zum'de the rules!"

Monica pauses to catch breath, then stops in consternation, "Oh no... you've never done that before..."

Harriet nods miserably, "Sorry", as she grabs some disposable wipes and clears away her tears and wipes her nose.

Jonathan - Third Wave

Monday 7/7/70 11:15:10 Carbon Freezing Chamber

Jonathan glided into the central data storage area of the node, a metal obliquette filled with hoses hissing noxious vapors and dark ominous vents located in various places around the area. He stepped off the edge, trusting in the Force to insure his safety. In the center of the obliquette two large, Troll sized rectangular carbonite encasing slabs hung into the middle of the pit, connected by various hoses and lines to the walls.

The walls were uneven, with dozens or hundreds of nooks and crannies, each one containing a miniature figure encased in carbonite. Jonathan cast about with an Analyze program and quickly discovered that the statues represented the stored data programs. He found the one he wanted, and again fired up his Analyze program, this time to seek out any hints of a Data Bomb or other trap on his package.

He couldn't make out the figurine's design, too heavily encrpyted but he was able to force it from its molding in the niche. He tucked the file into his robes. He examined the now empty niche, it was a glaring hole in the data storage area, and decided he couldn't leave it like that. He walked over to the other side of the pit and pulled one of the mystery machines from the wall and pried a panel off the back of it the replaced it against the side of the pit. He walked back to the empty niche and examine the heavy metal panel in his hands and the significantly larger hole in the wall. Turning his focus inward he called upon the 'Force' and began molding the metal as if it were warm clay until it fit snuggly over the niche.

In reality he'd taken bits of old data message files and bits of code from the storage systems data verification system and used an Edit utility to modify the code to cover up his theft of the data system, hacking the old code together in an attempt to splice up the 'hole' he left in the storage file by the removal of the data package. It was much easier to work this VR though.

Still smiling smuggly he turned to leave, the package tucked safely away in his robe's inner pocket, quickly mounting the ladder leading out of the storage area. He reached the top of the ladder, but as his head cleared the lip of the pit he found himself facing a pair of gleaming white boots. Unfortunately they were attached to the rest of the gleaming white armor of an Imperial Storm Trooper.

"Identify yourself, icon."

Adam
Wednesday 5/14/70 18:32:10

"Bad people, Adam, connected people. Listen, you remember Shwen, right? Yeah, I can see by your face that you do. You're right, she is very beautiful." 'Beautiful' might not have been Adam's first choice of descriptor - something more like 'unstoppably hot' would have served better. Tyisha continued - "Well, she realized how beautiful she was here - in China she's too short and her feet are too big, so she thought she was ugly - and anyway, she wasn't getting enough here to pay tuition, so she started dancing. It was something she never would have done back home, but something happens to a woman who has never been considered attractive and then all of a sudden men are falling all over her. And in a situation like that, most women don't seem to mind that they are after her for all the wrong reasons. So she started dancing, and like a lot of strippers, she simultaneously came to hate it, and hate her customers, but also became addicted to it - to the stimuli of the music, to the adulation of the men. She started accepting 'tips' from certain men she was attracted to anyway, but that opened her up, made her vulnerable. Once she lost the ability to get help from the Star, the Mob moved in. They told her last night she was going to start working on their terms, with their customers, for what they chose to pay her.
"Adam, there's no reasoning with these guys - I know, I tried," she said, pulling down the high collar of her paisley halter-vest to reveal an ugly handprint of a bruise. "But you could do it, Adam. You're one of those charmed types that can pull anything off. Please help her. I know she got herself into this, but she's my friend, and this would kill her. This was like a wake-up call for her - the intoxication of the last few months got washed away with a splash of arctic water, and now she's a modest girl from the Chinese countryside tormented by the realization of what she's already polluted of herself, and about to hauled into a world that shouldn't exist in a just universe."

Harriet
Tuesday 7/2/70 03:15:46

Absently Harriet filled her coffee mug with the last of overnight's shift's coffee. She then started through the routine of cleaning the jugs out and resetting the water and checking the ground beans and filter levels so that the morning crew would start out with fresh brew. The routine task, familiar after many years, helped settle her a bit as she thought through the radical suggestion Monica had made during dessert.

Decision made, Harriet scanned the site log, //Who Clocked-IN, noting that as usual Marcus was milking the clock. It was time to make the rounds and final checks for inventory and the morning's lower foundation laying.

Marcus abruptly opened his eyes as Harriet gently prodded his lower belly with the active rivet gun, "Who the fu... crap. Harriet." She nodded affirmatively, then pointed to the last of the cross braces, "I've sent every else home, so we're all alone now Marcus, but I notice that that final cross brace isn't hot riveted yet." Laying her callused finger along the rivet guns trigger and digging it deeper into Marcus's stomach, "Shall I show you how one of these works?" The heating element started some of Marcus shirt fibers smoldering, "Well?"

Marcus nodded and grabbed hold of the rivet guns barrel, very relieved as Harriet allowed him to take it.

"Off the clock too, I'll be back in twenty to check on your work. You'd better be done and gone." With a shake of her head Harriet headed down to do a final round of checks on the latest deliveries from the previous evening. No matter how close and accurate the planning software and agents worked to get the project going smoothly there was always no other way to account for mis labeled or incorrectly entered or read items then to have someone double check the critical path materials and make sure that the right grade of cement was actually delivered and in the mixer. There had been one site where low grade cement had been poured into the support column and it wasn't till the 5th floor was put in place that the column cracked. Luckily it hadn't failed completely so no one had been injured, but it had put the project behind four weeks, one to tear everything down again, and the other three to re build the same five floors. She'd also learnt to make sure someone also double checked the core sample results and didn't wait for the city inspector's office for the analysis.

After confirming all materials and equipment had been correctly matched with the AR inventory and planning for the next pour, Harriet checked the site log, and now that Marcus had left, checked on his work. Some of the rivets were obviously slightly out of line, but not enough to matter, but Harriet did discover he'd left the rivet gun on and hot, which meant she was going to have a little chat with him the next day. The man had better learn to take care of his equipment.

Strangely ebullient, not even finding the gate unlocked as she left made her upset as she left the site. It would just be another item to mention to Marcus the next day. She locked it and started walking to her small apartment nearby.

All she was thinking about was dragging Andy down to City Hall first thing in the morning. And that Monica could surprise her like that.