Pausing in her duty's to make sure she heard that right, she stops what she's doing, drys her hands and turns to Jamie "How long has he been gone? where did he go?"

The girl looks up at you with her big blue eyes, "I dunno where'd he go... but he lefts yesterday morning."

"Yesterday? While we was away? Did he say anything? Did he take anything with him?" Why would he leave?

Moving to the living room switching off the stereo as she passe's it, She stands in front of the Trid and waits for everyone to notice she takes a deep breath and shouts "Anyone Upstairs, Down Here NOW!".

After waiting for the contents of the upfloor to come down stairs. She looks around the room. "Ok everybody i want you to look around the this room and tell me who's missing and where they are." As she does so she takes Jamie's hand and pulls her close as to hug her to make sure she knows she's done nothing wrong.

Jamie starts to cry just a bit regardless of the hug, "I was up watchin' da trid and he came through to go out da door. I asked where'd he was goin cause he had a backpack wid him and stuff. He shushed me and said he'd see me later and left. I was sleeping most of the day so I didn't think of it till now. I'm sorry!"

The other kids are scrabbling around taking a headcount and after a few minutes things calm down and it is reported that Jason is the only one missing. It seems he took his few personal belongings with him.

Rick comes bounding in from the kitchen, "Who's hurt, who dun it, why they do it, and who get's in trouble for it?"

Ed calmly watches the comotion, clueless untill he is clued in by Mo. "Jason?" Ed ponders for a moment. "Oh, the augronaught?" refering to his chosen matrix icon. "He ran? We gotta go find him... hes not gonna last long around here at night... too many weirdos. Kid has real talent too, it'd be a shame to let that all go to waste."
Ed rolls off the couch and begrudgingly returns wearing shoes and pants. "Anyone know where he might have gone? Anyone? anyone? Buler?" Ed trails off after his misplaced humor.

"I as concerned as much as to where he is as to why he's gone. Did anyone have an argument with him? But to be Honest Ed he left yesterday morning, if it was with the intension of not coming back then he's gone. The best we can do is ask if anyone saw him leave and if he talked to anyone. And we start that soon before were out too late."

While she say's this is wiping away Jamie's tears with her cuff.

he left yesturday morning, not this morning

Jamie's tears starts to subside a bit, though she still sniffles out, "I sowwy. I shoulda said somethin' earlier but I gots so sleepy and went to bed."

"When did you start to feel sleepy, Jamie? Did you do anything that made you sleepy?" Rick asks the small child, wiping away her tears and generally just trying to make her feel better.

"Umm... I stayed up all night watching da trid. I know Mo hates when I do that, but she wasn't here."

Realizing what she said, he looks up at Mo, a tad bit scared of being punished.

"I think its the only reason I saw him go, he left real early in the morning. I didn't remember it till just a little bit ago or I woulda said somethin' before."

"Hey thats ok, this time." Turning to look at Rich "We can try to look from him via the matrix but.... What did we do that would make him leave without telling us?"

And where would he think to go. The guys across the street didn't say anything about anyone leaving, so they probably don't know anything. Did anyone else here see him acting strange," Rick asks as he turns to the rest of the tribe.

"As much as i don't like to say it. There's not a lot we can do. He was one of the older ones, more likly to survive out there. All we can do is hope we catch some sign of him in the matrix."

Looking around the room for something to wash up Mo can't help but think o f Why?

Ed nods his head in agreement.
"I guess your right in a way. The odds of us finding him are slim to none outside. I don't want to sounds like a hardass, but if he really wanted to leave, I'm not going to stop him. Who knows, maybe he got a hookup in the big blue room... its not the first time people have left for real 'jobs' before. But then, not everyones cut out for this sorta life either..."
Ed hangs his head slightly, sighs softly and shoos someone off a spot on a couch. He looks around at the children, his family. They are all cut out, why wasent I... Ed stands back up attempting to prehaps cut the melencholy "Who wants to take the king on in Civ VII?" Ed collects the takers and heads up to his lab to play some games with his kids.

Finding not much to wash up and seeing the young'uns slowly dispersing.

"You know, I think there is really nothing we can do. So im gonna go kill some Paranormals, anybody want to join?"

"I'm going to go look around in his room. Maybe he left a clue to his whereabouts -- or at least to where he was going. Enjoy you gaming."

Rick looks around for a moment before heading upstairs to look through the escapee's room.

"If you spot anything come get me. I'll be around Sub basement 6. But im only gonna play for an hour or so."

Several hours a rather sheepish looking Ed slides down the banaster, having just gotten his hoop kicked by several of his more daring students in Civizalation 7. Ed dismounts and meanders to the kitchen. Hmmm eegs... Ed opens the fridge and pulls out 3 eggs and the last few slices of soybacon. We need to go shopping again dont we...

Pulling out the datajack out, Mo squints as she opens her eyes. Finnally got passed that bloody door. How long did it take? Looks at the clock.. 02:37 What!! 7 hours!! God i needed to go shoping! got no food! The little ones haven't eaten!! With this Mo climbs out from under her multitude of blankets and pillows and heads off downstairs to find whats left and atempt to make something out of it.

Opening the cuboards she see's a large bag of pasta and 3-4 different sauces, "Sorry kiddies" she says under her breath "This is all i got" As she proceeds to try to make something from it.

While she busierly prepares the food (at least half the kids are up cos Mo wasn't around to get them to bed) her mind start wandering about the SK that they have.

Ok it's an SK, thats nothing new, granted it's a good one, but why would someone want us to kill it? SK's have been around for a while now. What makes this one so special? Unless it was a simple corperate thing. But even then this P-Sec payed us alot of nuyen to do it. Gotta be something special, might need to take a real look at that picture again.

With that Mo serves up flavoured paste, which taste's quite poor, and alot of it gets left. Shopping at first light i think

"Ed, Rickard. Was there any strange code bits in the that SK?"

Rick puts in a call to the street doc that the gang told him about.

"Hello, I wonder if you could provide me with a cyberscan?" he says when the phone call is answred.

"Where did you hear of me?" is the reply.

Ed retires to the communal room after making his food, and begins work on a new "wasdat" program.
"Anything strange? If you call near sentiance and language man-wasent-ment-to-understand normal, no, its pretty run of the mill. Im getting very tempted to compile this puppy and see what pops out... And we are outta bacon, and milk too I think. I think Im gonna need to get out and see Uncle Rufus before I settle into classes again, so ya want me to tag along to the market?"

"Give it a couple of hours, want to be back before the sun has a chance to come out. So how much would it fetch you recon? Not that im wanting to sell it mind, It would defeat the point of what we did at a guess. Could have a word with False Echo....."

"Couldent tell ya offhand. As far as I know, this isnt exactly, umm... stuff that would be for sale"

"Hmm. Yeah sure. You have the address? <if not, he rattles it off> Come down in an hour and we'll take care of things."

*click*

Cursing slightly, Rick heads up to his room and checks to see how much nuyen he's got on hand. Not much, but hopefully it'll do. Grabbing two credsticks totalling 1,115 and stuffing one in each shoe, he starts walking toward the Doc's planning to arrive just on time.

When he gets in, he introduces himself as Nick and asks how much the scan is going to cost. Noticing that there is a relatively new cyberterminal in the room, he forgets himself and comments, "Hey, whiz gear! That thing connected to the 'trix?" before remembering he's supposed to be professional here.

Ed pulls himself away from his deck, and shuffles into the kitchen. "Honestly, I have no intention on directly telling anyone that we know about this thingie, but Im putting feelers out to check what is known about the project. And what that shrimp was doing connected to it."
Ed goes to the fridge, but panics after opening the door. The Misfits are out of coffee.

"No sir-e, I keep my stuff offline. Call me paranoid, but thats just how I like it. Anyhow, have yerself a seat right ova 'eer and we'll get started."

He runs the scan and the results come out just like they did at Doc Bloodmoney's.

"That'll be 250 cred, little fella."

Handing him the 250 and asking to see the results for himself, Rick thanks the Doc and heads out. Walking him he shakes his head, still not quite beliving that there were no strings attached to their new bioware. Entering the tribe's house, he shares the good news with Ed and Mo before stashing the rest of his cash back up in his room.

Ed musters an amused chuckle "Nice to know my head isn't going to explode I guess..."
Ed meanders for a few hours, spending a little time pondering exactly how he would get somewhere to compile his new pet project. After drawing a complete blank he jacks in and logs onto the Shadowland data nexus seeing if he had gotten a bite on his request yet.

Half an hour later an exasperated (and rather uncafineted) Ed gathers Rick and Mo. "Good news, bad news. I got some info on that file we trashed. Good news is there is a very good chance it works, and its a super advanced SK. Bad news is we dont have anything near close enough to run the sucker, and its owner is going to be very very pissed off, so its pretty much vapor-ware from now on. So unless we can build a major server in the basement, its going onto chips and going to gather dust in the drawer."

At hearing Ricks tale Mo nods and thinks again, that this is strange.

After finnishing with the cleaning up, Mo Starts to compile a mental list of things that she needs to get shopping wise, after getting a rough total as to it's cost. She walks up to the others

"Erm guys, i think it's about time we started to do some work that actually earns us real money. Cos we are needing to do some shopping. Also anyone been eating the rice? because it's been going a lot quicker then i've been cooking it." Under her breath you hear her say "Millions of nuyen in code and we can't sell it or tell people we have it..... Something wrong with that."

She disappears to get her coat,
"So who's got cash? and who's coming shoping?"

"I've got some cash," Rick answers heading back up to his room. Grabbing 200 he heads back downstairs with his walking staff and his coat. And waits for Mo.

"I got some money somewhere, I think" Ed goes up the stairs, puts shoes on, and grabs a stick with some money on it, he hopes. "Gonna try your luck with the car again?"

Karl finishes his marathon simsense viewing session, and walks downstairs just as the others are about to leave.

"Hey guys, wait up, where ya goin', whats been happening?"

"Not alot, just going down shop, for a full gorcery shop. Were out of almost everything, including soycafe. Then when we come back, i think we better start doing some favours for people so earns us some nuyen, cos were almost out of that as well, unless you have a small stash somewhere?"

The following events take place after you arrive home from your shopping trip...

When the shitty '52 Ford that Ed "acquired" earlier somehow manages to make it around the bend on the way home from the grocery store, you can already see that strange things are afoot at the crashpad. As you near closer, the first thing you spot is a black and silver '64 Suzuki Mirage resting boldly in the parking lot in a manner that would allow a fast escape. The yard looks a bit worse for wear due to several heavy vehicles driving over it within the last hour or so.

Just as you pull in as far as you can and start to empty from your ride, a cacophony of loud gunshots echo from inside and the living room's windows flash in time. The terrified screams of several of the children follow immediately thereafter...

The strange bike Ed could pass off, the heavy equipment traces, MAYBEY, but the gun shots are a serious no-no. Ed floors the junker and jumps the curb, This is Eds raging fury.

*edited to make sense*

--- snipped for the purposes of having this make sense ---

As Ed turns the americar and attempts to run up the curb, the front wheel breaks off and the van rolls over onto his side throwing everyone inside around as the van skids to a halt in front of the house.

As Ed crawls out of the broken front window, he looks up at the house and his eyes go wide. Through the living room window there are kids pulling back the shades. Behind them you can see a brand new entertainment center where the latest zombie flick is playing at high volumes. The hero is blasting away at them with his SPAS-22...

Ed crawls out the drivers side window, nursing several bruises and a nasty gash, but for the moment ignoring everything, dashing for the door. Ed sees the new AV gear as he thunders though the front door like a bull elephant. "Turn that DOWN" he hollers, then rembers that there was still people in the other turned Ford. He dashes back out onto to lawn to help Mo and Rick out.

As the americar, bounces and over turns Mo gets thrown to left side towards Ed, clashing heads with a dull thump, which was only audiable to the 2 involved due to the crack and "yelp!" coming from Mo as her arm conected with the sterring wheel.

Tears welling up, Mo bites her lower lip to stop any more noise coming from her, as well as giving her something else to think about instead of the pain, coming from her arm.

Using mostly her good arm Mo starts moving tins of her one by one, so as she can get out.

Having fallen asleep while watching the collector's edition version of Neil the Ork Barbarian vs. the Venetian Space Bimbo Zombies from Alpha Centauri on the new 72-inch state-of-the-art trid system, Rev is vigoursly shaken awake by little Jamie who is pointing frantically out the window. When the gothically-adorned teen turns around and sees a wrecked Ford only inches from the front porch, he nearly falls out of the lush leather sectional he and the other kids were relaxing in moments earlier.

Rev rushes to the door with Jamie in hand, her tiny legs wrapped around the older teenager's scarecrow-thin waist. There he discovers that it's the other kids of the tribe inside the vehicle. He lowers Jamie to the ground and tells her to go back inside before rushing over to offer his help.

Dressed in a tattered Looks 2 Kill band t-shirt draped overtop a long-sleeved fishnet top that comes to a triangle at his photographer gloved hands, Frankenstein-stitched black leather jeans, and a pair of chain-wrapped biker boots, you at first don't recognize the elf lending his assistance. But if you wiped away the whiteface make-up and the baroque henna tattoo around his eyes, took away the thirteen earrings dangling across his pointed ear and the heavy amount of macabre jewelry, then swept back his short, angry hair dyed black and blood red, you would probably recognize that it was none other than Jason beneath all that shit.

With a rather sarcastic muttering of "nice parking job" in the ork's general direction, Jason drops to the ground and climbs through the broken window to help Mo and the others.

While working to free Mo and the others still trapped inside, Rev notices that some of the wounds look pretty nasty. "Alix," he calls out to one of the kids watching from the porch. "Run inside and bring me the medkit under the kitchen sink."

Once everyone is safely out, the zombified whizkid starts working some magic on the wounds, assuming someone with more medical knowledge doesn't pick it up first.

None in the car got away clean. Ed and Thor are just banged up a little, but Mo's arm and wrist are bruised badly and may be broken. The same goes for Maelstorm's ankle, it looks like it got cought under a seat when the car tipped.

Several of the Brain Eaters come running out of their house accross the street, "Holy drek! What the hell happened!?"

Seeing the group come rushing out, armed with an assortment of devices, Mo puts up her right hand to stay them.

"It's ok, nothing to worry about. We wasn't expecting any guests so, when we came round the corner hearing gunfire coming from the house, cos some had the trid on a bit too loud (looks accusingly at Rev), Ed got a little over eager, and thought i would be a good idea to park the car in the living room, Ow!!!." Mean while Rev is following instruction from the medi kit.

Turns to jamie, "Jamie dear can you get me my splints from my room, their in the green box" Turning back to the group

"Lucky Ed can't park too well and only myself and mealstrom got hurt."

Turns to Ed "How comes you always manage to get off lightly??"

Rev simply looks up and lifts a brow as he tightens the bandage a little more aggressively than the software instructed. "Is that what caused this?" He does his best to hold back a chuckle, but fails miserably as he continues bandaging the motley tribe up.

"So, yeah... what exactly are we going to do with this hunk of metal now? It looks like Wonderboy over there trashed the front axle, so even if we could shove it hard enough to tip it over we couldn't drive it out of here. I'm also guessing that it's been... 'creatively acquired'... so just leaving it here isn't an option. So....?"