03-Apr-2071, 14:05:06, Jasper's, Puyallup

"Hey there lil' lady, you found anything usefull?" He shares his info, and what he learned from Nuke. "I'm thinkin we should regroup before we go knockin on doors for these guys."

03-Apr-2071, 20:32:31, Jasper's,Puyallup

Jasper was in the middle of hardwiring new access ID's for his com and the drones when Nuke hit him up.
<<Sounds like a plan. Where you want ta meet up?>>

03-Apr-2071, 14:07:15, Starlight Express, Tacoma

Lil' lady? Inwardly, and not visible on the comm Stray frowns. She concurs with Jasper's views though. "Yes, that would be better I think."

03-Apr-2071, 20:32:31, Stray's Apartment, Tacoma

Stray answers Nuke's message as well. <<<Yes, that would be safer.>>>

03-Apr-2071, 20:32:46, University of Seattle Graduate Student Parking Lot D, Downtown, Seattle

<<Looking into where I can find the Mo-Towns. Anyone know anything about them?>>

Nuke opens his eyes, looking out in the dank night air, racking his brains about the local gang scene, trying to remember what he knows about the Mo-Town.

03-Apr-2071, 20:32:46, University of Seattle Graduate Student Parking Lot D, Downtown, Seattle

03-Apr-2071, 20:36:41, University of Seattle Graduate Student Parking Lot D, Downtown, Seattle

The truck backs out of its' parking space, headed for the exit.

<<Knew the name sounded familiar. The Mo-Towns are a go-gang, into the whole Road Warrior hot rod scene, based out of north Puyallup. Turns out that the trog that DLC had issues with is their leader. When they're not getting into pissing contests with shadowrunners, they spend their time gooning for some yakuza clan, slinging dope, and running a carjacking operation. I like them already. Don't know Puyallup that well. Any place anyone can recommend to meet up>>

03-Apr-2071, 20:36:59, Jasper's, Puyallup

Jasper Scratched his head,

<<Hell, theres a laundromat up that way. I go there pretty regular, never much happenin there. >>

03-Apr-2071, 20:37:25, Jasper's, Puyallup

<<<A laundromat meeting?>>> Stray blinks. That's the first time she ever heard of such a thing. I guess no one else would suspect or think of that either...

03-Apr-2071, 20:37:49, University of Seattle Campus, Downtown, Seattle

Nuke steers his way towards the interstate as he talks, tasking an agent to go back and check his network for intrusions or additional users.

<<Not that out of whack. Certainly draws less attention than a bar, and it's not like we're going to sit around talking. It's just a place to get together before we move onto finding the Mo-Towns.>>

03-Apr-2071, 20:37:58, University of Seattle Campus, Downtown, Seattle

<<<Do you know a safe place to stash a bike near the meeting spot, Jasper? I'd like to hitch a ride with one of you if we're going in gang territory.>>>

03-Apr-2071, 20:38:07, Downtown, Seattle

<<Could just stash it in the back of my truck. Once we get moving, I'll just remote drive it back up north and stash it someplace quiet in Auburn.>>

03-Apr-2071, 20:39:17, Puyallup

<<I was gonna suggest a chop shop I know, but Nukes Idea is better, and it'll save ya a couple creds>>

03-Apr-2071, 20:39:26, Downtown, Seattle

<<Not to mention that the last chop shop guy you talked to sold one of his clients down the river to us.>>

03-Apr-2071, 20:40:42, Downtown, Seattle

<<That too. I'd not like to lose this baby.>> Stray pats her bike affectionally during her conversation over the matrix, then rides to the laundromat, entering after a quick scan of the surroundings - it is too close to the Barrens for her comfort, after all.

03-Apr-2071, 20:46:45, Puyallup wash-n-dry

Jasper pulls into the laundromat in "Shelly" with "Charlene" parking on the other side. He lights up a smoke, and waits for the others to arrive. Sliding the second Ruger from its holster he double checks the ammo. With polarized windows, he's not too worried about onlookers, and he hadn't carried this piece in a while, so he wanted to get the feel of it again. Jasper didn't feel like explaining the difference between Slim and Marcoli over the comm, so he just let it go. He figured the current plan was better anyway. The "Mo-Towns" sounded like a good group to know. wouldn't hurt to have a few more fiends in the neighborhood, especially if they were into cars.

03-Apr-2071, 21:17:41, Puyallup Wash-n-Dry, Puyallup, Seattle

Nuke cruises through northern Puyallup with one hand on the wheel and a gun in the other. Seeing the matrix connectivity start to fade, he pops open the satellite link and connects the truck to it.

At the laundromat, he eases diagonally into two parking spaces, next to where the others are waiting, then jumps down from the lifted pickup.

"Sorry to keep you waiting. Had to come all the way from north downtown. Let's get your bike loaded up and out of here so we can get some work done."

03-Apr-2071, 21:19:58, Puyallup Wash-n-Dry, Puyallup, Seattle

Stray nods, and pushes her bike in the back of the Van, then takes out the bag with her Remington and her other gear. "All set." she says when she's inside the van, and contrary to her words starts to check her gear again - mostly to busy herself on the way.

03-Apr-2071, 21:21:02, Puyallup Wash-n-Dry, Puyallup, Seattle

Jasper pulled out of the laundromat and headed north, following the van by half a block. <<So how ya'll want to approach this? I rekin it won't be too hard to spot these guys. We just gotta figure a way to talk to 'em for they try to carjack us. I'm aimin to keep my nice guy hat on this time, but lord help 'em if they hurt my girls. >>

03-Apr-2071, 21:25:37, Puyallup, Seattle

Riggers... Stray shook her head slightly, amused at the protectiveness in Jasper's voice when he spoke about his vehicles and drones.

<<<Offer to buy parts from them? Unless they're hopped on drugs and chips they shouldn't attack business partners... though you never know with the gangs.>>>

03-Apr-2071, 21:25:44, Puyallup, Seattle

Nuke's big pickup winds its' way back north out of Puyallup under remote control as he kicks back in the van.

"Why don't we just level with them? Explain that we're looking for someone who's crossed swords with them in the past and that if they help us find DLC, we'll make sure something bad happens to him."

03-Apr-2071, 21:25:51, Puyallup, Seattle

"I like it, These guys might just be the break to gettin us back on track, Lord willin and the creek don't rise"
Jasper flipped on Charlene's radio scanner for background noise as he watched for beaters that have been overly welded or added to in some way.

03-Apr-2071, 21:28:07, Puyallup, Seattle

After a few minutes the tags on the walls start to change, going through a very small "contested" strip before the Mo-Town tags take over completely, not just classic tags with spray-paint but also AR-tags using anything from hacked appliances, both working and broken down, serving as nodes to tons of RFID chips marking the gang territory. What looks like a first-generation Personal Mobility Vehicle, with some parts welded on, stands at a corner, turning towards the runners' vehicels when they close. On the other side what looks like the remains of a rotodrone, with just one stabilizer still working and an Ares Predator II mounted in it, hangs from a lamp post. The sensors show a vehicle approaching from the side - it's classified as a Nissan jackrabbit, but that's just because of the transponder, the visual identifaction is simply not workin - it's the size of a sedan, and must weight more than 2 metric tons, and the engine obviously is not from any jackrabbit - or other car. It looks like a hedgehog on wheels.

The hedgehog stops about 10 metres away, and the runners hear and receive a call simultaneously "This is Mo-Town. State your business."

03-Apr-2071, 21:28:12, Puyallup, Seattle

Jasper was waiting for a second for someone else to speak, but decided to,as Nuke had said, level with them."We're lookin for a guy that we hear tell, came up here and pissed in ya'lls soyflakes. We wanted to find him and do bad things to him. thought maybe ya'll could point us in the right direction. His name is Drives-like-crazy, has a habit of stealin cars and runnin 'em into lonestar stations, and maybe hangin on women he ought not to be too"

<<how was 'at?>>

03-Apr-2071, 21:28:45, Puyallup, Seattle

Stray thinks it was a good speech, but doesn't comment, concentrating on the vehcile facing them. She feels slightly out of her detb, faced with so much hardware - even it it looks like cobbled together from trash and junk.

"Drives-like-crazy?" the voice - synthetic according to the voice analyzer software - sounds surprised and there's a short pause. "You'll want to talk with the boss then. follow me, and no funny business or you'll regret it, got it?"

The thing that once was a jackrabbit starts to turn, and drives on at a slow speed. Probably to give the boss and the rest of the gang time to prepare for the runners.

03-Apr-2071, 21:28:45, Puyallup, Seattle

"Either we're in business, or we're dead. Hope this doesn't suck."

03-Apr-2071, 21:28:53, Puyallup, Seattle

"How reassuring."

03-Apr-2071, 21:28:59, Puyallup, Seattle

Jasper moved "Charlene" in behind the sedan, and then followed in with "Shelly". He thought about laying back a bit, but he didn't want to make these guys any more nervous than they might already be.

03-Apr-2071, 21:38:21, Puyallup, Seattle

The former jackrabbit leads the runners' vehicles further into the twisting streets of the Mo'Town turf, and the further they enter, the more AR spam they encounter. A lot of traffic, and a lot of nodes the traffic passes through. It looks like someone collected a year's worth of trash from a electronic corp and cobbled the pieces together into lots of semi-stationary drones and other things. The trip ends on a former parking lot, covered with cars in various stages of being gutted, faced with a full-size truck - with welded-on steel plates - and two more car-things. Various weapon systms are trained on the runners, and half of them might even work.

A short troll - about 2.2 meters, but very massive for his size - wearing an armored jumpsuit with patches from half a dozen race circuits steps out of the truck and in front of the van. "What do you want?" his voice seems to come from a synth, his lips are not moving.

03-Apr-2071, 21:38:21, Puyallup, Seattle

Nuke swung his door open and stepped out onto the cracked pavement.

The barrage of defeated connection attempts from his firewalls threatened to completely obscure his vision. The hacker smirked. No bunch of barrens junkers were going to brute force their way into his system.

Leaning casually against a fender, he pulls his gloves off, revealing the black chrome hand of his replacement arm.

�Like he said, we’re looking for someone that I hear you all aren’t exactly taking cozy fireside naps with. He took something, and we want to take it back from him. Enemy of my enemy is my friend, neh? Anyway, we have reason to believe he’s in the area, and even if you won’t help us out, we at least wanted to get your blessing to go stomping around your turf looking for him.�

03-Apr-2071, 21:39:12, Puyallup, Seattle

"Why would anyone we hate be hanging out in our turf, chummer? and who exactly are you talking about? We've got more than one enemy." The voice sounds suspicious, but the troll's posture doesn't change, he remains alert, maybe tense, but just a bit out of phase with the speech.

03-Apr-2071, 21:39:22, Puyallup, Seattle

"Drives Like Crazy"

Nuke pauses to gauge their reactions.

"He's in hiding in north Puyallup somewhere, and I guess I figured that was all your turf."

03-Apr-2071, 21:39:38, Puyallup, Seattle

"That fucker? Hiding in our turf?" The voice all but explodes, but again the troll doesn't really sjow any physical reaction. A string of curses follow, and if anyone is monitoring the matrix traffic, it intensifies for a second. Then the voice clams down "How much is information worth to you?"

03-Apr-2071, 21:40:01, Puyallup, Seattle

Jasper went ahead and hopped down out of the truck. He smiled and nodded as he waddled over towards Nuke, keaping his hands up to show he was in no hurry to grab a side arm. "Howdy ya'll, I like what you did with the place. Look here, I work outa these barrens quite a bit these days, I think we could do each other a lot a good. Hell, I'll even come up here and give ya a hand in the shop. I know my way around some tools, I know a good parts guy too. a 'course this is just talk fer later, In the more immediate terms, whatcha think it should cost fer you to roll over on some skinny dippin wheelmonkey? "

03-Apr-2071, 21:40:15, Puyallup, Seattle

Stray felt rather undergunned with all that hardware around them but got out of the can as well, with the shotgun slung over her shoulder. It did make her feel both more vulnerable - outside the armored van - as well as less - being able to move freely.

The troll's voice, if it is his voice at all, sounds out again. "Make an offer. We also accept parts and services. But I haven't met anyone who could actually teach us anything about cars. Or anything else." Again the boasting doesn't find any match in the troll's posture.

03-Apr-2071, 21:40:22, Puyallup, Seattle

The troll go-ganger's bravado is expected, and Nuke wilts a little bit. He's pretty sure the troll is wrong, though.

03-Apr-2071, 21:40:50, Puyallup, Seattle

As far as Nuke can tell, there are several dozen hidden nodes around the area - in addition to several dozens not hidden nodes. The area seems as packed as the entrance of a mall in downtown, electronically. With some jamming and nodes switching on and off it's hard to keep the numbers up to date though. Device ratings vary, but most are low - not the vehicles and drones though.

The troll's PAN (hidden) is slaved to another node, but there are four more hidden and two overt nodes on the troll.

03-Apr-2071, 21:40:50, Puyallup, Seattle

<<What do you think? How much is it worth to us?>>

Overwhelmed with curiosity, Nuke sets about listening in on the gangers' comm traffic, then moves on to checking out the rest of the troll.

03-Apr-2071, 21:40:53, Puyallup, Seattle

<< 300? I ain't got much in the way of cred>>

"You guys do much with aircraft? " Jasper scanned the scene as if looking for planes or helicopters, he took a count of guns, cover, exit routs, just in case they decided that the offer wasn't worth as much as trying to kill him and take his trucks.

03-Apr-2071, 21:40:56, Puyallup, Seattle

<<I figured an even 500 if they insist on cash, or a few days in the shop if they don't.>>

03-Apr-2071, 21:41:46, Puyallup, Seattle

It is hard trying to listen in to the comm traffic - there is so much of it, all encrypted, and most reports and feeds from drones, not chatter. Nuke manages to discern though that all that's going from the troll out to a relay in a car are sensor results. He is not talking at all on the comm, and may even just related talk from someone else through his voice synth.

Jasper notices a number of drones, some airborne, mostly blimps though, but they are bound to have some roto-drones or worse somewhere - provided they can still lift off with the mods expected of the gang. The obvious exit is the way they came in through, but that may be trapped. A bird's eye view on his comm from some sat images cobbled together offers another route, but that will require some fancy driving to get through a narrow side alley filled with trash.

Stray agrees with the two other runners. <<<We should start low though, 250 maybe.>>>

The troll answers "We do all kind of stuff. Air, land, sea, sewers - you name it, we do it! So, what is the crazy bastards name worth to you?"

03-Apr-2071, 21:41:46, Puyallup, Seattle

"How about 250 for Drives Like Crazy's real name, and we go up from there based on what else you can do to help us find him tonight."



Curious about the stream of data between the troll and the car, Nuke switches his focus to it, reasonably sure that the troll in front of him isn't actually the leader of the Mo'Towns.

03-Apr-2071, 21:42:34, Puyallup, Seattle

The voice coming from the troll is riddled with laughter. "Real name? What are you, some trid-reject? Drives-like-Crazy is his real name. The only name that counts. Now, if you want some "real names" of the bastard's real friends we're talking real credits..."

Nuke can't detect anything inside the car (must be shielded, and routed through the car's system), and the system and firewall ratings look like 5 - to be expected by a gang so much into drones. The gang member negotiating demands 1000 credits for the names of the rigger's contacts but settles for 600 after the usual bartering and back and forth, and the rejecting of various "alternate methods of payment" by both sides - the gangers don't want outsiders doing work on their tech, having had a bad experience in the past, and the runners probably don't want to owe the gang any services "to be decided later".

03-Apr-2071, 21:42:41, Puyallup, Seattle

Nuke fishes a disposable commlink out of a pocket, opens the shrink-wrap seal, powers it up, transfers 600 nuyen to it, then holds it out to the troll.

"600 cred. Keep the burner if you want."

The hacker fights to stay calm, hoping he doesn't say the secret word that will set off the firestorm.

"What have you got for us?"

03-Apr-2071, 21:42:59, Puyallup, Seattle

The troll walks over, his cybereyes showing neither pupils nor emotion, just a pure black surface. He grabs the commlink - surprisingly delicate given the size of his hands - and runs a few quick checks. Apparently satisfied - he doesn't try to ri Nuke in pieces at least - his borrowed voice states "Drives-Like-Crazy got help when he screwed us. One of those bastards that helped him is "Test Screen", a hacker. He kept our hackers busy, and hid his location and changed his data. Then there were a couple gillettes hitting us - we identified two of them, Toby the Troll and Slicer." Small clips follow, showing a heavily armored ork with a LMG and a black stealth-suit clad man wielding two katanas. No troll.

03-Apr-2071, 21:43:04, Puyallup, Seattle

The images flash by. Nuke pulls up the ones from the chauffeur and runs them back again, comparing the body language and frames of the shooters who grabbed Cheryl with the images from the gangers.

"How'd he screw you?"

03-Apr-2071, 21:43:46, Puyallup, Seattle

The images match two of the shooters - though the match is not 100% sure, since faces were hidden. Body type is reasonably close, but wouldn'tbe enough in court byfar.

The troll's voice gets a bit louder "Are you kidding? That damn bastard screwed Sasha!" Probably literally, given the venom audible in the voice.

03-Apr-2071, 21:43:54, Puyallup, Seattle

"Hey, we ain't trying to pry bud. and lord knows I've been there" Jasper didn't want to drag the details of his unfaithful gal pal up in front of his boys. Although, he was currently more concerned with the amount of opposition they were up against. Drive-like-crazy may have had a funny name, but he had a very serious crew.

<<I'm startin to think we may be a little outnumbered with this group we're chasin>>

03-Apr-2071, 21:44:10, Puyallup, Seattle

<<<Why? Do you know them?>>> Stray isn't familiar with those names, but maybe Jasper knows them.

03-Apr-2071, 21:44:16, Puyallup, Seattle

"That just ain't right. Definitely sorry to have brought it up.

Nuke stands up straight, no longer leaning on the fender.

<<More that there are four of them and three of us. Those odds can get even really, really fast if we catch someone not paying attention, though.>>

03-Apr-2071, 21:44:27, Puyallup, Seattle

The voice goes on "And then the fucker's friend hacked our best truck, and drove it off the road - into a pillar! With one of us inside!" A few choice expletives follow.

Stray blinks - she hasn't heard some of those curses before, and makes a few mental notes.

03-Apr-2071, 21:44:34, Puyallup, Seattle

"don't you fret none, Ole boys new name is gonna be Bleeds-like-crazy" Jasper pulls out a smoke."I guess we'll be gettin to then, If you guys think of anything else, give a holler" He sends his dummy comm number to whatever node seems easiest, then starts headin back for the truck. "And like I said, I'm in the area If ya'll got some business down the road. "

<<Nuke sumed it up Stray. We better get the drop on these guys, or we'll be in some hot jumbelia.We're probably gonna have our hands full on the matrix side, and that still leaves the gunbunnies. I also don't know what kinda hardware this rigger is totin, then there's the possible hostage situation...>>