Too cheap. And I'd like it far better if Netcat is nabbed too, and Slamm-IO has to choke his pride and ask Clockwork for help. Which, given he is paid, he'll offer. This guy's an ice cold mercenary, but that doesn'T mean he won't work for him. He probably just would bleed him for money.


Where do you have that from?


Of course he'd interfere. He staffed Jackpoint with his favorites. He'd just deny he did to outsiders.

Also, what if dissonant mancers kidnap hackbaby because they saw it as "the one"? Their avatar of chaos, come to make them take over the Matrix, whom they take to train and nurture him/her? Adventure novels need a dash of epic, otherwise we end up with wholly uninteresting stuff like Drops of Corruption.

And finally, being a fan of George R.R. Martin: What if the dissonant mancers are right?

Clockwork would be perfect as a scapegoat, though.



-k

Maybe Clockwork wants to prevent the Second Coming of Deus?

Of course, if whoever kidnapped the baby wanted this shitstorm, then I guess some GD/IE/AAA is getting framed for it.

Meanwhile in Essen;

"Yes everything is going to plan."

Couldn't resist.

Slamm-O! is the only decker of his generation that got a profile in Target: Matrix. That means the corps are watching him just as much as they are Fastjack, The Smiling Bandit, SilveryK, Michael Sutherland, etc. He was 19 at the time his profile was made, and the others were all in their 20s-30s. He made the transition to Matrix 2.0 with no problems (even mocking other deckers for having to leave their basements now) and is now considered in the top tier as a member of Jackpoint before even turning 30. Not counting otaku/technomancers, I can't think of anyone who's managed such accomplishments at his age.

It's worth pointing out that this may be because other deckers of his quality and age aren't the massive gloryhound loudmouths he is, too.

I have some...ideas along these veins. Something with an ending that will make one sit back and say, "Yep, THAT is Shadowrun right there."

Check this out then.

I did. There's a partial storyboard for what amounts to the lead-in for the first book.

I was torn on whether or not Netcat should be taken as well. Might do a second pitch and see how it fills out. Having competing storylines that merge is pretty popular right now, but I don't want to see too many viewpoint swaps.

I'm torn! So torn! I see Hackbaby's abduction and return as the opening salvo in a larger arc. I see a few other points of possible awesomeness. I need to stop doing this. Damn you for highlighting another project!

Glad to be of service.

Dear Lord! All I wanted to know was who is Netcat's baby's father?

I love where the discussion has gone. Keep it up, good people.

Am I the only one to imagine enthusiastic Joseph D. Kucan in a leather jacket reading that?

When I derail a thread, the damage done to the environment and passengers is epic!

It's who I was thinking of.

Now imagine him in the "UNCLE KANE IS COMING FOR YOU!!!" scene.

Kane lives!

*Humph* The idea is popular here, but the moment I move it, no forward motion at all.

I'm not normally the pessimistic sort, but I can definitely see CGL nipping this in the bud by having Netcat miscarry or something. They might even go the soap opera route and have Slamm-O! NOT be the father.


However...

Part of me could see kidnapping the kid as a way to get a lot of these bigshots to come out and possibly leave themselves exposed.

That's true. FastJack is probably wanted on a variety of things for the last 50-some odd years of hacking/decking/hacking...

Kane is wanted in HOW many countries?

Slamm-0!s parents are First Generation Shadowrunners as well.

And there's the rest of the reprobates.

But expose them to take them, or expose them to use them as useful tools? Which would be more profitable.

Not much profit in vengeance...

Well, are we operating under the belief that MCT's taken the kid to see what a born virtuakinetic is like? Burning the Rose Garden seems to implicate MCT involvement on some level. Those guys aren't gonna be looking for vengeance if it doesn't profit them. Aztech would take the baby for study and sacrifice the rest. I think that whoever's pulling the strings needs them for something. Burning the Rose Garden to pull out Puck in Exchange for what?

Who says it's one of the Megas? There are a lot of other groups out there that need some dirty work done...

MCT with the Rose Garden, yes, good option. And they can get the Puck out of there too at the same time. Or what's left of him.

AZT, less likely. They're a boogieman for so many other things... That said, they also need a lot of dirty, dirty work done.

It could be a rogue spy agency of some country that needs deniable assets to do something really nasty. And they're more likely to pull the, "Just one more job..." that gets the 'Runners all ready for carnage, destruction, and mayhem.

PoliClubs are always a popular choice. Alamos 20K making a come-back would be a good option, full of crazy and professional at the same time. (They're a good suggestion for a Pink Mohawk wearing a Black Trenchcoat. Surprised I didn't think of them for that thread.).

Just some ideas...

I agree with Canray, way to many possible bad guys out there to count, i mean hades, i could see the "Ressurect the US" camp in the UCAS being behind it in a move to make things way to hot for the megas by framing them....see, so many possibilities.

Now canray, you know you have opened yet another can of worms and now i have to see this published in DDH as well

To be wanted, you'd have to be able to keep a notice in your computer systems. It's canon that Fastjack constantly goes around wiping data about him almost as fast as they can write it (the post in Target: Matrix being an exception).

And I just did. Oh, my...
You just made my day

These things tend to catch me when I'm in the middle of school/work projects, so I have some creativity to burn but not a lot of forward imputeus since I'm barricaded by grades. See alt.War (but you can't see my Auchwitz project since I havent' posted it, har).

The Rose Garden idea is one I'd like to run with for the first book just because I view the Excahnge as a product of the Deep Resonance. I also want to explore whether or not it has a soul. It has self-preservation, certainly, as it wants the 'runners not to save the TM's in the Rose Garden, butkill them. It will be the moral horizon for the team as to whether or not they want to do that.

Now, if Netcat had gotten nabbed and planted in there...that might make for some good reading.

Ah, but Puck has been nabbed and is there. So they already have someone they know and...

"So, we have to kill a bunch of these people and... Drek, it'd be a mercy! Look at them! I haven't seen anything like this since Chicago!" "Yeah, but, this would be out-and-out cold blood killing. We should have brought Kane. And... OH GHOST! PUCK! THEY GOT PUCK! THOSE BASTARDS!" "He's been here... All the time? Puck man, say something!" *Puck barely whispers* "Come on man, tell us, what's going on?" "K... K-k-k-k... Kill me."

...

"A mercy."

...

"Put your guncam on him."
"WHAT?!"
"Do it, I'm going to set your 'link to record and we're going to blow this open once we get outside."
"Fine, just hur-wait what are you-"
"Son of-Intrusion attempt it's through my firewalls-"
"It's not ME, it-PUCK's ID?!"
"It's hacking the smartlink node! DISENG-"
*gunshot*
"SHITSHITSHIT WE NEED TO GO NOW!"

Ok, I feel like I'm out of the loop (which happens a lot with the fiction since I only started playing in 4th and I haven't found all the novels yet)

Who is Puck and what is the Rose Garden?

What's the Rose Garden? And what happened to Puck? Feel free to spoil it for me, I'm guessing this is some book that I don't have.

I'll probably get pre-empted by this by someone else, but...

The Rose Garden is a MCT project only vaguely alluded to in recent books. It's a live study of Technomancers that MCT has managed to nab and vivisect while keeping alive in an effort to understand what makes TM's tick.

The infamous Puck was an Otaku, IIRC, that Faded prior to Crash 2.0, then manifested as a Technomancer. Not incredibly popular on Jackpoint, but heard rumors of the Rose Garden and said he was going to check it out. Afterwards, vanished.

Corp Guide has a MCT Technomancer manager escape the company after seeing Puck, vivisected but still alive, within the Rose Garden project. Well, I suppose he sort of escaped. Parts of him got away.

I thought he was investigating dissonant technomancers in Unwired? Ex Pacis or something?

What he was investigating, and what he got may have been two different things...

And, quite possibly, Ex Pacis might be in charge of the Rose Garden.

Can we get back to poor, kidnapped Hackbaby now?

Did we have anything confirming him as a Techno? I recall lots of harsh words and accusations and death threats, but I don't think Puck ever said anything about being one. I wonder if FastJack has actually dug anything up on the Rose Garden. He did say he'd check it out.

If he's one of the roses in the garden, I think we can call that one confirmed.

Puck was an otaku working for Deus. He used his connection to Deus to load Pax's Jorgamund virus during the Novatech IPO. There is rumor that he is a technomancer and not just a faded otaku, but Puck himself refuses to comment on this.

The last time we hear from Puck* was during Unwired. There he says he was tracking a group of AIs called Code Clan. Code Clan was connected with a technomancer cult called the Discordians, some of whom are former members of Ex Pacis. After that, Netcat says that Puck was offline for 5 days.

Next, we see the scene in Corporate Guide where he's being tortured and experimented on by Dr. Catherine Sharon, a computer science genius on MCT's payroll(more on her in Emergence p11.) This is relevant because the first time we saw Puck in Shutdown, this is what he was doing to others. Puck being inside a faraday cage lends credence to the idea that he is a technomancer.
Someone going by the name NamelessYakGuy also gives some cryptic info on the Rose Garden and the "silver thorn", which is probably silver haired Puck.

Then, in Feral Cities, Netcat drags Pistons to GeMiTo to meet with a gang called the Capotreni, who were the last people Puck went to see before he disappeared. The Capotreni seem somehow connected to technomancers. The German wiki claims they are a technomancer gang, but I can not confirm this.

Lastly, in Vice, Netcat and Pistons are in Afghanistan trying to barter passage to Kolkata in Bengal, India. This is of note because Kolkata(or Kolkota) Integrated Talent & Technologies was one of the hubs Winternight and Ex Pacis used to launch the Jormungand virus.
Earlier in Vice, it also notes that Friday, the only surviving Norn of Winternight, has recently escaped. Clockwork then spells it out that a psychopathic killer who used to run with Pax is on the loose and that Puck has gone missing while investigating Ex Pacis.

*Puck also has a comment at the beginning of Vice about high-tech arson. Considering there are not one, but two references to his disappearance later in the book, this would imply that all the info in Vice was compiled at different times.

Well, maybe...or did one of the newer books actually confirm that?

Dear Lord, you all are creative geniuses.

I feel like a monkey trying to do a math problem when I try to create a simple run in Seattle for my group and here you all are taking Shadowrun creativity to the next level.

I bow to your creativeness <bows>

Keep it up!!

TM, it's worse than you think. We're still at the "Monkeys with Typewriters" stage.

Wait until we really hit our groove!

If I had a real datajack, you'd be getting the real good stuff. I think best when I'm on my feet, but it's not very convenient to lug my laptop around while strolling around the beach.

If I had a real datajack, I'd be taking one hell of a wonderful nap right now while I looked busy.

One of these days, I'll get a digital recorder and not look like a total nutjob walking down the street vocalizing ideas every now and then.

It doesn't help wearing an army surplus greatcoat and having a massive beard. I look like I just came out of the Mountains of Northern Ontario.

...

Which I did, but it was six years ago!

You can take the can out of the mountains of northern ontario, but you can not take the mountains of northern ontario out of the can.

Even talking about hunting rifles scare these City-Folk Flatlanders.

I'm in the Army and when I told my family I have fun at the range they look like I sprouted an extra head.

To her credit, my wife loves it when I spend an afternoon at the range burning through a couple boxes of ammo. I've started hitting a local range with her brother-in-law and nephew, and she likes it when all the men-folk in her life spend time together, blowing off steam and giving the gals time to hang out and talk about us.

When I commandeer the kitchen table to clean my guns afterwards? That, she loves a little less.

Dad commandeered the kitchen table one winter to build the engine block for his Harley-Davidson.

That was... An interesting Winter.

/me feels out of place with all these gun nuts.

Erm.... I have a Nerf gun?

Which reminds me, I need to set aside some time to go put some rounds through my 1911 and my 12g.

The range near here is too expensive, me and my friends have some stuff set up out waaay out in the woods....

More than I have, man. Stupid Canadian Laws... I gotta hit the US some day and get some shooting done.