"""Okay. This deck will be the cost of his betrayal, then,""" she says, peaking into the bag.

"""Lets get out of here."""

Karma looks around the area, taking note of any vehicles that may trail them afterwards. Especially that car that had been there when they arrived.

Blue heads to the car. He asks the spirit to Guard the two of them and the vehicle.

Karma darts for the car as well, carrying all of the loot evidence she took off of Billy.

The Elektro scoots off as Karma drops the gear over her shoulder into the back seat.

"""Can you conceal our vehicle? If I find some traffic and overhead cover, can you then reconceal us? We can then abandon the car in a parking garage and I can have a contact pick us up."""

The good news is that between trees and buildings, it's not too hard to move behind visual cover from the aircraft. There are enough businesses that want buildings around the Seatac airport, that careful dodging is quite viable. The vehicle is also sufficiently nondescript that it blends with every other blobby grocery getter on the road.

The spirit continues to hover, guarding as per Blue's request, but there are no immediate obvious threats to push it into a response.

Karmakaze takes no chances and heads for downtown, where there are larger buildings, overpasses and parking garages that can provide coverage if needed.

While Karmakaze drives, Blue can look around enough to determine that apparently the gyrocopter decided to loiter around Billy's place without attempting a landing. It makes lazy circles in the air, not particularly high. This does mean that the further Karmakaze drives, the easier it is to have other structures interposing at a low angle.

Blue considers the tactical situation. """ Yeah, I could have the spirit conceal our vehicle, but if we do that as we drive, other drivers will also have trouble avoiding us. Heh. Now might not be the time to experiment with the interaction between the Concealment and Guard powers of a spirit. If we were to stop somewhere, that would be more practical.

"""It looks like the gyrocopter is staying around Billy's place rather than following us. I don't know whether that means it didn't notice us, or is relaying our direction of travel to something else. """

As all this is going on, a running conversation, albeit one-sided, carries on in the back of Blue's mind. Beyond that, into the aether.

::: Well, Owl, it looks like this is one of those times Freddy talks about. ::: He always refers to Nietzsche as Freddy when he talks to Owl.

::: I'm scared and hurt. Things are hunting me, the way sparrows and crows treat your kind. You will evade and run. But in the end, it is you that eats, not they. This is what i need. I will face them come what may. Give me strength, Owl. :::

Relieved the chopper isn't following, Karmakaze hands Blue her link.

"""Look up Jaxx's number. Use a new burner to contact him. Ask him if we can meet ASAP."""

+++Oh no. Blue's paranoia is contagious. A gyrocopter will do that, I guess.+++

Blue breaks and tosses the previous burner, and pulls out his last one. """This is my last one. I'll have to get more. New maintenance shopping list: socks, food, burners."""

He gets Jaxx's number from Karmakaze and sends a message. <<<Blue here for me and K. Need to meet ASAP. Please respond with location and time.>>>

Jaxx, whatever his interpersonal shortcomings may be, is a businessman at heart. What is the first rule of closing the deal? Answer the damn phone. Or Matrix message. Or whatever.

He gives a prompt response: <<<Right now I'm at the Krispybab Kebab shop in south Renton. I'll take a seat and hang out for half an hour. Soon enough?>>>

According to the dashboard autopilot of Karmakaze's car, that should be plenty of time to scoot over. He might still be licking grease off his fingers by the time that they get there.

Blue forwards Jaxx's response to Karmakaze. After her nod regarding the timing, Blue responds, <<< See you there. >>>

"""Good idea sending a text message rather than calling. Otherwise we would have never got the meet location in time."""

It's a short enough trip, and even with a few traffic snarls they get there under 20 minutes later. Through the window of the little kebab shop, Blue spots Jaxx sitting at a plastic table on a plastic bench, sipping some kind of neon orange drink in an idle fashion. He's alone, not counting a couple of bored-looking girls behind the counter, who are ignoring the universe in favour of chatting with each other about something - anything that doesn't involve doing a job or paying attention to the rest of the world.

Once they find a spot to park that at least partially hides or blends their car in with the rest, the two enter the shop. Blue catches the girls' attention (no easy task, that) and orders a couple more of that orange drink Jaxx is drinking. Taking his place at the table, Blue sits so he can see out the window.

"""Glad you could see us on such short notice. """

Jaxx doesn't particularly react when they enter, but is similarly unsurprised when they join him. When he's not setting Karmakaze's teeth on edge, he can play it cool with the best of them. """Null persp, amigo. It sounded important, so I found the time. So what's the big read?"""

"""Blue has been burned. All his contacts turned on him under pressure from Mitsuhama. We need to be off the grid from any pursuers.

"""We are also working a job trying locate an undercover Lone Star agent that has gone missing. I need a decker that we can trust to run the legwork we need. I have Blue's decker's cyberdeck as payment. I yanked the battery to prevent it being tracked. I am sure a decker can pull the data needed, and keep the deck as payment, or partial payment."""

Blue adds, """Yeah, Mitsuhama has been pulling all kinds of tricks the last few days. With Karmakaze's invaluable help, I've managed to dodge them all and do a job or two in the meantime. This missing person could help us answer a few niggling questions about another matter, so finding the agent is really important. """

Jaxx sits back, stretching out his legs somewhat off to one side of the table so that he doesn't collide with Karmakaze's long limbs.

"""Yeah, that'll happen. Sometimes ya gotta operate no matter whose edamame ya burned.""" He takes a sip from his drink, and looks thoughtful. """I know people - of course I know people - and I can definitely farm this out. I'm just curious what the value of this deck is. Any big datablobs on it? Anything I can take to the bank? Or is it a grab bag of freaky sims and datasteals from low-rent fab shops? Do ya have a name I might know, whose it was?"""

Blue replies, with a concerned look on his face. """Yeah, I can tell you what his moniker is. But, if he's on Mitsuhama's radar, because of me, then anyone passing his name around will also become a person of interest for the big M. """

See that? See how Blue is getting all 'street' now after only 6 days and a bit?

"""You want to risk that kind of attention?"""

Jaxx shrugs. """If they're monitoring things, they know what I do, and that I talk to all kindsa people all the time. The fact some slot's moniker passes by means nothing. In fact, I'd be more surprised if I hadn't heard of him, and dealt with him before. So it's everyday biz - just lay it out."""

"""Well, in that case, his name is Billy Morgan. He's fabricated some identities for me, and has done some research into business connections pertaining to a case we worked on earlier. """

Since it probably doesn't matter anymore, Blue gives Jaxx the address where he and Karmakaze found Billy. No need to mention Billy's niece. Though, thinking just now of her, her impending indoctrination into nefarious magic does worry Blue some.

Jaxx nods thoughtfully. """Yeah, I've heard of the man. Not the hottest, not the worst on the 'trix. I'll take the deck and pass the work to someone worth dealing, but where is Billy now? Do you have a go-to on him?"""

Blue thinks he knows what Jaxx means. """Last we saw him, he was just outside his doss the address of which I gave you. Here's his 'trix contact info. """

"""We need this to go to someone reliable and trustworthy, Jaxx," Karma emphasizes the need for loyalty. """We have been burned too many times..."""

Karmakaze ensures Jaxx has the entire list of inquiries for the new decker to work, the same handed to Billy previously. In addition the request for a copy of all the data stored on the cyberdeck, as there may be other clues in there pertaining to either job.

Jaxx nods, seriously while he says: """You got it, Karmaphase. Lost comrade, I understand. I'll give it up for the hottest I can get, and that's drekhot all night. I'll even cover the difference, but maybe the paydata on the deck will cover it. Mean time, I could use a little messenger service myself."""

Blue thinks to himself, +++ Man, it's like a pile of clothes hangers. You think you have one pulled out, but three more come attached. Side jobs upon side jobs. +++

He is reminded of Billy's niece. A hanger that hasn't left him alone. But, business is business right now.

"""What did you have in mind?"""

"""Oh, nothing big or difficult. There's a slot who's been annoying the wrong people, and I prefer it when stupid kids stay alive, and productive, rather than dead and decompositional. Eventually they smarten up and get more usefully productive, rather than forgotten stains in an organ tank someplace. I'd like it if some public-spirited folks could go to him and give him a pep talk and a reason to change his ways."""

"""How peppy do you want the talk to be? """ Blue asks. """I'm not all that interested in hurting someone.""" He remembers with some chagrin the thug in the diner. Well, he did do some healing afterwards. Oh, yeah. The car in the parking lot with miss PoliDemos. But she was snotty and drew her ... wait that was after he nuked her vehicle.

Then there was the fire elemental. But he did apologize ahead of time.

Hmmm. Slippery slope, anyone?

Jaxx waves a hand casually, before going in for another sip of his drink. """No, really no more than it absolutely has to be. I have all the details, you'll have plenty of ins and outs for a pointed sermon. Fragitall, I'd do it myself if I didn't have so much else on my cooker. Basically, he's been skimming custom biologics that he was couriering, and that's a quick way to end up as biologics yourself."""

Red flags are waving in the back of Blue's brain. +++ Are we ever going to be free of those people? +++

With a knowing glance to Karmakaze, and emphasis on the key words, Blue asks, """What kind of custom biologics are we talking about here? And to whom was he selling them? """

"""Various kinds. Last batch was a colon cancer treatment. Very specialised, tailored to the patient, unique to the cancer, strictly custom stuff. He shows up, fifty micrograms short. What he did with it? I have no idea, but I just don't want him wasted over a mosquito wing's worth of hoop cancer drug, scan?"""

Blue's anxiety level drops. """ Odd. That kind of thing could not be sold to just anyone. Only the person for whom it was designed. And if you try to sell it at a stolen goods, desperate buyer markup, the police get involved. That is kind of stupid.

"""Hmmm. Unless a competitor producer wanted to do some reverse engineering. That might work. We could have a police angle to work in that regard. """ He glances at Karmakaze.

"""I guess we have to take it. We are just going to be waiting on the decker anyways. Where do we find this hoop?"""

Jaxx sits back and says: """At any given moment? Anywhere; he's a courier. But I know where his homebase is. It's a logistics hub not far from here. Makes sense, yaknow? Halfway between Seattle and Tacoma, near the airport, near the sea. He on-again, off-again runs with a crew, as a sort of associate member, and they do all the exotic transport. He's land-only, but he's good."""

"""Right. We will go find him. Let him know what is up. Tell the decker to call me directly when he has some answers or some data. Our investigation started a week behind, and then this Billy bastard wasted another day."""

Karma looks the place up on her link, looks at a satmap of the area, to see where the best place to park for some surveillance work.

The satnav lays it out pretty well; the logistics hub is a sort of older truck stop that went metastatic and now incorporates some warehouses, utility businesses such as fuel, repair, a rail interconnection, a couple of cranes and a pad for thunderbirds. There are two probable nerve centres; the office building (which appears to be some old prefab structures that have stood the test of time), and a diner close by the truck facilities. The whole thing is on an east/west axis, running alongside the old 405 near the run up the hill to Burien and Seatac. The ground is just high enough that it wasn't wiped out by Mount Rainier dumping a lahar on Puyallup, and it looks as if whoever runs the show picked up facilities here on the cheap. The whole area is rebuilding.

A little more research, pretty much reflexive, shows that the area is a known base for a go-gang called the FedUpExpress, known for go-gang style but smuggler finances. Their style is loud but deceptive, rather than sneaky. They specialise in running tailchasers, rapid vehicle changes and changes of transport mode so as to frustrate pursuit. Nine times out of ten, security providers and corpsec teams figure out that FedUpExpress smuggled something by seeing that they moved, and finished moving before a response team could even get moving. This makes them expensive but effective.

Surveillance shouldn't actually be too difficult because the facilities in the logistics hub are actually real; many people move in, out and through all the time.

""" Alright, stakeout expert, how do we do this? """

"""We park someplace without a lot of stationary people, who will wonder why we are stationary. Or find a cafe or something with outdoor or window seating. Or the easiest way I have discovered in the past few days is send a spirit to do the boring work.

"""It wouldn't hurt to do both.

"""Once we spot our target, we tail him until we can catch him off guard and alone."""

Blue considers Karmakaze's suggestions. """Yeah, the thing with my kind of spirits is they don't cross domain boundaries. So, if I call a spirit inside his place, it won't go out. I call a spirit out here, it won't go in. So if he heads out somewhere, we could have a spirit tail him till he ducks into a building or something. Let's pick where we want to sit and I'll figure out the spirit to call. """

"""Sounds good. Lets move and get into place."""

She turns to her fixer, """Jaxx, have this decker contact me with anything he finds, if he is comfortable with that. We could really use a decker we can trust."""

Jaxx grins at Karmakaze. """Null sweat, Karma-Kram. I'll get you something back as soon as he can drill it. Meantime, have a link of a message for the courier.""" He stands from the table, on the way telling his 'link to drop Karmakaze a file.

It's not particularly big or dramatic; a list of drops, and a list of missing quantities or contents. It doesn't look as if any analytics were done on them, so Karmakaze might be able to figure something out while waiting in a stakeout.

Jaxx wanders out, taking the confiscated 'deck with him, whistling softly to himself.

Karmakaze makes a loop around the complex looking for the best place to park with good view of where the subject hangs out. Finding something suitable, she parks where there isn't too much stagnant foot traffic.

"""You think you can call upon a spirit to alert us when they see "the Messanger"?"""

The drive over gave Blue a chance to rest some. He waits a few more minutes until his head clears completely, studies the image of the messenger, and then summons a city spirit.



::: Thank you for answering my call. I seek a person who looks like this, ::: He brings the image of the courier to mind. ::: Over there, ::: he indicates the hangout, ::: is where I expect him to be, either coming out of that building or coming to it. Patrol near there. If you detect him, alert me. :::

"""It's done. A spirit will look for him. One of us should be able to see him. I have a spell that can help, if things get tricky.

The spirit whiffles off like the puff of dieselsmoke that it looks like. With that settled, the ambient noises of the environment infiltrate the car. The rush of tyres on wet roads, the hum of charging transformers, the shouts of workers transloading containers to or from trucks with their massive robot cranes.

It's busier than one would think, but nobody pays the slightest attention to the small car.

Blue remarks to himself the appearance of the spirit, which reminds him of Acidsalt Dieselsmog, the poor bugger who fried itself doing Blue's bidding. Once its time of healing back home is up, maybe Blue will try to summon it specifically in order to thank it personally.

Blue doesn't know if he actually can summon a specific spirit. Knowing a Free Spirit's true name is useful in that regard, but he's not sure in this case.

The two sat in the car for a quite a while, but hadn't spotted their man, or anything else suspicious yet. Karma couldn't afford to get tunnel vision on her target, while they still had a target on theirs. At least this was a way to kill the time while they waited on the decker to work his magic.

After a while of sitting and waiting, Karmakaze gets a notification courtesy of Jaxx. It's in the form of a map and a set of documents, apparently produced by his decker of choice and forwarded.

The gist of it appears to be that Daisy, or someone who looks amazingly like her, was part of a shipment of people who were shipped out (apparently unwillingly) by pressures within the region. The bus in which they were moving headed north, out of the enclave, and into the native lands. Now there's no guarantee what happened out there, but the bus went as far as what had been Skagit county, turned east into the hills up to old Concrete, and then returned to Seattle. What's left of Concrete these days is a few ruins overrun by a return of nature, and a sort of relict settlement. It's about as off-grid as you'll find short of trekking into the middle of the Cascades.

While Karmakaze digests this information, the spirit returns to alert Blue to the arrival of a fellow on a ... bicycle. That's right, an actual, pedal-driven bicycle. Well, wait, it seems to have a battery. Perhaps it's electric-boosted.

""" Heads up, """ Blue alerts Karmakaze. """ My spirit tells me that someone matching our target's appearance has just arrived on a bicycle. """

"""Can you or the spirit knock him to the ground as I approach? Then I can help him up with a warning."""