<<In that case, I think I'd prefer staying close. How do you want to do that.>>
Tien replied

Tamarind sent to the team <<I didn't think we could force our employer to leave if he doesn't want to, and if we can deal with the shedim he may be useful for talking his son down? The problem is that they may search him up with spirits, and if they size him, living, dead, or reanimated, we don't get paid. If anyone could persuade him to put a chunk of the money up now , in case of accidents, that would be ideal. But I think we were all feeling that they are too much of a danger, in general and to us in particular, to walk away.>>

<<My thought is either we stick him in a truck, doors locked, out of the main line of fire but also where we can react if they go for him-- possibly with Raven, if she is mostly tapped out from spirit summoning.. Or we dig him a fox hole, between us. Either way we armour him up as much as possible.>>

She might leave Beauty with him too. Only a taser in terms of defense, but at least it would give her eyes inside the truck to see what he was up to, a potential partial defense, and if needed she could use it to knock him out if he was liokiat making more trouble. Should have done that earlier, likely, but no use crying about that now

(I'm presuming that we're talking together in a group and communicating separately - via comm - with Tien.)

"I'll feel better if he's close," Mato says. "The last thing I want is for the Fourth to roll up with the Third as his hostage. That would send this all to drek.

"Gladius can watch over the client. He'll be safe with Gladius. Tamarind, you make a good point that it might be good to have him nearby in case we drop Victoria and someone needs to break through to his son. But what I don't want to have happen is for our employer front-and-center to watch his son's head get turned into a canoe because we need to employ a lethal takedown to save our lives. So close, but not too close."

His toe kicks the dry Texas dirt.

"I don't like being on the front lines of saving the world. I'd rather leave this to Firewatch. But we're here and they're not, so it's our responsibility to nip this in the bud. This isn't some jockeying between two interchangeable corps; this is shedim vs. life as we know it. We know what side we're on. Now we have to back that up, because no drek sandwich that we have to eat will be as bad as the shedim succeeding."

Gladius replied to the message:

<<Tell Tien to take a car and come to my position - I need to keep an eye on the road to move the barriers, but other than that I can protect your employer.

But you also should get into position - with the accelerated timeline, there is no telling when they will arrive here.>>



Less than two minutes went by, before Tamarind's spy drone noticed a black SUV driving to the charging station with numberplates, that indicated an origin close to the Seattle border.
The car had three occupants - a blond tall woman, a good looking muscular man and a large black labrador.
While the two humans went for their respective restrooms, the black lab roamed on its own behind one of the buildings to do his business, as many other dogs had done before - but curiously without smelling any of those.

Only a few minutes later all three returned to the car, the lab jumping in without prodding, and resumed their journey.

Mato gives a "huh" at the drone footage.

"Do shedim need to, uh, expel fluids?" he asks. "I would think they were sustained by, I don't know, ambient mana energies or somesuch. I know there's a biological component, but I would have thought that it would just piggyback on whatever the spirit was doing.

"Maybe it's all part of the deception..."

Mato thinks of how boring it would be to pretend to go to the bathroom several times a day to keep up appearances. And restrooms in the Texas heat, ew. He's grateful his olfactory sensors have a cutoff function for such scenarios.

I am a bit tense at the anticipation, ahm "No idea actually, perhaps Gladius knows but a dog that poops and goes back to the car on its own? Pretty sure they are pulling off a Bobby there. So what do we do? I am not sure an ambush would still work if they are very alert. We go on as normal and wig it or? " I say while playing with my hair out of stress.

I try to observe the matrix and identify the icons active on the car, perhaps I can offer some tactical benefit there.

"I don't see anything that changes the plan yet. We set up to defend the road; if they go off-road, then we pivot."

Mato nods. "Yes, remember that Phillip has published papers on the conservation of mass. Let's see from my notes... 'Phillip has published a few papers on transformation magic, theorizing about where mass increases and decrease comes from in various magic spells. He proposes that mass is put in storage and retrieved from other physical metaplanes with the astral body acting as a bridge between them.' That completes my understanding of the topic; I'm not sure if it's relevant here, other than we know they have studied transformation magic.

"I'm assuming they are all disguised. I suppose the concern should be whether their disguised forms mirror their undisguised forms. For example, it would be easy and natural to presume the woman is Victoria, but that isn't necessarily the case. I don't want to lay down a fat headshot on the tall blonde only to find out that she was really Tien IV."

He looks to the women: "Do we have a way to confirm targets ahead of time? If not, will the mana barriers drop the illusions?"

Then he looks to Tamarind: "Do we have a way to track them here? I'm guessing the drones can't keep up individually. Can we daisy-chain a string of them to track their progress? Or can one of the Harriets hitch a ride?"

Mato looks out onto the future battlefield. "Ugh, might be miserable under these tarps. I'd wish for some wind, but they might rustle the tarps. Everyone make sure you have plenty of fluids to drink: dehydration is the enemy of snipers everywhere."

Tamarind has Lazybones zoom in on the car, getting good enough pictures that they can look up the exact make and model, and she keeps the drone watching it for as long as it can, getting estimates of speed vs the typical speed on the highway, in order to get a feel for how they are driving. She does some quick calculations then passes along her conclusions about likely arrival times to the team, adding at the end "Of course, we are talking about a trouble of mages, so by the time they get here the car may look different, they may have ditched it and be flying in, they may be ridiculously hard to spot, or even be taking their chances with enhanced spirit movement on the speed. I have Mimic watching from the sky on the likely road approach, so hopefully we'll have warning just before they get here, but no promises. I'll send a Pelliper further out to cruise the roads, but their sensor suite isn't great, it is even less likely to pick them up if they use any degree of disguise or concealment. "

Then she focuses on getting them to the farm before the 'trouble of mages' shows up. Once they are on scene she takes a deep breath, and approaches their employer, Beauty in her hand. She proffers the chromed pigeon, and requests "Could I please ask you to carry this drone with you. I call her Beauty, and normally I would carry her with me, however in this circumstance I would like to be able to keep an eye on what is happening around you, and she has excellent surveillance capabilities. If you will permit, she'll ride on your shoulder -- never fear, drones, no matter how lifelike, won't soil your suit." She doesn't mention the concealed taser in the drone, with which she could attempt some defense of the man, or possibly disable him should he attempt to further endanger their endeavor. She asks Gladius if he is able to wield a shovel while sustaining spells, or if one of the rest of the team needs to go dig a foxhole for III.

She discusses with Mato on the various grenades, and loads any into her remaining Pelliper, if that is agreed to.

Then she deploys the two firing platforms, making sure they are synched up to her RCC. One close to the farm gate, able to provide some support into parts of the farm, certainly cover the farm gate, and reach out to their preferred ambush point. The other one a few hundred meters further up the road, providing cover at the ambush point from a different angle. Each gets covered by a gilly tarp, and if there is any ability to line them up with rows of corn she'll choose to do that, providing more astral screening for them. She positions the three 'Aunties' (flying eye drones with concealed tasers) in the ditch near the ambush point, and initially places Toothless in the ditch closer to the farm gate.

Then she picks up a shovel and helps with digging fox holes. The priority is certainly for the metahuman members of the team, but if there is time she'll also dig a trench to let Toothless get further down out of site -- the tracked drone should be able to surge out without trouble as long as she leaves a bit of a ramp.

(assuming you sent a car as Gladius asked for)
Tien III arrived as discussed and joined Gladius. It was hard to make out under his armor, but the ex-firewatch man looked relieved to get outta of the heat.

The two men park inside the corn field, becoming barely visible in the process.
Tien took the drone with grace and did as he was asked.

Digging in the hard earth was a different matter: with so little time to prepare, the team only managed to dig three depressions beside the road, that were large enough to hide either two gun platforms or one person at a time.

Then the drone warned of an incoming vehicle - the timing fit, but the color registered as grey green.

People get the holes, firing platforms get placed further 'forward' and 'backward' along the road (so that the holes are not in the line of fire), and have to settle for being covered by the tarps. But who to put in the 'holes' and who to leave out?

==================

When the approaching van, of the wrong colour, is spotted, Tamarind asks AM if she can hack it <<It should have sensors to detect if seats are occupied, might not pick up a dog but we could at least tell if there are two human size masses inside. Would give us a starting indication of whether it is our vehicle. And then having the marks to try and stop it after it has going through the mana barriers>>

"I'll take the hole," Mato says.

He grimaces a bit. His cyberlimbs aren't prone to exposure or overheating, but on the other hand they can't assist with thermoregulation either. It was a lot of surface area he didn't have for sweating and the dissipation of heat.

"I could go for a Shmoozie or a Slurpie-doo from Stuffer Shack, but failing that I have my 'Lab Pure' brand water," he says, indicating his not-very-cold bottle of water.

The flare comp in his cybereyes means he doesn't need to wear sunglasses, although he admits he would look cooler if he did.

"My eyes can magnify like a scope. I'll try to get eyes on the cabin and establish targets, but I have to say that without a confirmation of who is who I'll be loathe to take a kill shot. I might have to aim for the engine block instead. Tam, do you know if the Talon has an aluminum engine block? Maybe I can get lucky and pierce the rotating assembly, or the cylinder wall.

"But, yes, let's try to confirm the target before we open fire. This road isn't used much, but I don't want to gun down a neutral party. I wouldn't put it past them to bring a hostage, or to mind-control a third party. They're not operating with the same moral guidelines we do." Or, at least, that Mato presumes that they do.

Mato gets in his slit trench underneath the tarp, setting up the Marpinger Mannlicher. He had six shots - plus two shotgun barrels - to get the job done without reloading.

Tamarind began to hastily hide the smart platforms




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

The approaching van didn't appear on the matrix at first glance, so was either running silent or had online functionality disabled. It was now less than a minute away, rolling along at about 30km/h, without even the usual high pitched sound that other electric vehicles had to warn pedestrians of their approach.

Mato waits with the Männlicher, which he can't help but pronounce as "man licker" in his head.

<<We have a van instead of an SUV>> Mato DNIs, even though he's sure the others noticed too.

<<Waiting for the intersect with the mana barriers. Hopefully that will clarify things.>>

Since she can do little else at the moment, Rachel will help Tamarind with setting up her things and disguising them.

Other than that, she will look for a place where she is not directly in the line of fire, and from where she can support the team with her spirits.

Tamarind was siezed with the idea of tearing off the long leaves from some of the corn plants and attaching them to the gun platforms. Before Raven even realized what Tamarind was doing, she'd already stripped leaves off of many of the nearest plants, leaving less cover. It was only when she was about to start gluing them in place that she realized she'd have been creating an obvious thicket in a field full of tall, narrow, corn.

And just like that it was high noon - or rather show time, considering that noon had come and gone.

As the car (whose matrix signature as well as any devices showed no signals whatsoever) reached the home stretch, Gladius moved his eight barriers into its way.



With squealing breaks the car came to a stop. For five seconds, nothing happened

Earlier: I do some legwork to acquire a hazmat suit to complement the gas mask. Like Bobby suggests.

I nod to Mato's explanation and work digging in the hard earth and concealing the platforms. "If the trap works, Trouble would dash in towards the car in the astral and whack whatever is still astrally active with astral combat. He'll be inferior to these guys, but intersecting with the wards a moment before they'll be vulnerable and astral movement is the best for Arione. So Trouble disables Arione and a spirit from Raven to materialize and disable.

"Once they pass through wards, any magical illusion would likely be broken; eight powerful wards are a lot even for them. We'll know which is which. Trouble would dash into the astral and whack Arione, still astrally active but perhaps unconscious. I don't think that Shedim can regenerate astral damage. So, with the Trickster's blessing, Trouble can destroy Arione without ever materializing. Raven can summon another spirit to do something similar, perhaps. While the mages handle the spirits, I can petrify whoever exits the car first, and we can also throw the gas grenade just in case they may have a spell for it - but it is one less spell cast against us. Let's throw everything at them and hope they don't retaliate because it can get ugly.


Prepping: I help with digging and concealing the platform, enjoying the hot sunny day for a change.


I also check the car in the Trix and see if there is any advantage I can get there. My heart beats strong when the car arrives, and I can feel the excitement, adrenaline, and fear when I know that we're headed toward an amazing feat or a disaster. I turned out to be the most interesting one out of my entire class with their mundane aspirations. I suddenly realized I was an obvious choice for the Trickster.

Mato studies the vehicle closely, grateful for his new cybereyes with all their bells and whistles. He puts them to good use, getting a zoomed-in look and relaying what he sees to the others.

All matrix devices inside the car as well as the car itself were offline, giving AM few options - at least on the matrix side.

Gladius called over comlink:
<<What the hell are you waiting for? Disable the car before they can flee and recast their buffs. I just felt a ton of intersections and 7 of my 8 barriers survived. They have no spirits and no foci at the moment, but if you don't act, this will change in a hurry. Shoot the engine and get that shears of life to cut that thing open for a gas attack!>>

As things get hectic, Rachel finally takes a deep breath and concentrates on calling for help from the spirit world.

The entity answers her call, and a powerful spirit appears near the shaman in astral space, ready to help her against this threat.

Raven asks the spirit to materialize inside the car, ideally behind the passengers, in order to knock out the two mages with his Noxious Breath at the first opportunity, and generally try to disable any hostiles there without killing them.

The spirit agrees to the task and sets off towards the car to materialize in there.

Well, what-do-ya-know, the plan actually worked! While one part of her mind is marveling at the improbability of things working as planned, most of her focus is racing through AR commands. First she orders Toothless to move to the driver's side door of the vehicle and then use its jaw's of life to rip the door open. Then she tells the 'Aunties' to launch themselves from the ditch and to hover just above the vehicle's roof -- if opening the vehicle summons a blast of fire, she'd rather that the three flying eyes were not in the same line of fire as Toothless.

Once the spirit informs her, that the task is complete, Rachel immediately notifies the team.

<< My spirit friend just informed me, that the two mages - that would be Tien IV and Phillip - are both down. Thanks to Gladius fabulous work, getting rid of their defensive spells, the spirit managed to take them both out. Unconscious, still breathing. They both tried to banish him, but our bond was too strong. >>

Mato shot the car and a few sparks later the lights went out. Muffled sounds indicated the struggle inside the car, than everything went silent for a second, before the drone reached the car and began to cut open the passenger doors.

A wave of noxious mist enveloped the drone for a moment, before getting dissipated by the breeze.

Inside the car three people lied unconscious in their seats.

Tien IV sat behind the wheel, a naked Phillip sat contorted next to him and a sprawled out Victoria across the backseat.

No alerts blared and no movement on the astral indicated that border guard spirits had noticed the brief altercation.

AM follows with petrified spells when she gets a line of sight. She prefers to control when they will wake up just in case they missed something. "Let's see if we can find the XT, and then we figure out how to ship Tien back to daddy."

Now, that it seems fairly safe, Rachel will get closer and switch her senses to the astral, in order to check on any magic that is still there.

Any removable foci, the witch will remove.

Other than that, she is curious about what state Arione is in. Is she dead? If Shedim are involved, her body should be... at least, that is what she thinks.

<< I would assume, they do not have that lying around somewhere. It is probably packed up. So, it isn't immediately visible on the astral. >>

The petrification hit and the two mages turned to stone - which made searching them a bit harder - but far from impossible.

Tien kept a crystal around his neck in his now petrified hand that Rachel identified as an F6 Power Focus. The two other golden pendants were an F6 spell focus and a centering focus of the same power.
Phillip didn't carry any foci, but his petrified flesh showed where his foci had been tattooed on his skin.

A bit of searching in the trunk brought the duffel bag to light, that the team had already seen on the Kanmushi footage. It did indeed contain the XT - well protected in its own little hard case. Besides that, there were the four kilos of reagents, neatly packaged and labled.

Arione appeared to the naked eye as nothing more than a good looking woman. A long look on the astral revealed the sinister truth: Underneath the apparent living shell was another aura hidden - one that smelled of death, decay and fear. Rachel could feel how it's regenerative power kept the body from decaying, despite the shock of the intersection having knocked out the spirit within.

More interesting were the remnants of two manipulation spells, that the spirit had maintained and that had also been disrupted - a clear link towards the two petrified mages indicated a powerful mind magic spell that had only been recently casted.

As a back up, Tamarind has one of the Aunties hover beside each of the figures. If they just start waking, hopefully a taser will render them insensible again.

<<Let's get IV away from the woman, restrained, and then awakened before we get interrupted. See if his mind clears up. But let's also do this before III gets mixed in with things >>

Speaking of which, she checks her feed from Beauty to see how things are going for III and Gladius.

<< I can see traces of mental manipulation on Arione and them. So, if I got this right, there were two spells sustained by her, and recast regularily, at least these were fairly recent. Maybe she did keep them "under her spell" quite literally (controlling their thoughts or something similar; if the Force of the spell is high enough to overwhelm their mental defenses, they would never be able to break free from it). If that is the case, they might actually be clear of mind (more or less, given what they have been through) now. But it is still a big risk to wake them up. Is it feasible to keep them unconscious and bring them back to Seattle first? Then our employer could also arrange for medical personnel. We could prepare them with some on-demand-sedatives, to knock them out again within a moment, in case it is necessary. Some precautions would be highly advised here, as we have no idea what to expect. Speaking of drugs, do we have the means to scan them for drugs in their system or anything else of note? And we should search them thoroughly... well, I guess Phillip will not carry much. Also, the Shedim is still there, held here by the connection to Arione's dead body, I assume. Its regeneration does not work properly at the moment, due to the magical nature of the damage it suffered by the intersection with the astral barriers. But it will awake at some point. >>

<<Wasn't the instructions on shedim destruction that we first destroy the body it is inhabiting, to make the spirit apparent, and then kill the spirit? If the spirit seems inactive now, let's get in with it. Raven, AM, Trouble you are needed for the second part, Mato and I can deal with the first. Let's get the body into the hole, the better to bury it. I'll get Toothless on that part, Mato could you help piling the body onto the drone? >>

She commands the medicine to carefully use the jaws of life to snag some of the body's clothes, and pull it out of the car. She does firmly instruct the drone not to apply first aid. There will be trace evidence, but they'll worry about cleaning that up after.

As she worked in the matrix, Tamarind was jogging through the corn towards the car. She'd been a distance back, so it will take a bit but if she is there before the deed is done she'll load her Ingram with something lethal and help obliterate the head. She'll have nightmares later, but for now? Get the job done.

<< I will ask the spirit to stand by and send the Shedim back to where it belongs, once freed from Arione's body. Also, let's search her properly, once she is out of the car. Who knows, what else she is hiding on her body. >>

>> Crap, we need to murder her. Let's get it over with, bury her in the hole for the firing platforms, and get going.
I wish I brought my urban hunter-throwing axe, but I never thought I'll need it though.




I would help with whichever task was needed, even decapitating the severed head. I'll also make sure that we repossess any foci on Arione and reagents as a big bonus for the team, but would separate the two mages from their foci before attempting to wake them up.

Mato jogs up. When he looks inside and sees everyone unconscious, he says, "Oh dang!" Then, after a moment of contemplation he adds, "So did I shoot the car unnecessarily?"

He follows the lead of the others. He does as Tamarind asks and pulls Victoria's body out and loads it onto Toothless.

<<She died back in that auto accident>> he replies to AM. <<We don't have to murder her. We just have to... break her earthly remains.>>

He looks around. <<We don't want any witnesses; we don't need anyone jumping to the wrong conclusions. Let's make sure we're away from those spirits providing overwatch on the farm. AM, did you notice any sensors on the farm's perimeter that might pick up our activity? If so, we'll need to wipe that.>>

Mato checks the front seats, looking for anything interesting there or in the glove compartment. He runs his radar sensors over the vehicle to search for hidden compartments or other materiel that had escaped observation.

It occurs to him that they should update Gladius and Tien III.

<<Mission accomplished>> he comms Gladius. <<Hold at your current position. We'll come to you.>>

<<Sir, I am pleased to report that we have recovered both your son and the Xenobite-Tesseract>> he comms Tien III. <<Your son is unconscious but unharmed.>> He leaves out the part where his son's body has been petrified. <<There are traces of magical mental manipulation on his aura. That influence has now been disrupted, but it may be prudent to keep him sedated for a short while so that he can regain consciousness within a controlled environment.>>

"Let's drop the petrification," he suggests to Raven. "We need to diplomatic when we return him to his father. His father will be distressed about his condition. I have a shock hand and a tranq patch if he wakes up and is unruly."

>>Praise the Trickster; she is gorgeous for a burn victim. Any witness would see it as a murder of a rich SINNer. This is rough; we may need some help from Tien Senior to make sure this stuff goes away.


I grin when Mato assumes the petrification is Raven's work, "Wrong sorcerer!" I say "But fine, just tell me when and grab their expensive toys and make sure they stay down. Search them for auto-injectors or anything that can miraculously wake them up."

I drop the spells when Mato instructs me to, but before that, I check to ensure that Tam's "murder" has no digital witnesses active in the Trix. I am awed that she does it, I mean, I would have done it but it would require some digital dice or a straw pulling. I am not spoiled, but this is not a pleasant task. Ex-military people are tough as nails.

<< AM, maybe once you dropped your spells you can heal the wounds on Tien IV's body, and Phillip as well, which they sustained from the spirit's attack. >> Rachel asks.

She explains to her spirit friend that they have to destroy the Shedim, in order to send it back to where it belongs (wherever that is, exactly).

She gives the spirit the task to do that, once the Shedim is seperated from its physical shell.

Then the witch begins removing all the astral signatures present at the scene.

Mato is mildly embarrassed, both by his assumption that the petrification was Raven's and also that he jumped the gun by telling Tien III that his son was unharmed.

I couldn't tell with the petrification, he tries to tell himself privately.

"Good thinking," he says instead. "We'll look for auto-injectors. I'll run my scanners over them to make sure we don't miss anything."

He eyes Tien's crystal and his two golden pendants.

"Are those corrupted in some way?" he asks Raven. "We should separate them from his person, but since his father is our client I'm inclined to think that we should return those as the IV's personal property."

Once everyone is ready, I take off the spells and then say "Bring the first aid kit, mundane healing before magic." I augment my mind to make the most out of my rudimentary first aid knowledge and follows the instruction of the medic kit.



Once I finish the mundane healing, I go for magical with Trouble's help to augment my natural magic. I chant a repetitive mantra to strengthen their spirits. The mind-bending thing about spells is that they work faster than words so the mantra is not part of the spell it is just me getting ready, and finishing with the medic kit but it seems appropriate for shamanic healing to have some minor ritual even if I am perhaps the most liberal in my class.

Tien's spell seems robust, while Philip's ends up more superficial. They are as good as I can make them.



I've done what I can for them. What next?

and given the okay I heal the two mages like Raven has requested. Tien's spell comes up great, while Philip's seems more superficial.

Rachel will check the foci thoroughly before answering Mato.

"No, I don't think they are corrupted. And, of course we give them back. These two are not our enemies, we are here to save them. V's belongings, we should keep, however, maybe we can put them to better use."

When the healing is done, Tien IV looks unharmed, which is good. A few bruises on Phillip are not great, but given the situation, it still seems like a very favorable outcome for him.

She does not like it, she was the one who has made the spirit cause these wounds and the pain that comes with it, after all. But there really was not much of an alternative. And sometimes, the end does justify the means. It surely was the right call to disable them quickly, who knows in what state of mind they were in that moment and what else might have happened. It was better for everyone involved, including them. Now they have a real shot at getting back to a normal life.

Gladius replied: <<Understood, we'll hold position.>>


A quick check showed, that the ambush site had been well chosen: It was far enough away from the border to not trigger notice by sensor or spirit. As far as the team was concerned, there were no recordings going to the matrix but their own.

The foci looked to be nothing more than highly expensive magical equipment. Dragging the three unconscious people out, took a moment or two longer, as the petrification made it hard to extricate them from their seats.

Giving them some first aid - mostly in the form of IVs and oxygen to improve respiration - gave both Tien IV and Phillip back a bit of color on their cheeks and lessened the blue of their lips.

Victoria carried four foci in total: Two spell sustaining foci - Manipulation and Health - as well as a centering focus and a power focus, all of them F6. A veritable treasure, most likely purchased by Tien IV.


Dragging Victoria's body to one of the shallow holes in the ground was easy enough. Though destroying the body was only half the job, AM and Raven knew. Dealing with the freed shadow spirit would require quick reactions, lest the creature woke up once free from the body.

Finishing with the mages, I move on to the car, casting the fix spell on the engine to undo what damage Mato has done. "Let's fix that car so we can make it disappear. You are in luck that the weaners have a tendency to break windows, I got a spell for that."



With the car fixed, and me a few reagents poorer. "Okay, mages fixed, car fixed - what next? Let's destroy Arione's body and bury her, it would be less James bond and more Jack the Ripper because Shedim can possess dead bodies even if they are not in pristine condition. So it is going to get very ugly. We'll need something sharp to do it quietly.

I say matter of factly; my voice is a bit automatic - a survival instinct kicking in though I really feel bad to destroy her in such a manner even if it is the logical thing to do.
Oh, and Raven keep that massive spirit on watch because the Shedim can still return, and there may be more bodies buried in these corn fields. I say with a grim voice and an ice-cold look.

"Oh, really," Mato says somewhat rhetorically when AM tells him that shedim aren't picky about how intact their hosts are. Dispassionate as he is, even this is a little much for him. He has a glassy look in his eyes that suggests he is imagining a tattered corpse shambling around.

"If the damage needs to be, ah, thorough, why don't we have Raven's spirit take care of it? It can probably fry it like its in the electric chair, right? And then crisp up the spirit inside once the exterior is vaporized."

He looks a bit relieved when AM fixes the vehicle he shot rather unnecessarily.

"I'll drive this. Is there a way to tell who it is registered to? I'd be curious if they stole it, or if they bought it." He gestures to the reagents to acknowledge that they had significant financial resources at their disposal.

He packs up the Mannlicher and tarps, loading them in the vehicle that Tamarind is driving.

"Alright, let's have a quick cremation and then go make some deliveries to our client."

"I am not sure, it is the best idea to have the spirit do it," Rachel wonders.

"While he is powerful and capable of it all, he won't be able to immediately react to the Shedim's seperation. He will have to be materialized as well."

I would not have considered doing it with a great spirit, but I'd never ask my Trouble to do anything so dark. It seems odd to ask a spirit to do it, not forbidden but still it is a simple but nasty task that we could do ourselves. I keep quiet, reflective, and I keep my shamanic upbringing to myself as the spirit slaver, saved my life twice, and as for the spirits? They never listen when I call, whatever it is that entices them --- I don't have it. It is not that sorcery is not enough it is more than I would ever dream of; these are the scars of my training in a tradition that values the spiritual connection above all else.


No biggie, we already owe the spirit so much. I'll do it myself. A few litters of petrol and an odd feeling like I've been there before. I watch the woman burn and force myself not to turn away until the deed is done, and we cover what remains with shovels. Rest in peace, Arione, and I am truly sorry you had to be burnt alive twice.

Mato isn't delighted with the smoke, which he's concerned might generate a response given its proximity to crops, but he has to admit that there's a certain degree of symmetry for Victoria to be cremated.

Also the smell is terrible, but at least his olfactory sensors have a cutoff that takes care of that.

"Raven, I don't know how many favors we can ask of your friend, but can we get some wind to disperse the smoke so that it's not a giant column of black pointing directly at something suspicious?"

He also thinks that some airflow might help the burn go faster. He's eager to depart.

Mato waits - unconsciously tense - for Raven to give confirmation that the deed is done on the astral.

Dousing Arione in lighter fluid and setting her ablaze was easily done, but took a long time. The purely mundane flame did obvious damage, melted flesh and destroyed tissue... only to have it regenerate, over and over again. Only slowly did the damage accumulate enough to overwhelm the amazing regeneration of the shadow spirit. All onlookers would likely need a very long time to get rid of the image of the burning, melting face that recovered again and again only to be destroyed anew.

Finally, after an agonizingly long time, the body stopped restoring itself and raven received the confirmation from her air spirit, that the emerging shadow spirit had been thoroughly disrupted.

The fire at least had burned cleanly, creating not too much smoke.

Gladius and Tien rolled up with their car. Gladius got out while their boss stayed inside. Only after Gladius had the confirmation that the deed was done, did he allow the team's employer to get out:

"Seems like the operation went smoothly after all. Good work. And you managed to contain the two victims as well. Tien has already been calling a few psychiatric hospitals specialized on dealing with traumatic mind magic incidents. We should probably cover up the body and get away from here, before anyone notices."

Rachel kept her distance, she did not care much about watching the body burn, even though she knew Victoria was long dead.

She thanks the spirit for helping them with this difficult task.

"I couldn't agree more," Rachel comments. "Let's get out of here."

Of course, Rachel will make sure they leave no astral signatures behind.

Burning the body made a certain amount of sense, it at least made the cause of death more ambiguous that bullets through the head. Still, once the body was found -- and they could not get a hole deep enough to keep animals from possibly digging it up -- DNA would identify the corpse quickly enough. Burying it had been her first instinct, but now she wondered .... then said the heck with it, what would be, would be. It was unlikely that the UCAS would extradite them to the CAS, worst case would likely be being sent back to the Sioux Council. And the pay from this job might just pay for a good back-up ID, so that she could start over again somewhere else, just in case.

Then she packed up those worries along with the memories of the ever burning body for tomorrow's nightmares, and got back to today.

She helped bury the body, although in truth it was Mato who did most of the earth moving. While they shoveled she talked to the team. "I know that we need to get going, but I have one favour to ask first. We can't extract all of those drones from the farm without hitting trouble with the border spirits and cameras, and even the RCC might be hard. But the stealth dongle might be possible, and has quite a bit of value. AM, could you do a trace on the location? Raven, AM, would either of your spirits be able to drag the RCC into the open, then would either of you have mage hand or something like that, which could unplug the dongle and tape it to a Flying Eye? Uncle could fly it out through the drainage pipe."

Meanwhile she commands the truck to maneuvers itself such that its back is towards the ditch. Then she has Toothless use the slope of the ditch to get its front tracks up to the back gate of the truck, engage the gecko tips, and slowly haul itself up into the truck bed.

Mato is tense at the slow cremation. His eyes constantly scan the horizon for emergency responders. He's less worried about Lone Star than he is about a fire engine. His backup plan is to immediately bury the body if there's any hint of trouble on the horizon.

He eagerly moves the dirt when Raven confirms that the work is complete. He shovels strongly and quickly. It's exertion, yes, but it's not unpleasant when it's a mini-celebration of your cyberstrength.

He listens as Tamarind makes her request. He nods along, understanding her desire.

"Don't forget Rat and Tom," he says. "Those Barrens kids I bought the tarot card from. They hacked the Flying Eye that Tiny attached the card to so that they could retrieve the card. I think he had a heavily modified Sony Emperor. If he could pull one of those together with Barrens junk, maybe he could do it again. I asked him to make us one by the end of the month. That was 2.5 weeks ago, so there's a chance he could have one done in the next week. It just depends if they want to work with us or not. We'll see."

When Gladius and Tien III arrive, Mato does his best to deliver the unconscious Tien IV respectfully.

"Here's the Xenobite-Tesseract," he says, presenting the duffel bag to Tien III. "If you can confirm its delivery, we can depart."

A thought occurs to him.

"Gladius, which way are you going? If you're not connected to Seattle, you could take the kid's car and hit the road. Which way is the wind blowing?"

To his credit, Tien III had little attention to spare for the incredible expensive artifact, acknoledging it with a nod, before putting it in his pocket, before he went to his son and hugged him.
"Thank you so much. I'll see to it that the damage this monster has done to him is cured. And his friend of course. You earned your bonus, truly."

Gladius shook his head as he answered Mato: "I agreed to accompany Mr. Tien, his son and Phillip for the moment, until they are savely under care at the specialist facility. I'm sure you can find a shady garage where you can vanish the car. If Arione is found, Lonestar will have their own suspicions, considering what we know from the hospital report. I suggest you wrap up your business - the jet will get airborn in about eight hours again. You are welcome to be on board again."

Well, so much for a cozy flight back to Seattle in a private jet... seems like they are not done here just yet.

"Mr. Tien, sir, please understand, that while we have a reasonably good idea of what the Shedim did to them, this is not a hundred percent certain. We do not truely know how they fell under its control in the first place. Take every precaution you can, medically and magically, for your son's and your own safety. I wish you both, and his friend Phillip, of course, the very best. And, please, keep this thing well-guarded. The Shedim is gone for now, but it is not destroyed completely. It might find a way back, and it already knows where to find the X-T."

Thanks, Gladius, you pulled through. I couldn't have done it without you... You are a good friend that went above and beyond your contract. I admire this kind of loyalty. I say sincerely. Shake the mages hand and then grin "Well, if you are ever in Seattle, come see me and teach me that spell you promised. Perhaps I can show you some of my tricks as well." I say, finding myself warming up to the person, perhaps because I could finally trust him.

I look at Tam and say, "If you want the dongle, no need to hack the RCC again; I made a back door; you send the prefix and append the message you want the RCC to execute. In your case, a trace command. " I show Tam how to trace the device and am happy that nobody has mentioned a shitload of reagents and Arione's very expensive Foci. These things may be even better than the monetary reward, though, I suspect that it is time to bring my mother to Seattle to someplace nice. I owe her this much.


I use the time to say my goodbyes to Tien III, "I am glad you are all together again; your son is lucky to have such a protective father. It was a pleasure to work for you." I say politely, knowing full well that none of my family would have gone to such lengths to find me, rescue me, or save me from a bad relationship. It feels comforting to know that some parents can reach that kind of support.