Al snatched the commlink from his pocket the moment it buzzed. Reading the text message from Sun, he smiled at the thought of good Kraut beer. He tugged out the mini-keyboard and one-finger typed a message - <<Bubbles - can that gadget in your hand hear us?>>

A brief glance, then shaking her head, *** pop ***, "Only if you send it a signal. Probably set to send when to detects certain frequencies. Standard security tag."

"Be hard to hear things through all that meat."

Bubbles is holding the the object in her suddenly extended razor sharp fingernails, the tag delicately poised between her enormous troll fingers.

"Probably can check what frequencies it responds too and search for thing asking for it."

"Sounds like a helluva plan ta me," responded Al, lighting a fresh Lucky and offering one to Mitch. He nudged the cooling body of the drug dealer with his combat boot. "Would shore as hell like to know what set this boy's countdown off, but'cha ask me, he never did know hisself. Warn't right in the head, this one. Been nice ta have saved him, but I reckon that'd've taken a dispensation from the voodoo gods, an' I ain't got that kinda power ta waste on poison peddlars o' his ilk."

Scratching his ass thoughtfully, the unshaven man continued, "Whaddaya think? I'm gon' gamble five minutes seein' if this hell-bound unfortunate's trail leads anywhere, an' if'n it don't, I say we head fer this here Teutonic beer hall. We kin git to the bottom o' that gewgaw in yer claws there on the way."

With that, Alouicious Harlan Guthrie sauntered slowly out to the street, puffing on his cigarette and looking at the ground.

Al
You follow the trail you had picked up earlier for several blocks. It is obvious that the Ragman either wasn't in any hurry to get where he was going, or he believed he was being followed, as his path winds up and down alleyways. The footprints intersect their own path at several points and occasionally meet with other groups of prints.

As the tracks leave the dock area, you lose them amidst the heavy traffic that destroys all hints of a trail.

Once everyone is in the van and Al takes his stroll away, Pesto backs the van out of the alley and moves it into the street to a parking spot around the corner. The orc then makes sure his drone has a good hiding spot and keeps the surveillance going in the ragman's body.

Twenty-three minutes after moseying off, Al was knocking on the van's rear doors. Accepting a hand up from Mitch, he said, "Well, I done followed that boy's tracks all over hell an' creation, but they din't go nowhere worth mention." He sat down and starting restowing his medkit the way he wanted it. As he worked, he squinted at the dawn light coming through the windshield - "Now I tend ta git thirsty jist 'bout any time o' day, but I'm wonderin' what sorta hours this Krutenau joint keeps..."

Eager to answer his own question, and equally eager for some beer, Al pulled out his bargain basement commlink and checked the public directory for Bar Krutenau's site.

"So what are we going to do now?" Bubbles asks from the entirely too small space for a troll she's squeezed into in the back of the van.

"Well, that all depends," said Al, laboriously scrolling down the Bar Krutenau site manually, looking for some indication of operating hours. It was enough of a hassle to make him almost wish for an AR set-up, but the last thing this cramped van needed was a puke-slick sliding up and down the floor panels as the van moved. "If'n this here bar's a never-sleeps kinda joint, then I say we head there right now an' try fer a line on our dead friend. If it closes down by day, then maybe we git some rest till night comes. In any case, though, I thought it was a right fine idea you tryin' ta see who's on the other end o' that there security tag."

::Tacoma Docks, October 18, 2070, 0600::

The hours posted for the Bar Krutenau, are from 1100 until the last person goes home. Unsure of whether or not they have closed, the team takes the ten minute excursion and drives past the bar.

It has clearly closed for the night. The lights are all shut off and a minimal presence exists in AR. As the van turns the corner, you see a large man hunched over in his coat sitting with his back against the building. He appears to be sleeping off the night before, arms wrapped tight around a duffel bag.

Al rasped - "Heh, whaddaya say, people, does that guy remind ya at all of our raggamuffin friend back in the alley? Gotta nothin' ta lose by tryin' ta talk to 'im. Or else jist hunker down a few blocks away an' try fer some shut-eye while one o' Pesto's toys keeps an eye on 'im? That'd give Bubbles plenny o' time ta try ta suss out this gadget we snared. Any thoughts?"

As the others thought about which route might be the smartest play, Al asked Sun, "Heya Peaches, toss me them matches."

Examining for himself, the vagabond noticed that only two were missing. That boy was just here, he thought, him and one other person.

Al
As the van drives by, you notice that the vagrant's jaw is lax against the duffel bag. His shoulders have the settled look of someone too far gone to realize that the position is painful. Under the halogen lights, his well-tanned features show a person who hasn't been in Seattle long or spent a lot of money buying his tan.

As the team pondered its next move, Al took out his knife and went to work on the Ragman's jacket. After removing and sorting all the drugs and paraphernalia he could, he set about thoroughly dissecting the filthy article of clothing, painstakingly searching for anything of interest that might have missed his earlier inspection. Looking out the window as he worked, he commented, "If that boy's even breathin', he shore as hell ain't from 'round these parts. That ain't hardly what I'd call a 'Seattle Tan.'"

"It could be worth offering him a more comfortable place to sleep." says Sun her tome almost makes it sound like an idea built on genuine concern.

"Not in my lap!"

Bubbles looks out from where she's been tinkering with a bloody security tag.

Al chuckled around his cigarette. "Her Majesty's got a point - mite cramped back here already. But since ya care so much, Sweet Cheeks, reckon it's you should talk to 'im. Jabberin's what yer good at, from what I'm gatherin'. Leastways," he added, examining a protective plate from the jacket, "I don't care what kinda happy-gas that boy's on, one look at them there cha-chas yer sportin' should be more'n enough ta bring any man to his senses."

With a look that could wither entire rain forests, Sun doesn't say anything to Al but rather steps out of the van. As she approaches the man, several things register.

The man is large, if he stood up, he would probably crest 6'6", maybe 6'8". A soft breeze carries the wafting stench of alcohol, bile and blood. Up close, there is no mistake that this slitch is dead. A slap patch on either side of his throat could have been the cause or at the very least limited his ability to put up a fight.

Bubbles proudly placed a hand on her dynamicly whorling glow painted horns, "Took me at least ten minutes to get the nail polish on. Hard to find cans of the stuff."

*** pop ***

The troll grinned, "Never heard them called cha-chas though."

"but not gonna bring back the dead."

"An' some radiatingly scintillatin' cha-chas they are, Yer Gloriousness," Al smoothly replied, now referring to the troll's horns instead of the elf's chest. "But speakin' o' raisin' folks from the dead," he continued, scooting across the floor and hoisting himself out of the van to join Sun, "our new pal looks like he needs a hand."

Going over to the big dead man, the little live man started patting his cheeks and saying, "Hey pal, time to wake up. Let's get you some soykaf." But as he pretended to struggle with the man's weight, he was actually going through his pockets.

Al

The big man's body is already starting to cool and feel clammy to the touch. Your fingers glide down the front of his coat, finding a credstick shoved in a pocket. His shaggy hair is reminiscent of a man who generally has shorter hair but hasn't been to his barber in a few month, a fact confirmed when you get to the man's identicard.

John Smith, the name alone sounds fake, but the card is good enough to get past most bouncers if not law enforcement. The image shows your newly dead friend with an army crew cut and a lighter tan. In the seven months since the picture has been taken, he has spent most of it outdoors in the sun you would guess.

There are no visible tatoos that you can find, though his hands and knuckles are heavily calloused suggesting that he worked for a living and worked hard.

The van rocks as Bubbles unlimbers her several hundred kilos, reaches a hand on the roof from inside and flips herself out. Landing on her feet, she then reaches down and with some effort lifts the body up and tosses it haphazardly into the back of the van.

"Can walk. Stretch legs. If you need to slice him like the other one."

"Won't rightly know till we get him stripped," Al replied quietly, tossing the man's duffel into the van after him, and saying in a much louder voice - "Alright buddy, we'll gitcha home in no time."

There at the back of the van, he used the cover of the troll's body to pass her the credstick and ID card. "Reckon any cash on there is your'n. But I'm more interested in whether either o' these is storin' any data of the ee-lec-tronic variety. I'm gon' have a quick look around fer how he got here, then we can take off fer somewheres a bit more outta the way an' see if we can't figure out who he is. My first guess is he's one o' the Cap'n's boys, but that's a guess'll need confirmin'."

Al

As you move across the quiet streets, there are a few noticeable cameras pointed at storefronts and intersections. Unless they have an exceptionally wide angle, none are looking at your van and companions, nor can they see past it to view the body that you are moving.

Looking to the pavement, there are no signs of a struggle or dragged shoes. From the initial positioning of the body, you'd suspect that he staggered out of the Bar and sat down to sleep it off.

After studying the ground briefly, Al filled the others in on the little he'd found - "Looks like he come out the door there yonder and in none too good a condition. Then just set hisself down here an' checked out." He shrugged. "That's double demon drug deaths we found in a dozen minutes. Hell, we must be gittin' close. Best have a good look at our friend here, then," he said as he passed by Bubbles, who was beside the vehicle busily doing her electronic magic.

Climbing back into the van, he cleared aside the remnants of his fruitless dissection of the Ragman's coat and settled on his haunches next to the big guy. Nodding at the man's duffle, he suggested, "Maybe someone kin have a look in there?" Then he got to it - a more thorough search of the man's pockets, careful examination of his shoes, stripping him enough to look for tats and another security tag-implant, and last but not least on with the rubber gloves for a cavity check. This guy was pretending to be someone he wasn't, and somewhere on him, Al was determined to find some clue about the truth of the matter.

After a brief shake of her head, Bubbles tapped Al on his chest, and then pointed at the drug stash,

*** pop ***

"Signals, piped the frequencies to your comms to scan for."

Right after stretching her legs to remove the cramp from scrunching in the confined space, she arched her hands over her head and stalked off, "Keep up the scans, we meet and compare notes later."

Al paused in his pillaging of the dead to protest - "Come again? All my ware's wifi-free..." - but his voice trailed off over the last few words as it all fell into place, sort of.

He leaned back against the inside panel of the van, wishing Bubbles was still there. Well, he'd have a lot of questions for her when she got back. He lit a fresh Lucky and thought out loud - "So this shit ain't magical at all - just some kinda aerosol wireless transmitter...But then how's it let the user pick up the signal?...Turn 'em into one o' those new kind o' hacker freaks the talkin' heads onna trid been a'squawkin' about? Naah, but maybe somethin' akin to it. Whadda the rest o' y'all think?"

Al

With some care, you begin to give the corpse a complete physical exam. There are no fresh incisions or hidden notes within the body. On his upper left bicep, there is an aging tattoo of a winged combat axe and scroll-work beneath it with the word "Axe" written indelibly marked.

The shoes are well-worn combat boots with dirt worked into the crevices and lacings. Jeans, t-shirt and leather jacket are unarmored. His jean pockets contain a commlink and a crumpled hard-pack of Gauloises cigarettes. The clothing all looks to have been worn for at least a few days, judging by the stains and smell.

Changing your gloves after completing the cavity search, you put on a new pair to tackle the duffel bag. Inside you find several weapons and items worth a fair bit of money on the street. It's fairly obvious that he wasn't rolled for his valuables.

"Well tie my hands an' dip me in gator shit," Al said when he saw the man's tattoo. "I think I know who this boy is." Looking again at the general appearance and kit, everything matched what he'd heard about the guy, and the age seemed right. "Just startin' ta make a name fer hisself in guide and merc work in Africa - but that was long on ten years past. Heard of him a few times in the next few years after that, but nothin' since. Not the kinda feller ta go down easy, tell ya that." Al was busily helping himself to the man's shotgun cartridges. "An' no junkie - not that I ever heard tell. This here bizness growin' uglier an' uglier, an' I am sure hopin' one o' y'all has some insight inta this whole wireless drug thing..."

"Not exactly my scene sweety. But I have to admit I find it some what disturbing."

Bubbles toys with the commlink as she walks to stretch her legs. Plowing through the security system isn't difficult, though the root access triggers an impotent alert. The alert is quashed before it can rally the absent defenses of the commlink.

The troll browses through a list of files, though none appear to be encrypted or hidden, limiting the oppurtunities for paydata.

At Al's request, Pesto gets the comm ID from their wandering team-mate and scours nearby systems for hints of a data-trail. The trail leads from the Bar Krutenau and pings across several neighboring public nodes before connecting to the Tacoma LTG and is lost amidst a series of transfers.

After spending more time then he would have liked searching through the matrix Pesto finally completes his search. The orc then shoots off a quick message to the others:

"Ok sorry it took so long. I guess I am a little out of practice. The trail definately goes to the bar. From there it bounces around the neighborhood a bit and then gets lost int he general traffic of the grid. So unless the commlink has anything new I guess we should focus on the bar."

Well thats one less lead, can you hack the nanites that make up the drugs? That or tune into what ever signal they use.

Pesto gives a mental shrug and then replies:

"Well we might be able to do either of those choices. What do you think Bubbles, can the drugs be hacked?"

Peering intently at his comm's tiny screen, Al read the team's text discussion with keen interest. Just the idea of hacking a cloud of nanites was enough to really set his mind spinning. Although the recent tech curve, a personal economic downturn, and his own biology had left him eating the dust of SOTA computing, he had always loved machines of all kinds. In fact, if they ever finished this job he was planning on investing in a major commlink upgrade.

And for that to happen they would have to get on the ball. Besides, the body dominating the bed of the van's rear cabin was starting to reek a bit. So while they waited for Bubbles' reply, he called over to Pesto - "Heya pal, think ya could see yer way to textin' an' typin' at the same time? If'n you'll roll this crate into a good, dark alley, me an' Mitch'll roll this pore feller out the back an' ya won't never even have ta slow down."

"Only one way to find out." *** pop ***

Looking skeptical, "Might take a while to know for sure. Could have special triggers too."

"Let's get started!"

The sun slowly begins to creep its way over the eastern mountains filling the horizon with shades of pink, orange and green. Air pollution had the one upside of making sunrise and sunset a more artistic experience when it wasn't killing you slowly.

Your hacker sets down to work, beginning the process of hacking a cloud of nanites. Meanwhile, Pesto gets the van moving and halfway down a dark alley, the door opens and there is a grunt of effort as a massive human is rolled out of the van and into the tender mercies of the Tacoma waterfront.

Without much direction at the moment, the team drives around Tacoma, thoughts of food and sleep cropping up occasionally.

Not to mention a healthy hankering for a wholesome hops-based beverage.

With two of his companions lost in their work, Al spoke to Mitch and Sun - "Tell ya what, once our long-toothed friends git through workin' their tech wizardry, I'm fer hittin' this kraut bar sooner than later. Got me a mighty thirst comin' on, an' as I kin see pros an' cons to goin' in before or after the place opens, well, all things bein' equal, as they say, don't reckon we need anyone ta be there for us to help ourselves ta some brews. Or braus. Or whatever them Deutschers call beer."

"Somewhere shady before the day gets going would be nice."

"That there's a right ironical request in light o' yer handle."

Al
Your mind wanders over the nanites and what they could represent. As you pull out the commlink to assist Bubbles with her rough hack job and search for more information, you realize that it is possible for the nanites to serve as a node if they are programmed to function collectively.

Watching the feedback from your analysis protocols, you quickly realize that this cluster is programmed to work collectively and is forming a weak link to the local grid.

Bubbles
The nanites collectively form a rough PAN of sorts. Distributing the various processes over such a loose structure would be nearly impossible and take years of research to avoid problems with redundancy filtering and maintaining operational integrity if parts of the cluster were destroyed. Your analysis of the delicate matrix shows that the hives are interacting with one another. Multiple doeses will probably lend to a stronger PAN.

As you begin to brute force your way into the PAN, the distributed network becomes more tenuous. Each time you select a node to infiltrate, the hive shuts out the small clusters you were attacking and repels the invasion.

*** pop ***

"Burning them up."

*** pop ***

"This would be a good way to get rid of the high quickly."

The trolls vacant eyes flicker around looking at VR objects while she mutters and chews her gum.

Watching the two hackers' progress as best he could on his tiny screen - and being no hacker himself - Al snorted in appreciation at Bubbles' insight. He had been thinking about how to make the mass easier to access, but she had immediately found an advantage in what had appeared to be a problem.

"That's some damnably sharp thinkin', Yer Majesty. Definitely could come in handy if we should find ourselves wantin' to shut some o' this stuff down." A fresh cigarette materialized in his mouth and then the Zippo was in his hand lighting it. "As fer hackin' in ta this thing an scorin' some info, I was thinkin' maybe we could mess with the concentration. A lot more of it packed inta one place might just force it to stay more cohesive...or it might make it easier to keep cuttin' parts of itself off. On t'other hand, a thinner concentration might mean less for us to work with, but it might not be as ready to go nukin' the compromised bits if there was less of it altogether."

He tapped his chest - "Already got some o' this shit stored safely away in here - ain't goin' nowheres without my say so. An' we got the Ragman's whole stash. I say first we pump another five or six cannisters o' the crap in the ol' iron lung here, an' the two of ya take a crack at it. That don't work, I vent almost all of it, and ya see what ya kin do with that."

Since he is more experienced with vehicles then computers Pesto is sitting back and only providing the occasional suggestion to Bubbles for the hacking job. He nods in agreement when she makes her potentially very useful suggestion and then focuses part of his attention on Al's suggested plan of action.

From VR he sends his reply to the others:

"Sounds like the best way to move forward with these things. Make sure you leave a little bit unused in case we need it later."

"Well all-righty then," Al croaked as he got into the dealer's stash and pulled out all the cannisters that roughly matched the one he'd already emptied into his air tank. Keeping one back for later, he proceeded to empty the rest into the nozzle in his left ribcage. Pulling his yellowing T-shirt back down, he leaned back and barked, "Hack me!"

In the Van

With most of the inhalants pumped into Al's air tank, Bubbles begins to attempt to hack the nanite cluster. As before, the nanite cluster falls away at each attack. This time however, the hacker keeps up her attack and realizes that the nanites aren't dying per se, but rather losing cohesion and re-associating with each of the collapsed bits. The nanites cascade back reforming but on a different carrier wave.

After a few moments, all of the nanites have cascaded multiple times, changing frequencies at a speed difficult for the hacker to keep up with. It becomes obvious that there is a missing component necessary to form a full node able to be hacked.

As the team ponders what the missing piece could be, attentions shift to the Bar Krutenau and thoughts on how to break inside.

Pesto
The drone you left watching over the Ragman's cooling body, begins transmitting data to you as a Lonestar patrol car drives by and stops. A patrolwoman gets out of the vehicle and approaches the corpse cautiously. She taps the body with her foot and seems to realize that he is beyond comatose.

As Bubbles pulls away from her hacking, a coroner van is pulling in near the patrol car. Two drones disembark and lift the body into the waiting van.

*** pop *** *** pop *** *** pop ***

Alternating between stacatto popping of mini bubbles and tossing random flavors of gum into her rapidly chewing gum filled maw Bubbles has her eyes shut as she flips through a dizzying array of softs and em scanning screens.

** SLAM ** "Can't keep up!"

"Needs something else."

Rubbing her hand against the van panel she just punched.

"What now?"

*** POP ***

The 50 centimeter bubble is testimony to how much gum can fill a trolls mouth, and as it pops, proof that centuries of non stick sugary rubber research has made some impressive strides.

Al chuckled good-naturedly. "Seems that without interactin' with a metahuman noodle, that dog will not hunt. Need some meat ta complete the circuit, is my reckonin', an' that's one bullet this mother's son ain't prepared ta take fer the team."

He gestured with his cigarette at their recently taciturn bloodhound. "Now unless Mitch here is inclined ta have another go, I'd say our best bet fer the here-n-now is a look-see inside o' that there German bar. Mebbe send in one o' them mechanical creepy-crawlies ta see if anyone's home, an' Good Lord willin' we head on in."

"Ragman's got company", Pesto says as he transmits the drone's feed to the other team members.

While he watches the authorities collect the former dealer he nods at Al's suggestion and says, "Ok as soon as the authorities have left with our friend I will bring Clara back here and see about the bar."

The orc then goes back to wacthing the show.

"Well alrighty, then. Long as we's waitin' on Clara, maybe I'll jist go take a li'l walkaround, real casual-like."

And with that he was out of the van. He strolled over to the nearby bar, stood across the street lighting a Lucky, walked along the sidewalk checking out the surroundings and keeping his eyes open for cameras. Discovered he needed to take a piss and headed into the alley behind the place. Managed to get commcalls, which he carried on in loud, boisterous and profane tones, whenever he was near anything he thought Bubbles might want a picture of, and was back at the van in five minutes.