[Crossbow]

"This is it, that is his ride over there..." Smiley points to the car.

"...and that is his place up there." pointing at the proper window.

"Good Luck."

Smiley leans back on his bike.

 

[Walks Through Walls]

(OOC it is a single level duplex so Smiley points at the proper side. Sorry I didn't paint the picture better)

Mr. Johnson nods. "OK this shouldn't take long." He walks over to the door. After a minute of messing with the door it pops open. You see him look around discretely and then pull out a wooden stake. He walks on in the house like he owns the place. Kage sees him walk through the foyer on his trid feed and go on into the house.

The whole block seems to be holding its breath it is so quiet. Then there is a muffled explosion, and glass from the bedroom window blows out raining down on the driveway. Acrid smelling smoke is wafting out of the broken window. A minute goes by and Mr. Johnson comes storming out of the house looking like he is going to string someone up. The wooden stake in one hand and a katana in the other he marches across the lawn making a bee line for the group.

He looks from one of you to the other. The stake shaking in his hand as he seems to try and control his anger. "Congrats you have tracked his car. He is no where to be found, but his car is here." he points with the katana as if to emphasis his point. "If I didn't know better I would think that you led me into a trap."

As he continues Kage notices that one of his minimized windows is showing activity. He pulls it up and sees that Vincent is walking out of his girlfriend's apartment building.

[Loki]

"That rabbit is sneakier than I pegged him for then, I have "him" on vid, entering the duplex. However I think I have where he gave us the slip. He's, once again, leaving his girlfriends apt. I'll try and match the 'link data to whatever he leaves in so we can track him. Odds are either he's coming to see who just broke in here, or will make a break for his other pad in Bellview." Kage flips up an ARO to the apt feeds for everyone, even the Johnson.

[Crossbow]

(ooc: Unless Kage rolled up I am alone waiting for Johnson)

"Well, to be honest Mr Johnson, I am actually rather delighted to have unfortunately brought you to the wrong location, though it was not my intention.

I suspected this was the case, but you being so kind as to actually prove me correct makes this a lot easier.  You have broken our contract, as I am sure you are aware, if you are not, let me elaborate.

We were hired to find a person and bring you to him for the express purpose of questioning him.  Now we are not children, I am quite confident speaking for my companions that none expected this thing to go quietly between the two of you, but I am sure you are aware that on the ladder of shadow activities, finding people and wetwork, or spotting for wetwork, are entirely different rungs, with a suitable adjustment of pay scale.

This said, I present you with the following options:

A) You pay us the remainder of our fee, as a gesture of good faith, and then my associates and I confer on what we are willing to do for you given the more honest level of our professional relationship.  Keep in mind, we do have a leg up on you in terms of intel, and we do have an idea of where he actually is now, and your gesture may go a long way in helping us decide to continue our arrangement under more suitable conditions.

B) You stiff us.  A fair option, given that we have yet to deliver what we agreed to bring you.  I would recommend against this though, as we will be forced to try an recoup our losses in another way, such as selling your name to McPherson and perhaps see what arrangements can be made there.

C) You do something else, and things go badly."

 

[Kontact]

[OOC:  I assume you're playing a little loose with the Masking rules for story purposes, yeah?  If what came out of the house was an illusion, Dizzy should have been able to tell from the astral, and if there were some sort of mist-form trickery, I'd have appreciated a test to potentially see it.  No big deal though.  Well, here's an assensing roll on the Johnson.  9d6.hits(5) → [6,4,6,1,2,5,6,2,4] = (4)]

Dizzy watched the tall, dark elf walk into the complex, and saw shadows of dust roll out, followed again by the elf.  She immediately sent her watcher to him.  At his comment the simple manifested crayon drawing of a little girl spoke to the man.

"If I didn't know better, I'd think you purposely withheld important information just to increase our likelihood of failure.  If you think this man to be a vampire and you simply want him dead, I can do this for you - maybe in the next ten seconds.  Simply say so.  Compensation doesn't concern me.  Killing a monster is its own reward.  If yes, speak quickly and I will see it done  If you would instead want me to drive him to his nest, speak on this as well and I'll say you have not wasted my time any more than we have wasted yours."

[Loki]

(( OOC he was right behind you, his autopilot told to follow.))

[Walks Through Walls]

(O.O.C. No I didn't play loose with the masking rules. Once the adventure is over I'll be happy to explain to you what happened Kontact. You know it wasn't an illusion or "mist" trickery. I did give you a roll just I made it for you just like I would have in a table top game because it was a situation where you weren't aware of what was happening.)

Kontact you see that Mr. Johnson is a powerful mage who is masking unsuccessfully (at least to you)  to appear as a low level mage. His power seems to be a bit above yours, but you aren't sure exactly how much. He has a weapon focus in his off hand (it is actually the stake not the Katana) He is also wearing a necklace that is a power focus of about a rating 5, and has a health sustaining focus in the form of a ring on his left hand. Right now he is angry, frustrated and since Smiley talked about breach of contract amused.

Mr. Johnson turns to Smiley with a smirk on his face. "You were hired to find a person so I could apprechend him and take him back to Atlanta for questioning. Now excuse me for not wanting to try and apprehend someone unarmed if that offends your sense of decency. I did not breach the contract though it sounds like that is your intention and may have been all along. If I told you everything is neither here nor there. Think on this, are you really going to break the contract because I may not have told you everything? What will that do for your reputation?"

"Here are my terms. Either do the job you were paid to do for what was agreed, or repay me my deposit."

"Now before you answer be aware if you repay my deposit and walk away I will be calling your fixer and demanding he pays me back his finders fee also since he will be in breach of his contract also. What do you think that will do to your reputation?"

"Now if you decide to sell my name to McPherson that is your decision, but again I will be placing the above mentioned call to your fixer, and also telling him of your betrayal of loyalty so he will probably make sure you never work for him again maybe not ever again in Seattle."

At this point he turns to Dizy's astral form, "I want him driven to ground. This is what I have stated from the beginning. Be careful though I doubt he is alone. He has a partner of some sort that has a tendency to show up at the worst possible times as if he is hanging on McPherson's every word, and the partner is just as dangerous if not more so than McPherson. He may not have followed him to Seattle that is one of the reasons I am here to try and apprehend him."

[Kontact]

"Driving him to his nest is different than simply finding him.  You should have been specific.  Now I will begin working in earnest.  Everything he loves, all that he has touched with a creator's hand, will be ruined.  He will know terror before he dies."

[Loki]

Keeping most of his attention on the apt cameras so he can see what Vince leaves in, Kage half listens to the discussion. Glancing up from his AROs at the Johnson, "There's a world of difference between a "possibly" awakened smuggler and a powerful" looking pointedly at the stake "vampire mage and his secret pal. Them's the kind of details that have a bearing how an operation is carried out is what we're pissed about. Well me anyway." in a lighter tone "Also I charge extra for jobs involving vampires, ninja's, cults, and other weird shit."

[Blue]

@Team: "You tell him, Smiley!"

comes over the commlink from Rat.

[Crossbow]

Smiley returns the smirk with one of his own.

"Mr Johnson, I deal in good faith, and I am under no obligation to explain this to you, but how you have handled this arrangement is far from proper.  You have withheld important information, under direct request, by playing semantics. And for no useful reason I can think of other than to have us on the hook when you try to do whatever it is you are planning and fail or because you are as nuts as our resident spellslinger and you get your kicks sending people on missions they are unprepared for, in either case, my rep is secure.

I am not the least bit worried about washing my hands of this, but you better get a clue, this aint the A-T-L.  You lie to a runner in Seattle, the price goes up or the job don't get done, that's just the way it works.  You are lucky it seems that the team is still willing to do business at all, so now I am doing my part and making sure the compensation is relative to the risk and effort involved.

You want us to put you with this infected, very strong spellcaster who is the ringleader of this operation, and who does have quite a bit of backup, and then you want us possibly be on the hook when one of you gets dead.  This is doable, at double the price, same terms.  You don't like it, I will offer you back half of my advance, and promise that I will speak of this no further if you don't.

I think I can speak for my team on this, except for Dizzy who appears to have gone into business for herself anyway.  You want her freebie, take it, you want the job done, we can do business."

 

[Kontact]

[OOC: Composure - 11d6.hits(5) → [4,4,5,5,4,6,4,5,2,1,3] = (4)  Walks, as a player, I would like the opportunity to use Edge on important tests even if the character wouldn't know they were making them.  That's just keeping IC knowledge and distinctly OOC knowledge separate.]

"Hmm.. Smiley is right.  I am being too eager to fall to my base desires.  Money is a consideration placed upon a thing.  Truth is the consideration one places in another.  Speaking truth is the price for my time.  Money is the price for my assistance.  Both of you have undervalued my assistance, but at least Smiley has earned my time.  You, Mr. Johnson have so far paid for less than a minute.  We will see what a minute can do to earn you more.  But as the grinning elf says, playing your picodor is a task of greater value than simply killing a beast.  It has all the same risks, but the exposure is far greater.  Smiley, I trust you to handle the trivialities.  I will do what I can meanwhile to salvage our position in this."

With that, Dizzy sped off over the astral back to McPherson's last known location, the "girlfriend's house."

[Walks Through Walls]

Dizzy gets back to the apartment complex and sees McPherson is getting ready to get into a car. (OOC you can make an assensing roll to make sure it is him. Also make a general astral perception roll to take in everything else going on when you get back to the apartment complex) Once he gets into the car unless you join him in the car you won't be able to look at his aura until he gets out, but you will be able to follow the car, but not describe it since it is a dead "technology" item on the astral plane. They all look the same, but you can follow one like following one of several cups in a cups game.

[Kontact]

[OOC: Roller's back.  Here's a couple rolls.  General 9d6.hits(5) → [4,5,3,6,2,1,4,5,2] = (3) and at McPherson 9d6.hits(5) → [5,5,5,4,6,6,3,1,3] = (5)]

"Mr. Cowboy, if you would like me to succeed in my task, do you not think it would be wise to equip me to succeed.  Tell me the things to expect when dealing with such a creature, and I will tell you if you are right about him."

[Loki]

((If the apt has cameras outside and Kage catches Vincent's departure, he'll try and match it up to a gridlink account.))