[Thermo]

Crazy Dave takes one look at Doc and his expression brightens.

"I've got just the thing. You look like you've fixed up a few broken bones in your day. This is the newest thing. You get the kit. You want resupplies you tell Jerry to get ahold of me and we'll find ya."

He flashes a salesman's grin and pulls off his pack. He removes a shiny white case with a holographic medical red cross on the top, with a red S-K written underneath.

"It's a top-of-the-line medkit. Something new. Uses nanobots."

He hands it over to Doc and looks him in the eye, smiling with his biggest lunatic grin. It's no wonder he's called Crazy Dave.

"So we got a deal, right? Don't disappoint me. Don't open it until midnight tonight. And do NOT have this thing in your possession by midnight tomorrow. You'll understand what I mean."

With that, he walks out and quickly disappears into the crowd. The big S-K case is on the ground where he was standing a moment before. His business card is laying on top of the Dragonfly case, crisp and white against the glaring sun.

[OOC: Jerry, Crazy Dave is now your new Contact]

[eighth circuit]

Hmm... Eugene is wide-eyed. So much to see. Forgetting that Hyena is by his side, he begins roaming the market, keeping an eye out for anything possibly related to his uncle, the Sextant, or anything that might interest him. He makes sure to remain aware of his pockets at all times.

General perception and assensing tests:
Perception 9 (visual 12) (12d6.hits(5)=3)
Assensing 8 (8d6.hits(5)=0) Boo (no glitch)

[Eleven]

Jerry - who was that guy? More importantly what exactly does he want us to do?  I'm already employed, and while I'm not adverse to side work, If it involves killing civilians, or will make our current job any more difficult I am out.  This city is a drekhole, and I've already done enough to make it worse.  As a rule I don't take jobs where I don't know what I'm supposed to do.

That said, if it's minor, I'm in. 

[farothel]

Hyena followed Eugene, but while looking out she also discretely tried to gain information about his uncle, dropping some naria into palms to get the talking going.  The faster she could deliver him there, the better it was for everybody involved.  She also hoped that the fact that she was a native and armed to the teeth - having brought her Alpha with her - would convince most people to go looking for easier prey.


I assume I was told the name of said uncle.  As for asking around, if I've read my books correclty it's a negotiation skill check.  I've taken no penalties as I'm using bribes to get some information (50-100 naria at a couple of places).  Should I roll something else, let me know.
charisma 3 + negotiation 2 =5 (5d6.hits(5)=1)

[Thermo]

@Eugene: You walk down the row of stalls, peering in and seeing nothing but dark and shadowy figures haggling within. So far, none of them look like your uncle. You manage to see a couple would-be pickpockets in time to steer clear. You've covered about half of the stalls so far, it's been about 5 minutes since you arrived at the market.

@Hyena: You're having a hard time keeping up with Eugene. You grease a few palms, and get a couple indistinct gestures towards the far end of the market.

[Sentinemodo]

Jerry - who was that guy? More importantly what exactly does he want us to do?  I'm already employed, and while I'm not adverse to side work, If it involves killing civilians, or will make our current job any more difficult I am out.  This city is a drekhole, and I've already done enough to make it worse.  As a rule I don't take jobs where I don't know what I'm supposed to do.

That said, if it's minor, I'm in. 

Arms dealer, they don't call him crazy without a reason ....
From what I gather this piece of gear in the box is lava hot, an will get S&K on our heels the moment we open it up.

Dave is probably setting S&K against those Shrapnels Dawgs ...
Which means we need to give the thing to them somehow and before or after make some damage ...
and tag it to them so we loose S&K from our heels and guide them toward Dawgs.

This could turn out real fun, though it would help to know what is inside...

anyway, we are starting our job on tommorow, so we could start and finish this little run tonight ...
this can make our real job more difficult, IF we'll get caught but so far those babies I got here are worth more than I got from Johnson and I could use a little more cash to optimize the software.

Now gimme a hand - if that winch is to hold, it must be screwed right ... now ... puuush...

Jerry finished working on the truck, and turned on to mount an AK-97 on the doberman.

You know anything about those Shrapnel Dawgs, or Seader Krupps presence here or Dirt Rangers?

[farothel]

@Hyena: You're having a hard time keeping up with Eugene. You grease a few palms, and get a couple indistinct gestures towards the far end of the market.

"Hey, Eugene," Heyna said over the comm, "I've asked around and he should be somewhere at the end of the market.  Let's move a bit faster as I'd rather have you under guard before I go to my own meet."

[eighth circuit]

Eugene walks over to the far end of the market, wondering about the contents of each stall along the way. They may be devoid of light, but the really good stalls have a powerful glow on the astral plane. He manages to stay focused enough to find a shrouded tent with a familiar musk. He pulls the colorful tapestry shroud to the side and peers inside. A hand grabs him by the collar and throws him onto a table. It's an ork who looks to be pushing 50 (ancient in ork-years) with a grey beard and a steely, world-weary face. He's got a knife in the hand that he's not using to hold Eugene down. "What the hell do you want?" he asks in Yoruba.

"Good to see you, too, uncle!" Eugene's eyes light up at the sight of a familiar face, even if it's someone holding a knife to him. Uncle Chigozi's face relaxes into a slightly puzzled look, and he lets go of Eugene.

"Is that you, Eugene? Sorry about that. Thieves everywhere. It's been getting worse lately, but business is good, too. How are your stupid parents? What are you doing in Lagos? This is no place for you, boy."

"My parents? I don't hear very much from them these days. I suppose the smuggling business is good. Surprised they haven't dropped you a line. I myself have been on quite a few trips home to Nigeria. I think perhaps the spirits are calling me here. What they want with me, I have no idea!

"But today, I am here on business. Tell me, uncle: why would a person tracking down a lost artifact, a carved sextant on a staff, in particular, have come looking in Lagos? And more importantly, have you heard anything about anyone asking about this artifact? There happen to be some very powerful people looking for it, and I can't imagine its presence could have slipped your notice entirely."

[farothel]

   
As soon as she had dropped of Eugene at his uncle's place, she went to her own appointment.  She had told Eugene that he should contact her in case he needed to get back to his hotel, as she didn't want him to walk alone in Lagos.  He didn't look strong, at least not from an Orc point of view, but he was kinda cute.  But she was sure that his uncle wouldn't let him.  The man was quite old and you didn't get that old in Lagos without being smart about some things.  She hurried to the meeting point, as she too didn't want to be on the streets after dark, or at least not in just any neighbourhood.  Arriving at the address a bit early, she did check it out first, but nothing out of the ordinary presented itself.

Five minutes before the appointed time, she entered the shop.
"Can I help you," she shop owner, a human woman, asked, probably weary about a heavily armed orc coming in.
"Yes, I'm looking for some toys for my nephew," Hyena replied, giving the code that Hrickik had given her.
"I might have something in the back," the owner said, leading her into a small room at the back of the shop where Hrickik was waiting for her.
"It's been a while," she said by way of greeting.
"That's true," Hyena replied, "and in some ways it's good to be back home.  At least here there's none of that 'snow' business."
That was something that had come as a bit of a shock when she had first encountered it.
"It doesn't look that bad," Hrickik said.
"From a distance or on a commlink, no,"  Hyena replied, "up close, it's horrible.  Anyways, as you know, I've contacted you because I would like to initiate.  While I could do so on my own, it's easier with others."
"You're right there," Hrickik said, "we do have some adept initiatory groups.  I'll see what I can do."

"Oh, right," Hyena said, "before I forget, I have a gift for the organisation."
She took the weapon focus from Iceblade out of the cardboard box she had put it in.
"It's a weapon focus like the one I have," she said,  "can be used by adepts and mages and it also works against spirits.  If necessary, I can teach how to bond with it."
"Impressive," Hrickik said, investigating it.  She was also awakened, as all daughter's of Yemaja are.
"This could be useful," she added, "I'm sure we can put it to some good use.  Come back here this evening at 21.00 and I'll bring you to your group.  It will take at least that to organise it."

"Ok, thanks," Hyena said, knowing a delay like that to get people in Lagos together wasn't unusual, "one more little thing.  If you should hear something about an artefact called the Sextant or the Compass or something, I'm interested.  My current Ms. J is looking into those."
"If we hear something, we'll let you know," Hrickik said standing up,  "and I'll see you tonight."
With the conversation done, Hyena left as well, going back to the market to see if Eugene was already done.  It was safer for two to be on the road instead of only one.  She would bring him to back to the hotel and then come back.

[Sentinemodo]

After finishing with the first drone, Jerry assembled the flying drone that he was carrying in the bag, that and checking the weapon platform completed the preparations.

Now it was time to look into Dave's issue. First things first, checking the stuff he left for any RFID or any other tracking devices. Then manually disconnecting wifi devices before turning on the drones, and connecting via datajack. Searching for any security flaws, trojans, and setting up firewall so it will not report it's position to any previous owner.

Then careful look over the weapons case Dave left for opening mechanism, opening traps, RFIDs. Trying to match the marking on the case with any known weapons symbols.

Finally some data searches: Seader & Krup Lagos operations, Shrapnel Dawgs, Dirt Rangers.

OOC:
for the bug scanning I use radio detector scanner, tag eraser and I scan for any hidden nodes using electronic warfare skill.

DataSeach(1) + Browse(5) + VR(2) -> base dicepool 8
4 intervals -> 8 + 7 + 6 + 5 -> 26 dices
Seader & Krup Lagos operations -> 8d6.hits(5)=2, 7d6.hits(5)=2, 6d6.hits(5)=2, 5d6.hits(5)=0 6 hits, no glitch along the way
Shrapnel Dawgs -> 8d6.hits(5)=5, 7d6.hits(5)=3, 6d6.hits(5)=3, 5d6.hits(5)=2 13 hits, no glitch along the way
Dirt Rangers -> 8d6.hits(5)=3, 7d6.hits(5)=4, 6d6.hits(5)=2, 5d6.hits(5)=2 11 hits, no glitch along the way

[Thermo]

@Doc T:

You spend the afternoon hanging out and watching Jerry's back. You manage to endure the constant swearing, yelling, tantrums, threats, and name-calling that the dwarf hurls your way while he works on the drones. There is a stretch where you have some blessed peace and quiet while Jerry does some data searching after you tell him all you remember about the mercenary groups that you'll be dealing with.

Dirt Rangers: These guys were pretty hard-core operators. They drove around in armored convoys, transporting VIP's and running anything of value around Lagos. If you saw these guys coming your way, it was best to stay clear as far as possible. Their symbol was the Jolly Roger. They were known as the guys that would fire first and ask questions later, especially if they came under fire. You've heard many rumors on what happened to them, but nothing credible.

Shrapnel Dawgs: A relatively new group of arms dealers. They formed when some disgruntled couriers and enforcers working for a variety of existing criminal gangs decided to join up and make a new syndicate. They're young, brash, and have a reputation for causing chaos and headaches for the more "reputable" black market operations in town.

Blue Octopus: One of the most connected arms dealers anywhere in Nigeria. They specialize in military-grade gear, and they're universally known as having no tolerance for other groups trying to "share" what they consider to be their turf. These guys are big enough to run with the AA Corp outfits, but are still far too small to deal with the big guys like AAA Corps and government buyers.

While Jerry's working, you have a chance to take a quick look at the weapons case and the medium-sized medkit. While you haven't got a clue as to what's in the weapons case, it has to be something pretty big. That or something pretty delicate, maybe requiring a bunch of padding. You genuinely hope it's not a tac-nuke.

The medkit opens smoothly on a butterfly pivot mechanism. You see a state of the art medkit with two clear panels, obviously indicating the remaining supply of the expensive "goo" inside. On closer inspection, you recognize it as a S-K reproduction of the Savior Medkit, originally developed by Shiawase Biotech. Neat-o, you think to yourself. [OOC: if you don't have Augmentation let me know and I'll send you the full description]

[Thermo]

@Jerry:

You spend the day working on reassembling your drone's weapon mount. You needed to make it look like a camera mount in case you got held up at customs, especially if you got caught on the UCAS side.

Armorer extended test: Threshold 6, 30 minute intervals

Armorer Extended Test (6): Armorer(1)+Logic(6)+AR Enhanced(2)+Superior Tools(1)+Superior work environment(1)+Juryrigger(3) (14d6.hits(5)=4)
Armorer Extended Test (6): Armorer(1)+Logic(6)+AR Enhanced(2)+Superior Tools(1)+Superior work environment(1)+Juryrigger(3) (13d6.hits(5)=6)

It takes you a little less than an hour to reassemble the complicated gimbal mount and make sure it's properly calibrated. Piece of cake.

Now to get to the fun stuff

You spend the next hour making sure the Dragonfly drones are up to spec. You're glad that you disabled the wi-fi before turning them on one at a time. They're factory new, and they're about two years out of date. They're programmed to report back to the central S-K database as soon as they're turned on so they can search for new firmware. That would have been a disaster. After finding and downloading the correct patches from a Shadowland site located in Egypt, you set up the firewall and restrict all user access to come directly from your commlink.

After looking at the weapon case, you see markings on it that are some kind of identifier barcode used to track inventory.

Always trust the Corps to keep track of their toys, you mutter to yourself.

Unfortunately, the case is used to store many kinds of supply items and is not specific to any one use. A quick image search on the Matrix shows It is the same case that's used to transport rations, grenades, military communications gear, lab equipment, pretty much anything breakable that needs to be stacked in an efficient manner. You don't dare try to break into the S-K database to search on this specific barcode. [OOC: You don't, do you?!?]

You use your radio scanner on the case and can detect faint RFID signals emanating from within. They're not coming from any one place, but instead seem to be coming from everywhere at once. They're encrypted signals that you recognize as "squealers". You run your tag eraser over the surface of the container but it doesn't seem to make much difference to the signals within. You don't find any hidden nodes, and the case itself doesn't appear to have any kind of boobytraps on it, but then again the well-hidden ones never do!. The whole operation takes you an hour.

You perform your data searches at 6:00 PM as the sun starts to get lower in the sky. Your searches take approximately 2 hours each. The owner of the junkyard barricades himself inside his armored building, muttering that the both of you must be crazy to be out past dark.

Data search results:

S-K Lagos Operations:
There's been a large buildup of S-K operations in recent months. They have a base set up outside Lagos where they do military drills and test new weapons systems that are purchased through various black market vendors. There's a rumor that they even have a full-size nanoforge set up to produce spare parts (and probably to scan and reproduce any weapons that a vendor is careless enough to leave laying around]. There was reportedly a S-K VTOL that crashed about a week ago, killing all 8 crew members.

Shrapnel Dawgs:
Most of the equipment they sell is stolen from other arms dealers and local outfits, not having the experience or connections to purchase their wares through more traditional black market channels. You are able to get the location of their main headquarters, a ring of approximately 20 shipping containers in a bad  part of town near the airport. Word is that they use animals of some kind to provide security against both metahumans and ghouls.

Dirt Rangers:
They were transporting an important shipment across the city when a S-K VTOL gunship took out the convoy with bursts from a nose-mounted minigun. S-K commandos grabbed several crates from the shipment and left the rest to burn. Their leaders were killed in the brazen daytime convoy attack and the group quickly dissolved. You manage to find a trideo clip showing armored commandos taking crates which look like the one in your possession and loading them onto the VTOL. At the end of the video, one of the surviving Dirt Rangers tries confronting a commando and is shot point-blank in the face.

It's now midnight.

What do you do?

[Sentinemodo]

After pooling the results and watching on them for a while...

All right Doc. Any ideas? I think, that this baby will scream once opened. I think we'll have a VTOL full of commandoes on our neck the moment we open this and judging by their performance we'll have them on us in less the ten minutes.

[Eleven]

Well Jerry my boy, If your guess is correct and we can use what's in the box from anywhere in the city then my suggestion would be for us to post up fairly close to a Shrapnel Dawg compound.  That way we can open it, use it, and ditch it before anyone has a chance to chase us down.

If possible, lets cruise by their compound and get a sense of entrances and exits so we can ditch the box shortly after use.  The Dawg's are barely a merc company anyway, so their security may not be so tight. 

[Sentinemodo]

You are fucking about my height or what? Is that some fucking dick length contest? I am a dwarf! Should I repeat?!? I AM A FUCKING DWARF! And I got a name that do no need adding any fucking 'boy' to it. I am not stingy enough to bitch constantly that you look like you've been drinking all night and I am affraid you puke the moment I let you in the car. I could, bloody hell, but I don't, so give me a fucking favor and get off me being dwarf. I got enough of it everyday and I take no fucking pleasure in working with a fucking racists.