[Marak1972]

Marak nods at the 'peptalk' that smiley gave and leans against the wall calming himself. As his uncles told him many times be prepared for the worst even if it doesn't happen. Marak looks at Smiley "Thanks mon " and gives him a big grin 

[SeriousOne338]

@Rybka: Like Tachikoma's cameras your vid pictures can't really detect anything. With a stroke of insight Rybka opens up a drawling program and writes out the cover's script a very cursive writing style. It take a few tries but finally a basic pattern recognition program running in the side bar identifies the language as old Germanic, the title of the book is "The Blood" written by some guy named Kemmler. Stopping from writing anything ease Rybka runs a net search, as the group probably predicted it brings up some odd info.

1- Lots of pages having to do with raising of the dead
2- Pre-WW1 information on some crazy prophet named Kemmler
3- Conspiracy theory sites
4- Nothing to do with a book known as "The Blood"


@Group:
Smiley woos you so calm down Tachikoma you get an Idea it's not so bad, Marak you still think its bad juju but will keep your piece for a while.

@Teddy:
Threat: Nothing overt, but this is not something you want to be posting you got.
Assessing: It has to do with Necromancy
Theory: You cant' tell much unless you read the book, which you feel would be a bad idea. But reading the warding glyphs on the lead you get the idea who ever did it was an amateur at best or someone just throwing down everything the think would seal bad things in.
 

[Lethe]

After getting a glimpse Teddy stepped back again and shivered. "Necromancy." he said. "I won't look into it, i won't even touch it. Nobody should ever touch it."

"That's some fine commlink we got us here. If our Johnson really wanted that book, we might be on to something. If you ask me, i would rather burn it now than later. - I am back in a minute." With that, Teddy stepped out of the warehouse to get some fresh air.

[Netzgeist]

Rybka takes out her glasses and massage her eyelids for a little while.

"So much for a complete Matrix search, boys. Well, the title of the tome's old germanic for 'The Blood'... The name is quite generic, and the info seems cryptic, so unfortunatelly we don't know what our Johnson is dealing with. The most I got is that it's presumed author," - Rybka points to the author's name on the cover - "that Kemmler guy, most probably was a prophet from centuries past (most references to him are prior to 1910!), not know of from his stable behaviour or sane mind. As it goes, there's no info on a book by him with this name."

Rybka puts her glasses again.

"If the mojo-man felt that way about that thing, I will second his opinion. This may mean big money, but it's not something I'm confortable in dealing with." - She gives a quick glance to the troll and the AI's hologram: "Not that it's dangerous as it is now, inert. But I would rather not find the influence the information this tome conceals unleash into one's mind."

[Thvor]

Hank mutters a curse. "Necro...Ok, if no one has any objections...Smiley, give me a hand getting these jars out, and then let's seal this box back up."

Figured Hank would have to ask for help--one golf ball-sized chunk of gold is about 2 pounds, so a jar of them is probably about 20...heavy enough that lifting one out of a box without toughing the thing next to it could be tricky.

Also, note that Hank is a bit shaken up by this, as evidenced by his using Smiley's prefered name. Not enough to stop him from doing the job, and probably not noticeable to anyone other than Smiley (and Rybka's kinesthetics, of course), but...

[Crossbow]

"No problem, Hank."  Smiley will assist in the gold removal, and continue conversationally, "Just getting a feel for the room, but do we really just want to hand this over to Johnson without a little more info?  I am not saying that this gold doesn't bridge the gap somewhat between our implied and actual risk, this is more of a moral question.  I doubt that simple collector value is on the mind of our Johnson, not to mention who ever we took this from, you know, the guys with money to burn, no real regard for law or metahuman life and at least some kind of significant contact with the UCAS military?"

The Amerind shrugs "To be honest, I still could see the arguement that we don't have what the Johnson sent us for, our intructions were pretty clear, and an old musty evil book is not a commlink.  I am just saying that maybe I could call somebody who might be able to tell us a lttle something."

 

[Marak1972]

Marak gets a puzzled look on his face and is chewing his lip. Finally he just comes out and says it as the 2 are about to lift out the gold jars. "Um guys just a quick question mon. Didn't the ancient ancient egyptians use gold jars for um rituals or mummies or something mon?? " He shrugs " I'm not trying to make everyones paranoia into overdrive just a random thought" With that he slowly walks over to offer his help in removing whatever. If its wanted. "You guys want a hand??"

[Mirikon]

Looking at Smiley, the hologram shook its head. "I came from an Aztechnology drone in Bogota. Magic works on drones just fine, just differently from fleshy things like you. And I like playing around with fleshy things, so I don't want to see them all turned into evil undead things. You're so creative sometimes! And you have strange tastes, as well. For instance, I saw this trid once where some girl was having sex with a naga, and then the naga ate her! And it said it was available in simsense, from both their points of view. I mean, an AI would never think of something like that for entertainment! You fleshy things are so creative!"

Tachikoma shuddered at the mage's declaration of what the book was about. "I told you I'd seen this trid before! And get the mage to scan that gold, too. It could be cursed! I saw that in a trid as well. Then can we please seal the book up again and get it far far away?"

[Netzgeist]

"We really should think well before taking any action now. I'm quite against handing this thing over to the Johnson. Call it principles, moral, spiritual purity... whatever. This book has a lovercraftian feel to it, and no good can come from it." She pauses her train of thoughts strategically, choosing her next words.

"Yet, not handing it to him is another issue, entirelly, and we should be prepared to it, if that's the route we take. I'm sure this guy will put all his resources in getting this acursed book on his grasp, and it wouldn't be wise to be on his way..."

[Thvor]

"Um, Marak, those were jars made of gold, not jars with gold in them. Very different. These, you can see what's in them," Hank points out as he and Smiley lift out the second glass jar and set it next to the first. "Ok, that's that. Let's seal this thing up again." Hank slides the lid back over the box and starts wrapping the chains back around it, snapping the padlocks back in place.

As he does so, he says, "Laughing Boy, we were hired to get this box. I don't know how long you've been running in the shadows, but you don't last long if word starts to get around the Johnsons that you drop a run halfway through just because you don't like how it's playing out. So I say we hand this box over and let the Johnson deal with it. As for the UCAS...those guys were from Unit 9. Spec ops team, mostly extractions. Gonna be hard to find out anything about them without drawing unwanted attention, but I'll see what I can dig up." A thought occurs to him, and he says, "By the way, does the number 875 mean anything to anyone? I didn't think much of it at the time, but our Johnson had a skull tattoo on his arm with a small number on it. Might mean something."

[Marak1972]

"um not the gold jars in those days held the mummy's innards and things....just saying mon" Marak shrugs and leans back against the wall looking out the window just in case trouble is about to bite us in the kester

[Lethe]

Teddy entered back into the warehouse, his face changed to his normal teint. "So, what is the plan? Getting rid of it, because it is not the commlink we expected? Or honor our deal? The second option would allow me, or us, if you are up to it, to keep tabs on the book and try to find out, who is behind it. I just can't allow such evil to fall into the wrong hands."

[Netzgeist]

"That's a very interesting way of thinking, Teddy." Rybka says: "I couldn't agree more."

[Marak1972]

"As am I." Marak chimes in. Shaking his head think damn I have some of mama's do gooder in me...I hope not 

[Crossbow]

"I have been running long enough to know that when a Johnson hoses us as bad as this one did on intel, we have every right to hose them right back.  'Sorry, Mr J, no comlink in the target vehicle' and we open negotiations from there, once we have a better idea about what exactly it is we are gonna be giving him.  I know you want to cut this loose quick as you can, but can you respect the fact that some of us might be concerned about what Johnson might do with this thing?" Smiley looks around the room.

"I am gonna call a friend, she has some contacts in the magical world, maybe she can introduce us to someone that can tell us about this thing."

(Calling the Maiden, and asking her to get us a meet with an occult investgator type that she trusts, and set up the meet somewhere else than here )