[Silence]

>>>>>[Iceblade, I can find those places and things, but not with my kid sister around.  I almost forgot how much trouble she can get into when she's bored.]<<<<<
     --Siouxsie(00:36:45/09-20-75)


>>>>>[This is why you should have left her with us, kiddo.]<<<<<
     --Sanctity Rose(00:38:25/09-20-75)

>>>>>[When it took you how long to ask me where she was?  When did you notice she was missing, for starters?  and who taught her to teach gang members pink, because I know it wasn't me.]<<<<<
     --Siouxsie(00:40:20/09-20-75)

[Silence]

>>>>>[The intense lights have mostly gone, leaving the warmer lights behind.  A predator done up like Jesus's crucifixion in barbed wire in place of nails and a crown of thorns.  Then the sheep he preyed upon are encouraged to use him as target practice.  The Knights pour into the area, seeking those who killed one of theirs, perhaps not knowing he was false, as the sheep will not speak to them.  A tangled knot of vengeance and pain, cut through only by the sheep not willing to relinquish those that protect them, but the hyenas glad would do harm to the protectors.  Perhaps they should be my new prey?]<<<<<
     --Jude(11:57:05/09-20-75)

[Chrona]

>>>>>[Jude I do not know what you are smoking but you might want to lay off.. Iceblade, Card I am heading from the Verge now to meet you two at the rendezvous point before we head to the DIMR.]<<<<<

--Chrona (22:25:22/09-23-75)

[Silence]

>>>>>[Nice to know I'm not the only one who Jude's posts worry.  On a slightly different note, does anyone know somebody willing to pay for Graceland to get firebombed?]<<<<<
     --Siouxsie(16:49:29/09-23-75)

>>>>>[I find Morrie, I swear I'm gonna kill him.  Painfully, and slowly.  Maybe I'll make him listen to Abba while I slowly strangle him......]<<<<<
     --Sanctity Rose(16:53:20/09-23-75)

[Mirikon]

>>>>>[Some days it doesn't pay to be a runner. First I'm late to the meet because I have to deal with educating a young mageling wearing Spikes colors about why you shouldn't throw fireballs at a lone elf on a bike (He's still alive, by the way. Just took his arms, and then stopped the bleeding. Whether he burns his Talent for cyber or waits until he can afford cloned or Type-O arms is up to him.). Anyways, we meet up, and start going, convoy style, through the city on our way to the DIMR. And we start getting attacked by the damn plant spirits. They're definitely not your normal plants, though. I'm not an expert at assensing, but they didn't feel like plant spirits, even though that's how they looked. They felt darker. And I get the feeling they're trying to herd us.]<<<<<

--Iceblade (18:22:33/09-23-75)

[Silence]

>>>>>[I hope that wasn't Jimmy.  He still owes me twenty nuyen.]<<<<<
     --Siouxsie(19:45:40/09-23-75)

[SpyroD]

>>>>>[Iceblade someone of yours have some ideas what is those so called plant spirit? We here have a lot of plants around and plant spirits around maybe we could help and be helped]<<<<<
     --SpyroD(08:02:20/09-24-75)

[Mirikon]

>>>>>[They weren't plant spirits. They looked like plants (trees, shrubs, vines, and the like), but they weren't plant spirits. The visible form of a spirit does not always reflect the nature of the spirit. A Spirit of Man can look like a child, a warrior, a ghost, an angel with a flaming sword... These spirits looked like plants, but they weren't plant spirits. They felt like shadows. Anyways, there was one helluva fight. Card, Chrona, and I all on bikes, all dodging plant spirits as we tore across town. They were about as strong as the spirits I typically summon, but there were quite a few of them. Don't know how it would have ended up if we picked someplace to stand and fight, but we wouldn't have gotten off without injuries. Made it to the DIMR, and the astral defenses blocked the spirits out. Chrona got his bell rung a bit coming through the wards, since he's a ghoul, but Card and I are fine. I'll speak more about the meeting later.

Siouxsie, I didn't bother to ask his name. The punk was just lucky I decided to stop long enough to stop his bleeding instead of just taking another arm.]<<<<<

--Iceblade (02:43:12/09-24-75)

[SpyroD]

>>>>>[Spirits in the likeness of plants that feel like shadow on astral?Right?Noted! I'm no mage as I said but I know my slew of them here in Prague, I'll inquire for it. But I may ask you why those spirits keep coming after you? I remember this drek booped yoy before, right?]<<<<<

--SpyroD (10:37:32/09-24-75)

[Kylen]

>>>>>[Got to show one of them why you don't try to jump an adept who can jump start a 200cc dirt bike with his bare hands. Almost felt bad for the sucker, but Ice was right. Those didn't feel like normal spirits. Not nearly as bad as those...things from China I discovered, but definitely off.

Also, Chrona with a slight migraine is almost entertaining. Almost. I'd not wish forcing yourself through an astral barrier that passively dislikes you on anyone.]<<<<<

     -- Card (02:52:12/09-24-75)

[Mirikon]

>>>>>[I don't know about the ones over there, Spyro, but the ones here started acting up just around the time Chrona and I got to work translating the tome. You know, the artifact of a past age with either fairy tales or a bestiary of some of the nastiest looking things I never want to meet, that may or may not make you crazy if you read it all the way through. Anyways, that could just be a coincidence. There's enough nastiness in the sprawl to feed shadows, easy. The fact that a whole group of them showed up when we took the thing out from the wards could also be a coincidence. Could be, but I'd be willing to bet it isn't. Which means the tome of ancient crazy-making and eldritch nastiness brought them to us. We've been speaking with the Wordsmyth about the tome, and he even complemented us on getting so far in such a short time, though he did point out that several sections were mistranslated. But for someone who hasn't got any training in ancient linguistics, I think we did pretty well.

Anyways, there are people here who can translate the tome properly, and we got a handy finder's fee for bringing the thing in. They've got scans of the original, and are working on fully translating it. Problem is, I took a look-see outside, and there are still a couple spirits hovering around in the astral, waiting on the tome. The DIMR's astral defenses are enough to keep them out, but the thing remains an ancient tome of crazy-making, and leaving it in the middle of a city is a recipe for Bad Things^tm to happen. Wyrmy, I know you know of someone who could keep this thing safe, both from spirits and from people who might be... manipulated by the tome. It needs to go someplace where there's someone powerful enough to keep it safe. There's two such places in the Seattle area, but there's too many people around both those places, since one is on top of a casino, and the other has a cult of toxics worshiping the atom. If the tome draws people to steal it like some artifacts have done (especially once they've 'woken up'), then it needs to be somewhere more isolated. Which means we need to find a way to take it out of the city without getting jumped by spirits. It was bad enough on a bike, I don't want to picture trying to fight those things while on a plane, for instance.

For the record, the finder's fee I got was being allowed to copy a few spells from the grimoires in the DIMR library. I didn't ask what Card and Chrona got.]<<<<<

--Iceblade (09:09:23/09-24-75)

[Longshot23]

>>>>> [Hey all, I'm back. Been trying to apply Iceblade's advice, with mixed success. If anyone runs into a chica calling herself Callisto, be careful - she's heavily connected with Humanis (she runs a part-time honey trap). And jeez, they really hate me <grin>.
Been reading over the last few weeks of postings. Any chance those weird 'plant' spirits are related to tempo? I think I recall something about users sometimes having weird auras, like plant embellishments?
Um, Iceblade, did you get anything more from that Azzie file?] <<<<<

-- Longshot (09:40:07/09-24-2075)

[Mirikon]

>>>>>[I checked it briefly, and then sent it on to a contact that works in the IS. They were very happy to receive it, and you may find some work headed your way soon, Longshot.

As for the spirits behind tempo, I don't know. I wasn't in Azzieland when that went down, and I never went near tempo, or the idiots that took it. Everything I heard, though, said they were seriously bad news. Maybe shadows. Could be the same kind, especially if the plants they were in were just destroyed, and the spirits weren't banished with their true name.]<<<<<

--Iceblade (11:28:23/09-24-75)

[Chrona]

>>>>>[Yeaaaah.. about that... remember money Johnson's datadump on me? Satellite image number two might be relevant. If it is the same spirits. I hope not. Anyway, yes the DIMR wards were unpleasant, they couldn't single me out, let me go in full powered or open it up to ghouls in general, so I had to deal with pushing through it, at Ice's bikes top speed, during a fight. I almost slammed my spell into the ward after me, but managed to correct its altitude in time. It should still be up there, occasionally taking pot shots if I see a Spirit out a window. Frankly i may just ask the DIMR for money, It's not like they have any Blood Stones.

Oh and yes, I'm staying at the DIMR until the tome gets moved again.]<<<<<

--Chrona (17:16:23/09-24-75)

[The Wyrm Ouroboros]

>>>>>[ Yyyyeaaaaah, you know she's not going to 'keep it safe'. ]<<<<<
          -- The Wyrm Ouroboros (12:00:00/09-24-2075)