CLH Never Too Careful..

GM: Criticalfault
Players: Criticalfault, Slinger
Synopsis: Crit and Slinger meet so Slinger can help with Crit's current mess…
Date: June 26, 2070


Slinger eyes the message on his screen. No, he doesn't like that one bit. He doesn't like that at /all/. A friend — even one he doesn't know well —
appears to be in trouble. And while a /smart/ runner might skitter away, Slinger has hardly ever been a typical 'smart' runner, and so far it has worked for
him.

The youth concentrates for a moment, bringing forth a rather significant spirit…

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls Conjuring + Karma Pool: 1 + 7 (power focus) vs TN 10 for "Conjuring F10 Watcher Spirit.":
1 1 2 3 3 3 4 5 5 5 5 7 7 8 11 = 1 Success

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls Conjuring + Karma Pool: 1 + 7 (power focus) - 1 (succs) vs TN 10 for "Conjuring F10 Watcher Spirit. KP 2/44.":
1 2 2 2 3 3 3 4 4 4 5 5 7 14 = 1 Success

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls Charisma vs TN 12 for "Resisting 12L stun.":
2 2 3 4 5 5 5 5 7 9 16 = 1 Success

«OOC» Slinger says, "Nope :) Taking the L, trauma damper eats it."

And… after a moment, the spirit appears. Slinger forms a mental image of Criticalfault's aura in his mind, and then murmurs, "Go. Follow. Find him. If
the trail leads to a ward or other barrier, come back and tell me where it is. If you are attacked, then come back and tell me where." The youth waves a
hand, sending the spirit on its way.

«OOC» Slinger says, "Limit on Watcher Spirit force is half of Magic (+ power focus) . Magic 13, power focus 7, 20 / 2 = 10."

Sitting in the corner of his newly aquired box car, Criticalfault sleeps soundly after the painkillers and other things Thog had given him finally
kicks in. He pulls his camo jacket closer to his head as his make shift pillow and snores quietly, trying to forget the problems hes had over the first few
days.

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls 10 vs TN 2 for "Watcher spirit — TN is 9 minus Slinger's intelligence (10).":
1 1 2 2 4 4 5 5 5 27 = 8 Successes

It takes the spirit a total of only fifteen minutes before it pops back next to Slinger, telling him in great detail of about the place where the signature
can be found. Slinger nods once — tells the spirit to return to its location and wait there. If the target moves, then it Slinger should be notified. And
with that, the youth gathers up his gear, including the milspec armor, and loads up for bear. And he drives in that direction, knowing this might be a trap.
Thinking it over.

Loaded for bear, indeed. Slinger has everything in the back of the SUV, and parks the thing carefully, somewhere out of the way and unobtrusive, not far
from the border. He loads up a map into the heads-up display, and marks the location the spirit related to him. Then, he suits up, loads his weapons —
Narcojet in one, AV rounds in the other. He summons a watcher spirit to reside in the back of the vehicle — and then floats out of the back of it,
invisible, scanning his astral surroundings.

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls Stealth for "Sneaking over the border…":
2 4 4 4 5 5 5

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls Stealth for "Sneaking over the border… KP 2/44":
1 2 2 3 4 4 5

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls Stealth for "Sneaking over the border… KP 4/44":
1 2 2 3 4 7 11

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Criticalfault (#6325) rolls 6 (Spirit's looking for Slinger) vs TN 11 for "Searching for border jumpers":
1 1 1 2 3 21 = 1 Success

Seeing something the spirit can't quite explain, it slides through the astral quickly toward Slinger, trying to decide weither or not to report and or
removal the tresspasser…if it IS a tresspasser.

Slinger took every possible precaution. But the problem is, sometimes you come up short. The trouble with spirits is that if you take them out, it tends to
alert the one who sent them. The youth lets out a muttered curse, and shifts his course, moving out of any possible view of the others. And then, he
concentrates his energies — and sends out a spell, to wrap around the thing like a bubble…

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls Centering + 3 (centering focus) vs TN 2 for "Centering against BG count.":
1 1 1 3 4 4 5 10 10 = 6 Successes

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls Sorcery + Sorcery Pool: 4 + 7 (power focus) vs TN 6 for "Spirit Barrier, F6, in a sphere/dome around the spirit.":
1 2 2 2 2 2 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 4 5 5 5 9 = 1 Success

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls Sorcery + Sorcery Pool: 4 + 7 (power focus) - 1 (succs) vs TN 6 for "Spirit Barrier, F6, in a sphere/dome around the spirit. KP 3/44":
1 1 1 1 1 2 3 3 4 4 4 4 5 5 5 8 9 = 2 Successes

The spirit guarding the borders stops as soon as it is cage appears around it. It fights against the dome it becomes trapped in. Pushing with all of its
might against the cage. However, by the time it finishes discovering the possible escape routes…Slinger is long gone…the spirit returns to its post,
deadicated now at least to making sure it doesnt happen again.

And the elf is well out of sight, now. He dismisses the spell once he is clear, and heads onward toward his destination, scanning the trainyard as he
approaches it and looking for any possible threats. He comes in low, taking advantage of whatever ground clutter there is.

Clutter is done in spades here. Parts of railway cars and train peices scatter every where. The tell tale sign of squatters moving junk around as well,
stacks of useless items pattern to make meeting places, sitting areas and other social positions. Car #7 is far in the back, closed and locked down from what
can be seen from above. Squatters walking around carrying on their duties to ensure their lives continue at the rate they have, maybe even scaling it up a
bit with stolen goods.

Squatters. Slinger glances at the auras of a few of them, looking for any real hint of cyber or magic. This almost makes no sense at all. But the car in
question… well, the best thing to do is approach it, and check out the lock. But one thing he does do, first, is detach from his body — and cautiously
slide toward the car, alert for wards of any kind or other barriers — and then slip inside to look around.

Inside the car is what one would expect. Bits of garbage, scrap used to make up furniture. Critical and Viktor sleep quietly behind their locked
doors. Blood covers the floor and each are in bandages and full of stitches, Viktor much worse than Criticalfault. Theres a bag of Criticals in the corner,
opened. A rifle setting out with ammo and near Critical specifically is an Ares Slivergun, locked and ready. Critical is curled up, a bottle of pain killers
laying open with a closed bottle of water next to him. Hes got one arm wrapped around a camo full suit hes sleeping on, another laying over the pistol.

The elf considers for a moment, looking around. He doesn't know the second man at all… so he solves the problem by simply materializing, and leans in close
to Crit's ear. "Hey," he whispers, his voice ethereal. "It's Slinger. You all right?"

Opening one eye Critical looks up groggily and surely drugged up, "Wow…i gotta be having some bad morphine…" He rubs his eyes and looks over
Slinger, "You can't be real…right?" He pushes an index finger into Slinger's form.

Critical's fuzzy mind can't make sense of that statement at ALL. "Your not outside…your inside already…but if you want to come in…i'll open the lock
for you..again." He moves slowly and is poorly coordinatedly. He then removes the shiny new padlock and opens the door, "Alright…" He stares half dazed at
the astral form.

The astral form disappears — and then as soon as the door is open, you can sense… you can feel the motion of air, at least — of something moving
past you and into the interior of the boxcar. "Stinks in here," comes Slinger's voice, a little muffled by the helmet. He thinks for a moment, surveying the
interior. "He okay?" he asks, referring to Viktor. "He somebody who's gonna wake up and shoot at me?"

Critical shakes his head slowly, "Hes…had alot of pain killers. So have I…your…not a dream ? I am awake?" Jason rubs his eyes and yawns, holding the
back of his head when he does, "How did you find me or I guess…us?"

Jason replies rather quickly to the last question, "No…not anymore. Thog stitched us up and got the fricken bugs out of us…Viktor didnt fair to
well…hes cut up badly, but Dalton fixed him…still he looks REALLY bad." Jason frowns and sighs, "I'm sorry to pull you into this, i just didnt want our
last meeting to be our…last…i guess." Jason's aura changes rapidly…going through a string of emotions now realizing Slinger actually did come to rescue
him.

Sighing deeply at that question, Jason gets ready to spit out an explaination, "Its…complicated, dont watch the trid i take it? We are all the fuck
over the news.." Jason hangs his head with his words.

The elf lights up his cigarette and offers the pack to his friend. "You need a smoke," the elf remarks with a grin. "I don't much watch the trid.
What the hell happened? And, you need anything? I can make a run, grab you guys some food or whatever you need."

"Well…alot. We were getting ready to do a run. We went to the meet…me and Vik…i've run with Vik before. When we met the J he was playing pool with a friend…" Crit closes his eyes tightly, reliving the memory from his bioware. "The two men, wearing contrasting white and black suits were standing shooting pool, asked of if we wanted to play. When we walked near them i felt my head open up and someone pour fuzzy pain into it. Viktor was first…his eyes just rolled up in the back of his head and he colasped. I felt like i was pushed under water and fall backwords..hitting my head on a pool table…i was out." Jason takes a few moments to catch his breath from the explaination. "When we woke up we were on the Trid, Corp loyalty hour. Said we sold ourselves to Ares, turned ourselves in. We were even ON THE TRID." Jason shakes his head, "We woke up in the pool hall..14 hours missing from my internal chronometer."

Slinger scowls as you relate the tale. "Frag. That is heavy stuff," the elf admits. "Anything missing? Anybody checked you out for cranial bombs or
anything like that?" he asks, worriedly. He takes another drag of smoke, holds it in his chest while he furrows his brow in thought. "Whoever these guys are,
they're playing fast and loose with the rules. That's not how biz is done." The elf takes a thoughtful drag, flicking his ash. "That how you got banged up?"
he wants to know.

Critical nods slowly to Slinger, "Thog checked us out. We were injected with something…he doesnt know what, doing tests on it. No surguries or anything
while we were out…which is good…Viktor apparently is some kind of magic." Jason shakes his head, "They are lonestar…we think, we still dont know. What
we do know, is were burned…and not just a little…most importantly. They bugged us. Internally…I managed to jam them and Thog got them out, still, they
were using us to try and mole people out…thank god i thought to look for them."

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls Centering vs TN 2 for "Centering against any BG count.":
1 1 2 2 3 4 = 4 Successes

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls 3 vs TN 2 for "centering focus.":
1 3 4 = 2 Successes

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls Intelligence vs TN 4 for "Astral perception, assensing.":
1 1 2 2 3 3 3 4 9 13 = 3 Successes

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls Intelligence - 3 (succs) vs TN 4 for "Astral perception, assensing. KP 4/44.":
1 2 4 5 5 5 7 = 5 Successes

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls Aura Reading vs TN 4 for "Complementary.":
1 2 2 23 = 1 Success

Slinger's assensing seems to relax him. "You probably aren't contagious," he decides. "And whatever it is, it isn't magically active. Could be all sorts of
things. Nanites, maybe." He sighs, and reaches out to gently clasp the other man on the shoulder, giving it a squeeze with the gloves of his armor. "I'm
here, though. Not sure what I can do to help. You got the bugs out, so you may need to lie low until the nanites or whatever are out of your system."

Critical nods slowly, "Yea…" He almost falls to the floor trying to sit, "I just can't believe it…i worked my ass off to get the little bit of rep i
had…these fuckers literally take it away in one twenty minute segment on TV." He struggles with the thought of having some kind of nanite timebomb inside
his blood, "I dont know what to do if its nanites…cutters just waiting to shred my heart and there isnt a damn thing i can do about it…"

Slinger nods quietly. "I know a couple of docs who might be able to help," he agrees. "Might be able to filter your blood, get the things out of there. But
it would take some pretty intense work." He drags hard on his cigarette, and reaches up to slowly run his fingers through your hair, smoothing out some of
the tangles. "Take a deep breath. It sucks, but we gotta figure out how to move forward on this. There's always an option. And you can always get a new
face," he points out with a grin.

Closing his eyes Critical relaxes some to the attention. He stops and takes a deep breath and slowly exhales, "Yes, I guess there is that…but i like
how i look in the mirror…its the face i've always had. Not to mention my reputation…all my working contacts, everything its toast…i wonder if slow
working poison or nanites would be better to check out with than someone else putting a bullet in my head for turning Corp." Jason closes his eyes once more, "I guess i could start over, but i gotta clear my name. I just gotta figure out who is behind this…and how they got us on Trid…i dont remember it, can
they use magic to erase the memory?"

Slinger considers that for a moment. "They could," he agrees. "And I'm not sure about getting it back. I've… I've managed to do it a couple of times," he
says. "But it's hit or miss. If I push too hard, I could end up just implanting a memory. But I'm willing to try — it would take a lot of trust, though.
There are spells that can be done, you know, controlling somebody's thoughts or actions. Lots of ways it could be done. Hell, it could be done with just
graphics if somebody wanted to go to that trouble, you know."

Sighing to himself again Jason nods, "No offense Slinger…but this magic stuff is bullshit…i can't believe there isn't anything i can do to protect
myself from this. Its like they can just do whatever they want." Jason balls up his fists and turns a bit red thinking about it all.

The elf lets out a slow breath. "Look, dude. Mojo is powerful, but it's… well, it's a form of technology all its own. Just like a gun only has so much
power… well, mojo can only do so much. Look, hold still, mano. I'm gonna try something. If you trust me. All right?"

Critical looks over to Slinger and nods slowly, "I dont know why, but I do." He adjusts himself where he is sitting and looks over Slinger, "You need
me to do anything..? Clear my head or something?"

"Just close your eyes," the elf murmurs. "Take a deep breath, and take my hands." He sits down opposite the other male, and reaches out to take his hand.
"Relax… and let me in. Trust me, nothing in there I haven't seen before." And with that, the youth begins to cast a spell… concentrating…"

Jason closes his eyes and takes a few deep breaths, he exhales and relaxes. After a few moments he opens himself up, at least what he hopes is opening
up. Images flash, a horror show really, men in white hoods appears, baseball bats and chains in hand. The image fades, going back to the night in question,
Jason searches with Slinger's help, he pushes the memory forward. It fades to back with Jason staring up from the floor, a lone star agent looking over him
speaking in a even voice, "Jace Laire, your under arrest…" The image fades to black.

"Jason," Slinger murmurs, in the closeness of the shared situation, seeing in your aura, in your mind, some of what you are seeing. And he follows it,
cringing at some of the memories, feeling some of the same emotions while he sees some of these things, shared in flashes of visions. He concentrates… and
then finally, he releases your hands, shakes his head. "Whatever this is, isn't mojo. You were just plain set up. So tell me, what the hell was that thing on
TV? Any chance you can go over it with your gear?"

Shivering slightly, Jason opens his eyes staring deeply into Slinger's eyes for a moment, sharing a connection he can't quite explain, he breaks eye contact
once Slinger speaks again, "I dont know. Yet. My gear has been comperised, i have to spend some time going over it to make sure its solid still…a lot of
nasty stuff they can do to a cyberdeck if your not careful. Once I get it setup, i'm gonna hit the TV station and steal the media files. Go over them with a
fine toothed comb..see what it is.."

Slinger nods once. "You're better at that than I am. Lemme know if you need anything. I got a basic toolkit, but I doubt that's any good for that kinda
thing." He reaches for another cigarette, leans against the wall. "Look… lemme know what I can do to help. But whatever this is, you survive it, it'll blow
over. Still might have to get a new face, though," he points out with a small smile. "The big question is… what the frag do they want?"

"Well, thats what i am dying to know…but i could really use your help…you know this magic junk and honestly, if you found me and Dalton found me.
Then someone else can just as easily, i need a place to stay, some place warded so i can work without worry that someone is spying on me and reporting back." Jason reaches into his bag and grabs his cyberdeck, cracking the casing, waiting for Slinger's responce.

Slinger thinks for a moment. "You got a place, other than this? I can ward it — put up a decent one. Will take me a few hours, but I can pull it off, keep
you shielded for a while, at least."

"Thats what I got to figure out…my apartment would be best…but I can't trust it, i dont think. Prolly bugged to high hell…why i grabbed this drek
hole." Jason sits for a moment thinking, "I can land another apartment though…one they dont know about."

Slinger nods. "Someplace in the warrens, where they aren't gonna check any SINs. We have to assume that anything public like that is compromised, at
least for now." He thinks for a few moments, drawing on his cancer stick. "Big question is, what the frag do they want, and what do they stand to gain? Why
go through all this?"

Jason nods, "I think i understand, think of it this way…" He continues to tinker with the deck now, double checking this and that while he speaks, "Its
perfect. I get made, they bug me, i run to my friends. They turn into made people run to their friends, just like a computer virus, we will systematically
destroy the shadows. Even better they offer cash to people turning in shadowrunners to get their start points. Its an amazing idea. Someone clever came up
with it and its gonna damage the community for years.."

"Yeah, but to what end?" Slinger asks. "The thing is, runners exist because the corps /want/ us to exist. If they wanted us gone, they could do it, you
scan? They have the resources that if they put their minds to it, they could squash us like bugs. But they don't. Because they /need/ us. They need a way todo things with plausible deniability," the elf points out. "And they tolerate our existence because frankly, they know that they're going to need to work on
that. Any corp tried to start cracking down on runners, they'd find all the other corps ganging up on them."

"Corps do need us, but what if they could make us do what they want by selectively black mailing us? Instant teams, perfect for their needs based on
research they've done while we are bugged and running to save our own asses." Jason poses his question, waiting for Slinger to kick the idea around in his
head.

Slinger nods thoughtfully. "I doubt they could pull it off, frankly," he comments. "But somebody might /think/ they can. Might /think/ it's a good idea,
and that's enough that they might run with it. You might be a test of that theory." He considers that for a few long moments, then shakes his head. "Trouble is, there's no centralization. It'd be corporation 'x' controlling person 'y', and once they know that runner 'y' works for corp 'x' it'd be like having their own people do it. Bye-bye deniability." He shakes his head. "It just doesn't fit with the way corps do things."

"Well its a start." Jason stops for a moment and looks up at the other man, "I just want to say, it means a lot to me that you came out, we never really
got a chance to sit down and talk some things over. I'll tell you some things about me if you want, i know i can trust you now…well now isn't a great time,
but you know what i mean." Jason gives a half smile, "I'm gonna hit the trix here in a few. I suppose we should leave before that. I wonder, if I give you
the cash, you got a solid ID to throw down for an apartment? If I can ask you for something like that.." Jason does look rather hopfull about that.

Slinger considers for a moment, then nods. "Yeah, I could rent you a place," he agrees. "What kinda place? I got a SIN that'll pass muster, just about
anything you need to do." He grins. "Just don't get me kicked out, huh?" He curls his lips up, then crushes out his cigarette, and nods once. He reaches out
to clasp the other man on the shoulder. "I'm gonna do a quick bugscan on you, before we get in my vehicle. And scan the astral, make sure you got no
hangers-on."

Jason nods slowly, "Null Sheen." He waits now, hoping that it all comes up empty, casually he glances at a device in his pocket, it reading green for
him. He nods and looks back to Slinger.

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls 6 for "R6 Bug Scanner.":
1 1 2 3 3 4

Slinger nods once, and grins. "All right. We're gonna take a nice casual route out of here," the youth responds. "And we're gonna find a spot, and we're
going to take some general precautions. Like we're gonna get you a chance of clothes, make sure there's nothing still on you. Then, we're gonna get you an
apartment, get you showered…"
"And the whole time, I'm gonna watch for astral dudes."

"I already redressed…my old clothes had bugs in them." Jason smiles through, seeing that the kids knows his tradecraft, "Shower sounds nice, i need
to remove my stitches too.." Jason stands and grabs his bag, "I got everything i need now…but we can rescan if you want. Honestly though, i wanna leave
this place and not come back, i'll leave Viktor a note, I think hes got someone coming for him anyway."

Standing Jason nods, "Whatever gets me the hell out of piss hole." He grins, "So, glad we met yet?"

Slinger grins. "So far, you're a lot of trouble," he teases. "But yeah, so far, you're worth it." He concentrates, re-activating his invisibility spell, then
grins. "Grab on tight," he suggests — and then wraps his arms around the other man. He grins and rubs his cheek against yours — and then together with you, lifts off into the night sky.

-Slinger and CF taking extra percautions-

«Auto-Judge[TRUE]» Slinger (#69) rolls 6 for "Bug scanner, R6, doing its thing…":
1 2 3 4 11 14

And with that, Slinger heads back across the border, going up high in the air — and giving his new friend a view of the city below. The two of them are
both covered by invisibility, and the youth grins, his helmet back on his head. "Whatcha think?" he whispers, as he heads up higher, with no aircraft,
nothing to support him and you except the force of magic.

Jason smiles and whispers back, "Its a 'magical' view…normally this stuff freaks me out, tonight though. I love it." Jason holds on tightly, still
slightly fearful of falling.

The elf grins. "Don't worry. I've got you." And indeed, his arms are strong, holding on to you without apparent effort. "And even if you fell, I can catch
you." He flies slowly downward, back on the 'safe' side of the border, and then descends toward the SUV. "Stash your gear in the back," he tells the other
man, as he opens up the secret compartment. "You got a good SIN? If not, can stash you in there, too. It has its own air supply."

Jason smiles and nods as hes finally put back on the ground. Jason thjen grabs his bag and tosses it in the back. He turns back to Slinger, "I got an
ID that will check…even cover my guns transport. Still, find some place nice. I am pretty damn excited about hotel shampoo and Trid. Living in a boxcar is
a real fucking eye opener." Jason opens the passenger side of the SUV and piles in, "I gotta get me one of these…this is fantastic." He looks around the
vehicle a little bewilder than the kid as one a car and two one better than he could afford.

Slinger climbs into the vehicle and starts up the large engine. The watcher spirit inside is dismissed, and the youth reaches for his smokes, idly lighting
one up with a deep, powerful inhale, before he slips it into gear, fastens his seat belt, and starts off. "I'm thinking…" He considers for a moment.
"Thinkin' about Cottonwood. Decent place, not too expensive, fairly discreet. Wanna stop and grab some burgers on the way?"

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