If going for Plan Convince Roth/Dirty Secrets of the Technocracy, do you think having the ability to "be treated exactly as Ami" could be handy?
Panopticon: A Game of Posthumans, Perniciousness, Paranoia, Politics, and Plasmaguns
Aleph
Princess of Stabbity
- Location
- The sixth circle of Hell (second on weekends)
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Mmm. Not really, no. It's the knowledge that's important, not the person it's coming from.
Fair enough. I just thought he might trust a Technocrat more than a Traditionalist though; Janice might try to pass off as her having found a Technocratic source and then pretend to be the Technocratic source. But then that ran into things like "So why does such a blatant deception seem like a good idea? Do you think you can pull that off without it dramatically backfiring?" and I didn't have much beyond "Uh, Idunno sort of a gut feeling?"
But I figured maybe it could be of use as a sounding board. I guess not though.
- Location
- Southern Virginia
It does occur to me that going full-Ami might very well count as a sacrifice of Janice's life. That does not make it a good idea, even remotely.
@EarthScorpion - Actually, if we take the transgenic option, wouldn't we be able to use the inherited transgenics as a Life focus? Sure, we'd gain them by rather Deviant methods, but once they exist they're perfectly kosher hyperscience. In this case it seems actually helpful that neither side of this pact actually fully understands what's happening - so could we declare "Life 2: 'Oh, huh, I guess my combat regeneration enhancements must have expressed themselves in you. Somehow. That's bullshit but so are reincarnating enhancements in the first place so oh well'", for example?
- Location
- National Capital Region, USA
[X] Plan Martyr
[X] 3 Boons.
[X] Hyper-Etiquette
[X] Control Code
[X] The Truth
Aleph makes a good case both narrative/theme-wise and OOC crunch-wise. Roth is far, far too optimized and supported as a combat build to make going toe-to-toe with him (or even an assassin route) an attractive or likely to succeed option. So direct battle is a bad idea. And as a Batman expy, I'd agree its very likely he has multiple contingency plans to take advantage of his own death to force the Ascension War into full speed once again. Roth wants full war. He wants it with the kind of single-minded, fanatical devotion that fuels Bruce Wayne's crusade against crime or Gendo Ikari's quest to get his wife back. He will burn his own life and everyone's around him to advance that goal. We're not going to beat him force-on-force. Even if we best him in battle, he'll still have built a way to make his death serve his cause. Janice needs to break that dedication, make Roth doubt or turn away himself...
[X] 3 Boons.
[X] Hyper-Etiquette
[X] Control Code
[X] The Truth
Aleph makes a good case both narrative/theme-wise and OOC crunch-wise. Roth is far, far too optimized and supported as a combat build to make going toe-to-toe with him (or even an assassin route) an attractive or likely to succeed option. So direct battle is a bad idea. And as a Batman expy, I'd agree its very likely he has multiple contingency plans to take advantage of his own death to force the Ascension War into full speed once again. Roth wants full war. He wants it with the kind of single-minded, fanatical devotion that fuels Bruce Wayne's crusade against crime or Gendo Ikari's quest to get his wife back. He will burn his own life and everyone's around him to advance that goal. We're not going to beat him force-on-force. Even if we best him in battle, he'll still have built a way to make his death serve his cause. Janice needs to break that dedication, make Roth doubt or turn away himself...
Shard
One and Many
- Location
- Malaysia
[x] 3 boons
[x] As an infiltrator and honey-trap, Ami was a consummate manipulator in quite a different way from Janice. Combined, they're inhumanly good. Janice gets +4 Etiquette (bringing her to 8). Of course, to clutch a Technocrat so closely makes you one in a way. Janice cannot use non-Technocrat-OK focusses for Life and Mind.
[x] There are secret Technocratic codes that Ami knew that will never have been invalidated, since the woman who knew them died. This gives Janice access to a one-use, high-level Technocratic override Control-level code. While their pact lasts, Ami will be able to roll contested Willpower to try to take control for short periods - though she will not be able to do so for a total of more than two hours a day or more than for a few minutes at a time, and can't use magic while she's in control.
[x] The truth is a powerful weapon. Ami will tell Janice the truth about her and why she died (which also gives her +2 Technocratic Lore). The cost of such knowledge will make her a party to the sins of the past, though, imparting the full karmic weight of who she was - and if she thought she was caught up in bad luck before, things will just get worse.
[x] As an infiltrator and honey-trap, Ami was a consummate manipulator in quite a different way from Janice. Combined, they're inhumanly good. Janice gets +4 Etiquette (bringing her to 8). Of course, to clutch a Technocrat so closely makes you one in a way. Janice cannot use non-Technocrat-OK focusses for Life and Mind.
[x] There are secret Technocratic codes that Ami knew that will never have been invalidated, since the woman who knew them died. This gives Janice access to a one-use, high-level Technocratic override Control-level code. While their pact lasts, Ami will be able to roll contested Willpower to try to take control for short periods - though she will not be able to do so for a total of more than two hours a day or more than for a few minutes at a time, and can't use magic while she's in control.
[x] The truth is a powerful weapon. Ami will tell Janice the truth about her and why she died (which also gives her +2 Technocratic Lore). The cost of such knowledge will make her a party to the sins of the past, though, imparting the full karmic weight of who she was - and if she thought she was caught up in bad luck before, things will just get worse.
Kerrus
Fractal Insanity
I like the three boon plan suggested by Aleph because, ostensibly it serves as problem alchemy and changes the issue from a very difficult confrontation- direct combat- to something that more fits our skill set. There's very solid reasoning behind that, but I can't help but feel that Roth, who knows something of who we are, will have prepared for it. Not that such preparations are or can be perfect, but I worry that he's engaged in his own problem alchemy, and as much as he wants a direct confrontation, he knows he isn't likely to get one.
That's why I'm voting like this:
[X] Three boons
[X] The truth is a powerful weapon. Ami will tell Janice the truth about her and why she died (which also gives her +2 Technocratic Lore). The cost of such knowledge will make her a party to the sins of the past, though, imparting the full karmic weight of who she was - and if she thought she was caught up in bad luck before, things will just get worse.
All of this shadow war spirals around the weight of the past. Roth's past forged him- and the operant theory is that his parents probably died in a VIGILANCE false flag operation, that the Technocracy wouldn't have Roth be who he is today if not for that. While Ami might not have been involved directly with such an operation- she was in the place to have information. Moreover, finding truth amidst the falsehoods has always been a theme of this game, and I feel it has a power to it. Knowledge is useful, yes, but the truth could be what we need to stop Roth- even just for a moment. Long enough to do something in that crisis moment.
[X] There are secret Technocratic codes that Ami knew that will never have been invalidated, since the woman who knew them died. This gives Janice access to a one-use, high-level Technocratic override Control-level code. While their pact lasts, Ami will be able to roll contested Willpower to try to take control for short periods - though she will not be able to do so for a total of more than two hours a day or more than for a few minutes at a time, and can't use magic while she's in control.
This is powerful and has the potential to directly counter elements of Roth's plan. Shutting down his ATLAS unit, for example, is the option everyone's thinking of- but something to remember is that ATLAS units are made of people- we know or suspect which particular person this ATLAS unit is made out of, and though now it is a technological war machine, it very likely still has the knowledge that person possessed in life, hidden away in places only high level override Control codes can access. Together, with THE TRUTH, I feel this has the potential to radically shift our outcomes in a direction Roth can't foresee.
[X] A soul can take on another form it once knew. Janice gains temporary access to a Spirit Charm which lets her assume Ami's shape, and ensures that the world itself treats her as if she was the dead woman - because she is. Note that this does not include any enhancements, which may produce questions if the Technocracy gets a close look. She'll owe her past life a debt, though - one she can call on to pay off some of the tangled up fate that surrounds them.
I categorically disagree that it doesn't matter where the information comes from, only that it is accurate. Roth, of all people, is the sort of person to have built himself up upon a throne of lies and technical truths. He is preparing to fight who we are, not who we were, and while we'd lose out on the transgenics and the like, we'd gain valuable options in an ability to radically redefine what we can bring to the table. Actually becoming Ami Sirai, even if only for short periods, could very much be exactly what we need to gain an upper hand here.
Especially if becoming her means we stop being Janice as far as the world- and, you know, magick, is concerned. Becoming the kind of source that Roth couldn't casually dismiss, one that has the position, authority, and identity to back up what they're saying is I believe immensely more important than enhancing our ability to manipulate Roth- who we must remember, is the Technocratic Batman.
Moreover, the themes of Karmic debts and payment are very strong in this game, and to me Janice's character seems like the sort who would take on the debt of her past life in the process of trying to save the future. That entire interaction- along with the Truth, seems like it would be very interesting to explore narratively.
You may also notice that these options synergize for their penalties. Taking ownership of Ami's karma, letting Ami fight for control for small periods of time, owning Ami a debt to try and resolve their tangled Karma- these are survivable, yes, but that's only a consideration insofar as, as much as Roth needs the fight he's preparing for to happen, as much as he needs to kick the hardliners into gear, to explode the cold war hot- he can always do it again. There are hundreds of break points waiting to explode, and all it takes is time and money and personal attention, three things that Roth possesses.
Yes, Janice is expecting this to be an end run, but I feel that the plan to burn brightly and burn out- well- remember the Serafina plan, where we had a similar option. It's doable, sure, it's something the character believes should be done- but at the same time historically pursuing those options give us a number of problems chief among which is that if our enemy is better at stalling than we are, everything hits us at once.
The options I'm voting for here are all intermediate to long term problems to solve- while giving Janice their benefits up front. Some of the other options- transgenics, the shiny legendary stamina, give us fantastic immediate benefits, but also fantastic immediate problems. The ettiquete option is very powerful- manipulating people, Roth or otherwise, is a key skill for Janice. But the downside, of limiting her to expectations, to certain rules? I feel that is too much to give up, because ultimately Janice is not a Hermetic or a Verbena, and she's not a technocrat or even the Damage Control agent of her past life- she is less than any one of these things, yet collectively more. Having that versatility is really what makes her who she is, and pattern locking down a huge part of that leaves a massive vulnerability that can- and assuredly will- be exploited. I think a lot of people are seeing that, and thinking eh, it's life, she's gonna die anyways we don't need it', but as well we've seen, Life can be so much more, especially in the hands of the Verbena.
Janice is a little of everything, and while I don't expect that she'll survive this, from a narrative perspective I believe these options have strong justifications, and that they would present the most interesting take on the story and the resulting conflict.
That's why I'm voting like this:
[X] Three boons
[X] The truth is a powerful weapon. Ami will tell Janice the truth about her and why she died (which also gives her +2 Technocratic Lore). The cost of such knowledge will make her a party to the sins of the past, though, imparting the full karmic weight of who she was - and if she thought she was caught up in bad luck before, things will just get worse.
All of this shadow war spirals around the weight of the past. Roth's past forged him- and the operant theory is that his parents probably died in a VIGILANCE false flag operation, that the Technocracy wouldn't have Roth be who he is today if not for that. While Ami might not have been involved directly with such an operation- she was in the place to have information. Moreover, finding truth amidst the falsehoods has always been a theme of this game, and I feel it has a power to it. Knowledge is useful, yes, but the truth could be what we need to stop Roth- even just for a moment. Long enough to do something in that crisis moment.
[X] There are secret Technocratic codes that Ami knew that will never have been invalidated, since the woman who knew them died. This gives Janice access to a one-use, high-level Technocratic override Control-level code. While their pact lasts, Ami will be able to roll contested Willpower to try to take control for short periods - though she will not be able to do so for a total of more than two hours a day or more than for a few minutes at a time, and can't use magic while she's in control.
This is powerful and has the potential to directly counter elements of Roth's plan. Shutting down his ATLAS unit, for example, is the option everyone's thinking of- but something to remember is that ATLAS units are made of people- we know or suspect which particular person this ATLAS unit is made out of, and though now it is a technological war machine, it very likely still has the knowledge that person possessed in life, hidden away in places only high level override Control codes can access. Together, with THE TRUTH, I feel this has the potential to radically shift our outcomes in a direction Roth can't foresee.
[X] A soul can take on another form it once knew. Janice gains temporary access to a Spirit Charm which lets her assume Ami's shape, and ensures that the world itself treats her as if she was the dead woman - because she is. Note that this does not include any enhancements, which may produce questions if the Technocracy gets a close look. She'll owe her past life a debt, though - one she can call on to pay off some of the tangled up fate that surrounds them.
I categorically disagree that it doesn't matter where the information comes from, only that it is accurate. Roth, of all people, is the sort of person to have built himself up upon a throne of lies and technical truths. He is preparing to fight who we are, not who we were, and while we'd lose out on the transgenics and the like, we'd gain valuable options in an ability to radically redefine what we can bring to the table. Actually becoming Ami Sirai, even if only for short periods, could very much be exactly what we need to gain an upper hand here.
Especially if becoming her means we stop being Janice as far as the world- and, you know, magick, is concerned. Becoming the kind of source that Roth couldn't casually dismiss, one that has the position, authority, and identity to back up what they're saying is I believe immensely more important than enhancing our ability to manipulate Roth- who we must remember, is the Technocratic Batman.
Moreover, the themes of Karmic debts and payment are very strong in this game, and to me Janice's character seems like the sort who would take on the debt of her past life in the process of trying to save the future. That entire interaction- along with the Truth, seems like it would be very interesting to explore narratively.
You may also notice that these options synergize for their penalties. Taking ownership of Ami's karma, letting Ami fight for control for small periods of time, owning Ami a debt to try and resolve their tangled Karma- these are survivable, yes, but that's only a consideration insofar as, as much as Roth needs the fight he's preparing for to happen, as much as he needs to kick the hardliners into gear, to explode the cold war hot- he can always do it again. There are hundreds of break points waiting to explode, and all it takes is time and money and personal attention, three things that Roth possesses.
Yes, Janice is expecting this to be an end run, but I feel that the plan to burn brightly and burn out- well- remember the Serafina plan, where we had a similar option. It's doable, sure, it's something the character believes should be done- but at the same time historically pursuing those options give us a number of problems chief among which is that if our enemy is better at stalling than we are, everything hits us at once.
The options I'm voting for here are all intermediate to long term problems to solve- while giving Janice their benefits up front. Some of the other options- transgenics, the shiny legendary stamina, give us fantastic immediate benefits, but also fantastic immediate problems. The ettiquete option is very powerful- manipulating people, Roth or otherwise, is a key skill for Janice. But the downside, of limiting her to expectations, to certain rules? I feel that is too much to give up, because ultimately Janice is not a Hermetic or a Verbena, and she's not a technocrat or even the Damage Control agent of her past life- she is less than any one of these things, yet collectively more. Having that versatility is really what makes her who she is, and pattern locking down a huge part of that leaves a massive vulnerability that can- and assuredly will- be exploited. I think a lot of people are seeing that, and thinking eh, it's life, she's gonna die anyways we don't need it', but as well we've seen, Life can be so much more, especially in the hands of the Verbena.
Janice is a little of everything, and while I don't expect that she'll survive this, from a narrative perspective I believe these options have strong justifications, and that they would present the most interesting take on the story and the resulting conflict.
Sirrocco
Pedantic
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Just tossing this out there, but there are other sacrifices to be made. For one thing, as part of a focus to prevent the Ascension war from breaking out, Janice could sacrifice her position in the Traditions. She could sacrifice her certainty and her political stance and go join the other side (as a moderate). That's a potentially very significant chip to offer in the quest to moderate Roth's position, and it's even one that could be explained by psychology. As such, sacrificing her own ability to Life like a Traditionalist (and Mind like a Traditionalist) starts being pretty significant, spiritually. Sacrificing her ability to remain alive and functional without Technocrat infrastructure starts having meaning too. We've been seeing her past life as technocrats a few different ways. It seems like a natural outgrowth, given that sacrifices must be made.
[X] Plan Awkward Martyr
[X] 4 Boons.
[X] Hyper-Etiquette
[X] Control Code
[X] The Truth
[X] Transgenics
She *can* still walk out of there alive... as a Technocrat.
[X] Plan Awkward Martyr
[X] 4 Boons.
[X] Hyper-Etiquette
[X] Control Code
[X] The Truth
[X] Transgenics
She *can* still walk out of there alive... as a Technocrat.
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Chloe Sullivan
Subdefective
- Location
- 1630 Revello Drive, Sunnydale CA
What does +2 technocratic lore actually do mechanically, though?
It's mostly a side-benefit. The actual benefit is "Ami cuts much, but not all, of the bullshit and stops pretending to just be a monster-hunting Damage Control agent whose job it was to track down and capture specimens and talks about her death and things like 'Vigilance' and 'HELMETSHRIKE' and that ilk".
notanautomaton
I've got 99 quests, I've finished one
[X] Plan Awkward Martyr
[X] 4 Boons.
[X] Hyper-Etiquette
[X] Control Code
[X] The Truth
[X] Transgenics
[X] 4 Boons.
[X] Hyper-Etiquette
[X] Control Code
[X] The Truth
[X] Transgenics
Aleph
Princess of Stabbity
- Location
- The sixth circle of Hell (second on weekends)
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Um.
Roth is Mind 4.
Conditioning is a thing.
BAD END
Seriously, I don't think transgenics is worth it if it's nothing but physical stat boosts, and I don't think "giving Roth what he wants" is going to work. We need to break his certainty, not flatter it. He's not interested in making deals and he certainly isn't interested in recruiting Traditions mages to the Technocracy. He wants to wipe the Traditions out, not convince them to defect. That's Jamelia's position, not his. Moderation will not work on him - we either shatter him like glass or twist him against a different enemy, and I don't like our odds on the latter.
FourthWall
May The Sun Never Blind Your Eyes
- Location
- Chiraq
Besides, Mind 4 means most any attempt at conciliation will end with Roth screaming MY PARENTS ARE DEAAAAAAAAAD and slapping Janice killing some Trads. 
Sirrocco
Pedantic
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I did not say, nor did I mean "Turn yourself over to Roth to do with as he sees fit". That would be a terrible idea. I was more talking about something that's half sacrifice ritual, half psychology, that uses our willingness to bend to induce in him a willingness to bend, boosted by Significant Social Fu, and channeling out past life. Essentially, convincing someone that you're right while also being anathema to everything they believe is significantly nontrivial. Coming to the table with "I've learned this terrible truth, and it's convinced me that you're partially right, but listen - you need to know this stuff too" is a stronger sell.
No, the strategy isn't fully fleshed out yet, but none of them are. the basic idea is that after this was over (if she lives), she'd go more-or-less turn herself in to one of the more moderate technocratic types, partially because she doesn't really agree with the traditions anymore (paradigm changes are nontrivial), partially because she now has augments that kind of assure at least moderate obedience to the cause.
I don't think we have what it takes to shatter him. I think the truth might (or might twist him, or might even moderate him), but a truth told from the lips of an enemy is one he's much less likely to hear.
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Aleph
Princess of Stabbity
- Location
- The sixth circle of Hell (second on weekends)
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Yeah, but Conditioning Traditions defectors is Union SOP. Even if she doesn't turn herself in to Roth, that still winds up with her pushed up to Conditioning 7 - like Donald was, back when he defected. And that is not a good thing in the current state of affairs. It makes her a potential pawn of Threat Null. Who now knows all about Vigilance and HELMETSHRIKE - and therefore Jamelia.
Sirrocco
Pedantic
- Pronouns
- He/Him
So, first of all they already have one of the HELMETSHRIKE guys in an ATLAS... in addition to what they knew because they were Control at the time. They have that information. Second, there are all *sorts* of people out there with high Conditioning, and there's nothing in particular that would make her an extra-special pawn as far as Threat Null is concerned. They are blind in important ways, after all, and the connections she has with HELMETSHRIKE are absolutely among those ways (Past lives? Really? What do you take US for?). Third... for anything beyond that, sacrifices are meaningful things. That's what makes them sacrifices.
Also worth noting that if she does get pulled in, it's reasonably likely to be as NWO (she fits their type pretty well in some ways, with a bit of retraining) and Bastion is perhaps learning to be a bit less heavy on the conditioning these days - or at least to go re-scrub his triggers so that they can't be used so easily by people with old codes.
[X] Three boons
[X] The Truth
[X] Technocratic Codes
[X] A soul can take on another form it once knew.
So... Basically Kerrus said what I was thinking and fumbling around about, and he said it well.
[X] The Truth
[X] Technocratic Codes
[X] A soul can take on another form it once knew.
This is sort of what I was thinking of when I made my fumbling suggestion about picking up the "Be Ami" boon. Except I sucked at saying stuff. And the rest of Kerrus's post has also strengthened my thought that we should try to pull it off in this way.
So... Basically Kerrus said what I was thinking and fumbling around about, and he said it well.
- Location
- in the trash
[X] Three boons
[X] The Truth
[X] Technocratic Codes
[X] A soul can take on another form it once knew.
[X] The Truth
[X] Technocratic Codes
[X] A soul can take on another form it once knew.
Aleph
Princess of Stabbity
- Location
- The sixth circle of Hell (second on weekends)
- Pronouns
- She/Her
... guys. Seriously. Roth has a member of Helmetshrike as his pet Conditioned ATLAS. I do not think coming to him with the face of a dead one is a good idea. Especially not since, IIRC, Ms Clock has been using him to wrap up Vigilance's loose ends.
And yeah, Etiquette restricts us, but holy shit +4 non-magical dice to all our social pools that can't be countermagiced or debuffed away are you kidding? That's incredibly strong when we're trying for a social roll.
And yeah, Etiquette restricts us, but holy shit +4 non-magical dice to all our social pools that can't be countermagiced or debuffed away are you kidding? That's incredibly strong when we're trying for a social roll.
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Update CXCV: Kybernetes
JB CXCV: Kybernetes
The Tokyo skyline is filled with light pollution. Bright neon lights cover the facades of the buildings. The sounds of urban civilization fill the air. There's a light mist and it's painting halos around the streetlights.
"We can use my car," Henriette says.
"No," Major Clarent says, bending down to grab one of the policemen's jackets. She shrugs it on, and tucks the handgun into a pocket. "At this hour, the Tokyo traffic is too risky. Far too easy for a hostile to snarl us up by engineering a jam. We need more mobility."
Henriette glances around. "Right," she says, pulling out her phone and inputting a few commands. "There's only one motorbike, but that should get us out of here. At least far enough for the traffic to thin out." Heading over to her car, she grabs a jacket of her own from the back. "I'm engaging its self-driving systems. They're pretty dumb - barely better than Masses-tech - but they might tail it instead."
"Good. You drive," the other woman says. "I'll deal with any tails."
"Got it."
The engine of the bike roars as Henriette accelerates out of the ground level of the car park, dodging between the thick traffic. She's not dressed for biking-she's dressed to blend in, like Major Clarent-but her clothes are shape-memory and have piezoelectric layers, and a command to them has them extend and stiffen enough to provide some protection against falls, scrapes, and-although she hopes that Donald is right about the normal likelihood of people being shot-bullets. Immediately entering the traffic she wistles. The entire place is snarled up to hell and back. There's no way they could have got out of here on a car. Even if they'd tried - no, they'd have been a sitting target at the first red light.
[So, I'm interested,] Clarent transmits over a secure link. [What do you believe Gregor gains from doing what he's doing?]
Henriette lets her ADEI part of her brain handle the driving while she considers this. This is something that she suspects is entirely deliberate by the older woman. She is distracted, which means any answers she give will be less guarded. Fortunately for her, she's learned from Director Belltower - and she has tried to avoid directly lying to Major Clarent whenever possible. Against a woman who's as good at mind-machine interfaces as her, direct lies are too risky.
So instead she told her the truth. Or, at least, a truth. She passed over the text of the suicide meme that Rose recovered while in deep cover pretending to be Serafina, and she described the fake-Serafinas they'd encountered twice now. The second one is documented, if Major Clarent investigates it. Perhaps she might go to Alexander Cross to enquire with the Progenitors, as the two of them have done ops together. Cross certainly knows, because he's the one the fake Serafina went to.
[I think he wants her out of the way for some reason,] Henriette sends back. [I think he considers her a threat. After all, she's in another Progenitor political faction to him. And she became a public Hero of the Technocracy after Moscow.]
[But that's too risky. Why would he want her dead?]
Henriette tries something risky. [Well, she was in EXEMPLAR III,] she suggests. [She knows all about them - and she also is Rose's mother. Maybe he wanted to replace her without Rose knowing. Then he'd have his own working EXEMPLAR III, following Serafina. And I know he's working in high end biotech.]
[Do you think that's plausible?]
That sounds like a trick question to Henriette. But it also seems... almost likely. [Let me ask you a question. What's he working on? What's his great scheme which means he's pulling Progenitors in from all over - and he's picked up a Clarent like you to run base defence when you're a decapitation unit? It's something that having Rose Ashford - and a loyal mind-hacked Serafina Rosario would help him with, isn't it?]
[That's classified.]
[That's not a no.]
[It's not a yes, either,] Major Clarent says neutrally. [You won't trick me into releasing classified information with such a simple ploy.]
Henriette starts to formulate a reply, when one of the cars in front of her swerves to cut her off, crashing into another vehicle. She narrowly dodges the collision. And then another car tries to sideswipe her, and she's sure this isn't a coincidence, it's enemy action. She dodges, leg almost scraping the pavement as she makes the turn.
[This is what I was concerned it might be. It's spreading.] Clarent says.
[What's spreading?] Henriette asks quickly. [I thought we were just dealing with Technocrats or hemophages or someone working with the police.]
[I did as well. But this-I've seen something like this, several years ago. It's an EDE, one which works through technology. Some kind of cybernetic one.]
[Intrusion threat?] Henriette asks, worried. They're both augmented. But no, that doesn't seem right. Those were baseline police, as far as she knew. Maybe they'd have some sort of sleeper prosthetic at most. But they didn't seem like it. And if it could take them over-why didn't it try already?
[No. Not for us. Enlightened personnel are resistant. Anyone with significant neural augmentation is totally immune. Your ADEI should be enough to immunize you. It spreads through technology, but that means smartphones, radios, video. I was part of the team-all heavy-spec cyborgs, because they couldn't touch us that way. I think it's holding a grudge.] She summarizes.
[So you put it down once, you can do it again, right?] Henriette says.
[Well.] Clarent said. [Not exactly. Not without getting attention. And this time it's smarter. It'll have localized us, gotten our signatures. And it can see my relationships. And yours. It'll be looking for, and finding, anyone who hates us which it can work with. Throwing them at us. Meanwhile it'll try to keep harrying us by ordering people around us to stop us. It can't engage in direct mind control, no, but it can change how you perceive someone socially. I'll send you what I can of the file.]
Henriette looks at the file. It's heavily redacted-she scrolls past the authorized for distribution by list which has such luminaries like PROG/DC/BLACKWATCH and SYN/ENF/BULLFROG and ITX/SHOCK/KINGSLAYER-apparently Clarent's classification, Henriette notes-and skims its abilities. It's a memetic virus, which spreads through basilisk hacks, visual or auditory. Not everyone is vulnerable-but enough are-and it can't deal with cognitive augs at all. Like most memetic EDEs it burns itself out fairly quickly, its hosts typically surviving the process.
Not so dangerous in Stage 1-it can influence thoughts, make people do things they might do impulsively, like cut off those two madwomen on a motorcycle because fuck her, that's why, or react more slowly or more quickly. Stage 2 she's worried about-it learns from its hosts, starts using their skills in a synchronous matter. Taking full control. Which doesn't sound dangerous, until they start manifesting powers over technology. The ability to make computers and machines just do their bidding. Or if it didn't do what she'd do if she was running them, and start trying to spread to a military base or criminals. Jane Clarent might be handgun-proof but her chassis isn't invulnerable to rifle fire. And, Henriette thinks, she herself isn't bulletproof. The only good news is the faster it spreads, the faster it burns out and leaves a new syntergene-Stage 3. So there's been a few breakouts of similar things. They let them appear, just keep the Stage 3 under watch, and burn it out. It's a low risk, relatively speaking, unless provoked. Or unless it's hunting you. Someone could have set it against them.
[Is there any way to stop it?] Henriette asks. [Some sort of leader or something?]
[No.] Jane Clarent says. [Distributed computing, distributed cognition. You have to kill all of its hosts if you want to contain it before it reproduces.]
Henriette wants to ask if that's what she did, but thinks better of it. The young woman suspects her maybe-ally would have done it, if things had come down to it. Hostile memetic viruses are dangerous things. Probably why Clarent's special forces, and Henriette's a pilot. But still, she doesn't want to kill people whose only crime was listening to the wrong radio channel or looking at the wrong thing. [So what do we do?] She doesn't wait for the answer-it seeks out cybernetics signatures, so she's trying to figure out how to deploy decoys, and how to identify the attackers.
[We react. Try not to get ourselves killed.]
In one of the black areas of the lab, Dr. Gregor Leon talks with what looks like a Bob. He wouldn't describe it as conversing-even though the entity acting through it is smarter than a Bob has any right to be-and via distributed processing, smarter than a normal person-it tops off somewhere around 'human super-genius' level. The kind of simple mind that he can predict fairly easily. The fact that it's an EDE just makes it easier. EDEs are, if anything, less flexible than humans are, even if they might be more intelligent in a straight-line way. More predictable. He's had some pretty good success predicting them to date. Which is concerning in some ways, reassuring in others. If only the opposition was so predictable.
The reason Dr. Leon chose the specific attacker-that syntergene-was because it was quite easily containable. The other reason was because a mind-virus which was smart enough to hold grudges was useful. He, of course, is immune. Give it a chance to absorb host bodies with knowledge, and a chance to take revenge against one of the members who stopped it from carrying out its imperative when it was last released. What it did past that was out of his control. More or less.
"I would recommend heavily that you ensure their death or incapacitation." Gregor Leon says mildly. "Otherwise, the consequences could be unpleasant." The Bob raises an eyebrow at him, but says nothing more. "I would have to make sure my involvement in this didn't come to light." The result of that is obvious.
"It is more dangerous than I expected, even without its parts."
"I have provided the resources you need most. Time. Use the tools you already have." Leon snaps. "Remember our agreement. I don't care what those tools are, or how you want to use them. In fact, the less I know, the better. Just get it done, and you'll get your part of the bargain." This is why, after all, Control needs him. Most of them can no longer think like he does. Even the Residents don't quite have the same focus anymore. They might be tempters, bargainers, and corrupters, but their greed is often their undoing. They're not willing to be losers in the deal. Mad, like all EDEs.
But still the favored victors of any war. They can make mistakes-and do, due to their madness and their alien thinking-but they just need to win once and it's over. Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven-and Earth today doesn't even manage to get close to heaven. So he's sending a hostile alien entity off, giving it the information it needs to target a pair of loyal Technocrats, possibly aiding RDs in the process. Nevertheless, it's nothing personal.
It's only business.
[Can we shake them off before that?]
[Yes.] Clarent says. [There will be electronic billboards 300m up this road. I've already taken them over. Stop at the traffic light for a moment.]
Henriette dutifully does so, realizing that she found Clarent's announcement surprising-but shouldn't have, since the Shock Corps, especially the 90s-era ones where they seriously started talking about "cognitive clockspeed" and "limits of human information processing" and "OODA loops"-they often did that. They'd just know what you did, and take advantage of that. She's been spending a lot of time out of the Convention, Henriette supposes.
The billboard is on the side of a high-rise building. Nearby-maybe a hundred more meters away-is their destination. [Close your eyes,] Major Clarent sends. Suddenly it erupts into an eye-hurting fractal pattern. Basilisk Hack. Henriette does so in time, waits a few seconds, then opens them. The fading pattern causes a brief pain in her temples-and that's collateral damage from targeting baseline neurology modified by the EDE. The result for everyone else is chaos. Cars slam into each other, drivers incapacitated. A motorcycle driver has the red highlight blink out of existence as he loses control and skids into the intersection. There is the sound of twisted metal and gasps of pain. Henriette feels a little sick about every injury it causes.
[Focus.] Clarent sends. With no time, she leaves the motorcycle and grabs Henriette. She runs, looking silly in her bare feet and too-short dress and stolen police jacket with the patches torn off, legs blurring. She doesn't seem to even notice the weight. [We'll make it there.]
[Can you...] Henriette starts.
[It's faster this way. Less of a risk they'll track us and the safehouse. Henriette admits she has a point. Even if this is weird and uncomfortable. They don't even take the elevators-instead she just uses a key on the fire exit and dashes up floor after floor. Major Clarent at least has the dignity to pretend to be out of breath when she enters, even though her actions-checking the windows, activating the security, and ensuring that the door is locked very, very tightly-belie that.
[So what now?] Henriette asks, when she gets her feet underneath herself. [What's your plan?] The safehouse is very... Iteration X. That is to say, it has all the comforts Henriette remembers when she was younger, years ago. And it has everything she's come to associate with the Shock Corps. There's a host of small household robotics, a wall which is already rotating to show off a weapons rack-mostly Technocratic standard weapons and some heavy cyborg rifles, rather than frontline gear-but it's useful.
[Right now,] the full cyborg says, [I'm going to get something more practical for evading an EDE. Weapons, too. There's some bags here.] Henriette checks the equipment while Clarent changes-lots of it is useful. Technocratic impact armor in various clothing, small arms designed for cyborgs, some light, although there's a heavy rifle-firing rounds big enough that a normal human would find it nearly impossible to fire unbraced-taking up some space. Henriette takes the opportunity to borrow some of the impact armor as well-it's more reliable than piezoelectric smart clothing, and doesn't require dedicated ADEI subprograms. And she's close enough to the body shape of Major Clarent that she can take advantage of them anyways-Clarent's taller and a bit more feminine, but that just means the clothes hang a bit loose on her-and a few setting changes in her ADEI fix that problem anyways. She picks up one of the shock gloves, feeling a little glad-reluctantly, but still glad-that Harlan had taught her how to fight unarmed. She doesn't feel like having to deal with something like this with just her basic survival training. Especially not if she doesn't want to leave a trail of corpses.
There's a few more nonlethal weapons which she can probably use-flashbangs, stickyfoam grenades, chemical smoke. There's a larger selection of lethal weapons-she looks at those more reluctantly-sure, a reality deviant like a shapeshifter might deserve being at the business end of a pulse-rifle belching out explosive-incendiary rounds with anticoagulant coating, but not people suckered into targeting the wrong person. [So what now?]
[Now we stealth ourselves-hopefully they're going to have to search this entire high-rise for people. Emissions damping, minimal electronics signature-anything that might minimize our signature. Given what this is, that might take a while. We didn't exactly run our own ECM when we were dealing with the first outbreak.] Clarent says. [And then we make our escape. Keep watch on the cameras.] Clarent looks just normal enough to be unnoticeable but is still equipped-hair set to a normal color rather than riotous red, wearing dark clothes and a dark jacket with plenty of pockets. There's a handgun in the holster, some sort of cyborg-use break-action one, and she's got some other weapons hidden on her which Henriette can see in EMI vision. All of what she's wearing is woven with impact armor, which reminds Henriette that despite being a military-grade cyborg, Clarent's not a Kesslerian death machine. She still needs things like 'body armor' and worries about being shot with some masses-grade small arms.
[Will do.] Henriette watches them simultaneously as she packs useful equipment-and takes what she needs. She's not sure if it's the basilisk hack or just careful movement, but it takes a half-hour before they come for them. And who comes for them isn't who she expects. They're dressed like regular Japanese civilians, but they clearly aren't.
The suppressed handguns furtively hidden in open jackets would tell her that much, as does the body armor and the hints of tattoos which her IFF recognizes as hostile RD artifacts. Their look does as well-all tight-cut hair, cold eyes, killer instincts. She doesn't need a tactical profiling program to realize they're a threat, nor does she need one to remember who they are. [That's a North Korean recon team.] Clarent sends her, unnecessarily. [Commandos.]
[I know.] Henriette says. She recognizes two of the faces from Moscow. [Are they working together?] There's five of them, two of them with the same faces. So the two brothers, and probably three extra combatants. Maybe RDs, maybe just proxies or foot-soldiers. But they're all dangerous.
[Probably. The enemy we're dealing with is smart. It works through proxies. It can sense relationships. Including negative ones. They probably were around to sabotage Technocratic assets or take down Union HVTs.] Clarent says. [I assume the EDE told them of a Kingslayer around and they decided the risk of escalating the war was worth the shot. Which means-]
[Is it going to happen?] Henriette asks. [The war, I mean. I'm sure we'll survive this.] She's already thinking of ways to avoid them-or to fight them, if necessary. She doesn't want that to happen. On the cameras, they're kicking down doors, floor by floor.
[Probably.] Clarent says bluntly. [Best case, it'll just be a border skirmish and some covert ops on both sides before someone hammers out another ceasefire. Something like this probably leads to the worst case of actual war-if they're assassinating high-ranking ItX officers and Heroes of the Technocratic Union that's not going to lead to any reduction in tensions. So let's not let that happen.]
Henriette nods. [Why aren't they just heading towards us?]
[This place is too well-shielded for that and I have false emitters laced throughout the building. They can't tell what's Union or not without physical inspection. So we have some time. At their current rate... maybe an hour.] Then she sees the Stage 2 infectees start pushing through the building, like rioters-but there's an organization in their movements, rather than mere mob mentality. [Nevermind. We have maybe 15 minutes. Multiple Stage 2 infectees assisting them. They're working together. Standard procedure.]
Remember Them? They're Back
Oh, yes. The North Koreans are active in Japan-and when they're given the chance to quietly neutralize two high-priority Technocratic enemies as war looks more and more likely, they took it. You have a semi-reinforced safehouse which is warded to some extent against scrying, and is hiding you from
Major Jane Clarent has Enlightenment 5 and the spheres Correspondence 4 (Multitasking), Mind 4 (Brute Force), Matter 2, Forces 3, Time 2, Prime 3. Yes, she's much more powerful than her writeup in London. This is intentional because you didn't canonize her spheres as what they were in London. I'd probably have found someone else if you had chosen her. She brings a military-grade cyborg body which has a Dex of "lol yes" and superhuman Strength and Stamina, as well as moderate levels of armor and redundancy, and a lot of cognitive-related hardware. Her safehouse has weapons, equipment, and surveillance. It is secure-just not secure against a North Korean hit-team operating in enemy territory who thinks Henriette is Public Enemy No. 1 and are assuming she's got Technocratic backup. There is probably some Entropy magic to lay down bad coincidences at work here.
Escaping the North Koreans:
Good news-they're plainclothes. Bad news-they're North Korean Special Forces. With all that entails. How are you going to deal with them?
[ ] Clarent has friends. She's been making the call, because the surrounding datascape hasn't been jammed. They're probably not 100% trustworthy and means you're going to have to do a lot more talking-but they're useful.
[ ] Henriette remembers that Mr. and Mrs. Rosario told her of a number to call in case things got bad or if she found something out about Serafina. This is both.
[ ] Bad news. They're jamming the place. You're going to have to make it out with your own wits and cleverness.
The Tokyo skyline is filled with light pollution. Bright neon lights cover the facades of the buildings. The sounds of urban civilization fill the air. There's a light mist and it's painting halos around the streetlights.
"We can use my car," Henriette says.
"No," Major Clarent says, bending down to grab one of the policemen's jackets. She shrugs it on, and tucks the handgun into a pocket. "At this hour, the Tokyo traffic is too risky. Far too easy for a hostile to snarl us up by engineering a jam. We need more mobility."
Henriette glances around. "Right," she says, pulling out her phone and inputting a few commands. "There's only one motorbike, but that should get us out of here. At least far enough for the traffic to thin out." Heading over to her car, she grabs a jacket of her own from the back. "I'm engaging its self-driving systems. They're pretty dumb - barely better than Masses-tech - but they might tail it instead."
"Good. You drive," the other woman says. "I'll deal with any tails."
"Got it."
The engine of the bike roars as Henriette accelerates out of the ground level of the car park, dodging between the thick traffic. She's not dressed for biking-she's dressed to blend in, like Major Clarent-but her clothes are shape-memory and have piezoelectric layers, and a command to them has them extend and stiffen enough to provide some protection against falls, scrapes, and-although she hopes that Donald is right about the normal likelihood of people being shot-bullets. Immediately entering the traffic she wistles. The entire place is snarled up to hell and back. There's no way they could have got out of here on a car. Even if they'd tried - no, they'd have been a sitting target at the first red light.
[So, I'm interested,] Clarent transmits over a secure link. [What do you believe Gregor gains from doing what he's doing?]
Henriette lets her ADEI part of her brain handle the driving while she considers this. This is something that she suspects is entirely deliberate by the older woman. She is distracted, which means any answers she give will be less guarded. Fortunately for her, she's learned from Director Belltower - and she has tried to avoid directly lying to Major Clarent whenever possible. Against a woman who's as good at mind-machine interfaces as her, direct lies are too risky.
So instead she told her the truth. Or, at least, a truth. She passed over the text of the suicide meme that Rose recovered while in deep cover pretending to be Serafina, and she described the fake-Serafinas they'd encountered twice now. The second one is documented, if Major Clarent investigates it. Perhaps she might go to Alexander Cross to enquire with the Progenitors, as the two of them have done ops together. Cross certainly knows, because he's the one the fake Serafina went to.
[I think he wants her out of the way for some reason,] Henriette sends back. [I think he considers her a threat. After all, she's in another Progenitor political faction to him. And she became a public Hero of the Technocracy after Moscow.]
[But that's too risky. Why would he want her dead?]
Henriette tries something risky. [Well, she was in EXEMPLAR III,] she suggests. [She knows all about them - and she also is Rose's mother. Maybe he wanted to replace her without Rose knowing. Then he'd have his own working EXEMPLAR III, following Serafina. And I know he's working in high end biotech.]
[Do you think that's plausible?]
That sounds like a trick question to Henriette. But it also seems... almost likely. [Let me ask you a question. What's he working on? What's his great scheme which means he's pulling Progenitors in from all over - and he's picked up a Clarent like you to run base defence when you're a decapitation unit? It's something that having Rose Ashford - and a loyal mind-hacked Serafina Rosario would help him with, isn't it?]
[That's classified.]
[That's not a no.]
[It's not a yes, either,] Major Clarent says neutrally. [You won't trick me into releasing classified information with such a simple ploy.]
Henriette starts to formulate a reply, when one of the cars in front of her swerves to cut her off, crashing into another vehicle. She narrowly dodges the collision. And then another car tries to sideswipe her, and she's sure this isn't a coincidence, it's enemy action. She dodges, leg almost scraping the pavement as she makes the turn.
[This is what I was concerned it might be. It's spreading.] Clarent says.
[What's spreading?] Henriette asks quickly. [I thought we were just dealing with Technocrats or hemophages or someone working with the police.]
[I did as well. But this-I've seen something like this, several years ago. It's an EDE, one which works through technology. Some kind of cybernetic one.]
[Intrusion threat?] Henriette asks, worried. They're both augmented. But no, that doesn't seem right. Those were baseline police, as far as she knew. Maybe they'd have some sort of sleeper prosthetic at most. But they didn't seem like it. And if it could take them over-why didn't it try already?
[No. Not for us. Enlightened personnel are resistant. Anyone with significant neural augmentation is totally immune. Your ADEI should be enough to immunize you. It spreads through technology, but that means smartphones, radios, video. I was part of the team-all heavy-spec cyborgs, because they couldn't touch us that way. I think it's holding a grudge.] She summarizes.
[So you put it down once, you can do it again, right?] Henriette says.
[Well.] Clarent said. [Not exactly. Not without getting attention. And this time it's smarter. It'll have localized us, gotten our signatures. And it can see my relationships. And yours. It'll be looking for, and finding, anyone who hates us which it can work with. Throwing them at us. Meanwhile it'll try to keep harrying us by ordering people around us to stop us. It can't engage in direct mind control, no, but it can change how you perceive someone socially. I'll send you what I can of the file.]
Henriette looks at the file. It's heavily redacted-she scrolls past the authorized for distribution by list which has such luminaries like PROG/DC/BLACKWATCH and SYN/ENF/BULLFROG and ITX/SHOCK/KINGSLAYER-apparently Clarent's classification, Henriette notes-and skims its abilities. It's a memetic virus, which spreads through basilisk hacks, visual or auditory. Not everyone is vulnerable-but enough are-and it can't deal with cognitive augs at all. Like most memetic EDEs it burns itself out fairly quickly, its hosts typically surviving the process.
Not so dangerous in Stage 1-it can influence thoughts, make people do things they might do impulsively, like cut off those two madwomen on a motorcycle because fuck her, that's why, or react more slowly or more quickly. Stage 2 she's worried about-it learns from its hosts, starts using their skills in a synchronous matter. Taking full control. Which doesn't sound dangerous, until they start manifesting powers over technology. The ability to make computers and machines just do their bidding. Or if it didn't do what she'd do if she was running them, and start trying to spread to a military base or criminals. Jane Clarent might be handgun-proof but her chassis isn't invulnerable to rifle fire. And, Henriette thinks, she herself isn't bulletproof. The only good news is the faster it spreads, the faster it burns out and leaves a new syntergene-Stage 3. So there's been a few breakouts of similar things. They let them appear, just keep the Stage 3 under watch, and burn it out. It's a low risk, relatively speaking, unless provoked. Or unless it's hunting you. Someone could have set it against them.
[Is there any way to stop it?] Henriette asks. [Some sort of leader or something?]
[No.] Jane Clarent says. [Distributed computing, distributed cognition. You have to kill all of its hosts if you want to contain it before it reproduces.]
Henriette wants to ask if that's what she did, but thinks better of it. The young woman suspects her maybe-ally would have done it, if things had come down to it. Hostile memetic viruses are dangerous things. Probably why Clarent's special forces, and Henriette's a pilot. But still, she doesn't want to kill people whose only crime was listening to the wrong radio channel or looking at the wrong thing. [So what do we do?] She doesn't wait for the answer-it seeks out cybernetics signatures, so she's trying to figure out how to deploy decoys, and how to identify the attackers.
[We react. Try not to get ourselves killed.]
***
In one of the black areas of the lab, Dr. Gregor Leon talks with what looks like a Bob. He wouldn't describe it as conversing-even though the entity acting through it is smarter than a Bob has any right to be-and via distributed processing, smarter than a normal person-it tops off somewhere around 'human super-genius' level. The kind of simple mind that he can predict fairly easily. The fact that it's an EDE just makes it easier. EDEs are, if anything, less flexible than humans are, even if they might be more intelligent in a straight-line way. More predictable. He's had some pretty good success predicting them to date. Which is concerning in some ways, reassuring in others. If only the opposition was so predictable.
The reason Dr. Leon chose the specific attacker-that syntergene-was because it was quite easily containable. The other reason was because a mind-virus which was smart enough to hold grudges was useful. He, of course, is immune. Give it a chance to absorb host bodies with knowledge, and a chance to take revenge against one of the members who stopped it from carrying out its imperative when it was last released. What it did past that was out of his control. More or less.
"I would recommend heavily that you ensure their death or incapacitation." Gregor Leon says mildly. "Otherwise, the consequences could be unpleasant." The Bob raises an eyebrow at him, but says nothing more. "I would have to make sure my involvement in this didn't come to light." The result of that is obvious.
"It is more dangerous than I expected, even without its parts."
"I have provided the resources you need most. Time. Use the tools you already have." Leon snaps. "Remember our agreement. I don't care what those tools are, or how you want to use them. In fact, the less I know, the better. Just get it done, and you'll get your part of the bargain." This is why, after all, Control needs him. Most of them can no longer think like he does. Even the Residents don't quite have the same focus anymore. They might be tempters, bargainers, and corrupters, but their greed is often their undoing. They're not willing to be losers in the deal. Mad, like all EDEs.
But still the favored victors of any war. They can make mistakes-and do, due to their madness and their alien thinking-but they just need to win once and it's over. Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven-and Earth today doesn't even manage to get close to heaven. So he's sending a hostile alien entity off, giving it the information it needs to target a pair of loyal Technocrats, possibly aiding RDs in the process. Nevertheless, it's nothing personal.
It's only business.
***
Thinking on the problem, dodging traffic-some of which is merely unintentionally obstructing her, the rest of which is trying as best as your average commuter can to kill a super-pilot with reflexes in the top .1% of human reactions or so-thank you Iteration X, thank you mom and dad-Henriette Langley sighs. If she was in a better situation-if they were using drones or soldiers instead of normal humans and their impulses towards road rage being directed by an alien puppetmaster-she could probably act more aggressively. But she's hampered-not by Major Clarent's cyborg frame and her grip, but by not wanting any of these people to die for no good reason. [Do you have an exit plan?] She asks desperately.
[There's a safehouse nearby. I think we can make it. It's in this building, and I have hardware and shielding.] Clarent sends, one several kilometers away. Henriette already starts thinking of routes to it. There's a closer one Donald and Rose have set up-but she's not going to go there. That would be foolish at best. Same for the NWO ones the Tyrants have given them some access to. That would be... unsafe. And, Henriette thinks sourly, 'unsafe' for a bunch of nu-who killers probably means eliminating the problem. Something she distinctly doesn't want here. [How are you on stealth?]
[I think I have it.] Henriette says. Coding improvised threat-detection-and-analysis patches while driving a motorcycle at breakneck speeds through traffic, trying to-with some, but not much, success-to outrun the spread and infection. She thinks she has a working model. [Here you go.]
Clarent nods fractionally. [This is workable, but I think I have some more data that can refine it. Let me fix what I can.] She sends it back, modified, and Henriette notices its estimated accuracy go up another few percentage points. She swerves to avoid one of the red-highlighted drivers, taking a hard right onto another road. Heading marginally closer to where the safehouse is.
[There's a safehouse nearby. I think we can make it. It's in this building, and I have hardware and shielding.] Clarent sends, one several kilometers away. Henriette already starts thinking of routes to it. There's a closer one Donald and Rose have set up-but she's not going to go there. That would be foolish at best. Same for the NWO ones the Tyrants have given them some access to. That would be... unsafe. And, Henriette thinks sourly, 'unsafe' for a bunch of nu-who killers probably means eliminating the problem. Something she distinctly doesn't want here. [How are you on stealth?]
[I think I have it.] Henriette says. Coding improvised threat-detection-and-analysis patches while driving a motorcycle at breakneck speeds through traffic, trying to-with some, but not much, success-to outrun the spread and infection. She thinks she has a working model. [Here you go.]
Clarent nods fractionally. [This is workable, but I think I have some more data that can refine it. Let me fix what I can.] She sends it back, modified, and Henriette notices its estimated accuracy go up another few percentage points. She swerves to avoid one of the red-highlighted drivers, taking a hard right onto another road. Heading marginally closer to where the safehouse is.
[Can we shake them off before that?]
[Yes.] Clarent says. [There will be electronic billboards 300m up this road. I've already taken them over. Stop at the traffic light for a moment.]
Henriette dutifully does so, realizing that she found Clarent's announcement surprising-but shouldn't have, since the Shock Corps, especially the 90s-era ones where they seriously started talking about "cognitive clockspeed" and "limits of human information processing" and "OODA loops"-they often did that. They'd just know what you did, and take advantage of that. She's been spending a lot of time out of the Convention, Henriette supposes.
The billboard is on the side of a high-rise building. Nearby-maybe a hundred more meters away-is their destination. [Close your eyes,] Major Clarent sends. Suddenly it erupts into an eye-hurting fractal pattern. Basilisk Hack. Henriette does so in time, waits a few seconds, then opens them. The fading pattern causes a brief pain in her temples-and that's collateral damage from targeting baseline neurology modified by the EDE. The result for everyone else is chaos. Cars slam into each other, drivers incapacitated. A motorcycle driver has the red highlight blink out of existence as he loses control and skids into the intersection. There is the sound of twisted metal and gasps of pain. Henriette feels a little sick about every injury it causes.
[Focus.] Clarent sends. With no time, she leaves the motorcycle and grabs Henriette. She runs, looking silly in her bare feet and too-short dress and stolen police jacket with the patches torn off, legs blurring. She doesn't seem to even notice the weight. [We'll make it there.]
[Can you...] Henriette starts.
[It's faster this way. Less of a risk they'll track us and the safehouse. Henriette admits she has a point. Even if this is weird and uncomfortable. They don't even take the elevators-instead she just uses a key on the fire exit and dashes up floor after floor. Major Clarent at least has the dignity to pretend to be out of breath when she enters, even though her actions-checking the windows, activating the security, and ensuring that the door is locked very, very tightly-belie that.
[So what now?] Henriette asks, when she gets her feet underneath herself. [What's your plan?] The safehouse is very... Iteration X. That is to say, it has all the comforts Henriette remembers when she was younger, years ago. And it has everything she's come to associate with the Shock Corps. There's a host of small household robotics, a wall which is already rotating to show off a weapons rack-mostly Technocratic standard weapons and some heavy cyborg rifles, rather than frontline gear-but it's useful.
[Right now,] the full cyborg says, [I'm going to get something more practical for evading an EDE. Weapons, too. There's some bags here.] Henriette checks the equipment while Clarent changes-lots of it is useful. Technocratic impact armor in various clothing, small arms designed for cyborgs, some light, although there's a heavy rifle-firing rounds big enough that a normal human would find it nearly impossible to fire unbraced-taking up some space. Henriette takes the opportunity to borrow some of the impact armor as well-it's more reliable than piezoelectric smart clothing, and doesn't require dedicated ADEI subprograms. And she's close enough to the body shape of Major Clarent that she can take advantage of them anyways-Clarent's taller and a bit more feminine, but that just means the clothes hang a bit loose on her-and a few setting changes in her ADEI fix that problem anyways. She picks up one of the shock gloves, feeling a little glad-reluctantly, but still glad-that Harlan had taught her how to fight unarmed. She doesn't feel like having to deal with something like this with just her basic survival training. Especially not if she doesn't want to leave a trail of corpses.
There's a few more nonlethal weapons which she can probably use-flashbangs, stickyfoam grenades, chemical smoke. There's a larger selection of lethal weapons-she looks at those more reluctantly-sure, a reality deviant like a shapeshifter might deserve being at the business end of a pulse-rifle belching out explosive-incendiary rounds with anticoagulant coating, but not people suckered into targeting the wrong person. [So what now?]
[Now we stealth ourselves-hopefully they're going to have to search this entire high-rise for people. Emissions damping, minimal electronics signature-anything that might minimize our signature. Given what this is, that might take a while. We didn't exactly run our own ECM when we were dealing with the first outbreak.] Clarent says. [And then we make our escape. Keep watch on the cameras.] Clarent looks just normal enough to be unnoticeable but is still equipped-hair set to a normal color rather than riotous red, wearing dark clothes and a dark jacket with plenty of pockets. There's a handgun in the holster, some sort of cyborg-use break-action one, and she's got some other weapons hidden on her which Henriette can see in EMI vision. All of what she's wearing is woven with impact armor, which reminds Henriette that despite being a military-grade cyborg, Clarent's not a Kesslerian death machine. She still needs things like 'body armor' and worries about being shot with some masses-grade small arms.
[Will do.] Henriette watches them simultaneously as she packs useful equipment-and takes what she needs. She's not sure if it's the basilisk hack or just careful movement, but it takes a half-hour before they come for them. And who comes for them isn't who she expects. They're dressed like regular Japanese civilians, but they clearly aren't.
The suppressed handguns furtively hidden in open jackets would tell her that much, as does the body armor and the hints of tattoos which her IFF recognizes as hostile RD artifacts. Their look does as well-all tight-cut hair, cold eyes, killer instincts. She doesn't need a tactical profiling program to realize they're a threat, nor does she need one to remember who they are. [That's a North Korean recon team.] Clarent sends her, unnecessarily. [Commandos.]
[I know.] Henriette says. She recognizes two of the faces from Moscow. [Are they working together?] There's five of them, two of them with the same faces. So the two brothers, and probably three extra combatants. Maybe RDs, maybe just proxies or foot-soldiers. But they're all dangerous.
[Probably. The enemy we're dealing with is smart. It works through proxies. It can sense relationships. Including negative ones. They probably were around to sabotage Technocratic assets or take down Union HVTs.] Clarent says. [I assume the EDE told them of a Kingslayer around and they decided the risk of escalating the war was worth the shot. Which means-]
[Is it going to happen?] Henriette asks. [The war, I mean. I'm sure we'll survive this.] She's already thinking of ways to avoid them-or to fight them, if necessary. She doesn't want that to happen. On the cameras, they're kicking down doors, floor by floor.
[Probably.] Clarent says bluntly. [Best case, it'll just be a border skirmish and some covert ops on both sides before someone hammers out another ceasefire. Something like this probably leads to the worst case of actual war-if they're assassinating high-ranking ItX officers and Heroes of the Technocratic Union that's not going to lead to any reduction in tensions. So let's not let that happen.]
Henriette nods. [Why aren't they just heading towards us?]
[This place is too well-shielded for that and I have false emitters laced throughout the building. They can't tell what's Union or not without physical inspection. So we have some time. At their current rate... maybe an hour.] Then she sees the Stage 2 infectees start pushing through the building, like rioters-but there's an organization in their movements, rather than mere mob mentality. [Nevermind. We have maybe 15 minutes. Multiple Stage 2 infectees assisting them. They're working together. Standard procedure.]
Remember Them? They're Back
Oh, yes. The North Koreans are active in Japan-and when they're given the chance to quietly neutralize two high-priority Technocratic enemies as war looks more and more likely, they took it. You have a semi-reinforced safehouse which is warded to some extent against scrying, and is hiding you from
Major Jane Clarent has Enlightenment 5 and the spheres Correspondence 4 (Multitasking), Mind 4 (Brute Force), Matter 2, Forces 3, Time 2, Prime 3. Yes, she's much more powerful than her writeup in London. This is intentional because you didn't canonize her spheres as what they were in London. I'd probably have found someone else if you had chosen her. She brings a military-grade cyborg body which has a Dex of "lol yes" and superhuman Strength and Stamina, as well as moderate levels of armor and redundancy, and a lot of cognitive-related hardware. Her safehouse has weapons, equipment, and surveillance. It is secure-just not secure against a North Korean hit-team operating in enemy territory who thinks Henriette is Public Enemy No. 1 and are assuming she's got Technocratic backup. There is probably some Entropy magic to lay down bad coincidences at work here.
Escaping the North Koreans:
Good news-they're plainclothes. Bad news-they're North Korean Special Forces. With all that entails. How are you going to deal with them?
[ ] Clarent has friends. She's been making the call, because the surrounding datascape hasn't been jammed. They're probably not 100% trustworthy and means you're going to have to do a lot more talking-but they're useful.
[ ] Henriette remembers that Mr. and Mrs. Rosario told her of a number to call in case things got bad or if she found something out about Serafina. This is both.
[ ] Bad news. They're jamming the place. You're going to have to make it out with your own wits and cleverness.
[ ] But Henriette's actually a lot better at fighting than she thinks, and Jane Clarent is a blender on legs. If you can ambush them when they're busy trying to assault into a Technocratic safehouse where useful foci are literally everywhere, you might be able to inflict a casualty or two on the North Koreans, and then run like hell. Because they're going to be very, very mad.
[ ] There's another vehicle here. One which is probably untraceable-and customized for high-threat situations. It'll be easier than losing them on foot.
[ ] Or, you know-you have a cyborg with superhuman strength, agility, and high-rise buildings everywhere. No need to worry about normal people when you can just open the window and jump to another building. If you do it quickly enough they might not even notice!
[ ] Write-In[ ] There's another vehicle here. One which is probably untraceable-and customized for high-threat situations. It'll be easier than losing them on foot.
[ ] Or, you know-you have a cyborg with superhuman strength, agility, and high-rise buildings everywhere. No need to worry about normal people when you can just open the window and jump to another building. If you do it quickly enough they might not even notice!
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- Location
- England
Right, so, Akashic North Korean Commando Twins and their friends, new and old.
Good at fist fite, we know they're cautious and mission orientated from the last go round, and we have some time to prepare, but not a lot.
I'm thinking we need to deal with them here and now to avoid headaches later down the line. But how?
Well, if we do we need a write-in, option 1 or option 2. Option 3 and the subset inside are all about running like cowards.
But we could run like a coward. If we want to deal with angry Akashic Commandos Twins later. Decisions, decisions.
Good at fist fite, we know they're cautious and mission orientated from the last go round, and we have some time to prepare, but not a lot.
I'm thinking we need to deal with them here and now to avoid headaches later down the line. But how?
Well, if we do we need a write-in, option 1 or option 2. Option 3 and the subset inside are all about running like cowards.
But we could run like a coward. If we want to deal with angry Akashic Commandos Twins later. Decisions, decisions.
Spectrum
Tell me a secret~
- Location
- Behind you~
Cuts off here