- Location
- Luton Airport
@Tempera, @MJ12 Commando, how much would it cost for us to buy Copperfield, or to look to set up our own equivalent?
Cowls: A World of Supermen and Subterfuge
- Thread starter MJ12 Commando
- Start date
- Original
-
- Tags
- cyberpunk (punk)
Depends. How much piracy do you want to do? If you want to get the licenses and everything, probably several months and 10 million dollars or more if you want an industrial farm rather than NutriSystems AG Personal Garden (for personal use only violators will be shot).
If you want to be less legitimate, you can buy or steal genestock from less legitimate sources and run a black market farm for less than a tenth of that price, because modern genegeneered crops are really, really hardy. You'll have to find someone to jailbreak the terminator genes though or get the genestock via corporate raiding. I'd say in that case, probably just a million bucks or two and a spare warehouse or something.
If neither of these options are acceptable, you can try growing regular crops, but that's going to cost a lot and take up a ton of space, because they aren't basically immune to everything and grow on dry dirt.
- Location
- Luton Airport
[X] Let us found Black Flag Foods, and go buccaneering to acquire bootleg tomato seeds, Me Hearties!
Now, now, be sensible.
If you wish to do that, we'd need a specific subsidiary with a full corporate veil isolating it from us, hidden under a holding company. We then have a disposable patsy running what appears to be a street-level operation hidden in an old warehouse. Money is transferred from the subsidiary back to the main company via licensing rights for the name and other intellectual property and interest-only loans which the subsidiary owes its holding company, which in itself owes the main company. Naturally, all profits from this operation are registered legally as "Licensing Fees for IP" and "Interest on Loans", because we don't want the IRS coming after us.
Let's put it this way. Crime is inevitable in a neighbourhood like this. There are no jobs. So why not make sure we control the black markets and the IP-cracking via disposable subsidiaries? We'll generate jobs, we'll generate sweet, sweet profit - and we'll avoid having to pay the full cost for anything. While we're a small fry, we can move beneath the radar - and everyone knows there's gangs and criminals in this neighbourhood, right? It's expected.
And the best thing is? If such an operation becomes unprofitable, we can burn it and hire our services to the owners of the IP for 'aggressive legal action', thus being paid for shutting down an unprofitable front company.
Downzone 7: Calm
- Location
- Australia
Downzone 7: Calm
You watch the press conference on cheap pirate TV. You could represent the company-but on the other hand, you don't want to show your face. Not when there might be corporate spies around, looking for a loose end. Shamus made a good point about staying quiet. Stay quiet, stay safe, don't get attention from your former employers. You've never been the best at keeping a low profile, but you still try. And anyways, with Darius there-you're pretty sure both of them are safe from an assassination attempt. He might be an asshole but he's the kind of asshole you can trust with your life, just not with your beer.
"Mister Espinosa." One of the reporters says. She looks downzone. Not the sculpted cosmetic-modded bubbly reporters of a proper news station. Probably a downzone newspaper. Not from someplace as bad as where you are, of course. You're here because the property values were dirt cheap and Alfonso figured with 3 enhanciles, even a rough neighborhood wouldn't be much of a threat. He's probably right. "What can you say about your intervention yesterday in the escalating gang war?"
"We are pleased to announce that we at the Prometheus Group are here to stay. Although we plan to specialize in enhancement biotechnology, we will, rest assured, be bringing security-and prosperity-to this neighborhood. I understand that times are tough," your brother says to the nods of the audience, "and that things have gotten worse. But with our dedication to the community's welfare-I believe we can survive and prosper in these tough times."
"What do you say about the allegations that you're just here to make a profit?"
"Well yes." He says, chuckling. "I would be irresponsible if I wasn't here to make a profit. But I believe that a strong community is the pillar of a profit. There is so much talent here that's lost, which doesn't get the opportunity to thrive. So our company extends beyond just augmentation, into uplifting-both people, and the society. One cannot thrive without the other."
"And what about your security forces?" Another asks, suspicious. "What do you say about the amount of armed force you bring? Are you just another gang?"
"Nothing could be further from the truth." Alfonso sighs theatrically. "We believe in security. We cannot have prosperity without safety-prosperity for either party. As many augmentation customers are in the field of private security, we will of course have in-house security to ensure such a tragic attack like yesterday's never happens again-and that if it does, we can prevent it before any harm comes. Obviously talk is cheap, but I believe the actions we took yesterday to mitigate harm to the community will demonstrate that we mean what we say."
There's some applause at that. It's almost enthusiastic, you think. That's good.
You haven't even managed to make it to your car after work when your earpiece buzzes again. The harsh tone informs you that this call isn't from someone on your private network, so it's not any of your employees. You answer anyway, prepared to move for the killswitch immediately if the call isn't legitimate.
"Nick here." The detective's cool synthetic voice is familiar enough- and hard enough to recapture- that you relax momentarily. "Got an update. Can you meet me soon?"
You hurriedly reroute the connection through both Shamus and Immolator's headpieces, allowing them to listen in on the conversation if they turned their earpieces on. "Sure," you answer distractedly. "Have to talk to you anyway, I've got another job for you. How soon do you need to meet?"
"Not my concern." You can almost hear his shrug over your connection. "Preferably sooner than later, if you have another job for me."
An annoyed grunt rises in you, stifled quickly. You'd planned on meeting with the gang members Immolator had selected as being worthy of further consideration, but that wasn't urgent, or at least not as urgent as tracking down the stolen Zenith assets..
"I'm free now." You hurriedly call up a map of the local area. "Is there anywhere in particular you'd like to meet me?"
"Bar called the Smoking Gun. Know where it is?"
A quick search brings up the building's address. At times like this, you really wish development on upcoming features like image searches and navigational routes was progressing better, but it was hard to integrate features like that into HUD's. It'd probably be really annoying to figure out how to use them anyway. You don't relish the thought of having to beg Shamus for training on stuff like that.
"Yeah, I can make it there," you reply. "Meet you there in thirty?"
"Sounds good." The connection closes abruptly. A tired sigh escapes you, choked back quickly, before you begin making your way to your car again.
At least the bar isn't too hard to find. It's an archetypal seedy joint. The bricks out the front are stripped of paint, graffiti replacing them faster than the owners could wash it off. Smoke drifts out from beneath the doors of the bar, and the sound of rock washed over you from half a block away.
You park your car out the front of the building. You're not worried about anybody stealing it- it wouldn't be hard to find in any case, and anybody who was stupid enough to steal it deserved what would happen when you found them. Besides, two burly men stand out the front of the building, glowing red eyes staring mercilessly at you as you climb out of the car. Augs. The bar must be doing far better than it appeared if they could afford to hire augs just for bouncers.
"Hold on," one of them grunts as you approach the building. "No weapons allowed in the bar. Put any you have in this container here-" he taps an empty blue tub sitting on a chair beside him- "and we'll return them to you on leaving."
"Certainly," you reply. Leaning over, you take out your wallet, placing twenty one hundred dollar bills in the tub.
The bouncer looks in, then nods, satisfied. "Thank you for your compliance," he rumbles. "Have a pleasant day."
The bar is even more archetypal inside. Smoke drifts and curls around the floor, snaking up and around the feet of people sitting furtively on tables astride the wall. You're not sure, but you suspect that all the bottles resting in the racks behind the counter are whiskey or cheap beer.
Nick is sitting off the side, nursing a whiskey himself. A glint of light is reflected from his steel jaw- a prosthetic replacement for a jaw lost in an explosion some years back, the Syndicate dossiers had told you. His left arm and right hand are also prosthetics, as bionic as his lungs and voicebox. His liver, too, but that was from the whiskey, not the explosion.
When he sees you, he waves you over, inviting you to sit down. You move over and raise an eyebrow at him, dragging a stool towards you and seating yourself atop it.
"A bit over the top, don't you think?" you ask, gesturing around you at the bar.
He nods in acknowledgement. "Deliberate design choice, I think. Owners wanted to sell an experience, or something. Police used to work in the region, corps had less influence, more PD's around. Now it's good to scope out the competition, see who's the real deal and who's a poser."
You know what he means. Ideas like that had been popular around a decade back. With things like organised crime syndicates and kidnappings falling, many businesses like these had fallen through. A lot of people were still fascinated with noir fiction and the like, so you can see the sense in building a business to sell that experience.
"Who're the posers, then?" you ask.
He looks at you with an expression somewhere between a smirk and a sneer. "Anyone in here," he replies disdainfully. "Real PD's don't work from bars. Terrible for privacy. Better to work in an office, or maybe a car. Depends."
"And yet here we are," you point out.
He nods, ceding your point. "Others are interested in your case, sticking their noses in. Keeping an eye on them, making sure nobody's after them yet. Useless idiots couldn't save themselves from being killed by a stray soybean."
"How noble of you," you reply dryly. "Anyway, you said you had something for me."
He reaches down, lifting a heavy briefcase that he sets atop the table in front of you with a solid clunk. He doesn't open it immediately, though, waiting patiently as you search your own pockets for the dockets confirming the payments to his account- Shamus had been kind enough to send them to you daily. They're in your back pocket, for some reason, and come out crumpled and dog-eared. Nick accepts them without comment, turning the briefcase towards you and opening it.
It's filled with files and photos- dozens, hundreds of them. Too much to go through here. Excellent. "Thank you." You pop it closed. "Give me a brief synopsis."
He drums his fingers against the table. "Kidnapping," he starts. "Fairly certain. Don't know who's behind it, but they're picking off homeless, elderly, people without friends or family with resources to hunt after them. Found more victims- a lot more. Dozens, maybe hundreds. Can't find records of them leaving."
You hum. "Hundreds of victims," you muse. "Unlikely to be a serial killer, then, although it could be an enhancile. Could be murder, could be a face-stealer, could be human trafficking, could be another gang starting up. Got anything more for me?"
"Little." He reaches into his pocket and draws out a cigar, which he quickly lights, blatantly ignoring the lack of an ashtray on the table. "People were poor, downtrodden. Could be gang movements, but unlikely, doesn't match any patterns. Nobody's seen them since. Either dead, or someone with lots of property involved." He politely turns his head as he takes a deep draw of the cigar and exhales, smoke streaming from his mouth. "Could investigate further, but a lot of information there. Would take time, which means money, or help, which means money too. Course, you said you already have another job for me. What is it?"
You mentally shift tracks, following along the man's rapid changes of subject as best you can. "Someone attacked a local corporation. I want you to find out who, why, and where they are now."
He flicks the cigar ash out onto the floor beside the table. Behind him, you can see the barkeep shooting you both a dirty look. "Why?" he asks. "No, ignore that. Saw on the news. Gang attack. Zenith, yes? Will track them down. Standard rates, ten thousand an hour."
"Done." You'd been prepared for this, and have enough to cover him for a week or so set aside without affecting your discretionary fund. The little you'd gained from the raids had been enough to cover that, at least. "Call me if you find anything. I'll be in touch."
And with that, you're gone.
The next day, you find yourself sitting back in your office alongside Immolator, staring down at a group of men and women. Nathan, the leader of Lima, and Juliet, the woman unofficially in charge of the ex-police you'd hired, are sitting across the table and to your left, while across the table and to your right are five younger men and women, the gang members Immolator had chosen for you.
Immolator is the first to begin talking, looking between the papers in front of him and the people in front of you. "Okay," he begins nervously. "I've asked you to meet us up here today to discuss, uh, a proposal Vector and I have been working on." He shuffles through the papers nervously, looking for the notes he'd drawn up for himself. "It's an extension of the militia program we discussed, uh, some time back."
He looks up at you, flustered. You give him an encouraging smile, which he returns weakly.
"As you all may or may not know, Prometheus is, um… sorry. Vector and I are part of Prometheus's security division, as you all, uh, probably know. One of the services Prometheus offers is, um, private security. Vector and I, we don't like the thought of keeping that kind of thing privatized, so we want to train you guys to… not be privatized." An embarrassed flush creeps up his cheeks. You rub his arm soothingly, which only causes him to flush more as he scrambles to look through his notes.
For a brief moment, you consider taking over the meeting for him. Immolator is an enhancile, and he does work in the security division with you, but he's still just a teenager, and one who'd dropped out of school some years back, to boot.
But then, that's exactly why you wanted to let him take the lead on this. It won't do him any good for you to take over for him- all it'll do is cause him to rely on you and follow orders. And if you wanted obedient soldiers, you could have just reached out to your contacts in the military.
Instead, you lean over to him and murmur into his ear, "Breathe, James. Take your time."
Thankfully, he listens to you, taking a few deep, slow breaths as he sorts through his papers.
"Sorry," he says eventually, looking up to take the reactions of the people in the room in. Nobody is looking annoyed with him- not that anybody would have dared to, with you sitting beside him prepared to glower menacingly at anyone who so much as looked sideways at him. "Where was I… uh, explaining the project, right."
"Vector and I don't like the thought of keeping our security privatized," he begins again. "We're certainly willing to offer our services to businesses and corporations for a price, but we don't want people to feel unsafe on their streets or in their own homes. Juliet, I'm sure you understand." The blonde nods at him, a small smile gracing her face as he continues to talk. "But Vector and I can't… can't keep the streets safe on our own. We're good, but we can only be in so many places in once, as we all saw recently."
"Yeah, trust us, we all noticed," one of the gang members muttered darkly. You shoot him a glare, and he almost falls out of his chair. "Noticed your, uh, timely arrivals! Yeah…"
Immolator coughs loudly, drawing everyone's attention back to him. "I spent most of yesterday drawing up a proposal," he continues, studiously ignoring the interruption. "I've run it by Vector and Alfonso, and they both approved it, but it's going to be useless if you guys don't like it. And you guys live here, which none of us have. So… If any of you have any thoughts on it, I'd really appreciate it if you'd speak up." Having finished his speech, he began quickly handing out sheafs of paper, handing a small stack to each of the people he'd called up here.
You look down at your own copy in front of you.
The proposal is fairly simple. You want your recruited gang members to begin training beneath Lima and the ex-officers, bolstering their skills and hopefully making them good enough to hold their own in the kind of skirmishes they might encounter on a day-to-day basis. They don't need to be good enough to take on augs on an even footing; that'd take years, even if they had the talents for it. Years and the kinds of weapons you don't have easy access to. They only need to be good enough to survive against other half-trained baselines.
You also want them to go out on recruitment missions, bolstering your security personnel that way. Immolator phrases it rather more diplomatically, of course, but no matter what you call it recruiting is recruiting.
While they all read the proposal, you glance at each of the five gang members in turn, then down at the papers in front of you. Some of the papers are your copy of the proposal, but others are notes Immolator and Shamus prepared for you.
A profile for each of the gang members sits in front of you, full of irrelevant details like their home addresses and schooling levels. You weren't interested in that; only in the information that might tell you more about who they were.
Eamon Guinness, listed at age twenty-four, is the first. The leader of the Black Vipers. The Vipers started up around ten years ago, in fact- most likely in the chaos of the public-sector police department being informally retired. A lot of gangs had started up in that time, but the Vipers had had a significant advantage most of them had never had; the man who'd led it for nearly eight years had worked in corporate security for a good two decades before leaving to found the gang.
Eamon himself, from everything you could tell, was a sharp individual. He'd completed schooling, and was even currently going through university- even more impressive than it sounded, because Northmire University, the one he was attending, was particularly aug-heavy, attracting people from the neighbouring regions of Ulysses and Kingsman's to it. Given how prosperous those areas were compared to the region you were trying to take control of, it was impressive that he was able to maintain his scholarship, even if he wasn't getting particularly good grades.
That was why Immolator recommended him. He was already displaying both leadership capabilities and strong affinity for mental augmentations. If you could secure his loyalty, he'd make a perfect recruit for an officer in your division.
Tara Khalsa, listed at age twenty-eight, is your second major prospect. While not affiliated directly with the leadership of her gang, the Hellions (trademarked by a company over in France, you absently note), she'd been instrumental in getting the gang up and running five years ago. The gang was affiliated with the Grocers, but with a more criminal bent to them; they made a habit of travelling to nearby regions and hijacking shipments of fresh food, then undercutting local grocers to swing a profit for themselves. They'd been doing pretty good, but attrition was getting to them- losing an average of a member a run did that.
Tara was one of their handful of intelligence specialists. Shamus hadn't been able to find out how she knew, but she reported shipment movements and was able to determine the levels of security each shipment would have "with 78% accuracy". It was possible she had good hacking skills, but it was also possible that she had crafted and maintained personal relationships with people within various corporations.
Immolator notes she's clever. You lean down and add your own note- Be wary. Suspicious levels of knowledge. Be careful she doesn't leak our own secrets.
Lucas Newman, listed at age thirty-one, is the third profile and second-in-command of the Hellions. He organizes their sales and hides their activities from corpsec and the remnants of the police. Hiding from even cursory efforts from corpsec requires a decent amount of competence, so you can see why Immolator thinks he's a prospect.
Contrary to your initial expectations, the man doesn't seem to be a technologist type. A bit of a shame, really, considering how powerful a tool they seemed to be in Shamus' hands. Then again, not everyone can have a data uplink connected directly to the towers installed in the roof of Upzone hanging over your heads above. Hell, most people didn't even have a connection- it took money to be able to access the web of information stored in the towers at all.
Karena Valli, listed at sixteen, is the fourth profile. She's not affiliated with a gang- or, well, she was, but that gang was one of the ones that dissolved when you began systematically destroying their weaponry.
She is, in a word, mercenary. Working for the highest bidder as a killer for hire. Young, but you've seen child soldiers. Fought against child soldiers. You're not surprised that a 16 year old can kill someone for money. You are surprised that she's lasted this long without any augs, but you suspect gangs can't afford that many of them normally.
She's good with explosives and small arms, according to Immolator's notes. Nothing compared to Lima or yourself, but probably better than the ex-cops. She probably isn't a good choice to lead the militia, but she could definitely be a solid asset in combat if trained and augmented. If you can find a way to secure her loyalty.
You add a note to her profile, too. Keep an eye on her. Can't have her being made a better offer.
Naomi Cooper, listed at age twenty, is the fifth and last profile in front of you. The co-founder of the Atom-Smashers, a gang that used to operate in this region, and the current leader of the Golden Valkyries, possibly the most pretentious name for a gang you've ever heard.
Naomi seems to be a sentimental woman, for a gang leader. The Atom-Smashers are a very influential gang in Winter Hill, the richest and most prestigious area in your prefecture. When they'd begun gaining influence and prestige, she had started to disassociate herself with them, remaining firmly embroiled in local politics. Eventually, the Atom-Smashers had left entirely, and she'd stuck around to form the Valkyries.
Immolator's notes claim that Naomi is a very charismatic woman. You haven't seen any signs of that, yet, but it's hard for charisma to shine through in a setting like this. You'll have to take his word for it for now. If true, though, it's definitely a solid point in favour of bringing her into this.
"It's a good proposal." Juliet is, unsurprisingly, the first one to speak up. "I can't promise that the others will go for it, but I don't think any of them will have an issue with trying to get the gangs off the streets."
"No issues here either," Nathan says next. "Discretionary budget seems to be high enough to cover equipment and facility costs for training, and scheduling seems fine, although you're not going to have many boots on the ground for the first few weeks. Sure about that?"
Immolator looks over at you, hesitant again. You nod at him, gesturing for him to reply. He does, albeit hesitantly. "Yeah, no, we got the delay covered. Vector and I need to hit the streets for a while anyway, so we'll be on hand to respond to any situations that occur."
"I see."
You wait a moment, but nobody else offers any input. You lean close to Immolator again, murmuring into his ear, "Ask them for ideas."
He nods. "Uh, do the five of you have any ideas?" he asks.
Nobody speaks for another long moment, until eventually Naomi lets out an annoyed sigh.
"Don't got too many," she replied. "Might be a couple gangs I can look into, a coupla people around here'd probably sign up if we told 'em we're plannin' on cleanin' up the streets. Might cost a bit, though, guess I'll have to bring it up if it happens an' all."
Eamon perks up. "Are you thinking about anyone in particular?" he asks. "I've got a few ideas, we could probably work on it to come up with something good."
She considers it for a moment. "I was thinking the Hulkers," she muses. "Edward ain't a bad guy, and since most of 'em have been his friend forever, we could probably nab most of 'em. Ultraviolents could be somethin', boss lady over here only took out their stashes, not their connections. Could be worth it if they're gonna train us up."
"Hmm," Eamon hums. "I'm not too sure about the Ultraviolents; they're a little, well, violent for my tastes. The Hulkers aren't a bad idea, though. They're really only tagged as criminals since they've been hitting Bluelight businesses and Bluelight set their corpsec on them. Maybe the Retros, too?"
You notice Immolator studiously copying down what they're saying, off to your side.
"Dunno 'bout that." Naomi taps the man on his head. "Retros are pretty far gone, over in the Meadery. Don't fancy havin' to go through the Kingsmans' to get to 'em. Not sure enougha their answer to risk it, y'know?"
"Right." He looks a bit let down, but continues. "Perhaps the Summer Hills, then? Nobody's had the balls to try to recruit them since Spook eviscerated the Rollers, but with Vector and Immolator here, we might actually be able to do it."
"That's an idea," Lucas interrupts them. "The Summer Hills are close enough that we won't have to fight our way through too many other gangs to get to them, and we do have some enhanciles of our own to counter him."
"Yeah, but what could you offer him to get him on side?" Karena gestures at you. "Sure, the boss over there can teleport, but just beating him up won't do us much good."
"A fair point," Eamon concedes. "Perhaps, then, Anna?"
"Anna?" Immolator asks curiously. "Who's that?"
"A minor enhancile," Lucas answers. "Makes drugs and such for the gangs over in Kingsmans. Nobody's had any luck in recruiting her, since she's able to make plants and stuff defend her place for her. I'm betting you could help with that, though."
"Kinda ignoring something, though." Karena speaks loudly enough to ensure that everyone can hear her. "Recruiting gangs sounds neat and all, but we're gonna need some practical experience if we want everyone to get the most out of training. The more we recruit, the less people we'll have to take out."
[] For now, Alfonso's business is largely set up. You have your team beneath you, there are various hires in the department, the biotech team is finally producing enough items to begin putting the company in the black again, and Shamus has set up his IT department and is officially heading it. Even Darius has been busy, setting up both a legal department and a PR department for you, although he's only heading up the legal department. You do have one final decision, though; you need to make a final decision on whether or not to set up an investigatory department.
[] You're also going to have to decide on where you're going to focus your efforts for the remainder of this quarter. You gave yourself a timeline of 12 weeks when you started this venture, and you've used 6 weeks of it so far. The gangs that attacked earlier seem to have gone to ground, so you've bought yourself some time. Where are you going to put your focus for the next, say, fortnight?
[] Meanwhile, for something completely different; we're going to have a scene from someone else's perspective in the hopes of exploring the setting a bit more and fleshing out some characterization. There are a few people you can have a scene with. Whose perspective do you want to watch from?
You watch the press conference on cheap pirate TV. You could represent the company-but on the other hand, you don't want to show your face. Not when there might be corporate spies around, looking for a loose end. Shamus made a good point about staying quiet. Stay quiet, stay safe, don't get attention from your former employers. You've never been the best at keeping a low profile, but you still try. And anyways, with Darius there-you're pretty sure both of them are safe from an assassination attempt. He might be an asshole but he's the kind of asshole you can trust with your life, just not with your beer.
"Mister Espinosa." One of the reporters says. She looks downzone. Not the sculpted cosmetic-modded bubbly reporters of a proper news station. Probably a downzone newspaper. Not from someplace as bad as where you are, of course. You're here because the property values were dirt cheap and Alfonso figured with 3 enhanciles, even a rough neighborhood wouldn't be much of a threat. He's probably right. "What can you say about your intervention yesterday in the escalating gang war?"
"We are pleased to announce that we at the Prometheus Group are here to stay. Although we plan to specialize in enhancement biotechnology, we will, rest assured, be bringing security-and prosperity-to this neighborhood. I understand that times are tough," your brother says to the nods of the audience, "and that things have gotten worse. But with our dedication to the community's welfare-I believe we can survive and prosper in these tough times."
"What do you say about the allegations that you're just here to make a profit?"
"Well yes." He says, chuckling. "I would be irresponsible if I wasn't here to make a profit. But I believe that a strong community is the pillar of a profit. There is so much talent here that's lost, which doesn't get the opportunity to thrive. So our company extends beyond just augmentation, into uplifting-both people, and the society. One cannot thrive without the other."
"And what about your security forces?" Another asks, suspicious. "What do you say about the amount of armed force you bring? Are you just another gang?"
"Nothing could be further from the truth." Alfonso sighs theatrically. "We believe in security. We cannot have prosperity without safety-prosperity for either party. As many augmentation customers are in the field of private security, we will of course have in-house security to ensure such a tragic attack like yesterday's never happens again-and that if it does, we can prevent it before any harm comes. Obviously talk is cheap, but I believe the actions we took yesterday to mitigate harm to the community will demonstrate that we mean what we say."
There's some applause at that. It's almost enthusiastic, you think. That's good.
***
You haven't even managed to make it to your car after work when your earpiece buzzes again. The harsh tone informs you that this call isn't from someone on your private network, so it's not any of your employees. You answer anyway, prepared to move for the killswitch immediately if the call isn't legitimate.
"Nick here." The detective's cool synthetic voice is familiar enough- and hard enough to recapture- that you relax momentarily. "Got an update. Can you meet me soon?"
You hurriedly reroute the connection through both Shamus and Immolator's headpieces, allowing them to listen in on the conversation if they turned their earpieces on. "Sure," you answer distractedly. "Have to talk to you anyway, I've got another job for you. How soon do you need to meet?"
"Not my concern." You can almost hear his shrug over your connection. "Preferably sooner than later, if you have another job for me."
An annoyed grunt rises in you, stifled quickly. You'd planned on meeting with the gang members Immolator had selected as being worthy of further consideration, but that wasn't urgent, or at least not as urgent as tracking down the stolen Zenith assets..
"I'm free now." You hurriedly call up a map of the local area. "Is there anywhere in particular you'd like to meet me?"
"Bar called the Smoking Gun. Know where it is?"
A quick search brings up the building's address. At times like this, you really wish development on upcoming features like image searches and navigational routes was progressing better, but it was hard to integrate features like that into HUD's. It'd probably be really annoying to figure out how to use them anyway. You don't relish the thought of having to beg Shamus for training on stuff like that.
"Yeah, I can make it there," you reply. "Meet you there in thirty?"
"Sounds good." The connection closes abruptly. A tired sigh escapes you, choked back quickly, before you begin making your way to your car again.
At least the bar isn't too hard to find. It's an archetypal seedy joint. The bricks out the front are stripped of paint, graffiti replacing them faster than the owners could wash it off. Smoke drifts out from beneath the doors of the bar, and the sound of rock washed over you from half a block away.
You park your car out the front of the building. You're not worried about anybody stealing it- it wouldn't be hard to find in any case, and anybody who was stupid enough to steal it deserved what would happen when you found them. Besides, two burly men stand out the front of the building, glowing red eyes staring mercilessly at you as you climb out of the car. Augs. The bar must be doing far better than it appeared if they could afford to hire augs just for bouncers.
"Hold on," one of them grunts as you approach the building. "No weapons allowed in the bar. Put any you have in this container here-" he taps an empty blue tub sitting on a chair beside him- "and we'll return them to you on leaving."
"Certainly," you reply. Leaning over, you take out your wallet, placing twenty one hundred dollar bills in the tub.
The bouncer looks in, then nods, satisfied. "Thank you for your compliance," he rumbles. "Have a pleasant day."
The bar is even more archetypal inside. Smoke drifts and curls around the floor, snaking up and around the feet of people sitting furtively on tables astride the wall. You're not sure, but you suspect that all the bottles resting in the racks behind the counter are whiskey or cheap beer.
Nick is sitting off the side, nursing a whiskey himself. A glint of light is reflected from his steel jaw- a prosthetic replacement for a jaw lost in an explosion some years back, the Syndicate dossiers had told you. His left arm and right hand are also prosthetics, as bionic as his lungs and voicebox. His liver, too, but that was from the whiskey, not the explosion.
When he sees you, he waves you over, inviting you to sit down. You move over and raise an eyebrow at him, dragging a stool towards you and seating yourself atop it.
"A bit over the top, don't you think?" you ask, gesturing around you at the bar.
He nods in acknowledgement. "Deliberate design choice, I think. Owners wanted to sell an experience, or something. Police used to work in the region, corps had less influence, more PD's around. Now it's good to scope out the competition, see who's the real deal and who's a poser."
You know what he means. Ideas like that had been popular around a decade back. With things like organised crime syndicates and kidnappings falling, many businesses like these had fallen through. A lot of people were still fascinated with noir fiction and the like, so you can see the sense in building a business to sell that experience.
"Who're the posers, then?" you ask.
He looks at you with an expression somewhere between a smirk and a sneer. "Anyone in here," he replies disdainfully. "Real PD's don't work from bars. Terrible for privacy. Better to work in an office, or maybe a car. Depends."
"And yet here we are," you point out.
He nods, ceding your point. "Others are interested in your case, sticking their noses in. Keeping an eye on them, making sure nobody's after them yet. Useless idiots couldn't save themselves from being killed by a stray soybean."
"How noble of you," you reply dryly. "Anyway, you said you had something for me."
He reaches down, lifting a heavy briefcase that he sets atop the table in front of you with a solid clunk. He doesn't open it immediately, though, waiting patiently as you search your own pockets for the dockets confirming the payments to his account- Shamus had been kind enough to send them to you daily. They're in your back pocket, for some reason, and come out crumpled and dog-eared. Nick accepts them without comment, turning the briefcase towards you and opening it.
It's filled with files and photos- dozens, hundreds of them. Too much to go through here. Excellent. "Thank you." You pop it closed. "Give me a brief synopsis."
He drums his fingers against the table. "Kidnapping," he starts. "Fairly certain. Don't know who's behind it, but they're picking off homeless, elderly, people without friends or family with resources to hunt after them. Found more victims- a lot more. Dozens, maybe hundreds. Can't find records of them leaving."
You hum. "Hundreds of victims," you muse. "Unlikely to be a serial killer, then, although it could be an enhancile. Could be murder, could be a face-stealer, could be human trafficking, could be another gang starting up. Got anything more for me?"
"Little." He reaches into his pocket and draws out a cigar, which he quickly lights, blatantly ignoring the lack of an ashtray on the table. "People were poor, downtrodden. Could be gang movements, but unlikely, doesn't match any patterns. Nobody's seen them since. Either dead, or someone with lots of property involved." He politely turns his head as he takes a deep draw of the cigar and exhales, smoke streaming from his mouth. "Could investigate further, but a lot of information there. Would take time, which means money, or help, which means money too. Course, you said you already have another job for me. What is it?"
You mentally shift tracks, following along the man's rapid changes of subject as best you can. "Someone attacked a local corporation. I want you to find out who, why, and where they are now."
He flicks the cigar ash out onto the floor beside the table. Behind him, you can see the barkeep shooting you both a dirty look. "Why?" he asks. "No, ignore that. Saw on the news. Gang attack. Zenith, yes? Will track them down. Standard rates, ten thousand an hour."
"Done." You'd been prepared for this, and have enough to cover him for a week or so set aside without affecting your discretionary fund. The little you'd gained from the raids had been enough to cover that, at least. "Call me if you find anything. I'll be in touch."
And with that, you're gone.
----------
The next day, you find yourself sitting back in your office alongside Immolator, staring down at a group of men and women. Nathan, the leader of Lima, and Juliet, the woman unofficially in charge of the ex-police you'd hired, are sitting across the table and to your left, while across the table and to your right are five younger men and women, the gang members Immolator had chosen for you.
Immolator is the first to begin talking, looking between the papers in front of him and the people in front of you. "Okay," he begins nervously. "I've asked you to meet us up here today to discuss, uh, a proposal Vector and I have been working on." He shuffles through the papers nervously, looking for the notes he'd drawn up for himself. "It's an extension of the militia program we discussed, uh, some time back."
He looks up at you, flustered. You give him an encouraging smile, which he returns weakly.
"As you all may or may not know, Prometheus is, um… sorry. Vector and I are part of Prometheus's security division, as you all, uh, probably know. One of the services Prometheus offers is, um, private security. Vector and I, we don't like the thought of keeping that kind of thing privatized, so we want to train you guys to… not be privatized." An embarrassed flush creeps up his cheeks. You rub his arm soothingly, which only causes him to flush more as he scrambles to look through his notes.
For a brief moment, you consider taking over the meeting for him. Immolator is an enhancile, and he does work in the security division with you, but he's still just a teenager, and one who'd dropped out of school some years back, to boot.
But then, that's exactly why you wanted to let him take the lead on this. It won't do him any good for you to take over for him- all it'll do is cause him to rely on you and follow orders. And if you wanted obedient soldiers, you could have just reached out to your contacts in the military.
Instead, you lean over to him and murmur into his ear, "Breathe, James. Take your time."
Thankfully, he listens to you, taking a few deep, slow breaths as he sorts through his papers.
"Sorry," he says eventually, looking up to take the reactions of the people in the room in. Nobody is looking annoyed with him- not that anybody would have dared to, with you sitting beside him prepared to glower menacingly at anyone who so much as looked sideways at him. "Where was I… uh, explaining the project, right."
"Vector and I don't like the thought of keeping our security privatized," he begins again. "We're certainly willing to offer our services to businesses and corporations for a price, but we don't want people to feel unsafe on their streets or in their own homes. Juliet, I'm sure you understand." The blonde nods at him, a small smile gracing her face as he continues to talk. "But Vector and I can't… can't keep the streets safe on our own. We're good, but we can only be in so many places in once, as we all saw recently."
"Yeah, trust us, we all noticed," one of the gang members muttered darkly. You shoot him a glare, and he almost falls out of his chair. "Noticed your, uh, timely arrivals! Yeah…"
Immolator coughs loudly, drawing everyone's attention back to him. "I spent most of yesterday drawing up a proposal," he continues, studiously ignoring the interruption. "I've run it by Vector and Alfonso, and they both approved it, but it's going to be useless if you guys don't like it. And you guys live here, which none of us have. So… If any of you have any thoughts on it, I'd really appreciate it if you'd speak up." Having finished his speech, he began quickly handing out sheafs of paper, handing a small stack to each of the people he'd called up here.
You look down at your own copy in front of you.
The proposal is fairly simple. You want your recruited gang members to begin training beneath Lima and the ex-officers, bolstering their skills and hopefully making them good enough to hold their own in the kind of skirmishes they might encounter on a day-to-day basis. They don't need to be good enough to take on augs on an even footing; that'd take years, even if they had the talents for it. Years and the kinds of weapons you don't have easy access to. They only need to be good enough to survive against other half-trained baselines.
You also want them to go out on recruitment missions, bolstering your security personnel that way. Immolator phrases it rather more diplomatically, of course, but no matter what you call it recruiting is recruiting.
While they all read the proposal, you glance at each of the five gang members in turn, then down at the papers in front of you. Some of the papers are your copy of the proposal, but others are notes Immolator and Shamus prepared for you.
A profile for each of the gang members sits in front of you, full of irrelevant details like their home addresses and schooling levels. You weren't interested in that; only in the information that might tell you more about who they were.
***
Eamon Guinness, listed at age twenty-four, is the first. The leader of the Black Vipers. The Vipers started up around ten years ago, in fact- most likely in the chaos of the public-sector police department being informally retired. A lot of gangs had started up in that time, but the Vipers had had a significant advantage most of them had never had; the man who'd led it for nearly eight years had worked in corporate security for a good two decades before leaving to found the gang.
Eamon himself, from everything you could tell, was a sharp individual. He'd completed schooling, and was even currently going through university- even more impressive than it sounded, because Northmire University, the one he was attending, was particularly aug-heavy, attracting people from the neighbouring regions of Ulysses and Kingsman's to it. Given how prosperous those areas were compared to the region you were trying to take control of, it was impressive that he was able to maintain his scholarship, even if he wasn't getting particularly good grades.
That was why Immolator recommended him. He was already displaying both leadership capabilities and strong affinity for mental augmentations. If you could secure his loyalty, he'd make a perfect recruit for an officer in your division.
Tara Khalsa, listed at age twenty-eight, is your second major prospect. While not affiliated directly with the leadership of her gang, the Hellions (trademarked by a company over in France, you absently note), she'd been instrumental in getting the gang up and running five years ago. The gang was affiliated with the Grocers, but with a more criminal bent to them; they made a habit of travelling to nearby regions and hijacking shipments of fresh food, then undercutting local grocers to swing a profit for themselves. They'd been doing pretty good, but attrition was getting to them- losing an average of a member a run did that.
Tara was one of their handful of intelligence specialists. Shamus hadn't been able to find out how she knew, but she reported shipment movements and was able to determine the levels of security each shipment would have "with 78% accuracy". It was possible she had good hacking skills, but it was also possible that she had crafted and maintained personal relationships with people within various corporations.
Immolator notes she's clever. You lean down and add your own note- Be wary. Suspicious levels of knowledge. Be careful she doesn't leak our own secrets.
Lucas Newman, listed at age thirty-one, is the third profile and second-in-command of the Hellions. He organizes their sales and hides their activities from corpsec and the remnants of the police. Hiding from even cursory efforts from corpsec requires a decent amount of competence, so you can see why Immolator thinks he's a prospect.
Contrary to your initial expectations, the man doesn't seem to be a technologist type. A bit of a shame, really, considering how powerful a tool they seemed to be in Shamus' hands. Then again, not everyone can have a data uplink connected directly to the towers installed in the roof of Upzone hanging over your heads above. Hell, most people didn't even have a connection- it took money to be able to access the web of information stored in the towers at all.
Karena Valli, listed at sixteen, is the fourth profile. She's not affiliated with a gang- or, well, she was, but that gang was one of the ones that dissolved when you began systematically destroying their weaponry.
She is, in a word, mercenary. Working for the highest bidder as a killer for hire. Young, but you've seen child soldiers. Fought against child soldiers. You're not surprised that a 16 year old can kill someone for money. You are surprised that she's lasted this long without any augs, but you suspect gangs can't afford that many of them normally.
She's good with explosives and small arms, according to Immolator's notes. Nothing compared to Lima or yourself, but probably better than the ex-cops. She probably isn't a good choice to lead the militia, but she could definitely be a solid asset in combat if trained and augmented. If you can find a way to secure her loyalty.
You add a note to her profile, too. Keep an eye on her. Can't have her being made a better offer.
Naomi Cooper, listed at age twenty, is the fifth and last profile in front of you. The co-founder of the Atom-Smashers, a gang that used to operate in this region, and the current leader of the Golden Valkyries, possibly the most pretentious name for a gang you've ever heard.
Naomi seems to be a sentimental woman, for a gang leader. The Atom-Smashers are a very influential gang in Winter Hill, the richest and most prestigious area in your prefecture. When they'd begun gaining influence and prestige, she had started to disassociate herself with them, remaining firmly embroiled in local politics. Eventually, the Atom-Smashers had left entirely, and she'd stuck around to form the Valkyries.
Immolator's notes claim that Naomi is a very charismatic woman. You haven't seen any signs of that, yet, but it's hard for charisma to shine through in a setting like this. You'll have to take his word for it for now. If true, though, it's definitely a solid point in favour of bringing her into this.
***
"It's a good proposal." Juliet is, unsurprisingly, the first one to speak up. "I can't promise that the others will go for it, but I don't think any of them will have an issue with trying to get the gangs off the streets."
"No issues here either," Nathan says next. "Discretionary budget seems to be high enough to cover equipment and facility costs for training, and scheduling seems fine, although you're not going to have many boots on the ground for the first few weeks. Sure about that?"
Immolator looks over at you, hesitant again. You nod at him, gesturing for him to reply. He does, albeit hesitantly. "Yeah, no, we got the delay covered. Vector and I need to hit the streets for a while anyway, so we'll be on hand to respond to any situations that occur."
"I see."
You wait a moment, but nobody else offers any input. You lean close to Immolator again, murmuring into his ear, "Ask them for ideas."
He nods. "Uh, do the five of you have any ideas?" he asks.
Nobody speaks for another long moment, until eventually Naomi lets out an annoyed sigh.
"Don't got too many," she replied. "Might be a couple gangs I can look into, a coupla people around here'd probably sign up if we told 'em we're plannin' on cleanin' up the streets. Might cost a bit, though, guess I'll have to bring it up if it happens an' all."
Eamon perks up. "Are you thinking about anyone in particular?" he asks. "I've got a few ideas, we could probably work on it to come up with something good."
She considers it for a moment. "I was thinking the Hulkers," she muses. "Edward ain't a bad guy, and since most of 'em have been his friend forever, we could probably nab most of 'em. Ultraviolents could be somethin', boss lady over here only took out their stashes, not their connections. Could be worth it if they're gonna train us up."
"Hmm," Eamon hums. "I'm not too sure about the Ultraviolents; they're a little, well, violent for my tastes. The Hulkers aren't a bad idea, though. They're really only tagged as criminals since they've been hitting Bluelight businesses and Bluelight set their corpsec on them. Maybe the Retros, too?"
You notice Immolator studiously copying down what they're saying, off to your side.
"Dunno 'bout that." Naomi taps the man on his head. "Retros are pretty far gone, over in the Meadery. Don't fancy havin' to go through the Kingsmans' to get to 'em. Not sure enougha their answer to risk it, y'know?"
"Right." He looks a bit let down, but continues. "Perhaps the Summer Hills, then? Nobody's had the balls to try to recruit them since Spook eviscerated the Rollers, but with Vector and Immolator here, we might actually be able to do it."
"That's an idea," Lucas interrupts them. "The Summer Hills are close enough that we won't have to fight our way through too many other gangs to get to them, and we do have some enhanciles of our own to counter him."
"Yeah, but what could you offer him to get him on side?" Karena gestures at you. "Sure, the boss over there can teleport, but just beating him up won't do us much good."
"A fair point," Eamon concedes. "Perhaps, then, Anna?"
"Anna?" Immolator asks curiously. "Who's that?"
"A minor enhancile," Lucas answers. "Makes drugs and such for the gangs over in Kingsmans. Nobody's had any luck in recruiting her, since she's able to make plants and stuff defend her place for her. I'm betting you could help with that, though."
"Kinda ignoring something, though." Karena speaks loudly enough to ensure that everyone can hear her. "Recruiting gangs sounds neat and all, but we're gonna need some practical experience if we want everyone to get the most out of training. The more we recruit, the less people we'll have to take out."
[] For now, Alfonso's business is largely set up. You have your team beneath you, there are various hires in the department, the biotech team is finally producing enough items to begin putting the company in the black again, and Shamus has set up his IT department and is officially heading it. Even Darius has been busy, setting up both a legal department and a PR department for you, although he's only heading up the legal department. You do have one final decision, though; you need to make a final decision on whether or not to set up an investigatory department.
[] No; you'll do fine without an investigatory department. Not knowing the situation around you is risky, but drawing the wrong kind of attention is even worse.
[] Yes; you need an investigatory department. There's always the chance that your efforts will draw the wrong kind of attention to you, but you need to have a good idea of what's going on.
[] You'll need someone to head the department, of course. Your best choice would be to pull Lucas Newman from the militia pool and assign him to the department. He's had experience in this kind of thing in the past, and the best part is he's already working for you, so you won't need to pay him anything extra out of your discretionary budget- Alfonso will handle his ongoing wage increase.
[] You'll need someone to head the department, of course. Your best choice would be to pull Nicholas Laine in and make him the offer. He's said to be one of the best private detectives in the region, and managed to pull together a list of over a hundred missing people in just a couple of weeks from next to no information. He's expensive, though. Really expensive. $1.5m
[] Yes; you need an investigatory department. There's always the chance that your efforts will draw the wrong kind of attention to you, but you need to have a good idea of what's going on.
[] You'll need someone to head the department, of course. Your best choice would be to pull Lucas Newman from the militia pool and assign him to the department. He's had experience in this kind of thing in the past, and the best part is he's already working for you, so you won't need to pay him anything extra out of your discretionary budget- Alfonso will handle his ongoing wage increase.
[] You'll need someone to head the department, of course. Your best choice would be to pull Nicholas Laine in and make him the offer. He's said to be one of the best private detectives in the region, and managed to pull together a list of over a hundred missing people in just a couple of weeks from next to no information. He's expensive, though. Really expensive. $1.5m
[] You're also going to have to decide on where you're going to focus your efforts for the remainder of this quarter. You gave yourself a timeline of 12 weeks when you started this venture, and you've used 6 weeks of it so far. The gangs that attacked earlier seem to have gone to ground, so you've bought yourself some time. Where are you going to put your focus for the next, say, fortnight?
[] You go into fights with the army you have, make sure that it's the army you want. By going to some of your old military contacts and picking up some decent gear, you can make sure that army will be capable of handling much more dangerous threats. It'll cost you some money-you're looking for good military surplus rather than old SPIWs and other 1960s relics from a dusty National Guard armory-but you could probably sneak in some upgrades for all your forces in there as well, including Lima.
[] You're going to assist the militia in their patrols around the city. By covering them in fights, taking down any augmented soldiers they may cover and preventing them from coming under heavy fire, you can prevent a lot of casualties that might be incurred while they're still in training- and get them used to working with enhanciles. It'll also let you keep the forces on the ground light, so the net result is that you'll have a lot more militia to work with when all's said and done.
[] You're going to spend your time working with your militia trainers and their leaders to reinvent community policing. By doing this, you'll hopefully help to avoid any drama that might arise from the perception of your ex-gangers- and the key to securing work in the private security sector is to have people think your men are good fits for the job. Having people who can work as peacekeepers instead of occupation forces might be very useful.
[] You're going to assist the militia in their patrols around the city. By covering them in fights, taking down any augmented soldiers they may cover and preventing them from coming under heavy fire, you can prevent a lot of casualties that might be incurred while they're still in training- and get them used to working with enhanciles. It'll also let you keep the forces on the ground light, so the net result is that you'll have a lot more militia to work with when all's said and done.
[] You're going to spend your time working with your militia trainers and their leaders to reinvent community policing. By doing this, you'll hopefully help to avoid any drama that might arise from the perception of your ex-gangers- and the key to securing work in the private security sector is to have people think your men are good fits for the job. Having people who can work as peacekeepers instead of occupation forces might be very useful.
[] Meanwhile, for something completely different; we're going to have a scene from someone else's perspective in the hopes of exploring the setting a bit more and fleshing out some characterization. There are a few people you can have a scene with. Whose perspective do you want to watch from?
[] Immolator.
[] Shamus.
[] Laine.
[] Alfonso.
[] Vertex.
[] Shamus.
[] Laine.
[] Alfonso.
[] Vertex.
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[X] Yes; you need an investigatory department. There's always the chance that your efforts will draw the wrong kind of attention to you, but you need to have a good idea of what's going on.
-[X] You'll need someone to head the department, of course. Your best choice would be to pull Lucas Newman from the militia pool and assign him to the department. He's had experience in this kind of thing in the past, and the best part is he's already working for you, so you won't need to pay him anything extra out of your discretionary budget- Alfonso will handle his ongoing wage increase.
[X] You're going to spend your time working with your militia trainers and their leaders to reinvent community policing. By doing this, you'll hopefully help to avoid any drama that might arise from the perception of your ex-gangers- and the key to securing work in the private security sector is to have people think your men are good fits for the job. Having people who can work as peacekeepers instead of occupation forces might be very useful.
[X] Shamus.
-[X] You'll need someone to head the department, of course. Your best choice would be to pull Lucas Newman from the militia pool and assign him to the department. He's had experience in this kind of thing in the past, and the best part is he's already working for you, so you won't need to pay him anything extra out of your discretionary budget- Alfonso will handle his ongoing wage increase.
[X] You're going to spend your time working with your militia trainers and their leaders to reinvent community policing. By doing this, you'll hopefully help to avoid any drama that might arise from the perception of your ex-gangers- and the key to securing work in the private security sector is to have people think your men are good fits for the job. Having people who can work as peacekeepers instead of occupation forces might be very useful.
[X] Shamus.
- Location
- Luton Airport
[X] Yes; you need an investigatory department. There's always the chance that your efforts will draw the wrong kind of attention to you, but you need to have a good idea of what's going on.
[X] USER MOTION Offer Nicholas Laine part payment in kind, having our people upgrade/improve his prosthetics, to cut back on the total cash bill.
[X] You go into fights with the army you have, make sure that it's the army you want. By going to some of your old military contacts and picking up some decent gear, you can make sure that army will be capable of handling much more dangerous threats. It'll cost you some money-you're looking for good military surplus rather than old SPIWs and other 1960s relics from a dusty National Guard armory-but you could probably sneak in some upgrades for all your forces in there as well, including Lima.
[X] Vertex's Viewpoint. Be interesting to see an outsiders view of our impact on the neighbourhood.
[X] USER MOTION - Prioritise recruiting Anna, the plant/drugs based enhancile.
[X] Get James to assist the militia in their patrols around the city. He's going to out on the street poking his nose around and following leads that Laine turns up anyway, and this way he gets more experience, the militia gets more exposure to working with enhanciles, and if one of the leads ends up kicking a hornets nest, James has some kind of support before you and Lima fall on those fuckers like an orbital kinetic strike.
[X] USER MOTION - Have Chemist synthesise scorpion venom for use by our biotech people and for sale.
On the ex-ganger recruits, Eamon and Naomi seem like excellent bets for officers in our security division. Karena, I suspect, might fit better in that "Deniables Squad" I want to start, for the operations we want to keep at arms length from the corp. The two Hellions, Lucas and Tara, look like they might be ideal to run the black market agribiz idea, alongside the enhancile I want to try recruiting, Anna.
[X] USER MOTION Offer Nicholas Laine part payment in kind, having our people upgrade/improve his prosthetics, to cut back on the total cash bill.
[X] You go into fights with the army you have, make sure that it's the army you want. By going to some of your old military contacts and picking up some decent gear, you can make sure that army will be capable of handling much more dangerous threats. It'll cost you some money-you're looking for good military surplus rather than old SPIWs and other 1960s relics from a dusty National Guard armory-but you could probably sneak in some upgrades for all your forces in there as well, including Lima.
[X] Vertex's Viewpoint. Be interesting to see an outsiders view of our impact on the neighbourhood.
[X] USER MOTION - Prioritise recruiting Anna, the plant/drugs based enhancile.
[X] Get James to assist the militia in their patrols around the city. He's going to out on the street poking his nose around and following leads that Laine turns up anyway, and this way he gets more experience, the militia gets more exposure to working with enhanciles, and if one of the leads ends up kicking a hornets nest, James has some kind of support before you and Lima fall on those fuckers like an orbital kinetic strike.
[X] USER MOTION - Have Chemist synthesise scorpion venom for use by our biotech people and for sale.
On the ex-ganger recruits, Eamon and Naomi seem like excellent bets for officers in our security division. Karena, I suspect, might fit better in that "Deniables Squad" I want to start, for the operations we want to keep at arms length from the corp. The two Hellions, Lucas and Tara, look like they might be ideal to run the black market agribiz idea, alongside the enhancile I want to try recruiting, Anna.
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Vindictus
XENO
- Location
- Texas
Have to run so don't have time for full plan
one option for securing loyalty would be providing scholarship moneys, possibly
what is he studying
- Location
- Australia
We left that deliberately blank so players could decide on it if they wanted to.
Pandemonious Ivy
Panties, Revolution. Big Drawers. Parachute.
PHILOSOPHY
- Location
- va
[X] Yes; you need an investigatory department. There's always the chance that your efforts will draw the wrong kind of attention to you, but you need to have a good idea of what's going on.
-[X] You'll need someone to head the department, of course. Your best choice would be to pull Lucas Newman from the militia pool and assign him to the department. He's had experience in this kind of thing in the past, and the best part is he's already working for you, so you won't need to pay him anything extra out of your discretionary budget- Alfonso will handle his ongoing wage increase.
[X] You're going to spend your time working with your militia trainers and their leaders to reinvent community policing. By doing this, you'll hopefully help to avoid any drama that might arise from the perception of your ex-gangers- and the key to securing work in the private security sector is to have people think your men are good fits for the job. Having people who can work as peacekeepers instead of occupation forces might be very useful.
[X] Shamus.
-[X] You'll need someone to head the department, of course. Your best choice would be to pull Lucas Newman from the militia pool and assign him to the department. He's had experience in this kind of thing in the past, and the best part is he's already working for you, so you won't need to pay him anything extra out of your discretionary budget- Alfonso will handle his ongoing wage increase.
[X] You're going to spend your time working with your militia trainers and their leaders to reinvent community policing. By doing this, you'll hopefully help to avoid any drama that might arise from the perception of your ex-gangers- and the key to securing work in the private security sector is to have people think your men are good fits for the job. Having people who can work as peacekeepers instead of occupation forces might be very useful.
[X] Shamus.
Sarpedon
Knight Errant
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Please he is clearly a Philosophy/Business Economics Double Major
also
[X] Vertex.
its the next best thing to SUPERHERO RILEY/D-Dog perspective and lets us see our corp from the community side.
Still thinking on the other bits.
- Location
- in the trash
Vindictus
XENO
- Location
- Texas
Okay.
Would a cross-department transfer be possible depending on the focus chosen, or would we need to keep him in the Security department? If we have cross-departmental transfers in mind, then we might want to get him some kind of degree that would help in one of our... Less staffed departments. Or possibly one of the ones that hasn't even been made yet.
As far as possible majors and combinations thereof go, here's my take:
Structural and Demolitions Engineering: Would help us build or modify facilities- And, perhaps more importantly, would help us take down enemy facilities in a precise, controlled fashion.
Management and Organizational Psychology: A more specialized twist to the 'Psychology/Business' double major Arcus suggested, which might make him useful in a number of leadership roles across the organization.
Computer Science: Obviously, we'd be doing this to bulk out our IT department. We might want to look into hiring regular CS majors before we do this, though.
Law: Again, this would be to bulk out a smaller department, and we should look into hiring other lawyers before we do this.
Forensic Science: Could be a benefit to a potential 'Investigations' department, if we ever get that started up.
After thinking about it, we should definitely not have him training in Science, because I'm sure that the science guys have already worked out a pecking order and we shouldn't make plans for that until we've at least given them a look over.
I also considered having him focus in kineseology, reasoning that having someone in house who knows exactly how physical training works could let us create better security officers, but then I decided that the ability to just augment our soldiers made this kind of worthless. Similarly, I discarded the idea of having him focus on Accounting, as I assume that Alfonso has someone taking care of the books already, and Criminal Justice, reasoning that we probably wouldn't get too much benefit from that major.
- Location
- Luton Airport
That seems like the best bet, given his already evident leadership capabilities, leaving us with solid officer candidate for our security department. Naomi is another one we might want to think about funding to go study. Possibly politics in her case.
Also @MJ12 Commando, @Tempera, can Chemist whip up some combat drugs, to at least give our unenhanced troops a ghost of a chance if a bunch of Augs come after them?
- Location
- Australia
You can do that. Mind that transferring these guys away means you've got even fewer people you think have cool skills to lead the militia with, though.
Yes to the first part, proooobably not to the second.
Vindictus
XENO
- Location
- Texas
Honestly, I don't really want to do a cross departmental transfer, but knowing that it is an option if we need it is pretty handy.
Anyway, as far as the other candidates go, I'm having a hard time thinking of what we could do to make them more loyal. Giving Lucas a position as Head of Investigations might do the trick for him, getting him more invested in our company- Or it might be a complete disaster if he's a mole.
On the subject of moles, I'm also somewhat wary of giving Khalsa any promotions in the near future, just based on how she's been presented. On the other hand, I suspect that might be a deliberate psyche-out on part of the GMs, to get us to sideline a useful asset. On the third paw, I suspect that the GMs probably know that people will suspect that it's a psyche out, and actually make her a spy so that when the players attempt to call the bluff it is revealed that she actually was a spy all along... I may be overthinking this.
Naomi seems invested in the local community, so I think she'd be influenced by us continuing to help build up the local community. However, if she left her first gang when they started growing beyond the community, then I'm not sure about whether or not she'd leave us when we grow outside of the community... Not an immediate risk, of course, but it's there.
Finally, Karena... I dunno. Not enough info to draw any conclusions about her TBH. Like, even more than the others, we know basically nothing about her except that she's good at killing stuff.
[x] Yes; you need an investigatory department. There's always the chance that your efforts will draw the wrong kind of attention to you, but you need to have a good idea of what's going on.
-[x] You'll need someone to head the department, of course. Your best choice would be to pull Lucas Newman from the militia pool and assign him to the department. He's had experience in this kind of thing in the past, and the best part is he's already working for you, so you won't need to pay him anything extra out of your discretionary budget- Alfonso will handle his ongoing wage increase.
For now, I think the risk in trusting Lucas is worth saving 1.5 million, and we need that intelligence department.
[x] You're going to spend your time working with your militia trainers and their leaders to reinvent community policing. By doing this, you'll hopefully help to avoid any drama that might arise from the perception of your ex-gangers- and the key to securing work in the private security sector is to have people think your men are good fits for the job. Having people who can work as peacekeepers instead of occupation forces might be very useful.
Hopefully, this will help our PR and community building efforts, and get Naomi more invested in the company.
[x] Vertex.
This both gives us an outside viewpoint, and works to scout out a potential hire.
Tempted to go for Laine instead, but holding off on that for now.
Anyway, as far as the other candidates go, I'm having a hard time thinking of what we could do to make them more loyal. Giving Lucas a position as Head of Investigations might do the trick for him, getting him more invested in our company- Or it might be a complete disaster if he's a mole.
On the subject of moles, I'm also somewhat wary of giving Khalsa any promotions in the near future, just based on how she's been presented. On the other hand, I suspect that might be a deliberate psyche-out on part of the GMs, to get us to sideline a useful asset. On the third paw, I suspect that the GMs probably know that people will suspect that it's a psyche out, and actually make her a spy so that when the players attempt to call the bluff it is revealed that she actually was a spy all along... I may be overthinking this.
Naomi seems invested in the local community, so I think she'd be influenced by us continuing to help build up the local community. However, if she left her first gang when they started growing beyond the community, then I'm not sure about whether or not she'd leave us when we grow outside of the community... Not an immediate risk, of course, but it's there.
Finally, Karena... I dunno. Not enough info to draw any conclusions about her TBH. Like, even more than the others, we know basically nothing about her except that she's good at killing stuff.
[x] Yes; you need an investigatory department. There's always the chance that your efforts will draw the wrong kind of attention to you, but you need to have a good idea of what's going on.
-[x] You'll need someone to head the department, of course. Your best choice would be to pull Lucas Newman from the militia pool and assign him to the department. He's had experience in this kind of thing in the past, and the best part is he's already working for you, so you won't need to pay him anything extra out of your discretionary budget- Alfonso will handle his ongoing wage increase.
For now, I think the risk in trusting Lucas is worth saving 1.5 million, and we need that intelligence department.
[x] You're going to spend your time working with your militia trainers and their leaders to reinvent community policing. By doing this, you'll hopefully help to avoid any drama that might arise from the perception of your ex-gangers- and the key to securing work in the private security sector is to have people think your men are good fits for the job. Having people who can work as peacekeepers instead of occupation forces might be very useful.
Hopefully, this will help our PR and community building efforts, and get Naomi more invested in the company.
[x] Vertex.
This both gives us an outside viewpoint, and works to scout out a potential hire.
Tempted to go for Laine instead, but holding off on that for now.
- Location
- in the trash
For Karena, we might want to see if we can find something that matters to her other than money. That she's working at such a young age suggests a rather messy family situation.
Naomi's hook is the most clear; she's probably really invested in the local community, so if we help to make the local community safe and prosperous we shouldn't have to worry about her loyalty. Expanding operations beyond just this area shouldn't be a problem with her as long as we don't decide to pull up and relocate.
Naomi's hook is the most clear; she's probably really invested in the local community, so if we help to make the local community safe and prosperous we shouldn't have to worry about her loyalty. Expanding operations beyond just this area shouldn't be a problem with her as long as we don't decide to pull up and relocate.
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TenfoldShields
Lounging on a Hoard of Words
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I love Immolator. He's such a dork.
[X] Yes; you need an investigatory department. There's always the chance that your efforts will draw the wrong kind of attention to you, but you need to have a good idea of what's going on.
[X] USER MOTION Offer Nicholas Laine part payment in kind, having our people upgrade/improve his prosthetics, to cut back on the total cash bill.
[X] You go into fights with the army you have, make sure that it's the army you want. By going to some of your old military contacts and picking up some decent gear, you can make sure that army will be capable of handling much more dangerous threats. It'll cost you some money-you're looking for good military surplus rather than old SPIWs and other 1960s relics from a dusty National Guard armory-but you could probably sneak in some upgrades for all your forces in there as well, including Lima.
[X] Vertex's Viewpoint. Be interesting to see an outsiders view of our impact on the neighbourhood.
[X] USER MOTION - Prioritise recruiting Anna, the plant/drugs based enhancile.
[X] Get James to assist the militia in their patrols around the city. He's going to out on the street poking his nose around and following leads that Laine turns up anyway, and this way he gets more experience, the militia gets more exposure to working with enhanciles, and if one of the leads ends up kicking a hornets nest, James has some kind of support before you and Lima fall on those fuckers like an orbital kinetic strike.
Laine's good enough that we're already relying on him. He's got a good sense of the community and was able to make inroads on a series of carefully hidden interlinked disappearances in, like, a month. Less even.
We might as well bite the bullet and offer him a long term contract, sprinkling it with a sickass biotech liver so he can drink all the cyber-whiskey he wants. I mean he's good at what he does, the best we have access to at this stage, and I'd much rather get a monopoly on his time and skills than run the risk of "sorry can't help, on another job but here's a few dudes who are 'okay' and could use the work". Because as the world opens up that's just going to be a kick in the balls.
My main argument for @Ironanvil1's choice, regarding the tech-up in particular, is that this is a really good point to improve not only troop quality but troop coherency. We've been a little rag-tag up to this point. A mixed spread of units that are only kinda half-integrated, like a particularly lumpy milkshake. We get everyone as close to standardized kit as we can. We get everyone decent armor. We get everyone matching masks too ideally (gotta get that sexy, cyberpunk gasmask; I'm not even joking, I'm dead serious). We start building a regimented idea of Prometheus.
A sort of esprit de corps y'know?
Breaking down the barriers so that the footsoldiers aren't "an ex-officer who hitched his hopes to the company" or "sorta-ex ganger here out of self preservation", but "this guy's a Prometheus heavy trooper, they're Prometheus's elite rapid response unit, I'm a Prometheus scout". Erasing some of their individual identities and painting them over with a Prometheus colored brush. It's something every major organization needs to do at some point, we should get started sooner rather than later. Especially as we start recruiting more heavily.
I think for a self-styled professional like her the ability to train with Lima is going to be pretty damn appealing. Gear and contacts and cash comes and goes, breaks down or gets lost. But skills never go out of style. And with the right skills she can get all those other things.
[X] Yes; you need an investigatory department. There's always the chance that your efforts will draw the wrong kind of attention to you, but you need to have a good idea of what's going on.
[X] USER MOTION Offer Nicholas Laine part payment in kind, having our people upgrade/improve his prosthetics, to cut back on the total cash bill.
[X] You go into fights with the army you have, make sure that it's the army you want. By going to some of your old military contacts and picking up some decent gear, you can make sure that army will be capable of handling much more dangerous threats. It'll cost you some money-you're looking for good military surplus rather than old SPIWs and other 1960s relics from a dusty National Guard armory-but you could probably sneak in some upgrades for all your forces in there as well, including Lima.
[X] Vertex's Viewpoint. Be interesting to see an outsiders view of our impact on the neighbourhood.
[X] USER MOTION - Prioritise recruiting Anna, the plant/drugs based enhancile.
[X] Get James to assist the militia in their patrols around the city. He's going to out on the street poking his nose around and following leads that Laine turns up anyway, and this way he gets more experience, the militia gets more exposure to working with enhanciles, and if one of the leads ends up kicking a hornets nest, James has some kind of support before you and Lima fall on those fuckers like an orbital kinetic strike.
Laine's good enough that we're already relying on him. He's got a good sense of the community and was able to make inroads on a series of carefully hidden interlinked disappearances in, like, a month. Less even.
We might as well bite the bullet and offer him a long term contract, sprinkling it with a sickass biotech liver so he can drink all the cyber-whiskey he wants. I mean he's good at what he does, the best we have access to at this stage, and I'd much rather get a monopoly on his time and skills than run the risk of "sorry can't help, on another job but here's a few dudes who are 'okay' and could use the work". Because as the world opens up that's just going to be a kick in the balls.
My main argument for @Ironanvil1's choice, regarding the tech-up in particular, is that this is a really good point to improve not only troop quality but troop coherency. We've been a little rag-tag up to this point. A mixed spread of units that are only kinda half-integrated, like a particularly lumpy milkshake. We get everyone as close to standardized kit as we can. We get everyone decent armor. We get everyone matching masks too ideally (gotta get that sexy, cyberpunk gasmask; I'm not even joking, I'm dead serious). We start building a regimented idea of Prometheus.
A sort of esprit de corps y'know?
Breaking down the barriers so that the footsoldiers aren't "an ex-officer who hitched his hopes to the company" or "sorta-ex ganger here out of self preservation", but "this guy's a Prometheus heavy trooper, they're Prometheus's elite rapid response unit, I'm a Prometheus scout". Erasing some of their individual identities and painting them over with a Prometheus colored brush. It's something every major organization needs to do at some point, we should get started sooner rather than later. Especially as we start recruiting more heavily.
I think for a self-styled professional like her the ability to train with Lima is going to be pretty damn appealing. Gear and contacts and cash comes and goes, breaks down or gets lost. But skills never go out of style. And with the right skills she can get all those other things.
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Sarpedon
Knight Errant
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] Yes; you need an investigatory department. There's always the chance that your efforts will draw the wrong kind of attention to you, but you need to have a good idea of what's going on.
[X] Offer Nicholas Laine part payment in kind, having our people upgrade/improve his prosthetics, to cut back on the total cash bill.
[X] You go into fights with the army you have, make sure that it's the army you want. By going to some of your old military contacts and picking up some decent gear, you can make sure that army will be capable of handling much more dangerous threats. It'll cost you some money-you're looking for good military surplus rather than old SPIWs and other 1960s relics from a dusty National Guard armory-but you could probably sneak in some upgrades for all your forces in there as well, including Lima.
[x] Vertex.
[X] Get James to assist the militia in their patrols around the city. He's going to out on the street poking his nose around and following leads that Laine turns up anyway, and this way he gets more experience, the militia gets more exposure to working with enhanciles, and if one of the leads ends up kicking a hornets nest, James has some kind of support before you and Lima fall on those fuckers like an orbital kinetic strike.
Collating all the bits. Also it strikes me that given his age, Eamon is probably getting a masters so while I stand by my previous GLORIOUS PHIL/BUISNESS ECON double major, hes probably in the middle of getting like an MBA so offering to pay off his loans/give him scholarships would be a good idea.
[X] Offer Nicholas Laine part payment in kind, having our people upgrade/improve his prosthetics, to cut back on the total cash bill.
[X] You go into fights with the army you have, make sure that it's the army you want. By going to some of your old military contacts and picking up some decent gear, you can make sure that army will be capable of handling much more dangerous threats. It'll cost you some money-you're looking for good military surplus rather than old SPIWs and other 1960s relics from a dusty National Guard armory-but you could probably sneak in some upgrades for all your forces in there as well, including Lima.
[x] Vertex.
[X] Get James to assist the militia in their patrols around the city. He's going to out on the street poking his nose around and following leads that Laine turns up anyway, and this way he gets more experience, the militia gets more exposure to working with enhanciles, and if one of the leads ends up kicking a hornets nest, James has some kind of support before you and Lima fall on those fuckers like an orbital kinetic strike.
Collating all the bits. Also it strikes me that given his age, Eamon is probably getting a masters so while I stand by my previous GLORIOUS PHIL/BUISNESS ECON double major, hes probably in the middle of getting like an MBA so offering to pay off his loans/give him scholarships would be a good idea.
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- Location
- in the trash
[X] Yes; you need an investigatory department. There's always the chance that your efforts will draw the wrong kind of attention to you, but you need to have a good idea of what's going on.
[X] Offer Nicholas Laine part payment in kind, having our people upgrade/improve his prosthetics, to cut back on the total cash bill.
[X] You go into fights with the army you have, make sure that it's the army you want. By going to some of your old military contacts and picking up some decent gear, you can make sure that army will be capable of handling much more dangerous threats. It'll cost you some money-you're looking for goodmilitary surplus rather than old SPIWs and other 1960s relics from a dusty National Guard armory-but you could probably sneak in some upgrades for all your forces in there as well, including Lima.
[X] Vertex's Viewpoint. Be interesting to see an outsiders view of our impact on the neighbourhood.
[X] Prioritise recruiting Anna, the plant/drugs based enhancile.
[X] Offer Nicholas Laine part payment in kind, having our people upgrade/improve his prosthetics, to cut back on the total cash bill.
[X] You go into fights with the army you have, make sure that it's the army you want. By going to some of your old military contacts and picking up some decent gear, you can make sure that army will be capable of handling much more dangerous threats. It'll cost you some money-you're looking for goodmilitary surplus rather than old SPIWs and other 1960s relics from a dusty National Guard armory-but you could probably sneak in some upgrades for all your forces in there as well, including Lima.
[X] Vertex's Viewpoint. Be interesting to see an outsiders view of our impact on the neighbourhood.
[X] Prioritise recruiting Anna, the plant/drugs based enhancile.
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Vindictus
XENO
- Location
- Texas
Why not just an MA in Philosophy and Economics?
- Location
- in the trash
Nah, we need to get some of those sleek faceless helmets with fiddly plastic bits and lots of angles.
- Location
- Luton Airport
The policing training is important, but it's not something we need to do right now, in the next two weeks, while we still have a street war against an unidentified opponent ongoing. Being able to tool up our recruits with shinies is also going to increase our appeal in recruiting ex-gangers to our services, I would think, better weapons and protection indicating we value them as more than cannonfodder.
Since I don't think Alfonso and the admin people are going to be that involved in sourcing milspec weapons for our people, it might be worth having them get started on the gladhanding aspects of our security division's PR, talking to local notables, that kind of thing, about what they want our security presence to offer. We're already offering a change from gangs openly coming round demanding protection money with menaces, so we don't necessarily have to present a perfect corporate security facade instantly, as long as we continue to herald improvement.
Since I don't think Alfonso and the admin people are going to be that involved in sourcing milspec weapons for our people, it might be worth having them get started on the gladhanding aspects of our security division's PR, talking to local notables, that kind of thing, about what they want our security presence to offer. We're already offering a change from gangs openly coming round demanding protection money with menaces, so we don't necessarily have to present a perfect corporate security facade instantly, as long as we continue to herald improvement.
[X] Hire Five Year Old to vet plans.
- Location
- in the trash
We'll do that after we finish placing the orders for black uniforms from Hugo Boss.
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