Houston GM

Joanna wants to use the combat ability Double-team, but needs somebody else with the ability first.

Jrska OoC: leers I've got Double-team.
Cassius OoC: facepalm Given Jrska's recent mutation ... you may as well rename it Spitroast.

Joanna seems to be leaning towards Slaanesh worship despite her best efforts. With any luck she'll no longer be a Sister of Battle, but can be rechristened a Sister of Pain.

Jrska: Who could resist when I'm around as such a good example? No-one can resist the beastwoman's butt. Poses

Cassius has also realised he can share his power with his minions.

GM: You'll still need to mark them with profane symbols.
Joanna: I'll let Cassius brand me.
Jrska: Aw, you won't let ME brand you.
Joanna: I never said that...

Jrska: I'm going to have so much fun with Joanna.
Cassius: You do realise I'll be branding her with Tzeentchian runes, right?
Jrska: Eh, I'll balance it with a nice Slaanesh symbol on her other buttock.

Cassius' player (to GM): I been watching – you've been stroking your goatee all day
Joanna's player: 'What shall I do to the PCs now?'
Jrska's player: He needs a white cat
GM: Now I'll all self-conscious!
Cassius' player: My work here is done.

Anyway – Cassius and Joanna are setting up a ritual that require the mutual murder of the Imperial and Severian commanders, while the rest of the warband are off to capture the aforementioned individuals. In fact, we just drove off an Imperial Stormtrooper attack on the Severian HQ.

Aladar, still insubstantial, hurries off after the retreating stormtroopers. He still has officers to immolate, after all. Cog, of course, is still lying shot and bleeding back at the door trying to weld his ribs back into place.

Jrska: That's why I left him to it. He needs to learn to appreciate the agony.

The Severian general is wearing a big white fur coat.

Jrska: Mmmm, I'll have that.

Jrska and her Kingfisher Girls, all wearing looted Severian uniforms, take refuge in audacity and stroll right into rebel HQ like they belong there.

Jrska: The body language screams 'Officer!' while the actual facts say Mutant.
Cassius: And by the time they sort out the cognitive dissonance -
Jrska: I'll be right in the middle of them

She marches up to the Severian commander, and unhooks a Web grenade from her bandolier.

Jrska: Reinforcements from home, sir. I was told to give you this.

Jrska does her very best Arnold Rimmer salute, but the Severian general recoils just in time to avoid the worst of exploding web grenade. Rapidly hardening fluid sprays in all directions.

GM: There's something I could say here, but I won't.
Jrska: Well, that was premature.
Cassius' Player: Did I ever tell you about my Bukkake Missile character? (A Monk/Psion with Entangling Ectoplasm.)

True, Jrska gets caught in the entangling blast too, but she DID manage to get within arm’s length of the Severian general, and they're now bound face to face.

Jrska: Hi there. Is that a plasma pistol in your pocket or are you just pleased to see me?
General: Get away from me, beast!
Jrska: fondles the general
General: Get off me!
Jrska: He doesn't know me very well, does he?
Cassius OoC: What's that condition that scrambles the order of words you hear? And he just said 'Get Off Me'

A pack of Severian troops attack Jrska as she frees herself of the goop. She giggles as one actually manages to hurt her.

Jrska: Oh you cute boy! A dozen warriors can stain their weapons in me without harm.

Back at the ritual room, somebody lobs a few grenades into the ritual room. Rather than ruin the preparation, Daemon Prince Cassius flings himself over the explosives. After all, he's a daemon now.

Jrska OoC: With any luck they aren't holy hand grenades.

True, this is probably evidence that Cassius hasn’t got the hang of being a Lord of Chaos yet – a true devotee of the Ruinous Powers would have thrown one of his minions over the grenade.

Joanna: Imperials? Those guys are so dead.
GM: Maybe.
Joanna: Are they wearing red shirts?
GM: Actually.. checks the Regiment picture Yes. Sigh

GM: I just thought – can you hear your own voice over mindlink?
Cassius: Is that what I sound like? Oh gods, why did nobody tell me? Is that my ass? Why did nobody tell me!

Joanna kills the Imperial sergeant before Cassius can psychically devour his mind, and he radiates his displeasure.

Jrska: Don't worry, my lord, I'll chastise her later – I've been saving that porcupine-skin condom for a special occasion.

The Imperials are reconsidering the wisdom of attacking a Daemon Prince.

Troops: Run away! Run away!

Cassius eats the brain of the sergeant Joanna killed – not ideal, but still useful given his lingering Space Marine talents - and radios his commander, mimics the sergeant's voice, and get gets a tactical sitrep. Including the whereabouts of the Imperial Commander. He sends Joanna off to assist Jrska’s efforts. Our Daemon Engine Stormfarrow sulks.

Joanna arrives at the Severian HQ and starts lobbing frag and stun grenades into the swirling melee of blinded, insane, stunned and raving Severians, Kingfisher Girls, and PCs. Aladar disarms the blinded General.

Aladar: Anybody got any sedatives?
Jrska: Cog does.
Joanna: I thought you would.
Jrska: I tend to go for stimulants

We cart the Severian general and a few of the more amusing survivors back to Cassius, who mind-probes the general for communication codes. Then Jrska informs the Severian troops that the general has been kidnapped by Imperials dressed as Severians, and where in the starfort he's being taken. Since this includes the equally confused Imperials, the results should be glorious chaos as everybody converges and start fighting each other and themselves.

Of course, we still need to capture the Imperial commander, and somehow get the two commanders to kill each other.

Cog: Don't forget to switch uniforms.
Jrska: Thanks for the reminder

We send Stormfarrow off to have fun with the Imperial fortifications, while we flank the Imperial HQ, and burn our way through the walls with Cassius' fearsome psychic power. The encampment on the other side is absolutely normal for this kind of engagement.

Jrska: Standard IKEA encampment?
Cassius: The tech-priests would like to know how you know the name of the Ancient Standard Construction Template designer.

Time to storm the pre-fab fortress!

Bizarrely enough, Ian had nothing to do with this



But he did  update me on his campaign of terror in DayZ. He's decided to build a base for himself. He didn't used to have a base - just an outhouse on the middle of the Haunted Forest. Teams would go into the forest hunting for his non-existent base, and walk right past the outhouse. He eavesdropped on one assassin that had gone in hunting him - the other PC radioed back "I've got to the outhouse - what do I do now?", dithered for a bit, then lost his nerve and fled back to town.

Anyway, his new base isn't as elaborate as most - it's just a barn. It's the accessories that make it the target of rage across the server. As one of Ian's friends asked him -

"Why have you spent four cases of gold on grenades?"

The grenades became the thirty-meter deep minefield around the barn. So far, nobody has even got to the door, despite him 'helpfully' arranging (booby-trapped) oil drums to jump between. One player even tried to drive a tank up to his door, and it got blown up too. Ian cheerfully looted the bodies and parked the tank beside his barn, and invited the player to come retrieve it. One team did try to land a helicopter on the roof, but Ian had deliberately chosen a building with a sloped roof. They slid right off into the minefield. Naturally, the carnage has greatly improved Ian's pile of loot. To the fury of the other players, he just stores it all in the barn.

Player: I got him! I finally got him! Wait, he's not carrying any loot.
Player 2: what? He took my best rifle last week!
Player: he says he stashed it in the barn.
Player 2: fuuuuuuuu-

Of course, they could just fly a plane into his barn, just like he did to those other players, but while he was bored one day he discovered something interesting. He was building a tower from scaffolding, just to see how tall it would go, and was well above anything in the game when a plane flew into it. The plane blew up - and the tower stayed standing.

Ian thinks "I've just invented a giant flyswat". He's intending to build them at the end of each airport runway.

He recently spotted one of the other players heading to the traders camp, and wondered what he was buying. So he took off his burlap sack and followed him in. It turned out he was buying a car, and then medical supplies. So Ian got into the back of the car while the other player was off buying stuff, laid down on the back seat, put the burlap sack back on, and waited. And once they were driving down the road, sat up and started squealing and gibbering in the driver's ear.

After the car crash, the other player admitted it was pretty funny, but was slightly peeved that the car was a write-off and he'd been killed in the impact. The Pigman, predictably, survived.

May 2052 - A year since our brush with the dragons, and nobody has turned up to immolate our apartments yet.

Inkubus: So we're probably okay.

Despite those selfies of us riding a dragon's back being posted on the Shadownet, anonymously.

Lots of other stuff has been happening, that we thankfully avoided. A free spirit has revealed itself as a major shareholder, forcing the Japanese government to extend citizen rights to astral entities. The Transpolar Aleut left the Native American Nations. An arcology has been built in the North Sea. Bioware is becoming cheap enough for the average cit. Seattle acquired a major shipping agreement and the economy has exploded. A new president is elected and promptly dies. Inkubus gets offered something 'better than Better Than Life chips', and narrowly avoids addiction.

Greenlight: I'm 21 now! I can drink legally!

Inkubus: My friend thinks My Little Pony uses Shadowrun magic. Earth ponies are physical adepts. Unicorns are true mages.
GM: Zecora is a Shaman?
Felix: And Changelings are insect spirits.
Inkubus: Exactly!

Inkubus: The next metamagic feat I want is Sympathetic Linkage. 'Hmm, this looks like that building – sculpt sculpt sculpt'
Felix: Get out the mashed potato.

Inkubus: And I've started wearing shirts.
Greenlight: Who are you and what have you done with our friend!
Inkubus: Part of the business is looking respectable.
Greenlight: But I can't recognise you by face! I need to see those perfect cheesegrater abs!

Inkubus has been working his way into the entertainment, party, and music scene. Hence the shirt.

GM: Only Ms. Winter gets to see the abs.
Inkubus: I'm sorry, are you implying I be mon... mon...
Felix: Rhymes with Epstein-Barr Virus.

It's at one of our weekly meet-ups for fine dining that we're approached by a rotund man.

Titus: It's the Penguin!
GM: He's a lot more bedraggled then that.
Titus: It's the Penguin on a bad day!
GM: He speaks in a high, crackling voi- Oh god, it IS the Penguin.

He seems desperate to talk to us. It probably has something to do with the suitcase chained to his wrist.

The Penguin: Thank the stars! We must talk at once! You can't know what I've had to do to find you!
Felix: Then don't tell us.
The Penguin: Let us retire to the restaurant and enjoy our midday repast.
Felix: How did you get in here?

Greenlight: So, how is the 'killing people for profit' going?
Warhammer: Profitable.

The Penguin – one Topal – orders a half-dozen entrees and desserts, and as we watch him like a pride of hungry lions bemused by a angry baby goat, he offers us 5000 nuyen each for a three hour escort mission. He's also cracking jawbreakers in his bare hands. Titus shakes his hand – a good excuse for some quick psychometry. He's very nervous, and the suitcase is extremely important, and dragging the local magical environment around like a lump of neutronium.

Felix: Is there a convenient canal outside so we can use a boat to bypass the plot again?

Topal is freaked out that we know how nervous he is.

Felix: Are you under a magical geas that stops you talking about the suitcase?
Topal: How am I supposed to tell you that?
Inkubus: It's the most common omission when somebody gets put under a geas 'Don't tell anybody about the geas'

We accept the job, and promptly refuse to let him get out of our sight.

Greenlight: You're coming with us, Mr Penguin. I mean, Mr Johnson.

Topal wants to drive out to the Puyallup Barrens – even scarier than the Redmond Barrens. We're promptly followed by a mob of bikers.

Felix: You know, what we need here is one of those self-inflating lifeboats. We push it out the back door, pull the cord and it goes WHOMP.
Greenlight: That's a great idea! Why don't we have one of those?

We do have Inkubus' Barrier spell.

Greenlight OoC: GM wants a chase scene.
Inkubus OoC: Metal mage says No.

The destination is one of Seattle's more notorious junkyards. Inkubus calls up some insurance – the spirit of the junkyard, a formidable canine THING. Topal enters via by a tunnel under the fence.

Titus: He's a burrowing penguin.
Felix: Fairy Penguin? They burrow.

Titus just lifts us over the fence. There's a black elf waiting for us.

Greenlight: They prefer African-American elf these days.

Elf: Are you ready, Raven man?
Felix: Penguin man.

Things aren't going to plan – there were supposed to be three people here. And there's vehicles approaching. Topal tries to force the suitcase onto us.

Topal: No, no, this is all wrong. Here, take this!

Not being completely stupid, we all back off fast. And when the Lone Star police turn up to arrest everybody, we simply put our hands up. After all, apart from trespassing on the junkyard, we haven't done anything illegal. Of course, then somebody yells “F**k, it's the Star! Ice him!”

Luckily for Topal, the sniper manages to hit his own team healer by mistake. Not good for the tiny mage.

Inkubus: She looks like one of those Cancer Kids!
Greenlight: She was from the Make-a-Wish Foundation – she wanted to be a shadowrunner.

Lone Star Chief: All right Bloodraven! We've got you and your terrorist compadres surrounded! Surrender and we might only beat the drek out of you!

Inkubus has the spirit conceal us and our client, and we depart. If the Lone Star were smart, they'd spray the entire area with fire, but they're preoccupied with that sniper at the moment.

Greenlight: Must have been a Lone Star sniper – nobody would be so bad as to shoot their own mage.
Inkubus: If Warhammer shot me, I'd assume he meant it.
Greenlight: If he shot you you'd have 14 holes in your chest.
Inkubus: I'd have thought he could do it with one.
Greenlight: Have you seen him shoot? I've never seen him select single-fire once!

The Penguin isn't looking well – 40 years older, and at death's door.

Felix: Do we go through his pockets for loose change now?

The Penguin: It's.. too powerful! You must destroy it? Find... Trixie!
Felix: The Great and Powerful Trixie?

Trixie is not, in fact, the famous pony, but the equally famous Seattle mage – the oldest in the city, in fact.

GM: Does anybody want to astrally assense the suitcase?
All: NO.

We roll Topal's body out the door as a snack for the Barren's inhabitants.

Greenlight: Goodbye, Mr. Penguin.
Felix: Eh, I give it six months before DC brings him back.

Trixie's shop has no wards – but does house dozens of dog spirits who are very interested in our presence outside. And she knew we were coming.

Titus: Divination will do that.

Greenlight: We won't tell her about the bikers. Whilst awesome it was irrelevant.

Trixie: Hello dearies-
GM: Oh, sorry, that was my elderly witch voice. Wait a minute – she IS an elderly witch!
Greenlight: First time this campaign your voices have actually be appropriate XD

Trixie insists she take the box with us while she thinks about us. We all take a sharp step backwards.

Inkubus: It was his dying wish that we bring it to you. And he was a client. As magically aware individuals we are not going to fuck around with that sort of wish.

Trixie says the contents of the suitcase – a statue – is phenomenally evil, and can only be destroyed by a dragon.

Inkubus: Good luck with that! So far this has cost us some gas money. We haven't even shot anybody! If it WAS handcuffed to me I'd saw my own arm off! And it's not like we have any way to contact a dragon.
Felix: Welllll...
Inkubus: No! Shut up!
Greenlight: *clamps hand over Felix's mouth*
Warhammer: Don't you say a fucking word!

Felix: Well, we might not have got any money or karma, but we've dodged a bullet.

Or possibly not. In a few weeks Felix is hearing rumours that there's a serial killer-dragon – thankfully not a GREAT dragon – out there. And that the half-eaten remains are horribly decayed, as if aged by decades. And that another dragon is offering a quarter-mil bounty on the killer's head....

Inkubus: I'd rather go up against a dragon than a Juggernaut. And those things are wandering around the American countryside.
Greenlight: Juggernaut?
Inkubus: Awakened Armadillo.

Inkubus can divine a link if he can get access to one of the victims. Greenlight can get him into the corporate morgue, after one of our contacts (one CyberPope) hacks our data into their systems. But why would a dragon serial-killer want to kill an exec from a real estate company that own much of the Puyullup Barrens?

Inkubus: Do we really want this job? If we kill the dragon we'll just have the idol again.
Warhammer: I just want to kill a dragon.

Titus: Which dragon put the hit out on the serial-killer?

The Feathered Serpent Aleesh, we learn. Perhaps we'd better talk to her first.

Captain Erg: Oldguard Headquarters, What the !#$#$@! is your problem?
 
Thema: You are not allowed to answer the phone anymore.

Titus: Greenlight’s 'hitting people in the face and dodging being hit back' skills are roughly equivalent to mine.
Felix: But she doesn't hit them in the face.

We're in Bavaria, conducting a covert book purchase for the Great Dragon Celedyr. Not that anybody but Celedyr has any choice in the matter. Even worse for us, Celedyr's base of operations is, as he puts it 'Right under Lofwyr's nose'. As pawns in some complicated game between two Great Dragons, it seems likely that the description of our fate will include 'and they never even found the bodies'.

Anyway, the unwitting purchasee is Baron Munchmaussen, and he and his domain are best described as Doctor Doom and his model Bavarian village.

Felix: What I want to know is why a Potemkin Village was built in Bavaria.

Unfortunately for us, the decoy book is guarded by fire elementals. Worse, there's no fire suppression system in the library.

Felix: Was Dr Doom dropped on his head as a baby or something? I'm having flashbacks to that Ambergel factory – we've got fire elementals, your white phosphorus grenades and no fucking sprinklers.
Warhammer: I'm quite happy to burn the library down.
Felix: So is the Baron, apparently.

GM: The Baron is a dwarf.
Felix: That's a troll. The tusks and horns are a bit of a giveaway. As is the 5 foot height difference.
GM: I was inadvertently racist, wasn't I?
Felix: Yes. Just because he's holding a beer stein does not make him a dwarf.
Titus: And here was me picturing him as a cool mastermind.

Felix, back-pedalling frantically, calls down his bound water elemental, and Titus swings his mighty sledgehammer Mjolnir.

Titus: If I time this right I'll hit them so hard they turn into a water elemental.

GM: You could pee on it.
Labrat: He's not a peon.

GM: The fire elemental is remarkably female. And reptilian.
Warhammer: Just right for Inkubus!
Felix: Somehow I don't think asbestos condoms are a mass-produced item.
Labrat: But if anybody is going to have one...

Felix's water elemental proves spectacularly inept.

Felix: We didn't come here for a steam bath! I told you to kill it!

GM: It's Warhammer's turn.
Felix OoC: Time to bring out new rules, new codexes, and more expensive miniatures.
Warhammer OoC: And cool art and miniatures painted to a standard you'll never achieve.

Felix: Bringing the hammer to the stone. That there is an intervening fire elemental is irrelevant.
Titus: With that much follow-thru I might have to worry about the floor.

Indeed, there's an ominous ongoing CRACK.

Titus: Oops.

The floor caves in and we, and the burning contents of the library, are precipitated onto the floor below. Where the Baron is watching the security screens and enjoying a beer and cigar.

Felix: If he had the book we're never going to find it now. It just had a burning library dropped on it.
Titus: It's entirely possible the book isn't vulnerable to normal damage.
Felix: What a pity we are.

The Baron, being a troll, just shrugs off the wreckage. He seems unhappy for some reason. At least the security is heading to the wrong floor, now.

Felix: They're get to the door and go 'Where did the library go? Did we get out on the wrong floor?'

The Baron gets a shotgun-full of gel rounds in the face and goes down.

Felix: And there is the proof that gel rounds are actually useful.
Warhammer: And Inkubus isn't here to see it.

Felix's Catalog spell confirms that the real Faustian codex is in here somewhere. We'd better start digging through the piles of burning books.

Felix: What is this, Nazi Germany???

Felix: Does anybody want to open the book and see if it's the real thing this time?
Titus:.... Nooooo?

At least we drag the Baron out in the hall as we leave. We were explicitly told to not kill him, after all. That doesn't stop Warhammer lobbing a few more incendiaries into the wreckage.

Warhammer: He started it.

We Weekend At Bernies our way out, with the unconscious Baron being puppeted by invisible shadowrunners, then dump him and the mysterious valise in the garden, and leg it back to Inkubus and the Munchmaussen Riots.

Baron: The InTRUders Are over THEERRREEEE.

The successful mission, despite some very public side-effects such as the burning town and castle, did remain relatively covert. At least until the selfies of us riding on a dragon hit the Shadownet.

Inkubus: This place offended my sensibilities. It had to burn.
Felix: You realise this is going to go down in history as the Munchkin Riots, don’t you?

Felix: I wonder what a dragon doing a double facepalm look like.

Felix: More likely the plan was for Goldie to take the book back by her own route, while our large conspicuous group draws the pursuit.
Titus: But we did it so well they don't even know what we look like.
Felix: They know one of us speaks German and the rest swear a lot in English.

We make it back to Celedyr’s secret underground research facility near Berlin. It’s not there.

Warhammer: The dragon’s fucking stiffed us!
Inkubus: And this surprises you how?
Felix: Huh. I was expecting to find a smoking crater and fiery graffiti reading -
Inkubus: ‘Lofwyr was here’

But the money transfer does come through – evidently Celedyr was at least partially satisfied with the result. By the end of it all (and the admittedly expensive Customs inquiries when we went to England and somehow come back from Germany) we all have close to half a million nuyen in the bank.

GM: Why are you Runners again?
Felix: Because we're adrenaline junkies and idiots.

So the heroes decide to covertly infiltrate this drug ring, in order to find a guy who ordered one of their own murdered. They've pretty much gotten it down to "Armando Fuentes"
 They get to the guy and in the corner is a statue of someone. I tell them to make some rolls.

They start talking. "What's your name?"
  "Silvio"
  "Who's that?" (Pointing to the statue in the corner)
  "Oh, him. That's Armando Fuentes. I had him stuffed."
  After two minutes of silence, the heroes plotted a new strategy...

If the villains just want to capture you, they'll be 10x as accurate as when trying to kill you.

Stray quote from the con a couple weeks ago, by a female player in character for a female character: "I am not naked. I have a rifle."

There are many bad places to be in the Shadowrun universe. Anywhere in Australia, for example. Or in the Ork Underground, while wearing a Humanis Policlub badge. But of all the bad places to be, on the 118th floor of a corporate skyscraper, with a pissed off Great Dragon on one side, and a Special Forces killteam and a helicopter gunship on the other, has to be somewhere near the top of the list.

Some might argue that the dragon being nominally on our side improves our odds, but that still puts us right in the middle of the crossfire.

Warhammer: The dragon's on our side?
Felix: He did offer to pay us a quarter-mil nuyen, so he seems favourably inclined. Unless the kill-team is his plan not to pay.
Inkubus: Dragons do come up with plots so convoluted they meet themselves coming around corners.

Inkubus: I'm sorry but I think this is a problem my dick cannot handle.
Greenlight: Well you're just not trying then, are you?

For the time being, Celedyr just stands there, roaring his rage at this effrontery.

Inkubus: What is he doing?
Titus: He's Charging His Laser

Luckily for us, the squad of troopers seems a little alarmed to discover that one of their targets is a dragon, and even the lieutenant's full clip of armour-piercing rounds does nothing more than irritate the reptilian.

At least the kill-team team don't have all the armour they might do.

Inkubus: This is the UK. 'Armoured bodysuit? Why do you need that? It's not like anybody has guns.'
Felix: 'I'm going pub-crawling. In Glasgow.'
Greenlight: 'Good luck with that.'

Titus appears to agree with the maxim 'If all fails, try a frontal assault'. He leaps across the gap between the skyscraper and the chopper. Greenlight hitches a lift. Titus lands spread across the cockpit, and grins unpleasantly at the pilot.

Inkubus: Hey! Looks like someone else is trying the power of the D! 'Excuse me while I hump this helicopter'

Titus flexes some muscles and tears off the helicopter door's hinges. Greenlight, clinging to Titus' back, leans over the troll's shoulder and pulls the doors off.

Pilot: Jesus fuck!
Greenlight: Hi!
Felix OoC: You just missed the perfect opportunity to say 'Get out'

Greenlight: Getting a troll in your rotor blades is not good.
Warhammer: Getting a troll on your windshield isn't good either, to be honest.

Celedyr responds to this poorly planned assassination attempt by fireballing the entire kill-squad. Happily, most of us have already dropped behind the lab tables when their grenades and ammo cook off.

Outside the skyscraper, on the wildly bucking helicopter, Greenlight drops an unprimed grenade between the pilot's legs. He panics and attempts to bail out. Titus helps. Greenlight climbs in.

Greenlight: Don't worry, Titus, I've played Microsoft Flight Simulator
Titus: That only has planes!
Greenlight: I modded it!
Titus: So you made up your own controls for helicopters.
Greenlight: Yes. Now where's the mouse...

They still manage to land the helicopter on a lower skyscraper roof, and hurry to strip it of anything valuable. After all, they'll make nice souvenirs.

Greenlight: I got a medikit!
Titus: *wrench* I got a minigun!

Celedyr: I have an idea who is behind this. I will tolerate no delay. Get on.
Inkubus: *picking up the cowering Felix by the scruff* Think of it this way Bubbles – either you fly on the dragon or you can explain to Security why you're leaving without the man who escorted you up.
Greenlight OoC: And why the 118th floor is on fire.

Greenlight thinks the sight of the dragon and her teammates flying out from the inferno is the best thing ever.

Greenlight: This is the greatest day of my life. I'm not even sure I'm real anymore. Is this a dream?

Inkubus is sitting up on the back throwing devil horns and screaming 'YEAAAAAH!!!!!'. Felix is just screaming. This will make for a memorable selfie.

Inkubus: Don't we need to lodge a flight plan? Oh wait – dragon.
Greenlight: What's the in-flight entertainment like?
Inkubus: We're on a dragon!

The dragon heads east, over the North Sea and multiple countries.

Greenlight: I never thought I say this, but flying on a dragon can actually get boring.
Inkubus: Look down.
Celedyr: I have a secondary lair in Berlin. *chuckles* It's right under Lofwyr's nose.
Felix, Labrat, Titus, Greenlight : burst into 'We're all gonna die' tears
Warhammer: hysterical laughter Funny guy!
Inkubus: just laughing I love this guy!

Celedyr lands in a field outside Berlin, and a hillside opens to reveal his secret research base.

Felix: At least they aren't wearing anti-static wigs.
Labrat: Purple anti-static wigs.

Celedyr: Rest. I'll be back in a very few moments.
Greenlight: That doesn't sound ominous at all.
Titus: If he wants us dead we're done for.
Felix: If he wants us dead no-one will ever find the bodies.
Labrat: You're being optimistic that there will even be bodies.

Titus: There's an entire proverb about doing deals with dragons!
Greenlight: When he's got you over a barrel you may as well hear him out!

Felix is still certain that we've just gotten involved in a powerplay between two Great Dragons, but even when you're that completely fucked, what can you do? You can't run fast enough to escape the blast zone anyway. Celedyr wants us to go to Bavaria to pick up an overdue book and drop off a valise. The book is called the Pandaemonicus Faustus.

Labrat: That does not sound like a good title at all!
Inkubus: Pandaemonicus Faustus? We know what a Faustian deal is, we're Shadowrunners!

It has a very Metal cover.

Inkubus: No good will come of this.

Felix: Does anybody want to ask what this errand has to do with the assassination attempt?
Inkubus: Probably nothing. Dragon.

We initially express our disinclination to accept this commission, despite an offer to quintuple our pay, and Celedyr's obvious displeasure does nothing to reassure us. Our hurried admission that we COULD do the job if we had a translator at least enables us to dodge THAT bullet.

Greenlight: Never make a deal with a dragon unless he's very very insistent. And standing right in front of you.

The destination is the Schloss Munchmaussen. At this time of year, it can only be reached by cable car.

Felix: I've seen that movie.
Inkubus: Yeah. The guy with metal teeth bites through the cable.

GM: You've going to Latveria to steal a book from Doctor Doom.
Inkubus: No – we're going to buy it without his knowledge.

We're to meet one Goldie in Bavaria.

Warhammer: How attractive is she?
Greenlight: And this is why we need a translator. Warhammer can speak German. We just don't want him to.

We arrive at the village of Munchmaussen, which is so stereotypically Bavarian, complete with lederhosen, that all it's missing is a Childcatcher.

Felix: I fucking told you – they're aliens, and they're turning Earth into a theme park.
Greenlight: Well, I give them full marks on the dragon ride anyway.

Greenlight: The miniature village of Munchmaussen.
Inkubus: We represent, the Lollipop Guild, the Lollipop Guild...

Inkubus: I'm in Hell.
Titus: It's basically Anti-metal, isn't it? Felix, know any illusion spells?
Felix: Well, Physical Mask – I could disguise Inkubus as a Von Trapp if I must.

Inkubus tries to promote at least something Metal, in sheer mental self-defence, and the complete failure of his Mob Arousal leaves him traumatised.

Inkubus: The Hell? What the Hell? The Hell?
Greenlight: Nevermind Inkubus, it happens to lots of guys...

Inkubus: This place has drained me of all my mojo.

However, we eventually realise that there are an awful lot of guard-posts around. And everybody seems to be acting happy.

Inkubus: Welcome to Germanyworld.
Warhammer: Are you going to give us vodka?
Greenlight: That would be Moscowland, next door. 'Occasionally we have dance-offs' sings 'Mos-Co! Mos-Co!'

Greenlight: Wait, why aren't Russian Power Rangers a thing?! Think about it, the dancing, the music, the bears. It'd be awesome. Of course, all of the zords would need a dash cam; then you'd KNOW they were Russian!
Warhammer: 6th ranger would come from Chernobyl; he glows in the dark.

Goldie, back at the hotel, locks the door, drops the facade, the act, and the accent.

Titus: --Pulls of the hair extensions and reveals that he was ME, DIO!
GM: No

She is American. And warns us to be very careful and to not overly rock the boat in the little tourist town from hell.

Goldie: Your luggage (our weaponry and equipment, smuggled across the border on our behalf) is on the table
Warhammer: *maniacal laugher, grabbing ensues*

Goldie: You're going to need to get into the castle
Greenlight: I would presume so. Unless he leaves his book out in the street. That'd make it real easy for us.

Goldie tells us that there are three ways into the castle. 1) using the skylift to the castle (Greenlight looks at party: lol no), 2) Up the cliff (Titus likes! Very Skyrim), 3) Through the front door (Titus liking intensifies)

Felix: Is there any way we can use a boat to get in? They've helped every other time.

Felix: Does the Baron have a daughter?
GM: No
Inkubus: Mother?
Titus: Sister?
Felix: Maiden Aunt?
Inkubus:... Schnauzer?

Titus: So we can't use a boat.
Felix: Or a boner.

Titus: Okay, sneaking or kicking in the door.
Greenlight: Sneaking please.
Inkubus: We can always fall back on kicking the door in if we sneak. The reverse is problematic.

Felix: We're assaulting the Disney castle. You know, if we ever tell anybody that this week we flew on a dragon, then -
Inkubus: - and then infiltrated a Disney castle complete with all the minarets and shit, they'd think we were tripping balls. And so do we. It wasn't until we saw the fistful of credsticks we're holding we realised 'that really happened'.

Actually, climbing up to the castle isn't that difficult – Titus' sheer strength would enable him to climb greased sheetmetal, and he brought plenty of pitons and rope.

Greenlight: I'm pretty sure if the dwarf had a minigun it would be less a minigun then bullet-fuelled rocket pack.
Warhammer: It'd be awesome though.

Meanwhile, Inkubus is wandering invisibly around time provoking a riot with surreptitious applications of Mob Mood.

Townsperson: I can't live like this anymore! I'm not even German! I'm actually Russian!
Felix: 'I'm a refugee from Moscowland!'
Greenlight: 'My entire life is a lie!' sing and dances the cossack

Halfway up the cliff, a missile blows something out of the sky. We freeze, but apparently they haven't noticed us yet.

Warhammer: Must be Inkubus' distraction.
Inkubus: Could be – I'm not sure how they'll react to having a lifetime of frustration unleashed.
Greenlight: 'Oh Franz! We must consummate our love for each other! Even though you are my sister!'
Felix: 'Sister'?!

Greenlight stun-batons the first security mook in the groin. Which might seem cruel but at least is better then Titus reaching up and throwing him over his shoulder. Felix summons his bound Air Elemental to conceal us and we stroll into the Schloss pretty much undetectable. Inkubus' spell-work is working even better than we could have hoped.

Felix: And in the valley below, Munchmaussen is on fire.
Greenlight: And a small child has a guard's head on a pike and screaming “Viva la Revolution!'
Titus: And speaking French, for some reason.

Greenlight: I'm half expecting Donald Duck among them, for some reason.

As the castle guards rush down the mountain to suppress the rioting, we enter the building, looking for the study and the book. The secure elevator does indeed have two gaurds inside, but when they stick their heads out to see while the doors just opened for no reason, it's childishly simple for Titus and Greenlight to punch them unconscious. After THAT, getting the book is no difficulty. Well, apart from the fact that the book is a fake. And that the Baron was waiting.

Baron: So. That is what you were after. I am disappointed. Guards!

Four elementals emerge from the fireplace.

Felix: In a library? Is he insane?
Greenlight: Well, it's not our fault then. Warhammer – light it up.
Warhammer: maniacal laughter

GM: I can just imagine Inkubus telling this story drunk at a party.
Inkubus: “And then we rode the dragon."
Drunk friend: “Duuude, I know you're into some kinky shit, but a 7-way? With a DRAGON?!”

The enemies of the Imperium are many, but a great many of them are servants of the Chaos Gods. Which is ironic, as many of them rebelled against the Imperium because they refused to bow down to the crushing tyranny, and most Chaos worshippers end up dead or mewling Chaos Spawn anyway.

Cassius: A space marine psyker, formerly of the Storm Crows, and now forging his own path to 'save humanity'. His increasing mutations include wings, an aura of crawling black fire, and permanent fusion with his power armour.
Aladar van Rijn: A former Rogue Trader, who made a few unwise business decisions and ended up in the Screaming Vortex. Already severely mutated, but still human externally.
Cog: A Heretek, and one of Cassius' most useful minions, especially given his knowledge of arms, armour, and genetek.
Jrska: Born mutant, and a joyfully perverse devotee of Slaanesh. Hyena-headed beastwoman, a skilled liar, and seductress. Even of Imperial battle-nuns.

Pre-game chat includes discussion of a Pathfinder game where Cassius' player's PC recently concluded a search for his unknown father.

Cassius' player: I was a bastard.
Me: But Tony, all your characters are bastards.
Cassius’ Player: No, this one was an actual bastard.
Peanut Gallery: A legitimate bastard XD

Cassius’ player: He’s Neutral Evil - i.e. PC.

Other loot from the Ardent Crown - astrographic charts apparently recording the movements of Eldar Craftworlds - invaluable intel - and a casket and signet ring combo that apparently makes the casket and its contents completely invisible to all but the wearer. This could be VERY useful.

Jrska: Cog, sweety? What’s this?
Cog: Hmm? Sorry, you caught me in the middle of mathematics.
Jrska: Tech-priest recreation.
Cog OoC: Fourplay XD

Evidently the Chaos Powers have been pouring knowledge into Aladar's lobes, along with daemonic clockwork.

Aladar: I’m now ridiculously competent.
Jrska: And here is proof that Chaos can warp the very laws of Reality.
Cassius: Hmm?
Jrska: Aladar is now competent.
Cassius: Mroowwwl!

Saucer of milk for Table Three.

Our GM decides NOT to replay out the torture of the Farseer. This squeamishness may be because he doesn’t want to know what Jrska can come up with. Either way, Cassius does rip enough out of the xeno’s mind to learn the secrets of Eldar divination. This is extremely bad news for the Eldar, and everybody else, frankly. But it doesn't take divination to note that Aladar is on the downward spiral that consumes most champions of Chaos - his physical and spiritual corruption is outpacing his infamy. It's very likely he will soon devolve into a mewling Chaos Spawn.

Jrska: Don't worry, my lord, I'll still keep him. Mmm, tentacles.

Cassius: Tell me, mutant - why were you willing to leave Aldar behind?
Jrska: He doesn't think I'm pretty anymore, my lord.
Cassius: Right.

This sort of backstabbing is precisely the sort of thing that wrecks most Black Crusades. Cassius decides the Ritual of Entangled Destiny might be in order - if one of us ever finds himself in such a situation that they need to appeal to the Ruinous Powers to survive, their eldritch attention will be directed to the entire group. This is rarely healthy, but entirely to be expected when the gods really can't tell most mortals apart, anyway. And it's a very good incentive not to backstab party members.

Anyway - the Chains of Judgement has finally found and entered the star system with that mysterious alien psychic beacon, and its attendant garrison of Horus Heresy-era Space Marines. One of the first things we learn is that they still have working spacecraft, which gives them a major tactical advantage. On the other hand, if they really have been isolated for that long, then they don't know how the Horus Heresy unfolded, or that the Imperium devolved into a brutal theocracy after the Emperor slew Horus, or just how far the Traitor Legions went in their alliance with the Ruinous Powers. Of course, the entire Heresy could have been avoided if the Emperor had actually trusted his Primarch creations, and the Primarchs hadn't had an entire graphic novel's worth of Daddy issues.

Cassius: We have to go wake the Emperor, then slap him. “You may have been a great man, but you were a terrible father.”

One of the system ships promptly moves to intercept us, demanding to know who we are, and warning us away from the asteroid belt of wrecked starships - many of them suspiciously reminiscent of Necrontyr tech. The ship is the Iron Pride, and bears a very odd mixture of iconography - the Loyalist Ultramarines and Imperial Fists, and the Traitor Iron Warriors. Jrska wonders how to announce ourselves, especially if these marines have no idea that Roboute Guilleman, Primarch of the Ultramarines, is long dead, and so is the Warmaster Horus.

Jrska: 'This is the Guilleman Can Get Fucked, and we declare for the Warmaster.'
Cassius: *gives Jrska a deathglare*This is the independent vessel Chains of Judgement.
Captain Ossian of the Garrison:Your ship has iconography of the Sigillite, yet you declare your independence?

That is true enough - Malcador the Sigillite WAS instrumental in setting up the Inquisition. But Cassius decides that honesty is the best policy, and the truth is that the Imperium is completely fucked.

Cassius: The Emperor’s vision has been abandoned, the future of the Imperium has fallen into the petty hands of Lords of Terra, the Primarchs are dead or missing, the Long War continues, and the status of the Emperor is up for debate. Oh, and Guilleman has sundered the Legions.
Jrska: *snicker*They’re going to love that.

Ossian insists on a live video feed - chancy, given Cassius' mutations. Especially since Space Marine psykers were banned by the Emperor's decree at Nikea. Of course, most of the Legions then ignored that decree, given the necessities of the war, and Guilleman allowed them again in the Codex Astartes. Perhaps Cassius' crawling warpfire can be passed of as merely psychic energy?

Aladar: No wonder I’ve lost interest in Jrska, only Cassius interests me now.
Jrska: *narrows eyes*
Cog: My god, it’s a love triangle

Cassius: Many of our brethren are fallen to superstition and ritual. The citizens of the Imperium are sworn to the Imperial Cult.
Captain Ossian: LOL that thing is still around?
Cassius: That thing is the mandatory religion of the Imperium.
Captain Ossian: … oh.

The Iron Pride tells us to maintain position while it returns to the planet to discuss this with the garrison commanders. It seems likely they'll want to meet face to face. And it doesn't take divination to tell they will not take kindly to surprises.

So how to play this? And how to explain all the mutants on the crew?

Jrska: Would you like me to dress as an obedient pet, my lord?
Cassius: No need to go that far -
Jrska: *silent cursing*
Cassius: - besides, I want to stick to the truth.

Cassius refuses to let Jrska sit in on the ongoing torture and interrogation of the Eldar, also he does use some of her Kingfisher Girls to massage the xenos' feet during their daily lunches. Daily meaning 'every three hours or other random interval'. She does get to warn the Eldar not to try abandoning her body.

Jrska: We've got Cog here to keep your body alive if you do abandon it - and there's so many fun things we can do with an empty psyker...

Jrska settles for a few laughs with the now completely demented captive dreadnought. Particularly about the way the dreadnaught's occupant used to think Cassius was a traitor, and now we've found an entire garrison of Loyalists working alongside Traitors. Cassius decides to play up the strengths of his mutations, rather than put them down to geneseed corruption.

Cassius: I do not consider it degeneration, I consider it…
Jrska: Enhancement XD

The Iron Pride is sending over 50 Space Marines.

Cassius: Half what you need to pacify a planet.

If they decide to try and take the Chains of Judgement, we're completely fucked. Let's hope Jrska's rehearsals with the 'Honour Guard' of Kingfisher Girls and mutants worked. At least our uniforms are freshly startched, and fuel the fantasies of any uniform fetishists around the place.

Jrska: Perky XD
Cog: And do the crew that aren’t Kingfisher Girls ‘stand at attention’?
Jrska: Probably XD

Jrska pantomimes perky obedience and helpfulness while the visiting marines are on board.

Cassius: I like Jrska like this. Maybe I should have got her a leash.
Cog: And a shock collar.
Cassius: No, I’m not going to punish her for bad behaviour - she’ll enjoy it. It’s a question of the carrot and the stick - and I hate to think what Jrska would do with a carrot.

Jrska's copy of The Lives of the Saints is useful too, as an example of how insidious the Imperial Cult has become. Ossian does want to know why it's taken 10,000 years for anybody to come relieve the garrison.

Cassius: The path to this system requires skill and audacity
Jrska: Then how did Aladar ever manage it?
Cassius: Just as well you’re not there for the conversation with Ossian.

Cassius also lectures Ossian on the nature of the Warp and its inhabitants. Although it's heavily edited, so we don't get blown out of the sky. For example, most daemons are reflections and echoes of mortal emotion and desire.

Cassius: As humanity is most numerous, they are more us than anything else.

Cassius further goes on to claim that even the most powerful daemons are essential harmless, since they exist by feeding on the cast-off effluvia of human thought.

Jrska: And the four Chaos powers sit up and say ‘Did someone just compare us to dust mites?’

Cassius: Carefully avoiding anything about worshipping the Ruinous Powers.

Ossian also wants to know what Cassius actually intends to do. Especially if the garrison agrees to hand over any of their stockpiled Space Marine geneseed.

Cassius: My chapter will be sworn to humanity, not some fallible human lord. We will serve those who serve humanity (it just happens that at the moment I believe the Chaos Powers are humanity’s best hope to survive things like the Tyranid invasion).

Ossian makes his proposal - since the garrison has no warp-capable ships or Navigators anymore, if we stop the recurring Necron attacks on the system by tracking them to their source, they garrison will give Cassius the engineered genetic material he needs. We have a goal! And one that will require a lot of alliances inside the Screaming Vortex, since trying to taken on an awakened Necron force with just one ship is a very good way to die, and die horribly.

Weldun: I think that's the problem with the DC comics. They're too serious.
Me: GRIMDARKGRIMDARKGRIMDARKANGST
Weldun: Yeah. They say 'Life is serious', but Life, the setting that doesn't have people flying around in their underwear, still manages to be funny. So why can't the comics be funny?

Weldun: Troubleshooting Macs. Step 1) Buy a real computer.
GM: Maybe you need to hit it harder. Like with a hammer.

We're going to need assistance to hunt down an destroy this Necron Tombworld. Avoiding backstabbing is also wise. Turning that captive Farseer into a Daemonhost that he can 'reward' Jrska with, but actually use to keep tabs on her, seems like a good double investment.

Cassius: I'm glad I let Jrska suggest using those drugs on the Farseer.
Jrska: I'm not stopping you from making daemonhosts. I'm delighted every time I talk you into doing something that debased.
Cassius: It's not the debasement, it's the way Cassius lets Jrska think she's the one doing the debasing.

Cassius: Let's go for Thrice-bound. Mainly to give Jrska a toy.

Cassius takes the time to talk some of Jrska's fanatical Kingfisher Girls into helping with the ritual. They're eager to please their mistress, and their mistress's lord. Naturally, an Eldar Farseer, especially one who's been dosed to the gills on sensation-enhancing drugs for months, is a hugely desirable abode for a Slaaneshi daemon. So desirable that a Keeper of Secrets, a Greater Daemon, turns up to take possession. Just performing these rituals is enough to boost Cassius' corruption up to 98%. Even with his infamy commensurately boosted to 97%, this means if he displeases the Gods in any way, he will instantly explode into uncontrolled mutation and Spawndom.

Cassius: ….
Jrska OoC: I told you at the start that here was an opportunity for the GM to boost our Corruption. And you were the one that didn't want the rest of us around for it XD

The Kingfisher Girls that participated in the summoning and binding are mutated by the experience. Mutations include snake-like features and tentacles.

Cassius: *facepalm* Unintended benefits for Jrska.

Jrska: *dancing down the corridors singing Hooked on a Feeling*
Cassius: Damn, that's catchy.
Jrska: Yes, my lord. I found a old 2D movie in the archives. Prison rape, genocidal terrorists, vivisection, auto-cannibalism. It's a laugh a minute. But it ends sadly – the hero gets killed by a bunch of idiots.

Jrska OoC: Admittedly 'Cherry Bomb' would be a good match for Jrska too, lyrically speaking.

Cassius: I do hope you enjoy it. This is a reward for your loyalty. You are loyal to me, aren't you, Jrska?
Jrska: Of course, my lord. *Lying, but perkily*
Cassius: *picking up Jrska by the throat* Why do I not believe you?
Jrska: Natural suspicion, my lord?
Cassius: Try again.
Jrska: Healthy paranoia?

Cassius: The xeno has a daemon within her flesh. I thought long and hard about the best way to reward you. You are loyal, aren't you?
Jrska: Yes, my lord! I yearn to see you achieve everything you're capable of.

Still, Jrska finds her gift waiting in the converted chapel. Her reaction can best be summarised with two small 'Poink!'ing noises.

Jrska: I'll probably be unconscious for days.
Cassius: Good. Cog might actually get some work done. Oh, I'm sorry, did I give away my agenda there? Ever since Aladar stopped responding you've been spending far too much time with Cog. He's been distracted.

In fact, Slaanesh is so pleased with Jrska's eagerness to 'fraternise' with the daemonhost she is rewarded with Hermaphroditism.

Jrska: *checks the contents of her pants* Excuse me lord, I have to go try this out.

Cassius: It's probably the scariest thing about Cassius.
Jrska: That you want competent people around you?
Cassius: That I genuinely want my minions to succeed.

To Cassius' horror, his efforts to research and conduct the ritual are enough to push him over to allegiance to Tzeentch, the Architect of Fate (the player needed more levels in Forbidden Knowledge, and miscounted the tally afterwards). This is something he's been desperate to avoid, still believing himself independent to the designs of the Ruinous Powers.

Tzeentch: Just as planned.
Cassius: What? Shit! No! Crap! Dammit! ...... Well played, Lord.
Tzeentch: You will now be known as Turdgurgler.
Cassius: What??
Tzeentch: Just kidding.
Cassius: SonavBITCH.

Appropriately for his new allegiance, his existing and additional mutations churn him into a distinctly more avian form, which at least fits with his Storm Crow origins, Jrska's Kingfisher Girls, Cog's vulturine tendencies, and Aladar's mental similarity to a Potoo.

On Tzeentch's Lords of Change and their resemblance to Skeksis.

Cassius OoC: That movie gave me nightmares.
Jrska OoC: It was called the Dark Crystal - not the Light and Fluffy Crystal.

Arriving back in the Solace System, where the battle against the reawakened Necrontyr has been reinforced by the arrival of a Millennial Warden Space Marine orbital watchtower. This is bad news, but at least it isn't an Inquisitorial watchtower. We tell the the picket ships to stand clear, but are told to stand by for investigation – apparently the Sector Chief Inquisitor has finally been told about a certain ship going around claiming Inquisitorial authority. Uh-oh. Especially uh-oh since they launch boarding rams and fighters when we try to flee. We DO have tech-priests, murder-servitors, that deranged dreadnought, brutal mutant armsmen, the battle-nuns, the daemonhost, and ourselves, but we are up against Space Marines here. Cog jams their communications - with 'Hooked on a Feeling'.

Space Marine: I'm hearing some sort of tribal chant over the helmet comm, Brother-Sergeant.

Jrska co-ordinates the defenses from the bridge (and grooves to the Awesome Mix #1), and Aladar and Cassius speed off to try and rid ourselves of these Loyalist nuisances. Cassius times the dreadnought's arrival so the elevator opens at the most dramatic possible time. The Nyan-cat music starts up, and so does his assault cannon.

Cassius: Mental conditioning with Nyan-cat XD

The Millennial Wardens retreat into cover, as Cassius, Aladar, and the other response units converge. Pretty shortly the Wardens are wondering what sort of hell they've been dropped into, especially with the competing soundtracks, and screaming of the rotary cannon and other firearms.

Marine Chaplain: This is devil music!

Aladar, very unwisely, rushes into hand-to-hand combat, and has both legs half-severed with a chainsword. Cassius is dueling with the Warden's Chaplain, to much better effect.

Cassius: Deluded fool! You stand before Cassius, Extinction's Angel, Doom of Leman's Solace! Smash!
Chaplain: I care not! You will all burn, traitorous scum! swipe!
Cassius: It is the Imperium that betrayed the Emperor! Smash!
Chaplain: It is you that is the fool! Only Chaos could spin such lies! Slash!
Cassius: *mind controls the Chaplain into attacking his own battle-brother*
Chaplain: NO! My will is STRONG! *SMASHES other Warden anyway!*
Cassius: Be honest – part of you enjoyed that, brother.
Chaplain: *falls back in horror at the truth of this*

Since both combatants have powerfields, this might go on for some time. Aladar remembers he can phase out of corporeality now, which given the chainsword now approaching at neck height will be a very good idea. He loses an arm anyway. At least he delayed the marine's assault on the bridge. Elsewhere, Jrska's co-ordination of the other defences isn't going so well – the other unit of Marines is moving to cut our own communications and power. The Dreadnought stomps up behind the wounded Sergeant, grabs him in a powerfist, and screams one sentence before crushing him to a spurting pulp.

Dreadnought: THE CAT. HAS. A. SOMBREROOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!

Cassius brings his forcestaff down on the Chaplain, whose faith is no longer quite enough to protect him. Luckily for him, the Emperor apparently has faith in him, and he manages to survive even as his battle skills, power field, and armour fail. In desperation the Chaplain draws a grenade and tries to slam it against his warped opponent. Instead, Cassius twists aside and the Chaplain loses an arm and his life. But because Cassius slew a champion of the Imperium, and using a psychic weapon to boot, the former Storm Crow receives the ultimate reward. The entire ship trembles, and even as Cassius' form twists and swells, a Herald of Tzeentch appears from the Warp and acknowledges his triumph.

Herald: Congratulations – the galactic game of fate welcomes a new player.

And Cassius' body explodes into his new daemonic form as a Daemon Prince of Tzeentch.
 

Helped a friend with a D&D 3.5 one-shot playtest, on the Roll20 website. I 'helpfully' resurrected Vitus for the event. Despite that, and despite the players all drawing mustaches on the picture of cartoon Dungeonkeeper he put on the virtual tabletop, the game worked rather well.

Me: Ok, apparently we're in an 8x8 room with a demented freak who likes to drop innocent school-kids into a fantasy world. Although one of them did get a unicorn as a familiar
GM: ROFL
Me: I vaguely recall a big bad called Venger
Narrator: Yes, He was a Nasty piece of work, The DM's son, if I recall.. Oh, wait, this thing's on? GM, why didn't you Tell me? AGH, now I've lost the element of surprise
Adrian Vyn's player: .: Unicorn... I remember a game where one of the players threatened to remove the DM's penis... DM said she can't it would be like removing a Unicorn's horn.
GM: Dude, just narrate the game, I don't pay you to kibbitz, that's the PC's job.
Narrator: Well, Fine. see if I Narrate any other game you run.. *ahem*

PCs -

Vitus of Clan Scorpion: Planeswalker and phenomenal arsehole.
Laudigan: Anthropomorphic Golden Crowned Flying Fox Sorceror/Bard, with such extraordinary natural grace and practised charm he has Vitus questioning his own sexuality. Vitus finds this somewhat disturbing.
Art: Wolfman cleric of Pelor
Adrian Vyn: Blue Panda-kin - a quiet beguiler with a tragic past.

Narrator: DEAR ADVENTURERS, WELCOME.
Vitus: *looks up startled at ceiling*
Adrian Vyn: Oh look, it's a disembodied voice!
Laudigan: The voices in my head sure are rowdy this morning..
Narrator: YOU FELLOWS OF VARIOUS BUILDS AND SPECIES HAVE BANDED TOGETHER AS A GROUP OF MISFITS WHOSE ONLY CONNECTION AT THIS POINT IS THAT YOU DO NOT ADHERE TO THE STANDARD EIGHT RACES OF THE FORGOTTEN REALMS SETTING. BUT NO MATTER.
Vitus OoC: "we are all individuals" - mandatory Monty Python quote out of the way...
Adrian Vyn: Dude, inside voice.
Narrator: YOU ARE SITTING AT A TABLE IN AN INN NOT FAR FROM THE RUINS OF HIGHTOWER CASTLE. IT HAS BEEN JUST LONG ENOUGH FOR THE TOWNSFOLK TO GET DRUNK ENOUGH TO ACCEPT YOUR WILDLY DIFFERING APPEARANCES.
Adrian Vyn: Oh great, a village of drunks.
Vitus: *mentally counts down until somebody - probably Laudigan - tries to seduce the barmaid*
Narrator: *glances back at the GM* Do I have to use allcaps? I mean, there's not really any way to type in bold here

It has been raining steadily heavier ever since the misfits got here.

Vitus: You have to wonder how anybody can live in this climate. Apart from frogs. *looks around at the townsfolk suspiciously* Or Deep One hybrids.
Laudigan: *Perking an ear at the continuous sound of raindrops on the roof.* At the very least it is dry. The last inn I slept in required several buckets to catch the water.
Adrian Vyn: Someone once told me, if the weather is bad, you need to complain to some god called the game master.

Vitus: *checks the weight of his coinpurse, and sighs* It would appear I'm going to have go loot some ruin again soon. Digging latrines would just be demeaning. *looks up at the ceiling, mentally calculating the odds of nearby loot vs. risk of gruesome death*

Vitus: You, barkeep - any ruins around here that the townsfolk scrupulously avoid?
Nig Llush, Bartender: Ruins? Naught but old Hightower to the north.
Vitus: Oh reeeeally. Do tell. Let me guess - lots of tales about the evil of the last resident? And how he was damned by the gods?
Nig Llush, Bartender: Naw, place was cleared out by adventurers like yerselves ages ago. used to be some old stronghold of a weather wizard, I think. Nothing but dust and stone now.
Narrator: Speaking of Weather... *truly ear-splitting crash of thunder & lightning*
Vitus: What in the name of Grabthar's right nut was that?!

More lightning blows in half the wall. Laudigan casually downs the rest of his swill and dabs his muzzle dry. He then proceeds to calmly duck under the table.

The Peanut Gallery: I'd advice any dwarves in fullplate not to stand up, inside or out

Laudigan: Perhaps the gods are growing weary of our idleness.

Vitus stands up authoritatively - somebody should at least appear to be in charge here.

Vitus: Townsfolk! Take cover!
Adrian Vyn: I don't believe they need to be told.
Vitus: I don't know about that, I've met some really moronic villagers in my time. Some you can't even leave out in the rain, or they'll drown

Adrian Vyn: Maybe we should relocate to the wine cellar?
Vitus: Anybody else thinking 'weather wizard'?
Adrian Vyn: If that's true, I blame you for bringing him up in the first place.

Vitus collects a few bottle of beer and heads to the basement.

Adrian Vyn: Well, I'm not going out there to pick a fight with a wizard.
Vitus: I'm not going out there in this weather - we'll wait til he's exhausted his dailies THEN go kick his arse.
Adrian Vyn: Is he our problem? If the rain stops we could just vacate the premises.
Vitus: *gives the panda A Look* He blew up the tavern

The Peanut Gallery: oh look, free booze

The bartender stares, shocked at the damage, then runs outside into the rain.

Vitus: What did I tell you? Too stupid to come in out of the rain...

Vitus pursues, then remembers he's 6ft4 and carrying a metal quarterstaff in a lightning storm.

Vitus: Maybe this was a bad idea...

Nig Llush, Bartender: It can't be.. The Weather wizard has returned?
Vitus: I thought you said he was dead. Exactly how long ago did you say his place was cleaned out?
Nig Llush, Bartender: He has been! At least 50 years!
Laudigan: If it were up to me, 50 years would be an ample time to make a grand return.

The Peanut Gallery: No weather wizard would be a one trick pony, where's the snow damn you.

The storm promptly obliges, dropping 4 feet of snow, sleet, and freezing rain on the village. In midsummer.

The Peanut Gallery: To the basement! Where all the very warming free rum is kept!

The group eventually tramp off to have a few pointed words with the wizard who interrupted their boozing. Nearing the tor things get quiet. Suspiciously quiet.

Laudigan: ...Do you hear that? It's... quiet, but it's there.
Vitus: NO, I DON'T HEAR ANYTHING
Laudigan: No. It is TOO quiet. *facepalms and rebukes himself for uttering the cursed words*
Art: It was quiet until you yelled.
Vitus: PARDON?

Two hobgoblins erupt from concealment in a snowdrift. We eye them with a certain contempt - attempting to ambush four alert magic-users really wasn't very bright of them.

Laudigan: *deadpan* My god, we're going to die.
Vitus: Well, full marks on the use of cover and Silence at least.

Vitus: Is it true what they say about Bats?
Laudigan: Depends what they say.
Vitus: That their 'racial weapon' is 'two-handed'.

Hobgoblins duly decapitated, we find a cavern under the tor that turns out to be some sort of underground complex. It's also swarming with rats, who prove hilariously inept right up until one has a go at the laughing hyena, and runs up Vitus' leg under his robe, where it makes a spirited attempt to circumsize him. Vitus' novel Prince Albert promptly develops lockjaw, rolling Nat. 20 after Nat. 20. Laudigan runs over to assist Vitus, who for *some* reason is running in circles flailing at his own crotch and screaming.

GM: Healing Grope...
Laudigan: Let's hurry and exterminate these vermin befo- by Boccob's COCK.

Another rat tries to sink its pointy little fangs into Laudigan's wrist.

Laudigan: You damaged my sleeve. Prepare to die, obviously.

GM: Be lucky yuou're not fighting Kobolds... "Shifty" is MURDER in high numbers like this.
Laudigan: But kobolds are so cute!

The number of Natural 20s the rats roll is beyond belief.

Laudigan: These rats are possessed by GODS.
GM: Quantum gods are fickle.

Laudigan: I cast "Summon Instrument: Flute" to the hand gripped around the rat's neck, making it appear within the rat's innards, tearing it apart as one end of the flute came out its mouth, and the other... under its tail.
GM: .....
Narrator: Dude. BRUTALITY.
Vitus: Well, I bet the Pied Piper never did THAT
Art: Rat for dinner any one?
Laudigan: Rat kebob.
Narrator: Laudigan is going to have to clean that flute.
Laudigan: Nay. I'll summon a new one.

Laudigan: Attack helpless critters, like heroes! *Punches air heroically*

Resting up -

Vitus OoC: *flicking through the "tome of sexy kobolds" while we wait*
Laudigan IC: *Polishing his wand while we wait.*

Narrator: Welcome to Adventure! Excitement! The occasional hot sex scene! Welcome.. to DUNGEONS! AND DRAGONS!
Adrian Vyn: The disembodied voice is back!
Vitus: ... ten more minutes, mom...

The sarcophagus in the next room is one of those ones with a portrait of the occupant's face. A really realistic portrait. Assuming the occupant was a flying vampire head.

Laudigan: BY BOCCOB'S DIMPLED ASSCHEEKS
Adrian Vyn: I told you to leave it alone...
Laudigan: Haha! Where's your sense of adventure?
Vitus: It got eaten by the last monster I could have avoided

The bard manages to take it down by spraying acid into its mouth.

Vitus: Well, I suppose it will be safe to open now, unless the gods are feeling particularly vindictive

Narrator: Running your fingers through the dust, something GRABS YOU!
Laudigan: Why is everything hellbent on laying hands on me?
Vitus: They think you're hot?... did I just say that aloud?
Art: Yes you did
Laudigan: I'd be flattered if I was more certain that I'm not about to lose my... my wand polishing hand.

It feels like a hand has tightly grasped the bat's own. Laudigan takes a deep breath, and lovingly grasps it back.

Laudigan: There there my darling, I am here.
Adrian Vyn: You're trying to seduce dust? I'm starting to think Laudigan has a one-track mind.

Laudigan pulls, and attached to his hand are the skeletal bones of some long-dead humanoid. It wears a ring on its ring finger. Laudigan examines the ring, then smiles warmly.

Laudigan: I'll admit... this is one of the more... interesting ways someone has proposed to me.

Laudigan: My sense of adventure is tingling. Of course, that could just be hypothermia.
Vitus: I think that's the Grim Reaper sharpening his scythe

Their's a stone chest in the next room. Art eagerly moves to investigate. The others, being more genre savvy, hang well back.

Vitus: Bet you a gold piece it's trapped.
Laudigan: You're on.

Art gets the chest open and promptly gets a dart right between the eyes. Vitus holds out a hand and Laudigan pays up.

Laudigan: ..you're lucky your skull's so thick.
Adrian Vyn: And that's why I stay far away from these things.
Narrator: So, instead of using your skills, you let poor Art take a dart to the skull?

Vitus is not very good at medicine, and has the bedside manner of the Grim Reaper.

Vitus: What do we do with this sort of injury? Do we have to push the dart all the way through so the tip won't break off inside?
Adrian Vyn: I warned you before to leave these things alone, you won't listen.
Vitus: I think I've got some pliers in my backpack here. For roadside dentistry.

Vitus: You'll probably want to get that out first, unless you want to be Art the Unicorn.
Art: Before I do, I am going to look into the chest, and see what is inside to make me get this much pain
Laudigan: Your priorities are impeccable.

Vitus: You know, whoever put that headband in there was just cruel - after all, if Art had already been wearing it he wouldn't have got a dart between the eyes.

Vitus use his crowbar to check *underneath* the chest

Vitus: Because that's the kind of thing I'd do if I had to leave something in a chest like this. A few baubles and a cursed item, and the real treasure underneath
Laudigan: Whoever put this here was simply not as savvy as you, I suppose.
Vitus: Maybe a few skeletal guards with long-lasting poison on their fingerbones, if I knew necromancy
Laudigan: Knew a necromancer once. Cold fingers everywhere.
Vitus: It's an important discipline

Vitus: Who wants to go through first?
Adrian Vyn: Whoever has a death wish... be my guest.
Laudigan: I think you could use a little more healing, Art, your... new face hole doesn't look very good.
Vitus: he needed that treasure like he needed a hole in the head

Vitus: The rats came down the corridor without incident, so the corridor itself might be free of traps - unless it's rotating blades at head height.

Art suffers injury to his other end later on. The long stone hall ends in a stone chamber furnished only with cracked, mouldering tables on which lie rusted implements of iron. Rain falls into the middle of the room from a shaft in the ceiling that must run all the way to the top of the tor. From the bottom of the shaft dangles a rope, swinging slightly. A drain in the centre of the floor allows the water to escape, but old, dark stains suggest that it was used to carry away... *other* fluids long ago.

Laudigan: Is that a sacrificial chamber? I'm getting a 'sacrificial chamber' vibe.
Narrator: Either that or a sex dungeon.
Vitus: *eyes the disembodied voice* Quite. But I don't think we have time for Art's backside to be thus treated
Adrian Vyn: How exactly do you eye something with no body?
Vitus: Arcane sight XD

Sadly, our paranoia is out of practise - we test the rope to see whether it could take our weight, of course. Unfortunately, it doesn't occur to us that it might be set up as a alarm system.

Narrator: Art tugs on the rope. You hear a rusty clang as an ancient bell peals out.
Vitus: fuckity boo

The ensuing battle is complicated by our own side casting Mist spells, and the arrival of an Enlarged undead Bugbear. Fighting blind doesn't help anybody, it would appear.

GM: YOU TRIED CASTING MAGIC MISSILE AT THE DARKNESS.

Laudigan is attacked by a hobgoblin.

Laudigan: That's a big sword. Compensating for something?

Adrian Vyn: Guess it wasn't the smartest idea to hide in a corner and be unable to leave without provoking Attacks of Opportunity.

Although we don't figure out what happened until after the battle, Art managed to Turn the bugbear. Which fled, and managed to knock itself out running down a hallway it was now too large to enter. Vitus is still casting Colour Spray at the enemies he can actually see.

Vitus: TASTE THE MUTHAFUCKIN' RAINBOW
Laudigan: It's beeeautiful!

Art: Can I take a wiz on the wizard?
Laudigan: See if you can!
Vitus: "we're off to pee the wizard, the horrible wizard of hobs"

The Hobgoblin Leader is still after Art.

Hobgoblin: GODSDAMNIT, STAND STILL, SQUIRREL!
Laudigan: HE'S NOT A SQUIRREL HE'S A BLUE PANDA.

The Weather Wizard, knowing he's cornered, attempts a desperate escape - ripping one of the multitude of patches on his robe, he flings it outward to the floor. And most of the PCs and one of the hobs fall into the 10 foot deep pit that just appeared. The Wizard leaps over the pit, laughing. "You haven't seen the last of me, Diblowiki, the Weather Wiz-
..... and doesn't make the jump.

Adrian Vyn: Wish I had time to hold the dagger up and let him fall on it.

Vitus, who was readying a rope and grappling hook to drag the bastard down anyway, garrottes him instead. Unfortunately, with the wizard's death the bugbear dissolves, flooding the pit with decomposing liquified remains. Yuck.

Narrator: The goo is extremely slippery. you ALMOST get enough purchase, but slip and fall back into the now half-full pit of goo. it's about up to your shoulders.
Laudigan: I guess we can swim.

Vitus: That... was... disgusting. If I could, I'd raise this arsehole from the dead just so we could kill him again.

The shadowrunners are an ork/troll group. Completely against stereotype, they specialize in stealth, subtlety, bluff, illusion, deception and misdirection.   Dent: ork, rat shaman No-Step: ork, snake shaman, healer Byte Force: ork, decker, chemist Eye Spy: ork, rigger, drones, paramedic Audacity Jane: ork, combat, stealth, security systems Happy Jack: troll, combat, disguise, negotiator Humanis Policlub: a human-supremacist political group; some of the radical members have ties to Alamos 20,000 Alamos 20,000: a murderous anti-metahuman organization Sons of Sauron: a ork-rights political group, which is often as violent as Humanis Policlub  
Happy Jack returns from negotiating with a Mr. Johnson.
 
Happy Jack: "I have some bad news, and some good news." Eye Spy: "I hate this game." No Step: "I'll bite. What's the bad news." Happy Jack: "The pay sucks for this job. Mr. Johnson's opening offer was 5,000 nuyen total. I was only able to talk him up to 8,000 nuyen." Dent: "I assume the good news is this is some kind of 'karma' job where we feel good about ourselves afterwards?" Happy Jack: "Mr. Johnson wants us to blow up a Humanis Policlub chapterhouse. The more destruction, the better." Eye Spy: "Happy Jack wins. I feel good about this job already."   The team tries to figure out how to wreck the chapterhouse without damaging adjacent buildings.   Audacity Jane: "I'll put cutting charges on the interior structural supports. The interior of the building will collapse, and the rest will be unstable. They'll actually have to pay money to tear down the unstable sections before repairing it." Byte Force: "I can also build the mother of all stink bombs. If all the furnishings smell horrible, it means they can't be reused or resold. They'll have to be written off at a loss." Audacity Jane: "Hah. The demolition and reconstruction crews will charge hazard pay if it smells bad enough." Happy Jack: "Maybe we can rupture a sewage line so the basement fills with black water." Byte Force: "That makes my stink bomb redundant." Happy Jack: "Not really. If your stink bomb smells bad enough, they won't notice the sewage until it's had a few days to fill the basement." Dent: "There's something poetic about filling the *******'s building with ****."   The team researches the target.   Byte Force: "I have some bad news." Eye Spy: "I hate this even more than good news/bad news." Byte Force: "The building is so heavily insured that it will be nearly impossible to do enough damage to hurt Humanis." No Step: "Something stinks about this job. I talked to my contact in Sons of Sauron. He says this chapter of Humanis keeps its hands clean. It's the main fundraiser. It does a lot of the politics and press releases. They even run a few charities. He's sure they channel money to the more radical and violent chapters, but they've never been caught doing it. Why does Mr. Johnson want this one blown up, instead of one of the violent chapters?" Audacity Jane: "Happy Jack, you royally screwed up. I'm starting to feel uneasy about blowing up a Humanis chapterhouse. This is supposed to be a 'feel good' job."   More investigation ... more bad news.   Byte Force: "I'm officially declaring this job a set-up. That chapterhouse is filled with wireless cameras. I'm betting we're supposed to get caught while we're trying to blow the place up." Happy Jack: "Yeah. I'm thinking we were hired by Humanis to blow the place up. It costs them nothing, then they use us as poster children for their next fundraising drive." No Step: "Should we refuse the job and return the advance?" Happy Jack: "No. If we do, Mr. Johnson will just hire some dumber orks and trolls to do the job anyway." Dent: "Instead, we get to be the dumber orks and trolls who do the job." Audacity Jane: "Even if I get in and out undetected, everyone's going to assume that metahumans blew the place up." Happy Jack: "We just need to fabricate evidence that humans blew up the chapterhouse." Dent: "Who is going to believe that?" Happy Jack: "This is a chapterhouse of moderates, relatively speaking. There's a big downside to being a moderate. The radicals on your side hate you even more than they hate the guys on the other side." No Step: "So we're supposed to show up looking like humans ... who just happen to be wearing their Alamos 20,000 name badges?" Happy Jack: "We find a couple Alamos 20,000 members who have criminal records, but aren't locked up, and they become our new best friends." Eye Spy: (spit-takes) "I'm sorry. My brain can't process 'Alamos 20,000' and 'new best friends' in the same sentence."   Humanis will certainly hide any evidence of human involvement, so the team sets up a dashboard camera to "catch them in the act," so the video can be leaked later.   No Step: "How are we going to conveniently arrange to have the camera get a good look at our faces? Dashboard cameras don't conveniently zoom in on faces." Happy Jack: "Right before you two break into the chapterhouse, the two of you will assault an indigent troll right in front of our camera." No Step: "So you'll be disguised as an indigent troll. But why wouldn't a troll just go all King Kong on a couple humans?" Happy Jack: "Audacity Jane will point a shotgun at me, while you take a bunch of whacks with a club." No Step: "Why do I have to be the one beating up on you? I'll already be straining just to hold up two illusions." Happy Jack: "If you hit me repeatedly with a club, I'll have some bruises. If Audacity Jane hits me with a club, I'll have massive internal bleeding."   Eye Spy: "What happens if our scapegoats have alibis?" Happy Jack: "I took care of that." Eye Spy: "You kidnapped them?" Happy Jack: "No. I called one of them and pretended to be part of Alamos 20,000 in Boston. I told them that we'd stolen data from the Sons of Sauron, and the group in Boston had just shipped a truckload of weapons to the Sons of Sauron in Seattle. While you're blowing up the Humanis chapter, our scapegoats will be waiting to rob a fictitious load of guns." Happy Jack: (in a nasally voice) "I swear I didn't blow up a building detective! I was innocently sitting in a dark alley waiting to steal some guns!"   Dent: "We ought to set off an EMP grenade next to their servers while we're in there." Byte Force: (wincing) "That's sacrilege. Data is meant to be stolen, not destroyed." No Step: "He's right. You two go in invisibly, so Byte Force can steal all the information off their servers." Byte Force: "Thank you." No Step: "And then set off an EMP grenade next to the servers, so they can't figure out what you took."   As they're leaving (still covered by the Physical Mask spell), No Step spray paints SUNZ UV SAWRON RULZS on the wall of the chapterhouse.   Audacity Jane: (as they walk away) "What were you doing?" No Step: "Making it look like we were trying to frame the Sons of Sauron for this." Audacity Jane: "Nobody is going to believe that the Sons of Sauron misspelled their own name." No Step: "Nobody?" Audacity Jane: "Okay. Fine. Nobody except a stupid and ignorant racist is going to believe they'd misspell their own name." No Step: "And who are we impersonating right now...?"   After the building is blown up and the video is posted online and leaked to the media....   Byte Force: "The only useful Humanis data I got was a list of donors." Happy Jack: "Some of those donors may work for metahuman-friendly corps like Saeder Krupp. I bet Humanis membership is a violation of corporate policy." No Step: "Get them fired?" Happy Jack: "Blackmail them." Dent: "It's about time you figured out how to get some money out of this mess." Happy Jack: "We completed the job. I still expect to get paid by Mr. Johnson too." Dent: "He's a Humanis member who tried to set us up. He doesn't want to pay us." Happy Jack: "Of course not, but he'll show up to the meeting, if only to get the chance to kill me."   Mr. Johnson arrives at the club with an entourage of bodyguards. His group also contains a fearsome number of mercenaries, street samurai and mages, who remain stationed a distance from the club.   As Mr. Johnson waits at a secluded table...   Bartender: (carrying a tray with a glass of champagne and a cell phone) "Mr. Johnson? A patron purchased this for you. I believe he was unable to wait for your arrival." Mr. Johnson: (picking up the phone) "I was expecting to see you here." Happy Jack: "I'm reasonably certain that I'd be killed before I got within two blocks of the club." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "But I've called in order to make arrangements for the remainder of our pay." Mr. Johnson: "I'm not pleased with the way the job turned out." Happy Jack: "The building was redecorated, just as you requested. Based on the tone of your voice, I would say that we exceeded your expectations." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "Obviously, some of your expectations were not met. If you wanted us to take the fall, you should have requested the service up front. We would have increased the price accordingly." Mr. Johnson: "There's no reason for me to pay you." Happy Jack: "Professional courtesy." Mr. Johnson: (snorts) Happy Jack: "As professionals, we keep silent about the activities of our paying clients. The key word is 'paying' clients. We do not extend the same courtesy to clients who stiff us. I'm sure a lot of people would feel quite betrayed by your activities." Mr. Johnson: (snarling) "Fine." Happy Jack: "In addition, the price has doubled. That's the surcharge for trying to kill us." Mr. Johnson: "Fine." Happy Jack: "And as a final matter, you need to be aware of the life insurance for me and my coworkers." Mr. Johnson: "Life insurance?" Happy Jack: "If any of us die, your comrades will receive a video. I'm sure you would find it awkward to explain." Mr. Johnson: "You're a shadowrunner. What happens if one of your other enemies kills you?" Happy Jack: "The video gets delivered, as promised. You might want to use that champagne to wish us all a very long life."    

Inkubus: One of the so-far rare Metal Mages – an elven charmer, hedonist and mage with a interest in Shadowruns and beautiful women and excellent booze.
Felix 'Bubbles' Bethke: A minor scion of Aztechnology corporate royalty, who was working as a security mage for that company when he got put on permanent leave. He has no idea why, and is only Shadowrunning in order to build up a better stock portfolio and supplement his trust fund. Like his housemate Inkubus, loves good food.
Warhammer: Dwarven ex-military sniper.
Labrat: Ork rigger and engineer. Still a member of the Cascade Orc tribe, but somewhat estranged.
Titus: Troll hydroponic gardener, accountant, and muscle. Hobbies include demolition and collecting housemates.
Greenlight: Team's good luck charm and bitzer - actually a teenaged girl whose entire family were rounded up by Renraku corp security. Hobbies include the innovative application of stun batons, and crossdressing.

It appears we're going to get involved in the violence between the Campbells and the McDonalds.

Titus: I think it was a feud between the soup people and the fast food people
Greenlight: 'You're not going to marry him!' ' But Dad, I'm so sick of soup!' 'You eat it with a SPOOOO-hack coughchoke' Sorry, choked on my own accent.

Perhaps we can use ritual tracking to find the remain Quicksilver chips? Pity none of us wanted to risk bringing the materials into the country.

Titus: What would ritual materials for a metal mage be, anyway?
Inkubus: Hookers and blow.

Felix has a number of deficiencies as a mage.

Inkubus: You'll be assisting me – because I don't have an intuition otherwise reserved for lemmings.

Felix and Inkubus do learn that one of the chips is probably in the McDonald castle.

Felix: Do we need to recruit the Hamburglar?
Greenlight: Why?
Felix: He's always stealing things from McDonalds.

And the last horcrux is at Transys-Neuronet, Quicksilver's employers, and who may have our client killed after he was caught snooping in their datasystems at our behest.

Inkubus: You know, the more I suspect we got our Johnson killed, the more I get this strange feeling..
Felix: Starts with a G...
Inkubus: It's a twisty, empty sort of feeling..
Greenlight: Indigestion?
Inkubus: That's it.

Felix: Did you know there's good evidence that magic doesn't exist?
Inkubus: Reeeealy?
Felix: Yup. It's all the result of a pervasive nanotech web permeating the biosphere.
Inkubus: So when we're astrally projecting we're really jacking into a nanotech Matrix?
Felix: Straight into our sensoria. It was all installed by aliens, reshaping the world into something that amuses them. They'd have to be 'magically powerful', and highly territorial.
Inkubus: That... makes a lot of sense. I for one welcome our new alien overlord.
Felix: Yup. And it would explain why one of the old Mars probes photographed a dragon's skeleton.

The group are now starting to think we should drop the case and go home. Trying to storm the 118th floor of a corp that makes combat cyberwear – especially when we aren't being paid – seems likea really really bad idea. Then Felix gets an email, from a Transys server, from one Tsangara.

Felix: How did they get this email?
Inkubus: I swear I'm going to destroy that pocket secretary
Felix: This is the new one
Inkubus: Oh god.
Titus: Did you clone your address book into this or something?
Felix: Well, I have been checking my social media...
Inkubus: headdesk

Tsangara congrats us on digging this deep, and says he has the fourth chip.

Felix: Is Tsangara a female name? If Quicksilver gave them the chip, it would fit the pattern.
GM: No.
Felix: Hmm. Obviously he was bi.

They want to meet, that evening, at a bus stop near Transys. Bubbles and Greenlight, with the others watching from their truck up the street.

Greenlight: Feel free to run over anybody that causes trouble.
Felix: It is a rental though
Warhammer: I wasn't intending on paying for it anyway.

Tsangara even knows Felix's real name. Frantic hand signals behind Felix's back ensue.

Felix: For the benefit of any recording devices within earshot, I have no idea what you're talking about.
Tsangara offers to pay us very generously - 250K each - for the other three chips, and the deck, and offers us info on how to recover the third chip. Felix gives the waiting truck a thumbs up.
Felix: That would be a extremely generous offer sir, if I had any idea who you are, what you're talking about, or who I am. I know nothing!

Tsangara claims involvement in the creation of the chips, but Quicksilver did something naughty. Nonetheless, he intends to reslot all the chips if recovered, just like we were doing. We just have to recover the one currently held at the McDonald clan seat first.

Felix: 'Have fun storming the castle.'

Greenlight: Please tell me they have knights.
Titus: They have highlanders.
Felix: In that case there can be only one.
Inkubus: Does that make me the Kurgan? Because I don't want to die like a bitch.

Greenlight: We've only met one person in Scotland with a bladed weapon so far. I demand a refund.

Inkubus goes hunting for Lydia McDonald, scion of the clan, and someone he can hopefully seduce to get us into the castle.

Inkubus: I can't believe this is our plan.
Titus: It is our default by now. Find out if an attractive woman is involved, then aim Inkubus at her.

Off to the McDonald stronghold at Glencoe, and the local bar – Old McDonalds - where Lydia has been tweeting her drunken mourning about the recent massacre – Morag was, after all, her sister.

Felix: Can I get that in a clean glass?
Barman: spit – polish There you go - the alcohol will deal with the rest.
Inkubus: casts Sterilize
Barman: Do ya want that in a combo meal? *schooner and shot glass* Which one of you is the designated driver?
Inkubus: *points at Felix* Can't you tell?
Barman: Right – you got water, or you got milk. And if you're really deviant we got orange cordial.
Inkubus: I may retire here.

Inkubus buys a round of drinks for himself, Lydia, and her bodyguards, before heading over to her able. The bodyguards get the cordial.

Inkubus' player: You don't play with seven players. Unless it's Deadlands.
Greenlight's player: Or a samurai game.
Felix's player: ?
Inkubus' player: Magnificent Seven.
Greenlight's player: It's traditional.

Greenlight: Why are we even bothering? If Inkubus is involved of course it's going to end up with the two of them in bed. The D intensifies.
Titus: I wonder if in One Piece, that's what they mean by 'the Will of the D'?

Felix's suggestion that Inkubus satisfy Lydia so completely that she remains passed out for hours is a good one – because once he's inside the castle's magical words magically tracking the third horcrux will be MUCH easier. On the other hand, while astrally projecting he also runs into Morag's ghost.

Inkubus: And I just banged her sister. Um....... hi?
Greenlight: Sleep with her too XD
Inkubus: Damn you for suggesting that *rolls to resist temptation*

Morag's ghost goes Ghostbuster's Librarian, when Inkubus admits he's after the third chip.

Morag's Ghost: NO! YOU WILL NOT TAKE QUICKSILVER AWAY FROM ME!
Inkubus: Quicksilver is neither dead nor alive right now. This will resolve it one way or the other. And if he lives, you will just have to wait. Leave him like this and you will wait forever.

Morag's Ghost: Quicksilver and I are bound in ways you cannot understand.
Felix: And you even have the Kama Sutra pop-up book.
Inkubus: I believe it, and I can't believe I believe it.

Morag agrees to let Inkubus take the chip hidden in her bedroom, on the condition she gets to come along. Sneaking the chip through the castle is going to need the assistance of a summoned Hearth spirit, however. Happily, since the family aren't going to like Lydia' elven boytoy, Inkubus has a good excuse to leave the castle before dawn. Lydia is even mostly over her mourning, and thanks him for his services earlier.

GM: And thank you for once again totally bypassing the combat elements of the module.

GM: You head back to Edinburgh followed by a very pretty ghost.
Greenlight: Did you f**k her so hard you killed her?
Inkubus: No, this is Morag. You know, her sister.
Greenlight: 8-( Are you going to leave half of Scotland pregnant, including the undead?
Inkubus: I wouldn't rule it out.

Inkubus' player: I'm a little disturbed by how many problems get solved with Inkubus's penis.

Tsangara wants to install the last few chips somewhere secure. The 118th floor of the Transys-Neuronet sounds good. To him. Not so much to the paranoid Felix. Especially because it's their R&D level. Plus, Tsangara has no trouble seeing or recognising Morag's ghost.

Quicksilver's matrix avatar materialises. In the Astral. This is extremely odd. He then takes Tsangara shoulders in his hands.

Quicksilver's Spirit: I need you.
Felix: Told you he was bi.
Inkubus: I think I just found three chances for consolation sex – all his girlfriends.
Quicksilver's Spirit: I need you to help me pass on to the next turn of the wheel.

Greenlight: Everyone is chasing the elven deck.
Inkubus: We did that last time.
Greenlight: Just running the joke into the ground.

Quicksilver unpacks all his mental and spiritual aspects, and somehow shares his with Tsangara, Labrat and Morag.

Felix: How the f**k is he doing this?
Inkubus: Magic so advanced it's indistinguishable from technology.

Quicksilver's life, flashing before Labrat's eyes, is very very very long.

Inkubus OOC: Never tell Felix about this – he'll never shut up about it. One of the conspiracy theories that no-one believes is the one about immortal elves.

Quicksilver's arcanotech reincarnation is just winding up when helicopter gunship fire blows in all the windows, Special Forces troops rappel in, and Tsangara drops his magical facade and is revealed as the Great Dragon Celedyr. Now is the time to lose control of our sphincters. Or clench like we've never clenched before.

The shadowrunners are an ork/troll group. Completely against stereotype, they specialize in stealth, subtlety, bluff, illusion, deception and misdirection.   Dent: ork, rat shaman No-Step: ork, snake shaman, healer Byte Force: ork, decker, chemist Eye Spy: ork, rigger, drones, paramedic Audacity Jane: ork, combat, stealth, security systems Happy Jack: troll, combat, disguise, negotiator Humanis Policlub: a human-supremacist political group; some of the radical members have ties to Alamos 20,000 Alamos 20,000: a murderous anti-metahuman organization Sons of Sauron: a ork-rights political group, which is often as violent as Humanis Policlub  
Happy Jack returns from negotiating with a Mr. Johnson.
 
Happy Jack: "I have some bad news, and some good news." Eye Spy: "I hate this game." No Step: "I'll bite. What's the bad news." Happy Jack: "The pay sucks for this job. Mr. Johnson's opening offer was 5,000 nuyen total. I was only able to talk him up to 8,000 nuyen." Dent: "I assume the good news is this is some kind of 'karma' job where we feel good about ourselves afterwards?" Happy Jack: "Mr. Johnson wants us to blow up a Humanis Policlub chapterhouse. The more destruction, the better." Eye Spy: "Happy Jack wins. I feel good about this job already."   The team tries to figure out how to wreck the chapterhouse without damaging adjacent buildings.   Audacity Jane: "I'll put cutting charges on the interior structural supports. The interior of the building will collapse, and the rest will be unstable. They'll actually have to pay money to tear down the unstable sections before repairing it." Byte Force: "I can also build the mother of all stink bombs. If all the furnishings smell horrible, it means they can't be reused or resold. They'll have to be written off at a loss." Audacity Jane: "Hah. The demolition and reconstruction crews will charge hazard pay if it smells bad enough." Happy Jack: "Maybe we can rupture a sewage line so the basement fills with black water." Byte Force: "That makes my stink bomb redundant." Happy Jack: "Not really. If your stink bomb smells bad enough, they won't notice the sewage until it's had a few days to fill the basement." Dent: "There's something poetic about filling the *******'s building with ****."   The team researches the target.   Byte Force: "I have some bad news." Eye Spy: "I hate this even more than good news/bad news." Byte Force: "The building is so heavily insured that it will be nearly impossible to do enough damage to hurt Humanis." No Step: "Something stinks about this job. I talked to my contact in Sons of Sauron. He says this chapter of Humanis keeps its hands clean. It's the main fundraiser. It does a lot of the politics and press releases. They even run a few charities. He's sure they channel money to the more radical and violent chapters, but they've never been caught doing it. Why does Mr. Johnson want this one blown up, instead of one of the violent chapters?" Audacity Jane: "Happy Jack, you royally screwed up. I'm starting to feel uneasy about blowing up a Humanis chapterhouse. This is supposed to be a 'feel good' job."   More investigation ... more bad news.   Byte Force: "I'm officially declaring this job a set-up. That chapterhouse is filled with wireless cameras. I'm betting we're supposed to get caught while we're trying to blow the place up." Happy Jack: "Yeah. I'm thinking we were hired by Humanis to blow the place up. It costs them nothing, then they use us as poster children for their next fundraising drive." No Step: "Should we refuse the job and return the advance?" Happy Jack: "No. If we do, Mr. Johnson will just hire some dumber orks and trolls to do the job anyway." Dent: "Instead, we get to be the dumber orks and trolls who do the job." Audacity Jane: "Even if I get in and out undetected, everyone's going to assume that metahumans blew the place up." Happy Jack: "We just need to fabricate evidence that humans blew up the chapterhouse." Dent: "Who is going to believe that?" Happy Jack: "This is a chapterhouse of moderates, relatively speaking. There's a big downside to being a moderate. The radicals on your side hate you even more than they hate the guys on the other side." No Step: "So we're supposed to show up looking like humans ... who just happen to be wearing their Alamos 20,000 name badges?" Happy Jack: "We find a couple Alamos 20,000 members who have criminal records, but aren't locked up, and they become our new best friends." Eye Spy: (spit-takes) "I'm sorry. My brain can't process 'Alamos 20,000' and 'new best friends' in the same sentence."   Humanis will certainly hide any evidence of human involvement, so the team sets up a dashboard camera to "catch them in the act," so the video can be leaked later.   No Step: "How are we going to conveniently arrange to have the camera get a good look at our faces? Dashboard cameras don't conveniently zoom in on faces." Happy Jack: "Right before you two break into the chapterhouse, the two of you will assault an indigent troll right in front of our camera." No Step: "So you'll be disguised as an indigent troll. But why wouldn't a troll just go all King Kong on a couple humans?" Happy Jack: "Audacity Jane will point a shotgun at me, while you take a bunch of whacks with a club." No Step: "Why do I have to be the one beating up on you? I'll already be straining just to hold up two illusions." Happy Jack: "If you hit me repeatedly with a club, I'll have some bruises. If Audacity Jane hits me with a club, I'll have massive internal bleeding."   Eye Spy: "What happens if our scapegoats have alibis?" Happy Jack: "I took care of that." Eye Spy: "You kidnapped them?" Happy Jack: "No. I called one of them and pretended to be part of Alamos 20,000 in Boston. I told them that we'd stolen data from the Sons of Sauron, and the group in Boston had just shipped a truckload of weapons to the Sons of Sauron in Seattle. While you're blowing up the Humanis chapter, our scapegoats will be waiting to rob a fictitious load of guns." Happy Jack: (in a nasally voice) "I swear I didn't blow up a building detective! I was innocently sitting in a dark alley waiting to steal some guns!"   Dent: "We ought to set off an EMP grenade next to their servers while we're in there." Byte Force: (wincing) "That's sacrilege. Data is meant to be stolen, not destroyed." No Step: "He's right. You two go in invisibly, so Byte Force can steal all the information off their servers." Byte Force: "Thank you." No Step: "And then set off an EMP grenade next to the servers, so they can't figure out what you took."   As they're leaving (still covered by the Physical Mask spell), No Step spray paints SUNZ UV SAWRON RULZS on the wall of the chapterhouse.   Audacity Jane: (as they walk away) "What were you doing?" No Step: "Making it look like we were trying to frame the Sons of Sauron for this." Audacity Jane: "Nobody is going to believe that the Sons of Sauron misspelled their own name." No Step: "Nobody?" Audacity Jane: "Okay. Fine. Nobody except a stupid and ignorant racist is going to believe they'd misspell their own name." No Step: "And who are we impersonating right now...?"   After the building is blown up and the video is posted online and leaked to the media....   Byte Force: "The only useful Humanis data I got was a list of donors." Happy Jack: "Some of those donors may work for metahuman-friendly corps like Saeder Krupp. I bet Humanis membership is a violation of corporate policy." No Step: "Get them fired?" Happy Jack: "Blackmail them." Dent: "It's about time you figured out how to get some money out of this mess." Happy Jack: "We completed the job. I still expect to get paid by Mr. Johnson too." Dent: "He's a Humanis member who tried to set us up. He doesn't want to pay us." Happy Jack: "Of course not, but he'll show up to the meeting, if only to get the chance to kill me."   Mr. Johnson arrives at the club with an entourage of bodyguards. His group also contains a fearsome number of mercenaries, street samurai and mages, who remain stationed a distance from the club.   As Mr. Johnson waits at a secluded table...   Bartender: (carrying a tray with a glass of champagne and a cell phone) "Mr. Johnson? A patron purchased this for you. I believe he was unable to wait for your arrival." Mr. Johnson: (picking up the phone) "I was expecting to see you here." Happy Jack: "I'm reasonably certain that I'd be killed before I got within two blocks of the club." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "But I've called in order to make arrangements for the remainder of our pay." Mr. Johnson: "I'm not pleased with the way the job turned out." Happy Jack: "The building was redecorated, just as you requested. Based on the tone of your voice, I would say that we exceeded your expectations." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "Obviously, some of your expectations were not met. If you wanted us to take the fall, you should have requested the service up front. We would have increased the price accordingly." Mr. Johnson: "There's no reason for me to pay you." Happy Jack: "Professional courtesy." Mr. Johnson: (snorts) Happy Jack: "As professionals, we keep silent about the activities of our paying clients. The key word is 'paying' clients. We do not extend the same courtesy to clients who stiff us. I'm sure a lot of people would feel quite betrayed by your activities." Mr. Johnson: (snarling) "Fine." Happy Jack: "In addition, the price has doubled. That's the surcharge for trying to kill us." Mr. Johnson: "Fine." Happy Jack: "And as a final matter, you need to be aware of the life insurance for me and my coworkers." Mr. Johnson: "Life insurance?" Happy Jack: "If any of us die, your comrades will receive a video. I'm sure you would find it awkward to explain." Mr. Johnson: "You're a shadowrunner. What happens if one of your other enemies kills you?" Happy Jack: "The video gets delivered, as promised. You might want to use that champagne to wish us all a very long life."    

The shadowrunners are an ork/troll group. Completely against stereotype, they specialize in stealth, subtlety, bluff, illusion, deception and misdirection.   Dent: ork, rat shaman No-Step: ork, snake shaman, healer Byte Force: ork, decker, chemist Eye Spy: ork, rigger, drones, paramedic Audacity Jane: ork, combat, stealth, security systems Happy Jack: troll, combat, disguise, negotiator Humanis Policlub: a human-supremacist political group; some of the radical members have ties to Alamos 20,000 Alamos 20,000: a murderous anti-metahuman organization Sons of Sauron: a ork-rights political group, which is often as violent as Humanis Policlub  
Happy Jack returns from negotiating with a Mr. Johnson.
 
Happy Jack: "I have some bad news, and some good news." Eye Spy: "I hate this game." No Step: "I'll bite. What's the bad news." Happy Jack: "The pay sucks for this job. Mr. Johnson's opening offer was 5,000 nuyen total. I was only able to talk him up to 8,000 nuyen." Dent: "I assume the good news is this is some kind of 'karma' job where we feel good about ourselves afterwards?" Happy Jack: "Mr. Johnson wants us to blow up a Humanis Policlub chapterhouse. The more destruction, the better." Eye Spy: "Happy Jack wins. I feel good about this job already."   The team tries to figure out how to wreck the chapterhouse without damaging adjacent buildings.   Audacity Jane: "I'll put cutting charges on the interior structural supports. The interior of the building will collapse, and the rest will be unstable. They'll actually have to pay money to tear down the unstable sections before repairing it." Byte Force: "I can also build the mother of all stink bombs. If all the furnishings smell horrible, it means they can't be reused or resold. They'll have to be written off at a loss." Audacity Jane: "Hah. The demolition and reconstruction crews will charge hazard pay if it smells bad enough." Happy Jack: "Maybe we can rupture a sewage line so the basement fills with black water." Byte Force: "That makes my stink bomb redundant." Happy Jack: "Not really. If your stink bomb smells bad enough, they won't notice the sewage until it's had a few days to fill the basement." Dent: "There's something poetic about filling the *******'s building with ****."   The team researches the target.   Byte Force: "I have some bad news." Eye Spy: "I hate this even more than good news/bad news." Byte Force: "The building is so heavily insured that it will be nearly impossible to do enough damage to hurt Humanis." No Step: "Something stinks about this job. I talked to my contact in Sons of Sauron. He says this chapter of Humanis keeps its hands clean. It's the main fundraiser. It does a lot of the politics and press releases. They even run a few charities. He's sure they channel money to the more radical and violent chapters, but they've never been caught doing it. Why does Mr. Johnson want this one blown up, instead of one of the violent chapters?" Audacity Jane: "Happy Jack, you royally screwed up. I'm starting to feel uneasy about blowing up a Humanis chapterhouse. This is supposed to be a 'feel good' job."   More investigation ... more bad news.   Byte Force: "I'm officially declaring this job a set-up. That chapterhouse is filled with wireless cameras. I'm betting we're supposed to get caught while we're trying to blow the place up." Happy Jack: "Yeah. I'm thinking we were hired by Humanis to blow the place up. It costs them nothing, then they use us as poster children for their next fundraising drive." No Step: "Should we refuse the job and return the advance?" Happy Jack: "No. If we do, Mr. Johnson will just hire some dumber orks and trolls to do the job anyway." Dent: "Instead, we get to be the dumber orks and trolls who do the job." Audacity Jane: "Even if I get in and out undetected, everyone's going to assume that metahumans blew the place up." Happy Jack: "We just need to fabricate evidence that humans blew up the chapterhouse." Dent: "Who is going to believe that?" Happy Jack: "This is a chapterhouse of moderates, relatively speaking. There's a big downside to being a moderate. The radicals on your side hate you even more than they hate the guys on the other side." No Step: "So we're supposed to show up looking like humans ... who just happen to be wearing their Alamos 20,000 name badges?" Happy Jack: "We find a couple Alamos 20,000 members who have criminal records, but aren't locked up, and they become our new best friends." Eye Spy: (spit-takes) "I'm sorry. My brain can't process 'Alamos 20,000' and 'new best friends' in the same sentence."   Humanis will certainly hide any evidence of human involvement, so the team sets up a dashboard camera to "catch them in the act," so the video can be leaked later.   No Step: "How are we going to conveniently arrange to have the camera get a good look at our faces? Dashboard cameras don't conveniently zoom in on faces." Happy Jack: "Right before you two break into the chapterhouse, the two of you will assault an indigent troll right in front of our camera." No Step: "So you'll be disguised as an indigent troll. But why wouldn't a troll just go all King Kong on a couple humans?" Happy Jack: "Audacity Jane will point a shotgun at me, while you take a bunch of whacks with a club." No Step: "Why do I have to be the one beating up on you? I'll already be straining just to hold up two illusions." Happy Jack: "If you hit me repeatedly with a club, I'll have some bruises. If Audacity Jane hits me with a club, I'll have massive internal bleeding."   Eye Spy: "What happens if our scapegoats have alibis?" Happy Jack: "I took care of that." Eye Spy: "You kidnapped them?" Happy Jack: "No. I called one of them and pretended to be part of Alamos 20,000 in Boston. I told them that we'd stolen data from the Sons of Sauron, and the group in Boston had just shipped a truckload of weapons to the Sons of Sauron in Seattle. While you're blowing up the Humanis chapter, our scapegoats will be waiting to rob a fictitious load of guns." Happy Jack: (in a nasally voice) "I swear I didn't blow up a building detective! I was innocently sitting in a dark alley waiting to steal some guns!"   Dent: "We ought to set off an EMP grenade next to their servers while we're in there." Byte Force: (wincing) "That's sacrilege. Data is meant to be stolen, not destroyed." No Step: "He's right. You two go in invisibly, so Byte Force can steal all the information off their servers." Byte Force: "Thank you." No Step: "And then set off an EMP grenade next to the servers, so they can't figure out what you took."   As they're leaving (still covered by the Physical Mask spell), No Step spray paints SUNZ UV SAWRON RULZS on the wall of the chapterhouse.   Audacity Jane: (as they walk away) "What were you doing?" No Step: "Making it look like we were trying to frame the Sons of Sauron for this." Audacity Jane: "Nobody is going to believe that the Sons of Sauron misspelled their own name." No Step: "Nobody?" Audacity Jane: "Okay. Fine. Nobody except a stupid and ignorant racist is going to believe they'd misspell their own name." No Step: "And who are we impersonating right now...?"   After the building is blown up and the video is posted online and leaked to the media....   Byte Force: "The only useful Humanis data I got was a list of donors." Happy Jack: "Some of those donors may work for metahuman-friendly corps like Saeder Krupp. I bet Humanis membership is a violation of corporate policy." No Step: "Get them fired?" Happy Jack: "Blackmail them." Dent: "It's about time you figured out how to get some money out of this mess." Happy Jack: "We completed the job. I still expect to get paid by Mr. Johnson too." Dent: "He's a Humanis member who tried to set us up. He doesn't want to pay us." Happy Jack: "Of course not, but he'll show up to the meeting, if only to get the chance to kill me."   Mr. Johnson arrives at the club with an entourage of bodyguards. His group also contains a fearsome number of mercenaries, street samurai and mages, who remain stationed a distance from the club.   As Mr. Johnson waits at a secluded table...   Bartender: (carrying a tray with a glass of champagne and a cell phone) "Mr. Johnson? A patron purchased this for you. I believe he was unable to wait for your arrival." Mr. Johnson: (picking up the phone) "I was expecting to see you here." Happy Jack: "I'm reasonably certain that I'd be killed before I got within two blocks of the club." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "But I've called in order to make arrangements for the remainder of our pay." Mr. Johnson: "I'm not pleased with the way the job turned out." Happy Jack: "The building was redecorated, just as you requested. Based on the tone of your voice, I would say that we exceeded your expectations." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "Obviously, some of your expectations were not met. If you wanted us to take the fall, you should have requested the service up front. We would have increased the price accordingly." Mr. Johnson: "There's no reason for me to pay you." Happy Jack: "Professional courtesy." Mr. Johnson: (snorts) Happy Jack: "As professionals, we keep silent about the activities of our paying clients. The key word is 'paying' clients. We do not extend the same courtesy to clients who stiff us. I'm sure a lot of people would feel quite betrayed by your activities." Mr. Johnson: (snarling) "Fine." Happy Jack: "In addition, the price has doubled. That's the surcharge for trying to kill us." Mr. Johnson: "Fine." Happy Jack: "And as a final matter, you need to be aware of the life insurance for me and my coworkers." Mr. Johnson: "Life insurance?" Happy Jack: "If any of us die, your comrades will receive a video. I'm sure you would find it awkward to explain." Mr. Johnson: "You're a shadowrunner. What happens if one of your other enemies kills you?" Happy Jack: "The video gets delivered, as promised. You might want to use that champagne to wish us all a very long life."    

The shadowrunners are an ork/troll group. Completely against stereotype, they specialize in stealth, subtlety, bluff, illusion, deception and misdirection.   Dent: ork, rat shaman No-Step: ork, snake shaman, healer Byte Force: ork, decker, chemist Eye Spy: ork, rigger, drones, paramedic Audacity Jane: ork, combat, stealth, security systems Happy Jack: troll, combat, disguise, negotiator Humanis Policlub: a human-supremacist political group; some of the radical members have ties to Alamos 20,000 Alamos 20,000: a murderous anti-metahuman organization Sons of Sauron: a ork-rights political group, which is often as violent as Humanis Policlub  
Happy Jack returns from negotiating with a Mr. Johnson.
 
Happy Jack: "I have some bad news, and some good news." Eye Spy: "I hate this game." No Step: "I'll bite. What's the bad news." Happy Jack: "The pay sucks for this job. Mr. Johnson's opening offer was 5,000 nuyen total. I was only able to talk him up to 8,000 nuyen." Dent: "I assume the good news is this is some kind of 'karma' job where we feel good about ourselves afterwards?" Happy Jack: "Mr. Johnson wants us to blow up a Humanis Policlub chapterhouse. The more destruction, the better." Eye Spy: "Happy Jack wins. I feel good about this job already."   The team tries to figure out how to wreck the chapterhouse without damaging adjacent buildings.   Audacity Jane: "I'll put cutting charges on the interior structural supports. The interior of the building will collapse, and the rest will be unstable. They'll actually have to pay money to tear down the unstable sections before repairing it." Byte Force: "I can also build the mother of all stink bombs. If all the furnishings smell horrible, it means they can't be reused or resold. They'll have to be written off at a loss." Audacity Jane: "Hah. The demolition and reconstruction crews will charge hazard pay if it smells bad enough." Happy Jack: "Maybe we can rupture a sewage line so the basement fills with black water." Byte Force: "That makes my stink bomb redundant." Happy Jack: "Not really. If your stink bomb smells bad enough, they won't notice the sewage until it's had a few days to fill the basement." Dent: "There's something poetic about filling the *******'s building with ****."   The team researches the target.   Byte Force: "I have some bad news." Eye Spy: "I hate this even more than good news/bad news." Byte Force: "The building is so heavily insured that it will be nearly impossible to do enough damage to hurt Humanis." No Step: "Something stinks about this job. I talked to my contact in Sons of Sauron. He says this chapter of Humanis keeps its hands clean. It's the main fundraiser. It does a lot of the politics and press releases. They even run a few charities. He's sure they channel money to the more radical and violent chapters, but they've never been caught doing it. Why does Mr. Johnson want this one blown up, instead of one of the violent chapters?" Audacity Jane: "Happy Jack, you royally screwed up. I'm starting to feel uneasy about blowing up a Humanis chapterhouse. This is supposed to be a 'feel good' job."   More investigation ... more bad news.   Byte Force: "I'm officially declaring this job a set-up. That chapterhouse is filled with wireless cameras. I'm betting we're supposed to get caught while we're trying to blow the place up." Happy Jack: "Yeah. I'm thinking we were hired by Humanis to blow the place up. It costs them nothing, then they use us as poster children for their next fundraising drive." No Step: "Should we refuse the job and return the advance?" Happy Jack: "No. If we do, Mr. Johnson will just hire some dumber orks and trolls to do the job anyway." Dent: "Instead, we get to be the dumber orks and trolls who do the job." Audacity Jane: "Even if I get in and out undetected, everyone's going to assume that metahumans blew the place up." Happy Jack: "We just need to fabricate evidence that humans blew up the chapterhouse." Dent: "Who is going to believe that?" Happy Jack: "This is a chapterhouse of moderates, relatively speaking. There's a big downside to being a moderate. The radicals on your side hate you even more than they hate the guys on the other side." No Step: "So we're supposed to show up looking like humans ... who just happen to be wearing their Alamos 20,000 name badges?" Happy Jack: "We find a couple Alamos 20,000 members who have criminal records, but aren't locked up, and they become our new best friends." Eye Spy: (spit-takes) "I'm sorry. My brain can't process 'Alamos 20,000' and 'new best friends' in the same sentence."   Humanis will certainly hide any evidence of human involvement, so the team sets up a dashboard camera to "catch them in the act," so the video can be leaked later.   No Step: "How are we going to conveniently arrange to have the camera get a good look at our faces? Dashboard cameras don't conveniently zoom in on faces." Happy Jack: "Right before you two break into the chapterhouse, the two of you will assault an indigent troll right in front of our camera." No Step: "So you'll be disguised as an indigent troll. But why wouldn't a troll just go all King Kong on a couple humans?" Happy Jack: "Audacity Jane will point a shotgun at me, while you take a bunch of whacks with a club." No Step: "Why do I have to be the one beating up on you? I'll already be straining just to hold up two illusions." Happy Jack: "If you hit me repeatedly with a club, I'll have some bruises. If Audacity Jane hits me with a club, I'll have massive internal bleeding."   Eye Spy: "What happens if our scapegoats have alibis?" Happy Jack: "I took care of that." Eye Spy: "You kidnapped them?" Happy Jack: "No. I called one of them and pretended to be part of Alamos 20,000 in Boston. I told them that we'd stolen data from the Sons of Sauron, and the group in Boston had just shipped a truckload of weapons to the Sons of Sauron in Seattle. While you're blowing up the Humanis chapter, our scapegoats will be waiting to rob a fictitious load of guns." Happy Jack: (in a nasally voice) "I swear I didn't blow up a building detective! I was innocently sitting in a dark alley waiting to steal some guns!"   Dent: "We ought to set off an EMP grenade next to their servers while we're in there." Byte Force: (wincing) "That's sacrilege. Data is meant to be stolen, not destroyed." No Step: "He's right. You two go in invisibly, so Byte Force can steal all the information off their servers." Byte Force: "Thank you." No Step: "And then set off an EMP grenade next to the servers, so they can't figure out what you took."   As they're leaving (still covered by the Physical Mask spell), No Step spray paints SUNZ UV SAWRON RULZS on the wall of the chapterhouse.   Audacity Jane: (as they walk away) "What were you doing?" No Step: "Making it look like we were trying to frame the Sons of Sauron for this." Audacity Jane: "Nobody is going to believe that the Sons of Sauron misspelled their own name." No Step: "Nobody?" Audacity Jane: "Okay. Fine. Nobody except a stupid and ignorant racist is going to believe they'd misspell their own name." No Step: "And who are we impersonating right now...?"   After the building is blown up and the video is posted online and leaked to the media....   Byte Force: "The only useful Humanis data I got was a list of donors." Happy Jack: "Some of those donors may work for metahuman-friendly corps like Saeder Krupp. I bet Humanis membership is a violation of corporate policy." No Step: "Get them fired?" Happy Jack: "Blackmail them." Dent: "It's about time you figured out how to get some money out of this mess." Happy Jack: "We completed the job. I still expect to get paid by Mr. Johnson too." Dent: "He's a Humanis member who tried to set us up. He doesn't want to pay us." Happy Jack: "Of course not, but he'll show up to the meeting, if only to get the chance to kill me."   Mr. Johnson arrives at the club with an entourage of bodyguards. His group also contains a fearsome number of mercenaries, street samurai and mages, who remain stationed a distance from the club.   As Mr. Johnson waits at a secluded table...   Bartender: (carrying a tray with a glass of champagne and a cell phone) "Mr. Johnson? A patron purchased this for you. I believe he was unable to wait for your arrival." Mr. Johnson: (picking up the phone) "I was expecting to see you here." Happy Jack: "I'm reasonably certain that I'd be killed before I got within two blocks of the club." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "But I've called in order to make arrangements for the remainder of our pay." Mr. Johnson: "I'm not pleased with the way the job turned out." Happy Jack: "The building was redecorated, just as you requested. Based on the tone of your voice, I would say that we exceeded your expectations." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "Obviously, some of your expectations were not met. If you wanted us to take the fall, you should have requested the service up front. We would have increased the price accordingly." Mr. Johnson: "There's no reason for me to pay you." Happy Jack: "Professional courtesy." Mr. Johnson: (snorts) Happy Jack: "As professionals, we keep silent about the activities of our paying clients. The key word is 'paying' clients. We do not extend the same courtesy to clients who stiff us. I'm sure a lot of people would feel quite betrayed by your activities." Mr. Johnson: (snarling) "Fine." Happy Jack: "In addition, the price has doubled. That's the surcharge for trying to kill us." Mr. Johnson: "Fine." Happy Jack: "And as a final matter, you need to be aware of the life insurance for me and my coworkers." Mr. Johnson: "Life insurance?" Happy Jack: "If any of us die, your comrades will receive a video. I'm sure you would find it awkward to explain." Mr. Johnson: "You're a shadowrunner. What happens if one of your other enemies kills you?" Happy Jack: "The video gets delivered, as promised. You might want to use that champagne to wish us all a very long life."    

The shadowrunners are an ork/troll group. Completely against stereotype, they specialize in stealth, subtlety, bluff, illusion, deception and misdirection.   Dent: ork, rat shaman No-Step: ork, snake shaman, healer Byte Force: ork, decker, chemist Eye Spy: ork, rigger, drones, paramedic Audacity Jane: ork, combat, stealth, security systems Happy Jack: troll, combat, disguise, negotiator Humanis Policlub: a human-supremacist political group; some of the radical members have ties to Alamos 20,000 Alamos 20,000: a murderous anti-metahuman organization Sons of Sauron: a ork-rights political group, which is often as violent as Humanis Policlub  
Happy Jack returns from negotiating with a Mr. Johnson.
 
Happy Jack: "I have some bad news, and some good news." Eye Spy: "I hate this game." No Step: "I'll bite. What's the bad news." Happy Jack: "The pay sucks for this job. Mr. Johnson's opening offer was 5,000 nuyen total. I was only able to talk him up to 8,000 nuyen." Dent: "I assume the good news is this is some kind of 'karma' job where we feel good about ourselves afterwards?" Happy Jack: "Mr. Johnson wants us to blow up a Humanis Policlub chapterhouse. The more destruction, the better." Eye Spy: "Happy Jack wins. I feel good about this job already."   The team tries to figure out how to wreck the chapterhouse without damaging adjacent buildings.   Audacity Jane: "I'll put cutting charges on the interior structural supports. The interior of the building will collapse, and the rest will be unstable. They'll actually have to pay money to tear down the unstable sections before repairing it." Byte Force: "I can also build the mother of all stink bombs. If all the furnishings smell horrible, it means they can't be reused or resold. They'll have to be written off at a loss." Audacity Jane: "Hah. The demolition and reconstruction crews will charge hazard pay if it smells bad enough." Happy Jack: "Maybe we can rupture a sewage line so the basement fills with black water." Byte Force: "That makes my stink bomb redundant." Happy Jack: "Not really. If your stink bomb smells bad enough, they won't notice the sewage until it's had a few days to fill the basement." Dent: "There's something poetic about filling the *******'s building with ****."   The team researches the target.   Byte Force: "I have some bad news." Eye Spy: "I hate this even more than good news/bad news." Byte Force: "The building is so heavily insured that it will be nearly impossible to do enough damage to hurt Humanis." No Step: "Something stinks about this job. I talked to my contact in Sons of Sauron. He says this chapter of Humanis keeps its hands clean. It's the main fundraiser. It does a lot of the politics and press releases. They even run a few charities. He's sure they channel money to the more radical and violent chapters, but they've never been caught doing it. Why does Mr. Johnson want this one blown up, instead of one of the violent chapters?" Audacity Jane: "Happy Jack, you royally screwed up. I'm starting to feel uneasy about blowing up a Humanis chapterhouse. This is supposed to be a 'feel good' job."   More investigation ... more bad news.   Byte Force: "I'm officially declaring this job a set-up. That chapterhouse is filled with wireless cameras. I'm betting we're supposed to get caught while we're trying to blow the place up." Happy Jack: "Yeah. I'm thinking we were hired by Humanis to blow the place up. It costs them nothing, then they use us as poster children for their next fundraising drive." No Step: "Should we refuse the job and return the advance?" Happy Jack: "No. If we do, Mr. Johnson will just hire some dumber orks and trolls to do the job anyway." Dent: "Instead, we get to be the dumber orks and trolls who do the job." Audacity Jane: "Even if I get in and out undetected, everyone's going to assume that metahumans blew the place up." Happy Jack: "We just need to fabricate evidence that humans blew up the chapterhouse." Dent: "Who is going to believe that?" Happy Jack: "This is a chapterhouse of moderates, relatively speaking. There's a big downside to being a moderate. The radicals on your side hate you even more than they hate the guys on the other side." No Step: "So we're supposed to show up looking like humans ... who just happen to be wearing their Alamos 20,000 name badges?" Happy Jack: "We find a couple Alamos 20,000 members who have criminal records, but aren't locked up, and they become our new best friends." Eye Spy: (spit-takes) "I'm sorry. My brain can't process 'Alamos 20,000' and 'new best friends' in the same sentence."   Humanis will certainly hide any evidence of human involvement, so the team sets up a dashboard camera to "catch them in the act," so the video can be leaked later.   No Step: "How are we going to conveniently arrange to have the camera get a good look at our faces? Dashboard cameras don't conveniently zoom in on faces." Happy Jack: "Right before you two break into the chapterhouse, the two of you will assault an indigent troll right in front of our camera." No Step: "So you'll be disguised as an indigent troll. But why wouldn't a troll just go all King Kong on a couple humans?" Happy Jack: "Audacity Jane will point a shotgun at me, while you take a bunch of whacks with a club." No Step: "Why do I have to be the one beating up on you? I'll already be straining just to hold up two illusions." Happy Jack: "If you hit me repeatedly with a club, I'll have some bruises. If Audacity Jane hits me with a club, I'll have massive internal bleeding."   Eye Spy: "What happens if our scapegoats have alibis?" Happy Jack: "I took care of that." Eye Spy: "You kidnapped them?" Happy Jack: "No. I called one of them and pretended to be part of Alamos 20,000 in Boston. I told them that we'd stolen data from the Sons of Sauron, and the group in Boston had just shipped a truckload of weapons to the Sons of Sauron in Seattle. While you're blowing up the Humanis chapter, our scapegoats will be waiting to rob a fictitious load of guns." Happy Jack: (in a nasally voice) "I swear I didn't blow up a building detective! I was innocently sitting in a dark alley waiting to steal some guns!"   Dent: "We ought to set off an EMP grenade next to their servers while we're in there." Byte Force: (wincing) "That's sacrilege. Data is meant to be stolen, not destroyed." No Step: "He's right. You two go in invisibly, so Byte Force can steal all the information off their servers." Byte Force: "Thank you." No Step: "And then set off an EMP grenade next to the servers, so they can't figure out what you took."   As they're leaving (still covered by the Physical Mask spell), No Step spray paints SUNZ UV SAWRON RULZS on the wall of the chapterhouse.   Audacity Jane: (as they walk away) "What were you doing?" No Step: "Making it look like we were trying to frame the Sons of Sauron for this." Audacity Jane: "Nobody is going to believe that the Sons of Sauron misspelled their own name." No Step: "Nobody?" Audacity Jane: "Okay. Fine. Nobody except a stupid and ignorant racist is going to believe they'd misspell their own name." No Step: "And who are we impersonating right now...?"   After the building is blown up and the video is posted online and leaked to the media....   Byte Force: "The only useful Humanis data I got was a list of donors." Happy Jack: "Some of those donors may work for metahuman-friendly corps like Saeder Krupp. I bet Humanis membership is a violation of corporate policy." No Step: "Get them fired?" Happy Jack: "Blackmail them." Dent: "It's about time you figured out how to get some money out of this mess." Happy Jack: "We completed the job. I still expect to get paid by Mr. Johnson too." Dent: "He's a Humanis member who tried to set us up. He doesn't want to pay us." Happy Jack: "Of course not, but he'll show up to the meeting, if only to get the chance to kill me."   Mr. Johnson arrives at the club with an entourage of bodyguards. His group also contains a fearsome number of mercenaries, street samurai and mages, who remain stationed a distance from the club.   As Mr. Johnson waits at a secluded table...   Bartender: (carrying a tray with a glass of champagne and a cell phone) "Mr. Johnson? A patron purchased this for you. I believe he was unable to wait for your arrival." Mr. Johnson: (picking up the phone) "I was expecting to see you here." Happy Jack: "I'm reasonably certain that I'd be killed before I got within two blocks of the club." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "But I've called in order to make arrangements for the remainder of our pay." Mr. Johnson: "I'm not pleased with the way the job turned out." Happy Jack: "The building was redecorated, just as you requested. Based on the tone of your voice, I would say that we exceeded your expectations." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "Obviously, some of your expectations were not met. If you wanted us to take the fall, you should have requested the service up front. We would have increased the price accordingly." Mr. Johnson: "There's no reason for me to pay you." Happy Jack: "Professional courtesy." Mr. Johnson: (snorts) Happy Jack: "As professionals, we keep silent about the activities of our paying clients. The key word is 'paying' clients. We do not extend the same courtesy to clients who stiff us. I'm sure a lot of people would feel quite betrayed by your activities." Mr. Johnson: (snarling) "Fine." Happy Jack: "In addition, the price has doubled. That's the surcharge for trying to kill us." Mr. Johnson: "Fine." Happy Jack: "And as a final matter, you need to be aware of the life insurance for me and my coworkers." Mr. Johnson: "Life insurance?" Happy Jack: "If any of us die, your comrades will receive a video. I'm sure you would find it awkward to explain." Mr. Johnson: "You're a shadowrunner. What happens if one of your other enemies kills you?" Happy Jack: "The video gets delivered, as promised. You might want to use that champagne to wish us all a very long life."    

The shadowrunners are an ork/troll group. Completely against stereotype, they specialize in stealth, subtlety, bluff, illusion, deception and misdirection.   Dent: ork, rat shaman No-Step: ork, snake shaman, healer Byte Force: ork, decker, chemist Eye Spy: ork, rigger, drones, paramedic Audacity Jane: ork, combat, stealth, security systems Happy Jack: troll, combat, disguise, negotiator Humanis Policlub: a human-supremacist political group; some of the radical members have ties to Alamos 20,000 Alamos 20,000: a murderous anti-metahuman organization Sons of Sauron: a ork-rights political group, which is often as violent as Humanis Policlub  
Happy Jack returns from negotiating with a Mr. Johnson.
 
Happy Jack: "I have some bad news, and some good news." Eye Spy: "I hate this game." No Step: "I'll bite. What's the bad news." Happy Jack: "The pay sucks for this job. Mr. Johnson's opening offer was 5,000 nuyen total. I was only able to talk him up to 8,000 nuyen." Dent: "I assume the good news is this is some kind of 'karma' job where we feel good about ourselves afterwards?" Happy Jack: "Mr. Johnson wants us to blow up a Humanis Policlub chapterhouse. The more destruction, the better." Eye Spy: "Happy Jack wins. I feel good about this job already."   The team tries to figure out how to wreck the chapterhouse without damaging adjacent buildings.   Audacity Jane: "I'll put cutting charges on the interior structural supports. The interior of the building will collapse, and the rest will be unstable. They'll actually have to pay money to tear down the unstable sections before repairing it." Byte Force: "I can also build the mother of all stink bombs. If all the furnishings smell horrible, it means they can't be reused or resold. They'll have to be written off at a loss." Audacity Jane: "Hah. The demolition and reconstruction crews will charge hazard pay if it smells bad enough." Happy Jack: "Maybe we can rupture a sewage line so the basement fills with black water." Byte Force: "That makes my stink bomb redundant." Happy Jack: "Not really. If your stink bomb smells bad enough, they won't notice the sewage until it's had a few days to fill the basement." Dent: "There's something poetic about filling the *******'s building with ****."   The team researches the target.   Byte Force: "I have some bad news." Eye Spy: "I hate this even more than good news/bad news." Byte Force: "The building is so heavily insured that it will be nearly impossible to do enough damage to hurt Humanis." No Step: "Something stinks about this job. I talked to my contact in Sons of Sauron. He says this chapter of Humanis keeps its hands clean. It's the main fundraiser. It does a lot of the politics and press releases. They even run a few charities. He's sure they channel money to the more radical and violent chapters, but they've never been caught doing it. Why does Mr. Johnson want this one blown up, instead of one of the violent chapters?" Audacity Jane: "Happy Jack, you royally screwed up. I'm starting to feel uneasy about blowing up a Humanis chapterhouse. This is supposed to be a 'feel good' job."   More investigation ... more bad news.   Byte Force: "I'm officially declaring this job a set-up. That chapterhouse is filled with wireless cameras. I'm betting we're supposed to get caught while we're trying to blow the place up." Happy Jack: "Yeah. I'm thinking we were hired by Humanis to blow the place up. It costs them nothing, then they use us as poster children for their next fundraising drive." No Step: "Should we refuse the job and return the advance?" Happy Jack: "No. If we do, Mr. Johnson will just hire some dumber orks and trolls to do the job anyway." Dent: "Instead, we get to be the dumber orks and trolls who do the job." Audacity Jane: "Even if I get in and out undetected, everyone's going to assume that metahumans blew the place up." Happy Jack: "We just need to fabricate evidence that humans blew up the chapterhouse." Dent: "Who is going to believe that?" Happy Jack: "This is a chapterhouse of moderates, relatively speaking. There's a big downside to being a moderate. The radicals on your side hate you even more than they hate the guys on the other side." No Step: "So we're supposed to show up looking like humans ... who just happen to be wearing their Alamos 20,000 name badges?" Happy Jack: "We find a couple Alamos 20,000 members who have criminal records, but aren't locked up, and they become our new best friends." Eye Spy: (spit-takes) "I'm sorry. My brain can't process 'Alamos 20,000' and 'new best friends' in the same sentence."   Humanis will certainly hide any evidence of human involvement, so the team sets up a dashboard camera to "catch them in the act," so the video can be leaked later.   No Step: "How are we going to conveniently arrange to have the camera get a good look at our faces? Dashboard cameras don't conveniently zoom in on faces." Happy Jack: "Right before you two break into the chapterhouse, the two of you will assault an indigent troll right in front of our camera." No Step: "So you'll be disguised as an indigent troll. But why wouldn't a troll just go all King Kong on a couple humans?" Happy Jack: "Audacity Jane will point a shotgun at me, while you take a bunch of whacks with a club." No Step: "Why do I have to be the one beating up on you? I'll already be straining just to hold up two illusions." Happy Jack: "If you hit me repeatedly with a club, I'll have some bruises. If Audacity Jane hits me with a club, I'll have massive internal bleeding."   Eye Spy: "What happens if our scapegoats have alibis?" Happy Jack: "I took care of that." Eye Spy: "You kidnapped them?" Happy Jack: "No. I called one of them and pretended to be part of Alamos 20,000 in Boston. I told them that we'd stolen data from the Sons of Sauron, and the group in Boston had just shipped a truckload of weapons to the Sons of Sauron in Seattle. While you're blowing up the Humanis chapter, our scapegoats will be waiting to rob a fictitious load of guns." Happy Jack: (in a nasally voice) "I swear I didn't blow up a building detective! I was innocently sitting in a dark alley waiting to steal some guns!"   Dent: "We ought to set off an EMP grenade next to their servers while we're in there." Byte Force: (wincing) "That's sacrilege. Data is meant to be stolen, not destroyed." No Step: "He's right. You two go in invisibly, so Byte Force can steal all the information off their servers." Byte Force: "Thank you." No Step: "And then set off an EMP grenade next to the servers, so they can't figure out what you took."   As they're leaving (still covered by the Physical Mask spell), No Step spray paints SUNZ UV SAWRON RULZS on the wall of the chapterhouse.   Audacity Jane: (as they walk away) "What were you doing?" No Step: "Making it look like we were trying to frame the Sons of Sauron for this." Audacity Jane: "Nobody is going to believe that the Sons of Sauron misspelled their own name." No Step: "Nobody?" Audacity Jane: "Okay. Fine. Nobody except a stupid and ignorant racist is going to believe they'd misspell their own name." No Step: "And who are we impersonating right now...?"   After the building is blown up and the video is posted online and leaked to the media....   Byte Force: "The only useful Humanis data I got was a list of donors." Happy Jack: "Some of those donors may work for metahuman-friendly corps like Saeder Krupp. I bet Humanis membership is a violation of corporate policy." No Step: "Get them fired?" Happy Jack: "Blackmail them." Dent: "It's about time you figured out how to get some money out of this mess." Happy Jack: "We completed the job. I still expect to get paid by Mr. Johnson too." Dent: "He's a Humanis member who tried to set us up. He doesn't want to pay us." Happy Jack: "Of course not, but he'll show up to the meeting, if only to get the chance to kill me."   Mr. Johnson arrives at the club with an entourage of bodyguards. His group also contains a fearsome number of mercenaries, street samurai and mages, who remain stationed a distance from the club.   As Mr. Johnson waits at a secluded table...   Bartender: (carrying a tray with a glass of champagne and a cell phone) "Mr. Johnson? A patron purchased this for you. I believe he was unable to wait for your arrival." Mr. Johnson: (picking up the phone) "I was expecting to see you here." Happy Jack: "I'm reasonably certain that I'd be killed before I got within two blocks of the club." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "But I've called in order to make arrangements for the remainder of our pay." Mr. Johnson: "I'm not pleased with the way the job turned out." Happy Jack: "The building was redecorated, just as you requested. Based on the tone of your voice, I would say that we exceeded your expectations." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "Obviously, some of your expectations were not met. If you wanted us to take the fall, you should have requested the service up front. We would have increased the price accordingly." Mr. Johnson: "There's no reason for me to pay you." Happy Jack: "Professional courtesy." Mr. Johnson: (snorts) Happy Jack: "As professionals, we keep silent about the activities of our paying clients. The key word is 'paying' clients. We do not extend the same courtesy to clients who stiff us. I'm sure a lot of people would feel quite betrayed by your activities." Mr. Johnson: (snarling) "Fine." Happy Jack: "In addition, the price has doubled. That's the surcharge for trying to kill us." Mr. Johnson: "Fine." Happy Jack: "And as a final matter, you need to be aware of the life insurance for me and my coworkers." Mr. Johnson: "Life insurance?" Happy Jack: "If any of us die, your comrades will receive a video. I'm sure you would find it awkward to explain." Mr. Johnson: "You're a shadowrunner. What happens if one of your other enemies kills you?" Happy Jack: "The video gets delivered, as promised. You might want to use that champagne to wish us all a very long life."    

The shadowrunners are an ork/troll group. Completely against stereotype, they specialize in stealth, subtlety, bluff, illusion, deception and misdirection.   Dent: ork, rat shaman No-Step: ork, snake shaman, healer Byte Force: ork, decker, chemist Eye Spy: ork, rigger, drones, paramedic Audacity Jane: ork, combat, stealth, security systems Happy Jack: troll, combat, disguise, negotiator Humanis Policlub: a human-supremacist political group; some of the radical members have ties to Alamos 20,000 Alamos 20,000: a murderous anti-metahuman organization Sons of Sauron: a ork-rights political group, which is often as violent as Humanis Policlub  
Happy Jack returns from negotiating with a Mr. Johnson.
 
Happy Jack: "I have some bad news, and some good news." Eye Spy: "I hate this game." No Step: "I'll bite. What's the bad news." Happy Jack: "The pay sucks for this job. Mr. Johnson's opening offer was 5,000 nuyen total. I was only able to talk him up to 8,000 nuyen." Dent: "I assume the good news is this is some kind of 'karma' job where we feel good about ourselves afterwards?" Happy Jack: "Mr. Johnson wants us to blow up a Humanis Policlub chapterhouse. The more destruction, the better." Eye Spy: "Happy Jack wins. I feel good about this job already."   The team tries to figure out how to wreck the chapterhouse without damaging adjacent buildings.   Audacity Jane: "I'll put cutting charges on the interior structural supports. The interior of the building will collapse, and the rest will be unstable. They'll actually have to pay money to tear down the unstable sections before repairing it." Byte Force: "I can also build the mother of all stink bombs. If all the furnishings smell horrible, it means they can't be reused or resold. They'll have to be written off at a loss." Audacity Jane: "Hah. The demolition and reconstruction crews will charge hazard pay if it smells bad enough." Happy Jack: "Maybe we can rupture a sewage line so the basement fills with black water." Byte Force: "That makes my stink bomb redundant." Happy Jack: "Not really. If your stink bomb smells bad enough, they won't notice the sewage until it's had a few days to fill the basement." Dent: "There's something poetic about filling the *******'s building with ****."   The team researches the target.   Byte Force: "I have some bad news." Eye Spy: "I hate this even more than good news/bad news." Byte Force: "The building is so heavily insured that it will be nearly impossible to do enough damage to hurt Humanis." No Step: "Something stinks about this job. I talked to my contact in Sons of Sauron. He says this chapter of Humanis keeps its hands clean. It's the main fundraiser. It does a lot of the politics and press releases. They even run a few charities. He's sure they channel money to the more radical and violent chapters, but they've never been caught doing it. Why does Mr. Johnson want this one blown up, instead of one of the violent chapters?" Audacity Jane: "Happy Jack, you royally screwed up. I'm starting to feel uneasy about blowing up a Humanis chapterhouse. This is supposed to be a 'feel good' job."   More investigation ... more bad news.   Byte Force: "I'm officially declaring this job a set-up. That chapterhouse is filled with wireless cameras. I'm betting we're supposed to get caught while we're trying to blow the place up." Happy Jack: "Yeah. I'm thinking we were hired by Humanis to blow the place up. It costs them nothing, then they use us as poster children for their next fundraising drive." No Step: "Should we refuse the job and return the advance?" Happy Jack: "No. If we do, Mr. Johnson will just hire some dumber orks and trolls to do the job anyway." Dent: "Instead, we get to be the dumber orks and trolls who do the job." Audacity Jane: "Even if I get in and out undetected, everyone's going to assume that metahumans blew the place up." Happy Jack: "We just need to fabricate evidence that humans blew up the chapterhouse." Dent: "Who is going to believe that?" Happy Jack: "This is a chapterhouse of moderates, relatively speaking. There's a big downside to being a moderate. The radicals on your side hate you even more than they hate the guys on the other side." No Step: "So we're supposed to show up looking like humans ... who just happen to be wearing their Alamos 20,000 name badges?" Happy Jack: "We find a couple Alamos 20,000 members who have criminal records, but aren't locked up, and they become our new best friends." Eye Spy: (spit-takes) "I'm sorry. My brain can't process 'Alamos 20,000' and 'new best friends' in the same sentence."   Humanis will certainly hide any evidence of human involvement, so the team sets up a dashboard camera to "catch them in the act," so the video can be leaked later.   No Step: "How are we going to conveniently arrange to have the camera get a good look at our faces? Dashboard cameras don't conveniently zoom in on faces." Happy Jack: "Right before you two break into the chapterhouse, the two of you will assault an indigent troll right in front of our camera." No Step: "So you'll be disguised as an indigent troll. But why wouldn't a troll just go all King Kong on a couple humans?" Happy Jack: "Audacity Jane will point a shotgun at me, while you take a bunch of whacks with a club." No Step: "Why do I have to be the one beating up on you? I'll already be straining just to hold up two illusions." Happy Jack: "If you hit me repeatedly with a club, I'll have some bruises. If Audacity Jane hits me with a club, I'll have massive internal bleeding."   Eye Spy: "What happens if our scapegoats have alibis?" Happy Jack: "I took care of that." Eye Spy: "You kidnapped them?" Happy Jack: "No. I called one of them and pretended to be part of Alamos 20,000 in Boston. I told them that we'd stolen data from the Sons of Sauron, and the group in Boston had just shipped a truckload of weapons to the Sons of Sauron in Seattle. While you're blowing up the Humanis chapter, our scapegoats will be waiting to rob a fictitious load of guns." Happy Jack: (in a nasally voice) "I swear I didn't blow up a building detective! I was innocently sitting in a dark alley waiting to steal some guns!"   Dent: "We ought to set off an EMP grenade next to their servers while we're in there." Byte Force: (wincing) "That's sacrilege. Data is meant to be stolen, not destroyed." No Step: "He's right. You two go in invisibly, so Byte Force can steal all the information off their servers." Byte Force: "Thank you." No Step: "And then set off an EMP grenade next to the servers, so they can't figure out what you took."   As they're leaving (still covered by the Physical Mask spell), No Step spray paints SUNZ UV SAWRON RULZS on the wall of the chapterhouse.   Audacity Jane: (as they walk away) "What were you doing?" No Step: "Making it look like we were trying to frame the Sons of Sauron for this." Audacity Jane: "Nobody is going to believe that the Sons of Sauron misspelled their own name." No Step: "Nobody?" Audacity Jane: "Okay. Fine. Nobody except a stupid and ignorant racist is going to believe they'd misspell their own name." No Step: "And who are we impersonating right now...?"   After the building is blown up and the video is posted online and leaked to the media....   Byte Force: "The only useful Humanis data I got was a list of donors." Happy Jack: "Some of those donors may work for metahuman-friendly corps like Saeder Krupp. I bet Humanis membership is a violation of corporate policy." No Step: "Get them fired?" Happy Jack: "Blackmail them." Dent: "It's about time you figured out how to get some money out of this mess." Happy Jack: "We completed the job. I still expect to get paid by Mr. Johnson too." Dent: "He's a Humanis member who tried to set us up. He doesn't want to pay us." Happy Jack: "Of course not, but he'll show up to the meeting, if only to get the chance to kill me."   Mr. Johnson arrives at the club with an entourage of bodyguards. His group also contains a fearsome number of mercenaries, street samurai and mages, who remain stationed a distance from the club.   As Mr. Johnson waits at a secluded table...   Bartender: (carrying a tray with a glass of champagne and a cell phone) "Mr. Johnson? A patron purchased this for you. I believe he was unable to wait for your arrival." Mr. Johnson: (picking up the phone) "I was expecting to see you here." Happy Jack: "I'm reasonably certain that I'd be killed before I got within two blocks of the club." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "But I've called in order to make arrangements for the remainder of our pay." Mr. Johnson: "I'm not pleased with the way the job turned out." Happy Jack: "The building was redecorated, just as you requested. Based on the tone of your voice, I would say that we exceeded your expectations." Mr. Johnson: "..." Happy Jack: "Obviously, some of your expectations were not met. If you wanted us to take the fall, you should have requested the service up front. We would have increased the price accordingly." Mr. Johnson: "There's no reason for me to pay you." Happy Jack: "Professional courtesy." Mr. Johnson: (snorts) Happy Jack: "As professionals, we keep silent about the activities of our paying clients. The key word is 'paying' clients. We do not extend the same courtesy to clients who stiff us. I'm sure a lot of people would feel quite betrayed by your activities." Mr. Johnson: (snarling) "Fine." Happy Jack: "In addition, the price has doubled. That's the surcharge for trying to kill us." Mr. Johnson: "Fine." Happy Jack: "And as a final matter, you need to be aware of the life insurance for me and my coworkers." Mr. Johnson: "Life insurance?" Happy Jack: "If any of us die, your comrades will receive a video. I'm sure you would find it awkward to explain." Mr. Johnson: "You're a shadowrunner. What happens if one of your other enemies kills you?" Happy Jack: "The video gets delivered, as promised. You might want to use that champagne to wish us all a very long life."    

Be polite to everyone. The next person you meet might be a world-class supervillain in their secret ID.
 
Even in a world with superpowers, knowledge is power.
 
Everyone has their kryptonite. Mine is cupcakes.
 
Spandex is a privilege, not a right.
 
Superscience has built powered armor suits that can fly and fire lasers without needing to be recharged ... but our smartphones still crap out before we get the chance to recharge them.
 
The worst part of being a superhero is the slash fanfic.

Roadtrip! Traveling to the Isle of Skye in order to find the missing elven decker Quicksilver. Why we're doing this is not entirely clear, since the person who was going to be paying us is dead, but we Shadowrunners are free spirits, unbeholden to the petty rules that govern society, and free to do any damn stupid thing that occurs to us.

Warhammer: We've been paid repeatedly for every other job we've done, we can cover one where we don't get paid at all.

Labrat arrives, delayed due to the fact his boat isn't rated from Seattle to London, especially since global warming apparently didn't happen in the Shadowrun universe and the Arctic Ocean is still, in fact, arctic. The bigger problem was all the giant underground brigadoons that suddenly appeared and that promptly filled up with seawater. And all those mined-out deposits that suddenly reappeared, along with their surrounding mountains.

Felix: Well, BHP-Billiton must have been pleased. The miners who were underground at the time, not so much.

Greenlight: Can we hire a crop-duster and spray the island with Agent Orange?
Felix: I don't think the druids will appreciate that, somehow.
Greenlight: That's the point

Labrat picks up a few toys en route.

GM: You meet up with a fixer named Angus McNab
Greenlight: So Scottish he secretes alcohol.

The involvement of druids - especially on their home turf, continues to make us nervous.

Inkubus: We're just going to go up there and see what the situation is.
Greenlight: Oh, thank f**k for that!
Inkubus: We're not going up there to piss in their cereal.

Labrat: So what's been happening?
Greenlight: We're in England now-
Felix: Scotland. Don't get them confused
Greenlight: We're in SCOTLAND now where everybody is drunk, eh-
Titus: That's Canada
Greenlight: WE'RE IN SCOTLAND NOW WHERE EVERYBODY IS DRUNK AND I KEEP GETTING INTERRUPTED-
Labrat: So I see
Greenlight: THE NEXT PERSON THAT INTERRUPTS ME GETS TASED IN THE FACE

Labrat: So you called me all the way from Seattle for a job where I won't get paid.
Greenlight: Yes. Mostly to f**k with you.

Plus, we can sing as we drive.

Warhammer: How about a drink-a-long?
Felix: If you really want to. 'If you need a job done that would land you in jail / Shadow-runrunrun, Shadow-runrun'
Warhammer: Rumrumrumrumrum, rumrumrumrum
Felix: 'As assets we're deniable in case we fail / Shadow-runrunrun, Shadow-runrun'
Warhammer: Rumrumrumrumrum, rumrumrumrum

There's a castle on the fair side of the loch, and a village on this side. Surveilling the fishing village while pretending to be birdwatchers -

Labrat: Nudist beach!
Inkubus: In Scotland?!
Felix: They don't even need the blue body paint.
Labrat: Oh wait, that's ice sculpture.

There is a circle where the druids from the isle hold a daily ritual.

Inkubus: Is anybody else wishing we had a mortar?

Greenlight: We so didn't bring enough firepower for this.
Warhammer: Uh-huh.
Felix: Who needs firepower, we have a troll.
Greenlight: You can't fire a troll long distances.
Felix: Labrat, you're an engineer, aren't you?

Labrat goes looking for the towns most disreputable fisherman.

GM: He's a grizzled old man-
Greenlight: "...but you f**k one fish!"

Whilst the anecdote about his various careers is no doubt fascinating, Labrat is actually after explosives.

Felix: I'm heading down to the quay early to scan the surface of the loch and beaches for birdlife. That is our cover story after all.
Labrat: And you've got that loched down.

They're also a small crowd of tourists here to see the druids.

Greenlight: Am I a bad person because I look at them and think 'meat shield'?

In fact, the way the whole castle-full-of-druids seems to be a tourist trap is a relief. Plus, there's no giant wicker man on the hill.

GM: The furry comes across the loch
Inkubus: Furry or Ferry?
Greenlight: Because if it's a furry I'm out of here
Inkubus: I want nothing to do with giant furries - it inevitable leads to vore.
Felix: Or insertion.
Labrat: Or both.
Greenlight: Alright, we'll go Attack on Titan for you.
Felix: 'In 2050 humanity received a grim reminder'
Titus: 'Then blew it up with C12.'

GM: Seven druids emerge and come across the grass towards the tourist bus
Labrat: I think they're all on the grass
Titus: There's Happy and Grumpy and...
Labrat: And Dopey is the leader
Labrat: Nah - he thinks he's in charge. It's actually the live-in maid.

Greenlight: Can I talk to Fiona, please?
Dwuid: Excuse me?
Greenlight: A friend of hers is in mortal danger.
Dwuid: That's... alarming news. I need to go talk to some people.
Inkubus: I think we need to go to the old rule - Greenlight doesn't get to talk to anybody until she gets over this 'honesty' thing.

Fiona: And what is your connection to Quicksilver?
Labrat: Merely to ensure he doesn't come to harm (which is true XD)

Quicksilver apparently left part of his lifeforce with Fiona. That on top of of the deck he left with Amelia is adding up to something alarming.

Inkubus: We think he's done something... very silly. Such as forcing his own reincarnation as a being of pure data.
Felix: He's basically been making horcruxes. I told you Harry Potter would be involved in this somehow.

None of us can figure out how Quicksilver managed this trick.

Felix: We're in a magical castle in Scotland.
Titus: Horcruxes.
Felix: Horcruxes.

Fiona will entrust Quicksilver's essence to the group in return for something commensurate from one of our mages.

Inkubus: Well....
Felix: You're at least closer to their tradition
Inkubus: Really? Really? I invoke the spirit of Metal!
Titus: *flips a coin and points at Inkubus*
GM: She wants to perform a ritual with you.
Inkubus: *tries to resist temptation*
Felix: *sigh*
Inkubus: What kind of ritual?
GM: Candles and shuffling around on the grass.
Warhammer and Greenlight: *snicker*

Inkubus: Am I going to to need protection? Because you hear stories.

GM: You're all invited to witness the ceremony
Greenlight: Oh my
Inkubus: It's not every day I have an audience. And you get to see what seven charisma looks like under the hood.

If the ritual is a busty there's still one way we can profit from this trip.

Inkubus: We can still sell his deck, right?

The ritual involves a dozen dwuids, various spirits, and a metric f**kton of power - the leyline through the area might have something to do with that. It also leaves Inkubus with the distinct impression of being repeatedly shot.

Fiona: I know he followed the ley to Loch Ness and met a presence there - I don't know what happened there.
Titus: We get to fight a plesiosaur! *high-fives Greenlight*

GM: You've got ten minutes til the last furry.
Greenlight: Gotta catch that giant wolf.
Felix: Wolf-fox. Herm wolf-fox.
GM: What?
Felix: You said furry instead of ferry again.
GM: *sigh*
Greenlight: Giant herm wolf-fox.
Inkubus: With wings. Part angel.
Titus: And a keyblade.
GM: And a pink and purple colour scheme. *sigh*

Quicksilver's horcrux is a black box sealed with wax and a silver clasp.

Titus: I was wrong - it's actually a phylactery.

Inkubus: Who wants to assense Quicksilver's box?
Warhammer: *snicker*

The box apparently contains something relieved that somebody has finally come for it. Inkubus speculates Quicksilver's mind is in the Matrix, his soul in the box, and his body bullet-riddled somewhere near the Loch. The box actually contains a very unconventional chip and a transponder inside a block of plascrete.

Greenlight: I think we've seen more innuendo in one square mile than I've seen in the whole of Seattle.

There's certainly a lot of mention of Elven Deck. But for now, off through the deep dark woods around Loch Ness.

Greenlight: We'll just follow the trail of rubbish left by earlier tourists.

The transponder and the chip's mystic glow leads us towards Castle Urquhart on the shore of the loch.

Inkubus: I feel so metal now I'm a glorified bloodhound.
Titus: Oh, I dunno, bloodhound sound pretty metal.

A Nature Spirit materialises in our path.

Nature Spirit: I know why you are here.
Felix: You're doing better than us then.
Greenlight: Yup.
Titus: Just stumbling blindly along after map points.

The spirit opens an astral gate and invites us through.

Inkubus: If what I thinking is going to happen, happens, we will learn things about each other
Warhammer: STAYING.

GM: Things are weird in the Astral
Inkubus: Shit be whack

The spirit wants us to perform a quest, if we still want the portion of Quicksilver it's guarding.

Felix: Let's just call it the third horcrux, shall we?

Greenlight: Will I get a magic sword?
Felix: If I reject the first offer will I get a better one?

We are promptly menaced by the Dweller on the Threshold.

Felix: The Antimatter Monster from Planet of Evil.
Inkubus: Ozzy Osbourne. 'What the f**k are you doing here?' The godfather of Metal.
Greenlight: 'Shaarrron! Who the f**k is this?'
Greenlight: Greg the Grim Reaper - "Alright, what the fuck do you lot want then? Oh, right, let me guess, you want to cross over. Oh, wonderful, like I haven't had to deal with this before. Magically active pricks, you think that just because you can magically assense means you've got the fucking right to cross over. Obnoxious shitheads."
GM: For Felix it probably looks like Zardoz
Felix: ?
Greenlight: Sean Connery in a mankini.
Warhammer: Now there is a mental image I didn't need

The dweller wants a confession from us before it will let us through.

Titus: I don't have any deep secrets
Labrat: You're just very shallow

Felix: *blushes bright red and mutters something inaudible*
Dweller: Speak up.
Felix: She was my cousin, alright? It was a family gathering. We wandered off over the hill...
Dweller: *transforms into Felix's grandad and royally chews him out*

Inkubus admits he kept a lock of Euphoria's hair, even before she was kidnapped.

Greenlight: What, not standard Shadowrunner paranoia?
Inkubus: No - she was the only innocent thing I've ever found in this life, OK?
Dweller: *transforms into Euphoria and expertly denounces Inkubus as a disgusting creep*

There are also Trials - reliving our most traumatic experiences. Inkubus re-enacts his horrible encounter with the deamon Twilight. Inkubus relives his encounter with the fire-demon Inkubus summoned.

Felix: *flees the burning factory, but this time making sure to kick the image of Inkubus repeatedly in the arse as we run, and re-emerges from the Trial gate on fire*
Inkubus: What happened to you?
Felix: *gives Inkubus a look that should make him burst into flame*

Luckily Warhammer and Titus are out in the real world to patch up the bullet-holes and stab-wounds our comatose bodies are sprouting.

Felix: Interesting thing about ganglions - they're the only medical condition that can be cured by literally hitting it with a book.
Greenlight: I like that wordplay - 'literally'

Inkubus relives the Dwuid ritual, but such is his own self-confidence that the danger touches him even less than it did the first time.

Inkubus: And in the real world I have an erection.
Titus: Not touching that one.
Felix: I'm not hitting it with a book.

Past and Present trials faced, we turn to the future. Felix is still annoyed at having to relive the factory.

Felix: Do we get to see what happens to Inkubus in the future?
Nature Spirit: It doesn't work like that.
Felix: F**k.
Inkubus: The same that happens every morning - I wake up surrounded by beautiful women.

Instead we all find ourselves in a limousine driving through Washington D.C., with a man with very blue eyes and an American flag lapel pin, who yells "What are you doing here?!" and then the car explodes.

We then find ourselves back in the Astral clearing, and staring at each other. For once, Felix's Conspiracy Theory hobby comes in handy.

Felix: What the f**k was that?
Greenlight: WHO the f**k was that?
Felix: ... I think that was a dragon.

Felix: We are never going to DC
Inkubus: Yeah. Right. You keep on believing that. We are going to DC. Just pray we can stay away from limousines.

Time to go back to Edinburgh, which will give Inkubus and Felix a chance to catch up on their social media, sad addicts that they are.

Inkubus: We'll catch the next bus
Greenlight: It's not for an hou-
Inkubus: WE'LL CATCH THE NEXT BUS

Back at Prof. Amelia's lab at the university where the extremely, almost impossibly advanced deck that Quicksilver used has slots for four custom chips - such as the two we've so far acquired at Skye and Castle Urquhart. It looks like we're going to have to stick our brains into the deck for some clue as to what to do next.

Felix: This is a bad idea - I've read Harry Potter, no good comes of messing with horcruxes.

And besides, none of us have datajacks. On the other hand, there are 'trode helmets.

Felix: And Edinburgh is part of Silicon Glen.

'trode-jacking in reveals the poorly resolved image of a slumped dead woman data-labelled Morag McDonald. This, presumably, is a clue. Warhammer manages to identify her via the death register and her tartan - apparently she was murdered the same day Quicksilver went missing. And that the fourteen homicides she was part of may reignite the murderous history of the Campbells and McDonalds. Certainly, the local authorities are very much afraid the McDonalds are plotting reprisals.

Titus: There's only way to end this feud
All: KILL THEM ALL
Inkubus: Or pick a side.
Titus: Or convince them both to meet a particular place to get the social XP, then betray them both for the combat experience.
Inkubus: But who we betray first depends on who doesn't have the hot daughter.

 

Back aboard the Chains of Judgement, using the wreckage of the Ardent Crown as cover as an Eldar cruiser attempts to carve both up. Among our prizes - several dead Eldar Warp Spider Aspect Warriors, who Jrska can no doubt find something amusing to do with; a live Farseer who she can CERTAINLY find something amusing to do with; and that mysterious casket the Eldar were carrying around, and that Cassius promptly announced as MINE. Aladar, who somehow survived his encounter with the Hunter last week, remains badly injured. Cog has injected him full of hypermeth and whatever other combat drugs Jrska can provide, which should make the subsequent starship battle interesting.

Cassius' player: Ah, 40K, the only game where you can take out the Holy Hand-grenade of Antioch, and read from the Book of Armaments, and be taken absolutely seriously.

Jrska: We'll leave the piloting to the expert systems. The ones that learned how to fly the ship by watching Aladar, and then was told 'see what Aladar does? Do anything but that.'

Jrska: So how many cultists are riding the missiles and waving cowboy hats?

Aladar's control of the laser batteries and missile barrages is startlingly deft. The Eldar cruiser should have vastly outclassed our little frigate.

Jrska: The gods favour us, my lord. Indeed, they favour Aladar. Their ways are ineffable and strange.

Unfortunately, our shots are so accurate we blow up their webway portal generator. The ensuing warp rift rapidly expands to consume all three ships.

Jrska: ohhhh, piss.

And Jrska fails to keep the crew under control.

Cassius: This is what you get for converting the crew to Slaanesh worship. They're all going "ooooh, pretty." Have you become the new Aladar?

The sudden wash of pure mutating hell-energy washing over the ship converts an unknown number of the crew into slavering, screaming warpspawn. That number is at least 3, since three of the bridge crew transform. Jrska draws her plasma pistol, despite the risk to the bridge controls.

Jrska: I know you warned us about backstop, my lord, but...
Cassius: This is where lasweapons come into their own - you don't have to worry about it penetrating the backstop.
Jrska: Or anything, really.

Cassius attempts to fry the spawn with warpfire.

GM: You'll hit about nine of the crew.
Cassius: Don't care. I know what kind of damage warpspawn can do.

The additional warp energy Cassius throws into the mix causes the consoles to sprout insane cog-work and metal tentacles.

Cassius: Cog is going to be busy doing repairs.
Cog: Ok, I'll fix it, but you have to tell Father you did it.

The worst thing about this that the Ardent Crown will no longer be colliding with the hiveworld Solace.

Jrska: We've inadvertently saved Solace. Perhaps this was the Eldar's plan all along.

Cassius detonates one of the spawn.

Cog: You should see him at parties - he once blew up a goat.
Cassius: As opposed to Jrska, where you just take away the word 'up'.

The former bridge crew member attacking Jrska seems a bit clumsy.

GM: If it was possible for a tentacle weapon to jam, it just did.
Jrska: It's a tentacle monster versus Jrska. I'm sure the tentacles are jammed *somewhere.*

We give up on trying to come alongside the Ardent Crown in warpspace, and re-emerge into the Materium. Happily, that's enough to nudge the Crown back into realspace as well, and it's back on course for a collision, four days later and only hours away.

Jrska: Imagine the scene down on the planet - 'The Inquisition has saved us from the Ardent Crown! Praise the Emperor!' Four days later 'Fuck, it's back!'

There are at least four system ships in orbit - they can be formidable, since they don't have to spare power or hull capacity to FTL engines, and can put it all into heavier armour and armament.

Cassius: Let's not broadcast 'The Inquisition has found you wanting'

The wreckage of the Ardent Crown slices deep into Solace's crust before it and its warp engine detonate, the ensuing fireball cracking the crust and spreading to engulf a good chunk of the western hemisphere.

Jrska: Just picture Jrska during all this - hive cities going up like magnesium flares, even against the background of magma - her leaning back in the sensor suite chair, naked with a glass of wine.

GM: One of the hive cities didn't get their void shields up in time - the wave of fire and warp energy scours half the arcology bare of life
Jrska: Ohhh, yeeeeeeeahhh *climax*

Cassius: Long term plan *sneezes*
GM: Interesting plan.
Cog: Nurgle would approve.

The actual plan is to leave some sigil of our passing scorched onto more intact landscape - to sign the work, as it were. But those system ships are, as mentioned, formidable. Also, something buried deep under the crust has been exposed by the gigantic impact - it looks artificial... Necrontyr seems likely. That, combined with a mutant uprising, would certainly match that prophesy we found on Voluptua.

Cassius: Let's get out of here.
Aladar: We're not staying around for the prophesy?
Jrska: Prophesy is fulfilled - we don't have to stay around for the massacre.

System Ship: You are not staying to render assistance, Lord Inquisitor?
Cassius: This is not an isolated incident.
Jrska: Tell them the Emperor's Angels of Death and the Imperial Guard are en route.
Cog: Give them hope XD
Jrska: 'They said help was on the way! They said!'
Cassius: Can you tell them that without giggling? Because I can't.

Cassius: 'LOL, they think they we're going to send help' - Not something you want to hear from an Inquisitorial ship.

Loot - a Psychic Hood (very useful to Cassius, especially when he's matching wits with the Farseer); a corrupted solid-slug pistol apparently dedicated to the Plaguelord; and some stranger items.

Jrska: We still have to interrogate the Farseer. She's going to be the guest of honour at a very special party, and I'm not talking about breaking out the religious accoutrements like the sandstone strap-on, oh no. Cog, honey, can you invent a drug that will enhance pleasurable sensations a few thousand times?

Jrska: I'll be sure to tell all my minions 'Now remember the Golden Rule, girls - treat others like you'd expect them to treat you'. Which sounds fine until you remember we're all Slaanesh cultists.

Cassius: My infamy is equivalent to a greater deamon.
Jrska: Well, yes.
Cassius: And to the enslaver of multiple worlds.
Jrska: Doom of Leman's Solace, my lord. And if they ever figure out that you were involved in this... *points at the wreckage of Solace*
Cassius: Word is getting out 'He's loose'
Solace Government: 'He's come back, arrgghhhh!'
Cog: 'No Solace for you, mortal'

Aladar's mutations are taking him further and further away from humanity - and from an appreciation of Jrska. 'Only the Warp pleases me now'.

Jrska: Am I pretty?
Aladar: It is of no consequence.
Jrska: Cog, could you pass me that spoon? Aladar clearly isn't using his eyes anymore.

But the Farseer and Aladar may have to wait - we've finally reached that alien psychic beacon, gaurded by Horus Heresy era space marines, that we heard about so long ago. Alarmingly, they still have working spaceships. This is going to be tricky...

Is this someone's strategy for getting good quotes? Post horrible puns until I come up with some quotes to break the chain?
 
More excerpts from the Shadowrun game. As previously stated, the runners are an ork/troll group. Completely against stereotype, they specialize in stealth, subtlety, bluff, illusion, deception and misdirection.
  Dent: ork, rat shaman No-Step: ork, snake shaman, healer Byte Force: ork, decker, chemist Eye Spy: ork, rigger, drones, paramedic Audacity Jane: ork, combat, stealth, security systems Happy Jack (aliases include Jonathan Bridges): troll, combat, disguise, negotiator Mr. Johnson: generic name used by/for secretive employers who hire shadowrunners     When Happy Jack meets with clients, he usually goes as one of his alternate identities: the distinguished Jonathan Bridges.   Mr. Johnson: "Thank you for meeting with me mister ..." Jonathan Bridges: "It's my pleasure to be here, Mr. Johnson. I'm Mr. Bridges." Mr. Johnson: "Mr. Bridges ... as in ..." Jonathan Bridges: "If you're about to make some comment regarding bridges and trolls, I've heard it before."     The shadowrunners discuss how they're spending their latest windfall...   Audacity Jane: "I can't believe you just spent 10,000 nuyen on a suit. What a waste of money." Happy Jack: "It's a high fashion suit with an armor lining. It's what the top executives wear." Audacity Jane: "So what? It's not like you're going to sneak into a building dressed like a troll CEO on our runs. You're still going in dressed as a janitor or a maintenance man like usual."   A few weeks later, while Jonathan Bridges (aka Happy Jack) was negotiating with a different Mr. Johnson...   Mr. Johnson: "And I'm prepared to pay each member of your team 6,000 nuyen." Jonathan Bridges: "6,000 nuyen? My suit costs more than that." Mr. Johnson: "..."   Unsurprisingly, the pay got negotiated above 10,000 nuyen apiece.
 
 
Discussing equipment on hand...
 
Eye Spy: "Do you have any anti-vehicular grenades?" Happy Jack: "Sure." (tosses a grenade to Eye Spy) Eye Spy: "This is a paint grenade." Happy Jack: "It's hard to drive or shoot when your windshield is covered with paint."   This led to the following conversation a few weeks later...   Byte Force: "What chemicals can I cook up for you today?" Happy Jack: "Paint for grenades. I'd like something that works a bit better than what we already have." Byte Force: "What are you looking to change?" Happy Jack: "Could you mess with the viscosity and surface tension? I'd like it to stick better to vehicle  windshields. And if they run windshield wipers, I'd like that to just smear the paint around without clearing it off." Byte Force: "Okay. That might be possible..." Happy Jack: "And could you include something that has a bit of an exothermic reaction? It doesn't need to be too strong. Just push the temperature of the paint over body temperature so it blocks infrared and thermographic vision." Byte Force: "Heh. That still won't help you much if the vehicle has radar." Happy Jack: "I was just getting to that. Could you mix in tiny particles of metal in order to scatter radar beams?" Byte Force: "****! Do you want the paint to yodel too, so it blocks sonar?" (long pause) Happy Jack: "That's a good idea ... but that might be a bit too much to expect from paint."     Needing no explanation...   Audacity Jane: "Of course dragons are at the top of the food chain. I can't eat that much."

Is this someone's strategy for getting good quotes? Post horrible puns until I come up with some quotes to break the chain?
 
More excerpts from the Shadowrun game. As previously stated, the runners are an ork/troll group. Completely against stereotype, they specialize in stealth, subtlety, bluff, illusion, deception and misdirection.
  Dent: ork, rat shaman No-Step: ork, snake shaman, healer Byte Force: ork, decker, chemist Eye Spy: ork, rigger, drones, paramedic Audacity Jane: ork, combat, stealth, security systems Happy Jack (aliases include Jonathan Bridges): troll, combat, disguise, negotiator Mr. Johnson: generic name used by/for secretive employers who hire shadowrunners     When Happy Jack meets with clients, he usually goes as one of his alternate identities: the distinguished Jonathan Bridges.   Mr. Johnson: "Thank you for meeting with me mister ..." Jonathan Bridges: "It's my pleasure to be here, Mr. Johnson. I'm Mr. Bridges." Mr. Johnson: "Mr. Bridges ... as in ..." Jonathan Bridges: "If you're about to make some comment regarding bridges and trolls, I've heard it before."     The shadowrunners discuss how they're spending their latest windfall...   Audacity Jane: "I can't believe you just spent 10,000 nuyen on a suit. What a waste of money." Happy Jack: "It's a high fashion suit with an armor lining. It's what the top executives wear." Audacity Jane: "So what? It's not like you're going to sneak into a building dressed like a troll CEO on our runs. You're still going in dressed as a janitor or a maintenance man like usual."   A few weeks later, while Jonathan Bridges (aka Happy Jack) was negotiating with a different Mr. Johnson...   Mr. Johnson: "And I'm prepared to pay each member of your team 6,000 nuyen." Jonathan Bridges: "6,000 nuyen? My suit costs more than that." Mr. Johnson: "..."   Unsurprisingly, the pay got negotiated above 10,000 nuyen apiece.
 
 
Discussing equipment on hand...
 
Eye Spy: "Do you have any anti-vehicular grenades?" Happy Jack: "Sure." (tosses a grenade to Eye Spy) Eye Spy: "This is a paint grenade." Happy Jack: "It's hard to drive or shoot when your windshield is covered with paint."   This led to the following conversation a few weeks later...   Byte Force: "What chemicals can I cook up for you today?" Happy Jack: "Paint for grenades. I'd like something that works a bit better than what we already have." Byte Force: "What are you looking to change?" Happy Jack: "Could you mess with the viscosity and surface tension? I'd like it to stick better to vehicle  windshields. And if they run windshield wipers, I'd like that to just smear the paint around without clearing it off." Byte Force: "Okay. That might be possible..." Happy Jack: "And could you include something that has a bit of an exothermic reaction? It doesn't need to be too strong. Just push the temperature of the paint over body temperature so it blocks infrared and thermographic vision." Byte Force: "Heh. That still won't help you much if the vehicle has radar." Happy Jack: "I was just getting to that. Could you mix in tiny particles of metal in order to scatter radar beams?" Byte Force: "****! Do you want the paint to yodel too, so it blocks sonar?" (long pause) Happy Jack: "That's a good idea ... but that might be a bit too much to expect from paint."     Needing no explanation...   Audacity Jane: "Of course dragons are at the top of the food chain. I can't eat that much."

Is this someone's strategy for getting good quotes? Post horrible puns until I come up with some quotes to break the chain?
 
More excerpts from the Shadowrun game. As previously stated, the runners are an ork/troll group. Completely against stereotype, they specialize in stealth, subtlety, bluff, illusion, deception and misdirection.
  Dent: ork, rat shaman No-Step: ork, snake shaman, healer Byte Force: ork, decker, chemist Eye Spy: ork, rigger, drones, paramedic Audacity Jane: ork, combat, stealth, security systems Happy Jack (aliases include Jonathan Bridges): troll, combat, disguise, negotiator Mr. Johnson: generic name used by/for secretive employers who hire shadowrunners     When Happy Jack meets with clients, he usually goes as one of his alternate identities: the distinguished Jonathan Bridges.   Mr. Johnson: "Thank you for meeting with me mister ..." Jonathan Bridges: "It's my pleasure to be here, Mr. Johnson. I'm Mr. Bridges." Mr. Johnson: "Mr. Bridges ... as in ..." Jonathan Bridges: "If you're about to make some comment regarding bridges and trolls, I've heard it before."     The shadowrunners discuss how they're spending their latest windfall...   Audacity Jane: "I can't believe you just spent 10,000 nuyen on a suit. What a waste of money." Happy Jack: "It's a high fashion suit with an armor lining. It's what the top executives wear." Audacity Jane: "So what? It's not like you're going to sneak into a building dressed like a troll CEO on our runs. You're still going in dressed as a janitor or a maintenance man like usual."   A few weeks later, while Jonathan Bridges (aka Happy Jack) was negotiating with a different Mr. Johnson...   Mr. Johnson: "And I'm prepared to pay each member of your team 6,000 nuyen." Jonathan Bridges: "6,000 nuyen? My suit costs more than that." Mr. Johnson: "..."   Unsurprisingly, the pay got negotiated above 10,000 nuyen apiece.
 
 
Discussing equipment on hand...
 
Eye Spy: "Do you have any anti-vehicular grenades?" Happy Jack: "Sure." (tosses a grenade to Eye Spy) Eye Spy: "This is a paint grenade." Happy Jack: "It's hard to drive or shoot when your windshield is covered with paint."   This led to the following conversation a few weeks later...   Byte Force: "What chemicals can I cook up for you today?" Happy Jack: "Paint for grenades. I'd like something that works a bit better than what we already have." Byte Force: "What are you looking to change?" Happy Jack: "Could you mess with the viscosity and surface tension? I'd like it to stick better to vehicle  windshields. And if they run windshield wipers, I'd like that to just smear the paint around without clearing it off." Byte Force: "Okay. That might be possible..." Happy Jack: "And could you include something that has a bit of an exothermic reaction? It doesn't need to be too strong. Just push the temperature of the paint over body temperature so it blocks infrared and thermographic vision." Byte Force: "Heh. That still won't help you much if the vehicle has radar." Happy Jack: "I was just getting to that. Could you mix in tiny particles of metal in order to scatter radar beams?" Byte Force: "****! Do you want the paint to yodel too, so it blocks sonar?" (long pause) Happy Jack: "That's a good idea ... but that might be a bit too much to expect from paint."     Needing no explanation...   Audacity Jane: "Of course dragons are at the top of the food chain. I can't eat that much."