death tribble

Not random, but one of my all-time favorites; pretty sure I've posted this in the past, but it's been a while.
 
Apollo XI launch at 500 frames per second

Two sunsets, one sun

Lucius Alexander
 
In reverse of normal order, the post is down here

Visited Reading at the weekend to see friends. Got to the station early and we got an early train. We had a round of Dungeons and Dragons V4, several round of Apples to Apples the first of which I won handsomely and the second of which went to the wire with all six people on 5 green cards, and rather amazingly I won (well equal first) at Judge Dredd.

Visited Reading at the weekend to see friends. Got to the station early and we got an early train. We had a round of Dungeons and Dragons V4, several round of Apples to Apples the first of which I won handsomely and the second of which went to the wire with all six people on 5 green cards, and rather amazingly I won (well equal first) at Judge Dredd.

Happy Easter!

I think Shadowrun has always been one of those games that is easy and fun to play but pretty difficult to GM becuase of the vast amount of ground you need to cover. I have GMed Shadowrun a LOT, but have played very little. The thing is, seems like with every edition there is one section that I just cannot keep in my head. The most recent two editions, the whole matrix thing was beyond my ability to remember it all. I would read the section, run it fine for a couple of sessions, and poof, it was gone again. Read it again, run it some more, etc. etc. ad infinitum. Got a bit tiring. Not sure why... 2nd and 3rd it was magic.
 
It's basically the D&D of science fiction gaming. It has everything so has wide appeal. The video games can only be helping it, which is good. Funny thing is, I personally got into Shadowrun because no one would play Cyberpunk with me, but when I mentioned the Shadowrun book people perked up. In the end, I like Shadowrun as well, so it's not too much of a loss.
 
And, getting back on topic...
 
A Champions game... sort of.
 
Josh, our semi-psychic duplicator/summoner/clone maker: Hey, you ever heard of "The Stranger?"
Linette, our elastic former cheerleader: Ewwww...
Josh: No, not that...
Linette: *smiling* *arched eyebrow*
Josh: ...I duplicate, I don't need to sit on my hand.
Linette: EEEEWWWW...
 
The M-F'ing Dragon of the West, B****!  :  I BLAST IT!
GM: ...the little girl?
The M-F'ing Dragon of the West, B****! : That ain't no little girl, holding a physics book in the middle of the street like that...
GM: Did you just MIB me?
The M-F'ing Dragon of the West, B****! :  YEA-UH!

Rusulka
 
Quote: "Don't think I'm helpless, just because I'm soft and cuddly!"

Mad Max. And Mad Max 2 (the Road Warrior to the Americans). This is how to do savagry. Rather than rampent cannibalism or zombies. And how can you  get better than  'YOU ! You can run but you can't hide !' or 'The warrior of the Wasteland. The Ayatollah of Rock and Rolla'

I miss Don Lafontaine intros and trailers.
 
https://youtu.be/S-jY47-pY70
 
I've actually eaten at World's Best Falafel.

Colorized Daguerrotype Photos

A dragon bridge, that breathes fire.
 

The Tardigrade is not exactly a arctic animal but perhaps the most successful extremophile organisms on earth. Found from the top of everest to deep underwater trenches from the poles to the equator.

 

The tiny Water bear is natures toughest creatures. and that's what Dr Bjorn Vannesønn a scandinavian bio-geneticist hoped to unlock with humans when exposed to an untested retroviral cocktail containing tardigrade genes Dr Vannesønn was trasformed into the giant beastial 8 limbed thing called simply the Tardigrade.

 

his lab destroyed in his initial confusion not knowing his own strength and attacked by the police, the army and local heroes, he fled to the far north away from people a brilliant mind trapped in a hideous form that does not allow him to perform the research that would cure him or even to speak.

 

But the tiny tardigrade has given him gifts too able to survive crushing pressure or vacuum temperatures close to absolute zero and temperatures over the boiling point of water safe even from famine and drought and able to enter suspended animation Dr Vannesønn is the perfect survivor.

Shadowrun – the other 2070 campaign
Apparently in the session I missed, the other characters went white-water rafting, got stuck in the middle of a d*ck-waving contest between Salish-Sidhe and Aztechnology, started a fire, and filmed the subsequent escalation. I should probably be grateful I missed this, even if there was ice cream at the end. For one thing, some-one as distinctive-looking as Ripper would be even harder to conceal in the camera footage than the other runners.

Oracle: Remember, I AM legally dead.
Ocelot: 'and if you say anything, you can be too'

Oracle also proposed nightmare fuel in the form of hundreds of Buster Moves – dancing plush toys with rudimentary AI – wired together into a twitching, staring, supercomputer. Fortunately, he's short on the funds to build this horror – keeping ahead of the software arms race is expensive - unless we can find another job soon. Boot's fixer makes an early morning priority call.

Strelok: Good morning, comrade. I have a job for you if you're interested.
Boots: Music to my ears – I need to buy that muscle toner somehow.

Apparently extra security is needed for a meet at The Sports Bar, in Freeway Park.

Boots: I've been there a few times when I was a kid... those poor ducks.

Boots: For most Shadowrunners, 11AM IS mid-morning.

Although it will be a problem for Oracle – he DOES have a day job.

Ripper K: It's a complication
Boots: Just like I'm an albino. And vindictive.
Ripper K: At least you don't have to worry about UV in Seattle.

Boots: Hey, Ripper, is this going to get in the way of your deviancy?

Boots: These conversations always reach the point where things get awkward. I LOVE working with you guys.

Ripper K: I'm going to call up an ARESearch Maps wiremap of the park – because if I had a missile launcher, I want to figure out where I'd be firing from.

It turns out that could be from anywhere – the freeway running through the park, the hi-ises all around...

Boots: There are so many, many ways this could go terribly wrong.

Not least because, as a AAA Security area of Seattle, us standing around with automatic weapons will attract attention.

Oracle: See if you can get some tracer rounds. Tracker rounds, I mean Tracker Rounds!
Ocelot: I suspect that slip was intentional.
Ripper K: Just order them off Amazon and one of the delivery drones will drop them off – you're an Amazon Prime member aren't you?

And then throw in the convention of security types at the pavilion. There's a rather high number of large people in suspiciously well-tailored suits wandering about. The fact that Oracle's drones will be running on a pre-arranged script, and the chances that this is going to go wrong wrong rise exponentially.

Ocelot: It has only just occurred to me that Shadowrunners started referring to the people that hire us as 'Johnsons' so we can call all our employers dicks.
Oracle: They do say a run isn't over until the Johnson has screwed you, somehow.

The runners chat about the run Ripper missed.

Ripper K: I do swim very well – I probably wouldn't have needed the raft.
Oracle: White-water bodysurfing should not be a thing.

Oracle is stuck doing his mystery day job where he has to log into an apparently random MMO for a few hours.

GM: And this week it's Glitterworld 4.
Oracle: Oh f**k.
Ripper K: Hmm?
Oracle: Idol management MMO.

Ripper K starts tagging civilians, security-types, and suits on the TacNet. We don't recognise the gathering suits, which we will no doubt regret very soon. Feeding the photos into face recognition software doesn't help.

Ripper K: It's those shiny teeth – they blind the cameras.

The doors are closed when a large and sparkly individual, with a highly attractive Orc girl on each arm, arrives. He's on the guest list, but he's late, so he won't be getting in. Of further note, his escorts are heavily but covertly armed. There's NO WAY we're letting him in.

Boots: It's the Penguin.
Oracle: Miraculously resurrected after his run in with a daemon.
Ripper K: Didn't your dad meet this guy?

Boots: I'm sorry sir, but there is no way I'm letting you in. But if you wait I'll make a call.
Penguin: You get stuck in traffic and this happens. Go on, make your damn call.
Boots: *winks at the orc escorts * Hey babe.
Ocelot: This is why we needed Oracle on duty – he could have blacked out everything below the neck.

Then the Halloweeners show up. A loud and themed biker gang. With flamethrowers.

Ripper K: There's no way this isn't a distraction.

Boots: Hey Strelok. We've got gangers inbound with flamethrowers in a AAA zone.
Strelok: … How???
Ocelot: What's the legalities of shooting them when they enter the pavilion grounds?

The thing we're not supposed to notice is the lone dog, packed to the gills with unmarked augmentics, that's strolling towards the pavilion. Ripper moves to intercept.

Oracle: I'd have packed it with surveillance hardware – it's a beagle. You have to call it Snoopy.

Boots: That's adorable. Have three bullets. 'You can tell I'm a hardcore gamer because I like hurting animals'
GM: The Halloweeners stop in their tracks and go '…. dude!'
Boots: Let 'em. They're next.

One bike gets its wheels shot out, and the other goes up in a fireball.

Boots: We've got one ganger who's bike doesn't go vroom vroom anymore and the other is one with the flame.
Ripper K: Oh look, it's some sort of bipedal incendiary device.

Knight Errant is surprisingly understanding, and ask us to come down to the station when we're off duty. After all, we are there as semi-legit security.

Ripper K: So, if I was making a run against this pavilion, what would my third line of attack be?

Probably the gardening droid that is making its rounds in the middle of the day. The one that stinks of liquid explosive.

Boots: Ripper, it's all yours.
Ripper K: Is it safe to shock it?
Boots: NO.

Ripper rips the 'pesticide' cannister off and throws it in the pond.

Boots: I'll leave that for Knight Errant to deal with. Wait, this park is full of civilians... 'Let's play in the fountain, mummy!' GOD NO.

Ripper K: Want me to pull the tracks off? KE will probably want to run cyberforensics on this.
Boots: Just hit the off button. I know I've unleashed bulletstorms today, but...

There's a few minutes of the meet to go. The security conventioneers across the road are watching all this with fascination.

Conventioneers: What the fuck did he just do? Into the pond? …. Alright then.

And then an apparently random assault happens nearby. And the woman attacking's hands start to inflate.

Ripper K: The f**k?

It's anaphylactic shock. And another distraction, but probably not one we can ignore.

Boots: Hold this – Orc running towards you with a rifle is never reassuring.

And recognising the situation, one of Oracle's drone scripts trigger – the medivac drone launches.

Boots: Ma'am! I have something to tell you! *stabs her in the neck with an EpiPen* And you! Stand over there!
Assault Victim: But she hit me!

And then the meeting of fixers, and our job, is over. It seems just barely possible that the medical emergency WASN'T a set-up.

Ocelot: Has anybody come out of the pavilion yet?
GM: Yes.
Ocelot: Good. If they hadn't I'd have gone in and started counting bodies.

Oracle: We need more jobs like this.
Boots: Ocelot, High Five! Ripper, Jazz Hands!

The Fixers: What the frell happened out here?
Ripper K: Surveillance cyberdog, bomb attack.
Boots: And Halloweeners.
Fixers: We didn't hear a thing!
Ripper K: Thanks.
Oracle: They can probably still hear the medivac.
Ripper K: And that was probably unrelated.

Oracle is quite pleased that his drone scripts worked so well he didn't even need to give them additional orders. And the fixers are so pleased with us that they'll probably keep us in mind for future jobs.

Boots: And lets sell off the organs from the dog.
Ocelot: Well, cyberwear.
Ripper K: The organs are kind of... all over the place.

GM: A 20 thousand nuyen dog... blown away with 10 nuyen worth of bullets.

Boots: High Five, Ripper! Argh, my wrist, what have I done...

Of course, Oracle is still going to need another job this month just to cover his expenses.

GM: Hacking is a high maintenance lifestyle.

Ripper K: Blowing the dog apart in front of all those kiddies was entirely necessary.

Of course, after the game Weldun points out everything we did wrong – he does security IRL.

Weldun: Like that woman who was having the attack. She was outside your perimeter – why did you leave your post? That said, I don't know a single security guard that wouldn't go help. In fact, if I knew one who refused to help, on those grounds, I wouldn't work with them.

NPC: Your forehead seems bigger these days.
Oracle: Why thank you, I've been working out.
Ocelot: Lots of Sudoku.

D&D - Dealing With Dragons
D&D Continues – more sleep-deprived efforts to gather intelligence before attacking King Gurnt. But, typically, any advances we make is complicated by more things we have to do – in this case, deal with a dragon – and not the cute faerie dragon we already know.

Lamech: Well, I've got my book of useful devices – let's see if there's any dragontraps.

Lamech: I don't suppose I could make a cart-mounted ballista?
GM: No. But you could always make a toy one – you've got 'Tinkerer'

Kavorog: We might be able to negotiate with it – green dragons are lawful evil.
Lamech: Maybe we can talk it into attacking King Gurnt XD

Druid: I used to have 'Entangle' but it got deleted from my deck 15 years ago as too powerful. Although the bondage fairy might have had something to do with it too.

Lacking any better ideas, Lamech whittles a harpoon, tethered to a water barrel. And with any luck, his Shatter spell will collapse the ruined tower before we even need to face the resident. Of course, if we can get the dragon to simply leave we can consider the job done – but none of us are that optimistic. Not least because the tower is also full of giant spiders. And apparently there's a group of masked humanoids hanging around the ruins of Thundertree village too.

Lamech: *headdesk*
Kavorog: We're going to be taking more prisoners, aren't we?
Lamech: Well, we needed bait for the dragon.

Lamech: So we're got three people all trying to lead the group, and two bringing up the rear. Jostling for pole position.

Kavorog the dragonborn shoulder-charges the door of the building the wannabe Death Eaters are hanging out in, and bounces off.

Lamech: *sigh*
Wannabe Death Eater: Who goes there?
Kavorog: YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE *firebolts the door*

Our back-up cleric attempts to shield-bash his way in too – and he bounces off as well.

Lamech: Well, if these guys know there's a dragon in the village, maybe they'll think it's trying to get in.

Kavorog: Maybe they're dragon worshippers. I hope they are – they'll be all over me. Got some hot bitches, yeah!

GM: Well, I think the polite option is off the table.
Urlon: I thought you were going to try and talk them down.
Kavorog: Nope – I was going to talk to the dragon.

Death Eater: (in Draconic) Hold them off! We'll use the other door and go around!

Straight into Urlon, and Lamech's Sleep spell. What a pity some of us know Draconic too.

GM: Right, their saves vs. Sleep. ... Nope. Not as such. Snorlax.

The survivors drop their scimitars and quiver after Kavorog roars at them. Their masks have little horns, and their cloaks batwings.

Urlon: Dragon cultists?
GM: Or demon cultists – do you really care?

Lamech: Take them of one at a time, and torture them for info. Let the others hear the screams.
GM: That could wake the dragon.
Lamech: Good point – we'll gag them first, then torture them.

They are actually dragon cultists.

Lamech: Wannabe dragon cultists.
Urlon: Pathetic.
Cultist: *looks pissed off*
Kavorog: *pats the cultist on the head* There there.

The cult-leader wannabe promises as secret knowledge, etc. in return for an alliance. That, at least ensures we keep him alive for future interrogation. Although he might be useful if we DO try to sic the dragon on Gurnt.

Thorn the cleric: I'd like to point out that's an evil act. But it could work.

The other cultists seem a little reluctant to actually talk to a real dragon.

Urlon: Lamech, can you do Ventriloquism?
GM: Don't ask the gnome to put his hand up the dragonborn's arse.

Lamech: If you stay within earshot of wherever I'm hiding I can suggest conversational attacks.
Kavorog: Cyrano de Bergedrac

Perhaps we can dress as cultists, and persuade him to move to Wyvern Tor? There was an orc problem there.

Urlon: Do we really want him closer to the town?
Lamech: By the time we have to deal with it we'll be higher level anyway.

Or if we pose as the cult, and deliberately piss off the dragon, and then encourage the cult to go visit, we can eliminate another problem.

Thorn: Wiping out an evil cult is NOT an evil act...

Urlon: I want to make sure I disguise my ears - I don't want him to bear a grudge against my race.
GM: And go out of his way to kill wood elves, instead of just killing them casually.

Druid: I'll go and prepare to support you, when it all goes horribly wrong.

Lamech: *hissing cues to Kavorog* 'Lord Wyrm! We crave your indulgence!'
Dragon: I AM VENOMFANG! THIS IS MY TOWER!
Lamech: 'We come from the Cult of the Dragon to give obeisance!'
GM: 'Whatever the gnome hiding under the bush just said!'

Lamech: 'We bring gifts as befit your majesty!'
Venomfang: HAVE YOUR DIPLOMAT COME OUT WHERE I CAN SEE HIM
All: ... crap.

Lamech actually persuades it that Wyvern Tor will make a better home to befit a true Wyrm. Complete with Orcs to enslave. Venomfang, despite his youth, is no fool, and wants to know what the catch is. Lamech suggests attacking King Gurnt would be appreciated.

GM: You're inciting a Forgotten Realms dragon to dragonrage. This is not difficult.

Problem – he wants us to prepare Wyvern Tor for him, by killing the orcs in his name.

GM: You're appealing to green dragon psychology. By posing as minions it can boss around.

Thorn: Dragons don't like being told 'no'. It's a winged teenager with big claws and wings and really bad halitosis.

Of course, if we do take Wyvern Tor, we can fill it with traps for the dragon's arrival. Such as big banners saying “Welcome to Wyvern Tor!”

Kavorog: 'What's that tiny writing along the bottom? ' 'Guess who prepared Explosive Runes today' BOOM.

Lamech: Are there any zombies actually left?
Druid: I never did a census.

Druid: You're a druggie, aren't you?
Lamech: I appreciate the natural pharmaceuticals.

Druid:.... you're a Wild Sorcerer.
Lamech: All natural, that's me.
Druid: There’s nothing natural about Wild Magic.
Lamech: More natural than daemonic pacts or being some kind of freak hybrid.
Druid:... good point.

But first, let's see if we can find that buried treasure one of the prisoners at the Red Brands base promised us. Not a problem. At least we coming out financially ahead on this trip. And chains from the smithy will be useful in getting the real dragon cultists back to the authorities. More ash zombies is less useful.

Kavorog: How are we going to carry an anvil?
Lamech: Make the prisoners carry it XD
GM: And they won't be running anywhere if they're tied to it.

And then we get ambushed by triffids.

Lamech: I think I was too startled by Thorn yelling in my ear to notice the plant monsters.

Elethendiel's Thunderwave spell is pretty loud too.

Lamech: And all over town zombies shuffle up of their ruins and stare up at the sky going 'uuuurr?' uuur... doesn't look like rain...'
GM: Waving umbrellas, and muttering 'I thought they moved that air force base'

Throw in all the giant rats the detonation panicked, and you can understand why we give Elethandiel some rather dirty looks.

GM: To the north are the zombies. To the south is the braying of a very large goat. To the east is the snorting of an angry boar. We can safely assume there are no sharks.

We flee back to the building with the prisoners, luring the zombies into an annexe and sniping at giant angry wildlife as they circle.

GM: So who are you going to Enlarge
Lamech's player: They're all asking for it.
GM: You're PCs, of course you're asking for it.

GM: You can hear the boar moving away from the building.
Lamech: It's about to charge the door, isn't it.

Yup.

And the giant goats launch themselves at the windows. So we're stuck in a small room with monsters coming in every door and window. The boar backs off for another charge, and is pursued by an Enlarged, Raging, lightning-breathing Kavorog. Hopefully this will result in bacon. At least the chaos seems rather startle the goats, too. A much needed reprieve...

The shadowrunners were an ork/troll group. Against stereotype, they specialized in stealth, subtlety, bluff, illusion, deception and misdirection.
 
Cast of characters: 
Dent: ork, rat shaman
No-Step / Gomi No ShuShu: 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
Universal Brotherhood ("UB"): a charitable fringe religious organization; secretly controlled by insect sprits
SIN: System ID Number; a combination of a social security number, driver's license, passport and debit card number
 
Universal Brotherhood - Getting Out of Dodge
 
Eye Spy: "These raids are just going to get harder and harder until the UB mops the floor with us."
Audacity Jane: "If they're smart, they'll reinforce the Seattle chapterhouses with additional guards from outside the area."
Happy Jack: "I certainly hope they do."
Eye Spy: "Do you have a death wish?"
Happy Jack: "No. I plan to start hitting chapterhouses in other cities."
 
Eye Spy: "How are we going to get our gear to other cities? Border guards and airport security tend to be really picky about those things."
Happy Jack: "We're going to get another vehicle. One more suited for hopping around the country."
Eye Spy: "YES!! We can finally get a helicopter."
Happy Jack: "I found something that's better. A blimp."
Eye Spy: "A blimp? It will take us forever to get anyplace."
Happy Jack: "These aren't your grandparents' Goodyear blimps. Cruising speed around 180 kmph. Top speed double that. They're harder to spot with radar or IR than anything short of a stealth glider. They're used by executives to get around cities and between cities, so everyone will assume we're rich and important. They also have enough range to get across the continent without refueling."
Audacity Jane: "They may be hard to spot with electronics, but they're really easy to spot with a Mark I eyeball."
Happy Jack: "I know. That's why I want to put LED panels on it. When we're cruising around cities at night, we can disguise ourselves as an advert-blimp. Nobody pays attention to those, and nobody expects one to spit out an infiltration team."
Audacity Jane: "You've got to be kidding. Your way to hide a blimp is to cover it in brightly lit advertisements?"
 
Eye Spy: "So where are we going to hit the UB next?"
No-Step: "California Free State would be a logical next stop. It's close. The UB was founded there, so they have a large presence."
Happy Jack: "That's the main reason I want to hit them somewhere else. I'm guessing they can follow the same trail of logic."
Dent: "So you're going to come up with an illogical way of choosing targets?"
 
Since the team was supporting their attacks on the UB chapterhouses by smuggling, the actual targets were chosen by which countries had inflated/deflated prices for certain goods.
 
Byte Force: "Where are we going first?"
Happy Jack: "Confederate American States."
No-Step: "Should I even bother asking what is overpriced there?"
Happy Jack: "Anything electronic. There's a huge tariff in order to 'protect' the nearly nonexistent domestic electronics industry. It artificially inflates the prices."
No-Step: "And what goods are available at cheap prices?"
Happy Jack: "Guns and ammo."
No-Step: "Are the Confederates deliberately trying to live up to the stereotypes?"
 
The team was understandably paranoid about the UB catching up with them when they sold living flesh form insect spirits to the biotech megacorps:
Each of the megacorps had employees that were UB members.
Some of those members were human form insect spirits capable of masking their true nature.
The human form insect spirits would act in the best interest of the hive/queen.
Even the non-possessed UB members might be persuaded to act in the UB's interest, instead of their corp's interest.
 
No-Step: "Wouldn't it be reasonable to assume that the UB will attack us when we attempt to hand over the live flesh form?"
Happy Jack: "It's highly likely. That's why we're not going to be there."
No-Step: "So who is going to the meet in our place?"
Happy Jack: "Nobody. We'll talk to the buyer on the phone, they'll deposit the money in a numbered account, and we'll get the flesh form there some other way."
Byte Force: "We can always send the flesh form by robocab."
Eye Spy: "We could steal a car and program the autopilot."
Dent: "I could mind control a courier into delivering it."
Audacity Jane: "Candygram."
 
Byte Force had been busy inventing new toys to use against the UB....
 
Byte Force: "This is pretty straightforward. I found a heat-resistant insecticide to coat flechettes with. If I'm right, you might be able to kill true form insect spirits with them."
Audacity Jane: "And if you're wrong?"
Byte Force: (shrugging) "Then it's like shooting an elephant with a BB gun. It's not going to hurt the elephant, but it might make it mad."
Audacity Jane: "And the only way to know whether you're right or wrong is for me to risk my life testing it...."
No-Step: "That's the joy of the scientific method."
 
Byte Force: "I figured out a way to make the UB's building unusable ... and it's not covered by their insurance."
Audacity Jane: "A nuclear warhead?"
Byte Force: "Stink bombs. I made some gas and paint grenades filled with putrescine, cadaverine, skatole and butryc acid."
No-Step: "So it smells like dead bodies and ... what else?"
Byte Force: "It smells like rotting meat, feces and vomit."
Dent: "That should cut the attendance at their meetings."
Eye Spy: (turning slightly green) "Crap. I think I'm going to get sick just thinking about it."
Happy Jack: "Well ... stop thinking about it."
Eye Spy: "..."
Happy Jack: "And just to set the ground rules for Byte Force's super-stinker ... if anyone ever uses that on a building that I'm in, or one that I need to go into, I will kill them myself."
 
Audacity Jane: "Is that stink bomb really going to be effective? Some insects really like those smells."
Byte Force: "But normal people don't. That's who I want to drive away from the building."
Dent: "If any of the UB members don't seem completely grossed out by the smell, you'll know they're insect possessed."
 
The team performed reconnaissance on the the target UB building in the normal manner. They abducted one of the UB members who also worked there as a janitor.
 
Dent: (after performing Mind Probe) "This seems wrong. The inner sanctum is on the top floor, not the basement or ground floor like normal."
No-Step: "Some insects prefer to live above ground or higher up."
Happy Jack: "Bees, wasps..."
Eye Spy: "I suppose butterflies would be a bit too much to hope for."
 
After killing the queen and capturing a live flesh form insect spirit, it was time to sell it.
 
Gomi No ShuShu: "My hunters captured a live specimen in Oklahoma City. Where would you like them to deliver it?"
Shiawase procurement specialist: "I thought you were going to deliver one in Seattle."
Gomi No ShuShu: "That's the challenge with live specimens. You have to acquire them where you can find them." (pause) "Shiawase has some large facilities in Oklahoma City. Your local people can handle the pick-up."
Shiawase procurement specialist: "They're not experts in handling paranormal animals."
Gomi No ShuShu: "The specimen will be heavily sedated, securely bound and muzzled. They will only need sufficient skills to pick up and carry dead weight."
Shiawase procurement specialist: "..."
 
The Shiawase procurement specialist seemed slightly surprised that Gomi No ShuShu requested that the payment be wired to a numbered account, rather than given in the usual certified credsticks.
 
Gomi No ShuShu: "Oh ... one more thing." (pause) "You may want to bring additional security personnel to the
Shiawase procurement specialist: "Why?"
Gomi No ShuShu: "I believe a number of Shiawase employees are involved with the former owner of the specimen. Therefore, I'm a bit concerned that there may be a security leak on your end."
Shiawase procurement specialist: (sounding slightly angry) "Which Shiawase employees?"
Gomi No ShuShu: (cheerfully) "I would be happy to discuss the sale of that information ... right after we complete the delivery of the specimen and the wire transfer of funds."
 
After the call was complete....
 
Dent: "I guess we'll be able to tell if he's connected to the UB if he refuses to pay us."
Happy Jack: "If he's working for the UB, then he's definitely going to pay us."
Audacity Jane: "Why? They're not dumb enough to pay to get their bug back."
Happy Jack: "It's the oldest trick in the book for tracking down who is behind a crime. Follow the money. He'll pay us just to see who collects the money."
Audacity Jane: "So we will get paid. We just won't be able to get our money back without getting killed."
Happy Jack: "Sure we can. We'll just have to launder it first."
 
In order to transport the flesh form insect spirit to the Shiawase procurement specialist (without having to go themselves), they loaded it into a robocab and sent it on its way.
 
Dent: "I thought robocabs required a SIN to use."
Byte Force: "We paid with a certified credstick, then used a SIN to activate the cab."
Dent: "Whose SIN did you use?"
Byte Force: "I borrowed a dummy SIN from the morgue."
Audacity Jane: "If you needed a dummy's SIN, you could have just borrowed Dent's."
 
Eye Spy: "I don't understand. Doesn't the system check to make sure the person's not dead?"
Audacity Jane: "Or audit afterward to make sure nobody is using the dead person's SIN?"
Byte Force: "A dummy SIN is used to process a Jon Doe through the morgue. First they have to activate the SIN in order to process the John Doe through the morgue. After they've finished activating his SIN and processing him through the morgue, they then process his death certificate and deactivate the SIN."
No-Step: "Your tax dollars at work."
Audacity Jane: "That would be more disturbing if we actually paid taxes."
Byte Force: "The system only performs a cursory SIN check if you're doing a legal purchase. As long as you have the money, the SIN check is a rubber stamp."
Happy Jack: "If Shiawase or the UB tries to backtrack where the cab came from, the cab records will lead back to this spot..."
Audacity Jane: "... chosen for the lack of security cameras ..."
Happy Jack: "... and the money trail will lead back to a dead SINless guy. I'm absolutely positive he won't rat us out."
 
No-Step called the procurement specialist one more time....
 
No- Step: "The specimen is en route. Let your people know that it will be arriving in a robocab."
Shiawase procurement specialist: "You squeezed into a robocab with a dangerous paranormal animal?"

No- Step: "Of course not. The specimen is in the robocab. I'm not getting within miles of the delivery site."
Shiawase procurement specialist: "..."

No- Step: "I told you that Shiawase might have a security leak. I'm not risking my life on the belief that you plugged it. I can complete the rest of our business from this end of the phone."

Oldest complete copy of Ten Commandments displayed in Israel
https://au.news.yahoo.com/a/27656662/oldest-complete-copy-of-ten-commandments-displayed-in-israel/

Barbaric. Though probably the aerial/satellite recon wouldn't find the centrifuges in action.

Origin story off the Oregon coast