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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Golden Bee" data-source="post: 9738259" data-attributes="member: 7041055">On intelligence:  <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1974/05/09/archives/each-others-mail-essay.html" target="_blank">https://www.nytimes.com/1974/05/09/archives/each-others-mail-essay.html</a>Weight Your Tournament!The Gray Gargoyle vanished among the stalagmites, a metal cable wrapping around the lawyer’s shoulders. But with a great cry of strength, the Jade Jaguar broke the cord…Crime! On a snowy evening in February, three figures gathered around an illegal machine. Detective Zelda Saeki, lawyer/boxer Tácito Uriel Velasco, and stuntwoman Lala Santinella, are in the break room, aiming for a high score in pinball. (Lala wins.)Their boss, the 13-year-old millionaire Devika, is furious. Midas Security just scooped them on a contract, and sent a taunting telegram about it. She’s off to a Broadway show, but by the time she gets back, she expects the contract poached! Otherwise, no gambling for anybody!Lala calls her contact at Midas, the underpaid secretary of their overnight answering service. All the woman is willing to give is an address over in Chinatown. The group takes the Duesenberg over. The spot’s a packed restaurant with an exclusively Chinese clientele. It has a secret though: it's a front for Chinese crime lord ‘The Ubiquitous Dragon’! The Dragon has multiple distinct corporeal forms. The  New York one is susceptible to flattery, and the group is able to get a solid deal by the time dessert is served. (It's always useful to have a lawyer in your adventuring party!)The Dragon:[ATTACH=full]415505[/ATTACH]*** A week later, the group has left frozen New York behind for a mysterious island near Macau. The security gig is to protect a combat tournament, one filled with unstable and arrogant fighters.Oddly, there are only seven entrants, with the final one missing. Notable among the fighters: Lala's mentor the Gray Gargoyle, luchador El Principe del Inframundo, and General Saeki's chosen fighter (and Zelda's old crush), Yoji Sanada.Also on the island is Tácito's brujo trainer. Rereading their contract, nothing prevents the boxer from also joining and taking the eighth spot… Which would put him against the Grey Gargoyle!The group investigates the cast of fighters. Lala flirts with Baltimore's representative, “Big Man” Carcetti (first seen in The Demise of Dr. Enigma!). Carcetti’s looking past his first-round opponent, Hong Kong actress Cheng Xiu. This turns out to be a bad move, as during their opening bout, he takes a sai right through the chest! Tacito’s Jaguar senses goes off. Carcetti was actually killed from behind, by Tacito’s old nemesis… The light-bending Mr. Nowhere!The group demands a pause in the tournament, to investigate. Mr. Nowhere was the eighth contestant… whose name was thrown out due to bureaucratic error. The Dragon, bored and debauched, gives the group permission to hunt and slay the interloper, as long as it's amusing.Hoping to find a less open arena, the group found an ancient cavern with a glowing snake statue. The battles continued, with Lala stalking through the crowd, and eventually hearing breathing from an empty corner. She pointed to a spot…and Zelda began perforating the interloper! The holes in the suit, combined with blood, made Nowhere visible. Tacito and the Gray Gargoyle, who were battling to a standstill, called a timeout to fight the killer. Unfortunately, the masked vigilante kicked Mr. Nowhere off a cliff! The man landed five stories below with a wet squelch.General Saeki asked an important question:Tacito, who won his round via forfeit, returned to his beachside hut. Santinella and Saeki finally investigated their criminal hirer. There was a reason it was so easy to win the contract: The Dragon didn’t value safety on her island at all. She wanted strong people to die, so her terra-cotta warriors could turn their chi into power. Her many lives came at the expense of others![ATTACH=full]415506[/ATTACH]Tacito and his brujo Leocadio sat watching the sunset, passing a jazz cigarette back and forth. Who knew when they were in a Mexican prison, they would eventually end up here? Their reverie was interrupted by the lawyer’s female coworkers. Lala insisted they needed to blow up the island, despite minimal skill in pyrotechnics. Zelda wanted to contact her father, if only for logistical support. Devi was mad that her lawyer was doing drugs.Outside his tent, Zelda conferred with her crush, Sanada. He admired her, sure, but as a devout follower of Miyamoto Musashi, his loyalty was to his blade and his nation.Inside, the elder Saeki praised his daughter’s propriety. The Dragon was a threat to Japanese interests: he would be happy to follow any battle plans she laid out! Zelda realized another problem: there was no guarantee that there was only one copy of The Dragon on the island!The group networked, teaming up with the trustworthy tournament members. Their investigation was solid, but the plan ran into issues while they were raiding a site of power. And escaping the island on a plane was even tougher… [Mechanically, it was a contest. In Fate, when you tie, the competition changes forms, sometimes massively!]The story cut from Lala putting her hand on the throttle to putting her hand on a Bible. The group was back in New York, on trial for contract tampering.Lala ignored the prosecutor’s argument, and won the crowd over by changing the topic. Didn’t Midas deal with Nazis? Wasn’t a German Zeppelin seen many months ago docked near Doc Midas’s office in the Empire State Building? Could anyone prove that this alleged “corporation” the ZSS had tampered with, which was housed in a now-shuttered Chinese food restaurant, was actually an entity?Tacito delivered closing arguments, and the jury declared the group… not guilty! At the back of the room was a mysterious Chinese woman, who gave them an unnerving look before disappearing into the crowd.</blockquote>

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