For the emperor ! (IC thread - always recruiting )

[Shayuri]

Kestrel shrugs at McClane's suggestion. She was opposed to exchanging information...there just wasn't much she was cleared to share.

"My assignment here is to safeguard Zhent physically and spiritually, and to act as necessary to see that his mission succeeds," she says noncomittally, and without clarifying how someone like her might safeguard someone's spirit. "Those orders stand while I obey the field commands of an Inquisitor."

After a moment of consideration she grudgingly added, "I'm skilled with a variety of weapons, stealth and intrusion techniques."

-----------

Zhent's confession earns him a nod from his bodyguard/assassin. Her eyes don't stray from the door of the Merchant Emporium though. She knew little to nothing of the Warp and those who harnessed it, and even that felt like too much some times. She trusted Zhent knew how to keep himself safe and didn't need any details. She also trusted that if he failed, it would be clear by the signs she'd been taught, and she would strike the deathblow. For the good of Man. For the good of Zhent.

For now, Kestrel's focus was on the shop.

"I don't trust this set up. Once they get their package, they'll kill Rat and whoever he's with. Safest course of action, considering what he carried. They're going to need help."

She took a moment to look the storefront over for cameras or other sensors that might keep watch outside.

 

[DrZombie]

Outside the warehouse:
There are a few hiding places from where the entrance to the warehouse could be observed unnoticed, and there are quite a lot of places from where the entrance are watched openly. Any of the prostitutes or pimps lounging about could be in the pay of Zylthar, and most probably will be. Kestrell notices a two armed bruisers, who act as some sort of guard. They wear their shotguns semi-openly. There appears to be no other security. The back of the warehouse is more deserted. Two more gangers hang around, one of them smoking a Lho-stick and bitching about standing in the cold.

At the requisitioning office.
The clerk is unsure how to react at the babbling colorful figure in front of him. A shade of crimson appears at the neck and slowly begins it’s conquest of the facial regions.

“Euhm, well, ah. Here’s what you ordered, miss.”

He nervously takes two packages stamped with the cogwheel-skull of the techno-priest and carefully puts them on the counter. One of them is marked with the rune marking explosive danger.

“Sign here please.” he remarks, then quickly and quietly ads: “Do you happen to have some time off for a drink tomorrow evening?”

[sblock=ooc] whenever you lot want to do something that you think you might have to roll for just add a dice roll. I'll need some sort of plan at the alley to move this on a bit.[/sblock]

 

[muggie2]

At the requisitioning office.
The clerk is unsure how to react at the babbling colorful figure in front of him. A shade of crimson appears at the neck and slowly begins it’s conquest of the facial regions.

“Euhm, well, ah. Here’s what you ordered, miss.”

He nervously takes two packages stamped with the cogwheel-skull of the techno-priest and carefully puts them on the counter. One of them is marked with the rune marking explosive danger.

“Sign here please.” he remarks, then quickly and quietly ads: “Do you happen to have some time off for a drink tomorrow evening?”

Trix smiles at him. She replies, also quietly: "What's your name?"
She opens the packages, explosive marked one first, and checks the contents as she listens to the clerk.
After he replies, she tells him, still quietly: "I'd love to. Not sure about the timing though - I might be a bit busy in the near future. Might even be a bit dead. But it sounds like fun."
She then opens the second package, and checks its contents, then signs to show her receipt of the goods. Very goods. Very very goods.
She tells him, as she signs: "I'm up for it. Not so much of the drinking though, more the company." She grins at him.

"Now, we've been talking for minute, they'll be wondering why. Not supposed to indulge in small-talk, y'know. So, time to talk for the listeners..."

She leans back a bit as she carefully puts the packages in her backpack.
She says in a normal voice (for the benefit of any listeners) "You've got my name right there on the forms - get in touch through my office in relation to..." she thinks for a second "...a field performance evaluation of the hardware. When I have enough field data, I'll contact you back and we can discuss it. I commend your dedication to your duties!"
Quietly again: "There. That'll make my boss happy, make your boss happy, and we get to be happy too! See you sometime soon, I hope!"
She grins mischievously, and walks toward the exit, thinking briefly about skipping, then dropping the idea until she's had time to accurately assess the sensitivity of the devices she now carries.
She starts talking to herself.
"I'm coming, Kel. This is gonna be fun. An' I got some new toys! Yay! They let me have what I ordered, they didn't downsize it! Hmmm, maybe I won't have to convince the chem-plant supervisor to let me have some spare barrels of stuff after all, if they actually let me requisition what I need, well, want. And I get a chance to meet the clerk guy again. What was his name? Ah, that's right. Gotta remember that. Seems nice. Have a drink with the guy... wonder if he'd enjoy Drago's?..."
She disappears around the corner, on her way to meet Kel.

 

[DrZombie]

Trixie leaves a very happy clerk named Roger behind and makes her way to the main station, carrying five kilograms of heavy explosives and four remote detonators.

Humming hapilly to herself she enters the operational section, a bustle of Arbites, scribes, servants, servitors and the occasional blindfolded and handcuffed subject. Behind a desk even more chaotic and heaped with a backlog of paperwork then hers, a familiar figure with blue-streaked hair sits cursing at the world in general and at a particular bothersome piece of bureaucratic vomit especially created to make her life miserable in particular.
She looks up with an exasperated sigh and brightens up at the view of a mentally unstable scribe carrying enough explosives to demolish a fair part of a big building.
"Hello Trixie. You coming here to help a hand with this investigation?" She eyes the packages suspiciously and grins "or are you here to help solve this Emperor-forsaken burocratic nonsense for once and for all?"

 

[jkason]

[sblock=ooc]

whenever you lot want to do something that you think you might have to roll for just add a dice roll. I'll need some sort of plan at the alley to move this on a bit.

I think the plan was for Kestrel and Zhent to wait a predetermined amount of time for McClane and Rat to deliver and exit. Should we assume that time's passed?[/sblock]

 

[muggie2]

Behind a desk even more chaotic and heaped with a backlog of paperwork then hers, a familiar figure with blue-streaked hair sits cursing at the world in general and at a particular bothersome piece of bureaucratic vomit especially created to make her life miserable in particular.
She looks up with an exasperated sigh and brightens up at the view of a mentally unstable scribe carrying enough explosives to demolish a fair part of a big building.
"Hello Trixie. You coming here to help a hand with this investigation?" She eyes the packages suspiciously and grins "or are you here to help solve this Emperor-forsaken burocratic nonsense for once and for all?"

Trix grins in response. "And who says I don't brighten up people's days with my mere presence, hmmm? Sadly, gotta say it's the first option. From what I saw on the datasheets I was given, you have a problem, and it's something I *may* be able to help with. Probably not something that should be discussed in earshot of civvies though. Unless you have a pressing need to complete all of this..." she waves a hand at the overloaded desk "...paperwork?"

Kelly shakes her head violently.

Trix smiles in response.
"So, can we adjourn to somewhere that might be able to wet my palate a little? Talking is pretty thirsty work, y'know? Still, if you'd prefer to work through this first, I have no objections. I'll just sit here and fiddle. No rush."
She looks into her backpack at the packages, then grins mischievously at Kel.

 

[DrZombie]

“Pfft. This nonsense can wait another decade.” Kincaid gets up from behind her desk and motions towards what you thought was one of the arrested hoodlums. A huge, scarred man with cold eyes follows meekly behind the two of you as you make your way to Kincaids appartment.
He’s got a barcode tattood acrosshis forehead with the words ‘penal legion’ underneath. A sturdy collar around his neck has a nice, shiny green blinking light, and he’s covered in badly-drawn prison tattoos.
“Trix, meet Brutis. Long story.”
A few minutes later the three find themselves in Kincaids cramped studio. Some rummaging in a cupboard discovers a half-empty bottle of Amasec and three glasses that once were clean. Brutis seems at first surprised to be given a glass, then spend the next half hour gently savouring the first alcohol he’s had in ages.

Kelly tells the story about what happened on the train. No mention is made of the inquisition though.
… and that is how I ended up with him. I managed to lose some paperwork, and now he’s detached to me.”
She gets more serious now.
“The other survivors and I, we kinda made a deal” she leans close and whispers.
“Something is not right, Trix. 30 pilgrims on a train from the resting place of the Saint and they turn out to be cultists? No way someone high up from the ecclesiarchy isn’t involved. And you know how close they are to the governor. There’ll be pressure on the Old Man to not investigate this. Cultists discovered on train, Adeptus Arbites deal with ‘em, medal for evryone and that’s it. Not this time, Trix. I need a really big favor.
Can you help me get to the bottom of this? I’ll even lend you Brutis here as a bodyguard.”

 

[muggie2]

Kelly tells the story about what happened on the train.
… and that is how I ended up with him. I managed to lose some paperwork, and now he’s detached to me.”
She gets more serious now.
“The other survivors and I, we kinda made a deal” she leans close and whispers.
“Something is not right, Trix. 30 pilgrims on a train from the resting place of the Saint and they turn out to be cultists? No way someone high up from the ecclesiarchy isn’t involved. And you know how close they are to the governor. There’ll be pressure on the Old Man to not investigate this. Cultists discovered on train, Adeptus Arbites deal with ‘em, medal for evryone and that’s it. Not this time, Trix. I need a really big favor.
Can you help me get to the bottom of this? I’ll even lend you Brutis here as a bodyguard.”

Trix nods, no smiles, all focus now.
"Cultists. That's why they called me in on this one. You're right, there's no way that 30 pilgrims on a train all turn out to be cultists without someone high up being involved. Senior member. Hmmm."
She starts to work through some of the data in her head.
"The only members of the ecclesiarchy high enough to be involved are definitely high enough to cause some serious damage. And you're right, they will almost certainly try to derail the investigation by means of the governor. But they will do it by deception, most likely, since that's how they managed to get their people in place. And they'll try to pin any blame on other people, such as you and I, and the other survivors. And that's probably the other reason they called me in on this, and not someone more senior."
[CLICK]
She grins.
"I'm expendable, you see."
[CLICK]
Her grin fades as she switches back to being hyperfocused. "Okay. I'll see if I can find some kind of pattern in the data, but I can do that on the move, as long as I get some time now and again to recheck the data. There's a pattern here, but someone has tried to hide it. Unless the only common reference is the fact that all came from the resting place of the Saint. Perhaps they collected them there to pull this off, or perhaps recruited them there. Need to get data on arrival dates, sponsors, links via who they associated with or places they visited."
She looks up.
"You said they all seemed psychotic. Could they have been drugged with something that made them susceptible to suggestion? Like some of the drugs you use in questioning that you can use to convince people to tell everything they know if you ask the right questions. Do that often enough, you could fill their heads with all sorts of crap, and then, before they get sent on the mission, they get another batch but maybe mixed with something that induces something like a berserker rage. That way they wouldn't attack each other, but go for 'unbelievers', so to speak."
[CLICK]
She grins.
"I'm so glad they assigned me to this one, Kel. This is going to be so much fun! I might even get a chance to use some toys on this one. Actually, if they pull the same kind of trick again, something like this would be useful."
She opens up the backpack, pulls out a small sealed package of something that looks like modeling clay.
"Ah, standard miniblock. Good."
She breaks it into three pieces, and rolls them into balls, then starts juggling them. Naturally she drops one. It lands on the couch, and bounces to a stop.
"I never could do that right." She looks at their faces. "It's totally insensitive. Won't blow even if you put a slug into it. Or even a dozen. On the other hand, use a detonator or hit it with an HE slug and it's BLAMMO! Anything in about..." She tosses one in her hand. "Hmmm, about 33gms, so that'd make it... ooh, maybe 15 feet, well, they're gonna be really unhappy. Within about 5 feet, you need a mop."
[CLICK]
She looks at Kelly with a strange expression.
"Throw one or two of these hard enough to hit the wall behind the cultists at around head height. With a contact detonator buried in it. Makes a mess. Just make sure you don't hit anything between you and them."
[CLICK]
She grins, and looks at Brutis.
"If you're a good shot, maybe we need to get you some HE slugs as a backup, if the contact dets I get don't work. Just think of the fun you could have!"
[CLICK]
With no expression on her face, she looks back at Kelly.
"Can he be trusted with HE slugs for his gun? Can you get us a supply? And while we're at it, I need to meet the other survivors. Seems a mite suspicious that none of you died when everyone else did. I need to eyeball them for myself, make sure none of them are hidden cultists trying to use this to get themselves into a position of trust."
She hands her drink to Brutis.
"All yours. I never drink when I'm working. Just enough to get the taste, and make it look good. Normally I dispose of the drink while everyone is distracted, but it would be a waste of a good drink to dump it. Better give it to someone who enjoys it, and from the way you're been nursemaiding that one, I'd say you would appreciate this one too.

 

[DrZombie]

Kelly sits back, overwhelmed as usual by the verbal storm called Trix.
“Trix, the other survivors are clean. I’m pretty damned sure about it, trust me.”

She thinks, then continues.

“They are at a hideyhole in the lower parts of the hive. You’ll definitely need Brutis if you’re going down there, but we’ll need to disguise him a bit. And yourself.
Be careful with the group. They’re all tough as nails, and they won’t trust you. I’ll see if I can get a message out to them before you get there.”

 

[Jemal]

McClane taps his foot against the ground as he and Rat stand waiting in the emporium "So what's the deal here, Rat?"

[sblock=ooc]
Neither I nor McClane have a clue what's going on, all the information McClane was given at the start was "bring rat to the spaceport for thirty thrones". Then just now I was told it's actually an emporium nearby, now we're apparently there, but I don't know if there's a password, a secret entrance, a contact, if we're supposed to wait/ask for zyltar, etc. I assume rat knows at least some of that since it was his job, but there's nothing I can think of to 'do' short of walking in and loudly announcing we have a creepy illegal box-full of evil to deliver, so it's Rat's show.
[/sblock]