Clusterfrag

Max nods in understanding,

"Will we encounter any resistance left behind in your wake? Men with guns, or less mobile drones?"

Alexei shrugs.

"It's unlikely, but possible. Not many men though, very small amounts."

Adams furrows his brow.

"Besides, what does it matter how many people we have? You're not smuggling us over, and we're providing our own transportation. What do you care how many people are in the car?"

"Whoa, buddy. Whoa. Whoa. I have a business to run. You think it's cheap maintaining my super souped-up ride? Let's call it ¥8,000. I give you special discount."

Max shakes his head at the video screen,

"Still too high, and my colleague makes a good point-- what difference does it make to you how many men are in our vehicle? 5,000 is the max I'm willing to offer you. It's that, or we blow through the border on our own. Your call from here."

"Nyet. I am afraid I cannot help you for anything less than ¥8,000."

(( Wow. These fraggers with no equivalent social skills are getting some lucky motherfragging rolls this run. ))

Max pauses the conversation, and asks over the comm to the team,

<What do you think, boys? 8,000 per head? I'm inclined to just blast through the border on our own like Doc suggested, but it might raise fewer flags if we go this route.>

Val frowns at the costs of running this mission. A necessity is a necessity, but getting paid any less than Clark agreed to makes the contract less savory with every nuyen accumulated.

< I'm for bringing Alexei in, personally. We spark a border dispute, there'll be munitions flying all over the goddamn place. Might get bad enough to frag with our exfiltration. Maybe you could get on the horn with Clark. Let him know that we're going to have expenses it'd be in his best interest to cover. They seem to be stacking up higher than any of us expected. Gotta be flexible in this business, grunts and financial backers all. Clark should get on board with that, if he has the smallest inkling of understanding just what exactly he's asked us to accomplish. >

Tyros sits in the back of the room, puffing slowly on a very large cigar. Evidently a new hobby he picked up after getting all the second hand smoke from the rest of the team. He calls them troll cigarettes.

When he brings the cigar to his mouth, pinched properly between his thumb and forefinger, it's not hard to Joyce bright red lines across the palm of his hand, as if the skin is puffed and pink during the healing process. The Mage has been almost completely absent during the last week, contributing almost nothing to the research and planning of the next mission. With he exception of the occasional foray for some food, he has otherwise been cloistered in his room. He did say he was going to sleep for a week after the fun in the Mojave. Maybe trolls just need more time to recuperate their large bodies after exertion.

"Let's just pay his fee and take it out of our employer once we are done. Best to keep this as clean as possible from the get go. God knows we will get it messy enough at some point. And we will still have the information we are obtaining to negotiate with at the end..."

Adams lets out a breath, and nods invisibly,

< Allright, let's get Joyride onboard. It's only 10,000¥ more than my plan, and has the added benefit of not sparking off an international incident from a false-flag attack. >

Max reflects for a moment that Sinjin must be in the dojo-- he always turns his comm off when he's in the dojo. Turning back to Alexei, Max says,

"Alright, Alexei-- 32,000 for four head."

(( Hey-- have we considered having Tyros just fly all of us way into the sky over the border where it's patrolled and basically just hop us over that way? ))

Kato stands and dusts off his hands, stepping back to admire his handiwork. The Rover is sporting a new set of smart tires; complicated machinations of nanotubes and composite materials that change various tread characteristics based on the type of terrain they encounter. In addition to the traction they'll provide while his employers are in the great white north, they also look fragging sweet. Indeed, the Rover looks ready to rumble, with the addition of a satellite up-link as well. While Kato doesn't necessarily understand what benefit the large antenna protruding from just behind the cockpit will provide, he notes that it makes the Rover look like a giant cricket, which is pretty cool.

Tyros puffs on his cigar after the call ends. One eyebrow raises.


"I could make everyone invisible and fly us all over the border. It would be a lot slower than a speedy car, but it could work and might save us some nuyen. The risk is that they have a mage patrolling the border, which would seem probable. In which case we would not be able to escape very quickly. A bit risky but could be done if the nuyen is tight."

A tiny stream of bubbles escape from beneath his nose as Sinjin's head tilts back, placidly rising a few inches to break apart against the blocks of ice that float at the surface of a deep steel tub. He watches their earnest struggle as they divide and change shape to finally gurgle out from the cracks between. Standing, the orks head and massive shoulders follow closely behind. He lets out a labored breath and checks a clock that hangs from the gym wall opposite him. Almost four minutes, that time. Climbing from the frigid ice bath, the Adept doesn't bother to towel off before throwing himself at a complex combination of climbing walls, ropes course, balance beams and salmon ladders that have been laid out in sequence throughout the gymnasium to test the strength and dexterity of his cold numbed and protesting body. Sinjin may not know much about the Yukon, but he knows one thing for sure. Its going to be cold. A bone chilling, lung crushing, skin blistering cold.

Lacking the social contacts and informational skills of several FRSR members, Sinjin has spent little time with them over the last week as they pooled their resources to outline and prepare the initial phase of their new contract. He'd always found that preparation was a key ingredient in the success of a mission, and as a PhysAdept, that meant training the body physically for the environment you'd been asked to work in. Fingers slipping as his muscles strain to reach the top of the last obstacle, he only hopes that he's had enough time.

Adams nods, and turns it into a shake of his head,

"Let's go with the plan as it stands. I like the idea of having a vehicle with us if things go bad, and I'm pretty sure the Council nations will have their borders packed with magic users. I don't want to get made, especially that early in our mission. Besides, we'd be carrying enough hardware on us that we'd probably be picked up by radar if we were airborne."

Kato heaves a pair of canvas duffel bags into the back of the Rover, a cigarette balanced acrobatically on his lower lip. He scowls at no one in particular, a bit nonplussed that no one commented on his hard work. The eccentric bartender slides the protective cover over the drone rack and steps away from the vehicle. A faint trace of envy is evident on the man's Eastern features--that is, until he turns towards the team who look every bit like well armed spacemen. He stubs out the cigarette with his heel and saunters back to the bar, throwing up a peace sign as he departs.

"Try not to get killed."

A faint smile crosses Adams' face as the Japanese man retreats to the safety of the concrete barracks. He turns and scans the seattle skyline, drawing his civilian coat over himself to guard against the cold wind.

This is going to seem like a paradise by the time we get to where we're going.

He pushes the toe of his boot experimentally into the surface of one of the new smart tires, and it deforms briefly at the intrusion. With a satisfied grunt, he checks the satellite link to the rover, and then verifies that the steel lynx is slaved through the connection.

Equipment checks concluded, he looks over and shrugs at the others.

"Ready when you are."

The Mercedes-Benz V12 lurking under the Rover's aggressive bonnet explodes to life, trumpeting a horsepower chorus out of the tuned exhaust system. The interior lamps dim, settling the Rover's minimalist cabin into an eerie azure glow as the myriad holographic instrument readouts project against Doc's solemn face. An unspoken understanding as to the dangerous nature of the mission passes simultaneously between all five comrades; seemingly made manifest in the growling reverberations of the Rover as it crosses the Firestarter courtyard. The insect-eye-shaped xenon-tungsten headlamps cut through the night like an arc welder beam, bringing the concrete jungle into sharp relief.

Seattle rolls by in the distance, an endless sea of lights blended together in the eternal haze that haunts it--a digital Vangogh. Doc grabs the manual shifter mechanism and slams it down into third gear. Though completely unnecessary with the vehicle's technology, he finds it comforting. The unmistakable feeling of gravity protesting takes hold of the runners as the Rover passes 180 kilometers per hour.

[ Yukon, Salish-Shidhe Territory ]

Doc yanks the wheel and the Rover leaves the weather-torn highway. A blizzard rages outside, reducing visibility to double digit numbers. The rugged vehicle bobs as it navigates the rocky terrain, heading towards the GPS coordinates given to the team by Alexei Joyride. After approximately a klick of navigating a rocky wash into a dry creek-bed, the team's contact appears in the swirling alabaster mist.

Alexei's ride is a onyx black Land Rover Impulse, perched on knobby snow tires so enormous that the wheel wells have been completely removed. A bank of flood lights fills the grill, each bulb wrapped in protective steel mesh. An enormous intake valve protrudes from the hood, like a waterborne predator breaching the surface of a brackish lake. All of the car's windows have been fully polarized and are protected under a network of thin rods. It idles with a alternating, guttural growl, like the hibernation sounds of a mutant grizzly.

Max looks out the window of the rover with a cigarette in his lips. His eyes narrow as he studies the vehicle. This early into the mission and the elf already needs a shower-- not a good sign. Max looks around the cab of the rover at his cohorts, and says over the air,

<Ready when you are, Russian.>

< Right. Here we go, try to keep up! >

A shower of lightly packed snow erupts from the Impulse's rear tires as Alexei rockets ahead from a dead stop. The souped-up border-runner drifts easily on four wheels around an embankment and heads up towards the highway. Largely obscured by the inclement weather, Doc can only see flashes of jet black and the yellowish glow of Alexei's floods.

< If you want to get across the border, you'll need to do exactly as I say, when I say it, understand? >

Adams grips the wheel and follows the bouncing lights in front of him.

The smart tires have been reprogrammed so that every other panel is retracted, so that the wheels more closely resemble a ferry boat paddle than anything belonging on a car. They dig deep down into the snow, kicking clumps of it up like little shovels.

< Got it. You call the shots. >

The Impulse thunders down the highway towards the border, an angry ink-stain in a sea of shifting white textures.

< We are approaching the border. I will tell you when to stop. You wait two minutes and then you cross, no matter what happens. We will rendezvous at these coordinates. Once you have arrived there safely, my job is done. >

The road shears off to the right suddenly, running parallel to a cluster of rocky protrusions. Alexei's brake lights are a flickering, blinding crimson against the contrast of the blizzard. He whips the Impulse around a hairpin corner, rear sliding out to to position the car along an ideal line. The oversized tires squeal, mixing smoke with the flurry of frozen particles and eventually catch traction.

< Stop here. See you on the other side. >

Val can't help but grin at the idiocy of the spunky Russian's notion of sneaking across a border, though his mirth fades slightly knowing that they'll be doing something quite similar in two minutes flat. Sweat begins to moisten his palms as Val flicks his gaze between the taillights of Alexei's Land Rover and the chronometer, digits clicking by with agonizing sluggishness, in the periphery of his AR feed.

Max sits and hardly breathes. His cigarette hangs in his lips, extinguished from neglect. The seconds count forward at an agonizing pace-- the terminus of which holds the perfect unknown.

The floating, ghostly numbers on the Rover's holographic cluster flash zeroes to indicate that the two minutes have expired.

Adams hits the signature masking device, and flashes a nervous grin in the rear view mirror.

"Well, this should be interesting," he says, slamming the accelerator to the floor.

The Rover hops a few times on its knobby wheels before they bite, one at a time, and launch the vehicle forward. The added weight of the steel lynx presses the wheels into the ground.

The alien landscape comes rushing up in the headlights.

The Rover careens around the rocky outcropping, pushing g-forces on its inhabitants. Doc counter-steers, guiding the nose of the car as it slides along the icy tarmac. The terrain becomes rocky and Doc shifts down to free up some much desired torque. Following Alexei's tire tracks through the snow the Rover plows through a bank and fords a stream, exploding a cascade of ice chunks and frigid water in all directions.

Doc swerves violently to avoid a heaping sprawl of razor wire and then again as a concrete barrier rises out of the haze.

Suddenly, the muffled popping of small arms fire rises above the sound of the Rover's chattering motor. The right side of the Rover protests loudly as a number of projectiles meet the armor plating.