Clusterfrag

With Yung acting as ladder valet, the remaining members of the team have no issue accessing the ladder even with the violent seas. Mouse wriggles up the wet, cold bars, followed by Axel, Reiya, Achak and then Yung himself. As the runners climb, they're forced to stare straight ahead at the hull to avoid a face full of pelting rain. The freighter is large enough that the seas do little more than rock it back and forth but below, the Imperatore bobs like a cork.

The tempered glass of the porthole is frigid against Mick's hands and nose. They squint, straining to plumb the depths of the ship's interior with their low-light vision. An empty hallway lies beyond: a spartan space designed for utility with pipes running overhead and raised panel flooring. There are no lights and no movement. The only thing that piques the adept's interest is a single discarded boot, lying on its side in the middle of the hallway.

Behind Mick, Mouse hauls herself up over the gunwale. The decker is drenched and panting, unused to such excessive physical effort.

<< Little? That’s not what your mom- >>

The decker exhales a hiss of frustration as she’s forced to immediately cut the Agent’s comms access, between dragging herself upward, rung by rung.

"‘HELPER’ MIGHT OVERLY OPTIMISTIC. ECHO, WIND- THOSE ARE HELPERS. THIS ONE’S JUST A TOOL." Her emphasis on that last beat doesn’t go unnoticed, as her view of the hull ahead is blocked by a text window, delivered to her HUD through her deck’s command line:

[[MESSENGER SERVICE- from AGENT_UNTITLED to M0USE:
Who are you calling a tool? I’ll have you know I graduated top of my class in Fastjack’s-]]

She gives her head a hard shake, sending the window out of her vision along with a spatter of rain. "BUT AT LEAST IT CAN HANDLE OUR PASSIVE RECONNAISSANCE. JUST… NEEDS SOME DEBUGGING."

With a barely audible "Yoisho-", Mouse drags herself over the railing, hitting the deck with a wet thud. Looking at this point more less like her namesake, and more like a drenched rat, she braces herself against the side as she gulps for breath. "...FRAG ME. I SHOULD NEVER HAVE SKIPPED GYM CLASS."

The rest of the runners climb over the gunwale. Every member of the team is now assembled, huddled on the port side of the freighter. A howling wind seethes across the deck, rendering most speech inaudible.

Yung attempts to relax, despite being drenched from the torrential rain. He flexes that nameless psychic muscle-- the one he thinks of internally as his third eye. The world changes. Curiously, the sea itself is a canvas of shifting colors because of the plankton present at the surface. The glistening deck of the freighter, however, is nothing more than a greyscale landscape. The ship looks a castle when viewed through the lens of astral vision: uniform, sterile, and dead.

Craning his neck, Yung continues to scan his surroundings. There is something there, albeit barely visible. He stoops down to get a closer look. Something akin to a transparent slug trail seems to float just above the deck; very small and very faint. Were it not for the stark and lifeless contrast of the ship, he'd have missed it entirely.

Yung scratches his soaking head, tilting it from side to side in analysis. << Got something meta here, looks like a bug trail. Could follow it, seems like the only sign of life. >> Yung traces an ARO path following the astral signature and shares it over the group network for the non magically inclined.

<< Can't say I'm excited to go bug hunting >>

Well that certainly gets her attention. << You don't mean like- actual bugs, do you? >> She peeks nervously between the members of her crew, trying to read their expressions in pale compensation for her own astral blindness. << If so, I might suggest we go the opposite direction. >>

Between gulps of air, she cranes her head around, trying to mentally map out the ship's features in the midst of the storm. << Then again, not like we can stay out here either. >> She pulls her arms in tight around her in a feeble effort to brace against the biting winds, and starts shuffling toward the central tiered structure, not exactly eager to stray from her teammates should the source of the trail choose to surface.

Axel huddles closer to the other team members, heart pounding. << Shit. Shitshitshit. >> He checks Wind and Whirlwind for the 17th time, and finally switches a brand new toggle, "UBGL" from "safe" to "armed." The drones' HE grenades all report ready. She's bristlin'.

<< Sir, >> he comms as he double-checks the Friendly Fire Safe Exclusion Radius, covering his anxiety with humor, << Is this going to be a standup fight, or another bughunt? >>

Wind and Whirlwind totter uneasily in the storm, but they manage to stay aloft. The drones crowd Axel, as if eager themselves to be out of the hurricane's wrath. Achak plucks a combat axe from his belt and nods to the team. "Should we split up to see what we can find or stay together until we know what we're dealing with?"

"TOGETHER." The response is uncharacteristically immediate and direct, sparing the usual routine of chronic overthinking. "IF THERE ARE SPOOKY GHOSTS AROUND, THE LAST THING YOU WANT TO SAY IS 'ALRIGHT GANG, LET'S SPLIT UP AND SEARCH FOR CLUES.'"

Axel nods emphatically. "What she said."

Mick grimaces. "As much as I'd like to say we should split up just out of curiosity to see what order we all get picked off in, I'm gonna agree with consensus here. In the meantime, I think we should start with the control deck. Anyplace we're likely to find immediate answers, I think we're mostly likely to find them there."

"YUNG AND I WOULD BE DEAD MEAT, FOR SURE. THAT'S JUST RULE ONE OF CAMPY HORROR." Specifically, it's the rule that the horny youngsters always get killed first. "THAT MAKES REIYA OUR 'FINAL GIRL' WHO KILLS THE MONSTER WITH A CHAINSAW."

The team of shadowrunners moves forward, huddled together like a herd of prey animals. Wind and Whirlwind take up point and rear respectively. Each porthole the group passes offers a new angle into the darkened innards of the ship, but empty hallways greet them every time. The ship pitches back and forth while sheets of rain lash down. At one point the wind rips a steel cable loose from the foredeck and it whips past, making an otherworldly noise.

Yung finally locates a recess in the ship's structure. He peers in, relieved to find a bulkhead door. He and Mick set up on either side of the locking wheel and then throw their weight into turning it. Metal groans as the water-tight seal is broken. The door swings open, providing access to the quit, dark and (mercifully) dry interior of the ship.

Once inside, the sounds of the hurricane become little more than white noise. The rolling of the ship, however, reminds everyone of where they are. Although the power is out, there seems to be radiant heat and moisture scrubbers as the atmosphere is quite comfortable. The team takes a moment to collect themselves, parked in a three way junction of corridors.

Out of the storm and into the darkness. The biting chill that seeps into her bones and the pervasive electronic hush stir sleeping sense memory. She’s immediately aware of a familiar tension blooming in her chest, an ache in the back of her neck where her datajack lies buried in a webwork of old scars- psychosomatic in its source, but real in experience. In suffocating blackness, she once again finds herself feeling very small, vulnerable, lost, alone.

Not alone. Focus. Get out of the dark.

She slips a trembling hand into one pocket and draws out her flashlight, casting the immediate vicinity in a blood-stain red as she sweeps her beam down each of the immediate hallways. Once again, she forces herself to face her teammates, to take solace in their presence, even as she tries to play it cool- her calm synths broadcasting over the shuddering in her breaths. "SO, ANY SIGN OF OUR SPOOKY FRIEND? "

Mouse nearly jumps out of her skin as an AR alert pops in her periphery. The agent reports that it has found an icon. Now that the team is on the inside of the signal masking matrix, the signal has found its way to her.

Achak pushes the nearest door open with the head of his axe. The door swings inward with a resistant groan. After glancing inside he holds up a single thumb to signal that the room is clear. His expression shifts into one of bewilderment as he steps into the room.

[[ ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ Give MARKS ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ ]]

Ignoring her agent's badgering, Mouse swallows, holding up a shaky hand as her eyes flit to the data on her HUD. "I'M PICKING UP SOME KIND OF WIRELESS TRAFFIC. LET ME MAKE SURE WE'RE NOT WALKING INTO A CAMERA, OR A TURRET." It's only now that Achak's movements, and expression, seem to register. "...UNLESS THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT WE'RE DOING."

(( Matrix perception to ID? And maybe info on the firewall if I have the extra hits for it. ))

Mick grins, the expression equal parts nervous and amused. "But walking into turrets is my thing. You tryin' to sideline me, or what?" The words, clarion clear and anathema to the scene, hang shivering in the air amongst the band of lowlifes cum mercenaries.

The ork shuts their eyes, the cold steel walls of the freighter imposing a sterile dread on all their senses, and whispers to themself, "Let us engage in tender sexual congress with this North American water fowl."

When they open their eyes, the veil of the physical world has been pulled back to reveal the astral plane. Their senses ablaze and refocused, the adept slips through the door behind Achak.

Upon escaping the torrential downpour, Yung instinctively shakes his head, sending droplets of water all over the dry interior. He pulls at the lapel of his longcoat sending rivulets of raindrops down the length of the garment spilling onto the floor. "Dios mio, next time let's make sure to avoid the hurricane, eh? Though maybe it provided us a little bit of cover from prying eyes."

After doing his best to dry off, he runs through a series of sensory checks, thermal to look for any lingering signs of heat signatures, active pipes or electrical currents, astral to asses variations on the signature from above deck, and auditory to pick up any ambient noise. "Bugs..." he clicks his tongue "Might have been a little bit of an alarmist, lets just say there's something on the astral here, and it's probably a friendly water spirit, yeah?" He says with a reassuring smile.

Yung's sensory foraging returns little useful information. Besides the roaring of the storm, crashing of waves and groaning of the hull, the ship is silent. A thermal scan simply reveals the cold metal corridors; the only heat comes from his comrades. The conduit overhead is dark, devoid of any current. One of the pipes contains water but a lack of vibration informs him that no pumps are running. He discovers-- when scouting the area with astral vision-- that the same, faint spatter of energy seems to adorn the floor. His breath materializes as a puff of vapor in the dropping temperature and it fogs up the nearby porthole as he relays his findings to the others.

The world shifts into a monochromatic diorama as Mick switches to astral vision. They slip past Achak and stand at the threshold of the room, which appears to be some manner of mess hall. Several rows of stainless steel tables crowd the center of the room and an open bar leading to a galley can be seen at the far end. Faint shreds of astral energy wither here and there like dying fireflies. An inorganic mass of some kind on the floor catches Mick's attention. Unable to properly discern what it is they're looking at, Mick blinks and returns their vision to normal. A pile of personal belongings greets their gaze. Sunglasses, makeup compacts, wrist computers, shoes, coats, cigarette lighters, hats, and even some kind of dental prosthesis are all arranged in a haphazard heap. At a glance, Mick's trained opportunist eye categorizes most of the personal effects as worthless. Those that might have had any value are stained and disheveled. It is quite literally a pile of junk. But, it had been someone's junk-- or many someones.

Meanwhile, Mouse sets her steely hacker's sights on the lone icon. After running the results of a scan through a few of her personal databases, her AR display informs her that the icon belongs to a commlink. The device doesn't appear to be connected to a larger network. She recognizes the make and model as a standard, off-the-shelf consumer model. The firewall looks pitiful, as if Mouse could sneeze on it and it would yield to her.

Axel loops a finger over the bridge of his goggles, and pulls them down over his eyes. The world lights up in yellows and oranges over a dull blue background as the thermographic vision tells him that yes, his teammates are warm and the ship is cold. He still finds comfort in being able to peer through the darkness.

He suppresses a shiver. "Welp, we came, we saw, we left, right guys? Damn shame. A ship full of sailors that just left the boat with absolutely nothing else amiss." He says hopefully.

A soft chuckle manages to escape, tinged with fraying nerves and lingering paranoia. "WORKS FOR ME. MIGHT AS WELL SCUTTLE THE SHIP WHILE WE’RE AT IT. 50% CHANCE THAT’S WHAT PREACHER WOULD WANT ANYWAY, SO REALLY, WE’RE JUST SAVING HIM TIME." She peers over at the rigger with clear empathy, her own movements stiff with unease. In a way, they might as well be back at Bongoland: trapped in a metal box, relying on their team to dispatch whatever monsters may be lurking in the darkness.

Still, her attention fixes on the lonely commlink icon floating in the darkened space, friendless and vulnerable. Her fingers twitch as she virtually drills down into the device, executing a very basic exploit against the familiar model. "I’VE GOT A COMMLINK IN RANGE. MAYBE IF WE’RE LUCKY, THERE’LL STILL BE A PERSON ATTACHED TO IT." Emphasis on, ‘maybe’.

Mouse watches as a pixelized dwarf goes to town on the icon with a battle-axe in her AR display. It's a little creation of hers: a code exploit she named Fury of the Small. It works by masquerading as a diagnostic service to get into the firewall and then simply brute forces the rest by filling up buffers-- just like a Dwarven berserker would. The consumer commlink yields in less than a minute, granting her full ownership over the device.

As the squat disappears into a burst of pixels, a low whistle of appreciation reverberates through the decker’s consciousness. [[Dem dorfs, man.]] Mouse, however, isn't done here. Icon in hand, she flicks out a finger, as though casting out an invisible tether, only to reel it back. "JAA, LET’S FIND OUT WHO OWNS YOU… AND MORE IMPORTANTLY, WHAT HAPPENED TO THEM."

(( Trace icon, then snoop on its messages/most recent actions to get a general sense of who owns this thing/where are they now. ))

Mouse flings the newly marked icon to her trace program. Coordinates slowly wink into existence as the software greps out GPS data. The process takes longer than it should, likely a result of the signal scrubbing quality of the ship's hull. Mouse imagines the data as tiny points of light flitting through the air around her, past her and wriggling past the porthole glass. She finds herself supremely grateful that she brought the satellite uplink.

Her musings are interrupted as the coordinates finish deciphering. Her AR overlay drops a marker, putting the device itself at roughly twenty meters away. Judging from her position, Mouse figures it must be somewhere on the same level as the team and deeper in the interior.

That task complete, Mouse focuses her attention on the contents of the device. The data comes in large chunks-- random samples of recordings, stills, and other personal data. She sets her agent to task organizing the digital dross while she herself selects things at random to inspect. What Mouse finds are snapshot glances into the lives of normal (whatever that means) people: a still of two dark-skinned children, their wide, unspoiled eyes turned towards the lens, an audio recording of a man singing in Farsi, stills of an unfamiliar marketplace, poems written in Arabic, a young bearded man in a dishdasha. Not quite what she expected.

The agent, advanced as it is, informs Mouse of the need to translate the messages. A progress bar materializes in the corner of her vision. Seems she will need to occupy herself for a couple minutes.

Reiya HATES boats. Absolutely hates them. She'd felt queasy going to and from Alcatraz, of course, but those were short trips, and neither of them involved a literal shitstorm. After heaving herself dry, the shaman's been following along and trying to quell her raging stomach, with no energy to even glare at the others, let alone do anything useful.

Achak's chanting in Blackfoot finally penetrates her consciousness and revives her to her surroundings, and after thrusting her nausea to the back of her mind through sheer force of will, she's able to board this new boat and look around with some interest. She doesn't feel able to contribute anything at first, but she does sense the presence of magic. Mick and Yung use their astral vision and seem to see remnants around the floor and corners. Reiya takes some deep breaths, gathers her will, and takes a look.

"LOOKS LIKE SOMEONE'S PERSONAL COMM. EVERYTHING'S IN CURSIVE- OR SOME FLAVOR OF ARABIC SCRIPT, SO I WON'T KNOW MORE UNTIL IT TRANSLATES." She furrows her brow, undoubtedly being called out for her ignorance internally, and simply marks the overall direction of the find for the team.

With her hands idle once more, she can't help but pick up on the uneasy stillness reverberating through the darkened interior. Taking Achak's thumbs up and the lack of gunfire as an indicator of relative safety, she creeps forward behind the taller amerind to get a peek at what the magical scouting party is gawking at. She peers in only long enough to glimpse the curious hoard before drawing back, twisting to face the rest of the stragglers, her tone low. "SO… WHAT THIS MEANS IS THAT THE REST OF THE CREW MUST BE RUNNING AROUND NAKED, RIGHT?"

Achak kneels, his palm hovering over the pile of belongings. For a moment it looks as though he might pluck up an object, but his hand closes slowly and he withdraws it. The expression on his face is inscrutable: something between grim determination and pity. "I'm not so sure these items belong to sailors." He points at a lipstick tube. "Cosmetics?" His expression flinches as his finger shifts to a different object. "Artesinal undergarments?"

His eyes rove over the legacies of strangers with fates unknown, finally stopping on what is obviously a child's hat. He glances up at Mouse. "Children..."

A lifetime spent socializing in the bowels of the matrix has clearly left an imprint on the young decker. For one thing, she hardly seems phased by the idea of sailors packing lingerie under their uniforms. "LOOK, I'M NOT GOING TO SHAME THEM FOR-"

Achak’s latest finding stops that thought in its tracks. She swallows hard and peeks back toward the pile, squinting at the stained and damaged condition of the accessories, before opting to simply snag a still image of the scene and pull back. "...ARE THOSE BLOOD STAINS?" Her eyes flit toward the others, lingering on Reiya, Mick, anyone who might be familiar with the kind of damage that would be left in a struggle.

She frowns, already trying to draw mental lines out of disparate points of data. "MAYBE SOMETHING ATE THEM- LEFT A PILE OF WRAPPERS." She twists her head, almost mirroring her mental acrobatics. "OR TURNED THEM INTO MEAT-PUPPETS. I MEAN, ISN'T THAT WHAT BUGS DO?" Again, she finds herself totally out of her depth, waiting for Reiya or Achak- or hell, even Yung, to provide magical insights beyond what she knows only through rambling 'body-snatcher' conspiracies.

"EITHER WAY- WE SHOULD PROBABLY KEEP MOVING… AND DEFINITELY NOT SPLIT UP ANY TIME SOON."

Mouse's ARO marker hovers in Mick's vision, a blipping beacon calling the ork deeper into the ship's bowels. It's a siren call luring the pack of inept sailors inexorably toward a craggy outcropping of where they'll likely be dashed upon the roiling, churning waves.

"Agreed. What say we go test the hospitality of our host?" The ork moves to the mouth of the mess hall, peering back out and down both directions of the hallway, their senses on edge. "Anybody got thoughts on where we might find a map of this tomb we're here to grave-rob? Engineering? Control deck? Fuck, where's our goddamned sea-troll when we need him?" The ork considers a moment, frustratedly split between the dual objectives of the ARO marker and making the control deck. The moment distends, pregnant and heavy, before the faintest grin curls one side of the adept's lips.

"Maybe we should split up."

Achak shrugs in response to Mouse, his gaze still fixed on the assorted personal items. "It's all very soiled so it is difficult to
tell."

Reiya catches what she recognizes as Blackfoot as Achak stands, muttering a quiet prayer. For whatever reason, it's clear the Amerind believes the owners of the discarded objects have shuffled off the mortal coil.

"You can venture on if you like," says Achak. He turns his attention to the galley at the back of the room. "I'm going to check that kitchen area. I will catch up as soon as I have scouted it." He grips his combat axe and lopes forward, cat-like, toward the bar.

Mick narrows their eyes at the Amerind, realizing for about the thousandth time that he could just as easily be a plant as an ally.

Turning their attention to the rest of the team, the adept argues, "He can catch up with some water magic or see drek." Mick scans the team. "Let's head for the marker."

Mick’s comment earns a snort- at least until Achak seems to take the suggestion literally. "FOR FRAG'S SAKE, ARE YOU TRYING TO SET OFF DEATH FLAGS?" She lets out an audible huff, her otaku superstitions translating into genuine frustration and a twinge of disappointment with the Amerind's continued temptation of fate. "FINE, BUT DON'T GO WHINING TO US WHEN YOU COME BACK WITH BUTT-BUGS. "

Axel finds himself slightly bent over, as if trying to stay out of sight of an unknown predator. He chuckles, and almost whispers a limerick.

""Here lies Mick,
away from the party they did go,
they returned very sick,
to a chorus of 'I told you so.'"

The humor seems to kickstart his reedy thread of bravery, and Axel steps forward. He takes Echo from his pocket, holds her in his palm, and lightly blows on the tiny dragonfly. It takes flight, and takes off down the right corridor.

"So," he says, "shall we go left?"

Mick smiles at the rigger's poem, appreciative of the moment of silly levity, and nods at his suggestion. With the gesture, the ork presses forward into the claustrophobic darkness, deeper into the bowels of the freighter.

Mouse finds herself withdrawing inward, folding her arms tightly against her chest, even as she follows the rest of her team. "’GO ON WITHOUT ME,’ HE SAYS. ‘I’LL BE FINE.’" As she grumbles, the timbre of her synths actually warps and deepens, morphing into a halfway plausible mimicry of Achak’s weathered and contemplative tones. "‘THERE'S NO WAY THERE'S A CRAZED BUTT-TOUCHER LOOSE ON THIS SHIP. AND WHEN WE MAKE IT BACK HOME, I’M GOING TO FINALLY TELL PREACHER HOW I REALLY FEEL ABOUT HIM."