Thanatos 51-50
2013-12-16, 03:19 PM
Chapter One:
The Vagrant Master
Your contact told you the job was her, but it doesn't look like any place you've accepted a job before. Sure, you've been to a lot of bars, and a lot of dives, but The Vagrant Master is a special kind of ramshackle, walls pitted deeply and warped as if from decades of neglect under Seattle's acid rain, despite the fact that the lease is lease, and the building itself, is less than a year old.
In meatspace, that's all there is to the front, warped, pitted, and damaged hadwood. In augmented reality, the only changes are the words Vagrant Master in a half-hearted facsimile of red-orange neon, and your own tag, verifying that, yes. This was the place your fixer directed you to, and you didn't get lost in the barren snarl around you.
Also: it's midday. That, in and of itself, is odd. Usually, Johnsons took the whole "Shadow" part literally and preferred to meet in the dead of night.
There's a long, sleek, limousine, so black as to drink in the sunlight around it, nestled in the back of the tiny parking lot adjacent to the building, in stark contrast to the building -- and the barrens, themselves. A pair of bulky Harley-Davidsons flank it, saddlebags bulging with what are probably lazily-concealed weapons.
The only other vehicle is a rusted, Ford Americar. I may have once been a bright green, but the rust and graffiti have long since obliterated that particular paint-job.
The front door sits slightly askew, and opens easily to your touch.
There is nobody in the small foyer to greet you, simply a small, hand-carved sign advising visitors to check their weapons in "the cabinet".
The cabinet in question is a rotted wardrobe, with the lock clumsily and half-heartedly torn out and thrown away a long time ago.
Through the empty door frame, the low, red-orange glow of the bar's lights creep into the room, illuminating a long stretch of polished mahogany bar-top with a human leaning against it, apparently deep in conversation with somebody over the AR in his glasses, his right arm popping and siezig as it numbly wipes down the same six or so centimeters of bar-top.
He does not have a left one.
Is this the place?
It has to be.
You check your messages again. The addresses match.
Inside the bar proper
Aside from the barman, there are two other metahumans immediately visible in the bar, one is a burly troll in a shabby waistcoat with a raggedy bowler cap impaled on one of his horns, chew on the stub of an unlit cigar and impatiently checking a pocket watch encased in bright gold.
The second is and elven man, sitting on a spare stool underneath a sign advertising "Private Matrix Booths" for the low price of 10 nuyen per hour. He glances up at you as you enter, but, unless directly interacted with, immediately resumes filing his fingernails, which appear to already be shaped into fine, sharp points and painted black, embossed with red and orange flame in Augmented Reality.
He is the only one without a default persona in the Matrix, presenting himself there as a meditating chinese guru sitting cross-legged and levitating above the "floor" with a long, true-red beard trailing to the floor.
The Vagrant Master
Your contact told you the job was her, but it doesn't look like any place you've accepted a job before. Sure, you've been to a lot of bars, and a lot of dives, but The Vagrant Master is a special kind of ramshackle, walls pitted deeply and warped as if from decades of neglect under Seattle's acid rain, despite the fact that the lease is lease, and the building itself, is less than a year old.
In meatspace, that's all there is to the front, warped, pitted, and damaged hadwood. In augmented reality, the only changes are the words Vagrant Master in a half-hearted facsimile of red-orange neon, and your own tag, verifying that, yes. This was the place your fixer directed you to, and you didn't get lost in the barren snarl around you.
Also: it's midday. That, in and of itself, is odd. Usually, Johnsons took the whole "Shadow" part literally and preferred to meet in the dead of night.
There's a long, sleek, limousine, so black as to drink in the sunlight around it, nestled in the back of the tiny parking lot adjacent to the building, in stark contrast to the building -- and the barrens, themselves. A pair of bulky Harley-Davidsons flank it, saddlebags bulging with what are probably lazily-concealed weapons.
The only other vehicle is a rusted, Ford Americar. I may have once been a bright green, but the rust and graffiti have long since obliterated that particular paint-job.
The front door sits slightly askew, and opens easily to your touch.
There is nobody in the small foyer to greet you, simply a small, hand-carved sign advising visitors to check their weapons in "the cabinet".
The cabinet in question is a rotted wardrobe, with the lock clumsily and half-heartedly torn out and thrown away a long time ago.
Through the empty door frame, the low, red-orange glow of the bar's lights creep into the room, illuminating a long stretch of polished mahogany bar-top with a human leaning against it, apparently deep in conversation with somebody over the AR in his glasses, his right arm popping and siezig as it numbly wipes down the same six or so centimeters of bar-top.
He does not have a left one.
Is this the place?
It has to be.
You check your messages again. The addresses match.
Inside the bar proper
Aside from the barman, there are two other metahumans immediately visible in the bar, one is a burly troll in a shabby waistcoat with a raggedy bowler cap impaled on one of his horns, chew on the stub of an unlit cigar and impatiently checking a pocket watch encased in bright gold.
The second is and elven man, sitting on a spare stool underneath a sign advertising "Private Matrix Booths" for the low price of 10 nuyen per hour. He glances up at you as you enter, but, unless directly interacted with, immediately resumes filing his fingernails, which appear to already be shaped into fine, sharp points and painted black, embossed with red and orange flame in Augmented Reality.
He is the only one without a default persona in the Matrix, presenting himself there as a meditating chinese guru sitting cross-legged and levitating above the "floor" with a long, true-red beard trailing to the floor.