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The Station
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Wolf started sniffing around and had then disappeared around the corner. He was soon back.
“there are so many here” he sat down and looked at her
“no, don’t you even”
“why not”
“no”
“we’ll talk about it later”
“oh you infuriate me some times” she stamped her foot -
Ben says to “Raf, we’ll be in touch. We need to go.” He gasps “So this is how I became a terrible father despite never maintaining a successful relationship.” He walks to the track and signals Alex to follow him. They are heading to a small isolated house that appears like a winery on the outside and is located at the heart of a large vineyard. “Care to meet our small team?” He asks
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“sure” she turned round to check on Wolf. He trotted along sniffing the vines.
“what are we doing here?”
“he has a blood mage on the loose”
“ah that’s why you’re no fun, do we have a scent?”
“no but we know which Valley he is hunting in”
“good start.” -
The old winery turns out to be a front for a control room. In the basement, located in a large wine barrel there is a cramped control room, filled with screens, maps and moving red dots. A tween, of about twelve, stands up runs toward Ben, crying, Ben!
she warmly hugs him, and asks “Did you bring candy?”Ben replies “it is bad for you”. I did here, he passes her a small matchbox from his pocket. “Shira, meet Big bird, she replaces Dana.”
Shira’s jaw drops and she seems unable to conjure a word she ignores BB and asks Ben “where did you conjure another gorgeous elf… Is she?” Ben replies “She is not infected, we need a new plan. We’ll discuss later.”He explains “Shira is our decker, our original decker bolted -but I try to get her back. Shira was her student, and she is extraordinary.”
He tells Shira, call everyone so that they meet BB, and the young girl disappears to one of the side rooms returning with two other teenage boys.They too seem astonished by BB, the older of them -that already begins to show early signs of adulthood introduces himself as “Negev” – and then adds “I am a mage, or at least I tried to be until Dana lost her memory and escaped us. With her gone, there is no one to tutor me, but I know a few tricks. I can deliver messages, and summon spirits” The younger introduces himself as “Efes”, and says “I handle explosives and surveillance. Ben tutors me.” he says proudly.
“I command some pretty advanced fleet of spy drones, as well as a few armed drones and smart platforms to protect us here.
Long story, Gindi’s people just busted our place and took Spinster and Rock. We were caught completely by surprise.” -
“OK so your security is shot and you’re shoe stringing your team” she found a chair and sat down on in the wrong way round resting her head on the back.
“let me talk this through ‘cos I’m fick, one this guy is rogue, two in a city where he is not allowed to be 3 running the crims” she ticked the points off on her fingers. “so we need to make things hit for him and his cohorts, difficult for the authorities to ignore and cause tension between the crims” she raised her hand “hear me out, this is all background noise to cover our hunting his supply of the drug”
She leaned back stretching. “I wonder if we acan convince the spirits to shun him? It happens but its not my field” -
Ben replies “We were not focused on hiding from Gindi, we did not share our location – but he has some of our suppliers in his pockets. He is unlikely to strike again, not before we complete the job. We do have a spiritual representative here, Negev please call him.”
Negev closes his eyes, and then a child’s spirit holding a football appears in the safehouse. It is a child but his eyes are old,
“You have great pain in your personality, so do I… You cannot end the suffering, the pain is inside you, part of what you are. It shapes you into a weapon, the vampires must be stopped – you do not realize it but they enslave you. They hunt my kind, but we guard this land from the others – and if we cannot awake before the other children will suffer, many children. The future is undecided, there is too much chaos, too little order. The wolf takes care of the pack.”Ben shrugs, “He refers to himself as Kid, none of us actually understand it. Your predecessor was a mage of some repute and she had a way to talk to him before she went bananas. Perhaps he made her crazy, none of us know.
What she said was that the kid is perhaps the most powerful ‘Evil spirit’. They are still unaware, trapped in endless nightmares of violent deaths – and most are insane with grief. Kid says that his kind has a function, to protect against the others – and they must awakened. He wants the spirit army disbanded, and the vampires defeated. We have no idea how he found us, or what he wants – but that kind of help is difficult to turn away. Considering that we lost all the professional shadowrunners in the team after Gindi turned on us.”
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Big bird lean back in her chair with why me exasperation.
“urgh, I’m gonna need to pace this out and figure out what we do? Think we need to stick to the plan. Let’s turn up the heat on our friends. I’ll make some calls and such. The we need to start looking at the drug supply. May be we talk to your friend. Aaaaand I need to hitthe books are research our friends out their see if there is a professor pedalling a differing hypothesis to the government line. “ -
The transparent child responds “I like plans, I also like the sea, it has these metal boxes that adults play with like Lego. One of them is special. One three three three A ZIM. Goodbye wolf girl, goodbye half-man, and Negev and Shira. Don’t call me again, I will come as I please.”
He disappears shortly after.
Ben shakes his head – “Kid is difficult” Negev adds “Completely different than other spirits, none of my senses indicates that he was even here. He has no aura… I only believe that he is real because the rest of you can see him. Dana called him an Avatar spirit.”
Shira gave him a look. Shira chimed in “I am glad that your plan is more elaborate than fuck your way into the Station. Let me know if there is anything I can do from the matrix, we have some serious connection here and impressive data processing capabilities. “ -
“OK let’s start with background on the spirits in Jerusalem and avatar spirits” she shrugged “I studied them at university but my special studies were based around blood magic” she paused “how many agent’s could you set up that could not be traced but will influence search patterns? May be if we start asking the questions it will start popping up and become an issue?”
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Negev asks “You want it to become an issue?” Shira suggests “Perhaps kid is talking about a shipping container? Metal boxes, and Zim is a shipping company followed by a serial number?… I’ll look into it.”
Ben says “I’ll ask around for the drug, see who delivers it. Perhaps my informants know.”
He shrugs “There is also a room here for you if you wish, or I can take you home – but hour is very late and if we do not go now then I am going to get some shut eye.”
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“Zim Could be a boat too, a ship. And check serial number that have two one em at the end. In fact try iee ei zim. I think I should go back right the now. Call me. To to book me for a swim suit photo shoot if you get hit.”
Shira laughed “how will you know our call from all the others?”
Big bird smiled sadly “I wear high collars in hot weather for good reason” she shrugged her plate carrier off and turned her back to the girl. She pull up her armoured shirt “don’t think I’m going to get many bookings with this merry lot dancing rounde back. Do you?”
She picked up the carrier “should I change in the car? Or do I have time to change here?” -
Ben says “Go ahead and change here, there is a room for you here. Third door from the right, new sheets and everything…”
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“I need to get back to my hotel. Don’t want room service messing with my stuff” she shrugged “also I need to be in town that’s where the action is”
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“I meant that you can change here if you like…”
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Alex mouthed sorry with wide eye and darted into the room. Changed and packed she re-entered the room
“right then, good to meet you all as see you soon, shall we?” she motioned to Ben. Once outside she paused a name nagged at the back of her mind, but never mind it would come to her. -
The ride to the hotel is eventless, the streets near the hotel are alive, teaming with activity even this late at night. Drunk, and happy young adults laugh and go around their business, loud and blissfully unaware of their surrounding. Guitar music and a beautiful voice that one cannot believe comes out of such a small girl welcomes the entrance to the hotel, along with some grumpy security that is undecided what to do, and several teenagers that listen to the music as if enchanted.
Spoiler: -
Alex hauled her bag into hotel, ignoring the world around her. She flung herself onto the bed. She bargained with GOD to make this kafkaesque twilight land not be. Children! offering up children. Maybe that free-spirite was the embodyment of their dead innocence. She scratched through the Web looking for a back handed slap to the system. She smiled wainly at her success. It was throwing a stone at a battle ship but hell two plastic bags of shopping and a bicycle had set the world on fire.
Washed and changed; she secreted her knife and dressed stuffed a burner phone in her pocket
She wandered for a while and ended up on the beach front. Time to begin
She put out several calls to friends from university about freespirits.
Then she took a deep breath and called Bison on the burner.
“we’ll good afternoon to you young lady. How are you? You got me some horrible tail of you being in Over your head, on your own, again?”
“err not quite but I got an odd one for you. I’m in Tel aviv.”
“hell teeth! What did you do wrong”
“come on, I was bound ta wash up here eventually, blood magic practicing vampire. Well here I am and I need a contact at the dracofoundation. Kerry got moved and I can’t get hold of her.”
“you know you they are state sanctioned, you can touch them”
“What if I told you one had gone off the reservation”
“my English does not stretch that far wahat do you me”
“one of them has gone rogue, is running the crime syndicates here”
“wow! Yeah OK lemme make some calls and file some report. I’m guessing you want me to keep your name out of it and this is all unofficial.”
“yeah I’m Moscow rules on this one faoe a bit”
“be careful, I still have to bring you to the mother church”
“oh don’t start on that”
“why not, you know God is showing you the way”
The conversation turned in a theological argument very quickly.
She found herswlf a street vendor and got halfia and and ice-cream. Eating thoughtfully she ran a quick scan of church establishments. Once she had the address she added it to here list of jobs for the morning.
“good, you need rest”
She jumped slightly “we need to lose the tails first”
“yeah, they have been trailing for a while” -
The drive home is eventless, Ben is strangely quiet and somehow drained or tired or vulnerable. He does not initate conversations and answers short and to the point without starting a conversation when she asks.
Shira’s text arrives at late noon “BB, it is a shipping container that contains toys and in particular Ballons. At least this is what the manifest says. It is inside Haifa’s port – about an hour and a half to the north. Do we take a look inside? I mean the port is a secure area and everything, but you are like superwoman right?”
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No surprise there she thought. “let me have a look first. Can someone run a drone past the out side so we can get some Intel. Do you need me to run through a wish list of the Intel we’ll need?” she smiled “and I’m not super woman, I’m more like the hulk”
Chips I need chips, with salt and vinegar -
Shira texts “You are too pretty to be the hulk…the best I can give you is Jessica Jones. Anyhow, drones will be intercepted… Tight security… as a seaport is protected just as well as an airport. Anything unauthorized within a certain radius is taken down. Ben stole a container from the port onece that I know off. So you can ask him how he got in – but he is analog so I don’t expect it to be something technological.”
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