Chapter 2

[thenine]

Who: OTA
Where: Quad
When: Week 2, Day 5 - Week 4, Day 6
Summary: Chapter 2 prompts!
Restrictions/Warnings: Violence, blood, et cetera. For anything surpassing 'R' on a rating scale, please create your own log.
Notes: Please title your subject line in the following format -- Open / Closed | Date. OOC event information can be found here.

Quick Navigation
The Nine
The Company
Westies
True Leithians
Leith
Resistance
The RAC

The Nine: Poisoned Well

With the heir delivered and Lady Derrish returning to health, balance has been maintained amongst the Nine. Swift and efficient - and, some would say, unbelievable - medical attention administered may have steadied the Lady's life, but for those in the ruling houses, the atmosphere of tenuous peace only grows thicker. Land Kendry has launched an investigation - with particular focus on Land Hyponia - into the source of the 'attack' on Lady Derrish's health. Of course, that is only the surface, and some suggest, with hushed voices, that there may be more to Land Kendry's goals than to weed out an assailant. Land Hyponia has long since been in support of maintaining the Seventh Generation Accords, which it defends staunchly against any opposition. One of the most agitated among those in disagreement with the Accords is Land Kendry. Now is the perfect opportunity for them to rearrange the pieces in their favor, and with the information they've fabricated, they'll be able to replace the head of Land Hyponia with someone who is - at least hopefully - more pliable to their agenda. The Derrish have their own suspicions, the cure surfacing all too conveniently timed to have been a coincidence. When Land Kendry's investigation procures evidence pointing to Land Hyponia as the culprits, inflaming the crime with implied - yet vague - ties to the resistance, the Derrish publically accept the accusation. Behind closed doors, the solution seemed to have come as uncannily easily as the cure, and suspicions only rise. But for now, the two houses remain allied - ready to use one another for their own interests. For those among the nobility, it's the time to reevaluate alliances, assuring the old and gathering the new. The more support you have, the safer you are - unless, of course, you chose the wrong friend. Some turn to other members of the nobility, some to the RAC for hired guards, some to the Company to mandate investigations unsuitable for Killjoys, and some may even turn to the underbelly of society to accomplish anything necessary to stay on top. Or to simply stay alive.

The Company: Cleaning House

There will be no accolades, and no rest, for the hard working Company officials following the response to the True Leithan attacks. Assignments shift from one thing to the next, moving from bureaucratic nightmare to bureaucratic nightmare. While there’s always busy work to distract from the intrigue behind the scenes, it’s not liable to be any safer. Some officials will be charged with maintaining peace and order on Leith, as the outbreak of a pandemic slowly spreads over the moon. From helping the afflicted find their way to a place of treatment, to safe and efficient body disposal—burning corpses by the hundreds—to attempting to track down the source of the virus, it's best anyone assigned here take heed ‘lest they find themselves falling ill as well. Westerley, on the other hand, is a different kind of headache. With Harvest Week in swing, most company officials will be reaching for a drink of their own at the end of their shifts. Rowdy workers celebrating their time off, spending their hard earned Joy frivolously, and citizens whisked away by the atmosphere of celebration all mingle throughout Old Town. Property damage, fighting, less than subtle illegal activity, and crowding all become more of an issue than they usually are during this time. It's the perfect setting to lay down the law, or to not be noticed by it. On top of it all, each and every member of the Company's workforce can expect to have their documents double and triple-checked. Those with any suspected ties to Leith are likely to undergo a more serious investigation. One-on-one interrogations become common practice, and whether you're trusted or suspect, you may come face to face with a companion in your duties. True Leithan sympathizers are what the Company review is after, but anything else unturned will surely not be ignored. Cover your bases.

Westies: Harvest Week

Harvest week is in full swing throughout Westerley - visa workers have been shuttled back in droves from their time on Leithian farms, many of whom were willing to take some of their observations to information brokers for a price. Most had superficial information to sell (the state of unease on the average farm due to the impending Accords, the increased suspicion that the migrant workers were forced to endure, the fear of retaliation by the rebellion for the True Leithian attacks), others with reports of increased security and weapons caches on the farms of those whose sympathies lie with the “heroes” of the attack in Old Town. Old Town, however, is even more of a chaotic mesh of humanity with the mass influx of returning bodies. Bars stay busy day and night, the hokk and ale flow almost faster than most can keep up, and many Enforcers and Killjoys alike can make a good bit of extra joy (or free drinks) by moonlighting as security at the more popular locations. Despite all of the fun to be had, there is still the undercurrent of unrest, because Company checks have increased even more and Intake has become a revolving door of petty criminals being held for the smallest infractions. Everyone is on edge as the Resistance grumbles and the Nine search the shadows for something or perhaps someone. The unrest only worsens once Leith is placed under quarantine. And through it all, criminal activity is on the rise. Somehow, despite the strict regulation and transport of migrant workers, there is an increased access to Jakk and Bliss. Norn has an ever growing market, and weapons dealers are in high demand both in Eulogy and by private buyers alike. Something is brewing beneath the revelry, and no one wants to be caught unable to defend themselves, it seems. Not that any amount of firepower can defend against disease when P43X shows up on W3D7--but it can certainly make the symptoms worse.

True Leithians: Second Stage

Wounded and pressed to a corner, the beast rears its head and bares a maw of teeth and ruthless pursuit. The True Leithian organization does not take pause to mend wounds left in the wake of last week’s retaliation, no. They do not seek the comfort of safe haven and recovery. Instead they turn their anger and fear inward, sacrificing their own for what they believe to be the greater good. On Week 2, Day 6, three individuals slip into the crowds of Leith, mingling with the revelers and the families celebrating Harvest Week. They share smiles and laughter, they share conversation and drinks, but most importantly, they share infection. Each of the three is responsible for disseminating P43X, a viral bioweapon designed by Zan Nikora on behalf of the military in years past. During its conception, the aim of P43X was simple: to create a weapon which could demoralize and destabilize an entire population within a matter of days. To create madness that builds in the blood and eats into the brain, spreading through every tier of society. And though its use has long been out of commission, its engineer has lingered. Zan Nikora, kidnapped and held under threat of death not to himself but to those he holds dearest, is made to choose between the lives of his family on Westerley or the strangers on Leith. His choice is obvious, though far from easy. Reassembling the buried curse takes time, supplies, and testing. He is provided amply with the last two but scarcely with the first. But still he complies. When his madness maker is complete and his existence becomes a potential loose end, it’s not freedom that Zan Nikora tastes, but the poison of his own medicine. Only once the voices in his head have risen above whispers and turned to screams, when his mind can no longer hold secrets worth sharing, does he see his family again. It takes six days*. Six days and Zan Nikora stumbles through Old Town, eyes unseeing, mind riddled with disease—infection spreading. Mod Note: *W3D6. Cure and vaccines will be developed and disseminated beginning on W4D3, but will not be fully administered to all locations until W4D5.

Leith: Pocket Posies

Harvest Week in Leith marks a period of joy and relief. Bazaars are open longer, the ordinary bustle of the business day replaced with celebration and festivities throughout the evening hours. Vendors offer games for adults and children alike, the sky is a constant wash of soft pinks, purples, and greens from holographic firework shows, and music fills the air from different stages. All walks of life are welcome to join in the merriment, just so long as they have the right to be there. Anyone suspected of an invalid visa or citizenship papers are dealt with harshly, but quietly. Tucked away into the darkness of a holding cell like all of Leith’s more problematic elements. It is a time of peace and relief, this week, and they will not abide disruption. But within the hallowed days of celebration, a sickness grows, incubating. Spreading. First, it begins with an ache deep within the muscles. The body tires too quickly, the flesh burns with a blanket of rising fever. Whispers skirt at the edge of hearing, unintelligible but audible, filling the audio cortex with illusions and lies. Food loses its appeal, though the body yearns dearly for energy it cannot hold, and breathing becomes tighter, harder. Next the tide of high fevers, of lethargy. The brain devolves into paranoia and mania, the mind races with delusions and hallucinations. Pain follows, a pain that seems to emanate from every nerve without relief or pause, seeping through the muscles and aching within the very bones of a person. Some may wish for death, and for many, that wish will be granted in an unending sleep when the fatigue pulls darkness across the mind, plunges the last thoughts of a person into static slumber. But not all will succumb so readily, and therein is the weakness that ultimately shelved P43X during its initial creation. Its impacts are not uniform—while much of the population suffers dearly, most are sustained with timely medical interventions, and many others recover with the prowess of their own immune system. For Leith, bountiful in money and supplies, most of P43X’s more fatal properties are circumvented or delayed. But even in this lush world of affluence and peace, there are the poor, the underprivileged, and the weak. They are not afforded the same haste of care, the same salvation. Instead, they’re given graves of sanitizing fires, and their bodies turn to ash.

Resistance: Sleeping Dogs

The chaos of the festivities that go along with Harvest Week provides the perfect cover for the Resistance to begin moving once again. New cells need to be formed in the wake of so many executions and new members need to be recruited. Info brokers with Resistance-leaning sympathies have an opportunity to make a little extra joy by putting the disconnected sympathizers in contact with one another, aiding the vetting of Company insiders that need new handlers within the organization. For Resistance members already embedded within, they need to work now to find new locations to store what supplies remain and to begin rebuilding the stockpiles of weapons and supplies re-confiscated by the Company. Some may have heard of abandoned mines or facilities that can be retrofitted out in the Badlands while others are needed to track down rumors of Company made fallout shelters located within the under-city tunnels. For this, Company moles are essential - the only hope of accessing these shelters is with long forgotten Company passcodes. And the Scarbacks, well. Everyone’s heard rumors that there are many within their ranks willing to help with recruitment and contraband transportation, though there’s little the Company can do to restrict their movements at this time. Because of this, Scarbacks may also be the only ones that have a chance of getting into Leith once the quarantines go into effect. Those already aligned with the rebellion will be tasked with coordinating supply movements, making a deal or three with the devil on behalf of those unwilling to back down from the promises of the Accords. Caution and purpose should drive their movements because if the True Leithian attack is any indication… those nationalists are not going to let go of their precious land and status without a long, bloody fight.

The RAC: Holding Pattern

Warrants still flow in with a regular consistency - enough to keep the average team or agent quite busy. Every harvest season there are visa jumpers that need to be caught and low-level warrants claiming petty theft from farms by Westie migrants. The increasing number of disturbances and crimes in Old Town guarantee a plethora of local warrants to capture criminals across the moon or those that managed to escape an Enforcer’s arrest. Some, however, have either been requested by Seyah Kendry herself or volentold by their seniors within the RAC to conduct investigations into the attack on the Nine. And not all of these investigations are on the Lady’s behest. Some of the Nine aren’t quite willing to take Land Kendry’s word as law and have quietly requested their own investigations into the attack in Old Town and the Land Derrish misfortunes. (MOD NOTE: There will be a comment thread for teams to sign up for the specialized plot related warrants on the monthly warrant post, located HERE. Once teams have posted for a plot warrant, the mods will give them a location and focused assignment.)

Comments

d again

[riastraid]

[ The fire escape's a little less stable than he expects, a little more prone to creaking, but ordinarily it wouldn't matter—Jason at least tolerates him, surely.

...On most days, anyway. But this fine, grimy afternoon, it seems like someone's outright pissed in his cornflakes. ] Woah, hey—!!

[ He ducks, bullet missing by a comfortable margin and pinging off a wall before lodging itself into harmlessly into the side of a dumpster. No harm done, though Lancer still looks a bit offended, feathers rustled in an annoyed, why are you like this kind of way. Is he here on a job? It's forgotten for the moment. ]

What the hell was that for?

[tirejacked]

[Tolerate is such a kind word. If...true. Most of the time, Lancer ranks a solid "okay" on his "give a crap" meter. Enough to deal with him conversationally, if not find him kind of a pain in the ass. Familiarity does tend to build up a tolerance to these kinds of things.

Right now, however, he's got his gun trained down the alley at the silhouette on the fire escape. Eyes narrowed, breathing too harsh, aim uncharacteristically unsteady. The sharp movement of Lancer's dodge is enough to kick in the reflex to adjust his aim and tighten his finger on the trigger again.

But the offended voice that breaks out is—

Wrong. And it hits like a bucket of icewater, rattles him violently back toward his senses. His teeth grit, and he backsteps away as if burnt. Drops the barrel of the gun down toward the ground, spinning on a heel to take a breath and rake his free hand through his sweat-damp hair.

Crap. Really losing it this time. Last thing he needs to be doing is jumping at shadows. He doesn't turn back around to answer the (reasonable) question. Tightly—]

Not now.

[Get lost.]

[riastraid]

[ Glad to hear Jason's robust social immune system has built up some resilience to Lancer's antics, not that it's helping presently. He knows him well enough to expect prickliness, but that's not the same thing as a misfire, a taut-wire kind of tension.

His better judgment shares his sentiment—get lost—but after a moment he scowls. ]

I'm the one who gets to be annoyed today, asshole.

[ It's hard to miss that something's wrong, which probably plays some part in why he's sticking around (a small fraction), crossing his arms. ]

You really think I should leave you alone right now?

[ If he'd been some Random Joe on the street, that bullet could've gone a lot differently. ]

[tirejacked]

[Your tepid concern is tepidly touching.

"Asshole" goes in one ear and out the other. He stows his weapon firmly in a holster to get it out of his hands and rakes his fingers through his hair again, pausing briefly—not for the first time in the past few days—at the scars on his scalp where the black-market tech that had rebooted him sits. (No miracle doesn't come with side effects. Is that a better or worse explanation to this crap than going out of his head on some brain-frying pandemic?)

It's too loud around here already—Lancer's presence is as grating as it is grounding. His teeth grind together through the sharp stab in his temples, hands dropping down to clench at his sides.]

You know me, I'm a real optimist.

[Hah. Can't blame him for trying. It's still sharp edged, but the lion's share of the force has gone out of it. (Like he's resigning himself to a little damage control. But hell if he's going to ask for it. Showing weakness in their line of work is as good as putting a bullet in your own foot, if not in your own skull.)]

[riastraid]

[ Say what you will about bravado and bluster, but sometimes it doesn't hurt to throw off the scent of weakness. Or at least give it a shot. Jason's just being a stubborn fuck if he's out here like this—it goes way beyond a twitchy trigger finger, straight into twitchy everything—but no doubt he'd be just as difficult if their roles were reversed.

Hopefully, that understanding comes with patience. He knocks Jason's elbow with his own as he walks past him, but otherwise keeps a good 3-foot distance. ]

Nice to see you still have your sparklin' sense of humor.

[ A good sign of healthy brain function!! ]

What're you still out here for?

[ As long as it's not ridiculous, maybe he'll help and get him back to home, sweet home. ]

[tirejacked]

[Stubborn fuck just about covers it. Really, where's the fun in waiting around to lose your mind in the safety of your own home. His hackles pick up when Lancer gets close, fingers twitching closed in predictable and defensive reflex. But even if the unease hasn't drained out of him in the least, he reigns his impulses in, this time.]

Maybe I was trying to lose a tail, peace and quiet's getting awful hard to come by these days.

[Despite being clearly aimed back at Lancer's insistence on being a nuisance, this is also like. Kind of true. If not actually a great sign of healthy brain function. Which is most of why he grimaces after saying so, raising his hand to pinch the bridge of his nose and exhaling sharply before dropping it back down and opening his eyes again. Take two.]

Warrant's out on Nikora. [He'll at least assume Lancer's up to date enough to get the memo.] His last known residence is downtown, I wanted a look around myself before tapping anyone for favors.

[So: work. What do you expect from him, really. Unfortunately he got a little sidetracked between where he was going and where he was trying to be, so downtown's a bit of a hike, now.]

[riastraid]

[ The nice thing about being a nuisance is that he's remarkably difficult to chase off—snark away, buddy. He picks up enough of the important parts—city's practically in a riot, Jason carries himself like someone with a migraine trying to get through his dry day job, Nikora warrant—and nods. ]

You and every able-bodied killjoy in this dump.

[ Note: able-bodied. ]

But I think you might've taken a wrong turn somewhere. [ Which, not to like, compliment him but... it's a little unusual. ] C'mon, let's take a walk.

[ Gives him a chance to gauge his symptoms and see whether downtown or some kind of hospice bed is a better destination. ]

[tirejacked]

[You understand his problem, then. Evidence has been sitting long enough through Harvest Week and the ensuing chaos, even without a bunch of schlubs stomping all over it.

Rather than address the fact that he's on the wrong side of town—]

Hate to break it to you, but I already promised the Wayne kid that he can play reindeer games on this one.

[That is, he's taken the warrant up with a partner already, sorry bud. He's not splitting the payout again just because you're going to be a nuisance and attach yourself to the proceedings.

Of all things, "Wayne kid" puts a strange sour taste in his mouth, grates at his nerves in a way that it doesn't have any real right to, and he pauses to suck at his teeth before ducking deliberately down a sidestreet. In a slightly more encourging direction, this time.]

[riastraid]

[ He follows along despite the obvious diverting, spritely in comparison, healthy enough to roll his eyes. ]

I don't need your chump change, numbnut. [ Actually, it's a decent little nest egg to whoever gets this sorted out fastest, but Lancer's motivations are never monetary to begin with. ] I'll just wait for this Wayne guy to take you off my hands.

[ Name doesn't ring a bell, but presumably he's actually signed on to work together with this guy. ]

You can try to chase me off if you want, but I doubt you can right now.

[tirejacked]

[There it is again, some bitter thing like bile rising up under his breath for no damned reason, twisting together into something caught and caustic and impossible to unravel. Trying to make sense of it just makes it worse. It can't really be directed at Damian—pain in the ass he can be, he barely knows the kid. The offhand comment catches at his hindbrain all the same, and chasing down the sting to the source feels like catching smoke.

So he voices his opinion on Lancer's commentary with a biting scoff that comes out knife sharp and sarcastic. Yeah, right.

But then the alley funnels into a dead end at the wrong time and he stops. Aggravated at nothing, impatient at his own apparent distraction and apparent inability to instinctively navigate the city he ought to know like the back of his hand. Could just chalk it up to impatience at Lancer's insistence on needling him, but really—

That's just the straw that snaps his patience. All at once, he kicks off the pavement and moves to swing himself up a nearby fire escape and make for the (too-low) 3-story rooftops. Solid enough for the moment, if not as deft as usual, so who knows just how long he can keep a lead. Says you he can't shake you, asshole.]