Episode Eighteen: The Peace and Quiet Job - kaseido/NeoTokyo GitHub Wiki

28 Minsky - 8 Ghengis

After a day passed out at the safepenthouse, the Team returns to the Honeycomb Hideout. The damage is minimal, just a couple broken windows from the ConBrands drone invasion. Still, Star is grossed out: “Put the windows back, air is disgusting!” Firebrand’s gotten a delivery of window glass for the neighborhood, so Carbide and Vir replace the brownstone’s windows and then they volunteer in the rest of the neighborhood. He’s probably the best general handyman around, and Vir patches up neighbors who’d joined in the fight by the community’s front wall.

Star escorts Nymph back home and slips her some good drugs. “You think these problems should remain outliers for Nymph for some reason?” She recommends Dr. Desai for therapy: “We like when somebody actually pays her, it means she’s more likely to do favors for us.”

Paragon follows Stephane-Louis back to the Spire. “She’s a grown-ass sociopath, she can do where she wants.” Carbide has shit to fix and doesn’t notice, Vir tells her to call to get smuggled back out – but the warrants against her have been cancelled. Harb’s dropped charges against Carbide for the burglary as well: Hot Uncle probably waved a couple McFarlanes in his face, an original Spawn.

Star gets a package delivery. It’s not ticking. She brings the package inside and calls Carbide, who scans it with his arm. “Yep, you got yourself a box.” Having her mail searched brings back some shitty memories. “Plus side, I didn’t open it and go through it for you.” That happened, every time.

It’s from Bai Wen-Yi, a post-WW2 bonsai tree, with the traditional inscription, “May have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong one.”

She takes a photo of it and texts it to the team. “If you don’t read Japanese, I think the Big Bad just hit on me.” Carbide tells her she should probably learn how to take care of it. Paragon sends some helpful websites. “Put a bird on it,” from an old earth meme revival group. Her library search turns up a registry: it lists the transfer from Bai Wen-Yi to Oshin Kazue. Tree-san was a gift from Saburo Arasaka to Prime Minister Nakasone in 1985 after his visit to the Yasukuni war memorial at the end of the Eugenics War. Gifted and inherited, the previous transfer was a christening gift to Bai Wen-Yi’s parents on his birth, 118 years ago.

“I still don’t know if I’m being hit on or not.” “400 year old tiny trees are not a casual gift, Star. You might be being proposed to.” “Marry him, he’s gross.” “I’ll call Sue,” and tells her to send a signed autograph for his cell on Sado Island. “What am I supposed to do with this?” “Water it!” “Check the box for care instructions.” There aren’t any.

“I feel like it would curse us all if we let it die after all this time. I’d have to commit seppuku, which would be hard, because I don’t’ have any guts.”

She calls Tanzo, and asks what it might mean in old-school corporate family customs. He’s amused: she has the most interesting problems. No names, but he can figure out the context, and the family in question has had a banking relationship with his firm for generations. The account managers… know things. He’ll check in with his people and report back.

Carbide notes Star didn’t ask about care, just about what it means. Sue takes care of problems, she’ll figure out how to take care of the tree. Sue finds a contractor at Sekushina Meido. Star has a deposit from cancelling the concert order, so yeah, plus a little extra to explain what they’re doing so she can learn on her own.

Paragon and Stephane-Louis are getting on well. She’s much weirder than she used to be, but he was okay with how weird she was before enough to give her a stuffed dino to be her deck, so he’s down with a weird girl.

A black cat leads Vir back to the Hideout, apparently with a message. “Paragon’s not here, she’s canoodling with her boy, but we’ll figure this out.” The cat heads down to the basement and sniffs around. Vir calls Mango down: the two cats circle warily, but once in LAN range some information gets exchanged, and the cat heads back to the front door.

“Are you leaving without snacks? I’m sure you’re busy, but guests should always have snacks. Hopefully Paragon can learn from Mango – now I wish I had a kitty brain, but what would I do with that?” The visitor eats all the snacks. Vir lets her out and she trots off with her tail up.

Carbide stars in on home and neighborhood defenses, coordinating with Firebrand. He wants to know if they’re amenable to drone patrols. Yeah, as long as it’s not weird: everybody’s on the gray side of the law, so they’re down with protection. And Carbide’s thinking perimeter surveillance, beat-cop kind of stuff, but All Drones Are Not Bastards. Early warning coverage, for now: he wouldn’t mind tying it into a combat response unit, but that’s for laters. Backed up by concealed stationary cameras – a rude surprise for anyone who takes out the drone patrols and thinks they’ve blinded the neighborhood. Firebrand will pay for all the materials if Carbide contributes labor.

Jade creeps up to Star’s door and knocks. She answers, confused: nobody knocks  Everybody texts first. Paragon hasn’t entirely internalized that lesson, but she’s the least likely to seek out contact, and the least likely to be weirded out by Star’s beauty regimens. “Jade!” “OH YOU REMEMBER ME! I’m your biggest fan in whole world.” “There are several Gorn who would disagree with you but we don’t have to tell them.”

Star asks if Jade’s mom is here. Yes, she’s cleaning up broken glass and tons of kitty hair: the flying glass upset them so there was extra shedding. Star asks how her therapy going. “Adults are so boring. But you’re not boring. Are you and adult? I can’t tell.” “Legally I am emancipated and that’s all that matters.”

“That’s a big word.”

“It means I don’t have a parent or guardian.”

“That sounds horrible, Mom’s always on me to do stuff but she’s pretty good to have around.”

“It’s nice to have somebody who actually cares about you in a safe and psychologically healthy manner.”

“That sounds boring too.”

“It’s a lot less boring than death.”

“I want to be like you!”

“There are a lot of things that can cover, can you be more specific?”

“I wanna sing! I know all of your songs by heart, not the newest ones I’m still working on those.”

“There’s a microphone over there”

She KILLS it! Star plays it back for her and adds backing tracks. “Now I know it’s weird to hear your own voice played back to you, but tell me somethings you did well.” Jade starts critiquing herself. “I said WELL, not WRONG,” and Star provides detailed positive feedback.

“Mom says I should be an accountant, but I want to be like you – not a goddess, but like you.”

“I definitely took some accounting classes – if you want to be like me you’re going to have your own money, and you should know what to do with it. If you want to be independent you gotta know all this stuff, so you gotta do your schoolwork. It’s not sexy, but it’s the most important part.”

Star copies the recording with and without the backup and gives it to her. T”hink about what you’re doing right and keep doing that, don’t worry about what you’re doing wrong, we’ll get there.”

“Can I come back again some other time? My mom said I should make an appointment.” Star gives her contact info to message her. “Did you just bluescreen?” Jade reaches out in a hugging motion but bows instead. Star gives her a good-fan kind of hug.

“They’re so cute before their dreams are crushed.”

Paragon gets a message from Killswitch, and meets him at the café Linvaa worked at. She gets a vanilla late and a pastry. A middle-aged man sits down at her table. “Call me Toledo.” He asks about her status these days. She’s not entirely sure, but “I am more useful to the people I actually like if I’m not official. I get to say yay or nay, and they get to threaten me with consequences. Works out for everybody.”

He offers her training and the contact information for his tech Fixer: he doesn’t have impossible-level stuff, but does have the best of what’s generally around. Killswitch may also call her from time to time with job offers, which she’s free to reject, though he’d like to do a run with her sometime.

Paragon’s good with him. She reads his thing as “Constructive being a dick,” which suits her. She tells Carbide she might have a source for more slightly restricted tech stuff if he ends up needing it.

Star asks Carbide for a door scanner, so she can scan her own stuff.

Sue passes on a bit of fanmail to Star: “Hi girl great concert, I’m so happy you’re doing well!” It’s signed “~Allspice,” with a spiral drawn in pink.

“Sue this is weird fanmail!” Sue explains that they ran a standard search on it, and the sender pinged as a solo who’s been operating for the last 15 years in the employ of RS Contracting. But there are photos, and that’s what set off alarms.

“They’re wearing my dead best friend’s face.”

Sue tells her the firm is a mid-tier bodyguard/escorting agency.

Star tells her, “Put them on security for the next gig. If this Minnie thinks this is funny, she’s going to find out different.” Sue’s been coordinating with Night: she’ll contract for a sniper. She tells Sue to book her a club gig in Koto City, something intimate.

Star messages the team: “If a solo named Allspice comes sniffing around, lock it down, I want to meet it.”

Carbide replies. “How pressing is this?”

“Just if it comes finding us. It’s wearing the face… of my band member.”

“….”

“Well, shit, that’s morbid.”

“Creepy!” says Vir.

“I need to go get really drunk. That working stomach is for a lot more than being able to eat pudding. It’s not fun to get smashed on one beer.”

And at that, Nymph is at the door, and yoo-hoo’s up for star.

“Nypmhie, come hang out with me.”

She arrives at Star’s door in a khaki jumpsuit, significantly unzipped, and a raspberry beret (the kind you find in a secondhand store). She announces that she’s dealt with her shit and has decided to quit her job and become a terrorist! “I researched the history of terrorism, and they all wear berets, and mine’s THE COLOR OF KLINGON BLOOD! How metal is THAT?!!”

Star breaks out the vodka that she has for some reason. “Have you talked to Romeo about this plan? You can’t become a terrorist.”

“Star, I’ve seen things!”

Star calls Desai on her internal Agent. If she can squeeze someone in this week as a favor – she’s got the good insurance – Star will come by next week. “I’ll squeeze her in today and you can see me tomorrow.”

“If she unzips her cat don’t be weirded out.”

Star’s going to walk Nymphie over to Desai, but not with her looking like that: the jumpsuit makes her look fat. “I’m going to leave the beret, that’s Dr. Desai’s problem. Strip, change, boots can stay, those are cute.” Nymph changes into a dress of Star’s.

Star walks her over to Desai’s office. Desai wonders where the cat is – is it invisible? No, she didn’t bring the cat this time. “It’s a Netwatch one, you’re gonna want to go slow. See you tomorrow!” Desai makes a face at her and slams the door.

Star writes a song about the invisible unzippable cat. Catchy, with huge sellout potential.

Paragon comes back after a couple days. Vir had texted about the cat mystery, but said it was no rush, and not worth interrupting canoodling time. Paragon brings Stephane-Louis back with her, and he’s a little squicked about her gremlin lair.

“It’s not rock bottom! Well, it’s rock bottom of a nice place, not rock bottom of a cargo container, I’ve moved up in the world considerably.”

Vir briefs Paragon, who turns on the catbrain. She told Stephane-Louis early on about the catbrain. She’s meowing and moving weirdly. Mango tells her Luna has a warning: bad people are making the Sailor Scouts do bad things to people, and Vir’s sister and a lot of the others don’t like it. Promise to help! Mango’s responsible for her humans and doesn’t want Vir upset – but more, she doesn’t want other cats coming around with messages. Paragon promises they’ll help Vir’s littermate and friends.

Mango sheds massively during skritching, until Paragon’s bored. Then she goes to find Vir, out in the garden. “So the other cat stays with your sister’s posergang, apparently protects them? I think that’s cat for they feed her, but we want to be respectful of the cats’ delusions. Apparently there’s a bad human getting the sailors to do things and they’re not happy, your sister’s particularly not happy. And that fits the source material I think? But I thought It was a white cat?”

Vir is baffled. Paragon explains, “The sailor scouts are based on 20th century Japanese media property… girls in floaty poses with legs that are 2/3 of their bodies and heads that are 2/3 of the remaining 1/3. They’re very leggy.”

Vir asks, “Aren’t the Princesses like arch-rivals?”

Yes, “But we’re less affiliated than we were, and I already kinda told Mango we would help your sister – she doesn’t like other cats coming here. If the cats think it’s a bad thing, it’s probably pretty bad.” She’ll do some searches to see what they’ve been up to lately, and maybe Star knows something because she’s got the same look?

Vir will try to message Shan again, but maybe she threw her Agent in a puddle. Paragon says, “But she does not have to be involved in her rescue. We will just do it, and she can yell at you about it.”

“Maybe that’s why I’m not dead yet, I need to rescue my sister before I can die. We were raptured, and returned as unworthy. There was the evil Satan lady and the guy who was pretending to be a waiter…. But this may be my task, assigned by You Know, the wiggly tentacle monsters.”

Paragon is weirded out and baffled. “Are they going to give you another task after this? Are they going to pay you? You should negotiate a contract. Eternal salvation is not liquid!”

Vir’s determined now: “We’re going to spy on my sister and rescue them from her own stupidity. If we can shut down that one person, we’re saving all of them! We do kind of want to get paid, but we can just steal that dude’s money. Let’s get Star involved, she can get money from stupid people! Oh, wait, whoever the badness is getting done to, they can pay us!”

They loop the whole team in. Paragon’s confident Carbide isn’t interested in the source media, but is in halting injustice and bad things. Star asks about timing: she needs a week of massive therapy, but will postpone if they need her to rescue Vir’s sister. Vir’s not super anxious: it doesn’t sound immediately life-threatening. And they don’t want to go in without everyone at top form. Star goes ahead and books the therapy, which gets her back to as good as she can be.

Night calls a meeting to ask for a favor: Annamaria Filovna of the bakery went to the Party Secretariat with a bunch of accusations against her, blaming her for the attack, and asking for Party funds to rebuild. The team’s outraged: they totally brought that on themselves, buying hinky wheat and doing a deal with the tentacle church.

Night explains the politics: Filovna’s from an old Party family, very orthodox, while Night’s parents are execs and she’s kind of a radical. She’s been working with Chance and Friction to build a modern, hip faction, and the boring old guys of the Secretariat are seriously not down with it. So yeah, they’re inclined to believe accusations from a Good Girl against the Bad Girl.

Carbide offers to send his data and testimony to Iso and Dil, who’re in good standing with the Party establishment. Paragon sends hers over to Carbide for inclusion. Night’s grateful: hopefully that’ll make the difference. And Uncle Firebrand got them to agree that if they decide to support her instead of Filovna, the Party funds will go to neighborhood security instead.

Shift calls Star: they’ve been in touch with xxxScarlettxxx and Ximena. Ximena was caught in the drone attack on the bakery, Scarlett rescued her, and they’ve been staying with the Bread Underground. Ximena needed a substantial-body replacement. She’d like to talk with Star. Star totally agrees, and Shift arranges transport for Star to visit.

A robo-taxi takes her way out into the exurbs of Koto City. Scarlett greets her and shows her to her girlfriend, now going by Naanobot. She’s dealing with a lot. Star gets it.

“I’m not gonna lie to you, it takes a really long time, a long long time. What did they give you for food?” Yeah, the tubes of gray paste. “I’m going to send you some of mine, it’s not the same as eating but it’s better than that.”

Star asks about Naanobot’s body. She tells Star that she got to work with design software: the person she was died in the blast. She wanted something new and kind of fierce.

“It’s good you got to decide, all this –“ gesturing at her own body – “is a marketing decision. Lean into the stuff that’s yours, not just the physical body but everything that’s you. It’s still you.”

Naanobot wants to start her own bakery in the Heights: she needs to do something, to feel useful, to have something other than therapy. Star asks if she does donuts. Hell yes, she does donuts. Star warns her motor control’s going to take a good long while to return, but she thinks the bakery’s a good idea. She’s happy to look over her business plan and invest if it makes sense.

They talk a bit longer, and Naanobot seems a lot steadier for it. Star hugs her carefully, watching out for the spikes, as she takes her leave.

Scarlett stops her at the door. “How’s she doing?”

“Remember how you felt before?” Scarlett winces and looks thoughtful.

“She got to make choices about what she looks like, and that counts for a lot.”

On the way back, Star stops at a clothing place and buys a big hideous oatmeal sweater. She’s going to write an acoustic song about the trip.

The next day is farmers market day: the Dirty Hippies are back. Vir scores some bok choy, Paragon gets leeks and butter. Dino has a little straw hat, bandana, and tiny basket. He’s looking for gooseberries -he wants ONE. A nice middle aged lady comps one to the handsome gentleman.

Vir seeks out her contact about the bee: Skyler is cheerful and utterly noncommittal. Vir says other stuff was going on around the blowing up, they were kind of distracted, and they were more abrupt than they meant to be.

Skyler explains that setting up a regular hive is not much of a big deal: you’ve got to hide from ConBrands, but it’s pretty basic stuff. However, he reached out because the Hippies had gotten word that Lifetech Consolidated has developed a prototype of a genetically engineered bee that can live in the wild: terraforming is a long way from complete, and Earth insects can’t survive outdoors. That’s why ConBrands rents out micro-drone pollinators to all the farmers on the planet. Lifetech’s looking to steal that market, but if a bee like that could be liberated, farmers wouldn’t have to go in debt just to pollinate.

Paragon suggests inviting Skyler over for tea and to see the garden for advice – and he might see some things they have while he’s there. Skyler says Arlo could use some tea. Arlo agrees and brings his bag. Vir waves anxiously at Carbide, gingerly crunching down on “bugs on a log.” They tell him they’re going back to the house for show and tell. “Oh. Yes. I will come along. Because some of the technical aspects of the gardening.”

Mango runs: Arlo smells weird.

Carbide stops Arlo at the door. “No offense but it’s been that kind of month, do you mind if I scan you for passengers?” No problem: Dirty Hippie security’s pretty good, but he’s absolutely down with a thorough check. He’s clean.

Star comes downstairs: "I smell patchouli and self-righteousness. WHAT DID YOU DO?"

He throws her a peace sign. “Hey.”

“Uh-huh. Why? What did you do?”

“He can help with the garden and maybe other stuff.”

“Okay. Don’t sell our house.” She goes back upstairs.

Vir makes tea and tells the story of their acquisition of the bee. Carbide fetches the stasis container and explains that they had some trouble when they opened it, so they don’t want to repeat that. Which is fine with Arlo: he pulls out something that was once an old Starfleet tricorder, and does a thorough scan. Yep, it’s genetically engineered, and capable of reproducing.

He tells them they’ve got some options: kill it and walk away, sell it to ConBrands who’ll kill it, or sell it back to Lifetech Consolidated. Or, use it to liberate all the farmers on the planet. Carbide tells him his primary concern is to not bring more heat down on them and the neighborhood. Arlo says that the Dirty Hippies are global and have great security: they’re built on smuggling foodstuffs in and out of the arcologies. They’ve been working with Firebrand for decades: the Team should talk to him for bona fides and planning. He’ll keep their secret, and offers to provide any assurances for himself they might want.

“YOU’RE NOT NATURAL!!” from upstairs. Star comes down with a sample sized bottle of shampoo. “It’ll help with the split ends.” He calls her racist for disrespecting his natural hair. And, he doesn’t pollute himself with chemicals!

“It’s cocoa butter.”

“It is??”

“Well, it’s KoKoButter™ It has plenty of natural synthetic oils!” Arlo is unimpressed, and takes his leave.

Night tells them that the Party Secretariat decided in their favor.

“Huh, how about that? For once the truth is on our side!” – Star.

“It seems faintly unnatural, but it works.” – Carbide.

They brief Night on the bee.

Carbide says, “I’ve gotta say ,breaking ConBrands on the pollinator issue really appeals to me on the visceral level and not just because my viscera used to have ConBrands stenciled on them from all the kibble.”

Vir adds, “As much as I don’t like my former home cult it’d be so great if they could have bees – they pollinate now with little kids with paintbrushes.”

“Moving away from the child labor is a real nice side effect to tall this. We just don’t want to tell Star if we decide to give the bee away!” from Carbide.

They decide they’ll talk to Firebrand about the Dirty Hippies and see if they can come up with a safe plan. Meanwhile, they’ll find out what they can about what the Sailor Scouts are up to, and devise a plan to stop whoever’s controlling them, and try to get that done before Star’s gig in a couple weeks.