Episode Five: The Highly Leveraged Job, Part 2 - kaseido/NeoTokyo GitHub Wiki
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The next morning, Paragon puts a tie on Dino, wears comfortable shoes at Starscream’s firm suggestion, and heads off to The Spire to play PA. She forwards the feed from Ebit’s Agent to Carbide to passively monitor.
At Starscream’s suggestion, Carbide and Vir head off to check out the properties Odaiba has purchased, to see what they’re doing with them. On the Metro on the ride out, a fierce-looking drag queen in 8 inch heels, a glittery sheath dress, and a tiara made from zip ties spraypainted with something sparkly gets on and nods to them. Carbide recognizes her tattoo as being a gang emblem for the Street Queens/Kings/Monarchs, who protect queer street kids. He gives her a respectful nod.
A couple stops on, a pair of fashies in white polo shirts get on, and immediately start hassling the drag queen. Carbide heads over, rolling up his sleeves to show his cyberarm, and suggests they get off at the next stop. After consideration and some face-saving swearing, they do. The drag queen introduces herself as Glory, tells them they’re welcome at a local gang safehouse, and thanks Carbide – though she could’ve handled the punks.
As they reach the first neighborhood, Vir smells something yummy, a nearby food cart just opening for the day. They ask Carbide if it looks okay, and he agrees. Vir picks up three Indonesian gulab jamun. They each have one, and Vir saves one for Eely.
Looking around, the place seems like a normal squat neighborhood, with a Night Market just getting going. Vir notices a small plaque at an intersection declaring the area property of Odaiba Securities: the sign has taken more than its share of filth and bodily fluids. The next neighborhood is in rougher shape and much less lively. No sign of anything going on, but another one of the Odaiba plaques. They head back to Carbide’s workshop, where he concludes they’re not doing anything with the properties, even clearing out the squatters, which seems odd. Vir admits they were expecting a lot more corporate goons and guerilla labs.
Meanwhile, Paragon meets up with Star, who’s on stage at Spire 404, working on blocking and lighting cues. She stands awkwardly for a while holding Star’s boba, then tries to offer it to her without interrupting – of course, interrupting. Star calls for a five minute break and leads her off to her dressing room.
She says she’d always assumed the dressing rooms at the star factory were bugged. She puts her feet up on her makeup table and cuddles Dino while Paragon jacks into the Net architecture. Paragon takes a solid smacking from the Black ICE, but finds there’s no monitoring established in the net. She doesn’t make it into the venue files. Star tosses her a box of tissues to deal with her nosebleed. They’re a bit at a loss for what to do next: the brain damage has scattered Paragon’s planning. Talking it through, they realize she’s got access to the GPS on Ebit’s Agent, and can track where he went last night. Apparently he went to a club in The Spire, then to a private residence a few floors farther up. Paragon will go scout those sites.
The first is Shadowdance, a club that’s stone dead at lunchtime. Paragon decides not to order the house special, a Pink Lizard Thunderbolt, which includes caffeine and a euphoric on top of a mix of sweet, powerful pastel liquors. She orders off the “For Losers” menu, getting a Blue Mapia, some sort of synthetic goats milk and curacao. She hacks into the Net architecture, which is sadly under-defended. It kills her to pass on the control node, which she could’ve used to make the soda fountains spurt and the lights induce seizures. The files, however, include a list of top-shelf clients and their drink, drug, and companion preferences. There’s also a list of authorized contractors. The former list only yields one name Paragon recognizes: Selene Vanlith, the exec at The Horizon Group who massively lowballed her in the settlement over Shift’s blackmail/assault. Paragon changes her preferences to loser drinks, hallucinogens, and cats in top hats. She doesn’t make a huge effort to cover her tracks: she figures Vanlith will take it as minor retribution for something she did to someone and count it even.
On the contractor list she finds Zhessa, the Orion “dating” Ebit. She’s an authorized courtesan, with a listed residence at the address Ebit visited second. Paragon heads there.
The block is under fairly heavy camera security, but Paragon’s able to hack in while wandering down the street. Zhessa’s security is hardcore, but Paragon gets lucky and beats it before its Black ICE can get hits in. She gets Zhessa’s client book and spreadsheets: Ebit’s down for “gifts” averaging out to about NB1000/hour. Costly habit! She pauses before a house a couple doors down to mislead anyone watching, then speedwalks off without apparently drawing any attention.
The team meets up that night, and concludes they’re stymied until their Face can act. So, Star calls in that she’s going to take a day off from rehearsal to “get centered.” She sets up an appointment with Daz Lomax for the next morning, claiming she’s interested in a real estate investment.
Daz is, of course, a fan, and thrilled to answer her questions. Star tells him she’s looking for some property to develop to improve the slums and give her studio space, as well as looking for good investments. Daz pretends to poke around looking for Taliesin Rackham’s card, which was actually right at hand. She says she doesn’t want to step on toes, so can he tell her what Odaiba’s looking at? He’s convinced to tell her that there’s a property about to go on the market that Odaiba’s going to bid heavily on. She mentions having seen someone fitting Viridia’s description, and he readily hands her Viridia’s card. She gets his number, and texts him back a custom Starscream winky emoji.
The team reunites and puts the pieces together. Daz was the one who placed the call to Ebit with the coordinates of the property about to go on auction, so he could get Tom Nook worked up as a bidder. Viridia’s buying the properties at an established market price much higher than they’re actually worth, then Taliesin is selling securities backed by a fake fortune in real estate. It’s the kind of thing that would utterly destroy the reputation of a firm like Odaiba.
They take the eyeball-cam footage from Carbide’s tour of the properties and send it to Shift to make a video from, which ends with the Odaiba logo dissolving into the piss-stained sign in the slum.
Star then calls the Rackhams’ boss, Shira Tanzo, leaving a message that she’s got information on the Rackhams that he needs – and Valdis Barrick of Dome Ops should be in the meeting as well. He returns her call 42 minutes later, and agrees to meet in two hours.
The team gets dressed in their Spire duds, and heads over. At Odaiba, security IDs Star and waves the group straight to a reserved elevator to Tanzo’s floor. The floor receptionist is a little whelmed, but offers refreshments and leads them back to Tanzo. Vir pockets a lot of fancy cookies.
Star gives a compelling performance to set up the video. Tanzo immediately begins digging into data while Barrick needs the scam explained to her. Tanzo orders Security to detain and interrogate the Rackhams, and Barrick puts in a similar call about Daz.
Tanzo inquires as to the group’s price. Star says that she just wants a fair shot at investing: return the properties to Dome Ops, and have them put them up again for a fair bid. Both agree: Barrick says she won’t give Star any sort of edge in the bidding but promises she’ll personally oversee a fair auction. Tanzo agrees it’s an equitable solution to cover their ass protect investors, but he’s not entirely convinced. To reassure him, Star does indicate she wants an open-ended favor in return for the team’s continued silence. He agrees.
They leave, but as they’re in the elevator, the building’s shaken by an explosion. In the lobby, Star grabs a minion to ask what happened. He says it’s a minor HR issue, being taken care of. He reassures her the explosion wasn’t on Tanzo’s floor.
Carbide wonders if the Rackhams had a “severance package” in place. Star decides it’s not their problem – unless and until they come at them for revenge.
They head off to Ebit to tie off the last loose end. Ebit takes some convincing to void Tom Nook’s debt in return for their silence about his role in the scam, given that Odaiba and Dome Ops are on a murderous rampage. However, the deal is sealed when Paragon explains how she’s completely owned his security. He hires the team as physical/net security consultants. Star explains that as a client, he’s covered by their promise of confidentiality – so long as he keeps his end of the deal.
Star doesn’t have thumbprints, so Paragon “signs” the contract for the team. Carbide’s security consult consists of his thoroughly smashing Ebit’s Alexa.
They call Isabelle to tell her they’ve fulfilled the contract, and Tom will have the chance to buy the properties he’s missed out on. Victory!