GURPS Cyberpunk 2078 Session 16: Request of the Clone

Characters:

Alexander "Specter" Marshal - Solo
Pat "Peacock" Watson - "Former" Nomad
Ruby "Paxos" Lang - Netrunner

Braxton "Jar" Jiggs - Cybertech/Ripperdoc     NPC

Personal Details

Paxos sent her boyfriend, Mitch, into the bedroom and gave him a pistol "in case", then buzzed over the intercom to ask the clone at her door what she wanted.  The young girl said she was looking for Ruby Lang, a woman who might lived here at one point.  Maybe she knew her?  Paxos asked why she was looking for her, and the clone said she needed her help with a job stealing software from Arasaka.  Paxos examined the girl on the camera for a bit then Pinged her to scan for weapons, but ultimately figured she was sincere (and unarmed) and let her in.

The clone looked like she was 10 or 11, but clones almost always aged at an altered rate, so that didn't mean much.  They sat down on the couch and, after Paxos confirmed that she was Ruby, the girl made her request.  She wanted Paxos to steal a program from Arasaka, and in exchange, the girl would give her legitimate credentials to a corpo datafortress.  Paxos eyed the girl warily; while it depended on the corp, those credentials were tens of thousands of eddies at the minimum.  Before agreeing to anything, she wanted to know who the clone was working for, and how she'd found her.

She insisted she'd come on her own and was only working with her sisters, and that she'd found her name and old address in a collection of files available to someone called "Ruslan Sokolov" that had been left behind by an employee who had been terminated.  There had been some sort of shakeup, leaving Sokolov out of the picture but the data was still around, and she'd gotten access.  With that, she'd gone to Paxos' old landlord and was able to get her current address with a bit more investigating.

Paxos recalled that Sokolov was (or at least used to be?) at Kang Tao and had been the one to send the kill order for them and Lin Ru, and that he wouldn't have much left in the way of goons after they killed the first batch.  Looking for more info, she asked which of the Arasaka factions they'd be stealing from, but the clone just tilted her head and asked "Factions?  Uhh, Arasaka Tower faction?".  Paxos brought up the crew on the holo to ask their thoughts, while the clone sat there, impeccable posture at odds with her grungy street clothes.

Jar said he knew fixers who would buy the datafort credentials, assuming they were Kang Tao, for anywhere between fifty to three hundred thousand eddies.  Everyone's interest was piqued by that, but Paxos noted that their last job from Kang Tao had resulted in them getting shot (Jar retorted that it had also paid them 110k eurodollars).  Peacock was ambivalent; they wanted to know more about their missing sister, and the clones of her seemed a good bet on finding that out, but they also didn't like the risk.  Specter settled it by saying he was in, and that was that.

Paxos told the clone they were interested, but wanted some assurance that she actually had the credentials she was talking about.  She pouted a bit then asked if Paxos had a computer with access to the net she could use.  She started typing away on the keys while Paxos looked over her shoulder: she was much more proficient than one would expect for a ten year old, and while she was no netrunner, the addresses and commands she was entering were to legitimate Kang Tao internal security nets.  After a minute or so of the clone struggling to grasp why she couldn't get access (apparently not understanding that not everywhere was on the Kang Tao internal network), she managed to open the personnel file for Ruslan Sokolov.

Apparently he'd had quite the fall from grace after the botched attempt on the crew's lives, and had been demoted to assistant junior operative, low grade.  However, the file hadn't been updated, and it looked like he still had all his old permissions.  Paxos wasn't sure how long it'd last, but since the file said that Sokolov used to be a manager in intelligence, he would have had access to some juicy paydata, and the clone seemed like she did have access.  It would have to do.  Worst-case, they could always klep some other stuff from Arasaka Tower.

Paxos gave the okay, and started asking for more details.  The clone, who finally introduced herself as Martha, said that they were going to steal a Shredder that was designed to deal with a specific type of implant, then produced a shard from one of her many pockets.  She slotted it in her cyberdeck and found specifications and technical documents on the brain implant they'd just stolen from Konpeki Plaza (or a slightly older version, anyway).  There were several generations of the implant, apparently, some of which still had BioDyne letterhead, while the newest were all Arasaka.

At Peacock's request, Paxos then asked about the clones.  Turned out that after being extracted from Militech, Martha, Dolley, and Elizabeth had gone to Kang Tao, while Abby, Martha 2 ("We just call her 'Two'") and Jennifer Thracker went to Arasaka.  Jennifer and the others had been picked up first, and she'd seemed confused and angry that they were being split up, but the corporate goons hadn't given her much of a choice.  The clones used to have weekly video calls (Jar: "Probably some kind of therapeutic measure"), but those were cut off a few weeks ago with no explanation.  Paxos reckoned that Arasaka-Y had struck up a deal with Kang Tao for assistance during the civil war, and that that deal had ended a few weeks ago, but she didn't know why, and didn't say anything out loud.

Since Sokolov's demotion, the other staff rotated through frequently, as though nobody wanted to be involved with a failed project.  Martha and her sisters had only met the new lady in charge, Jane, once, and the researchers no longer used their names in front of them.  The fact she was able to escape at all meant nobody really cared anymore.  As for "Jennifer", she hadn't seen her since they'd split up at the safehouse.  Paxos pondered the clones' names and groaned when she realized the answer.

They were named after the wives of the first five presidents of the USA, which meant beyond a shadow of a doubt that they had been a Militech project, and that if Peacock's missing sister was anywhere, it would be there.  Paxos asked for her contact info, and Martha thought for a moment, then asked if it would be a problem for her to just call her directly at Kang Tao?  Yes, it would be a problem.  A dead drop was arranged by the dumpsters outside of Kang Tao HQ: they would drop off the shredder by December 17th, and Martha would then drop the credentials on the 18th.  Arrangements made, Martha popped up off the couch and headed back out onto the streets.

It Begins

Peacock got their cybereyes expanded and an image enhancer jammed in, while Jar and Paxos got more 'ware installed (a Kerenzikov and monowire whip, respectively).  Specter started a course of therapy to recover from the edge of cyberpsychosis, but one day at his gang's hideout someone ran through the door clutching their bleeding gut and yelled that the Tyger Claws were coming!  Specter shouted out orders for others to take up flanking positions, and took the role of bait to draw all of their fire, just standing in the open.

Four gangoons crashed through the front door holding handguns and katanas, but only one managed to get a shot off before being gunned down.  Specter was hit in the forehead, but it bounced harmlessly off his MetalGear helmet, and responded with a burst of fire from his rifle that killed the ganger instantly.  The second wave followed shortly after and, while a pair tripped over their dead allies, one fired a shotgun slug at Specter only for it, too, to do nothing, while the last one standing drew a grenade and ran at him, screaming.

Specter triggered his Sandy, shot the man in the throat, ran up to him, grabbed the grenade out of his hand before he fell, then threw it out the front door, which was still swinging closed.  He saw the looks of horror on the faces of the gangers outside as the grenade detonated midair between them, and was utterly unaffected by seeing them shredded by the explosion.  Specter shrugged, said "Livin' on the streets ain't easy", then turned around and went back to his meditation exercises.

Peacock spent a day tracking down Jennifer Thracker at Arasaka and eventually discovered that she had adopted the alias "Bianca Wyse".  Jar made contact with a Holocall, and arranged a meeting at the Tom's Diner in the Glen the next day without any real objections from Thracker.  Over the course of a fast food lunch, Peacock discerned that Thracker did actually care about the clones, leverage which Paxos then used in her attempt to get her on-board with their heist at the tower.

After only the lightest prodding, she agreed to give them information.  The alliance between Kang Tao and Arasaka-Y had collapsed several weeks ago; she didn't know the details, but rumour was that Arasaka goons had gotten into a firefight with Kang Tao during a double cross.  At any rate, the Shredder they were looking for would be in the datavault in the third R&D subbasement (well below the bunker levels which should, in theory, hold off a direct hit from a nuclear bomb).  It had a double-lock handshake security system, requiring passkeys held by Yorinobu Arasaka, the CEO, and Kazumi Kanata, head of R&D.  The two of them would be attending a board meeting on the 15th.  

There were many ways to access Arasaka Tower, though none were without their risks.  AV landing pads on the upper floors, an executive elevator from the parking garage, and, of course, the front door.  They'd probably be able to get past security if they forged passes, but it'd be almost impossible to smuggle anything past the metal detectors.  Speaking of impersonation, there was an upcoming meeting with some BioDyne staff about new projects on the 13th which Kazumi would be attending.

There'd used to be a tunnel network out to the badlands but that had been collapsed at some point in the past year when some edgerunner drove a tank in.  There were multiple elevator banks, but they all required access cards, ditto for the stairwells, and there were automated turrets built into the ceiling outside the doors on every floor.  A series of air vents ran through the tower which someone could maybe squeeze through if they knew what they were doing.

A little while ago, there was some big security breach in their computer system which had necessitated reinstalling most of it, and there were now constant warnings blaring "THIS ACTION COULD BE UNSAFE, DO YOU WISH TO PROCEED?" for even the most routine operations.  Ironically, this had made staff less alert because now they just ignored all the warnings.  Lastly, Jar gave Thracker a microcamera to take some photos of security measures from the inside, which she would later give to Paxos via a dead drop in Reconciliation Park.

Notes:

This job in particular led to a divide between what the PCs/players wanted to do (not taking a shady job), and what they ended up doing.  Peacock's player pointed out that they were clearly meant to take the job, so not taking it would just mean not playing GURPS that night.  This is more or less true, and I wouldn't have had another mission prepared for them, but I've also said I'm open to the PCs setting up their own jobs if they want.

Paxos: "I feel that generally when someone sends people to kill you, you don't turn around and work for them."
Peacock: "Eh, business is business."

Me: "Hey, if corps never hired people who'd stolen from them in the past, they'd never hire any edgerunners at all!  Surely it goes the other way."

The least realistic part of the game was a girl's clothes having pockets.  This led to the joke that someday someone will make "cargo pants for women" with fake pockets.

Martha had a jammer in one of her many pockets to block the trackers in her skull.

Martha didn't recognize Paxos as being involved in the extraction from the Militech facility.

In case you thought Jane Watson and Mary Jane Watson wasn't confusing enough, we now also have Martha and Martha 2.

Picked some 'ware that made sense for Jar to have, including Subdermal Armor so he never has to take off his threads for armor.

Peacock has almost maxed out their cybereye slots, which have progressed from "Anime Eyes" to "Clannad".

Specter had to spend luck to avoid going cyberpsycho in the gang confrontation, and just barely made it.

At long last, we have confirmed the canonical ending of 2077: the Nomad ending.