Current
I just force Bork or Shiva to RP when I need a GM.
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4 yrs ago
I think the main thing with any IC is a good pitch, I've joined plenty of RPs because the pitch was good (but rarely do I care about how pretty the thread is).
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4 yrs ago
Some questions are just curve balls though. Traditionally the answer to "Do you support white supremacy?" is an easy no, unless you're either an idiot or racist or probably both.
Symbols danced across her visual field layered by lines of code. A cascade of characters that threatened to overwhelm her with barely contained neurofeedback. Her skin was cold. Metallic. Her skin was not her own. Awareness consumed her. Data moved at the speed of light. Her nerves were fiberoptic rivers. She felt alive. She felt whole.
She was slotted into the Seawolf. The atmospheric diving suit was battered and bruised, but still functional. Her last job had fallen apart as soon as she had hit the water. They'd wrecked her drone. They'd banged up her suit. And they almost managed to sink the tanker before she had sent them sinking to the bottom of the South China Sea. The payout barely allowed her to salvage the situation. She was broke, real broke. Her drone was busted up. She owed money and she'd soon run out of old favors to call on. She was sinking too fast.
Diagnostics from the Seawolf reeled her in from her depressing thoughts. The damage was superficial. The Seawolf was still operational. She was still operational. Her trusty friend, the Seadog had taken the brunt of the damage. The drone was out of action until she could afford some serious repairs. She could hear the hum of the AI in the corner of the metal warehouse she had commandeered. It was alive. It was processing, it was calculating, and it was thinking, but it's body was broken. She needed a life raft. She needed something to keep her floating.
Connected to the Seadog she felt a lifetime pass in seconds, minutes, and hours. The urge to remain. The desire to cast off the weak flesh that bound her burned deep within her heart. There was freedom in the machine. There was rapture in the darkest depths of the Deep. The diver was stubborn. The diver was proud. She wouldn't give up. She wouldn't surrender to the waves even as they towered above her and came smashing down on her head. She would struggle until she sank beneath the waves. Numbers drifted into her field of vision, gently reminding her that it was time to go. She hesitated. She always hesitated. Without her connection to the machine she felt empty. She felt incomplete. The Seawolf called out to her. It whispered to her. Instant, overwhelming euphoria beckoned her. Communion with the machine. Perfect unity. Escape from the depths of the South China Sea.
Wrapped beneath an olive rain poncho, Toma moved carefully. Water glistened on her bare ankles. Her rifle was slung over a shoulder, hanging loose and ready beneath the poncho. Her pistol was holstered along the small of her back. She trusted Chang. He wouldn't send her into a setup, but she didn't know the employer. She wasn't going in naked. Suraiboshen. She didn't know what to make of it. She'd never been there. It didn't make sense. Meeting in a five star sushi joint wasn't the usual way she fished up a new job and a fresh stack of credits. She wondered if there'd be sushi. There was always time for food and drinks, especially if her potential employer was paying. Dinner would make it a worthwhile trip even if the job turned out to be a wash she reasoned.
Toma wove through the meandering crowds with purpose and a faint pang of hunger. Disconnected from the Seawolf she felt the needs of the flesh return to her awareness in faint waves of unwelcome reality. She palmed a cigarette from the pocket of her faded shorts, submerging her hunger beneath a layer of burning nicotine. Canton Canal belonged to the triads. Belonged to the Black Yangtze. As much as any piece of the floating city could really belong to anyone. The surface world was always shifting, always changing, and the depths, the Undertow, her world, existed beneath the reach of petty tyrants.
The cigarette fell apart into ashes as the wake warrior reached the address that Chang had scribbled down on the back of the pack of cigarettes. She had chain-smoked her way through almost the entire pack of cigarettes as the day faded into darkness. She hadn't been in a hurry. She'd needed to stretch her legs. She'd wanted to think things through. She doubted she was being followed. She wasn't anyone important. She wasn't carrying anything hot. She was just another swimmer struggling to stay afloat in between the rolling waves.
Toma stopped to light the last cigarette, posting up against the front window of a store offering the finest in antique typewriters. Real typewriters that stamped ink characters onto paper with each press of a mechanical keyboard. Tools of the wealthy and esoteric. Complex machines from the analog age. The proprietor took one glared at the wake warrior and looked as if he was about to say something before he retreated back inside his store. Toma nodded sagely as he left her to smoke in silence and continued to watch the street. The cigarette lingered between her lips, an ember glittering in the rain. The restuarant reminded her of a temple. Drawn in minimalist lines, the simplicity of the squat structure convinced Toma that there was serious money involved. Only the wealthiest in New Malaca would spend a fortune to make something look simple. Aesthetic architecture turned into high fashion at the cost of credits. It seemed like a waste to her. She preferred salvage, the endless bounty of the South China Sea.
She stamped out her cigarette on the street. The wake warrior crossed the robe bridge and eyed the two yojinbo guarding the entrance. Visible chrome was a bad sign. Guns were a bad sign. Heavy guns held in the hands of kitted up street samurai ithcing to use them were a worse sign. She didn't doubt that the two suits would be more than happy to gun her down if she seemed like a threat. She pocketed her lighter slowly, exaggerating her gestures, slowing down her movements. Gunfights were bad for business. She didn't need the heat.
"Nice shades," Toma offered, facing the two mountains.
The guards smirked back at her and two pairs of red eyes gave her the once over. Combat models she suspected. Gear worn when overt violence was the only purpose. The suit on her right, gestured towards her rifle, "You're not getting in here with that automatic."
Toma shrugged, relinquishing the amphibious rifle with an ease movement of her shoulder. The hired muscle handed her a token as he took her rifle. The chip felt smooth in her hand. Cherry wood she thought glancing at the delicate reddish-brown hue of the wood. Natural cherry wood. Expensive. Very expensive. Chinese numerals were carved into the ticket. 777. Jackpot. She hoped her luck would keep. She needed a break. She needed to make some serious money. She needed an easy job, but the payout told her otherwise. 500,000 asyuan. 500,000 asyuan promised trouble. Lots of trouble.
"Turn in the chip on your way out and you'll get your weapon back," the gaurd said as he stepped closer. The delicate scanner in his gigantic hand beeped loudly as it passed over the diver. She didn't move. MAD scanners were nothing new. She wasn't loud. She wasn't worried. Her cyberware wouldn't ping any sonars as anything interesting. Not unless the operator was really listening. And they usually weren't. She was running silent and she was running deep.
"You can keep the pistol," he said briskly. "However, do not abuse the generosity of this house. Unwarranted use of your weapon will be met with appropriate violence."
Toma nodded to the mass of metal and muscle as the doors slid open with the familiar click of a disengaging electronic lock. Toma stepped into the room and waited for the door to close behind her. The lock had been triggered remotely. Someone was watching. Despite the minimalist décor she suspected that Suraiboshen was protected by a high tech security system. Something fancy. Something stolen from the depths of a corporate R & D facility. Something very discreet, something that had cost a stack of cred-ships. The smell of money, real money troubled her. Rising too high above the waves meant danger, real danger. The sort of danger that even a crash dive to crush depth couldn't escape.
The hallway was crowded and Toma didn't hide the frown that appeared on her lips. She worked well with others. Diving required cooperation. Never dive alone. Never dive alone was the sensible advice of all dive masters. But Chang hadn't said anything about others. He hadn't said it was a team effort. She didn't work with strangers. Trust came slowly to her and she preferred to vet any potential allies. She recognized few of the faces. Marcus. Marcus stood out to her. She recognized the grizzled old mercenary. She remembered the job. She remembered the bodies. They'd buried half a start-up beneath the waves that day. If Marcus was there, it meant violence.
Xiaolan. Her heart shaped shades brought back memories of open waters. The remains of a battle, scattered with debris and dead pirates. Xiaolan meant war, real war, and kaleidoscopic violence fueled by synthetic drugs loomed. The pirate was reliable. The smuggler was talented. Toma trusted her. As much as one could trust a pirate. She followed her own strange code of violence.
The diver caught the end of a question as she stepped into the hallway. Her muscles still ached. She didn't want to sit down. Interfacing with the Seawolf she had forgotten to move. She had ignored the pleading request from her limbs. She had silenced the whispers of her flesh. She'd listen to the pitch. She'd eat some sushi. She'd do the job. She'd do the job so long as it didn't threaten to sink her.
"We are but sea dogs in search of coin," the Scrapper replied, offering a subtle nod towards the Artist of War. She could taste the adrenaline as it began to slowly seep into her veins.
Name: Born Tamara Anatolyevna Malikova, called Toma by her friends, and known as Scrapper in a professional capacity.
Age: 25
Gender: Female
Affiliation: A consummate professional, Toma has carefully cultivated working relationships with various criminal gangs, corporations, and hacker enclaves.
Appearance:
True to her professional name, Toma appears as a figure dressed in repurposed pieces of cloth and recycled material. She is scrappy in spirit, body, and soul.
On land, she wears tank tops, short-cut jeans, and plenty of mesh. Her boots are ragged and lined with rubber to afford her purchase on water-lined decks. Enamored with all things machine, she is covered in a constant layer of oil and mechanical grime. Toma smells of salt with a subtle hint of industrial chemicals and synthetic lubricants. The polluted waters of the South China Sea keep her hair black hair dyed a shade of dirty brown. Cut in jagged self-styled lines her hair never reaches past her shoulders. Toma's eyes are a shade of metallic gray, recalling discarded metal, and pass for biological only at a quick glance. Her pale skin is colored by the sun and pollutants, darkening to a shade of light brown. Toma has a number of scars that mark physical labor and close calls scattered across her body, but none are particularly noteworthy. She has an elaborate tattoo of a sea serpent that begins on her right hand, snakes up her arm, and travels across her shoulder before wrapping around her left side.
In the water, Toma wraps herself in neoprene diving suits or encases herself in atmospheric diving suit of her own design.
//YOUR SOUL
PERSONAL GOAL: Toma is just trying to make a buck. She has gear to keep in working order. She has ammunition to restock. She has booze to buy. And she has fancy sushi to eat. Deep down, Toma has childish dreams of buying her own nuclear attack submarine and creating her own underwater empire, free from the corruption of the surface, but she knows that dreams drown first in New Malacca.
LIKES:
The South China Sea
Diving
Loud and Fast Music
Booze
Old Western Movies
DISLIKES:
Being stuck on dry land for too long
Liars
Slow boats
Anyone that tells her what to do without paying first
Pineapples
REPUTE: Stories of the Scrapper travel across the waves of the South China Sea. Whispers tell of a figure emerging from the dark waters of New Malacca. A being without a name, faceless, and nameless. A diver. A creature of the Deep.
Toma is a nobody in New Malacca. She keeps her head down and deals with trouble efficiently. She pays her debts on time. She prefers bribes and conversation to violence. She avoids associating openly with any dissident elements and keeps her opinions to herself. Her friends are few and carefully chosen.
The Scrapper is storied figure among those that ply their trade beneath the waves. Divers have heard of the Scrapper. Divers know of the Scrapper. Some of them have even met the Scrapper. Working with a small number of trusted fixers, the Scrapper has worked without regard to factional affiliation and raised a modest reputation as a problem solver of the depths. The most reliable way to hire the Scrapper is to contact Mr. Chang, a well-known fixer rumored to have ties with the Black Yangtze.
HEEL: Toma is an adrenaline junkie. She lives to push the envelope on land and in water. She wants to go faster. She wants to dive deeper. She wants to feel alive, which requires feeling like there's a good chance she's going to die. She is enraptured by the risky connections her direct neural interface creates and she's constantly chasing the euphoria of communing with the machine. Toma prefers to operate right at the edge of her crush depth, where pressure threatens to crush her at any moment.
CODE: Toma follows a simple code based on the idea that someone pays her and she completes the job without asking unnecessary questions. Any moral compulsions Toma had against carefully measured violence or crime were drowned in her youth. Another bloated corpse fed to the crabs. Toma counts political parties, fresh religions, startups, mega-corporations, gangs, and even pirates as valued customers. Credit chips don't care much about good or bad intentions.
However, if she were asked, and Toma generally isn't, she'd admit to harboring strong sympathies for the Fisherman Party. She knows what it's like to be hungry. She knows what it's like to dream of freedom. Real freedom. Freedom from the corporations and government technocrats. Freedom from the gangs. Freedom from the ghosts of the past.
Afraid of sinking, Toma keeps what little idealism that she retains carefully contained beneath the surface.
QUIRKS: Toma is inordinately fond of sleeping in odd places and it isn't uncommon to find her curled up in some corner of her scrapyard workshop. She prefers to sleep near the water and close to her gear, putting little trust in the gangsters she pays for the privilege of not being robbed blind while she sleeps.
//YOUR PAST
She feels Chang watching her. She's not sure how he does it with his eyes closed. But she knows he's watching. The beer in her hand is cold, a Chinese knock-off of a Bavarian wheat beer.
"Scrapper," he finally says, his eyes open. "Someone's asked for you."
"Who?"
"Don't know," he replies as he tosses her a pack of cigarettes. Japanese. Seven Stars. He had to have paid top dollar for them. His answer is a warning. Chang knows everyone. He knows all players. He knows all the players that matter and some that don't. She suspects he might know everything that happens in New Malacca. Sooner or later.
"What's the job?" She asks, fishing a cigarette out of the packet.
"Don't know," Chang replies with a frown. "The contact expressed a desire to reveal that at a later time."
"What's it pay?"
Chang pauses,"500,000 asyuan."
She doesn't manage to catch the cigarette as it falls out of her mouth.
"Is it a trap?"
Chang thoughtfully strokes his beard. She doesn't know how old he is, not really, but Chang is a fixture in Hibiscus Lane and Canton Canal. Black Yangtze, some say, but she doesn't know, not for sure. The tobacco stained grin he flashes is far from reassuring, "Hard to say. When this sort of money is involved, there's always several games being played in parallel."
"As bad as Undertow Junction #793?" she asks, managing to light her cigarette. Her hands are still shaking.
Chang laughs, "I don't think so. That was a remarkable situation"
"Reassuring. You want me to accept, no?"
The fixer shrugs, "I get 5% of your payout."
"You're a real bastard, you know that right, Chang?" She fumes.
"Good men don't last long here, Scrapper, you know that yourself."
"Mmm, they sink faster."
A child of the Flot Slums. Toma was born into an enclave of Russian refugees that had fled the civil strife and economic collapse. Her home was a leaking fiberglass that sank deeper into the South China Sea with each passing month. She could swim before she could walk.
The South China Sea claimed her mother, lost with the rest of her fishing vessel in a typhoon. Her father taught her all the he knew. He taught her how to repair ancient rusted out machines. He taught her how to study the latest technologies stolen from the corporations. He taught her much, but he could not prepare her for New Malacca.
Her first real job was working for the corporations, risking her life beneath the waves. She was one of the hundreds of commercial divers responsible for maintaining the Undertow. Protecting the secrets of the corporations and the New Malacca City Council. She watched her first friend die from an air embolism, nitrogen bubbles in his blood killing him in an instant. More of her friends died to accidents. The depths of the South China Sea were merciless and mistakes were fatal.
She branched out, diversified her skill set. Worked salvage, pillaging the skeletal remains, shipwrecks that littered the South China Sea. Feeding on the dead, she grew stronger. She cannibalized implants from corpses, from soldiers of the forgotten corporate wars. She slotted software looted off of research vessels reclaimed by the sea. She paid a small fortune to the ripper docs to commune with the machine, to feel metal as her own skin, to see through mechanical eyes, and to move as if it were her own body.
Mr. Chang found her after a job gone bad. The great raid on Undertow Junction #793. A generation of divers drowned in the waters surrounding Undertow Junction #793. They bled out, torn to pieces by steel darts. They imploded, as they sank beneath crush depth, vanishing forever into the great underwater canyons.
The old man gave her new purpose. He provided her with jobs. He was fair. He only took 5% cut from her payouts. He taught her the true nature of New Malacca, he taught her to hate the surface, the land of the corrupt and weak. Others dreamed of rising to the tops of New Malacca, but Toma dreamed only of sinking deeper. To the only free place that remained.
"What do you say, Scrapper? Ready to head beneath the waves again?" Chang says, interrupting her thoughts, driving the memories away. She curses Undertow Junction #793 as she has every day since she sank it. Burying it beneath the yellow sands.
"I'll do it," she answers. The last job had been a real Пиздец. A real clusterfuck. Her drone had been fried by state-of-the-fucking-art corporate ICE. Her suit was banged up. She was broke. She was fucked. And she'd only survive so long floating on old debts.
Chang smiles,"Suraiboshen, 7.00 PM. They'll know to expect you."
He knew what her answer would be all along.
//YOUR PERSON
ATTRIBUTES:
Underwater Specialist - Toma is an expert in all things underwater. She can construct, demolish, find, and salvage things underwater as easily as she can breathe.
Scrap Rigger - Toma has a gift when it comes to corralling drones and automated vehicles. She knows how they are designed. She knows how they are manufactured. She knows how they are maintained. And she knows how to use them to deadly effect. Few mercenaries in the South China Seas could compete with her particular knack for piloting a machine as if it was her own body.
BODY MODS:
Saewung Advanced Piloting System (SAPS) - An advanced targeting and piloting system that allows direct neural control of vehicles and drones. The culmination of decades of research aimed at perfecting SAPS doesn't just provide the user with greater speed and precision but quite literally links the user at a neural level with a machine. While offering considerable advantages in terms of performance, prolonged use of the system can inflict severe side effects on the user. Furthermore, dangerous levels of biofeedback can be experienced by the user as a result of damage to an interfaced machine.
Tzu Peace Solutions Nyx Combat Cyberoptics - Early in her career as a diver Toma replaced her eyes with a cyberoptics combat package from Tzu Peace Solutions. Containing a suite of vision enhancements, Nyx implants come standard with image enhancement, infrared sensors, and low light vision. Toma has had her implants further modified with an additional layer of reinforced glass to provide anti-dazzle and environmental protection. Even pitch blackness is no problem for Toma.
Custom Titanium Bone Lacing - Toma has had her bones laced with lattice chains of a reinforced titanium alloy she looted from a sunken Russian nuclear submarine. Beyond increasing her weight, the bone lacing has made her body able to handle greater weights. Additional benefits are that she punches much harder and that her body resists physical damage thanks to the plates of titanium that are now spread out across her body.
EQUIPMENT:
Tzu Peace Solutions Barracuda Amphibious Rifle - Toma favors an advanced amphibious assault rifle intended for use by combat divers. Designed by Tzu Peace Solutions in 2085, the Barracuda allows both underwater and above-water ammunition to be fired from the same chamber and barrel. The rifle sports a compact, bullpup layout and can load and fire standard 5.45x39mm ammunition as well a proprietary cartridge design for underwater by TPS engineers. Sporting a firing rate of 700 rounds per minute with a range on land of 500 meters, the Barracuda is a fearsome weapon. Underwater effective or lethal range is about 55 meters at a depth of 5 meters. The effective range of the Barracuda decreases in parallel with increased depth as the increased pressure reduces the amount of time fired rounds supercavitate which leads to a rapid increase in hydrodynamic drag. A military grade weapon, the Barracuda allows for the use of a suppressor, optical sights, and comes standard with a 40mm grenade launcher.
Freeport Metalworks Minnow Underwater Pistol - Toma's sidearm on land and in water is an electronic pistol with four barrels. An early answer to the problem of firing conventional bullets underwater, the Minnow instead silently fires 4.5 mm by 155mm steel darts. Each pull of the trigger fires a barrel sequentially and the pistol can rapidly run dry under sustained use. Ammunition comes in convenient clips of triple stacked cartridges.
Dive Knife - A serrated knife that Toma insists on calling a Diving Tool and only rarely uses as a weapon.
Malakhit Central Design Bureau Atmospheric Diving Suit (SEAWOLF) - The Seawolf is a heavily modified atmospheric diving suit that Toma owns and lovingly cares for. Designed by the Malakhit Central Design Bureau, the Seawolf was constructed for use by the Russian navy in rescue and combat operations. Manufactured from forged T7075 steel alloy it uses an advanced articulating joint design that Toma based on later scrapped American variants. Capable of operating in up to 850 meters of seawater for a normal mission of up to six hours the has a self-contained, automatic life support system. Additionally, the integrated dual thruster system allows the pilot to navigate easily underwater. Toma has applied black anechoic tiles to reduce the visibility and sound signature of the suit.
DAMAGED EQUIPMENT:
Boeing Echo Guardian (SEADOG) - The Echo Guardian is a small marine autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) designed and built by Boeing in the late 2080s. Composed of state-of-the-art alloys, the submersible weighs a mere 1.5 metric tons, is 5 meters long and is able to descend to 7,500 meters. The drone is useful for a variety of underwater inspection tasks such as explosive ordnance disposal (EOD), meteorology, port security, mine countermeasures (MCM), and maritime intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance (ISR). Toma treats the drone like a very large dog and it is her frequent companion on missions. The Seadog is tragically in a state of recent disrepair, having suffered an unfortunate encounter with some premium grade corporate ICE.
Not strictly part of my character sheet, but I wrote some related if random stuff in present tense (please forgive me):
0 meters
She glides into the water, letting her atmospheric diving suit sink slowly.
The waters of New Malacca are filthy. They always are. She's used to it. The industrial chemicals and pollutants burn with faded intensity. She prefers the darkness of the waters. The darkness suits her. She longs for it. She dreams of the warm caress of the sea. The sailors know only the surface. They're afraid of the depths. They're blind to an entire world. The real world. The only true free world that still exists. The sea beneath the surface.
She knows better. The darkness hides her presence. It protects her. The corporate sec outfit isn't monitoring for something as small as her suit. Their lights can't illuminate the vast sea. They can't hear her. They're worried about a rival corporate submarine loaded to the brim with quantum torpedoes.
She knows they've been down their for months. They're reaching the end of their endurance. She has been testing them. Slowly frying their nerves with planned intrusions. Mapping out their security system. A faint ghost vanishing on their sensors, inching closer only to melt away into the sea. Another false signal. Another error of their high-powered sensors. Another artifact looming in their AR display.
50 meters
She listens to the first ping of their active sonar.
The return signal will never reach them. It has already been distorted by the anechoic tiles that line her atmospheric diving suit. She suspects that they are sleeping. The automated defense system will not notice her. She feels the AI reaching out, seeking with its binary tendrils. She's just background noise to the enslaved AI. It doesn't even notice her. It's queries dissolving into nothing.
150 meters
She slows her descent.
The fixer told her about the close range motion sensors. He didn't need to tell her about the turrets. They were esoteric, but she knew they were there. A product of the Nine Mile War. Automated harpoon launchers meant to skewer enemy combat divers. A rarity in the current age. Deadly mementos to mad men and a mad war.
She knows she has to move slowly. She is patient. She rigs her suit for silent running. Electronic equipment going dark as the airless engine dies down to a mere hum. She knows they can't hear her. They can't ID her. She sounds like the water. She sounds like a biological creature slowly swimming through the darkness. She sounds like nothing.
She is nothing, a creature of metal coated with pitch black rubber tiles drifting downwards.
Sinking.
Sinking into the deep.
300 meters
She stabilizes her atmospheric diving suit, the propulsion system now no more than a whisper as she silently glides towards the research facility. She is a predator in these waters. They are in her environment. Clumsy creatures hiding within their underwater habitat woven from reinforced steel. The change in pressure will kill most of them.
She feels a tinge of remorse. Killing brings no pleasure. But it will be painless. And it will be quick, faster than even their enhanced nerves can react. It's better than what any corporate sec soldier can expect. It's better than what they deserve.
New Malacca offers no mercy. The South China Sea permits no hesitation. The Straits are full of bodies. What's a couple more?
She feels at peace as she begins to deploy the explosive charges.
The Georgian looks over the diver. He's seen her kind before.
Eyes dulled with vodka, a cigarette loosely dangling between her lips. He imagines she's thinking of the sea. He can almost hear the siren call that has ensnared her. Given time, he knows it will drag her to the ocean floor. Another drowned soul lost to the endless waters of the South China Sea.
But now, right now, she's an asset. He's never hired her before. He doesn't even know her name. Chang recommended her. Sent her to him. The Georgian smiles, showing a mouth full of gold and silver teeth. He remembers his old teeth shattered and broken. A parting gift from some unnamed American intelligence agency. The unspoken price for his integrity and silence. They had made him a legend. They had made him a man of great standing. They had made him an honest thief. The precious metals that lined his mouth were shipwreck salvage, one of the many bounties of the South China Sea.
"It's simple enough job," he begins, drawing in the air with his hands, a little showman's flair.
"Chang told me the details," she says with a dismissive wave of a hand.
He nods. He prefers it this way. He hates having to tell a story to sell a job. Time is money. And money...money is everything in New Malacca.
"Can you do it?" he asks, wrapping his hands around his still cold drink.
"No problem," she replies, the ghost of accent playing across her voice. "The crew will cost you extra, though."
"Of course," the Georgian answers. He slides a credit chip across the table. "Just make sure to recover the files. The situation is unique. Mistakes would be problematic."
The diver takes his credit chip without comment and nods at his instructions. He tries to place the accent. Russian he thinks with a flash of anger. He hasn't forgotten. Generations later and he remembers. He remembers the stories of the Dark Crash. He remembers his grandfather, a broken man full of steel parts and shrapnel. He swallows the bitterness with whiskey. He is a fixer. He is a professional. He has no time for personal grudges. He is not concerned with national enmities. Not unless it means a profit.
He holds out his hand and the diver shakes it. He wipes the oil off of his hand after, but she doesn't seem to be offended. He registers a faint smile.
"What do I call you?"
She pulls her legs close against her chest and looks at him with hungry eyes. Like a cat, he muses as he watches her carefully. Demanding and full of threat.
"Scrapper," she drawls lazily, taking a drag from her cigarette. The Georgian smiles again. He's heard of her. He's heard of the Scrapper. He's heard of her reputation. Of course Chang sent him a professional.
Naril
Abstract Proxy