Tsuiraku-town, part 3

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Jack Rothwell
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Re: Tsuiraku-town, part 3

Post by Jack Rothwell »

OOC Making an assumption here about the details regarding who the vineyard was sold to, correct me if i'm wrong/OOC

At that moment Martin sighted the south-western vineyard and slowed his horse to a trot. From his vantage point up the road the place appeared virtually empty, certainly not the war zone he was fearing. He allowed himself to feel a tiny bit of hope that Dandelo's talk about the place had been pure fabrication. Martin gigged the animal closer, letting a cautious hand fall and rest on his hip near where a revolver lay under his overblown jacket. He closed his eyes a moment and recalled the names on the papers he'd stolen which stated who the vineyard had been sold to.

'Layla and Faye Sorensen... who knows? This might be a legit business after all.' He cleared his throat as he pulled up outside the main building.

"Hello?" He called. "Is anyone home?"

.....................................................................................................................................................


Meanwhile, at the Mead and Drum, Rosh finished the paperwork he'd been pouring over and opened the door to his office. He froze in the frame at the sight of the heavily armed group of people intimidating his weaseley barman. He mouthed hung open and worked briefly, before he stepped backwards and shut the door with a delicateness he hadn't known he could manage.


OOC Last bit purely for comedic effect. /OOC
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Re: Tsuiraku-town, part 3

Post by Graybeard »

OOC:
Jack Rothwell wrote:OOC Making an assumption here about the details regarding who the vineyard was sold to, correct me if i'm wrong/OOC
All correct about the Sorensens, and the paperwork would look as legitimate as it possibly could. I'm still traveling and can't stay on long enough to catch up on what has happened, but will be back in play tomorrow.
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Re: Tsuiraku-town, part 3

Post by Graybeard »

[OOC: OK, back in regular contact now, but it's going to take me a day or two to get caught up. What's happening with Layla can be asynchronous with the rest for a while, though, so:]

"Oshima ... Oshima ... Do I know that name?" Layla mused as she sat down in front of a weird-looking apparatus.

"You've probably seen it around town," Galina said, making some sort of inscrutable adjustment as the instrument started to hum. "It's a common surname in Tsuirakushiti. A lot of the businesses in Tsuiraku-town are owned by a so-called 'industrialist' named Oshima. Just between you and me, I suspect he's more of a gangster than an industrialist, but he doesn't mess around with us here. I don't think the archmage that I'm supposed to go see has any contact with him, either." She smiled, although Layla couldn't see it. "I damn well hope not, anyway. The Mesuinus are enough crazy hyper-powerful mages for one person to deal with at a time. Now focus on that glowing orb in the view finder ..."

Actually, quite a large fraction of Galina's analysis was wrong, but she had no way of knowing that.
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Re: Tsuiraku-town, part 3

Post by Hours »

Seishi was somewhat nervous, normally he'd just get a courier come and take him to the meeting point, but this time they sent this woman and an armed guard. Dandelo and Rosh would have a small relief as they left almost as suddenly as they arrived, saddling up to a closed wagon outside and heading down the road. Seishi sat in back with the woman and two of her guards while the other two sat up front in the driver's seat, another riding shotgun. The woman spoke first.

'I am... Yui Oshima.' The woman said, handing him an envelope, 'As I understand you have had employment with my predecessor, one Tanaka Oshima.' Seishi noted that clearly the two weren't related in any way, she was clearly only half tsuirakuan at best. 'We wish to keep a trusted contact and employee as long as we can, as we can rule out you as being responsible for my predecessor's demise, however I work quite differently from my predecessor, and you'll be seeing very little of me...'

Seishi opened up his package, it was full of money and a few notes, somewhat more than he was regularly paid even.

'You have your instructions and your payment, the instructions include the location of the next drop point where you will find your next assignment and payment, check the location every few days after your assignment is complete, but if we hear word of your failure there will be no drop.' Yui said, the two men opening the back of the wagon and looking outside. They were still moving.

'You have your instructions. Don't fail us.'

Seishi found himself being manhandled by this woman's two guards. And before he knew it he was rolling along the road after they'd thrown him out on the street. It was wet here and no one was around, they must have been outside of Tsuiraku town and in Rinkaiel proper. Tending to his scrapes with what healing magic he knew, Seishi read the note, his next target was a... Liquor store?

---

Back at the Vineyard, Gault moved and opened the door, getting a look at this... Frankly, he didn't know the word for it, some vacuous ponce of means obviously. Gault raised an eyebrow and turned to Ace.

'Another new face who can't be vouched for around here...' Gault had heard the stories, he'd been akwardly chatting with Ace for a while now and there was very little the two could talk about beyond the random wierdos at the Vineyard as neither could truly talk about work without making some sort of deadly compromise, and from what Gault could hear the place could have enough intelligence leaks to be used as a colander.

'Do you know this man?' Gault asked Ace gruffly, clearly intending on unpleasantness towards the man should he not answer positively. This put Ace in a pickle and he thought fast, he was used to being the voice of reason apparently.

'No. I don't, but he could be here on business.' Ace replied, 'We're leaving now so if you have anything to talk to the owners about you'd better come back later.'
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Re: Tsuiraku-town, part 3

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Martin climbed down from the horse as he was addressed by the men. By the looks of things they weren't overflowing with joy to see him, but no-one was reaching for a firearm either. On that count, things were already going better than anticipated.

"My apologies. I seem to have caught you at a bad time." He said, removing his hat and holding it to his chest. "I was looking for a Layla and Faye Sorensen. I had a pressing matter to discuss with them." He sized the men up, leaning on a cane he'd bought which made a slight rattling noise as it took the would-be fop's weight.

"Maybe you could help me to that end. It concerns a business transaction concerning a Mr Oshima... perhaps you've heard of him?"
Last edited by Jack Rothwell on September 9th, 2010, 5:05 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Tsuiraku-town, part 3

Post by Graybeard »

OOC: I'm finally able to go back through what has been happening, as I get ready for Ace and Layla to get back active, and noticed a possible problem:
Hours wrote: 'Tanaka... He arranged hits for the boss, enemies and traitors...' Oshima gasped for air, cringing at the pain from his guts and his own burning lungs, 'Got them killed by hiring out bounty hunters and assassins from the guilds!'

'Who were the contracts?' Wallace insisted quietly, smirking at how these Tsuirakuans didn't really have a stomach for any sort of real insistence.

'A whole bunch... We... We got a message every week from the temple with a list of names... Tho-those two Seeadler you got the names already. A-a source who wanted a bigger cut from what he helped with name of Aozo... Uh...' Oshima cringed, he was clearly thinking very hard, 'A teacher, Dasuke Kinabalu who sold us out on an arms shipment, bigshot guilder Rohen Dalton and... And-and that's all the jobs I remember I swear! Most of the time we got this guy by the name of Seishi Torou to do the jobs, he stays at the Mead and Drum... He'd know more...'
Problem is, I'm not totally sure this is consistent with the way Dasuke Kinabalu got killed. The manner of death need not be a problem, if Seishi Torou is a magic user. The fact that it happened in a comparatively public place, however, probably is. It's not a show-stopper requiring a retcon, but rather, something that will have to be watched as this all unfolds. So /OOC:

---------

Ace rolled his eyes at the latest batch of weirdness to waft through the vineyard. Since when had a cover operation that had worked quite seamlessly in Kiyoka, if Layla and Faye were to be believed, become such a magnet for bizarre characters? Well, one played the cards one was dealt.

"Layla isn't my wife," he told Gault neutrally, adding a mental yet, "and it's not quite time to pick her up. She said she'd be done with her first session a little after noon, which gives us an hour before we need to head into town." He thought for a minute, wishing Faye was available to do some decision making; the two women were better at that than he was. But sometimes you just had to stick your neck out. "Tell you what: maybe we could go a little early, catch some lunch or something, and drop by the liquor store. You probably know there's this one on the outskirts of Tsuiraku-town that will be the distributor for the vineyard once we're in production mode. It wouldn't hurt to check in there." And pick up a little muscle if it comes to that.

------------

"I'm amazed," Galina told Layla, real awe in her voice as she looked up from the weird instrument. "Not one beginning magic student in a hundred has your ability for focus and concentration. Maybe not one in a thousand. Where did you get that?"

Layla had an answer ready for that one; she'd seen it coming from the moment her friend described what the morning's activities would be. "Motherhood?" she joked, getting a broad smile from her fellow young mother; the quip had hit its target square on, and with some luck, deflected Galina from what could be an uncomfortable line of inquiry. "Seriously, I don't know," she went on, somewhat untruthfully; she suspected that the ability to hyperfocus was one of the things that separated a top Wraith from the riffraff. "It's just something I've always had. You met my mother, right? Mom always remarked on that when I was a girl. I gather she was the same way. There's probably a genetic component to this magic stuff, don't you think?"

"There might be," Galina agreed. "They really don't know exactly how magical aptitude works, which is one reason why we're casting the net broadly here as we try to recruit people to work at the gate." The ensuing chuckle didn't have much humor in it. "Of course, that recruiting isn't going well."

Layla decided to take a chance. "Is that why your arch-mage Oshima is in town?" she asked. "I've heard that those guys attract followers, like famous actors and singers and such. Is he here to draw a crowd and get all this jump started?" Now why is she looking at me like that? Did I go too far?

"Damned if I know," Galina answered. "All I know is that -- you're going to laugh at this -- I'm supposed to meet him at the Temple of the Divine Dwarf, of all places, right after lunch."
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Re: Tsuiraku-town, part 3

Post by Hours »

[OOC: He is a magic user, however I made careful note to say that they only used the guy most of the time as I couldn't find the death scene you just linked, thus Seishi isn't neccessarily the one who killed Dasuke. It could have easily been someone different that Tanaka Oshima (Mr. Silver) decided to use.]

At this point Gault could only shrug, he could see what Ace was going through, and that was something he gave him a bit of sympathy for. He looked this interloper up and down. Problem was this guy was slinging around the Oshima name as if it were an instant induction to people who had some sort of idea of what the hell was going on.

'Alright, let's get going then...' Gault tightened his jaw and turned to his man, 'You get the horses, I don't like them being left tied up to an empty house.'

And then there was a matter of this guy who didn't give a name, 'Listen, I have no idea who you are, or what's going on at this place. Follow if you want to meet one of the two but it probably won't end well.'
Last edited by Hours on September 12th, 2010, 2:33 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Tsuiraku-town, part 3

Post by Jack Rothwell »

OOC Martin didn't cross the network of traps leading to the house, he stopped his horse on the road near the front of the building that leads out of town as people were coming out. He called out, remember? He didn't approach the building on foot. And certainly wouldn't have been under the impression they were open for business if he had come across the traps. And he wasn't 'slinging the Oshima name around as an induction tool', he was making a simple logical inquiry based on the info he'd gathered. Martin's out there, but he's not a dumbass, could you retcon please?/OOC


'Listen, I have no idea who you are, or what's going on at this place. Follow if you want to meet one of the two but it probably won't end well.'

"Martin Dashwood." he replied promptly, replacing his overblown hat. "Lead entreprenuer for the Grohl trading company of Saus. And if you're heading to see the woman in question it would earn their collective gratitude if I accompanied you."

He turned on his heel and remounted the brown nag that waited patiently for him.

"Of course I wouldn't dream of getting in your way if you have important business to attend to. But by all means... lead on."
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Re: Tsuiraku-town, part 3

Post by Graybeard »

[OOC: We may need to do a bit of work here to keep characters and sub-threads from tripping over each other -- probably shouldn't go too far in writing each other's characters into actions -- but anyway:]

"Of course I wouldn't dream of getting in your way if you have important business to attend to. But by all means... lead on."

"Well, then, let's," Ace replied. A few minutes later, the carriage (and horse and rider) were standing in front of the liquor store.

Large Oskar was minding the counter when Ace went inside. A quick exchange put him on the alert to be ready to head for either the magic lab or the tavern, packing heat if necessary, then Ace went back outside. "Okay, now what?"

--------------

"The Temple of the Divine Dwarf?" Layla almost giggled, provoking a real giggle from Zachary. "Isn't that a rather odd place to find an arch-mage?"

Galina also giggled, also provoking a similar reaction from her daughter. "You'd certainly think so, wouldn't you? I don't know what he's thinking of. Have you ever been there?"

"No, but I've been to the clinic they run," Layla said. "They fixed me up after an -- accident at the vineyard." It didn't seem necessary to go into details about the airship crash.

Galina rolled her eyes. "And I can just imagine what kind of 'dwarven artifacts' they used on you. Well, you survived." Another giggle. "Hey, want to do lunch and get caught up on this before I go over there? You can bring your boyfriend, and I know just the place..."

[OOC: OK, so most of the parties are finally coming together, or at least can be, if people want. But then what?]
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Re: Tsuiraku-town, part 3

Post by Jack Rothwell »

OOC Alright, timeout. If we're gonna decide on a direction to go with the story i've got an idea; since all the characters are trying to locate the real Oshima in one way or another why not set-up a meeting with him? The original way i'd planned Martin (Leo, in case it isn't glaringly obvious) to meet the group was with them interupting a meeting he was having with Oshima to discuss buying some property in Tsuiraku Town (there's a huge bloody backstory being written in fan-fiction which gives him the means and the motivation to do that *plug*). If the guys pool the info they've gathered as individuals it should present some way of achieving that, if nothing else occurs Martin could always use his 'creditials' to get them in, or there's always the Gewehr approach, or use him for misdirection AND take the Gewehr approach?

After that... obtain some valuable info from Oshima then deal with the shack once and for all?/OOC
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