Aberrant: Children of Quantum Fire - Losing Sakura

[Dawn OOC]

This fiction is a continuation of Forbidden Fruits...

The first three hours passed without much news pouring in to Darion. Then he started to get returns of information, some good, some bad. The good was that the information Star had found out about Van Hout was solid. The bad was discouraging: Ibiza authorities hadn’t found Sakura on any departing vehicles yet. The Congolese embassy had received his message and passed it along, but there was no Storm King full of fury, heralding his arrival with a raging storm. Darion found that curious – and infuriating. And Puck, Darrik’s great hope, had done a cursory search, said that he was having trouble finding her on the planet because he didn’t know her signature. He would keep looking and had been granted access to go into the Creche to search through lingering signatures to learn hers.

But information and help was coming in. Geryon and other factions of the Teragen were responding with affirmations of help and the corners of the globe were being searched for her. His old allies in DeVries were donating their time to do their own searches and press their contacts for information.

The best was that Snow and the lion-nova had woken up. Darion had gotten information from Snow, who was coherent long before ‘Tahir’ was. Even now, the odd nova seemed to have trouble taking a human form, which Darion found interesting – if a puzzle for later. Snow had told him about the attack. It was exactly what he had feared – careful and coordinated. Someone had planned this carefully.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Five Stars descended on Van Hout Elites’ offices in Taiwan. They occupied a small office complex on the outskirts of Taipei in the Wugu District. It was a quiet building among other quiet buildings and only the sign out front gave any hint to what was inside. Star didn’t bother with the door, instead ghosting through them. She did the same to the secretary’s office, moving past the woman without pausing, silent forms in quintet. The woman didn’t try to stop her, instead reaching under her desk. No doubt to warn someone.

That was fine with Star. She was here to talk.

The man in the big office was baseline-unassuming. She had heard him speaking in Mandarian before she passed through the wall. The man was hanging up, after telling his caller that he had to call back. There was a smile on his plain face as he rose and bowed to her. “Ms. Starseed. Welcome to Van Hout Elites. What may I do for you?”

[WhiteRain]

Chang relaxed back in the chair she’d formed of herself, listening as Darion gave his report. She could sense his agitation. It showed in the small twitches of muscle around his jaw, in the way he tapped the table with rhythmic reliability.

Snow looked inconsolable. She had not been crying, she wasn’t half the girl she looked, but she seemed about ready to rip someone in half with her bare hands. She was strong enough to do it, too. She sat off to one side of the small table, while Darion occupied the chair on the opposite side.

“And that’s about it,” Darion said. “It’s not been long so there isn’t much information available. I appreciate you bridging over. I know you’re busy over on the islands.”

Chang waved it off. “Sakura is a friend. I did anticipate that something might… happen to her if she was not careful. Or if she did surround herself with strong enough protection.”

Darion sighed. “That isn’t fair. Einherjar’s dick-waving contest was pretty distracting. God knows what would have happened if that escalated further than it did. I’ve been in touch with my lawyers and we’re collating data to put to Utopia and the N! Report. I figure we might as well make good of a bad situation.”

She inclined her head. Darion was always a level headed Nova. At times it was easy to lose sight of the value of that quality in the midst of so many philosophical discussions and world-changing discoveries. “Fools will be fools. It is the manner of Kings and Gods to let everyone else suffer for their grievances. It is no different with Mal and Pax, or any other powerful Nova. All feel the shock if Atlas shrugs. It is prudent of you to collect this information. We should be able to find a use for it. The problem we have now is what to do?”

Snow began to grind her fingers into the table, leaving deep gouges in the wood. “We find who did it and I show them what Meh’Lindi’s taught me about being a monster.”

“Straightforward,” Chang said, “but futile. Elites work for money. We need to follow the trail back to whomever hired them. As it stands we lack much in the way of relevant information. What was the motive, if not her demise? Where is she being held? Why act now? Why use such a small company when Anna DeVries offers the best? Is it a matter of funding, or a deliberate tactic?”

Darion shook his head. The overhead lights glinted in his silver eyes and shone on his silver hair. He was a lovely man. If Chang was interested in men she would have bedded him long ago. He never chose to be a woman around her, perhaps for the best. He was not half as flexible as most of her close confidants, lovers and friends. “It could be any. And that’s the problem. I’m a good hacker so I’ll see if I can make progress via the OpNet, but I’m sceptical. They’ll have their bank accounts protected, and client confidentiality is a big deal. Sooner or later I expect Geryon will organize a grab and run on one of the Van Hout higher ups, then squeeze them for information. God, what a mess.”

Chang laced her fingers. It was a mess. She put a lot of stock in Sakura’s success. It was important for the future of Nova kind, even if some of the more short-sighted of her colleagues could not see it. Sakura was a fertile Nova, though, and for that reason alone the search for her would be fevered. The fact she was able to make other Novas fertile only made her more important.

Unfortunately that opened up a library of possible interested parties. On the surface it seemed to shut out Proteus. They would want her dead, and quickly. She was too dangerous to live. Of course, if they were behind her abduction, it might also be the case that they wanted to research how she could ‘cure’ their sterility cocktail. There were arguments for just about everyone, including the cults she once mentioned.

What can I do? That was the true question, and why Darion invited Chang to Ibiza. I can listen. The whispers of the past where hers to listen to, it could be that there was something to be gleaned from chatter between the elites. That was unlikely, however. Professional soldiers – contrary to the movies – did not loudly announce their goals. If they had Puck or other Novas in Ibiza would have already heard. The best Chang could do was observe, consider, and try to piece together information as it came in. That and lean on the people she knew to gather that information.

“Will we be joined by anyone else?” She asked.

Darion shrugged. “I have no idea. I asked everyone who was there to turn up and share what they’ve found out. Will they turn up? Who knows. Puck went running off in the middle of the kidnapping. Tells you where his focus is. Snow could have been dead for all we knew then and off he goes with his fuck buddy.”

Snow smiled. “Come on, Darion, you’re being a little harsh. It was just eclipsodol.”

“And they could have put a bullet in your head while you were out. You and that tiger guy.”

Chang nodded. “Puck’s lack of responsibility is a personality trait. It will fade. He was strongly against the Anavasi’s support of Sakura and did not gel with her personally. It does not surprise me that he showed no interest in her wellbeing.”

“Darrik will be here. He wasn’t happy at all. Starseed’ll probably spare a body to give us an update. She’s everywhere, bit like Lucrezia. Speaking of which, I hear she’s… pleasantly indisposed.”

Chang’s breath caught. Her wife had been in chrysalis for several weeks now, all of her bodies melded together and reabsorbed until she melted down into a perfect egg of shining, solid latex, supported on a cradle a little like an eggcup. It was lonely. The yearning was with her all the time now. It was a tension in her gut and in the back of her mind. In a simple, visceral way, her cock missed her. But the lack went through her like sound through water, permeating every ounce of Chang’s being. She had almost forgotten what it felt like to be alone.

“Yes,” she said.

“Congratulations,” Darion said, and gave a little salute. “Every cloud has a silver lining, and all that.”

“The events are unrelated. My joy at one cannot assist with my grievance at the other. Well, I suppose we shall have to wait and see. As it stands we do not know where, when, who or why. Hopefully our sources will change that.”

[Toby Lupin]

"We'll see." Chang at least, knew Darrik was there from the weight on his feet suddenly on the floor near one wall in the room before his voice spoke. He nodded with a brief smile in greeting to Chang before pacing a little forward to fill in everyone on the updates they would expect. "Not much surprise," he suddenly admitted, "but Puck isn't familiar with Sakura's signature and is in the Creche rectifying that. Several of Star just got to Van Hout offices in Taiwan."

"And you?" Darion asked.

"Staying here." Darrik explained. "I know Chang had heard from Puck about our finding 'something'. The end result seems to have been the development of an Exalt! gestalt or psychic network. At the moment, I'm better off here, passing on what Puck and Star pick up."

[Karren Gaunt]

Meanwhile, Coraline was, to put it bluntly, very unhappy. The metamorph had gotten the news of Sakura's kidnapping an hour or so after it happened, and the chain of failures that allowed it to occur made her quite literally turn red before she got control of herself. Herself blinded by the Club's privacy measures and needing to protect her cover. The Terats who were supposed to be protecting Sakura distracted by a brawl involving a member of Team Tommorow and King Einherjar. It galled her, and she had been on the hunt ever since.

Coraline had reached out to her contacts in the Aberants, the Congo, DeVries, and her core team. Norman too in the hopes he'd be able to help *somehow*. If all this wasn't a distraction to keep them spinning in circles long after Sakura, her mentor, her friend, had been shot in the head by a nova killer bullet and her corpse warped into the heart of a star, if Sakura was, in fact, merely being held hostage, she'd be found.

Alex could datamine like no one else. Hopefully she would.

Starseed, literally, could have a finger in every pie at once.

Coraline? She was a set of eyes, ears, and a nose in the sky, a mere ten minutes from anywhere in a world. So she flew in flashes and steps, far enough to sweep a new patch of terrain below with her senses wide open to anything, contracting her sense of self to almost nothing, filtering a torrent of data at each spot for hints, clues, anything, that might lead her to the emerald nova. Relatively futile, even for her, but she'd try. Node damn her, Coraline was going to try.

[Dawn OOC]

Starseed stared coldly at the unassuming man with five sets of accusing eyes. “You have information I need.” Her voice was as cold as her gaze.

“I see.” The man gave her those two words, his face a mask of bland pleasantness.

The silence stretched. The first to speak lost. The man didn’t seem in a hurry to say anything; Starseed was the one operating on a timeline. When she realized he wouldn’t break until perhaps after the Sakura’s triplets were born, she spoke. Forcing quantum into her voice to make up for speaking first, she ordered, “You will release all information you have about Sakura’s disappearance to me. I know someone hired your elites for this task. I will have their name.”

“You may have their name if you precur the proper warrants. That would be a warrant from the Judicial Yuan, the Taiwanese branch of judicial authority, and the People’s Republic of China. Once you have satisfied both of those august bodies, you will receive the records.”

“You will give them to me now!” Starseed let all of her anger seep out, lashing the man with the power of her quantum.

The man stared at her. “When you have followed the proper channels, you will have them. Do not think you can threaten me, either. My secretary has already called the Taiwanese police, who will take a dim view on one of their companies being harrassed by a foreign nova. You know the way out.”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Darion’s phone buzzed. Opening it, he found a list from one of his contacts. It contained the name of all the companies and individuals who had done research or expressed interest in nova fertility. It was a very short list, thankfully; given the unyielding sterility of the nova condition, most companies choose to focus on something that was more profitable. Those left were people with a personal interest in reversing nova sterility. They were also people who’d have a lot of interest in Sakura, as well as a desire to have her and keep her alive.

[WhiteRain]

Darion felt stupid for asking Chang to come out all this way. Reading people was among his better skills, and hiding her feelings was one of Chang’s worst. She would have preferred to stay on the island with her wife.

And who could blame her? God only knew what Darion would have done if his wife were in a similar situation. Though saying that, her clarity was nice to have. He felt like punching something, just the same as Snow, but Chang? She was like ice.

Futile is the word, he thought when she dressed Snow down. He had been an elite once, he knew how it worked. Contractor hires your boss, boss offers the job, you take it or leave it. A bunch of guys took it, obviously. The one they caught, the shapeshifter, had slipped away in the confusion at Forbidden Fruits. That wasn’t something he was going to live down easily. Somewhere there was an elite sitting at home laughing at how amateurish the Teragen’s operation was. He knew this because he used to sit in on just those conversations.

That bothered him a lot. The whole night was a clusterfuck of epic proportions. The natural instinct was to blame everyone but himself. The right thing to do was to blame nobody but King Einherjar the Mighty, worst invitee in the history of the entire clubbing scene.

No, that wasn’t right either, even if he made for a nice venting target. The right thing to do was blame nobody. Events just came together in the right way for somebody to take advantage.

He hoped that he could take advantage of the fact that Sakura was officially under Congolese protection. Einherjar did prove to be a man of honour. Most conventional codes of honour would require him to act to protect Sakura. So far, though, he had heard nothing back after informing the Congo government of the situation their monarch had created. Knowing it was partly his fault, he had to act, surely?

The talk around the table was not productive. Too little info, too many options. Darion ran over what they did know for a while.

Darrik did offer one bit of useful – if that was the right word for it – intel. “Starseed got in touch a while back. Apparently Van Hout office is hiding behind the Chinese and Taiwanese governments. They won’t release their records without no less than two warrants from the police.”

“Like that’ll ever happen,” Darion said. “The Chinese government is to corruption what the average sumo wrestler is to a bowl of rice.”

“A dire and mortal threat?” Chang offered.

“No. Ravenous,” Darion said, bitterness flavouring his voice. “Still, we can put pressure on them another way.”

“What do you have in mind?” Darrik asked.

“We point out something they probably didn’t know: That Sakura is under King Einherjar’s personal protection and that he’s not likely to be diplomatic if he gets involved, which his vaunted code of honour will require him to do. Given he’s not fond of the Chinese government already, I think they’ll be able to follow the implications. They won’t roll over, of course, but it’ll get them nervous. It’s one thing to sit behind an implacable wall of bureaucracy, it’s quite another to do it when someone’s setting up explosives at the base of said wall and cheerfully setting up neon signs pointed at the pile.”

Snow giggled. “I’ll handle the signs. I’ll make them pink. Seriously, though, fuck the Chinese.”

Chang looked over at her. “Given the environs I will not take that as a proposition, and assume that present company is excepted.”

Snow stopped, and put on an awkward smile. “Yeah. That. You know what I mean, though? Why is everything with the Chinese such a fucking nightmare?”

“Because the rest of you are ignorant savages who do not understand the proper way of doing things,” Chang said, her four voices forming a calm chorus. “Things are done differently in China. Westerners have no understanding of how to do business there.”

“They understand threats as well as the next person,” Darion said.

“Indeed.”

“You think this will work?”

Chang shrugged. “Westerners hiding behind Chinese indifference and corruption rarely realize that the Chinese are equally indifferent to them. The government will serve up the warrants fast enough if you drop Einherjar’s name. Perhaps even quickly. I suggest threatening both parties. One may be quicker than the other. The Taiwanese government is usually more reasonable and prefers to stay shy of trouble.”

“Or both will do nothing, and Van Hout will bury their records,” Darrik said.

“You’ll find out soon,” Darion said. “Darrik, I want you to engage in this pleasant chat. You have my number so you can call if you need any further information. You’re the smoothest talker at this table. All you really need to do is make them believe that we’ll tell Einherjar, and that if we tell him he’ll come. Nobody sane is going to like that idea. Make it clear that Sakura was kidnapped, and therefore he’s not going to consider anybody between him and her to be an ‘innocent’. They’re at best partners in crime. You'll need to talk to the Taiwanese government, the Chinese, and Van Hout directly. If we're lucky Van Hout will roll over rather than risk an angry Storm God triggering world war three on their door step. And yes, you should make sure they're aware we're not bluffing. This is the survival of our species we're working with, give or take the odd fertile Nova.”

Darrik frowned. “Do we know his honour works like that?”

“No, and neither do they. Put on your best convincing face and talk like the Storm King told you that himself.” His phone blipped. “Hang on.”

Darion clicked the phone open and checked the incoming information. It was a direct feed from the Starling network. Finally. Synapse you old dog, you did good with this little scheme.

“Okay, I’ve just got an update. Don’t know how helpful it will be but I’ll lay it on you all anyway.”

Darion laid out what he had learned in simple, straightforward terms. The names and locations of companies involved in curing Nova sterility, interested persons, all of them people who were sinking massive amounts of research time and capital into the practice right at this very second all over the world.

And there weren’t half as many as might be expected.

“I’ll hit up a couple of those,” Snow said. “I’ll bring Prudence with me. We’re good at making nice, and she’s good at stopping me from tearing people’s faces off when they make me angry.”

Darion pointed a finger at her. “No disintegrations.”

Snow actually cracked a smile. “No transforming into a beautiful monster and eating them, either?”

“It might not go down well and we don’t know if any of these people are involved. They might be. Van Hout remains our best option right now.”

Carver, we could do with some more detail on these persons/companies

[Toby Lupin]

Darrik nodded, with a fierce gaze in his eyes as he considered the directions Darion had given him. "I'll start with the Chinese. If we can't budge them even for fear of Einherjar, then we don't even have Van Hout." Through the gestalt, he requested Star to stay around in shapeshifted animal form and ensure a flurry of document deleting or other record destruction did not take place. Similarly, he updated Puck and suggested he meet back up with Chang and the rest.

Then, he waved farewell, and set out through a shadow-jump to Beijing, to pay a visit to the mandarins in the judiciary. He expected to draw some attention, but fair enough. The Chinese government should realize how serious the matter was.

[Shosuro Miren]

Puck materialized a moment later, looking tired and irritated. "I think I have a feel for her," he stated with out preamble, "but I haven't been able to find her yet. I've managed to cover the most of the Western hemisphere, at least in rough chunks. This isn't like looking for a planet that's glowing with life energies. This whole world is saturated. I could take me....too long. And that's assuming two things: there's not a nova out there sitting on her that can hide her from my senses, and that she's still on the planet."

He scrubbed his face and sighed. "I have everyone I can looking everywhere they can for her, but so far this is a bust. Whoever pulled this off is either powerful, connected, and lucky, or they've been watching, planning, and waiting for the perfect moment to take her. The worst is if they're both." He leaned back in the chair he'd appeared in, closing his eyes again. "I'll keep searching, but....I doubt this way is going to find her."

[WhiteRain]

Darion was a little surprised when Puck materialized, but glad as well. A few Terats might not see the bigger picture with Sakura, but he hoped Puck would. The basic hope of the Teragen was that sooner or later everyone would sign up. Of course Chang – being Chang – devoted an entire section of her speech to the Teragen to exploding that hope, but Darion tried to keep the odd ember flickering.

The Teragen, even in its current flawed incarnation, was the least worst option available. He could see nobody anywhere doing as much for Novas as the Teragen did. Philosophical quibbles, nutjobs and psychos aside, the Teragen was attempting to do some good for their fellow Nova. That mattered.

“Glad you could join us, Puck.”

He made a grumbling sound and stayed reclined in his chair. Either something was annoying him or his mind was elsewhere. Maybe both.

“Darrik my boy,” Darion said, “what on earth makes you think we have to do this legally? We’re the fucking Teragen, and these guys just made themselves the enemies of the Nova race. You think we’re gonna roll over because a bunch of baselines won’t let us defend ourselves? These words you say, they make no sense. Oh no, Darrik, we’ll try and do it nice, but if Van Hout want to make us get naughty, then naughty we assuredly will get.”

“That course of action will have been anticipated,” Chang said, her voice as soft as the sound of dying hope. “Though a small group of elites, they are still elites. It behooves us to consider that whoever hired them to do this may have been intending for this very reaction. Just because Sakura is important to us for her abilities does not mean she is important to the kidnappers for the same. Sometimes the value of a thing lies not in what it does, but in what it will make other people do to attain it. My homeland has always been… twitchy concerning Novas. As a rule of thumb we don’t behave very well. My existence is an embarrassment.”

“You’re not welcome?”

Chang smiled her mysterious smile. “Let us say that I and my government have a… gentleman’s agreement to stay away from one another. They still consider my artistic endeavours to be a sign of China’s strength and I to be Chinese, but my behaviour and proclivities – let alone politics – are quite unacceptable. So distance is the preferable solution. The alternative would require us to talk about things, and one does not talk in China. There is an old verse. ‘Who are the Chinese? Tell me if you know. Only, do so quietly, so as not to cause a fuss.’ It says much about my former people.”

Darion nodded. “I guess it does. Still, you saying we should do nothing?”

“No. I am saying we should not be foolish. Action taken against Van Hout should be of a non-Geryon character. By all means toss Einherjar at them if you can. It’s about time the Storm King stepped down from his throne and did something useful for his fellow Nova. The Congo has proven to be a wasted endeavour to date, a monument to squandered potential every bit as egregious as the baseline societies it apes. That’s why it’s so embarrassing that it’s the closest thing to a Nova society in our age. But I believe I went into that at an earlier meeting.”

Yes. Somewhat. The network almost caught fire in the wake of the Teragen grand meeting, not least because of Chang’s dedicated effort to shame and piss off every Terat present. On the other hand few of the big fish were angered by what she said. Most of them were wise enough to take her words as they were meant: as a meaningful critique intending to galvanize the organization into productive action. The number of Terats considering murdering the Mirror Queen seemed to suggest that she might have come on a touch too thick.

But that was Chang. A philosophical landslide waiting to happen, held in check by her own self-criticism and naturally quiet demeanour. Most likely – unless one of those Terats actually did assassinate her – it would be years before she spoke like that again. And no doubt there would be another explosion in the ranks.

She always says her voice is quiet, Darion thought, but it sounds a lot like thunder to me.

He pulled his mind back to the matter at hand and turned back to Darrik. “Still, if we can’t do this legally, we’ll do it illegally. These are Novas committing crimes against Novas, hiding behind baseline laws. Fuck ‘em. I don’t care what society we end up building in the end, they’d still get their asses kicked for trying to pull this shit. We might not be able to punish them the way they ought to be, but we can make damn sure their crime gets undone. For now we try it nice. After that we start looking at our infiltration options.”

Darrik nodded. “I guess that makes sense.”

“Puck,” Darion said, “you might be able to help us with our search in another way.”

“Oh?”

“Yup. Take a gander.” He sent his phone spinning across the table towards Puck. It came to a stop at a precise angle, facing him as though he had just set it down a moment ago. “It’s a number of companies who are looking into Nova fertility. Snow and Pru intend to check some of them out, but I don’t see why you couldn’t either. Legend has it that you might have a certain… personal interest in Nova fertility.”

He chuckled. It wasn’t a funny joke, really, but any humour right now was better than nothing. It felt weird to take charge in this room of godlings, but two were young, one was not a godling, and the other was Chang. She could lead, but she did not seem to want to.

***

Chang listened to Darion laying out his plans with quiet approval. He had spent too long in the background of the Anavasi. It was time for him to emerge, and show them all what made him the man he was.

She did not mention that she intended to speak with Count Orzais about borrowing Turncoat. If the shapeshifter was not busy, he would be perfect to infiltrate Van Hout and recover the necessary information.

It was likely that the Count would agree that recovering Sakura was a matter of interest to all Novas, and so would be willing to help. Not for free, of course, but not for much either. Perhaps he would want a painting for one of his mansions or even a full Anavasi commission. He did like to keep on the cusp of developments, and at least for now the Anavasi were the hot new thing. Infinity’s reboot of the Cult of Mal was still ultimately putting new paint on an old group. While an interesting development, the changes were not new as such. Infinity’s rise to leadership provided the true talking point.

As it stood, the Anavasi were an unknown from top to bottom. They had much to prove.

Chang was confident that Darion – left to his own devices – would provide plenty of evidence that the Anavasi could be relied on to pull their weight. She had no intention of taking the spotlight away from her adherents the way Narcosis did from hers. The Mirror Queen ruled in name alone. Like any mirror, she would reflect the will of her people.

But from time to time there was her will to consider. Right now she willed for Sakura to be free once again, wiser for this lesson in reality, and able to return to the crèche project better armed against future predations.

She would rather move quietly, though, sight unseen and touch unfelt.

[Dawn OOC]

Though there were six names on Darion’s list, he was able to remove three who didn’t have the resources necessary or, in the case of the Mothers of Mercy Hospital, the one that wouldn’t stoop to kidnapping someone. The nuns there wouldn’t have done such a thing; they were far more interested in converting and pulling Sakura into their ranks. That would happen about the sixth of never.

The remaining three were people who had means and motive. Mannes Eikenboom had approached Sakura at one time to make a nova army. That didn’t make him stand out in any way; so had Conner McBride and Matak Wek. All three of the men were wealthy enough to hire elites; Eikenboom was a citizen of the Netherlands whose reasons for an army were unknown. McBride owned his own island in the South Pacific, and wanted an army of nova sons to help him keep it safe. Wek was a Sudanese warlord who had his sights set on more than just Sudan; rumors were that if he got his nova army he’d begin a conquest of Africa. If true, it’d be the most ill-advised conquest in the history of time; Africa hadn’t been ripe for conquest since Utopia set up in Addis Ababa. All three men had contacted Sakura and been turned down by her; all had the resources and desire. Wek definitely had the personality for kidnapping, and McBride was former Elite and a rumored sadist. Eikenboom was less well known; he lived in Amsterdam and came from money.

[Dawn OOC]

What I'd like everyone to do from this point forward is let a little time pass. Let me know what your PC is doing for the next 5-7 days. I know that Darrik is going to be smoozing with Chinese officials, and it is going to take him that time to weasel his way in to see them, then work through the face-saving they have to do (they want to give him what he wants, but for their own status, they can't jsut give it to him) to get the warrants. With those in hand, Taiwan will only take a day or two to grease the wheels. Feel free to pick up some contacts in the Chinese gov't.

I'd like to know what everyone else is doing during this time, please. Feel free to post below.

[Karren Gaunt]

After the intial days of failure and utter silence from her other sources, Coraline had forced herself to step back from the hunt and *think*. If they hadn't spotted Sakura from above by now, that had to mean she was deep underground, far underwater, or, and this seemed increasingly likely as the days went by, dead and intered in the sun if her kidnappers had any intelligence at all. In any event, her running her Node ragged wouldn't help anyone, least of all herself. There were enough eyes on this that the best she could do was to get back into her neglected comitments and be ready to infiltrate and quietly obliterate the people responsible as soon as she got a hint, a whisper from her sources, of what she was looking for: her friend and her friend's yet-unborn children, alive or dead.

It was time to think, to be still, and reflect about how she could prevent any more kidnappings like this from happening. If the most famous fertile Nova in the world could vanish into thin air amidst her own Terat bodyguards, what chance did the rest have when Proteus and it's diverse flunkies went after them? None at all. And Coraline was going to solve that riddle. Once and for all. No matter what. And pray these particular Motherhunters were dumb enough to leave Sakura alive. Her generation deserved that much luck.

[Toby Lupin]

It took Darrik five days to get the Chinese warrants in hand, approved by the Economic Tribunal and double-stamped by the Enforcement Tribunal, to ensure that the Van Hout corporation had no other recourse to legally counter the former's decree. Also, alongside the warrants themselves, as an extra punitive measure for threatening the nova race like and to show Sakura's friends were not playing games here, certain orders freezing the assets of Van Hout in China, of which there were naturally considerable amounts.

There was barely any reason Van Hout would wake up in time, mired in their smug arrogance - and besides, legally and less than legally they didn't have a chance. The formal arrangements, though conducted with a certain lack of warning to the defense, were under Darrik's thumb. One could have made it go faster, but part of the Chinese judiciary's (the judges and officials he spoke to) incentives to cooperate was that they could do so in this official face-saving manner and not fall over like dominos.

Still, all the facts really went Darrik's way. One: Van Hout had been identified by its own captured operatives as culpable in a kidnapping in Ibiza, Spanish soil. Sakura, clearly something of a celebrity now, and with quite many friends who were anxious for her swift and safe return. The Teragen didn't need referencing, Darrik was known right now to be a Terat, his presence told that for itself. And the big one, Einherjar.

Of course, Darrik assured them, it would be deplorable for Ein to attack Beijing, but who knows? The Nordic-Congolese barbarian king had to be dissuaded, and prompt Chinese efforts might actually improve relations. In short, there were a perfect storm of strategic reasons to ultimate dig the Chinese into place on Darrik's side.

And in truth, his nova social muscle had wowed the bureaucrats too. It was telling that Darrik accepted a celebratory evening at an upscale Beijing nightclub with the same judges on the Enforcement Tribunal after the gavel came down. Of course, they wanted to keep him away from their wives too.

Taiwan proved similar, but less wish to stand on ceremony. Two days there, and warrants and asset freezing were fixed. Also, Darrik requested, and got bailiffs down to the Van Hout offices in the name of 'evidence securing.' Now, Van Hout would have to recognize their straits and cut the crap.

OOC

Those in the loop: Star, Puck, Darion, Chang, etc, have been receiving regular updates as events warrant.

[WhiteRain]

Darion was on a plane inside twenty four hours. It would deliver him to a place pre-arranged, a private airstrip that would take him to the home of Matak Wek, a Sudanese warlord with delusions of grandeur and an unwise idea.

He had asked Puck to investigate Mannes Eikenboom in Holland. Puck was a civil sort. It seemed a good environment for him. A man like Matek Wek, though… that was Darion’s kind of encounter.

Darion was no fool. Terats had a bad habit of underestimating baselines. Darion knew better. He – then she – spent long enough as an elite that he had seen how much damage they could do when correctly equipped, when rightly prepared. Being shot was not fun.

His power suit had been packed up and waited for him at the location. It was time to brush off the old Starling again.

A handsome man with silver hair and eyes became a beautiful woman with silver hair and eyes, a figure to die for and armour that could help anyone perish if they were in the mood. She had made improvements to the armour since last she wore it. There was a hardlink into the Starling network, allowing her to continue uploading and downloading information on the fly. Money was bouncing back and forth across the world in a digital blizzard as Darion purchased information and bought informants. Most of the more idealistic Terats could be motivated easily. The less so liked the feel of money and were willing to look for information to cash in on the dozens of significant bounties Darion had set up.

Geryon – never a friend of mercenary Starling – said he would look into the matter. Sakura was a fertile Nova and one who could let infertile Novas have children, and under their own terms as well. Geryon did not need additional motivation to want Sakura freed. Starling gave him information for free on this one.

Finding Sakura was not business. It was duty. Money was just a way to grease the wheels for those who did not recognize duty when it flashed before them.

How much use they could be, Darion could never guess. Geryon carried heavy responsibility on his bunched, muscular shoulders. At the least, though, he was another boogie man that could be wielded like a stick. Nobody sane wanted Geryon to pop up in their back yard.

The Sudan was not very friendly to Novas, but Darion made his way through its places and peoples. Sometimes she wore disguises, sometimes she cut down soldiers or shot them or assassinated them. Whatever was needed, Darion did.

He made his way to Matak Wek and arranged an interview. Veiled threats worked well when the man knew he could follow through. And in that interview she pressed him with the urgency of her mission, was honest about Sakura’s kidnapping and that Matak was a suspect. She told him that she was hired to find Sakura before someone else did, she let Matak Wek know that the Teragen were on the trail and they had the same information she did, that they might well be on their way behind her.

She made sure Matak knew that cooperation was in his best interests, on every level imaginable. He was a warlord with grand ambitions. He was one inch away from being caught in a Nova crossfire.

Darion put her faith in the idea that Matak Wek was no fool, and that, having deployed elites in the past, he would know how bad this could go for him. The only question was, if he knew something about Sakura’s fate, did he think himself smart enough to deflect the Teragen’s investigation?

[WhiteRain]

Conner McBride, owner of his own little island in the ocean, most likely did not expect the arrival of Snow and Prudence. But then, who did?

They were dropped in by a Terat friend, and Snow snapped her ribs out into fleshy wings to float down the rest of the way. On the ground Snow snapped and cracked and swelled into her back-bent naked shape, mouth agape in chest and jaw, head rotated one hundred eighty degrees.

Prudence swelled and writhed, tentacles emerging from all her orifices and her flesh stretching like a swollen bag. They were a pair of roiling horrors straight out of nightmare, both of them angry with this turn of events, both filled with the righteous indignation that fuelled the Teragen from the very beginning.

Screams were what they wanted, and got. When resisted, Prudence’s tentacles and Snow’s teeth incapacitated it. Darion stressed that nobody should die, so they were as gentle as invading horrors could be, leaving scars on the minds of those before them, instead of on their bodies.

The meeting with Conner would go as nicely as he wanted. Snow declined to resume a human appearance. Prudence sucked her tentacles back in, shifted to a shape not her own, kept her seven heads, seven arms, seven breasts. Enough to freak anyone out, but not so much that even simple conversation would become inconceivable.

It was good cop bad cop on a Lovecraftian scale. And if he resisted… well, Prudence could twist his emotions at will, and fill his mind with such terror that it would either snap, or he would crack and tell them all the wanted to know just to let him be.

Darion told them he wanted an army of Novas to defend his island. They were more than happy to let him see just what it was he had been thinking to buy.

[WhiteRain]

While the Anavasi mobilized, Chang moved in other circles, visibly absent from the search for Sakura, no more than morale support. She doubted that Darion’s information would come up with the goods, though it might lead to other leads. But such visible searches were useful. They were – if nothing else – a good distraction.

She arranged a meeting with her old friend Count Orzais, another of their many chess matches. He knew her goals, of course. He always did.

While they talked of recent happenings and discussed events in the world and the Teragen, about how things were shifting in the wake of the grand meeting, about the ramifications of the Cult of Mal being taken over by the newly transformed Infinity. About Chang’s speech, and how hurt the Count felt at such harsh words.

All was smiles, of course. He of all people knew who Chang spoke to, and the intention behind her words. It was a quiet warning hidden behind double speak, a ‘be careful what you say’ that he knew she would not listen to.

Eventually though, Chang turned directly to the issue of Sakura. She discussed the importance of the crèche to the future of all Novakind, about how much trouble could come from someone who forced her to use her abilities for their benefit, and how great a loss it would be if she were to die.

The Count was moved, or so it seemed. Of course he knew all of this and Chang knew that, but such was how the game was played. She turned to specifics soon enough, mentioning that the Anavasi were mobilized, but that she doubted her people had the resources they needed to solve the problem alone. They were former Pandaimonion for the most part. Information was not their speciality. Finding people was not something they needed to worry about. Most of them were best at character assassination and those sorts of shadow games.

The Casablancas, though… they existed for this sort of thing.

Chang put forward the idea that her Anavasi made a good shield, that everyone would be watching the new Terat faction making waves, making itself known. She put forward the idea that now was an ideal time for Count Orzais to act without being noticed, and to maybe ask Turncoat – if he was free – to slip into Van Hout and maybe access their servers to read all information related to Sakura’s case.

Of course, the Count had other resources, other Terats loyal to him, and vast potential actions he could take. When their chess game ended they kissed each other on both cheeks, said that they must do this again soon and never be strangers.

Chang returned to her new home, sure that the Count would do something, but with no idea of what, or when.

[Dawn OOC]

Cora’s study of the kidnapping was an enlightening exercise in how an elite team working together and taking full advantage of a distraction could steal someone away into thin air. Unfortunately, it didn’t offer much help on where Sakura was now. That was one Cora’s mind as she went back to her neglected duties and left the work to others: that perhaps this would never happen again, if she was vigilant enough.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Darrik chafed at the entire Chinese affair, but even he had to admit it had been fun at moments. Some of the parties had been fun, once he’d gotten behind key closed doors. Learning about some fun Chinese sexual deviancies had been a bonus.

Now, it was down to business, and to getting the information he needed. He expected issues when he stalked into the back office at Van Hout; instead, he got full cooperation. The Managing Officer, who introduced himself as Yang Lin, pulled up the required information. The warrant required Van Hout to turn over the names of the elites and buyer who had requested this contract. Darrik could practically taste victory, only to have Lin frown and say, “The kidnapping of your friend wasn’t formally contracted through Van Hout.”

“What?” Darrik asked, starting to scowl.

“It must have been freelanced.” Lin held up a hand. “No worries, Van Hout will offer all aid. From the powers you’ve described, I know which team you are talking about. They are currently in the field, but I will recall them. They will have the answers for you shortly.”

Shortly was the next day and Lin actually looked pensive when Darrik had returned for his information. “They would not tell me.”

Darrik’s eyes narrowed and he ran through a range of threats that were appropriate here. “You promised cooperation.”

“And you will have it. Only one person could override me.” Lin paused, clearly struggling, before he said, “The owner of Van Hout – Mannes Eikenboom. He has told them to keep their silence, for some reason I do not know.”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

“I had nothing to do with that.” Matak Wek was not un ugly man. He wore brutality like most man wore clothing, but he didn’t pull it off nearly as well as Einherjar did. Still, Darion didn’t doubt the man’s honesty. Wek had met his eyes, but not too intently; he hadn’t stiffened or flushed, any of those give aways that people offered when lying. “You wouldn’t have found me if I had, because I’d have dragged that pretty bitch into a dark hole to make babies with her.”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

There was another option, one that the two nova women hadn’t considered. While his men had screamed and tried to shoot them, Conner had seen what was coming for him. It was a nightmare, all the women he’d ever beaten or raped or killed, coming for him in two monstrous, terrible forms. It was no small thing to say his mind utterly snapped. By the time Snow and Prudence won their way into his panic room, he’d already redecorated it with the inside of his skull via the medium of a 9 mm.

His second in command, a whiny weepy fellow name Marko was far more alive and forthcoming. His information was delivered between screams and drooling, but he made it very clear that Conner hadn’t even mentioned Sakura recently, much less kidnapped her.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Oddly, it wasn’t the Count who called Chang first with more information. It was the Morrigan. “I pulled some of the Storm King’s strings. I have it on good authority that this wasn’t authorized by any government. Now, what else have you uncovered since Sakura went missing?” That was probably the most the feral nova had said to Chang in her entire life.

[SalmonMax]

Meanwhile, in the nerve center of Primus, Alex added a set of queries to the system that coordinated and did low level screening on incoming electronic intel. It was unfortunate, but as much as she sympathized with Cora's plight, she couldn't spare her physical presence at the moment. Information though...that could be handled by background processes, then thoroughly analyzed. It wasn't fast, not even for her.

The search spiders she'd created would be nearly unrecognizable to baseline hackers. They were sent out in disassembled packets, masquerading as 'junk bits.' The random fluctuations in data that were commonplace over the internet and wireless services. Any normal system cached them for a few milliseconds to make sure they weren't important, then purged them. The span of time involved meant it wasn't useful for hacking. However, she'd worked them out so that the pieces would assemble in the cache and immediately spawn a near-copy before being purged. The copy replaced that step with an immediate spoof of the cache registry, concealing its presence there and sparing itself the next purge. These utilities targeted high traffic servers and trunk line repeaters, and could sample immense quantities of data without anyone being the wiser.

She could find searches on Google, Yahoo and other search engines, and track them down to an IP. The system was able to scan forums and message boards, using infected systems as 'zombies' to send more conventional netspiders out in vast quantities. Facebook and Twitter feeds. Photodumps. Emails that passed through the infected servers, which was most of them by virtue of having servers on the major trunk lines. Not just internet either...major cellphone routing systems and towers let her scan texts as well, and her custom image-recognition software had better than 75% hit rates when scanning camera memories.

The system produced an ocean of data every second, and even with the advanced computation abilities of Primus' computers, and occasional help from Alex herself, it came with a backlog of flagged 'hits' for further review. Upgrading hardware and software was an ongoing process, and she'd improved its efficiency, but it was still time-consuming to find what one really wanted. Even so, it was a small price to pay for having, in some ways, the whole world be your spy agency.

And if that wasn't enough, the computer could coordinate the datamining information with intel gathered from the 'birds and bees' remote recon drones, which could listen and take pictures of their own, adding speech and image recognition software to the mix to get eyes and ears on the ground in the location.

Alex kept the list of search terms small, to try to keep the return rate manageable. It was a measure of her desire to help Cora that she was willing to add to it.

'Green plant nova woman' The logic filter was set to prioritize hits by relevance...that was, how many search terms were matched within each hit. The more, the higher the priority. Terms in the correct order, within the same sentence or at least very close to each other, also pushed the priority up. After a moment's consideration, Alex added one more. 'Pregnant.'

Then she went on with her own work...letting the system to its job.

(OOC - Hope this is enough to give an idea of what she's up to. Any questions, just PM or tell me in chat when I'm in next.)

[Toby Lupin]

Darrik went quiet, as inwardly, he realized that the answer was handed to him on a plate now. "Actually, you've been quite cooperative, thank you Mr. Lin. All that I ask now is if you can call Mr. Eikenboom, and inform him you need a face to face meeting, which will be of the utmost importance. Don't mention me at all. But I expect to know when and where, so that I can drop in."

Still tense and worried about offending the inhumanly persuasive nova, Lin still objected to the subterfuge with his employer, and the nova recognized he wasn't going to get anywhere pushing, so he relented, Lin could (as he would have anyway) tell Eikenboom it was Shadowheart who wanted to speak with him. Darrik waited outside while Lin would make the arrangement. Darrik smiled thinly, sending a mental message to Puck over the gestalt.

Puck's messages had gotten steadily more and more irritated over the week, a child-like frustration emotionally. Apparently Eikenboom had completely eliminated information relating to his whereabouts, no photos, and a young man still with the emotions of someone his actual age of a few years of life was raging over the fact that his supremely impressive intellect and perception couldn't find a wealthy baseline.

His belief that Eikenboom had to be the culprit for Sakura's disappearance had been exceedingly more and more dug in, and Darrik at this point had to agree with him. *Puck, you're right. Eikenboom is the owner of Van Hout, and he told the team that took Sakura to clam up. The good news is, his subordinate is cooperative- and I'm going to see if I can set some bait in getting him to Van Hout. Also, get someone - Synapse if you can on short notice - to focus on tracing the destination of a call Mr. Lin is about to make to Eikenboom.*

[Shosuro Miren]

*I've had people looking into him all week, love. Including Synapse, and he's even doing it for free. The man is a ghost and apparently has been for three years. I've gotten some old pictures pulled up, but no one has seen him since he pulled his magic trick. Aletheia got me his Raschoud file. He's a minor nova, some elevated intellect, but he's not even in the top fifty percent.* Darrik could feel the sigh across the link, as well as the mental background noise of the other Exalt! members working on this issue or a dozen others. *This...I really hope he isn't the one behind this, Shadowheart. If he is, then he's been planning and patient and waiting for this. Do you think he might have known about Sakura before she showed up in the Congo? All of this...it's just too.......perfect.*

*If it isn't him, then we're back to square one. If it is him, then she's alive, but there's a chance that we're never going to find him because he's spent too much time and energy and resources setting this up and there just isn't anything left to follow.* Puck was working himself into a frustrated snit and Darrik could feel him mentally and emotionally step back for a moment. *We need to know more about Sakura. Where she came from, who knew her before. How Eikenboom might have found out about her before a few months ago. And we need to find him. If we're going to do that, we need everyone on the same page. Think you can gather up anyone that cares about her or what she means for the novas sterilized by idiot baselines?*

[Toby Lupin]

*Call in Darion and the others then. Keep someone on that phone call, and I'll consult those of my family. I know Cora for one- and Alex- you know her as Genesis, would help. Hell, Genesis IS the smartest person on this planet, and she has survellaince over the planet. I'll get in touch with them.*

Darrik was relieved by Puck's calming, but equally worried about the implications of his words.

[WhiteRain]

Chang’s surprise showed in the way her eyes shifted colour, from a fairly usual red and blue to green and gold respectively. She leaned back in her self-seat and steepled her fingers. “The Morrigan herself. My my my, this is an interesting turn of events. I’ll not delay you, something tells me you have no interest in socializing. As I understand it your attempt in Forbidden Fruits lies at the heart of this whole disaster, after all.” Her four voices were a musical harmony, lacking in judgement. She was not in the habit of taunting Novas who were not named Scrambler.

The Morrigan did not answer her. This was almost certainly something she undertook either on someone else’s say-so, or with great personal effort. Strain showed in every word she had spoken, it rang like a symphony of pain in Chang’s ears, as if she represented something dark and personal to The Morrigan. Either way, she doubted it would be wise to prolong their conversation.

“I am not the nucleus of the search. I didn’t even know she had been kidnapped until some while after the fact. The person you should be talking to is Darion Mográine. I believe he made some dramatic gesture on the night in question and was the one who contacted you in the first place. I’ll put you in touch.” She gave The Morrigan a smile and sent a message to Darion on her phone. He answered almost immediately. “He’ll be ready to talk to you in an hour. For the meantime I can tell you we weren’t expecting governmental involvement anyway. Van Hout are too little league for any significant power to be involved. If it was some third world country we’d have found her already and chastened the criminals. I’d say it’s almost a guarantee that this is either the work of a complete independent, or a shadow game launched by a secondary party. As it stands the only significant lead I’m aware of is Van Hout themselves. Darion, I’ve no doubt, will let you in on the details in an hour.”

She was not offended when The Morrigan just nodded and ended the call.

[WhiteRain]

“Suicide? Really?” Darion stalked down the corridor with Snow and Prudence at his side.

“You keep saying that like it’s our fault,” Snow protested.

“Oh yes, I’m sure Mr. McBride’s temple became magnetic or something.” He put his fingers into the shape of a gun and mimicked blowing his own brains out.

Prudence laughed. “Not quite. I don’t know why you’re so upset. His second in command wasn’t lying, I’m sure of it. Sakura’s not there and never has been there. He was scum at best and abominable at worst. The gene pool sent me a ‘thank you’ card. It was pretty.”

Darion stopped and pointed at her. “You know, this is why the Teragen can’t have nice things. We do not play well with anyone!”

Prudence’s throat bulged a little. She opened her mouth and a bunch of tentacles flickered out, black and glistening, just a few inches beyond her lips. She swallowed them again and grinned. Snow laughed.

Darion gave a grunt and stalked onwards. He didn’t mind. All the bitching was to help him blow off steam and they knew it. Or at least, Prudence did. She always knew how people felt. The last week or so had been an exercise in frustration. All of his sources turned up three leads and two out of the three led nowhere. Eikenboom had conveniently vanished into thin air. That made him the front runner, but didn’t prove anything.

All of a sudden he missed Lucrezia. She could have hit all these leads herself at the same time. As for Chang… quiet defined her. Quiet did not signify inaction, though, and he suspected her late quiet only meant she chose to pursue the issue from a different angle. The fact she popped up out of nowhere and said ‘oh hai, one of the scariest Novas in the world wants to talk to you’ certainly backed up that interpretation.

He wasn’t going to start questioning her for that. One of us is on the Pantheon and the other’s not. There’s a reason.

Not that this little flurry of activity did not have side benefits. The Anavasi’s efforts were being noticed by the Teragen at large. It was a small thing, of course, but a good opening effort from the new faction. Sure they might make pretty pictures, some Terats would say, but what use are they?

Shrapnel and her ilk would be impressed by Snow and Prudence’s approach to the problem. They liked unnecessary body count. Geryon would probably appreciate it too. It was showy and it let the baselines know why they should stop fucking about with Novas. The Casablancas would appreciate Darion’s – and hopefully Puck and Darrik’s – more diplomatic approach.

It mattered to keep things in perspective. They were a fingertip closer to finding Sakura, if only by eliminating a couple of possible locations. But making an impression in the larger Teragen would have far-reaching consequences. The Alchemist still needed a month or two to get Mad Lab up to scratch, and the first Mad Lab production, some movie involving half of the core Anavasi membership, needed time to mature and be completed.

In the meantime, efforts like this would help remind the Teragen that they were not a bunch of fawning poseurs.

Darion headed into the conference room he had booked. He turned around and shooed Prudence and Snow. “You’re not coming.”

“Why not?” Snow said, with a girlish pout.

“What did I say earlier?”

Prudence chuckled. “This is why the Teragen can’t have nice things, eh?”

“Precisely. Go on, get. I’ll update you later. As far as I understand it this is just going to be me telling The Morrigan what we know. Which is nothing. Look how exciting our information is!”

He strode into the room, flicked the light on and headed to the front of the table. The room held an absurdly long table with more chairs than should ever be needed in the OpNet age, with a huge wall-wide viewing screen built into the far wall so whoever they talked to would get their faces stretched ten feet wide.

Soon enough, the distinctive visage of The Morrigan popped up on the screen. Darion greeted her dressed formally, sans leather jacket. He cut a great figure in a suit, with his silver eyes and hair done up in a ponytail.

“Morning,” he said.

She grunted. “What have you learned about the kidnapping?”

He fought down his residual anger at Einherjar and answered professionally. “Not as much as I’d like, but it’s only been a few days and it’s a big world. We’ve squeezed the Chinese – always prudent – and identified three primary targets who’ve shown interest in Sakura in the past. We hit them up over the last week. One fell down an elevator shaft onto some death afterwards, the other one rather impolitely told me that he wouldn’t be findable if he had her, and the third hasn’t been found despite our best efforts. As he’s the private owner of Van Hout elites, the odds are favourable that he’s our man. We’re still running data checks and throwing info nets to locate other options, though. Just in case.”

The Morrigan listened patiently. Whether or not she found his report either interesting or impressive he could not have guessed. “And who is this man?”

“Name’s Mannes Eikenboom, a Dutch low-level Nova. He dropped off the grid three years ago. Everything points to this whole fiasco being a long-term plan that just happened to hatch during your boss’s…” he held back the unflattering remark that was desperate to be heard, “disagreement with Wendigo. We haven’t identified the individual Novas involved in the attack at Forbidden Fruits. If we can crack Van Hout’s files that’ll help but the Chinese are being slow on that end. We tossed around the threat of Einherjar-based lightning annihilation to grease the wheels a little. The old ‘Teragen are scary’ card’s rather lost its value these days. Hope he doesn’t mind, but he does have a history with the Chinese and I figured it was worth taking advantage.”

[z-The Morrigan]

“He will not mind.” Morrigan looked sure on that matter. “And if it yielded results, then he will thoroughly approve.” She was quiet a moment, obviously considering options. “It seems that the individual novas involved are the best key here. If they are working at Eikenboom’s direction, then they might know where he is.”

“That had occurred to me, yes.” Darion didn’t quite keep the sarcasm from his voice.

“I never doubted it had. Some of us are not as fast as you.” If she was insulted, it didn’t show in the intense gaze of her red eyes. “How likely is it that we will find the individual novas?”

“Given time, very likely.”

“Given what we know about Eikenboom, is Sakura still alive?” There was no distinct emotion to say if the Morrigan preferred her to be found alive or not but there was an odd flicker of green in her scarlet eyes. It was gone in a second, but Darion had seen it.

“Probably. His interest in her was mostly regarding her fertility abilities. A little hard to make use of her fertility without her being alive.”

“I am ready to assist, physically. Where should I go to join the hunt?” She was still giving him the unreadable feral visage and Darion wasn’t sure what she was thinking at that moment.

[Karren Gaunt]

When Darrik had finally gotten around to telling Coraline about the progress on his end of things, she had been rather terse as she waited out the full tale, colors flickering up and down the visible spectrum. And then she had shared her relative nonprogress back with a very simple offer, chorus tense but with a note of grim hope now that she had a name. This was why she put so much work into making friends and allies outside her family.

"Darrik, give me a list of areas you think would be worth quietly investigating, and I will leave no stone unturned investigating them. And if I find Sakura or evidence of Sakura having been there, you'll know as soon as I do. I'll be passing this along to the people I know to see what they can do with it. Thank you."

[Toby Lupin]

"You're not going to simply go off by yourself." Darrik stated firmly, not wanting Cora's independent streak to derail the work here. "Get Alex to help us if you can, but there's going to be a meeting, if you can come, involved members of the Anavasi, me, and I want you and Alex there if you're going to help. We're going to have to plan this out seriously before we make our next moves- Eikenboom has proved a ghost so far, surprisingly."

[Karren Gaunt]

Darrik's ever-changing sibling chuckled behind one hand despite herself and the situation, "I'll do what I can to get Alex to spare more than a spare set of eyes for this and make an effort to attend the meeting if you give me a time and a place for it, but... No promises on waiting if my sources find a lead first. Sakura is my friend, and every minute that passes is another in which her captors could realise they should kill her if they already haven't. Time is *not* on our side. That they could take her from the midst of the Terragen is in itself bad enough. That someone who wanted to have her to himself can hide from us..."

Every trace of humor died from her expression as she spoke, chorus humming asynchronously, features deadly serious, "This can't happen again, Darrik. No more Motherhunting."

There was a flash of light and the shadowy hearthrob was facing an angel of light, "Any objections to me going to bring my sources into the loop in preparation for the meeting? I'm going to see what the leader of the Aberants has to say about your new hint. With Uncle being... Unreliable, she's our best hope for quantum insight."

Bodymorph: Light

[Toby Lupin]

Darrik sighed lightly, not at Cora's request but at her lack of understanding of the situation. "I can't stop you, Cora. Anyway, you're not getting something. One, you might want to realize that the abduction occurred thanks to the perfect distraction of a Storm King without control and at least regard for the surroundings where he chose to make a spat. Second- Eikenboom is NOT a motherhunter, at least in the traditional sense. He made advances to Sakura before for the use of her fertility for quite military breeding. She'll be alive. The fact is, he's clearly planned very extensively, so if you bull ahead- he'll catch on and the whole chase continues."

[Karren Gaunt]

"If he's the one we're after, Darrik, and someone hasn't framed him so we can find him for them," Coraline countered with productive happiness dyeing her photonic form warm happy shades of yellow, blue, and green in waves, "But he seems pretty likely, so I'm looking forward to the meeting. Oh, and *if* they run this time, I think I know someone who can help us keep up the pursuit. I'll bring them into the group for this."

The metamorph chuckled polytonically and spared a final wave for her adoptive sibling, swan diving into the ground and away from the scene.

[Dawn OOC]

Alex wasn’t able to draw anything up on a search, but that wasn’t surprising given the depth to which Eikenboom had covered his tracks. She was able to find his records up until the point that he disappeared, but in the six years prior to him disappearing, some interesting holes had developed in his finances. Much of his money simply… disappeared.

That indicated that he’d worked on funneling the money away to somewhere he’d have access to it after hiding. It could always have financed his current retreat, so Alex devoted a bit of time to that, too. Finding where his money went was a long, involved puzzle that meant combing through databases – something Alex didn’t mind at all. It was rather fun!

Gradually, she began to piece where the money went and she dug deeper into shell companies and fronts, slowly building a picture. Most of the money went to numbered Swiss accounts – exactly what Alex expected it to do. Some went to buy gold – not stocks but actual physical wealth. Some went to an account that paid out monthly stipends to a woman living in the Congo. Alex dug into her history and found that she was an immigrant from Sierra Lorne who had a single son. She’d gained access to this account just before his birth and had moved to the Congo with her wealth. There, she’d lived a quiet, good life with her son.

The rest, less than twenty percent of Eikenboom’s shifted money, had gone to various companies which created parts for space-worthy housing and vehicles. Alex found that very interesting, though at that point it became very murky what the money had bought. The young woman was forced to conclude that any dealings had been verbal in nature in exchange for the appearance of investment.

But it had given Alex an important clue. Sakura likely wasn’t on earth anymore.

---

Darion welcomed the news that Sakura wasn’t on Earth anymore. It meant that their searching on the planet hadn’t been in vain; it had confirmed Alex’s theory. It also meant that Puck could focus on searching outward. A quick call set the lad to the task; though he promised he would do it as soon as possible, it would still a bit before he could do it.

Cora also welcomed this news. Though she didn’t like the fact that the scale of the search had widened, it also offered the chance that Sakura was still alive. She just had to be found.

Now, they needed the next clue.

---

Darrik was tired of getting nowhere with finding Sakura. So he did what he did best – he found people to talk to. Alex gave him information about where some of Eikenboom’s money had gone, so he went and made friends. It was easy – they were all baseline owners and managers, and their relationship with Eikenboom was three years old. From them, Darrik learned that most of the money had gone two places: the first to build housing on the moon and the second to building a complex on Mars.

The house on the Moon had an odd suite built within it, with locked entrances and an attached suite for another person. There was a scheduled drop arranged; the company during the drop had agreed to leave the packaged supplies every couple of months. The complex on Mars was much more like a large house, build with safeguards and amenities for a comfortable and hidden life.

---

Armed with the information from Alex and Darrik, Darion set Cora to searching the Moon. It was a lot smaller than Earth. Puck had said she wasn’t there, or on Mars. That meant she was being hidden, which wasn’t an uncommon tactic. Cora herself hid from other novas all the time. So the beautiful teen was reduced to a visual search.

There were a few research stations on the moon. They were public and well-known, and Cora merely flitted through them to be thorough. Beyond that were the private compounds, built by isolationists and even one cult, who set up on the ‘dark’ side of the moon and embraced the darkness of space. It was only a matter of time before she found the complex.

Of course, the glowing patch of fungus outside of a complex was a big clue.

Cora swept down from above and through the wall. She hit paydirt immediately: Sakura was resting on a couch. Cora shook her awake, attuning her at the same time, and told her, “I’m getting you home. Now.” Without giving her a chance to argue, Cora turned them both intangible and rocketed for home and safety. She didn’t stop until she’d delivered Sakura to Darion, smiling as the two novas hugged eagerly.

Now that was a happy ending.

[z023]

deleted

[Quantum Fire]

Nice story

End of Thread

XP: 3 Standard, 3 Baseline, 4 Nova

Bonus: Sakura - 1 Standard XP

Note: I merged this thread with the captivity thread, to bring it all under one roof so to speak.

[Karren Gaunt]

Still hovering in her energy form, the metamorph made a noise that would be clearing her throat if she currently had a throat. "Not to interupt," her chorous intoned warmly, "But there was another person up in the base where you were being held, Sakura. Is he worth going back to collect or should we move to checking out the Martian facility and collecting the man aparently behind all this if he's there? I'd like to see Mars terraformed one day and rather not have people who kidnap my friends living there."

[z023]

She didn't pull away from Darion, but did shift so she could nod at Coraline. "Conrad, yes. Please go get him. He helped me, the little he could do, and I don't want to leave him stranded there. His family...they'll probably need help and protection as well."

Creases formed on her forehead as she frowned, "Martian facility? Is that where the Dutch man is? I never learned his name...." Darion could feel her shiver and she turned her face away from Coraline, wanting to not have to deal with all the aftermath of the kidnapping yet. Maybe ever. "Yeah," she said softly. "We should...he shouldn't...he needs to be stopped. From being able to do this again...to anyone else...."

[Toby Lupin]

Darrik stepped forward to lock eyes with Sakura, serious as he answered. "Mannes Eikenboom, and yes, he'll pay. He may be a nova, but his disregard for you, trying to force you into whatever he had planned- he'll answer for it. Though at the moment," he expression happily softened. "You're here and well." He gave into her pull and kissed her on the cheek. "Welcome back, Sakura, we've missed you."

[WhiteRain]

Plans had a habit of coming together suddenly and completely when Novas were involved. Flashes of inspiration, precognition, or just flat-out supernatural look could propel a thing from disorganized, rambling chaos into a surge of hyper-accurate, directed activity in the blink of an eye.

That more or less happened here. He tried to keep things organized, but there came a point where raw power just bulldozed over everything and he got to sit back, put his feet up and wait powerlessly for things to settle again.

Luckily enough, it all went just right.

He waited in the conference room, with its big projector screen that they never used though he did prepare slides just in case, for only a minute or so before Coraline reappeared, Sakura in arms. You lucky, lucky girl, you.

He slid out of his chair, the last to join the growing crowd of smiling Novas and – therefore – the one required to rain warm piss down on their enthusiasm.

Darion waded into the crowd, careful to avoid the more powerful people in it just in case someone felt uppity. “Guys, we’re all glad she’s back, but please, less hassle. Can someone get her a drink? Coraline, grab the other guy. That should be a given. Darrik, sort out that drink. Coffee, maybe, unless Sakura has her own preference. We can save group hugs for later. Snow, go pass around the good news, Pru, help her with that.”

“I’m a big girl, Darion, I can handle it alone,” Snow replied, with a look in her eyes that said she knew exactly what he was up to.

“Correction: You can fuck it up alone. With the two of you involved, I’m at least semi-confident it’ll work out.”

Snow actually stamped her foot. It caused a crack to form in the ground.

Darion looked down at it. “I’m totally billing you for the repair work.”

Prudence just smiled and gave him a wink, then slapped Snow on the arm. “Come on, Snow, he’s right. We need to spread the good word. Chang’ll want to know at least.”

“But she can probably hear this already!” Snow protested as they headed out the door.

When she’s right she’s right, Darion thought. Though he doubted even Chang was quite able to hear cross-continental yet.

With everyone busy for at least a few moments longer, he took time out to get Sakura sat down and settled. “Do you want a blanket or something? Any other human comforts beside hugs and hellos? Those we can get in short order. Morrigan isn’t here but she helped us network, so you can give her thanks another time. And hugs, maybe.”

[Karren Gaunt]

"Be right back in a heartbeat with our second prize then. But I expect us to be talking about finding this Martian compound when I do get back," replied the metamorph with a polytonic chuckle, going FTL with a thought and a pulse of quantum. She overshot her target first pass, chuckling to herself silently in that strange tachyonic realm where she saw all of creation like a distorted mirror.

A second pass through the Earth's core towards the moon and she coverted back into light passing through the rock to come to a perfect halt within Sakura's former prison. "Conrad?," Coraline called, featureless head scanning the moonbase for traces of the nova, "Sakura likes you, so I'd suggest coming out before I start not liking you. You don't want me to come get you after you helped kidnap my friend."

[Toby Lupin]

Sakura flushed at Darrik's kiss, and exhausted physically, mentally and emotionally as she was, Darrik flushed too, and Darion a bit as well, for the resulting pheromone level was simply racing out of control. Before he did anything untoward, old lusts rising, Darrik quickly asked, "Drink preference?"

"Fruit juice." Sakura replied with a similar speed, since his sheer bad-boy attractiveness was bringing flashbacks of their near-copulation in Ein's palace. Darrik nodded and went off to sort out that drink, though the fact that he was seductively swaying his hips more than usual did not escape her own attentive notice. He was thinking of a sweet juice for her... strawberry, yes. Strawberry, Darrik, exert some control, man.