Chicomoztoc

[Ante]

Naica, Chihuahua State, Mexico

September 13, 2010

The town of Naica, population 4,775, was about what one might expect of a tiny Mexican village. Like much of northern Mexico, the surrounding landscape was dry and barren, with only sparse – and mostly dried out – vegetation to alleviate the monotony of rocks and reddish-brownish dirt. The streets of Naica itself looked like something out of a Robert Rodriguez movie, only without the gun-wielding mariachis and hitmen. It was small, barely holding its head over the Third World marker, and in every way classically Mexican.

The Peñoles offices were a much different story. While not opulent or especially cutting edge by any means, they were most definitely well-maintained and the plaster that lined their exteriors was almost pristine in its whiteness, making the buildings stand out against the surrounding dirt, rocks and hills like something fresh and clean. On the face of it, there was absolutely nothing remarkable about the mining facility at all, other than its seeming cleanliness. But to Grav, and especially to Shreveson, there were indicators of its somewhat exceptional nature. The reinforced, barb-wire fencing, the security personnel with outfits and gear that were just a little too nice. Little things were the only signs that Peñoles was more than just some podunk operation sitting quietly outside of a podunk town in the middle of nowhere.

As the company bus that had transported the three Argonauts from the city of Chihuahua finally pulled to a stop out front of the main offices, a small group of men could be seen coming out to meet them. A few of this group immediately moved the rear of the bus where they began to offload whatever baggage they could find, while the rest waited patiently for Wesson, Shreveson and Gravinski to disembark. As they did they were greeted warmly with handshakes and smiles.

“Greetings!”, said one of the men (in Spanish). He introduced himself as Juan Morales and then turned and introduced each of the other three men standing with him in turn: Victor Mendoza, Jaime Cortes (pronounced ‘Hie-may’) and Raul Garza. It was not immediately clear what positions within the company any of them filled, but they all seemed genuinely friendly and glad to see their guests.

As the Peñoles people were all under the impression that Wesson was the IT expert come to clean up the digital mess that had recently befallen their computer systems, while Grav and Shreveson were engineers come to advise their own engineers on certain difficulties they were having with operations going on at the Gibraltar fault side of the mine, the Argonauts almost immediately found themselves being separated out by their greeting party.

Morales pulled Wesson aside and started leading him towards their offices, exclaiming, “It’s so good you’re finally here. Our systems are a mess! Please, come inside and we will get you your pass and go over some of the details of what’s happened and answer any questions you might have, before taking you down into the mine itself.”

As this was happening the remaining three greeters began to lead Grav and Shreveson towards some vehicles (regular four-doors, but still nicer than the bus they’d just spent a couple of hours inside of). Cortes didn’t say much, but Mendoza and Garza were rather chatty.

“We thought you’d both like to check into your hotel first; have a chance to wind down after your trip here, you know? The plan is to give you both a tour of the mines tomorrow and let you see the operations at both fault lines, and then we can get down to work.”

Garza added (in a mostly joking tone of voice), “But we could give you the tour now if you don’t like the sound of air-conditioned hotel rooms!”

Click to reveal..

OOC: Just as with the crew over in India, each of you has been issued a false ID. What those names are is not terribly important, and you may even use your own names if you want to. None of you is being passed off as Mexican (since all of you are quite obviously not), so there’s no need to worry about that. The Peñoles people are under the impression that you are outside consultants – though not necessarily from America, if any of feels that your character could reasonably pass as someone from somewhere else in the world and wants to give that a try.

You may recall that Lee said there are Section 2 people at the mines. This is true, but don’t expect any of them to reveal themselves to you, except in the case of an emergency. They aren’t supposed to break there cover and neither are any of you.

Wesson, you do not have to get right to business if you do not want to. Morales may be a bit put out if his IT expert needs some ‘down time’ before getting to work, but it’s not like they aren’t giving the engineers exactly that and within earshot, too.

Grav and Shreveson, likewise, you do not have to go to the hotel. You can, if either or both of you prefers to spend an evening sounding out mine workers at a local cantina or something, or you can say to hell with that, get us in that mine!

Let me know if you need anything else from me.

[BlueNinja]

Originally Posted By: Ante

Naica, Chihuahua State, Mexico
September 13, 2010
Morales pulled Wesson aside and started leading him towards their offices, exclaiming, “It’s so good you’re finally here. Our systems are a mess! Please, come inside and we will get you your pass and go over some of the details of what’s happened and answer any questions you might have, before taking you down into the mine itself.”

He smiles, shaking the man's hand and responding in understandable (if accented) Spanish. "Daniel Day, just call me Dan. Let's see the offices, and give me the details. I'll save going to the mines until tomorrow when I'm fresh, but I'm an early riser. Six in the morning too early, or will someone be here?" He glances over at the two 'engineers', and his English suddenly carries a trace of a Boston accent. "Hey, I'll see you at the hotel later. Call me if there's any problems with the rooms if you get there before I do."

Following Morales, he heads towards the large building. "All I got was that your computers crashed, and something about a virus attack? I gotta say, these things are getting more and more sophisticated every year. Hell, sometimes every month."

[Courier]

Steve had changed his clothes and his bearing. His movements were measured, unhurried, and controlled. He'd gotten a crew cut and now wore functional clothes, complete with a closed tool case at his belt. His only attempt at humor a tee-shirt which said in Spanish "I disarm bombs for a living. If you see me running away, try to keep up."

Quote:

As this was happening the remaining three greeters began to lead Grav and Shreveson towards some vehicles (regular four-doors, but still nicer than the bus they’d just spent a couple of hours inside of). Cortes didn’t say much, but Mendoza and Garza were rather chatty.

“We thought you’d both like to check into your hotel first; have a chance to wind down after your trip here, you know? The plan is to give you both a tour of the mines tomorrow and let you see the operations at both fault lines, and then we can get down to work.”

Garza added (in a mostly joking tone of voice), “But we could give you the tour now if you don’t like the sound of air-conditioned hotel rooms!”

Staying in character, Steve answered in Spanish (with a slight French accent), "Never say 'no' to air-conditioning. It's a gift from god. Lead away."

And let's give our other team member a chance to poke around inside their systems before we have to try to break security or fake competence.

If Steve gets the chance he'll try to chat with the greeters, asking them how long they've worked at the site and what issues they've had.

[Ante]

The Too-Early-Bird

Morales turned to regard Wesson, his eyes crinkled a bit around the edges and one eyebrow cocked just the tiniest bit, the expression on his face saying – politely but clearly – ‘are you joking?’

All he said was, “Uh, six? No sir, not normally, but… if that’s when you want to start, I guess I could get here early to get you set up…” It was pretty clear that the man was none too pleased with Wesson at the moment, but he had the good sense and professionalism to keep that to himself as he maintained the pretense of politeness while guiding ‘Dan’ towards the main offices.

In answer to ‘Mr. Day’s’ question, Morales said, “I don’t know who said it was a virus uh, Den*, but there’s definitely something wrong with the systems down there. None of the computers are directly connected to any outside network, so a virus isn’t very likely and, well, it’s not an outcome I want to have to tell my superiors about, you know?”

He smiled a little bit wryly and a little bit uncertainly at ‘Den’, obviously hoping that whatever the problem was, it wasn’t due to outside attack. “Honestly, we think it’s either data-corruption or OS*-related, but we can’t seem to localize the source or reliably reproduce any of the errors we’re seeing. It’s really frustrating.”

Once they’d gotten inside of the Peñoles building, Juan guided Wesson past the front desk and beyond what was obviously something of a security depot for all of the site’s security personnel. Past a non-descript door and Wesson found himself inside the sort of back-office room that seems to have spread clones of itself throughout the world, because Wesson was certain he’d seen this very room before – many times and in many, many places. All of which was to say that it was a dull, unpleasant little room painted an ugly off-white slash off-yellow color.

Inside was an overweight, middle-aged woman who seemed to be pulling double-duty as a member of the site’s security forces and as some sort of secretary, though it was unclear which of the two capacities she was operating in as she ran Wesson’s false information through her computer and then caused it to spit out an official ID Card for him to use while working at the facilities. “This gets you onto the grounds, no problem, but you’ll still need an escort anywhere inside of the mines themselves”, she said firmly but indifferently.

After that was all taken care of, Juan Morales led Wesson back outside and to (what Michal had to assume was ) Juan’s car and the two of them drove to the small hotel that the supposed IT Expert was to be staying at during the next couple of days.

“So”, Morales said as he helped Wesson get his bags out of the trunk, “I’ll pick you up tomorrow? Say a quarter to six?”

Try to Keep Up

“Amen, brother”, said Garza, in response to Steve’s comment about gifts from gods. And then he and his fellow Peñoles employees continued to guide the two Argonauts towards the vehicles.

The drive over to the hotel was surprisingly brief, but then Naica wasn’t a very large town. Even so, Shreveson was able to learn that Mendoza and Garza were both relatively new to the company, having worked in the mines for about a year and a year and a half, respectively, while Cortes was apparently the ‘old hand’ out of the group, having worked as one of Peñoles’ mining engineers for over four years.

Mendoza and Garza seemed like the sort of men who believed in working hard and playing harder, and it was clear that – since they weren’t taking the new arrivals down into the mines on a tour – as far as they were concerned right now was play time. By the time they’d reached the hotel, they were chatting with Shreveson like they were old amigos, and even Cortes seemed to be relaxing a little. Shreveson wasn't even certain that it had anything to do with his own personal charm or if these guys were just that talkative and friendly. Whichever it was, it was likely to help in their investigations.

Mendoza, in particular, seemed dead-set on getting to know Gravinski, no matter how little talking she did, but all three of the men – even the taciturn Cortes – made an effort to engage the attractive ‘engineer’ in conversation (it had already dawned on Shreveson by that point that Grav’s gender and physical beauty were likely to turn into a huge asset on this trip, though it was unclear yet whether or not Grav herself were inclined to agree).

As they all piled out of the car and the three men began to help the two Argonauts unload their baggages, Garza turned to Steve and said, "So, hey, after work the three of us were planning on going out for some drinks, eh? You two want to come?" He winked at them both as he added, "We promise not to keep you out too late!"

Click to reveal..

’Den’: To the average Mexican, there is no more difficult English syllable than the long ‘A’ (it’s about as hard for them to say as it is for the average American to correctly pronounce the infamous Spanish ‘double-r’), making a name like ‘Dan’ extremely difficult to say correctly. Wesson can expect to get called ‘Den’ and ‘Denny’ a lot on this trip.

OS-Related: Actually, this is English terminology and I have no idea if there is a similar phrase in Spanish or not. But whatever. OS stands for Operating System.

OOC: Given the timing, it's entirely possible that Grav and Shreveson are still at the hotel when Wesson finally arrives there, so if you three would like to confer with each other, then by all means do so.

[BlueNinja]

Originally Posted By: Ante

The Too-Early-Bird

Morales turned to regard Wesson, his eyes crinkled a bit around the edges and one eyebrow cocked just the tiniest bit, the expression on his face saying – politely but clearly – ‘are you joking?’

All he said was, “Uh, six? No sir, not normally, but… if that’s when you want to start, I guess I could get here early to get you set up…” It was pretty clear that the man was none too pleased with Wesson at the moment, but he had the good sense and professionalism to keep that to himself as he maintained the pretense of politeness while guiding ‘Dan’ towards the main offices.

Holding up a pacifying hand, he smiles. "No need to get up early. Just let me know what time things start around here, and I'll be ready."

Inside the building, he pokes around a bit, obviously evaluating their 'normal' computer infrastructure. "So, WiNova edition 2, huh? Nice OS, pretty stable. Weird that you'd have these problems with it. What do they operate down there, anyway?" He takes the security badge when it's offered, clipping it to his suit, and 'absent-mindedly' absconding with the pen he used to sign the forms.

((Legerdemain roll, please))

[Courier]

Steve thought, Thank you. You inviting us for drinks is much better than me inviting you. It's amazing how many so called 'high-security' places fall for 'social attacks'. Sometimes that means going through garbage, sometimes that means talking with someone's pissed off ex-girlfriend, sometimes that means putting a pretty girl on someone... Steve looked at Gravinski and mentally vetoed that idea, ...and sometimes it means paying for drinks.

Steve said, "We'd love to. And as long as I'm here I might as well put the company expense account to good use, drinks are on me."

What does the guy code say about this? Oh yes, match drinks with the guy paying for them and try to get the pretty girl drunk. And after a few drinks... try to impress her with how important you are and what you've worked on.

[Grav]

Grav had been playing the aloof engineer role, giving short fairly noncommittal answers and smiling alot. When they offered to take them for drinks she nodded. Drinking was something she enjoyed, though alcohol did little to her anymore. "That sounds great, I'd really like a chance to loosen up and unwind abit after our trip down."

She nodded to Mendoza. "What would make things even better would be if there was somewhere we could go to do a little dancing as well." Her tone seemed to promise that such a thing would be better for everyone involved.

[Ante]

The Too-Early-Bird Gets the… Pen?

In answer to Wesson’s pacifying hand and counter-offer, Morales answered, “Oh, things go around the clock around here, mostly, but that’s down in the mines. The topside offices are closed from 6pm to 8am so there’s not normally anyone up here at 6am to escort you down into the mines themselves. If it’s important, though, I could be here to take you down. We do need the problem fixed, after all.”

,,

While in the Peñoles offices, Michal succeeded in swiping a pen while signing a form, all the while asking his questions. Morales answered them all to the best of his ability and soon enough they were finished with all of the boring preliminaries.

After that was all taken care of, Juan Morales led Wesson back outside and to (what Michal had to assume was ) Juan’s car and the two of them drove to the small hotel that the supposed IT Expert was to be staying at during the next couple of days.

“So”, Morales said as he helped Wesson get his bags out of the trunk, “I’ll pick you up tomorrow? Say a quarter to six?”

Making Things Even Better

All three of the Peñoles employees looked well-pleased as Steve responded to their offer of drinks with a counter-offer of his own, namely, that he would be paying for the drinks! When Gravinski followed that up by suggesting that there be dancing as well – the fact that Anna hadn’t actually said that she’d be dancing with any of them yet didn’t really matter – just the suggestion, coming from such an attractive woman, was enough to lift their spirits. With big grins on their faces, the three men said their goodbyes to the two ‘engineers’ and said they’d be back around in a couple of hours to pick them up from the hotel for the night’s activities.

And then they were gone and Steve and Anna found themselves with a couple of hours to kill.

[BlueNinja]

Having thusly determined that his captors were either unobservant, or terribly careless with office supplies, he enjoys the ride back in fairly comfortable quiet. Slinging the backpack up, he nods. "Sounds good. I'll be waiting out front here, and we can get started. By lunchtime I should be able to give you a firm ETA on how long it'll take to finish up the job."

Inside, he waits a few moments, then makes a quick check for cameras, listening devices, or any other indication that he's being watched. ((I think that would be Tradecraft, but could I fake it with Intrusion?)) Once done, he sets up a laptop next to the window, connecting to a commercial satellite in orbit. First he checks his conspiracy nuts, though it's doubtful they've turned up anything new. Once done with that, he sends off a couple of e-mails, turns it off, and goes to bed. After all, he's got an early day tomorrow.

[Courier]

Steve went to his room and started searching the place for bugs. If he finds some he won't disable them. Whether he does or not he'll eventually get out the "engineer's demolition" trade magazines he brought with him and read them.

[Grav]

Grav didn't even bother with a sweep, she just assumed it was bugged, taking a quick nap after reading an engineering magazine, then a hot shower, before getting ready for an evening of drinking. The clothes she wore hugged her curves, not to the point of being totally skin tight, but enough to be distracting to a man whether he'd had a few or not.

[Ante]

Sweepers

Neither Michal nor Steve found any signs of surveillance in their rooms, despite thorough and exhaustive searching. Whether this was because their cover-identities really were that good, or because Peñoles was really that careless, or because neither of them really had much experience with sweeping hotel rooms for bugs, it was hard to say. Whatever the reason, both could be certain that if they'd missed any bugs or other surveillance devices in their rooms it hadn't been for lack of trying.

Sleepers

Grav, meanwhile, took it easy. The bed was actually pretty nice, as beds go, though the bathroom and shower weren't really up to first-world standards. But then, this wasn't really the first-world, was it? All in all, though, it was probably safe to say that her time waiting for Mendoza and his friends was more relaxing than either of her fellow Argonauts', if less cautious.

Exploitation

Soon enough, Mendoza, Cortes and Garza came by Steve and Anna's rooms and carted them off to the very imaginatively-named Bar Bar. Which was, needless to say, a bar. Not a very classy one, but it made up for it with character. The ceiling was low, and seemed lower, thanks to the haze of smoke trapped underneath it. The only seating, aside from that at the bar, were weathered and scarred corner tables with low-hanging lights over the center of each providing adequate but moody illumination. Most of the central area of the floor was taken up by billiards tables, but the far corner had a small stage with an actual, live band performing traditional banda ranchera music, and a small area of open floor where a number of singles and couples were happily dancing the night away.

The trio of Mexicans led the two Argonauts to one of the corner tables and they ordered drinks, though Cortes and Mendoza kept eying the dance floor, and then (covertly) switching their gaze to Gravinski, back and forth. "So", it was Garza who kicked off the night's bullshitting, "how'd you two get into this kind of work?"

Analysis

Back at the hotel, Michal was busy at his computer. He was right to think that his conspiracy site hadn't turned up much, but it had turned up some. For one thing, someone had finally gotten around to pointing out that the title Siribhuvalaya was actually made up of two words. The first meant 'Circle', while the second meant 'all creatures' or 'all life'.

Given how this could obviously not be translated directly into English, Wesson could see how a valid translation of the two words would be 'all knowledge' (i.e. 'circling' or 'encompassing all things', hence 'all knowledge'), but at the same time it made the young genius wonder. The fact was, the title left the potential subject matter of the book somewhat open to debate when you thought about it...

The second interesting thing that had turned up was a rather well-researched post that implied (but couldn't categorically prove) that the Ljang-khu Drukpas had long-standing connections to another society that the poster called the 'Chin Long'. Wesson's twelve-ton brain couldn't help but notice that this was just another way of spelling 'Qinglong' - the society that the Assistant Director had briefly mentioned while briefing them all on the Ljang-khu. The post went on to lay out an exceeding long string of highly circumstantial evidence, pointing to the Qinglong's past history as a part of the very same Eighteenth Century Chinese revolutionary group, the Heaven and Earth Society, that had later branched out into several different groups, one of which had become the precursor of the modern-day Heaven Thunder Triad.

It was readily apparent to Wesson that, as well-researched as the post was, there was nothing with much real substance to it in the entire thing. Still, it was talking about the very same Qinglong Society that Lee had mentioned, however briefly. Interesting...

[Courier]

Steve drank up and waved a hand at the bar and said, "The Fame, the Glory..." he raised an eyebrow to Anna as if to say If she weren't here I'd have also said, 'The Women'. Then more seriously he said, "Ah, I got started young. When I was just a kid I was blowing things up in this field next door. It's a miracle I didn't lose any body parts. How about you, what brought you here?"

[Grav]

"It seemed like a good way to ensure I always had a job." She smiled, showing pearl white teeth. "It has yet to fail me so far."

She followed their gaze and smiled. "The music's pretty good isn't it? Who's idea was it to come to this particular bar?"

[Courier]

Steve waved the waitress over and said, "More beer. A pitcher please. And a bottle of tequila and some shot glasses." Steve lifted an eyebrow to the others, making it clear if they had anything they wanted to add they should.

{OOC: Lie Detector on, Mental Pro: Investigation}

[Grav]

Grav shook her head, what was ordered was fine, the alcohol wouldn't faze her but she was good at acting like it did.

"I haven't had good Tequila in a very long time, I do hope they have it here." Her voice was a sultry distracting purr, playful and inviting if nothing else.

[Ante]

Beer Before Liquor

The conversation between the Peñoles workers and the two Argonauts flowed freely and easily, for the most part, and when Steve asked them how they had wound up at Peñoles themselves they were each happy to answer. The fact that Steve was making sure to keep the alcohol flowing wasn't hurting their willingness to share either.

Mendoza, it turned out, was a local boy and had started working at Peñoles at a very early age, because it was the only really good work in town. Garza had graduated from university with a degree in engineering, and since Peñoles was one of the oldest, and the premier mining company in Mexico, he had gladly accepted an offer of work from them. Shreveson picked up nothing odd or untoward about either of their stories - as far as he could tell, both young men were hiding nothing - or at the least, they were who they claimed to be.

Cortes, the oldest and quietest of the trio, gave a story much the same as Cortes' - except that he was lying through his teeth as he told it. Steve's heightened nova awareness simply could not miss the obvious signs of the man's deceit and now that the Section 1 agent was looking, there were other signs as well. To be fair to the man, anyone without Shreveson's observational skills probably wouldn't have noticed a thing ((OOC: by which I mean that Grav hasn't noticed yet )), but to Steve it was almost painfully obvious.

Realizing now that the man was deceiving them, Steve's keen awareness noticed other tell-tale signs. It occurred to him that, while all three of the Peñoles men were wearing the sorts of sturdy shoes that one would want when working in and around a mining site, Cortes' shoes were really more the sort that you'd expect to see a soldier - or a mercenary - wearing. Further, when he thought to look for it, Steve couldn't help but notice the ever so slight bulge under the man's coat, small enough that it was hardly conclusive of anything, but too large to ignore once seen.

Meanwhile, Garza and Mendoza were more than happy to focus on the pretty, female engineer, while their older colleague kept Steve busy.

[BlueNinja]

Originally Posted By: Ante

Analysis

The first meant 'Circle', while the second meant 'all creatures' or 'all life'.

Given how this could obviously not be translated directly into English, Wesson could see how a valid translation of the two words would be 'all knowledge' (i.e. 'circling' or 'encompassing all things', hence 'all knowledge'), but at the same time it made the young genius wonder. The fact was, the title left the potential subject matter of the book somewhat open to debate when you thought about it...

Frowning, he considers this information for a few moments, then forwards it to Truth and Bannon. Given the time difference and the delay before he left Argonaut HQ, it'll be the next day before they get it, but it might be useful.

Quote:

It was readily apparent to Wesson that, as well-researched as the post was, there was nothing with much real substance to it in the entire thing. Still, it was talking about the very same Qinglong Society that Lee had mentioned, however briefly. Interesting...

After considering this for a moment, he saves this information and adds a few questions about what the group in India has discovered about the theft. Until they answer, he doesn't want to foward a great big wad of merely circumstancial evidence, but with some more clues, maybe he could find out more.

Putting his computer away, Michal gets ready for bed and sets an alarm for 5am. Tomorrow should be an interesting - and likely profitable - day.

[Courier]

Steve noted Cortes' reactions and considered. The other two were legit employees, Cortes was internal security or some such. Odds were he was just a thug under orders without knowing the 'why' of those. If he knew what was going on in the mine he'd probably be there and not here... but he certainly knew about security and how to bypass it. How to encourage that... Grav? And there was the larger question of whose minder was he? If he had to work with the other two all the time, then they knew more than they knew they knew. Clear that up, get more alcohol, then start a game of 'what is your best story about stupid management'.

Steve took a drink to encourage everyone else to do the same and asked in a friendly manor, "So do the three of you normally work together?"

[Grav]

Grav listened and laughed at all the right moments, never deviating from the cover story she'd been given, and playing the role of the feisty, yet dutiful troubleshooting engineer to the hilt. "At least you haven't had to move around alot with your job. The way my life is I never get to stay somewhere long. It's always Do the job and go, I never just get to relax."

She gave them both her most awardwinning smile. "That's what makes tonight nice, I have a chance to have a little fun for once. One I plan on taking full advantage of."

[Ante]

In Media Res

Michal opened his eyes in the dark of his hotel room and realized that he must have fallen asleep, though he didn't actually remember having done so - it felt like he'd only lain down a moment before. A quick glance showed his clock to be blinking uselessly, displaying the almost-certainly-inaccurate time of 8:16 in between blinks. Seated at the foot of his bed was a woman smoking a cigarette.

A quick series of blinks and eye-rubbing did nothing to change the situation and the woman remained placidly seated at the end of his bed, turned so that her profile was visible to him in the dim ambient lighting provided by the blinking clock next to his bed and the light of the stars and the moon outside his window. His unannounced guest, from what he could see of her, was very attractive and looked for all the world as though she had just stepped out of a 1970's giallo* film directed by Sergio Martino. In fact, she bore a strong resemblance to Edwige Fenech - though her hair was too short, being in a highly coiffured mini-bouffant straight out of the 60's or early 70's. Even her cigarette looked stylish and European (how it did that, exactly, was something of a mystery - it just did).

While Michal was still in the process of reacting to her inexplicable appearance, the mysterious woman turned towards him and, with a sly smile and in a voice lightly but unidentifiably accented, asked, "Have you ever noticed how everything is connected?"

Click to reveal..

Giallo: A genre of Italian cinema consisting of crime fiction or mystery, with elements of horror fiction and eroticism often mixed in. The origin of the name is taken from a series of cheap paperback novels that each had a trademarked yellow cover ('giallo' means 'yellow' in Italian).

Fault in the Storyline

"Oh, only about two months now", said Cortes in answer to Steve's question. "I was transferred over to the Gibralter fault line about then and we've been working together ever since."

It was clear that he was essentially telling the truth, though Steve could sense that there was some hidden weight behind the man's words. And, he remembered, the Gibralter fault line was only one of two fault lines inside of the Peñoles mine - the other was the Naica fault - which was the one that he was supposed to gain access to. The implication was strong that Cortes had, until only recently, been assigned to the Naica fault, though it was just as obvious that he was trying to avoid discussing it.

In response to Annalise's latest - and deliberately - flirtatious comments, Mendoza finally overcame whatever self-consciousness had been holding back before then and said, "Speaking of having fun - you want to dance?" His grin as he said it was as excited as it was nervous.

[Courier]

Two months. That might be about the same time they decided to bring in some outside consultants? Or better still...

Steve asked, "Transfer? Is that another word for promotion?" Or if he's not here watching the outsiders, perhaps a demotion. And either would make a good excuse for more drinking.

Steve nodded his head slightly to Mendoza's comment.

[BlueNinja]

Originally Posted By: Ante

In Media Res

Michal opened his eyes in the dark of his hotel room and realized that he must have fallen asleep, though he didn't actually remember having done so - it felt like he'd only lain down a moment before. A quick glance showed his clock to be blinking uselessly, displaying the almost-certainly-inaccurate time of 8:16 in between blinks. Seated at the foot of his bed was a woman smoking a cigarette.

A quick series of blinks and eye-rubbing did nothing to change the situation and the woman remained placidly seated at the end of his bed, turned so that her profile was visible to him in the dim ambient lighting provided by the blinking clock next to his bed and the light of the stars and the moon outside his window. His unannounced guest, from what he could see of her, was very attractive and looked for all the world as though she had just stepped out of a 1970's giallo* film directed by Sergio Martino. In fact, she bore a strong resemblance to Edwige Fenech - though her hair was too short, being in a highly coiffured mini-bouffant straight out of the 60's or early 70's. Even her cigarette looked stylish and European (how it did that, exactly, was something of a mystery - it just did).

While Michal was still in the process of reacting to her inexplicable appearance, the mysterious woman turned towards him and, with a sly smile and in a voice lightly but unidentifiably accented, asked, "Have you ever noticed how everything is connected?"

Michal blinks at the woman once more, then calmly leans back, hands folded behind his head. "Aw, how sweet," he says towards the ceiling, "you sent me a brunette." He maintains a playful smile, looking back at her. "Not the best pick-up line I've heard, but it's unique. But I'm guessing you're about to protest that you only came here to talk. Oh, and," as the tip of her cigarette is crushed out delicately, "I'm sorry, but this room is no-smoking."

[Grav]

Anna smiled and nodded. "I was wondering when one of you would step up to ask." She stood and held out her hand, Escorting Mendoza to the dance floor, just as the band began a new song.