[20APR2075 1820 | La Casita Negra | College Station, TX | CAS]
"Man, I never should've let Error work this deal, this car smells like shit!" Hopeless had a point, the car did smell pretty awful and Bookworm felt whoever Error made the deal with got the better end of it. Breeze wasn't saying anything, not that he could since he was driving via Cold-Sim, knocked out and plugged directly into the car. Lucky bastard... the dwarf thought. They had rolled the windows down immediately when they got in, but it only helped a little.
The smell was so distracting that Bookworm had barely had the focus to look through what Breeze had found while searching the Matrix at Pugger's. Once he had finished putting on a show, Error had left with the college kids and the rest of the team had hopped into the Americar to secure the party supplies. The whole thing had worked out pretty well. Jen had apparently charged the team's drinks to the oblivious college kids who Error regaled although that gesture, for some reason, left Hopeless uncommonly subdued. What Breeze had found was pretty wild; the crème de la crème of conspiracy theories. The craziest part was that it appeared to be 100% accurate. The whole Retro-Futurist movement, based on financials and other links, looked like it very well could be some kind of False Flag operation organized by a few well-connected Awakened folks.
>>False Flag: False flag (or black flag) describes covert military or paramilitary operations designed to deceive in such a way that the operations appear as though they are being carried out by entities, groups or nations other than those who actually planned and executed them. Operations carried out during peace-time by civilian organizations, as well as covert government agencies, may by extension be called false flag operations if they seek to hide the real organization behind an operation.
As crazy as it was, it didn't have a whole lot of relevance to their current job, at least nothing she could tease out. It was still interesting as all get out and a massive secret that had just been gifted to her. As the team pulled into the parking lot of La Casita Negra, Bookworm put on her game face and said, "OK, here it is. The proprietor is Mischel Villanova and she's an elf. You know, in case that needed to be said before we walked in there." The dwarf glanced at Hopeless before continuing; he returned her look with an expression of disgusted incredulity. "I figure if anyone speaks Spanish, they might want to take lead here."
"I know a little Spanish-" Both men replied at the same time. Looking at each other for a brief second, Breeze blinked first and said, "You go ahead, man. I'm still a little hazy from spending so much time in the Matrix."
"Yo, that's cool, Breeze. You probably should stay out here and keep the car running anyway in case this shit don't go down right. But let me borrow one of your credsticks," Hopeless responded.
Nodding, Breeze passed over one of his credsticks, confident in the traceless nature of the money passing through the device. Glancing at Bookworm, Hopeless said, "College kids have cash, why don't you load this thing up with a few hundred nuyen?"
Sighing, the dwarf responded, "Fine, fine, just know that I'm taking this off the top of our pay... whenever we get paid." Bookworm accessed her commlink and transferred every last cent she had made finding the team in the first place to the credstick.
Exiting the car, the skinny human and squat dwarf walked up to the shop. La Casita Negra appeared to be a typical Aztlan bodega, most of the signs and the few AROs that were active were in Spanish. Bookworm could work out a few of them, but certainly not all; Hopeless comprehended them much better. The shop appeared to have sold fuel at one point in time given the pumps in the middle of the parking lot, but the price listings were so out-of-date that practice must have ended a decade or more ago.
Aztlan Salsa music assaulted the two upon entering the bodega. There were a few customers perusing the beer isle, but the counter was clear. Approaching it, the two caught sight of an attractive elf woman, with the swarthy tone common to those of Aztlan descent and a look of disinterest or maybe even annoyance, it was hard to tell. "Hola, forasteros. ¿Qué te trae por aquí?"
Figuring the elf was screwing with them by speaking in Spanish, Hopeless smirked and replied, "Este es el mejor lugar para la cerveza. Dos barriles de Shiner favor." He fired off a quick message to Bookworm to let her know the score.
<<@Bookworm [Hopeless] Hopefully she gets the drift not to fuck with us since I hable español...
The elf actually smiled at Hopeless' response. Switching to accented English, she said, "Certainly, I have a few kegs available. Two kegs are going to run 250¥, with 150 of that being the deposits that you get back when you return the empties. All I need is the nuyen and a SIN."
"Funny that..." Hopeless replied. "I seem to have left my SIN on my other commlink. But I do have this credstick loaded up with 275¥ that I'm hoping will save me a trip home. Encaja?"
Mischel eyed the skinny gringo up and down for a second. She doubted the Star would try to send in any undercover agents to try to bust her, considering the bribes she paid, but who knew if someone new had been promoted. Looking at the two more closely, she doubted either one of them would meet Lone Star standards and went with her gut. "Call it 300¥ and we've got a deal."
Smiling broadly, Hopeless handed over the credstick. Bookworm piped up, her head almost below the level of the counter, and said, "Oh, we need a pack of strawberry syntharettes and a lighter, too."
[20APR2075 1830 | La Casita Negra | College Station, TX | CAS]
With the kegs, several bags of ice, a few trash bags, and a bag with a pack of strawberry sytharettes plus a lighter loaded into the backseat, Bookworm sat sandwiched between the two heavy drums. The smell was fairly oppressive.
"Can we talk about a plan in case we need to leave if Lone Star shows up?"
Pausing for a second, she slapped her forehead. "Man am I dumb, we probably need to involve everyone in this discussion." Queuing up her messenger application, she composed and sent a quick text.
<<@Team [Bookworm] Just to update everyone, we've got the beer and are heading out to the pit. Anyone have ideas for getting out of there in case Lone Star shows up for whatever reason? I'd feel a lot better if we had something organized>>
