On Regina - Part 3

The crew of the Skylark continues to investigate the death of Fig's Uncle Vlen and make the acquaintance of an odd character.

This chapter is based on Carl's notes from our October 8, 2021 session. Since we are scattered around the country, we use Discord for voice communications and the Roll20 online virtual tabletop to connect with each other.

The illustration was modeled in Sketchup and rendered in Unity. The buildings in the background are from Kitbash3d.

Continued from: An Assassination on Regina.

Location: On Regina in the Regina Subsector.

Date: 205-1110

Regina, ah Regina

Having some time on world, most of us took classes to sharpen our skills.

In addition to the classes, over the next few days we planned to go near the shipping areas and look around Winter Shipping. Winters Shipping is where Professor Ujinka's assassins' contact Exceedingly Discreet works.

Kipenzi, Medicus and Fig are the barhoppers (hoping for kareoke).  Coming out of the first bar we noticed we were being followed. This person is not one of the Imps from before - a much shadier looking person. He got ahead of us somehow, but we spotted him.

He said "don't look over. I know who killed Vlen Backett.  Meet me at 10 PM at the Flotsom. Make sure you are not followed"

It was near 8PM, with some time, we went to some other bars. We heard rumors, delicious rumors.  Kipenzi picked up some juicy news.
 
  1. You know Gaius Labre? He’s dead. What I hear is, he crossed Ven Yasha.

     *** Gaius was one of the assassins at the professor's place.  Hmmmmm  ***

  2. Harlen? Red-haired guy, right? I’ve heard of Harlen. He’s a fixer. Deals in smuggled goods, weapons, alien tech. He’s got a base in orbit somewhere.

      *** recall that a red headed guy showed up at Vlens hotel room  
             also a redhead got arrested for the murder
             more than one redhead in the mix, not all necessarily involved.  ***

As the night passed, and 10PM approached, we headed to the Flotsom.

Entering the Flotsom, we spotted our guy.  He was on the roof of a nearby building, watching our arrival.  Hopefully he was watching to see if we were alone or followed, and not setting us up.

A few minutes later he entered the bar and joined us. Nervous, and watchful like us, he identified himself as Detective Odoy. He talked about Ven Yasha, and thinks Ven was the person who ordered Uncle Vlen's death.

Ven Yasha is REALLY powerful, and connected to a LOT of spheres of influence. He is rumored to have a private station in orbit, used for smuggling.  There are lots of things in orbit, so hiding one would not be out of the question.  It, at least, passes a reality check.

He is pretty sure that the folks at Winters Shipping would know where the station is.  Winters is just one of many organizations that Yasha works with.

We asked Odoy if Winter Shipping would be raided, and he said that he thought probably not (they are too well connected).

When asked why he was off the case, he said that he is on medical leave.  "Mood swings, paranoid tendencies... LYING BASTARDS."

** Note to ourselves  -  we should do our own research on this guy, and Norrim as well when we get back to the Skylark.

After our conversation with Detective Odoy, we did some more barhopping and kept an eye out for a tail. We listened for more rumors and had a good time, but got no useful information.

Back at the Skylark we recalled some of our discussions with the assassins.

• The assassin did not know where Harlen is based, or where the stolen items are.
• He contacted Harlen through a contact in Startown, a Llellewyoly named Exceedingly Discreet.
• The Dandelion operated out of a brokerage called Winter Shipping.
• The password for getting to see the Dandelion was "Seventeen tons of flax".  Just mention that at Winter Shipping, and they will let you in to see Exceedingly Discreet.
• Reggie Navaro was the boss of the two thugs we encountered at the late professor's house.
• Regie Navarro has "The Device". - Some kind of EMP projector.
• What did Harlen take from Vlen?
  

We did some database searches and Medicus was able to get into some non-public ones as well.
 
We found:

• Detective Odoy - Public Order Commission Detective, listed as inactive.
• Pallod Norrim -   Confirmed Inspector with the POC. No picture found. Sam found a memo from him saying that Odoy is medically unfit for duty and should not be trusted. Norrim has a long record of good performance, and by the book.

It was getting late and we called it a night.

207-1110
More computer searches in the morning.

• Gaius Labre - died in custody yesterday. 
• Ven Yasha - a conspicuous LACK of information.  
• Harlan   -  tons of entries, but nothing useful.
• Winter Shipping - (‘Behind on your mortgage payments? Unable to pay your crew salaries? Unexpected repair bills beyond your means? Winter Shipping is here to help by buying your cargo at a massive discount, in exchange for prompt service and no questions asked.’).
• Winter Shipping is a brokerage that specializes in speculative traders; more accurately, it specializes in swooping in on poor merchants who are down on their luck.

Medicus noticed some unusual slowdown in our connection speed.  Checking on that, he DID find an issue. Looks like yesterday something intruded on us. He found it, and figured out that it was just for monitoring. Looks like it is the Imperial Interstellar Scout Service.

Why is the IISS monitoring the Skylark's computer?

Perhaps, when we searched yesterday, we tripped some warning software and it got us backtracked.

Or someone in Scouts could be working for Winters Shipping.

Barhopping again in the evening.

208-1110
Today we had driver's tests scheduled for Kipenzi, Leon and Sam. Leon aced his tests, the others found that they already had licenses on Regina and just payed a fee to get them reinstated. 

Spitballing, we wondered if Vlen was acting like a Mule. Kipenzi scanning the cryo capsule with her scanners to see if there was anything strange (without opening the cryo unit). She found an anomaly.

He had some kind of cybernetic implant in his brain. Only the military grade sensors we had allowed Kipenzi to find it, it was well hidden.

Medicus checked the database of cyber implants, and found it didn't match anything he could find. The location and configuration indicated that might be a memory enhancement device. It was not connected to the endocrine system, so was not for fighting.  Not clear what it would be for, but best guess is memory related.

Hunting down the autopsy files, it says 'gunshot to the chest, close range. Probably a low velocity snub pistol. High level of Tusul in blood system.' No mention of the implant, it looks like the coroner didn't find it.

Harlan seems to be a major involved person.  We are for sure being followed by local authorities, maybe by his group too, and now perhaps by the Scouts.... Oh My !!!

209 thru 213 - 1110
Continuing the classes, trying to be NOT suspicious.  Barhopping as usual, with Leon along now that he has some ordinary clothes.

We picked up a few more rumors:

• "The POCO are up in arms about some Imperial police force taking over some murder inquiry. What I heard is that the guy who was killed was a Zhodani spy, and the whole thing’s now a matter of state security."
•  "Winter Shipping – they’re over by the Downport. Good place to go if you need a loan, or if you’ve got a hot cargo that you need to shift before POCO shows up."
•   Sam hears, "The Dandelion? I’ve heard of him. He works at Winter Shipping. Those bastards bankrupt good honest spacers. Don’t go near them."
  

 The dandelion is like the broker for Winter Shipping, sorta broker/manager as best we can tell.

212-1110   
We get a TNS message of interest:
 

More barhopping in the evening, and another rumor:

"Ven Yasha is the Duke of Regina."   

Probably not... but maybe de facto?

214-1110
We made a visit to Winter Shipping. Fig and Sam were our away team. We planned to talk about being the executor for Vlen, and to see if there was any unfinished business.

They had two offices, one in Startown and one in the starport. The Starport office was closed, so off to the Startown branch we went.

The office was really nice. Well decorated, neat and shiny.  Receptionist Marid said hello. Talking about unfinished business for Uncle Vlen, they have none.  She took our ship and broker information and said they would be in touch.  This place looked like a very successful business.

She said the starport branch is usually closed, and they do their initial business dealings through this office.

We figured that the starport office was probably the smuggling side of the operation.

The building also has a back door....HMMMMMMMMMM...   a clue???? Checking it out, we saw that across the alley was a fence and more buildings. The fence was the Starport fence.

We also noticed a security system in place, not truly impressive but definitely there.

After leaving the main office, we went back to the starport and walked around the Winter Shipping building.  Knowing they would be watching us, we checked out some of it.

After the visit we had a discussion. Midnight madness or just head off to Alell?

Continued in: On Regina - Part 4.

See Also: Dramatis Personæ, Skylark 2, Campaign Starts, The 2nd Adventure, The Chamax Plague, Horde, Shadows, Research Station Gamma, Twilight's Peak, Prison Planet, Leedor on Aramis, First Call at Zilla, Trade War, The Bloodwell, ANNIC NOVA, The Kinunir, Kesser's Return, Justice, Mission to Mithril, Outback, Skylark and the Pit, Last Flight of the Amuar and One Crowded Hour.