<span style="font-weight: bold">@ Ome (Stella):</span>“Against the Firin' Oziran?  You'll need crazy.” He names off the address again, 205 Haynes street, at the wall.  “Oh! Sorry, just a second...” He leans back, his hand muffling the phone it sounds like, and comes back forward.  “Ahh... miss Limia... there are a few issues we'll need to clear up on rules, too.” He says, a little more serious, and a little more excited as well.  “Not that this will affect your eligibility, and you'll have more waivers to sign, but are you averse to any of the following...” He gets to a list.  “Anything-goes, as in crotch-shots, biting, you know, fighting dirty... barbed-wire in place of the ropes, c-4 plywood traps, cages, chairs, an exploding ring, glass light tubes, tables, thumbtacks, vore, or weapons?  Do keep in mind that a competent medical staff is always on hand, but there is absolutely no pressure on the theatrics.” He shuffles in his chair, the phone shuffling in static a bit.  “But why don't you think about all that on your way here?”<br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold">@ Glaive and Darkmark (Malice):</span>Marcus pockets the larger credit chits, the 100K ones, for now, and continues.  “Well, you see, if we hired someone in Ratio to break into a highly secured Ratio installation, the whole thing would be a clusterfuck of technology clashing.  Black ops with thermoptic camouflage and lockpick guns and computers would have a maybe one in three chance of cracking this place at best, according to our employer.  It's secured against technology of all sorts.  Closed circuit, infrared and radio cameras, turret guns up at night, armed guards, laser trips, trapped vents, bulletproof everything, laserproof almost everything, mobile robots, electronically, mechanically sealed doors, retinal and fingerprints and voice and keys and all sortsa shit.  I could give you the specifics, gentlemen, as I hail from and live in Ratio, but the boss needs someone who can be a real ghost.  Someone who can get in using will.  That's right.” He leans forward.  “Have you ever been close to the wall?  Sometimes things go haywire, maybe a passerby from the other side gets a phone call or one of your magic gizmos shorts?” He leans in.  “We have a way that we could buy you guys about... I would guess... twenty minutes to an hour of functional will use on the other side of the wall.” He explains.  “Of course, not that anyone would believe a goddamn word you say, but once we're in, we'd be buying your silence concerning this method of ours, too.” He pauses, and looks to Malice, and back to Glaive.<br/><br/>“I trust gentlemen as well trained as yourselves are capable of carrying sixty some odd pounds for such a period of time?” He cocks an eyebrow.  “And do keep in mind that car.” He pauses, sitting back, relaxed as a carriage passes by, one of the less expensive unhorsed models.  “So he's shouting to the half-deaf bastard, 'cantrip!  It's a cantrip!'  And the deaf guy, he's from Ratio, he's like, “Gesundheit!”<br/><br/>He pulls out a small shimmering onyx sphere you'd recognize as a radial silencer.  “It'll keep out most prying ears, but I don't take chances even in the half of town where everyone's blind to this sort of thing.” He explains.  “Sorry, where was I?  Ah, the item itself.” He leans forward.  “Will an extra ten percent afford us a lack of questions?  The only assurance is that what you're looking for – we will provide images, descriptions – will not be heavy, toxic, irradiated, explosive, or anything the like.  Harmless, harmless!” He smiles.  “Now I know this seems sudden, but I didn't expect to meet an A list mercenary and a trusted associate of his, to boot, while walking to the diner.  What say you, gentlemen?” His cold eyes scan you excitedly.<br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold">@ Arsony (Amsar):</span>The boy chokes as the wind is knocked from him the gun is seized from his grip; even before he'd hit the ground he was yelping in panic, and now that he couldn't breathe, he'd raised his take above him in all hopes that he'd get away from this one alive.  Holding it out to you, his arm trembles, and he stares up and along the vicious looking whip, eyes darting back to yours, then down lower, to avoid your gaze.  “Take them...” He stammers finally.  “...please forgive me, ma'am...”<br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold">@ Chiro (Onyx):</span>“An expedition, my boy?” Something clicks.  “I think... you're out of your damned mind.  But that's never stopped you before, has it?” He pokes through a little bit of liquor on a cabinet jimmied open beside the fridge.  “Like hell I'm going back to spooktown this soon.  Say no one's lived there for centuries, but you know what's unsettling?” He glares over his glass, the grizzled glare of a survivor of wars, of a glorious ranking man that rues every step he's taken to become experienced as he is.  “It's not the lack of magic that's ultimately unsettling, boy.  Not even that you can't manage anything but simple detection rotes.  It's like...”  He pauses.  “It's like, I went to sleep one night in the back of my jeep on the edge of town, and the next morn, the whole inside was covered in dust.  Like the entire place has been corrupted by entropy.  Years of dust settles in one night.” He groans.<br/><br/>A drought of scotch, then...  “It's a scary prospect.  It feels like, wherever you go there, you're waiting for something bad to happen that never does.  Like when you've got a sick relative or high-risk stocks or a big report being reviewed by the board, or a syphilis test, you're just waiting for bad 'something' that doesn't come.”  He puts it down.  “And I don't even know what it has to do with the paradigm integration, save for something similar to our materials was found there.  That spooks me.” He glares, and then puts his glass down and takes a deep breath.<br/><br/>“When can you be ready?”<br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold">@ KavenBach (Santi):</span>The coffee shop is a serene scene... a gentle response to the vicarious reality you'd experienced moments ago.  Plenty of normal, safe looking folk, from both sides of the wall.  White or blue collar, but generally well kempt, a young to middle adult assortment, active and gently spoken, the lot of them.  In general, not like the thuggish fellow who'd just given you vertigo – well, some were dressed as such, but it's more the public atmosphere that seems to offer at least and ounce of security.  They serve up coffee quick, excellent stuff, bitter and rich, as well as all sorts of hot and cold mixed coffee-flavored innovations.  The place is packed, and a few spare seats here and there, one at the counter next to a gorgeous, mussy-haired redhead twenty-something wearing a padded, slightly looser but form fitting Ratio style series of blues, one off back in the corner near the restrooms, beside a lionmorph with a broad nose and a regal air about him, reading a paper, and a table with chairs facing to and away from a half-blinded window, casting slats of light and shadow across a cute teenage couple – one wearing local fashion and one in Velle robes, giving each other eyes that say what they cannot in public.  The aroma, everything offers comfort now, even the tired but oddly pleasant cashier handing you your beverage moments after you'd ordered...<br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold">@ TaciturnTiger (Jori):</span>Silence... just silence.  As your eyes involuntarily trace the energetic resonance, you see a scattering of objects shining in the ashes.  Upon simple inspection, pieces of... jewelry?  But normal jewelry doesn't come charged with such energetic magical resonance.  And something out of the ordinary again... a flattened, still lustrous box... a... what is that?  A long cord protrudes from the back end, ending in a triple-pronged protrusion that looks like it's supposed to fit... something.  Around the inside of the box are rippling coils and a piece of bread, which, startlingly, is the only thing not burnt to cinders or even burnt at all here.  But Ratio products are Kitsch and useless on this side of the wall, one can't even plug them in...<br/><br/>What the hell were these people up to?<br/><br/>There's suddenly a shuffle from behind, a shuffle like that through lawn and not pavement.  A crunch.  Someone was approaching, on the property...