Longshore Crew session 7

Session 7 of the Longshore Crew campaign.

This was a session of legwork and hunting down a number of potentially interesting leads concerning the hotel break-in.

Gary was called to analyze the liquid found in the vial. He confirmed that it was the same spurt toxin found in David's body, and produced by the spurts they Crew found in the Blue Water Circle camp. Gary also looked at the hotel's computer and was reasonably certain that it had not been tampered with.

Kalina started to ask around the hotel staff about what happened. She quickly discovered a number of facts aobut the hotel and its staff.

• The hotel is owned by Ulla Stevens. Ulla is a Hanover citizen, though she has lived in Longshore for several years with her 17-year-old son, Konrad.
• As well as being the hotel's owner and general manager, Ulla also works as the hotel receptionist. She employs three members of staff: Konrad and Hal Davenport as other receptionists, and Giraud Nye as a cook.
• Konrad is also a Hanover citizen, Hal used to be a prospector, and Giraud is a Native resident of Longshore.
• The cleaning drones are not owned by Ulla, but supplied by Tsano McCleod as part of a general maintenance contract.
• The room broken into was one of five that had been booked by Hanover several weeks ago. The booking started today, and continued for three days. Ulla had no idea who was supposed to be staying in the rooms.
• The hotel was fairly full of various people from the Longshore area who were in town for the market that surrounded the Hanover emporium ship, due to arrive today.

Meanwhile, a Major Aachen of Hanover Security Services had contacted Travar about the information the Longshore Crew had passed to Hanover about the various Blue Water Circle terrorists they had encountered. Aachen said that he was arriving shortly in Longshore on other business, and arranged to meet Travar around noon. Anticipating this meeting, Travar returned to Lonshore from the poachers' camp and came to the Rangoon hotel to catch up with what Kalina was doing.

Soon afterwards, Aachen also turned up at the hotel, with two other HSS goons. Ulla looked aghast when Aachen turned up, and shot him some absolutely killing glances before retreating to her office. Further questioning of Ulla revealed that she had been married to Aachen when she was living in Lebensraum, the marriage had broken down rather acrimoniously when Konrad (their son) was little, and Ulla had moved away to Longshore. Aachen confirmed the story with Travar, and also said that HSS were interested in the Blue Water Circle terrorists as they had been implicated in the killing of several Hanover citizens in the past few months.

Suspecting that the break-in in the hotel was an inside job, and noting Konrad's obvious dislike of his father, the Crew thought that Konrad might have helped with the crime, perhaps after falling in with bad sorts among his Native friends. They followed him to a meeting of the Longshore branch of the Church of Whalesong Theogeny, but stayed outside the meeting place. Jamirika swam up first, but as soon as he did so he noticed a 'fin (without a CICADA) swim away from the meeting. Travar and Kalina suspected that the 'fin could be Defender, the BWC sympathizer from Keepsake. After the singing, Konrad and his friend Adjigo thought they remembered the 'fin in question being an out-of-town one that had appeared at the church occasionally in the past, but Maker, the Church Leader, said that he had never seen the 'fin in question before.

The Crew also questioned Hal (getting him out of bed after his night shift) and Giraud, but didn't learn anything. Soon afterwards, at the end of the afternoon siesta, Kalina and Joe spotted Giraud leaving the hotel. Joe followed him as he walked out of town on the only road, towards the airport. After a kilometer or so, (about halfway to the airport), Giraud stopped, took some photographs, and then headed through the jungle towards the Irrawaddy River, taking more photos as he went. When he reached the river, he turned round, walked back to the river, then returned to the hotel.

And so the session ended, with lots of leads but also lots of questions.