The Liaison (06-30-2022)

== A Night Call - Hangdao, Qiyuan Republic [07/01/2022] ==
Shen waited for news on the attack, downloading whatever information he found useful on this backwater universe like usual until the memo came through on his workstation. A picture of those wannabe heroes from the CACG beaten and bloodied. He quickly snapped it up into his archive, printing out a few copies and organizing them into three dossiers. Then he sent the notification.
 [MASKIE: "We're meeting now, I've got a golden opportunity right here."]
He waited for a while, before the familiar ping of a reply.
 [PLUTO: "It's 10:30PM here, what could you possibly have for us?"]
 [SKULL: "Ignore Mira's lapdog, he's afraid of making money. Herzberg like usual?"]
 [MASKIE: "Yeah, I'll be there shortly. dUMA?"]
 [IRON: "This is within acceptable parameters, I will depart shortly."]
What a strange machine... Shen thought to himself. He gathered up the dossiers, his laptop, and put on his jacket. Before heading out the door, he tucked his sidearm into his holster and slipped on a pair of gloves and mask. He walked down the stairway of his safehouse, barely avoiding some sickly snot-nosed child hanging off one of the railings. He scowled, obscured by his mask, but left it at that. He finally made it down to street level, shooing away some dirty street urchins from his car before entering. 
He sighed before cranking the car with a satisfying purr of the engine. He drove to a secluded airfield nearby fast as he could, cruising though the neon lit "City of Secrets" as the locals called it. A fitting assignment area for him, he thought. Once he made it to the airfield and made sure there was nobody around, he flipped a few switches and let the car work its magic. 
The car gently lifted off the ground, hovering slightly as the car reconfigured itself to flight mode. The wheels revealed a set of engines within them, coupled with the sustainer on the undercarriage of the car and the powerful thruster on the back. He typed in the location for the autopilot, sitting back and buckling up the flight belts as the thruster engaged. The car was airborne now, rocketing towards Herzberg while Shen calmly thought out his pitch... at least as much of it he'd need to give with Judas on the line. 
==The Proposal - Faustraten, Herzberg Federal [06/30/2022]==
Kira disembarked from his AV, stepping onto the landing pad as two lightning cracks lit up the rainy night sky. He walked to the entrance, the only one in the nondescript building aside from the fake doors on the street level. There were two Syndicate goons keeping watch, one on each side of the door. One took a glance, recognizing him and letting him after radioing in to Shen no doubt. The corridor was floored with a plush red carpet with intricate patterning. There were a few doors on each side of the hallway, with the last one on the right being the meeting area. 
The Chuckleskull CEO entered the meeting room, meeting eyes with Mira, her assistant Mark, and dUMA. "Look who's finally here? What was that about being afraid of earning money?" Mark snidely remarked. 
Kira flipped him off with his prosthetic hand, earning an exasperated sigh from Mira and a scoff from its target. "Sorry, must be a malfunction," Kira said afterwards with the fakest smile ever conjured by man. He sat down on one of the comfy red chairs with the others and awaited Shen's arrival. They didn't have to wait long in the end anyways, as he entered the room shortly after they all settled down. 
"Pardon the lateness, traffic and all that. Glad to see you're all here," Shen said, unpacking a plastic sheet from his pocket and placing it over the chair he was to sit in. Kira still had to hold back chuckles while Mark could only look on in disbelief as always. Mira and dUMA however, were more used to the liaison's germophobic tendencies with politeness and programming keeping them silent respectively. Finally, when Shen managed to fully drape the chair in the plastic sheet and sit down, he continued his train of thought. 
"So, the business opportunity I have for your three organizations," he began, pulling out his laptop and the dossiers. He slid a dossier to each of the three figureheads and notified Judas through the comms client on his laptop. Mira and Kira both opened up their dossiers immediately, with dUMA being last after silently struggling with a motor control software glitch. 
Their eyes, or optical sensors in dUMA's case, went wide. Photos of multiple members of the CACG's own Roundtable Council injured severely, including their "unbreakable" director Archangel. Judas joined the call and began, his voice loud and clear through the multiple speakers in the room, "As you can see, the Camelot Anomalous Containment Group is losing their touch. Just today, they were attacked in a rally led by the Candidate known as Heralda Smith. You may have heard of her. She's quite the popular woman these days. Anyways, our own... specialized... agents seem to have dealt more damage to the Group in a mere few hours than any of you have tried to for years. But worry no longer, the Syndicate has the resources to put the Group in its place. All I request, is your cooperation, and your time. An accord, if you will?" 
"What the boss is trying to say is that we're offering very generous incentives if you three can cause as much chaos and sow as much discord throughout Camelot and the Grail at large as as possible. I know for a fact your organizations could stand to get a little nudge upwards. A paycheck to the tune of around $750 million creds, more anomalous tech for your manufacturing or operations, things like that." 
"Seriously mask man? Just for causing a commotion?" Mark remarked after a while. 
"Do you guys need anything done in specific, Maskie?" Kira asked afterward. 
"Just do anything that'll put more stress on them. This is an opportunity that may not come again." 
"What about allocation of replacement software? The CACG has effectively corrupted critical functions and data as you might've noticed," dUMA inquired. Being the first to ask about the additional "tech" Shen offered. 
"That may be a bit more difficult, but we can definitely help with that if that's what you want?" Shen answered. 
And finally, Mira spoke up for the first time in the meeting. Her voice was quiet, yet enthralling enough that it could freeze the entire room. "PlutoCorp will accept this deal then. We can discuss payment separately." Kira chuckled and followed up "In that case... we'll take this assignment too." 
Before Shen asked for his response, dUMA answered as well. "I see no reason not to take this offer then, offworlder-friends.." 
"So we're all in agreement? Once we start getting reports of your operations we'll start the payout then. Hear that boss?" Shen asked, chipper to be talking about operations and business again. 
Judas answers, "We'll have to work on how you address me, but yes, I did hear everything. You'll all be receiving wire transfers from a different name. Precautions for both of us of course. I hope you all don't let this partnership down. After all, we're doing this for everyone's best interest. For continued greatness... 
For... Humanity."
== A Secondary Offer - Faustraten, Herzberg Federal [06/30/2022] ==
Mark and Mira got up as Judas' monologue ended, intending to be the first out as dUMA and Kira rested in their seats for a few moment. Shen quickly waved them down right after fumbling with the hang up button. "Before you all leave, I do have a bonus offer for your organizations..." he said, wiping off his laptop before tucking it back into his bag. Kira's ears perked up, Mira leaned back over the table, and dUMA's optical sensors narrowed on him. 
He pulled out a handful of disposable photos, the type they gave field operatives to ID targets. All of a single item, an odd-looking device with ceramic casing and the CACG's logo. He slid them to each participant, even Mark, and let them get a good look at it before continuing. 
"I assume you four are familiar with Dr. Void. This device right here," he said as he tapped his copy of the photo, "is a high-capacity data drive with more data than I could hope to get on my own, not to mention countless CACG files only he and the rest of the CACG's little Council are privy to. For my own personal reasons, I am very interested in obtaining this drive. If you can snatch it off that little mist-faced rat, I can bump the paychecks you guys get from the boss to $2.5 billion creds." 
"For an overgrown USB drive? Must be something important on it then..." Kira quickly responded. 
"And if it's so valuable, what's stopping us from just keeping it for ourselves?" Mark followed up, earning a tired glare from Mira, a chuckle from Kira, and a simulated expression of shock from dUMA. 
"Other than my gracious offer? Not much. But I trust you four will do the right thing," Shen said with a cool and calm smile. He got up from his seat, folded up the plastic sheet over it, and took one last look at the small group of leaders before leaving. 
"We'll be watching, don't disappoint." 
 
Category:Parables
Category:Elections Arc Parable