Meat Puppets After getting the details of Lord Zhaal and Gray Fox's betrayal of Glitch to the simsense prostitution ring leader known as Mr. Voodoo, Killeroo and his team found that their window to rescue Glitch from becoming a thoughtless meat puppet was shrinking. Without a functional med-tech in Doc, Jazz made some calls and came upon information concerning a traveling back alley doctor by the name of Erik "The Swede" Nygren. On the run from the people who paid for his education, Swede had made it to the shops in the Sprawl and was trying to keep a low profile. Fortunately for Jazz and the group, he wasn't very good at it. Visiting him at a soy noodle stand on a busy thoroughfare, Jazz offered him a spot on the team for the remainder of the run. Despite learning that the previous med-tech they had hired was thrown from a four story window by their enemies, Swede remained calm and confident about his new gig. That and the forty five hundred credit upfront fee that Jazz accepted to pay proved to be sufficient courage for this doctor without borders. A short cab ride later and Swede was standing in a bombed out building that overlooked Voodoo's tenement building and discussing plans with the team on how to get Glitch back safely. The first proposed plan was to act as a client and attempt to buy Glitch from Voodoo. This was immediately shot down by Jazz. It quickly became clear to the group that Jazz knew who Voodoo was or at least what kind of business he was in and she refused to be a part of any plan that involved giving money to Voodoo or even meeting with him in person. In fact, Jazz offered an additional bonus if the team managed to put Voodoo in the ground and halt his operation. Scratching this plan, the team decided to go for something a little more direct; Barrett would utilize his drones to perform surveillance around the building while Killeroo and Swede would slip into the building through a network of underground sewer tunnels. From his surveillance, Barrett had learned that two armed men guarded a back entrance to the tenement and another two guarded the front. In addition to this, his drones had picked up heavy uses of electricity on the fourth floor. Electricity that was being siphoned from another nearby district through long cables that ran under the streets. The team made the decision to have Barrett and his drones stay back and prepare to plunge the tenement into complete darkness when the time was right. They moved past the corpses of gangers partially or completely submerged in the sewer's muck--unlucky souls who had been killed attempting to circumvent another gang's turf through the tunnels. After forcing open a hatch with a large and unused boiler sitting atop it, acting as a dead weight lock, Killeroo and Swede made their way into the building's basement. Swede's unfortunate lack of grace caused a series of tools to fall from a nearby wall mount, startling him. As a result, the good doctor wheeled around and fired several shots at what he believed was a potential hostile. Ironically, this commotion caught the attention of one of the thugs Voodoo employed. Killeroo and Swede hid in the bowels of the basement and awaited to ambush the guard. Flicking the lights on, the thug noticed that the basement floor was a mess and delved deeper to investigate. Killeroo pounced on the guard and immediately knocked him unconscious--but not before he was able to get off a burst of automatic gunfire. With the other guards now alerted, Killeroo and Swede rushed to exit the basement and get to the fourth floor. Asking Barrett for some aid, the drone rigger successfully managed to utilize his crab drone to draw the attention of the lone front door guard and the two rear guards. Using gunshot sounds and flashing lights, the small drone managed to fool the thugs into shooting each other--leaving only one alive. Arriving on the fourth floor, the team noticed emergency lights were powering some, but not all, the necessary lights and equipment needed to operate the simsense clinic. This was where Voodoo converted young men and women into thoughtless meat puppets for his and others' amusements. Moving stealthily to the clinic's operating room, Killeroo spotted an aging surgeon in a bloodied smock throwing his hands up in frustration; his bio monitors and cyber limb tools were not functioning with the emergency power only. He needed more "juice" if he was going to complete his work, he spat into a comlink. The smooth as silk response from Voodoo assured him that power would be returned soon, that he and his men had other more pressing concerns--like intruders. Looking around the room more, Killeroo saw several gurneys and the still bodies of men and women lying atop them. Glitch was there and looking very different from what she looked like before. Most of her hair had been sheared off for cybersurgery and her body was a pincushion for various injectors and cybernetic implants that were not there previously. The surgery to convert Glitch into one of Voodoo's puppets was almost complete. Nearby to the doctor were two prostitutes who seemed to just be watching the doctor work on Glitch's body, seemingly unfazed by the blood and the gore of cyber surgery. Wasting no more time, Killeroo and Swede stormed the room--the former knocking one of the prostitutes sideways and the latter sticking a gun in the surgeon's face. To their surprise, the prostitute picked herself off the floor with little more than a small gash across her forehead. The two women's irises blazed a dark red glow and concealed blades slid from their forearms and fingers. These were much more than simsense prostitutes, they were killer razor girls. Killeroo swung around his massive machine gun, "Lil Betty", and began firing at the one he had injured. Both razor girls moved like the wind and began slicing and stabbing at the large kangaroo hybrid. Temporarily distracted, Swede was sucker punched by the surgeon and dropped his pistol. Drawing his turbo charged stun gun, Swede managed to intimidate the doctor into standing down. This wasn't an issue since bullets were now flying freely around the room. One of the razors leaped up and latched onto the ceiling, drawing 'Roo's fire while the other began cutting into him. Realizing his partner was in trouble, the good doctor changed targets and proceeded to incapacitate the grounded razor girl with the stun gun. Taking this opportunity, Killeroo grabbed the stunned razor girl and put her through the wall--knocking her out completely. The remaining razor leaped down and attempted to rush towards Glitch's body. Swede drew upon some courage and leaped onto the fast moving cyborg's back, covering her eyes in the process. The razor girl slipped, knocked over some surgeon tools and began wrestling with the doctor on the floor. Killeroo grabbed a hold of the razor's ankle and swung her into the ceiling and smashed her body against the old tiled floors, knocking her unconscious as well. Now that the shooting had stopped, the surgeon attempted to make a run for the door. Killeroo stopped him in the tracks with a fast clothesline that knocked the doctor flat on his back and drew the air out of his body. Barrett reported that the remaining thug was heading up to the fourth floor now that the shooting had stopped. He warned that Voodoo often surrounded himself with four or so razor boys and girls and that they would likely be seeing them if the team didn't hurry and leave while they still had the chance. Taking the surgeon with him down the fire escape, Swede made his way to the street where Barrett's rigged battle van quickly appeared, ready to take them away. The remaining thug walked into a hail of bullets from Killeroo who was stealthily lying in wait. Back To Sharkey's Grabbing Glitch and any nearby equipment that was necessary for her survival, the team left while the going was good and met back up with Jazz at Sharkey's place. On the drive there, Zhaal seemed somewhat repentant after seeing what Voodoo did to Glitch's body. Upon seeing her friend's body in this current state, Jazz disappeared
inside Barrett's van where Zhaal had been locked up. After working him
over and leaving his face bloodied, Jazz returned to see both doctors
remove some of the cyberware that Voodoo had forced on Glitch. Voodoo's surgeon offered to help remove the simsense hardware he had just recently installed, saying that he only did what Voodoo paid him to do. He also made it clear that Voodoo had no interest in repairing or replacing Glitch's cybernetic brain. To him it was a moot point since she was to be outfitted with simsense chips that would outfit her with a personality of his choosing. Just another razor girl to add to his collection. The surgeon also explained that repairing or replacing Glitch's cyber brain would be a very expensive procedure and require around the clock care for the comatose body of the netrunner. Though it was clear that Jazz has little patience or love for anyone who deals with people like Voodoo, she allowed both men to live and told Barrett to drop them off somewhere far from Sharkey's. Jazz compensated the team and offered to keep Swede and Sharkey on retainer now that the run was finished. Both runners agreed and Sharkey even offered to house the team in her underground bunker for a few days until the heat on the street died down some. After the lights dimmed and the runners were tucked away in the underground bunker's rooms, Jazz was summoned by Sharkey. The amphibian hybrid revealed to her some of the information that was contained in the paydata Glitch and the other two netrunners uncovered during their raid of Yokono corporation's networks. It turned out that the advanced robotics corp was funneling ridiculous amounts of money into a secret project that was hosted on a hidden node in their network. Whatever it is that Yokono was developing with this secret project, it was worth tens of millions of credits and warranted a team of highly trained killers to go after anyone who had even heard about it outside of Yokono corporation's offices. Jazz pondered this possibility and asked Sharkey if she was feeling up for a netrun. The hybrid grinned, revealing razor sharp, shark-like teeth. "Thought you'd never ask."
