"Come on... Come on..." Sha'hGrim muttered to herself, waiting for the two large Trucks in front of her to move forward. She was last in line, and while not defenseless, was likely the most damaged of the now-heavilly beaten group.
Sha'hGrim wasn't sure what happened, but all of a sudden, Alexia surged forward, shooting loose gravel and dirt in to the air with her tires. She wasn't waiting around any longer, and fortunately, Sha'hGrim was ready. She took her foot off the brake, hovering over the Gas for Darkon to follow. *Ping-Ping-Ping* The sound of bullets hitting her armored Truck's exterior as she waited for Darkon to follow Alexia. - They must somehow be on the same wavelength or something... She thought to herself as Darkon's truck raced forward on the heel of Alexia's. As they had both been in front of her's, Sha'hGrim was close behind, but following. It didn't occur to her that her helmet had not yet been connected to the new Commlink Darkon had given her when they'd met outside the barn. The fight had been enough of a distraction that she hadn't thought to connect yet. Not that it would have mattered - with the jamming in effect.
"Finally!" She said out loud, stomping her foot down on the gas full force, actually hoping that some of the stones coming off her wheels would cause some bumps and bruises to the advancing soldiers. Sha'hGrim did her best to control the Truck as it flew around the corner of her drive-way on to the road beyond, keeping pace with Darkon and Alexia as they sped down the road, and away from her residence and home for most of her recent life. - Insurance will cover most of that... I can do some 'Runs for the rest. She thought fleetingly as she considered the hole in the wall, the now blasted to bits outbuildings she had used for feed bins, composting, greenhouse, and other functions which no longer mattered. - I can't do much gardening while I'm being hunted, now can I?

Alexia caught a round in the shoulder while getting over to her own vehicle, but was up and running again and soon taking off, flooring the accelerator for all it was worth. With Gel rounds being effectively useless against vehicles the soldiers stopped firing, turning instead to try and deal with who ever was fighting the rest of their group with what was clearly extremely lethal force. As the view faded in the distance the Jamming started to petere out and then finally ended entirely as you drove clear of it's range almost 40 minutes down the road. The real trick was then communicating with Sha'hgrim as she'd lost her Comlink (At least temporarily) and had no way to speak to the rest of the group without pulling over first. Darkon meanwhile had remembered a small establishment he'd heard of that was run by an old cagey dwarf that was said to occasionally arrange for secure hideouts. There were only a few issues, it was Triad controlled property, and Darkon didn't actually know any of them. Still, it was a start and it just meant one had to be careful of just how much you trusted your hosts. Besides as far as Darkon knew, the Triad had no interest in the group at the moment, and as long as they were careful about what they discussed, they would likely remain that way.

"Good gods! That was nuts!" Sha'hGrim said out loud, expecting a cacaphony of responses. She got some - but not the ones she'd been expecting.
"Indeed. That was quite the experience. Despite the significant pain I am dealing with, I will be enjoying this experience for some time." The Guidance Spirit responded. It had relocated, now that the melee was some distance behind them, from the Seat to the back of her chair. It's rear hand-feet were clutching the seat, while the front hand-feet were enmeshed in Sha'hGrim's armored coat, holding on to various grabbable pieces.
"Owww..." Jenny moaned, making use of the impressively capable link between Sha'hGrim and the Cat.
"Oh my god!! Sweety!!! I will take the pain away as soon as I can!" Sha'hGrim responded back, her head swimming with grief and guilt. She and Jenny had made a formidable team in there, but the result of their success was that Jenny was on the verge of death; barely clinging to this side of life. Or, at least, that was the interpretation that Sha'hGrim was taking.
"I'm actually, interestingly, enjoying this." The Earth Spirit possessing and enhancing Sha'hGrim's body stated.
"What do you mean?" She said out loud, having trouble keeping track of all of the communication Channels she had available to her. It was easier to simply speak out loud, and let the confusion sort itself out.
"What do you mean: "What do I mean?" Was my statement unclear?"
"Well, my brethren have distinct impressions of what the metahumanity uses their power and prowess for. This particular service is distinctly different from what my brethren would have me believe "Service" to your kind entails. I am interested, and curious, to see how this version of a partnership with you continues." The Spirit said, slowly, in it's "Earthy" mind-voice. This was not the first time Sha'hGrim had requested the aid of an Earth Spirit in this way - though typically she tended to prefer the Spirits with the "Movement" power, as they could make her much faster than she could move on her own. The benefit was really quite spectacular, when used effectively. And in fact, it had long been one of her favored training tools when working with the Cats.
"Sorry, Guidance: I was speaking with Earth. I did not mean to confuse. Earth: I too am looking forward to progressing our partnership. You saved my life today, and Jenny's, likely in more ways than one - though we may never know how many. I firmly believe that it was you flowing in to my body which gave pause to the attacker." Sha'hGrim stated, filling her words with genuine gratitude.
"If you are correct, and I suspect you are: Earth saved my life as well. You may relay my appreciation." The Guidance spirit added, noting that he will now live on, and enjoy the experiences he gained today, perhaps as a function of the Earth Spirit lending it's strength to Sha'hGrim.
"Earth: Guidance wished to extend to you his appreciation as well. He states that if my theory is correct, you saved his life as well." She relayed.
"As I said: this has been quite interesting, and I am curious to see where this leads. You may consider me to be a willing partner for the time being." Sha'hGrim was shocked by the Earth Spirit's statement. She was well versed in how much Spirit's tended to dislike being Bound. She had kept the Earth Spirit's services for just this sort of scenario - while feeling slightly guilty in asking for it's longer term commitment to her. Of course, she had paid the price; but even a fair deal, with a long-term service required, could still be uncomfortable.
"Earth: I am astounded. I honestly don't know what to say..." She said, her words echoing the truth of her deep astonishment.
"For the moment, you may say nothing more. I can feel your honesty." It responded.

Meanwhile - the road sped on, Darkon's red tail-lights keeping Sha'hGrim on track.

Car Radio/Matrix News Feed (Female voice): This just in, Government officials are claiming the recent data packet sent to several news networks, including us here at KKCW News is a Hoax. Several experts however dispute the government claims and state that the UCAS Government and Military are trying to mislead the public in regards to the events surrounding the actions of Unit 237. UCAS Government and Military sources point out that the supposedly deceased claimant, Seargent Sidney Fairbanks is a wanted Terrorist ranked number 9 on the UCAS's most wanted list. Independent sources have however verified that Seargent Fairbanks was in fact a member of the UCAS Special Forces branch and was involved in a number of actions in and around Chicago during the Insect Spirit breakout. In addition Ares Spokesmen have stated that Seargent Fairbanks was listed in their records as a military level hacker and is a suspect in the break down of communications early yesterday that saw to an unannounced test firing of an ARES Weapons Satellite that had been sold to the UCAS Military.

Sid has said that the comlinks are clean again. I hope he is right. Darkon paused a moment. Thank you, friend. He waited until they were well inside the asphalt jungles of Seattle. Where comlinks beeped by the tenthousands per square mile. On his, hopefully clean comlink, he sent: "Alexia, Sha'hGrim, I think I know where we can go. It's not perfect, but the safest I can think of. Of course it will cost us a bit. But I think what we have at the moment should get us through a while. First of all we need to recuperate.

To himself, he said: "And I need to find Robyn and Brighid. The longer it takes... " He heard the news in the radio. Something made click in his head. Chicago. Insect spirits. Fairbanks. Is he involved? Insect spirits. Oh goddess! Please protect them. Please let them not be in the hands of insects. Oh please no... The whail of sorrow could be heard on the comlink too.

With renewed grief, Darkon drove to the contact adress for Nicolas Chen, the dwarf he only knew by name and reputation.

As the group drove in a small 3 vehicle caravan, following Darkon the entire way there, a few more tidbits filtered in. Male Speaker: "Listen, all I'm saying here is that the UCAS Military put out a warrant for this guy almost a year before the UCAS Government got on board and put him on it's most wanted list. Couple that with the fact that both the Government and the Military have refused to open the man's files to review by an independent body, or even a Judge supports the claim that he was part of some sort of Special Forces unit. Furthermore, while we managed to dig up the records from some of his squad mates, we found all of the available records are either heavily redacted or are also highly classified by the Military. Given that the Government doesn't even seem to have SIN records for a few of his listed Squad mates either indicates the information was lost during Crash 2.0, or they were actually part of a Black Ops unit. Several military veterans I've spoken to have mentioned now that this 'Unit 237' never officially existed, nor does it appear in any of the UCAS Military's records, but it does show up in several reports we've managed to dig up from CAS and Ares public records before those were suddenly reclassified or 'lost' 20 minutes ago. We even have proof the records were removed or redacted retroactively and managed to save several copies before some one pulled the plug...." Second Male talker "That's nonsense! Pure Conspiracy Theory bullshit! I know everyone likes to claim the UCAS Military is in Ares' back pocket but it's a whole other thing to claim their colluding on some grand cover-up! Just because Ares is the number one contractor for arms and armaments doesn't mean they can't be replaced in a heartbeat by any one of their competitors." First Speaker "Which of course has no relation to the fact that five minutes ago you were paid 60,000 nuyen and given a trip to an Ares Executive retreat for two weeks for your entire family." Second speaker "Hey, now just you wait! Making accusations like that I....." and so the debate went on without really shedding any more light on the matter.

Still it was clear that one way or another, the now deceased Sid had had something of a rather shady past and the announcement went out around the same time he'd apparently died before the jamming kicked in. Of course he had been a hacker, and going by the news reports one that had been considered world class, famous even in the dark circles of the world where the public never saw or heard things. Time enough however would come to look into that and all the other things the last two days had stirred up. First the group needed somewhere safe to stay and as they pulled into the scrap yard just outside of Pullyup Darkon couldn't help but wonder just how much they could trust this man they had heard of. The place looked innocent enough, but hardly the sort of place one would use as a safe house. That was either a good or bad sign, but who could really tell. The other problem of course was that it was still late at night (Or very early morning depending on your take on things) and the gates were locked and barred. At a quick glance the security seemed fairly low, just a few obvious and old security cameras, a couple of signs warning of guard dogs and electrical fences. Nothing too fancy really, just the basics most Junkyards had to keep vandals and thieves out.

Sha'hGrim got out of the car the moment they stopped at the gates. She'd left the car on, and left the keys in the ignition. And while her Guidance Spirit had proven fallible this night, she wasn't worried about a car thief. It would be a rude awakening for a young kid to hop in and meet a possessed Bandit sitting in the front seat. Besides, she'd gotten out of the car for a good reason: she was still radio-silent, and it made her nervous.
"Hey, how do I hook this thing up to my earbuds again?" She asked Alexia when she rolled her window down. Sha'hGrim was unabashedly poor at handling this sort of thing, and admittedly, didn't have to do it often. She'd always had an active example, in the past, for burner phones to be modelled after.
"Well, first you... Here, just give it to me." Alexia said, realizing it would actually be faster for her to do it herself. Sha'hGrim handed the latest Burner phone Darkon had handed her before they'd run.
"Ok, all set. You hearing us now?" Alexia subvocalized. Sha'hGrim now knew that, because her earbuds were connected to the commlink again. Alexia had even done Sha'hGrim the favor of connecting to the shared frequency, so she could hear Darkon too.
"Ahh, much better. Thanks 'Lex." She replied, also subvocalized. It felt good to be back on the comm channel.
"So, uh, what's this place?" She asked, stepping back out in to the open. Mostly she had gotten out of her car first because, while possessed, she was the least vulnerable of the three of them. And she'd wanted to make certain that if a sniper was going to take pot-shots, it wouldn't result in their immediate demise. Just for safety's sake, Sha'hGrim activated her Astral with the old and familiar phrase. She looked around, hoping to notice if they were under Astral surveillance of some sort as well, which wouldn't be the least bit surprising.

"This, hopefully, is a place to crash for the night. Maybe a bit longer. But everyone seems asleep." Carefully, the shaman looked around, then he looked around again, this time on the astral.

Perception roll. First physical, then astral. Int5+perception2-stun1 (6d6. hits(5)=1, 6d6. hits(5)=0)

He sighed. "I don't think it will help us much to anger the dwarf by waking him up. But I don't want to stand out here until dawn. Well, at least the comlinks are clean again. Or so I hope." He scanned the contact link on the front gates sign and initiated the call. "Good evening. My apologies for the late disturbance, but I'm afraid I need your help. If you do not mind, could you please let us stay for a few nights?"

Etiquette roll. Charisma7+Influence4-stun1=10d (10d6. hits(5)=2)

"Yes, I know it is late. But then, this is the usual time for business like ours, isn't it?" He smiled. One could hear it on a phone when the other one smiles.

Negotiation roll Cha7+Influence4+Mentor Spirit advantage2-stun1=12d (12d6. hits(5)=3)

The compound honestly looked exactly what it was supposed to be, a Junkyard. The astral made things a little clear on the matter of there being some life inside the fenced in area, especially as one old, clearly 2nd generation cyberware enhanced junkyard dog showed up with a low growl. The poor animal probably wouldn't still have teeth given it's apparent age, were it not for the fact that the teeth were clearly metal and the only reason it didn't seem to suffer from arthritis was that over half it's body had been replaced by cybernetics that at least outwardly seemed half rusted.

What was perhaps a bit of a surprise was that the irritated sounding voice that answered wasn't an adult's but rather sounded like that of a child, complete with an Asian accent. "What? No. This is Junkyard, no place to sleep. Do not want bums in Junkyard! Go away!" Darkon's follow up netted a slightly annoyed sounding sigh. "Ours? No, we junk. You not look like type that junk! Unless you want to sell car for scrap?" there was an oddly half excited edge to that last bit.

What? Did I get the adress wrong? No, this is it. The link on the gate... I'm sure I am right here. He looked at the others, slghtly dumbfounded. But he was not lost for words for long. "Thank you, but I need my car for a while longer. Who are you? This is Nicolas Chens Junkyard, isn't it?"
Darkon thought: Of course they can't just admit to everyone. Ah well.

To that young voice he said: "Mr Lung told me, this was a good place to go." That was the codename with which one could confirm legitimacy. At least the first step to it. Come on. Don't let us stay out here all night. I am tired and need to rest, Darkon thought. I don't have much patience for this sort of game right now.

"It is, and this is Nicolas Chen." the young voice said, squeaking slightly "Just how do you know Mr Lung?"

GM note: This is where you can more or less pull it out of your ass and toss in another social attempt for good measure.

"To be exact, it was an aquaintance of Mr Lung who advised me to come here if I need shelter. I would not dare to disgrace his discretion by naming him in such a public place. But I think I can risk saying I met him in the shadow of Mitsuhama on a fourth of July."

With a smirk, Darkon thought: That should make him curious at least.

Etiquette roll: Cha7+Influence4-stun1=10d (10d6. hits(5)=3)

"Fine fine. I be out in a minute." The testy child voice responded "But no funny stuff! Try funny stuff and butterball will eat you!" the name incidentally seemed to go with the AR tag for the cybered dog. The same cyberdog that was apparently already getting winded and honestly looked.. well.. rather old.

"So? What happened?" Sha'hGrim asked, literally tapping her toes on the ground. She hadn't been bored though. The rusted look of the Junkyard dog had been quite amusing, and impressive at the same time. - Great camouflage! She thought to herself. - I'll bet the fence is electric too...
"The morning is coming soon, and I will be departing. Do you intend to let me go, or would you like me to stay longer?" The Guidance Spirit asked, intruding in to her amused thoughts on the Junkyard Dog.
"Oh, goodness, you're right. To be honest, I need all the help I can get! But I think that you need rest even more than I do - you should return to your metaplane. If I need help in a pinch, I will call on you then. Or one of your brethren. Thank you again for all you've done tonight!" Sha'hGrim replied. She was surprised at her genuine sadness that the Spirit would be leaving at sunrise. But she had meant it when she'd said he needed his rest!
"You might want to go back to your car now Sha'hGrim..." Alexia prompted.
"If they were going to shoot at us, I think we would have known by now..." She finished, a grin on her face. She gave Sha'hGrim a quick wink before returning her watchful gaze toward the junkyard.
"Yeah... I guess that does make sense." Sha'hGrim replied, walking back toward her own vehicle. She stepped in to the Truck and immediately twisted around, looking over the seat to check on Jenny. - Not good... She needs my help as soon as possible... She noted, seeing that, thankfully, Jenny had not gotten worse. But she was still in bad shape.
"Hang in there Jenny. I'll be helping you soon." She said to Jenny soothingly using their magical link.
"Uughhhh..." Jenny responded. Not so much with words; but with a drawn out internal groan. It was likely a mixture of pain, and the effort of keeping conscious.
"I know... I know..."

After a few moments a very small figure came out, using a cane to help support him. While Darkon had known to expect a dwarf, this looked far more like a child than an adult. He had little hair and were it not for just how weathered and old his skin looked, the mind would have insisted this person was most certainly a young child. As it was the 'child' looked freakishly like he was in his early 60's with a bum leg. Chen eyed the trio outside the gate for a moment, not speaking, nor responding if spoken to. "Rest I see you need." he said still in that child's voice. "But how you pay?" he glanced about but the area was pretty deserted at this time of day and there generally wasn't that much traffic out here to begin with anyway "You no Triad. But you no look like enemy."