21:02 <Crion> So. Fun times and reminisces and discussions about the violation of privacy inherent in some contracts are over, and it's a brand new day. Time to break into the tunnels beneath UMBC. 21:05 <dammitwho> Goodness, how are we going to break into a locked area an-- ahahaha. Sorry. 21:05 <Crion> How's everybody kitting up, and do you have a plan of entry? Place? Time of day? Way to explain any guns you're toting? 21:07 <VoxPVoxD> There's not really any situation where Stewart would need to explain his gun that he'd bring his gun on. It's not like the Sun's Cinders cult is going to call the cops on us. 21:08 <Crion> In fairness, "explain your gun" probably only applies to Tony. Probably. 21:08 <banana> Night would be traditional for this sort of thing, when there aren't people all over campus looking directly at us... 21:09 <CBN> Tony's not even sure he'll need it---an absolutely obliterating shotgun is one of those bells you can't unring once it comes out. 21:15 <banana> Melanie's going to spend a few minutes in the Hedge that day, just immediately outside the Wherehouse in the rain - she wants to feel as clean as possible before wading into these tunnels, in case they're sewerish. Since there's a real risk of violence, she's going to wear a heavy leather jacket and bring her A-game (the A stands for anger, someone else's, converted to Glamour). 21:17 <Crion> Good news for Stewart -- the blueprints for UMBC's original construction recently got scanned into the relevant county databases, which are of course password-protected and are of course rather easily bypassed, because county IT is lazy and only puts the passward protect on the webportal, which is not itself secure and can be bypassed with a (highly precise) direct link. Add that to the 21:17 <Crion> blueprints of the Albin O. Kuhn library, the dorms, and the newer Shriver Public Policy building, English building, and Physical Sciences building, and you've got them all. Weirdly, the physical plant doesn't seem to be in here. 21:18 <Crion> A 'physical plant' in this context is the big maintence ops building on campus where the groundscrew, cleaning crews, and more heavy-duty builders and engineers have their offices and keep their equipment. 21:19 <trenchfoot> Nels is definitely bringing her gun, and I believe she's got a kevlar vest from one of their previous outings. That goes under a sweater large enough to hide it. Can't get much safer than that, not without looking like a complete weirdo. 21:19 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart spends the entire day napping, hanging out with Lauren, and doing research that he keeps the motley updated on. He's home from the Belvedere in time for his stream-- "Deranged_Squirrel with the five-bomb of gift subs - Sgrunt, dotBak, Leonardo_da_Cringey, WizzrobePython, and Unregistered Hypercam, welcome to the Reactor, enjoy those emotes, make sure to thank Deranged_Squirrel..." 21:20 <Crion> The blueprints do not feature detailed tunnel diagrams -- they feature notation of two connected "main tunnel lines" which go around campus, one of which sort of loop around the main buildings and one which is basically a straight shot from underneath the administration building out to a point off campus: an escape route. 21:20 <Crion> But dotted lines to not a detailed map make. 21:20 <banana> "What's our policy on avoiding the sun cult," Melanie inquires of the others? "If we run into trouble, would we rather fight than lose teh chance to find the kids?" 21:20 <banana> *the 21:21 <dammitwho> Maggie: "So what does Autumn do with these blueprints now that we've got 'em? Put 'em in tomes?" 21:22 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Ravens will keep them on file." 21:23 <dammitwho> Hopefully: "In tomes?" 21:23 <Crion> Stewart's drive around campus combined with the maps makes it clear what's going on: the physical plant, seemingly inconspicuously located at the southeastern edge of campus away from the original construction (and therefore not linked into the tunnel system like the newer Shriver building, for instance), is in fact directly over that escape route tunnel. One assumes this is how it connects. 21:26 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Even *my* magical tome is digital now." 21:27 <trenchfoot> Nels, to Melanie: "I'd prefer not to fight the sun cult if we can avoid it. But that's more of a general preference..." 21:29 <CBN> Tony, to Melanie: "I don't even know if I want to bring the ol' Slayer, feels weird slinging it when the folks on the receiving end might not be weird Hedge shit or wizard crap." 21:29 <dammitwho> Maggie: "Yeah, they don't seem so bad. Just a little squirrely." 21:29 <Crion> Meanwhile, hitting the books (well, the magical Encarta) reveals no information about any permutation of the Church of Sun's Cinders, but eventually Stewart gets a redirect...to the page of "Network Zero." Looks like these guys are Anonymous crossed with ghost hunters...? Stewart's probably run into them at least once or twice on the web. Anyway this link takes him to the "Splits, Offshoots, 21:29 <Crion> and Controversies" section, which non-specifically hightlights that a bunch of Network Zero cells have left the larger 'project' because they wanted to be a lot more pro-active than the core team was comfortable with (because, frankly, the core team are all just posters and little more). They've taken their skills out into the real world, begun recruiting, and doing...whatever it is they 21:29 <Crion> think is the right thing to do. 21:30 <banana> "I think you should, Tony. The Machine Stewart describes.. it's got no idea of mercy." 21:31 <VoxPVoxD> Well at least they're not wearing V for Vendetta masks. 21:32 <Crion> Frankly, lacrosse players and pick-up artists do not seem to be the demographic that Network Zero generally services. 21:33 <CBN> Tony: "Fair enough, but unless someone's like, a machine zombie or roboman or something, I'm gonna at least hope someone tries to talk them down without me having to fire on them." 21:33 <banana> Oh, here's something important: "Could everyone please wear iconic stealth gear, like Zorro or whatever? Dark stuff, or a mask.. something that symbolically demonstrates you're trying to hide." 21:33 <banana> "The, uh, the Wyrd will conceal us as long as we tell that particular story, silly though it might be." 21:34 <VoxPVoxD> Pick-up artists and terminal posters have a pretty strong overlap. "I don't... really have anything like that. But I can hide myself, it's no big deal." 21:36 <banana> Melanie: "Maybe you could borrow a sable cloak from the Lord Sage's capacious inventory thereof?" 21:37 <CBN> Tony: "I've got some eyeblack around here somewhere, would doing some camo lines on our faces work for that?" The question is not 'why does Tony have a jar of eyeblack' but rather, why doesn't everyone else. 21:37 <banana> Melanie: "Yes! Anything that the night can cling to." 21:37 <banana> "I mean, to which the night can cling." 21:49 <trenchfoot> Nels: "I've got... some inconspicuous clothing? Or what I was told was. Um. But no masks or capes or anything like that. Is it fine if it's all black?" 21:50 <banana> "All-black counts. This is.. stagecraft, basically.. it's actually a contract I learned from- well, he was an awful playwright, but he knows the Audience." 21:53 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I think I'm gonna stick with my own magic. I don't really want to get into costume." 21:53 <trenchfoot> Nels has a black sweater and some dark enough jeans. She's got her own magic, too, but hey, free ride. 21:54 <banana> Melanie looks worried. On the one hand, Stewart's magic is effective enough that he tends to vanish entirely from sight and bend light as well as, like, bullets. On the other.. what if. 21:56 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart feels vaguely guilty, like he would if Melanie had brought homemade snacks and he said he wasn't hungry... but he's not gonna dress up. 22:24 <Crion> So what's the plan? 22:25 <Crion> You've got a couple of different routes in -- basically any you care to pick, adjusting for security cameras and sheer amount of locks -- so which will it be, and when? 22:25 <banana> If we start at the escape route, nobody will slip out past us, and we won't risk campus security guards... 22:27 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "That's the most likely spot for Thorpe's place of power, the Machine men seem intimately linked with physical infrastructure and that's the closest thing on campus to that." 22:28 <banana> Melanie: "Then we'd be cutting to the chase, and we'd have a way down if it wasn't there." 22:29 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods. "Sounds good." 22:30 <CBN> Tony: "Also, fewer chances to run into stuff that isn't relevant to where we're trying to be." 22:30 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Probably the part of the tunnel system kids are least likely to sneak into for hookups, too." 22:30 <CBN> Tony: "And we uhh already know which part is the most likely. So." 22:31 <banana> Melanie: "They're like eighteen... it's whatever part they're in.." 22:32 <banana> "Can we spot a route from parking to the plant building that's not easy to watch?" 22:34 <banana> If not on a map, we can just head out there. 22:34 <Crion> A review of the maps shows there's actually an overflow parking lot right next to the physical plant, which consists of two buildings: the warehouse, and the facilities management building. Storage and offices. 22:36 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "We can park right in front, or we could park across the street and cut across the fields." 22:39 <banana> Melanie: "Let's try to stay hidden and prioritise that over a quick getaway. I have, like, an uneasy feeling that something which appeared to be a smash and grab on the college's campus would get a lot of security and press." 22:39 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Would it really? Huh." 22:40 <banana> Melanie: 🤪 22:40 <trenchfoot> Look, people used to just steal stuff all the time and it was fine. 22:41 <trenchfoot> ...shit, phones and cameras are a thing. Right. 22:41 <VoxPVoxD> Cops also used to just be random schlubs who were at best as-well-armed as the average criminal. 22:42 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Alright, we'll park further out then." 22:46 <Crion> Night time intrusion? 22:47 <VoxPVoxD> Yeah. 22:47 <banana> None of us have regular schedules, even compared to students. 22:48 <Crion> Then it'll be after dark at a time of your choosing on a weeknight of your choosing when you pull up on the facilities management compound off the east side of the circle, in however many cars you decide to travel in. 22:49 <Crion> Both buildings are exceptionally well-lit, even for a generally well-lit campus (all the big pole flood lights were recently replaced with even bigger ones), and everything seems quiet except for Parking Services, which has one of the tinpot parking dictators themselves ambling from the front door down to his campus cop car, then driving off. 22:50 <banana> As the motley debarks, Melanie asks the ones in ostentatiously Stealthy gear (or facepaint) to gather around for a moment. Demonstrating their submission to the Wyrd's cliches, she calls upon it to gather the night itself also, wrapping them in shadows deeper than any parking lot can provide. 22:57 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart just backs away from the car, outside the radius of the streetlights, and never comes back into view. 22:58 <trenchfoot> Nels also managed to find a cute black hat. The kind that one of the burglars in an incredibly loud movie she had to turn off partway through had! 23:03 <dammitwho> Maggie has taken footballer streaks of eyeblack, because that's hilarious. 23:04 <banana> The building may have been well lit before we arrived, but there are shadows between the lights. We can walk in darknesses imperceptible to mundane squints. 23:04 <Crion> There's another car sitting out in front of the plant with another campus cop in it. He's "guarding" the place mainly by listening to earbuds and watching something on his tablet, but he's got the vantage if you're not careful. 23:05 <CBN> Tony's got a sufficiently dark hoodie on, pulled low over his eyes, with just enough eyeblack to get real Criminal-looking with it. He follows Melanie's lead, and the shadows seem to agree. 23:05 <trenchfoot> We're always very careful. That's why we find ourselves in mortal peril so much. 23:09 <VoxPVoxD> We don't make mistakes or good decisions. 23:14 <Crion> Stewart takes a quiet look about. Parking Services looks like there might still be someone in it -- a light's on inside at least -- but side-door access to the rest of the building seems quiet and safe. The warehouse seems to be totally shut down for the night and has foot access from the far side of the building from the cop. The only problem is both have security cameras. 23:15 <VoxPVoxD> But once the motley is out of sight and it's clear the guard doesn't notice them, everyone on the group text gets a buzz with directions to and a picture of the warehouse entrance and the camera above it. 23:17 <banana> Melanie: "Looks like a hint. Does anyone think they'd notice if a camera went AWOL?" 23:19 <CBN> Tony: "If we get in quick enough, we can deal with that problem later. They'd probably just call in a maintenance request when they spotted it and be off." 23:19 <trenchfoot> Nels: "They probably break all the time." 23:20 <banana> "Thank you. We're all such responsible citizens." Melanie glares at the offending camera; the shadow around her shimmers, a summary heat-haze. 23:22 <banana> The wall behind the security device splinters, whether or not it was originally wood; dark and thorned tendrils boil forth and seize the camera by its neck, strangling the life from the machine in seconds. 23:22 <trenchfoot> ...okay they probably don't break like that all the time. 23:33 <Crion> The door it oversees is locked, though of course that's not really an obstacle to any of you with glamour. 23:35 <VoxPVoxD> Click. 23:38 <banana> It's kind of hard to think about *why* the door would now be unlocked, who might have unlocked it, et cetera - but nevertheless it opens, and we can begin the tunnel hunt. 23:39 <Crion> The warehouse is...well, it's one of those. As central receiving for the entire campus, there's obviously a lot of Stuff around, but it looks mostly organized and sorted. The forklifts are parked off where they presumably should be and are locked down for the night, so on and so forth. 23:39 <Crion> There's emergency lighting, but it's very poor. Do you risk turning on the actual lights? 23:40 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart doesn't; the others can make that decision for themselves. 23:40 <CBN> Tony, low: "Anyone pack a flashlight...?" 23:40 <Crion> You can have trivially packed flashlights. 23:40 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart's phone has a flashlight. 23:47 <banana> Whispering as we search: "It's humorous talking to Stewart over the DM like this. Intellectually I know he's somewhere nearby, maybe he can even see us, but the possibility of seeing him in return.. doesn't even feel like an option." 23:47 <Crion> The motley searches. This appears to be a normal warehouse...except for the back loading dock. 23:48 <dammitwho> Maggie: "'over the DM'?" 23:48 <banana> "Direct message!" Melanie holds up her phone. 23:48 <Crion> There are a lot of ways to deal with height differences between a truckbed or container bed and your dock itself. One way is to build the dock elevated to a standardized height, and then just kind of wing it if anything non-standard comes in -- this works for most warehouses, because they only receive from one source: the back of an eighteen-wheeler. And those are the same height every time. 23:49 <Crion> Not so here on this back dock, which has a great hydraulic plate that raises like a ramp, apparently, to an arbitrary height. That's what the controls next to it seem to suggest. But there's something off about the floor. 23:50 <Crion> It slopes down for whatever reason, leaving a slight lip. 23:50 <dammitwho> Maggie: "Ah! I'll bet that ramp goes down as well as up!" 23:51 <trenchfoot> Nels: "...ramps usually do?" 23:52 <banana> I think that's up to you, the walker? "Okay, how to open it.. it will either be some kind of ordinary looking control on the wall of the garage of an elaborate secret passage kind of thing. Depends on how dumb they thought the students were when they were building out this place." 23:59 <banana> *or an 23:59 <CBN> Tony looks around. "It can't just be like...pressing the button an extra time, right?" 00:01 <Crion> The panel for the thing appears to have a raise button, a lower button, a manual lock-release so that the previous two buttons won't work while it's engaged, and a hole for a turnkey. 00:19 <trenchfoot> Yeah, we can just. Look. Okay. "Lower the ramp." It's not like anyone else is going to stop them. And it's her warehouse now. 00:20 <banana> "Did you just seduce a loading dock?" 00:21 <Crion> The key mechanism turns, the manual lock disengages, and the down button depresses. The ramp slowly lowers into the furthest-declined position...revealing a wide concrete opening, from much older construction. Beyond that is what appears to be, well, a tunnel. Wide and featureless and heading down into the earth. 00:22 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Please never say those words in that order again. And no. I did not." 00:24 <banana> And yet it's opening its- Melanie laughs to herself, but doesn't continue out loud. 00:24 <Crion> The industrial catacombs beneath UMBC are the motley's to explore...next week.