The Shopping Trip From Hades (ACRO Plot)

[The Bushranger]

The Mall of Acronymia.

It has every store known to mankind. The inside is bigger than the outside.
Some of the wings are bigger still.


And, in one, small hallway, leading to the women's restrooms, there's a shopping bag, a pool of blood, and a corpse...

And a couple of security guards, standing around looking nervous.

[FireFox]

Sam strides in, flanked by two men with submachine guns, and two people that look like lab techs, with large bags of equipment. They make their way to the restrooms.

[The Bushranger]

The security guard sees them approaching, and stands to attention, saluting.
"Security Lieutenant Ford, ma'am. We kept the scene intact for you, ma'am."

Indeed, there's a pool of blood - two kinds of blood - and an overstuffed shopping bag laying on its side.

And a corpse.
Looks like a shadar-kai.

[FireFox]

Sam salutes back, then wordlessly indicates for his men to leave the area. Her two, Prometheus Security, men take up positions while the techies start scanning blood, fingerprints, and DNA. And yes, they have Dani's on file.

[The Bushranger]

Lt. Ford's team leaves the area.

There's a fair bit of her DNA there. Mostly in a good part of the blood.
There's blood from another human, male, there, too, as well as from several shadar-kai.
Her fingerprints are all over the bag, which has items spilling out of it...

Oh, and the dead shadar-kai died from a close-range Crystalstorm to the crotch.

[FireFox]

Sam smiles humourlessly at the dead body, then watches as a begloved techie slowly takes items out of the bag and checks them over.

[The Bushranger]

The items will be catalogued as follows...

A couple of books, that fall into the category of how to build a household together.

A very skimpy nightgown and an even skimpier swimsuit.
Neither in Dani's size - for a rather taller woman. One Sam's size, in fact...

A Taurus Judge .45/.410 revolver in a crystal case.

And a small, plain box. A ring box, big enough for two rings...

[FireFox]

The techies give each other a look, then put the rest of the stuff in the bag, after fingerprinting them, and sealing that in a larger bag.
Sam, her expression worsening after every revealed item, finally breaks down at the last and leaves the room sobbing.
The Forensics team takes as much time as needed to canvass the area, trying to find every little "clue" that may remain there, and then go question clerks after checking the receipts to build up a picture of where Dani was at different times; a simulation over her trip to the mall. They also ask for assistance from the security cameras.

[The Bushranger]

The security cameras show Dani's progress through the mall, going from store to store, then heading to the restrooms...where she's confronted by a dark-haired man and three shadar-kai.

A fight ensues after only a few words, Dani's first blast taking down one of the shadowy creatures and wounding the others, before she's taken in a headlock by the man, who shouts something in a strange language...and then transport rings descend, whisking them away.

It seems this was VERY well planned, right down to the second.


Witnesses, it seems, saw nothing.

[FireFox]

They run the image of the man, and all of the fingerprints, through Prometheus Securities' very extensive database. Of course, it's doubtful that they're in there.

After a few hours of work, the techies go back to their lab, somewhere, and Sam returns to the bathroom to take another look around.

[The Bushranger]

The fingerprints come up with a match. Dani's.
The ones from the man actually come up as being...almost like two sets of prints overlaid into one...


There's not much new to see. However Sam might notice, laying on the floor, a note...

How'd they miss that?

[FireFox]

Sam, barely able to even see the note through her tears, bends down to pick it up. ... Really, guys?

[The Bushranger]

The note is very simple.

"Thank you for coming. We have something you want, and now are about to get something we want. Keep looking up! M."

[FireFox]

The first thing Sam does is go for her gun, and then she stands and looks, well, up.

[The Bushranger]

As Sam looks up, the ceiling irises open...

And transport rings descend around her!

[FireFox]

Sam doesn't have time to do anything other than prepare, while the soldiers outside start panicking.

[The Bushranger]

And vroom - she's gone!


...



...


Rematerialising in what seems like an abandoned warehouse, or something of the sort. Wide open space, concrete walls, dead center in a 25,000-square-foot floor illuminated by flourescent lights.

The rings here, for the record, come out of the floor.

There's a door, one door, in one corner of the room, and that's it.

[FireFox]

Sam looks and listens as she silently approaches the door, trusting her heightened senses to possibly pick up on the sounds of people.

[The Bushranger]

There's a faint hum of machinery, that seems to be a little louder behind the door.

But otherwise, the room is as quiet as a graveyard.


The door has an electronic lock, and it sure looks like it's trapped, too.

[FireFox]

Sam paces around the entire room, making sure she didn't miss anything. Then she stays by the door, gun ready. She waits, and she listens.

[The Bushranger]

Hummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm....

Not even omminous humming, either. Just machinery, muffled.


The pacing reveals concrete. Lots and lots of concrete. And the control panel for the rings, of course.

[FireFox]

Sam's pissed, but she knows somebody wants her there, so she waits.
...
She can go a long time, seething rage and depression notwithstanding.

[The Bushranger]

...

...

...

...

Two hours later...


click! from the lock on the door.

[FireFox]

Sam silently brings her gun to bear, standing to the side of the door.

[The Bushranger]

The door slides open.

The machinery noise gets really, REALLY LOUD now that it's open.

Nothing else happens.

[FireFox]

Sam waits. You never know how impatient they may get. Also, she hasn't made a sound since she got here, so if they don't have cameras, they make think she's gone.

[The Bushranger]

Cameras with X-ray vision!

...

...

...

...

Two more hours pass...

Suddenly, the machinery powers down.

The sudden lack of noise may be painful.

[FireFox]

Sam expected a fight; she has special earplugs.
And annoying amounts of patience.

[The Bushranger]

And lo, 30 minutes later, footsteps can be heard approaching down the hallway.

[FireFox]

She gets ready to hold the gun on anyone who steps through.