Episode1Act4

CAST

• Michi Nom
• Carina Yuzu
• Dorota Kowal
• Sarah Lee
• Hannah
• Brennan's Girl Friend
• Brennan's Landlady

Brennan Hugh's Apartment

After going to the Mei Mei Cafe and getting minimal information, Carina and Dorota drop Sarah and Michi near the hospital and then head off to find out where Brennan Hughs lives. Dorota checks the cortex first and gets an address, but since the streets are all a jumble, Carina is left to ask for directions more than once. Eventually they end up down a row of apartment buildings that are on the edge of town and more run down than the central part of Mei Mei.

"I swear this place was just kind of dropped from orbit and let lie where it landed," Dorota says after several of the twisted streets. And then she sees the apartment buildings. "My kind of place."

Carina eyes Darota at that comment, but nods. "Well. Let's go see what we can see, shall we?" Maybe no one will stare at her chest in here. Maybe.

The apartment building is the third one on the left. Carina and Dorota have no trouble going in and climbing the stairs to the third floor where they read room 302. There are about three other doors on this floor besides his door.

Knocking on Mr. Hughs door elicits no response.

Carina looks over at Darota. "OK. I suppose we should ask around, and see when his neighbors saw him last. Unless you happen to have a talent for picking locks?"

A shrug. "Depends on the lock," Dorota murmurs in return. "I think asking around is probably better, as I'm still feeling a little obvious, even here." Carina nods, and goes trying to find neighbors to question them.

Carina starts knocking on doors. Apparently in the afternoon no one seems to be home. Eventually she makes it downstairs to what seems like the landlady's apartment. A middle aged woman answers, frowning. "What do you want?"

Dorota is going to let the one trained in social engineering do the talking and stay quiet, with quick glances around that likely make it plain she's here to protect the gorgeous woman. Probably from people who...well, you know.

"Good afternoon, Ma'am." Carina responds, offering a winning smile in a manner staged to help ease the woman back from her grouchy edge. "I am looking for Brennan Hughes, who lives in Apartment 302. I am just wondering, when was the last time you saw him, Ma'am?"

"Brennan? Ain't seen him lately." The landlady eyes Carina suspiciously. "What do you want with him?"

"I just want to check in on him and make sure he's OK." Carina answers. "He missed a meeting with myself and a business associate. I am a bit worried that something may have happened to him. I thought the least I could do was check."

Dorota nods. "Right. We're kind of...worried." Which is all Dorota is going to say, for right now.

The landlady hrmphs. "I don't get into other people's business. If he missed a meeting with you, take it up with him. And don't go bringing his problems to my door." Then she slams the door and locks it.

Carina does not frown; it's bad for lines later in life. "How rude. Let's see about trying to pick that lock, shall we?"

"Again, depends on the kind of lock." Dorota makes no promises, keeping her voice quiet. "She wasn't rude. She was scared."

Dorota then, rather casually...picks the lock. Apparently the new mechanic has a shady past. Or has helped people break into their own property before.

Once Dorota gets the door open - with seemingly contemptuous ease - Carina leads the way inside, so that they can try to find some evidence of what the heck is going on. Hopefully without getting caught.

Inside is a small one bedroom apartment. It is very bare bones. No pictures or knick knacks. Searching around the apartment, nothing seems particularly interesting or telling about where Brennan Hughs might have gotten up to. Then Dorota checks the cooler because coolers have food. In the cooler, there are boxes of what looks like various pills and other medications.

"Looks like...he was dealing in drugs. We need Sarah to look at this," Dorota says, simply. There's too much for one person to be taking. "Could be he was helping people out."

"Or smuggling. Should we take this with us and leave? Or try to bring them here?" Carina inquires. She's not sure; she's a tad rusty in the nefarious scheming aspects, and the last time she tried she ended up in prison twice over.

"Too much for us to carry. But we could take a picture," Dorota muses. That's not hard to do. "Or a couple of..." She frowns. "Smuggling for nefarious purposes or for good ones, I'm not inclined to...you know."

Carina nods. Then she takes a few pictures with her Cortex. "Let's take a few samples, just in case. And let's get out of here."

Dorota nods. "I hope...I really hope...he was stealing it for people who can't afford it." She takes a couple of small "samples" of the pills, ones the purpose of which she honestly has no clue.

Pictures are taken, samples are pocketed. Then Carina and Dorota turn to leave. *shhick-Click* It's an unmistakable sound. Standing in the door to the apartment is a brunette holding a very large shotgun. "You have 2 seconds to tell me what in this gorram world you're doin' before I make a mess of your pretty faces.

Carina holds up her hands, facing the woman with the gun. "We were about to leave. We came here looking for Brennan, because he missed a meeting. We're concerned. We're not here to be a threat to you, or anyone else."

Dorota nods. "Just what she said. There's...uh...no need for the gun." Dorota, nervous. That's a BIG shotgun.

"What meeting? I ain't never seen you around before." The woman doesn't lower the gun.

"He was supposed to have a meeting with someone, and missed that meeting." Carina explains. "That person asked us to look into this, and try to make sure he's OK. We're not armed, and we mean you no harm. Could you //please// lower the gun?"

Dorota nods. "Right. We're friends of an associate of his." She's starting to get real nervous, her stance shifting a little.

The woman's shoulders slump and the shotgun points down. "I don't know where he's gone to. Called me the other day, said he saw somethin'. Wouldn't tell me what. Haven't seen him since."

"We'll find him," Dorota assures, although her tone might not be the most *reassuring*. "And I promise, we want him to be okay." Well, they don't. Felix does. So...

"Can you tell us exactly when you heard from him?" Carina asks, as gently as she can. "It could prove useful information."

"Two days ago. He called me, said he would be off work soon. Was real nervous but wouldn't tell me much more. I'm afraid he saw somethin' awful over at the hospital. They take serious issue with those that know what they shouldn't. Or, maybe they figured out he was skimmin' off the top of their supply. Maybe not. I don't really know." The woman seems to be rambling a mite, like his disappearance has been eating away at her.

"Alright." Carina offers. "That's when he missed his meeting, as well. As she said, we'll do all we can to find him and bring him back safely. We're going to get going, to meet up with a few others who were checking somewhere else. We'll be in touch."

Dorota nods. "There's...clearly something odd going on at that hospital." Of course, they can't take on a corp. But maybe they can get this one guy out. "And we will..."

The Hospital

The Hospital and Research Facility is one of the largest buildings in Mei Mei. Upon reaching the facility, there are signs for two main entrances: Visitors and Emergency Department. Before heading to the emergency department, Michi and Sarah scout the outside and find that besides the two public entrances, there seems to be a third one in the back of the building. Michi notices that this entrance is watched by a camera. Going to the Emergency Department Entrance, Sarah speaks all sorts of Jargon, attempting to solicit more of an emergency to Michi's ailment. Unfortunately she speaks to a set of deaf ears and they are left to wait their turn among all the other emergency patients.

Sarah glances over towards Michi, sitting down next to them, "Well, plan A didn't work... thoughts on a plan B?" She hmms, glancing around the emergency waiting area.

"Plan B. Let's hope I learned something from Carina." Michi says. He waits for a nurse to stop in at the check-in station and then walks up, putting a little swagger in his step. When he's close enough, he offers the nurse a smile. "Listen, I'm only here because my ship's doctor insists I get a check-up for this burn I got in the engine room, but suddenly you walked in the room and this whole gorram trip is worth it."

The nurse does a double take at Michi, that sort of blink when you finally realize something that you didn't see before. A blushing smile lights up the nurse's cheeks. "Ain't you adorable." She says with a flustered stutter, her eyes solely on Michi.

"Almost as much as you." Michi leans in close, just like he's seen Carina do. Invading personal space just enough to draw attention and put the subject off balance.

Meanwhile, Sarah manages to attract zero attention from the distracted nurse, casually sliding the tablet into her possession. Quietly, she begins to scan for information regarding Brennan Hughes, shielding the tablet from view.

The nurse lets a giggle escape her lips, quickly stifling it with a hand over her mouth. "You said you were waiting to be looked at?" She redirects, her hand reaching for the tablet that is no longer there.

"I was but now I'm hoping to look at you more." Michi says, quickly, "Maybe after your shift? I hear there's a good diner in town..."

The hand that was going for the tablet, stops as Michi redirects her. "I get off at 8PM." The nurse offers. "Meet me at the entrance then?"

"Absolutely. I'll be picking you up in my shuttle." Michi promises. Inwardly, he hopes he isn't lying. Simple job, right? No way things will go wrong...

Hannah smiles brightly and then heads back to deal with another patient with high hopes of meeting Michi after her shift is up.

Sarah slides the tablet back to the proper spot, resetting the screen so that the nurse will be hopefully none the wiser. Then she murmurs softly to Michi, "John Doe admitted two days ago with serious injuries, allegedly Reavers. Room on the second floor. Shall we pay them a visit?"

"Reavers. Planetside?" Michi says, once they've moved away from the nurse's station. "That makes no sense. Nor does anyone surviving. Think we can get into the room without getting into trouble?"

Sarah nods, "Well, that's apparently what the witnesses said, but yeah, I agree." She hmms, "There /is/ the visitor's entrance. And it might be that whoever did it wanted it to look like the Reavers."

"Let's go, then." Michi motions, raising his voice. "Look, doc. They're busy here and I don't think they can do much for me you ain't already done. We're going and if you argue you can find another bunk, got it?" He begins moving towards the door. "I got a date to get ready for."

Circling around to the visitor's entrance, Sarah and Michi enter through a revolving door. At the Visitors desk, there is a woman wearing nurse's white including hat. Her hair is pulled back into a tight bun. She wears a red lipstick that is slightly less red than her hair. To the left of the visitor desk are a set of elevators. To the right, behind the desk is another door. If you turn full around once you enter through the revolving door, there is a lobby area with plush chairs to sit in.

Sarah walks over towards the elevator, giving a slight nod of hello to the nurse on duty as she makes her way across the foyer. She just tries to look like she belongs, you know.

The nurse doesn't even bat an eye.

Michi walks along with Sarah. "If someone made it look like reavers, there might not be enough of a face to identify the guy." He notes.

Sarah hrms softly, "Point, but I'm curious as to what exactly is going on." She smiles faintly, "Nice work, by the way." Once in the elevator, she pushes the button for the second floor.

The elevator dings and opens and it uneventfully takes Sarah and Michi to the second floor where it opens to another nurse's station. The hallway moves to the left and right, around the station. Nurses and doctors are busily moving about.

"I've watched Carina a lot." Michi says with a shrug. "... interacting with people. Not just staring at her. I... whatever." He mutters. "You're in charge, doctor. Lead the way."

Sarah nods, and murmurs, "The one time I think I'll get to hear you admit it." She grins a touch and makes her way towards the room in question, looking all business as she keeps an eye out for possible trouble as she goes down the hall.

It doesn't take long to locate the room where John Doe's room is. Unfortunately, the room is empty.

"Surgery?" Michi asks, only half looking into the room. He's watchint the hallway, head down, looking to make sure trouble doesn't come their way.

Sarah shakes her head, "No... not surgery. They were transferred..." She frowns, "Looks like they went into the research facility. This is getting more and more complicated." Still, at least it looks pretty easy for her to get in and out of the hospital system.

"... I think we need to go, for now. If you can, copy as much of the information as you can get to look somewhere else. But something smells funny and I'm not interested in tackling it with half a crew." Michi says. "We need to go."

Sarah smiles at Michi, "You might end up missing your date, you know." She then starts copying over whatever data she can get her hands on, working quickly... and if she can somehow get into the research databases, so much the better.

Sarah snaps out her data solid, then looks at Michi, "Research side isn't accessible from here, but I got the rest. Let's go." She agrees with the captain, pocketing the data.