Stealing the tech, part 2

Drones started to come to life around me. Not good. All alone on the first floor.
I hustled to the back, looking for another way out. There was an emergency door but it was welded shut. "This is not up to code!" I yelled in sarcastic frustration.
The other two came back down the stairs. Blitz was in a bit of haze, though I wasn't sure why. We headed for the tower, which was how to access the subterranean tunnel to the building we were seeking.
The tunnel's motion lights kicked on as we entered, showing a five-meter wide hallway that extended for a ways. There were all kinds of parts and equipment strewn all over, including hardware that included vehicle-grade weapons. We raced down the tunnel toward our destination. Halfway there the tunnel bent toward the other building. But just beyond the bend were targeting barriers. I strained to move them out of the way of my two companions with the intent of pushing them back into place to dissuade pursuit. Far ahead of us we saw two red lights come on and the sound of electronic pinging. Seemed like two entities. "You have anything for this?" I asked Blitz. He sneaked toward the lights, using some wrecked targets as cover, cutting the distance. We were about 35 meters from the red lights, whatever they were. Blitz moved up about half way; threw out a hand and the sound of metal smashing echoed from where the red lights sat. The other one whirred and moved to track Blitz. There was a muzzle flash and the sound of gunfire from the other threatening light source. Hard to tell but it seemed like a pair of sentry auto-guns. Blitz got hit but the plates in his armor seemed to absorb most of it, staggering him.
I ran up to Blitz and tried to shoot the red eye. I only winged it. I was close enough to see it at that point, a sort of tripod. It returned fire and a bullet ripped through my hip and some of the plates in my armor.
Spark stitched up the other gun emplacement and it went quiet. She came over to me while taking out a medkit. "It's not bad enough to waste time on that," I told her.
We went past more equipment and came to another set of double doors. Spark took over point since I was not in top form anymore, hobbled by the wound. The area was strewn with junk - shipping crates, boxes, parts - almost a small landfill. Up the stairs we went stealthily. Spark moved a crate but misjudged its weight and basically threw it out of the way with a crash. "Sorry," she whispered sheepishly. She moved up to the first floor door. She paused with the door open and leaned back to tell us someone was in the room. "That's you," I said to Blitz, waving him up. He went through the door tumbling as he went. All I could hear was gunfire but I couldn't see what was going on. In I rushed to see someone running up on Blitz, but the person's back was to me. He turned as I entered, then I hit him with the taser zap and it seemed to disorient him. Spark hit him with a Narcojet pistol shot and he went down in a heap.
While Spark broke out the medkit for Blitz I headed past them into the building to find Kurtis, our goal. I headed for a door leading to a service corridor, ignoring the mess hall. I passed a stairwell and the hall opened to a lobby, which seemed unkempt as evidenced by the cobwebs. The double doors are open at the front of the building and there were two men just inside. They were talking to each other so I used their distracted state to make my move across the large lobby. I got to another stairwell and headed up. This area - a barracks, by the look of it - looked more lived in. I heard far off movement and approached quietly. As I got to the door I saw an orderly with his back to me at the door. I pushed him into the room, closing the door as I followed him in, my gun out. "Follow my instructions and you live," I said deadpan.
"Whatever you want to do," he yammered. "What do you need?"
"Throw your common the ground and tell me where Kurtis is," I replied.
"Kurtis? Kurtis isn't here. They moved him. I don't know where they moved him. That's above my pay grade. Just leave me alone." I spied his tablet on the table. I grabbed it and his comm, then I tased him unconscious.
Leaving the room I could see my teammates below me in the stairwell. Blitz motioned me to a room where Spark and I can set up an ambush on a foe I don't see yet. Spark brought the comm they also stole. She began linking them by another secure channel.
The trap was sprung. One guy went into Blitz's room. Another straggler came in later, and Spark moved out to attack him with the Narcojet. The capsule hit him but a wave of energy rippled and the capsule seemed to fall away without effect. The man turned to Spark and make a finger gun, seeming to cast a spell. I leapt out, tasing him. He turned his attention to me, splitting his two fingers to send two tendrils of energy - one at each of us. At the last second, Spark threw out an arm and literally grabbed at the energy lancing toward me, snatching it and absorbing some of it instead of me taking the full power of the attack. She shot him again and this one hit him right in the chest. He jerked back violently, stumbled and fell. Spark ran up and checked him for weapons. She motioned me toward Blitz.
"You called?" I yelled to Blitz as I walked toward the guy holding him at gunpoint. The guy turned to face me and I fired the taser at him. Seeing he was surrounded he surrendered.
"Otto's stepping up their game and not just in scrap metal anymore, eh?" he said, pointing to my cap.
I handed the tablet to Spark. "Maybe this well help us find the asset."
Spark said it showed a transfer to a safe house....in Hamburg. The asset was awaiting the Russians, a team led by a Maxim Sidorov. Spark blanched at the name but said nothing.
We headed for the door, double time. I led our exit out to the wood line while successfully evading security.
Eventually, back in Hamburg, I contacted Mr. H to give him the update. He paid us 80% of the fee and said he expected us to complete the job.
"Unfortunate but out of your control," Mr. H said. "We're knee deep in this so complete the mission and contact me then."

Stealing the tech, part 1

A little down time after the Poland mission. I spent some time trying to establish a safe house. I needed to be able to put people up in Hamburg after they are extracted but don't have a final destination - yet. After three weeks I found a place and purchased some air mattresses and food, etc. It's a studio apartment in a big building in a not terrible neighborhood. It's not done, but it's livable.
Blitz told me he was trying to track down those who could teach him Ritual magic, which he wanted to use to find his missing mother. I know a little about the story; he lost track of her when he was at the military academy attached to her work in the Ukraine.
Spark was busy building a shop for her cybernetics - a lab in her crappy dwelling.
I got a call from Oskar. He had a job: infiltration, recovery of tech, extraction. In Germany, fairly close by.
Code in hand I was off to make contact. The guy wanted to meet at the Blonde Scorpion, a bar we've met contacts at before. He said he'd be in the reflective vest. "See you tonight." Once we were there, it was easy to find him at the end of the bar. Fashion is strange.
I made introductions and he found us a table, though it was in the middle of the room. I did not approve, but he was paying for the job. Luckily it was too loud for eavesdropping. "You can call me Mr. H. I'd like to know the others I'm working with."
The target would be Alder Tech, a German development company that is under Saeder-Krupp. The item we were stealing was a bit of rigger tech, a platform, a prototype that had just been completed. It integrates multiple items at once, and is funded by the Russians unbeknownst to the devs.
"We don't want this tech in the reckless hands of the Russians," Mr. H. said. He wanted us to snag it and bring it to a drop point.
In my amateur style I tried to suss out his loyalties but I'm bad at it and he's not dumb. He didn't give away anything.
The terms were arranged, including a bonus if we didn't harm any civilians or damage the facility. I tried to negotiate a little better payday and lo and behold I did squeeze better terms out of the client. He complimented our professionalism and agreed to up the price of the job.

We were given an address for the lab, which is off the beaten path in a decommissioned Army depot. We had three to four days before the Russians arrived to collect the prototype.
There is a highway nearby, with an exit 15 kilometers from the site. There's a truck stop, gas station, restaurant and motel.
Spark did some computer shenanigans and got us cover IDs for the small scrap company that goes to the lab site to get waste metal.
Blitz went to Otto's, the scrap yard, to get hats with their distinctive patches on them. I had to help buy a few of them. I was so charming! But we had to wait two days for an order to be put in so we were a little nervous that the timing would be too tight. It worked out.
After that I walked the route between the motel and the lab compound to see if there was a path we could take if we needed to hoof it in and out. There was, through the woods to the back of the facility via a northwest approach. There was a four-meter tall perimeter fence with vines growing on it, indicating that it was NOT electrified and that it was not maintained. There was gravel for about seven meters to the scrap pile, with a gate at the yard. There was also a building, two stories in concrete with a guard tower on top. Another building sat on the other side of the yard.
I scrambled to borrow a Tiffani Defiance Protector stun gun, so that I had a non-lethal option to get the bonus pay.
In the morning, I kitted up with pistol, taser, knives, climbing gear, wire cutters and medical kit. On the way to the site, I stopped about a kilometer out and stashed my crossbow in a tree in case I needed more bang on the way out.
We walked in via the route I scoped out previously. It was 5 a.m. We heard the echo of a car door closing from the front of the facility. Next came the sound of tires on gravel, which faded away. After that, it was all quiet.
I led the team quietly to the edge of the fence. We went in through a sliding gate and were into the scrap yard. We used the debris as cover to sneak to the rear of the single story building at the back of the site. There was a security camera affixed to a swivel but we ducked past it.
While I guarded our six Spark was looking for an external cyber-terminal to hack. What she found was an air conditioning unit with a camera honing in on her movements. She ducked it and stumbled onto the terminal, and got access.
There was power to both buildings, and they were connected via underground tunnel. There was also a single-wide trailer toward the front of the site. Blitz did his astral thing - the sight-beyond-sight move - to see if there were people in the buildings.
There was one person in the trailer-building. We considered sneaking over there intent on capturing the person inside and use the tech inside to find the prototype. WAIT, instead... why not walk right in as Otto's employees with a question for personnel? Maybe we can barge in and neutralize the person.
Spark entered, shoving a device in the man's face to get him to sign off on a work order. When he went to sign, I jabbed the taser in his ribs and shocked the drek out of him. He went down in a blubbering heap. Spark had already found a computer linked to the facility's network. The idiot at the desk was auto-logged on. Spark went to work cutting security then on to a complex layout.
We headed for what the computer calls The Garage, the two-story building with the tower on top. There was a big garage door on one side and a set of conventional double doors on the other. Taser in hand, I pushed open the double doors. There was an anteroom with more double doors beyond that. Through the glass it was dark though it was obvious there was a large area, perhaps the entire first floor.
Dimly glowing LEDs and my cyber eyes show it to be a room full of drones. Blitz's magical senses didn't detect any life inside. Spark and I started looking around while Blitz went to check out the tower upstairs.
"What does a rigger platform look like?!" I asked Spark as I rummaged through desks and drawers. She showed me the headware and associated tech from the data Mr. H. gave us. There was hardware and software. Our focus would be hardware, Spark noted. The hum of Blitz's open channel droned in my ear. There was a 3-D printer that tipped me off that I might be in the right place. Spark found a digital paper trail identifying Kurtis Blomkampf as the person the prototype is installed in, and that he was convalescing in the other building, the one we'd been hiding behind earlier.
Spark headed upstairs to get Blitz. I gripped the taser in my off hand and drew my Ares Predator, ready for whatever trouble was bound to come.