Scavenger Hunt Part 2: The Challenge

The lights in the Daisy Chain brightened up just before midnight, and I'm surprised to see how quickly the place emptied out. It hit me that no one was left except for a crowd of elves in Ancients Green… and us! Scanning the crowd again as we hear the Chain's heavy doors swinging shut, we do spot a knot of elves that don't quite match the rest of the crowd. Most of them are in Urban Explorers, the comfortable armoured jumpsuits that are popular with city couriers around the world.

Even as the rest of the club's elves were paying attention to Belial and Sting as they hop on stage, I notice that the other group of outsiders seem to be eyeballing us back; sizing us up if I'm not mistaken. One gives our group a dismissive sneer, and one with bright blue hair shot me a wink before turning her attention to the action on stage. They must be our competition tonight.

Sting's been the leader of Seattle's most infamous go-gang for over two decades, so I'd expect this sort of staredown to be dominated by her; at a glance, though, almost the opposite seems to be true. Belial is big and strong where she's leaner and lankier than most elves. He looms almost half a head taller than she does, and there's an energy to him as he bounds onto the stage that Sting just doesn't seem to match. Everyone knows elves don't get old and weak quickly, but there's an undeniable youth and enthusiasm that Belial's got and Sting... hasn't. The crowd of Ancients responds to it, with more than a few of them pumping their fists and howling encouragement as the pair square off.

Sting clears her throat, and continues. "You declared the chal'han, and I accepted an hour ago. The terms of the challenge have been agreed upon, our proxies prepared." We can't help but feel less than "prepared," given the circumstances. Her canine implants gleam as she gives Belial a wicked grin, interrupting the solemnity. "Last chance to back down."

"I declared the chal'han and you accepted. My proxies are ready." Belial's trained singer's voice carries across the club. "And it's nice of you to ask, granny, but I ain't quittin' now."

"Accepted and confirmed," a dark-haired, dark-eyed Ancient says from just in front of the stage. And they, along with the whole crowd, said "So let it be done!"

"I present my seconds," Belial says, lifting one arm to point at us. Removing any doubt, a spotlight illuminates our section of the dance floor, lighting up our crew for every elf to see. "Professionals, paid honestly for services to be rendered. I declare them my Milessaratish for the next hour. They are my arms and legs, my beating heart and clutching fist. They stand for me, and I trust them to bring me glory."

"I present my seconds." As Sting's voice rings out, a second spotlight fires up and rings that group of non-Ancients we spotted earlier. "Our Laésa cousins, paid fairly for services to be rendered. I declare..."

None of us could hear the rest, as the Ancients in the crowd reacted with a wave of muttering. Sting must have ovaries of orichalcum to bring Laésa to an Ancients rite, and it's not sitting well with the crowd. Belial might have youthful enthusiasm on his side, but Sting's showing she's still as audacious as ever.

"You never did own every elf in Seattle, kid," she says to Belial when the mutters stop. He doesn't seem fazed by her choice of seconds though, still sound in his confidence in us.

Sting takes his silence for assent and continues the challenge. "Let them go forth and serve as our own, garbed in our colors, doing our will. Let them strike down our foes, lift up our friends, and bring riches to this family."

"Let them go forth… and kick ass! In the name of the Ancients!" He says in response, stabbing his fist in the air, to the roar of the crowd.

Belial peels off his Ancients jacket, holding the worn leather up for everyone to see, then swings his arm in a wide arc to toss the vest toward us. "I say if they're doing Ancients work, we let the Ancients take the heat for it. So who's in?"

Sting's faintly glowing cyberoptics roll at his gesture, and she made no move to follow suit, herself.

"These people are standing in for us and doing our jobs tonight. I'm not letting them take the heat for it, or go out there without showing the world whose name they're kicking ass for!" Belial's tone carries a bit more serious ring to it now, and I can hear the leader he can become. "We've only got a couple of minutes before the rubber hits the road, people. Who wants to do the right thing here and lend our proxies some armour?"

That was enough to get a pile of jackets thrown our way, and in a few moments we all had our pick and even the Laésa team were wearing Ancients Green. Must be pissing them off, having to wear enemy colours. Belial hopped off stage and is slapping the bare arms of every Ancient who surrendered his cut, favoring them with smiles or fist bumps, handshakes or nods.

Sting yelled "Everyone out front! All proxies, to your wheels!" The race is almost on.

Carried along in a sea of green leather and pointed ears, we were soon deposited by a Rover 2068 —which is emblazoned with an assortment of Ancients decals, stylized flames and Celtic knotwork - even as the Laésa team are getting on their own bikes.

Spectrum sent a message to the rest of us. This usually meant that he was about to be an idiot or a genius. Sometimes both. I reckon, he wrote, we should take the pimp out first. If he has a ride to jack-roll those girls with...

I saw what he was getting at. A second ride would help with getting the girls back, and thus prove that we stopped the pimp!


As Sting's wiry form and Belial's powerful one take to the center of the street, everyone fell silent. They stood back to back, with Belial facing us and Sting looking at her own proxies a short distance down the block. Then Sting and Belial swept their arms through the night air, and every horn and engine on the street blared at once: the race was on now!

As we dived into our Rover, our commlinks went off.


Our team's SOP is to write a draft e-mail of any names we need to know more about. We sent ours as soon as we were escorted out, and we just got our replies.

We tallied up what we found out...

Belial is a combat mage with the Ancients. Used to be called Kid Fireball. Sting had been co-Captain of the Ancients for 20 years.

The Spikes claim most of I-5 as their turf. They've had a very long feud with the Ancients, and their gang initiation is to kill an elf - any elf would do.

Jimmy the Chin is one sick SOB. He used to be Mafia, but his Family was in Chicago when the bug spirits turned up. He'd been mentioned on Shadowsea as getting some new 'merchandise' in. He keeps the girls hooked on bliss so they can't leave. We agreed to do him first.

The Skraacha have been trying to be more organised since word got out about the vote on whether or not to make the Ork Underground an official District of Seattle.

The auto-trucks are alright for long stretches of interstate, but they need to go really slow inside cities.

The Laésa are a gang of mostly Tír exiles. Every elf kid in Seattle that wants that type of life wants to be an Ancient, but the Laésa offer a second home to folks who are on the run from Tír Tairngire.

The chal'han was as serious as elves got when it came to a feud.

I mentioned how I know that the autotruck is basically just a drone plugged into a semi. I was thinking that if Spectrum could hack it open, I could take the wheel and drive the whole thing to the Daisy Chain. Let's see the Laésa beat that!

But we'll leave that for last. For now, we have a pimp to raid...