VRDET Op: The Marraketh Connection Seg #6: "The Great Outdoors, Part 2" By: nexxus 3 kline ================================== Nexx left Phoe and Shad to inspect the rooms on their own, opting to head straight for a bedroom and a shower. She walked down the hall and took the last door on the left, out of habit more than anything, all the rooms were the same anyway. Tossing her pack on the bed, she pressed the light switch before tossing herself on the bed as well. "This whole thing is turning into a disaster," she commented to the room. "I hope tomorrow turns out a little better." With a sigh, she sat up and took off her boots, then dumped the entire contents of her pack onto the bed, sorting things into separate piles as she searched for her hairbrush. Flying on a dragon was great except for the tangled hair. *** After an hour in the bath, 20 minutes of hair brushing and 5 looking for her nail file Nexx's thoughts turned to food, or lack of having eaten any all day, and made her way out into the kitchen to see what was available. "Nothing..." she commented, closing the door. "I *know* I asked for a stocked kitchen when we checked in, so where the heck is all the..." her train of thought was interrupted by the sudden mental image of a very large dragon. A very large, very _hungry_ dragon. "SHAD!!!" Did you eat everything?" she shouted in the general direction of the livingroom "Yes" came the shouted reply. Nex sighed, shook her head and walked over to a panel on the wall. Ten minutes later a waiter knocked on the door and quietly let himself in to restock. Nexx grabbed her specially ordered Chinese take-out from off the waiters cart and made for the balcony where she found a spot that provided a good view of the mountains. This where she stayed; leaning against the ledge, take-out carton in one hand, chopsticks in the other, she watched the mountains and wondered about Kat and the missing Rescue team members. She'd been staring into space for a full three minutes before she heard the sniffing noise behind her. She felt someone... some*thing* behind her, the hair stood up on the back of her neck, "You gonna eat that?" implored Shad from behind her. Startled, Nexx jumped, losing the take-out carton over the edge. She leaned forward to watch it fall, Shad rushing forward to see as well. *** Down on the street below *** Tarlen was feeling confident in his new suit, he just knew that he'd impress everyone at the club. Looking down at his new shoes, he noticed his shoe was untied. He quickly stepped closer to the building, so as not to be in the other pedestrians' way and bent down to tie it. He wiped a small smudge of dirt off the left toe before moving to stand up when suddenly, *splat* He found himself covered in soy sauce. "Oops." Shad commented in a small voice. Nexx snickered madly, "Guess we'll have to order some more." and headed inside to see if Phoe wanted anything and to place the order. *** Much, much later *** *Crash* Nexx was awakened by a vase crashing into a million pieces, it seems they had failed to close the doors to the balcony and a sudden breeze had caused the curtains to blow out, knocking it off it's pedestal. She noted the time and winced, it was after 3 pm already and the others were still asleep. Not wanting to wake them just yet, she quickly got dressed, grabbed her backpack and went down to the lobby to see if the EDT logs they were promised had arrived yet. They had. Impatient, she pulled her laptop out of her backpack, powered up and slid the data clip in. She spotted 6 landings; one in Marraketh, two just outside Chi-Lin, one in the mountains and two inside Chi-Lin limits, one of which was marked a a 'presumed teleport'. "Must have been when Shad showed up." she commented to herself. On closer inspection, the Marraketh landing was undoubtedly VR's, as was one of the landings just outside Chi-Lin, the second one was a large group. The second Chi-Lin teleporter was an approved military entrance, so there was no way it could have been the missing VR personnel. The mountain landing showed only two people. It had to be two of the missing VR people, it was at the same time and of the same signature as the Marraketh landing, but which two. And what happened to the third person. Where could they have landed? Nexx cursed under her breath and shoved the laptop back into her pack. "I'd better go wake Shad and Phoe up. We've got to locate those two and find out what happened to the third." she sighed and headed for the lift, teleporting to the room as soon as the doors closed. *** "Good, you're awake." she said, teleporting in right behind Shad. He turned around, "Nexx? I thought everyone was still asleep. You got the logs?" he asked. "Yeah." Nexx replied, sitting in the nearest chair and pulling out her laptop. She tapped a few keys before the data appeared mid-air in the center of the room. "This is what was recovered from their logs. As you can see, there were only 6 landings yesterday." she tapped a few keys and the projection zoomed in on the Marraketh landing. "This was VR's landing." she narrated and typed at the same time. "And this was when we came to Chi-Lin. This one, I'm assuming is where you broke through, Shad." she continued. "And this, right here, it has the same signature as the Marraketh landing, this has *has* to be VR..." she paused. "But..." Shad interjected, detecting more to the story. "But," Nexx began. "There were only two people in that teleport." Phoenix finished, having woken up and heard the noise. "Yeah, which means..." nexx began again. "Someone didn't make it?" Shad finished. "Yeah, exactly." Nexx frowned. "Unfortunately, we have no way of knowing who is still missing. The good news is, we at least have a good idea where we can start looking for them." "Where exactly was their landing location?" Phoe queried. "Can you pinpoint those coordinates on a map?" "Yeah, hold on a second." Nexx closed down the log and pulled up a map of the mountains. A couple of keystrokes later a blue dot appeared where the two VR members were recorded as having landed. "Right there," she paused. "And if I'm not mistaken, they should have been able to see Chi-Lin from there, if we're lucky they've headed this way. It'd be nearly impossible to see them down there from the air, too many trees." "How far is that from town?" Phoenix asked. "Well, it's about 3/4 of a day on foot. If they started walking towards Chi-Lin right after they landed, they would be here by now." Nexx answered. "Ok, and if they didn't head straight for town?" Phoenix looked around for a clock. "It's late afternoon." Shad interjected. "They'd be here by now." "Yeah," Nexx began. It suddenly occurred to her that they may not have any way to get into the city. "We should check at the gate, I'm sure they'd head for the city first. Just in case they're here." 20 minutes later they were on the street, headed for the gate. TBC in "Roughing It"