Cathal leans over to Rhiannon. "If we are back we should make this trip a topic in the pattern class."

In reply to Cathal O'Donoghue (msg # 31):

After getting her coffee, Rhiannon returned to the group, sipping as she waited.



"I agree. There's a lot here to discuss."

The bus actually takes 55 minutes to arrive, somewhat to Charlie's annoyance.


A little over 3 hours later you find yourselves approaching Washington, and about 30 minutes later, about 7.40am local time you pull into the parking lot of a large Army Surplus store.

Grabbing her bag Charlie jumps out and heads for the front door.
By the time you catch up, she's opened the door and gone inside. You notice the sign on the door which says "By Appointment only - Buzz for entry."
Following her in, you notice the front counter is unmanned.
She re-appears a couple of minutes later, holding a dvd in her hand.


This message was last edited by the GM at 08:26, Fri 13 Oct 2023.

Cathal takes over the driving.

He notice the shortcut, even having no great knowledge about US geography he knows that Washington is at the east coast and days away with a car.

He Exchanges glances with Rhiannon after Charlie enters the store.

And then follows Charlies into the store and helps to go through the shopping list. He get things fro himself, making sure everything fits. He takes Glock 26 with a spare magazine and a box oaf ammo. He gets a knife and a Winchester 73 with some ammo  for himself.

He helps the others when needed to get everything on Charlies shopping list.

There was no mistaking that shortcut. 3 hours was way too short for where they ended up, but it did raise a question as to why it took them any hours. When it occurred to her, she asked Charlie.

"Charlie? I love the shorter travel time, but if we can just shortcut through Shadow, then why does it even take hours? Why does it take any time at all?" If she had been keeping track, she would have checked if the travel time and the clock time matched.

Still unsure of the destination, they continued into Washington for another half hour, arriving in a place Rhiannon found quite surprising. Why a military store? Cathal seemed to wonder the same thing, exchanging a glance with her. She gave him a shrug, then followed him through the door.

After Charlies instructions, Rhiannon looked lost. She understood fatigues and boot. "If I may? I don't know what any of those things are." Cathal seemed to have a clue, so she pleaded with him.

"I can pick out the cloths, but can you help me sort all that other gun stuff?"

"Charlie? Why are we dressing up as if we're going to war?"

Cathal points to the webbing. "That is a kind of belt,  mostly for attaching something to a backpack for example."

"Not so good with guns, but lucks there are little price tags at the arms that help. In any case take a knife and when you are not used to a weapon the lighter Glock 26."

"If you want another fire weapon, Shotgun  ammunition hold little balls inside so lot of ouch. Winchester is bit more prizes has longer reach. Not that I used on of them. Just some memories from my mother.

Rhiannon wasn't reassured by either Charlie or Cathal. She found some camouflage patterned pants, a matching brown tshirt and a pair of decent boots. They weren't the nicest looking things with heavy canvas sides, but they fit well. She let Cathal help with the webbing, knife and the Glock, but she had no interest in the shotgun. Looking over the others, the smaller MP5 seemed more appropriate for her size. Charlie would have to help with the grenades and other unusual weapons.

"You do realize," Rhiannon opened up to Charlie. "I've never fired a gun and my fighting experience consists only of self defense classes. Where are we going and why?"

"If you've never fired a gun then just don't draw it unless you absolutely have to."

"Now as to where we're going I don't know exactly, but we'll find out when we get there. As to why, because I want to demonstrate another use of the Pattern and one of the limitations in using it in that manner, oh and the millon or so in US Treasury bearer bonds might just be useful."

"Are we doing a bank robbery, more or less?" Cathal comments. He is fine learning stuff about pattern usage, he is no sure he is going to like this example.

He picks several tactical balaclava, just in case, hands one to Rhiannon and offers the rest to the others.

"If I wanted to rob a bank, then I'd open an account, get a safety deposit box, create a trump of the vault, and then trump in and out. Robbing banks is a mugs game, and only done if there is no other way to achive the objective. So no we're not robbing any bank."

"We are collection US Treasury bearer bonds with weapons? You have all my attention." Cathal replies.

"If you really want to know we're going to emulate a stunt pulled by my mother in her mid 20's. We're going to hijack a drugs deal, and relieve the participents of the payment."
"And just so we're clear my mother did this with only the assistance of her then boy friend in her 4x4 with no preporation. I'm not making the same mistakes she did."

"Ah, sounds great. And you figured into your plan that most of us just know at which end to hold a gun?" Cathal asks friendly.

"You mean did I factor in the fact that you're all wet behind the ears and know diddly squat about shit, with possibly the exception of Kenneth and Cassandra, then the answer is yes."

Cathal shrugs and smiles.

He has a small problem with what is going on and the way Charlie treats them. It is not their fault that she was pointed out to babysit them.

Right. Rhiannon glanced around at her kin nervously. Aside from sounding outlandish, this was completely bonkers. Charlie's plan was to rob drug dealers of a million US dollars. Rhiannon wasn't a cop, or even a screenwriter, but she could guess that if a million dollars was on the line, these drug dealers would have a lot of guns there to protect it. She could imagine that a well trained and properly equipped team with pattern powers could easily take that money with little risk to themselves, especially given they could skew the odds in their favor. The problem was that while everyone present had the power, only Charlie had the skill. And not just with pattern, but also with the equipment. It just felt reckless, especially given that their leader was just ripped away from the best parts of her 36hr bender and then coerced into this excursion. Her supercilious attitude didn't help either.

That all said, Rhiannon had some faith that Charlie did have a workable plan. That faith was mostly justified by the sense that her family possessed godlike abilities. The rest of her confidence was hope that Cordelia's daughter's cocky-bitch attitude was based on no small amount of competence.

"Well. Would let us in on how you see this going and what we're all supposed to do?"

"How this is going to go exactly.."
"No real idea. We'll just improvise. That said the mini-bus isn't going to cut it. If it were just a few of us I'd go grab an ex-military Landrover, but given that there's a dozen of us, we're going to need an MTV of sorts. I had thought to raid an FBI deport but that's off the cards given the time of day, so we'll just have to go find one somewhere more convenient."
"In the mean time just load yourselves, your gear and my shopping list onto the mini-bus."
As she says this she pulls her sword, and a pair of pistols (Glock32s from those who recognise the model) from out of her bag, holsters the pistols, and slides the sword through her webbing.

Rhiannon's eyes widened at Charlie's response. Fuck all of the woman wasn't outright insane. There had to be an easier way to get a million dollars. "Are you serious? What happened to not making the same mistakes as your mother? How do you even know this drug deal is going to take place?" This felt like this was about to become the field trip from Hell.

"What even is an MTV, aside from music television?" Rhiannon looked around at her relatives for anyone else to raise a question or a concern. Cathal?

"Perfectly serious, and I'm going in prepared. My mother wasn't.""
"As I'm using the Pattern to locate such a transaction I know it will be taking place, and MTV stands for Medium Tactical Vehicle, basically a Caimen. They're used by the FBI, Law Enforcement Agencies, and the US military, amongst others. "

Cathal looks troubled when Rhiannon give him a glance.

"We improvise, serious? You lead us against a bunch of armed most likely highly violent Drug-Dealer and want to improvise with several people who never pointed a weapon at a human target."

"We did not grew up knowing like you did, we did not grew up being trained in fighting like you most likely did."

"What do you want to prove that we are useless?, That we are easy prey?"

"Nope. The point of the exercise is to demonstrate what you can do with the Pattern. If you're not interested then you're welcome to return to the Mansion."
This message was lightly edited by the player at 07:45, Sat 14 Oct 2023.

"The question here is if you have to demonstrate what you want to demonstrate in the way you are about to do it." Cathal points out.

With everybody back onboard the mini-bus, Charlie takes the wheel this time, although its about 10 minutes before the bus departs from the parking lot (and yes you all notice the Pattern in use again).
Rather than head for the highway, she heads West towards the Appalachians, turning left and right at seemingly odd points, although after a few turns it becomes reasonably obvious that the landscape is changing subtly with each turn she makes.
After about an hour and a half you find yourself on a reasonably windy mountain highway. A further 15 minutes and you find yourselves approaching a low-loader that's pulled to the side of the road. On the low loader is a Caiman MTV <img
src="http://www.armyrecognition.com/images/stories/north_america/united_states/wheeled_armoured/caiman_mtv/Caiman_MTV_MRAP_BAE_Systems_multi-theater_mine_resistant_protected_vehicle_United_States_American_640.jpg">.
Charlie pulls the minibus in ahead of the low loader.

Getting out she approaches the low loader, which causes the driver and co-driver to get out. When she gets to about 10ft from them they both pull their guns, which causes her to stop. After a few seconds, the driver puts his gun away, followed about 15 seconds later by the co-driver.
All three then walk back to the cab, where Charlie retrieves a small unit, whilst the driver begins lowering the ramp on the back of the low loader.
Walking back to the minibus she says.

"I'll drive the van. Though, I should warn that I don't have a lot of driving experience."