Downtime actions for the Bell & Birch Job:

The crew begins Phase 2 of their plan to gentrify The Drop:

• Constance starts going around to the abandoned buildings in the area and kicking out the squatters.
• Shade goes to the non-abandoned buildings and talks to the owners. The recent breakout of war between the Sashes and the Lampblacks helps foster the idea that now might be a good time to sell.

Constance and Boots go to meet with Lady Drake. Constance informs her of the ongoing war, her prediction that the Red Sashes will win, and of her intentions to absorb the remnants of the Lampblacks. Lady Drake mentions that the root of the conflict is a personal grudge between Baszo and Mylera. She agrees to Constance’s proposal for continuing the arrangement that she had with the Lampblacks, should the conflict resolve in the manner everyone expects. She also agrees to set up a meeting between the Dolls and Prichard, Baszo’s 2nd in command, who by all accounts is a fairly reasonable individual.

The crew decides to poach a fence. Boots knows a luxury fence named Basran from the card table at Spogg’s; he currently works exclusively with the Hive.

Boots and Gloves go to Spoggs, and get into a game with Basran. Boots steers the conversation towards business, and it comes out that Basran is unhappy with the fact that The Hive doesn’t deal in narcotics. Boots presses the matter, and Basran lets slip that he’s looking for Blue Cloud (morphine), but in the process makes everyone nervous (and suspect that Boots is an undercover Inspector).

Kamali’s Vice is Blue Cloud, so she goes to Rolan Volaris in Nightmarket to talk about setting up a meeting with Rolan’s supplier. Rolan asks for three Coin as a finder’s fee. Kamali brings this to the group, Constance sends Gloves to negotiate, and he manages to talk Rolan down to 1 Coin and a favor.

Meanwhile, Gregor goes to visit Stazia, an old friend who runs an apothecary. Stazia says he doesn’t have any Blue Cloud on hand, but if Gregor can bring him some raw material, he can prepare some. However, the size of his shop limits the amount he can produce at any given time. The group decides that this would make for a good long term project sometime in the future (they have their eye on the Drug Dens claim).

Notes:

Some background on Blue Cloud. It’s basically morphine, and it comes from a particular breed of flower that grows in The Dagger Isles known as the Royal Poppy, due to the deep purple color of the petals. The latex extracted from the seed pod is a sky blue in color, and this is where the name comes from (even though the color mostly fades once the substance is processed into the drug).

We have yet to see Kamali properly indulge her Vice in-game, but when she does, it’s a highly ritualized affair. The syringe she uses is of a fairly ornate steampunk-inspired design, a delicate glass tube encased in lots of intricate brass filigree, with very fine replaceable needles made of an obscure steel alloy that’s resistant to rust and corrosion.

# dontmesswiththedolls