Own the Means of Production

"Cully has been busy lately, hasn't he?" Russell remarked as he guided the Navigator through light evening traffic towards Mexicantown. "You hear about that pigeon, Beckett? Cully caught him trying to poach in one of his clubs. Escorted him out, broke his jaw in about nine places and knocked a couple teeth out. When the kid started to heal it, Cully broke the jaw again and forced him to heal it offset. Then sent him on his way with a promise to torpor his ass if he caught him stealing again.

"Funny thing is I talked to someone who saw Beckett a couple nights later. Said he'd developed a bit of a speech impediment," Russell related with a harsh laugh. With his story concluded, he pulled the Navigator into the parking lot of their destination motel.

"Yeah, Cully's a jumped up little shit," Brown mutters, dismissively.

The motel itself is an uninviting sprawl. Peeling paint gives way to grey walls caked in dust. The few around in plain view besides a couple prostitutes of indeterminate gender and an old man smoking up on the second tier outside an open motel room. Everything's bathed in the lurid flickering light of a neon sign which gives it a somewhat unreal quality, even to your Beast.

Brown leads the way and you take a walk around the block, past busted vending machines and a scared looking white kid obviously trying to sell here. The Gangrel takes a set of stairs and finds door 5C. He pauses and looks your way.

"What time'd you make it?"

Russell checked the watch on his wrist. "10:22 in the pm." He nods towards the door as if to say be my guest.

"Hell with it. As if we got a gilded invite..." Brown hammers on the door hard enough to rattle the cheap lock. A tired face peers through the smeared window to your left. You hear muffled conversation spoken in a Slavic tongue. The door clicks open a crack, revealing a mortal woman in a grubby negligee wearing the same tired expression as she looks you up and down, eyes semi-luminous in the lurid light. She's old and thin with brittle, avian features and an anemic complexion; blue veins beneath pasty skin.

Brown doesn't miss a beat, placing a heavy hand against the door and leaning in.

"We're from Springwells. Heard all about Kiril."

More discourse ensues in the unidentified language and the face shifts back and forth vigorously enough that the greying ponytail to fly about the owner's narrow shoulders. Finally the door opens and the aging servitor steps back.

You see Kiril across a bare, dust-coated room just after your Beast reacts. He's compact, of medium height, wearing a goofy Hawaiian shirt with a pair of over-sized Ray Charles sunglasses. His hands are like shovel blades and his bare forearms are covered with fading tattoos of cathedrals and fortresses. The ink's broken up by ugly black blotches of frostbite. Brown enters the room cautiously, never taking his eyes from the Haunt. As the door closes behind you, you register a dramatic drop in the temperature. The woman's leg quivers and Silvashko grins broadly at the pair of you.

"Ah, Springwells, hello. My condolences. For the recent violence."

It isn't the accent that's thick, but there's a guttural quality, unattached to nationality, in Kiril's voice. Brown looks at him strangely, although it's a look you're familiar with.

The Haunt's bulky eyewear shifts in your direction, and the shark grin twitches wider.

"You are Springwells. Please. Sit. How can we benefit each other?"

"Nice to meet you, Mr. Silvashko," Russell replied, giving the unfamiliar name his best efforts. "My name is Stone." He left Brown unintroduced, figuring if the Gangrel wanted his name known, he was more than capable of sharing it. And formality against Brown's brusque entrance could be an effective, if well-worn tactic.

"I'm told you're quite a talented procurement agent. We were wondering if your services were available to everyone...or just to curious Carthians."

"There are few things which I will not sell, Stone. They're rare. The answer to your question is one of these things I will not sell."

Gingerly, the Haunt removes his sunglasses and looks at you. His eyes are almost mole-like; the skin surrounding them is a milky, calloused skin graft, the eyes themselves glimmering like beads in their puckered little sockets. Brown recoils a little. He's uneasy around your kind. It's easy to miss Silvashko's aging concubine as she slinks into the bathroom. The temperature drops noticeably as the bathroom door is locked. Kiril smiles as he polishes his eyewear with the front of his shirt.

"If somebody comes to me, like you do now, wanting to ask 'You know Mr Stone, Kiril. Do you sell him guns? Do you sell him girls or boys or drugs or bombs?' then my answer is the same. I tell them that the answer to their question is not for sale."

He pauses to replace his glasses, adjusting them carefully. He perches lazily on a cheap dresser. Coughing and shuffling is audible from the motel bathroom.

"My policy is discretion. That said, perhaps there's something you need which IS for sale."