Mystery of the Missing Plane (Adventurers)

This page is for sharing & collecting information obtained for the "Mystery of the Missing Plane" arc, which began on May 10, 2015, run by the Adventurers super group. Some elements of this page is offered from an OOC perspective.

The shortened link to this page is: http://ow.ly/MLgGT

Team member discussion

Collaboration on Clues (In-character reporting)

Red Spider: ((Share details that you learn in here! Put a < hr > tag one line after your comment)) Red Spider: ((Day 1 has begun)) Roak: Everything I have gathered thus far is pointing in one direction. I cannot proceed any further until the team has gathered up and I can present my findings to them, as well as convince them of their validity. The next course of actions . . . May divide the group.

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Events

Day 0

Cassandra Olsen (Red Spider) hosts Celeste (Stormherald), Caitlyn (Dreamweaver), Deandre (War Beetle), and Roak at her condominium. The group enjoys some time relaxing in a hot tub. Cassandra receives a call from her father, surprising her with a snap vacation to New York City, for her and two friends, using his company's private jet.

Hours later the flight leaves Millennium City's Wayne County Metropoliton Airport (DTW) for Newark International (EWR). The plane goes off radar shortly before reaching its destination, prompting an investigation by officials at all levels.

Stormherald is likely the first to learn of the potential disaster: she is at her newspaper's offices when the newswires first share reports of a missing civilian aircraft originating from Millenium City.

Day 1

Concealing Info

Adventurers main computer gave a keyword alert while monitoring police systems: search warrants had been issued for the homes of all passengers and crew on the flight. Fox, Meltdowner, Phantasm, and Roak infiltrated Cassandra's condo, taking care to remove references to the Adventurers on her computer, hide her costumes, and seal off access to her panic room. The detective assigned to look around - David Sheffield - found nothing of interest.

Hacking the Flight Data

Hornett enlists the aid of Cyber-Slash - a reformed(?) criminal hacker - to break into satellite tracking & FAA systems. She locates the plane's flight plan, including a full manifest, as well as data on satellite pings received from the plane - revealing it continued east of New Jersey into the Long Island Sound.

The manifest lists the following aboard:

Pilot: Mason MacTavish

Co-pilot: James Fenwick

Flight Attendant: Andrew Cave

Passengers:

Alaina Brennan

Cassandra Olsen

Nicole White

Cassandra's Father

Stormherald, Dreamweaver, Roak, Hornett, & Phantasm visited Mr. Olsen while he was having a private smoke on his balcony. Roak covertly enters the home and plants bugs while the team members talk to Bill. The team learns contact info for the other passengers' families. They also receive the full employee listing of DTO Flights Inc., DTO's subsidiary which provides private flights for the DTO executives.

Addtional to the pilots and crew on the flight, DTO Flights Inc. also employed *Shelly Asner* as their office manager. Bill also agreed to provide e-mails of the flightadmin@dto.us.com account. This will happen on Day 2.

Bill pleaded with the team not to disturb *Marie Olsen*, his wife, who had never quite come to grips with Cassandra's dual life, and is presently beside herself.

Hornett's equipment registered that Bill may have been lying when he said he didn't know of any enemies he might have.

Search

Informed by flight data obtained by Hornett & Cyber-Slash, Lady Justice flew 'Lawbringer', and began to search the coast of the Long Island Sound, from the plane's last radar ping, to Newport, RI. Though unsuccessful, her thoroughness allows that area to be completely discounted for further searches.

Day 2

Black Owl Data

Team ally Black Owl, an old friend of Red Spider's, shares details of his Day 1 solo investigation. He extrapolates the plane's heading and comes up with a search area, a cone heading NNE from the last known position. He also has a fuel calculation.

Black Owl also believes that the co-pilot is not involved in a conspiracy, having visited the man's place.

Roak Visits DTO

Roak infiltrates DTO and Bill Olsen's office computer, finding deleted e-mails to his personal assistant asking for last-minute tickets and hotels booked for Cass's Day 0 trip. Bill also exchanged e-mails with a colleague, pretty much begging him to turn over his booking of the private jet for that evening to Bill. A cursory glance at Bill's computer schedule shows he had a great many appointments to attend meetings about 'Olsen Shipping, Ltd.'. He had also recently deleted e-mails written the afternoon of Day 0, asking his personal assistant to drop what she was doing and obtain a hotel booking, theatre tickets, etc. for Cassandra & 2 friends in NYC immediately.

Tail Debris

Fox flies around the search area on his vehicle. With help from Juggernette, who provides additional analysis of Fox's data remotely, they locate a piece of debris floating alone in the Atlantic, part of the missing plane's tail. It shows no signs of burn marks, but appears to have been torn off of the plane.

Survivors

Lady Justice succeeded in locating two survivors: Alaina & Nicole, Cassandra's friends. Shivering and barely clinging to a floatation device too small for two, Lady Justice puts them in her plane - Lawbringer - and has them spirited away to Newport, RI for immediate medical attention. LJ continues the search using her armor's rocket boots. Doctors at the hospital stress that Alaina & Nicole need a day of rest first before they should be subjected to questions.

Roak Questions Marie Olsen

Roak impersonates a police officer and heads off Mrs. Olsen as she prepares to get into a car and drive to the home of Alaina's parents to see if a phone call comes in. Roak offers to drive her, as she clearly is not in the right state of mind to drive. On the way, Roak asks questions; he learns that Mr. Olsen has been working a lot of late evenings lately - which is unusual for him - and had cancelled a trip to Paris with her last month. She also had no idea he was sending Cassandra to New York City. Mrs. Olsen believes one explanation for his behaviour is that Mr. Olsen is having an affair.

Info on Olsen Shipping, Ltd.

Cyber-Slash calls Celeste (Stormherald) and tells her that ARGENT connections to DTO staff were pretty flimsy, probably not a reliable avenue. But following up on a discovery she made that Bill - not Cassandra - was on the flight plan as the plane's passenger, she found some potentially shady dealings by Bill. She, too, has discovered info on 'Olson Shipping, Ltd.', and an address which she provides to Celeste, a pier where Olson Shipping apparently operates. Operating a company like that is very out of character for Olsen.

Xeno's E-mail Search

Xeno discovered from the flightadmin@dto.us.com e-mails that Bill had arranged the plane booking at the very last minute. Bill pleaded with a colleague to relinquish a booking on the plane, so that Bill could use it that evening. Bill also told flightadmin that he alone would be traveling to NYC.

Wreck Located?

Though not well outfitted for a wide search & rescue mission, War Beetle receives a boost to his capabilities by Juggernette's secondary reading of search data. With Fox and Lady Justice's discoveries early in the evening, Juggernette helps point to a location in the ocean where War Beetle might find more plane wreckage. Just before midnight War Beetle's scanners do locate a large metallic mass consistent with the missing jet, at a depth of about 140 feet. An underwater search will have to wait until Day 3.

Day 3

Investigation at the Docks

Celeste (Stormherald) arrives at the address Cyber-SLash provided of Olsen Shipping, Ltd. On arrival, she finds she's stumbled into a gun fight! Detective David Sheffield of the MCPD is pinned down, his cover surrounded by machine gunners trying to take him out. Celeste calls in Dreamweaver to help handle the bad guys, and Sheffield manages to take some out, too. Sheffield implores them to call in emergency responders, and get clear. He will share what he finds on site with them later.

Wreck Search

War Beetle conducts a search of the plane wreck. Inside he finds the body of Andrew Cave, who apparently suffered a bleeding wound before the crash; Mason MacTavish, who was shot in the head while he was seated in the cockpit; and James Fenwick, who was in the passenger section and was wearing a sleeveless wetsuit, not his flight uniform. A pistol with silencer was also in the passenger section. Looking around the wreck site, Beetle also located the 'black box' with cockpit voice recorder & fight data recorder intact. (The battery must have received a bad jolt in the crash, and was not sending signals).

Black Box Data

The following was heard in the cockpit:

<20:30> Plane departs Detroit.

<20:35> Pilot announces they're at altitude, they can release their safety belts. Music starts playing. They're partying in the passenger cabin.

<21:45> Distinct sound of a silenced gunshot in cockpit. Passengers seem unaware, sounds of music still coming from cabin. Plane's transponder deactivated.

<22:01-22:03> Plane rounds north tip of Long Island. Autopilot set for a slow descent. Someone is busy breaking things in the cockpit.

<22:06:11> Cave enters the cockpit, says it doesn't look like Newark out the window, asks for ETA. Silenced gunshot. Screaming.

<22:06:45> Fenwick barely heard ordering passengers to remain seated, or they will not survive.

<22:09:08> Screaming can be heard on cockpit voice recorder. Flight recorder registers loss of cabin pressure.

<22:09:26> For the next 24 seconds, Cassandra, Nicole, and Alaina can be heard in the cockpit.

Nicole: "Oh my God he's dead!"

Cass: "He smashed the controls."

Nicole: "We have to get help!"

Alaina: "Which one is the radio?"

Nicole: "I think this! This! ...Hello?! Hello?! ... Hello?! Can anyone hear me?"

Cass: "It's not working."

Alaina: "It's getting cold!"

Cass: "We don't have much time. C'mon!"

Nicole: "Where are you going?!"

<22:10:52> Something like an explosion can be heard. It rocks the aircraft.

<22:12:31> Flight recorder registers impact and loss of power. Final entry.

Cassandra Located

Lady Justice commits to searching the area again, especially with news that Cassandra's body is not in the plane wreckage. In the afternoon, she catches the scent of Cassandra - something with her hyper-sensitive nose, she's keenly attuned to - and follows it to its source. Cassandra is emaciated and unconscious, but alive. She is located on Noman's Land Island, a disused former bombing range. It is clear that Cassandra was awake when she arrived, and had eaten whatever she could - bugs, seaweed - but it wasn't enough to sustain the diet her enhanced body requires. She must have exhausted herself swimming nearly 50 miles to the island. Lady Justice delivers Cassandra to a hospital in Newport. Phantom Mk. I keeps her company.

Preliminary Finding at Olsen Shipping

Detective Sheffield tells Celeste (Stormherald) & Dreamweaver about his findings, with Roak listening in. It seems that police have located a variety of contraband. Most alarming was what they initially thought were a set of nuclear bombs, but have since discounted that possibility (but the devices' purpose is still uncertain).

Day 4

Confronting Olsen

With more than enough evidence of his culpability in some criminal activity, as well as the downing of the jet, the team confronts Bill Olsen. Bill pleads that he did what he had to to keep his daughter safe. He knew something big was coming, and was not sure who he could trust, so he wanted to spirit Cassandra away to New York City where he would have immediately called her upon landing and warned her to disappear. He says that the reason he didn't want to come forward sooner is that someone had been visiting him for weeks and threatening him to do things like buy up the company, or they would harm his family. He then implicates Dreamweaver. After a tense moment of disbelief among the team, Dreamweaver flares a psionic blast and escapes Bill's condominium!

Tracking Dreamweaver

Dreamweaver continually taunts the team over team comms, and promises to bring down some buildings. They fan out and Stormherald locates Dream preparing a large bubble of static psionic energy, which she could use to collapse two buildings around her, probably killing herself and a great many others. The stress of this action causes Dream to bleed from her head pretty heavily. Stormherald knocks her down, and then out. Cyber-Slash comes along, having seen Dream curiously blow past her (the two are friends), and hearing what's happening, helps the team subdue Dream for now with her phasing claws.

Red Spider Returns

Under a shadow escort from Lady Justice & Phantom MK I, Cassandra (Red Spider) returns home to Millennium City with her mother, Marie. Because Bill & Marie's condo is wrecked from the early morning confrontation, Marie stays with Cassandra. During the day, Cassandra is visited by friends, including Meltdowner. Cass urges MD to have faith in Stormherald's call to hide Dreamweaver, and work with the team to uncover what was really going on with Dream.

Day 5

Dreamweaver is Questioned

Roak, Stormherald, Meltdowner, and a holopresent Red Spider are present when Juggernette brings Dreamweaver, complete with restraints to prevent her using her powers, into the HQ for questioning. Dreamweaver doesn't remember meeting Bill Olsen or doing the things of which she stands accused. Some team members believe there could be another mole on the team.

Dreamweaver / Bill Timeline

Black Owl has Bill Olsen hidden away safely. From Black Owl, the team learns that Bill first started encountering Dreamweaver two months before. Using this guide, there is the possibility that Dreamweaver was put under the influence of Poison Lash (who did inject her with something that made her lose her powers), Cyber-Slash (who, at the time, got in a very public brawl with Dreamweaver), or VIPER (who hypnotized and briefly captured her).

Introducing... Mister Midnight!

Red Spider calls up her ally Mister Midnight. She had intended to introduce him to the team on Day 0, but due to a schedule conflict, he was unavailable to attend that day's party at her home. With suspicions of betrayal on the team, she wants Mister Midnight in place as someone objective. For his part, he offers to teach her meditation techniques that may speed her healing.

Roak Finds WMDs

Roak deftly steals Detective Sheffield's credentials and disguises himself as a police detective. Inside of a secured area at the Olsen Shipping, Ltd. site, bomb squad and other interested parties examine four 'bomb' like devices. One expert tells Roak he's convinced that the devices may be smaller-scale Electro-magnetic Pulse (EMP) bombs capable of taking out electronics in a radius of a few city blocks.

Mister Midnight's Looks Into MCPD's Search of Olsen Shipping

Mister Midnight uses the Adventurers back-channel access into MCPD computers to read about evidence found at Olsen Shipping, Ltd.

Looking into the autopsy records, he finds that only two of the bodies from the site have been identified:

Rory Kenning Age 34, killed by a gun shot to the head believed to be from a gun other than Detective Sheffield's. Kenning was an ex-US soldier who was known to police. He was caught accepting bribes in 2007 while serving in Iraq; Kenning was subsequently court martialed and dishonorably discharged from the service. After that, his record shows a string of felonies and misdemeanors.

Brock Sharkey Age 39, killed by Detective Sheffield's firearm. Career criminal in his 20s, he seemed to go off the grid in his 30s. Had numerous warrants out for his arrest, and was believed to have left the United States. Had allegedly taken part in drug smuggling to Canada.

Mister Midnight finds that a wide variety of contraband has been shipped to these docks from a wide variety of places - Boston, NYC, Puerto Rico, Vibora Bay, San Diego.

Day 7

Bill Olsen's Assets

The FBI announces that it is recommending indictments against Bill Olsen on several charges including criminal conspiracy, trafficking in weapons and drugs, and racketeering. As Bill cannot be located, he is considered a fugitive. His passport is flagged, his assets frozen, and he is considered one of the FBI's top most wanted.

Day 8

Enemy Revealed

VIPER tips its hand when Serpent Master arrives at Cassandra Olsen's condominium to either execute or kidnap her, being unable to locate her father. Lady Justice, who is monitoring the Olsens closely, is quick to react, and calls in the rest of the Adventurers. Serpent Master signals his allies to cut power to several city blocks; Lady Justice responds by jamming frequencies, preventing Serpent Master calling for more help.

Battle in the Condo

Meltdowner helps Cassandra to a safer location while the team does battle with Serpent Master in Cassandra's home. The armored VIPER agent ably dispenses with Roak and Mister Midnight. Stormherald bravely scoops up activate grenades and teleports out with them, but is critically injured when they explode near her. Meltdowner proves troublesome; an explosion of his seems to weaken Serpent Master. Serpent Master & Roak are defenestrated, but Meltdowner teleports out to save his team mate from a fatal fall. Serpent Master takes the chance to escape.

Injured Stormherald

Lady Justice's bots fly Stormherald to hospital. Though gravely injured, Stormherald is able to speak from her hospital bed later on.

Day 9

A Playlist for Stormherald

Red Spider started asking the team for songs for an iPod to help Stormherald pass the time in recovery. So far the playlist includes:

AC/DC - Thunderstruck (Xeno)

The Decemberists - The Mariner's Revenge Song (Red Spider)

(Ambient Noise) - 30 minutes of gentle, babbling brook ambient noise (Red Spider)

NPR - A vintage 1.5 hour programme on the decline of NYC's thriving oyster business (Roak)

Daniel Powter - Bad Day (Red Spider)

(More to come)

Mind Control

Juggernette observes that even with the protective helmet supposedly shielding from outside psychic interference, Dreamweaver still periodically suffers fits of mind control. In consultation with Red Spider, it is decided to quietly put trackers on Dreamweaver and let her go free next time to see where she ends up.

Day 10

Dreamweaver Tracked

The team follows Dreamweaver to an alley in the city center. There, Dreamweaver is seen to receive instructions from a VIPER agent. The agent mentions something about a plot in other cities, and that it is time to take Dreamweaver in for debriefing.

Subduing Dreamweaver

Meltdowner engages with Dreamweaver higher up in the sky. He eventually defeats her and leaves her unconscious to attend to other parts of the fight.

Driving off Serpent Master

Juggernette applies her technological arsenal to driving off the powerful assassin, Serpent Master. The last time she encountered him, he shot her and broke her arms.

Pursuing the Agent

The VIPER agent seeming to be in charge of the operation fled on foot, firing a pistol at Roak and Mister Midnight while they gave chase. Once they gain the upper hand on him, he unthinkingly dashes straight into the path of a moving vehicle. He is taken to intensive care at Mercy Hospital with various superficial wounds and internal bleeding.

UNTIL Help

Red Spider convinces Jason Leander to lead the security detail to maintain watch over the captured VIPER agent. It is feared that VIPER will attempt to assassinate the agent before he can talk.

Day 11

Interrogating the VIPER Agent

The Adventurers are given special permission to interrogate the VIPER agent in hospital. Xeno and Roak go in.

Although hostile & cagey, the agent recognizes his predicament: VIPER will try to kill him. But he doesn't relish the idea of a life in prison, either. Roak uses some subtle intimidation techniques. In time the agent reveals much of the plot:

- VIPER wants to establish itself more strongly in the United States, but needs a large amount of money to hire 'talent'

- VIPER's own reserve of gold is valuable enough, but they want to maximize its value for sale

- The EMP bombs were a secondary option, in case the primary plot failed (or didn't work as intended)

- The primary VIPER mission: use powerful U.S. businessmen, coerce them into creating a 'smuggling network' and move contraband between them - expose them to law enforcement all at once to cause a massive loss of investor confidence

- Whether the primary or the secondary approach was used, the result either would have been that U.S. investors would seek to place their investment dollars into gold, which is a usual response to major stock market uncertainty

- VIPER could then sell off its gold and make a tidy profit, paving the way for increased their U.S. operations

- The plot was scheduled to be enacted within 48 hours (sometime on or before Day 13)

The agent was assigned only to handling the Millennium City angle of the plot, so he said he does not know which other businessmen or other cities are being used for the plot.

He did indicate that he knows how to locate the VIPER nest coordinating this operation, and that he knows it is located in Canada.

He also said that he can undo some of Dreamweaver's programming, provided he utters a certain phrase, which he shared - though he claims that it will only work if he is the one who says it in her presence.

Day 12

UNTIL Briefing

Captain Rachel Clarke briefs the Adventurers. The interrogation of the VIPER agent was completed, a frequency located, and the Canadian base location was triangulated. UNTIL offered the Adventurers the chance to spearhead infiltration of the base while UNTIL drew VIPER's defences away. Objective: get into the base and download data on their gold plot before they could wipe their computers.

Dancing Through the Snow

Clarke drops the Adventurers off on an ice road across a lake from the VIPER base. A team of Red Spider, Dreamweaver, Roak, Meltdowner, and Juggernette follows Captain Clarke, ducking through cover, avoiding VIPER scouts, and using a mountain pass high above the base's walls to sneak in undetected.

The Battle

The team springs upon the VIPER base at unawares. While Roak, Meltdowner, and Dreamweaver cover the outside, Clarke, Red Spider, and Juggernette infiltrate the base. Juggernette hacks in to find the quickest route to the base's main computers. Clarke and Red Spider give Juggernette cover while she engages in the download. A few VIPER agents try to spoil the fun, but aren't able to stop THE ADVENTURERS.

Once the team acquires the data, they reunite with the guards outside, and depart the base before UNTIL wipes it out with a massive air strike.

Aftermath

Red Spider

By Day 12 she was able to take her casts off and felt well enough to fight. But Cassandra Olsen will have to feign injury for the next month or more so that the rest of the world doesn't grow suspicious of her rapid recovery.

Bill Olsen

Bill is exonerated, and the data acquired from the VIPER base reveals he was one of about a dozen businessmen across the United States coerced into VIPER's plot. While no charges will be laid, his reputation has taken a serious hit, and he privately wonders if VIPER won't still come after him...

Dreamweaver

Dreamweaver starts to be de-programmed. It will be a process going on for weeks.

Stormherald

Stormherald still has much recovery ahead of her for the grave wounds received on Day 8.

Evidence & Data

Images

• 

  Newspaper - Day 1
• 

  Flight Plan & Satellite Pings - Day 1
• 

  Fuel Limits & Likely Search Area - Day 2
• 

  Tail Debris - Day 2
• 

  Alaina & Nicole, Survivors - Day 2
• 

  Jet plane wreck - Day 2
• 

  Cassandra - Day 3
• 

  Olsen Shipping, Ltd. Clues - Day 5

Other Info

DTO E-mails

On the morning of Day 2, Bill Olsen arranged to have some e-mails from within DTO to the flightadmin e-mail account sent to the team.

Dockside Info

Gratitude from Detective Sheffield should pay off once his people have a chance to look through the Olsen Shipping, Inc. property. What was so worth hiding there that the workers were willing to take out a police detective? Sheffield will contact Celeste (Stormherald).