Vat:19 Mania In Romania

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Starring: Amiri, Pauline, Koz, Joseph
Guest Starring:
Challenge: International Operations
Location: Romania
Date Played: 20 Mar 2013

A Hard Bargain

Pauline: So "Rose", the dragon-lady, and her mate are ready to move on, but they won't leave unless we get them a little something- from Romania. She's vague about what, which is worrying. One of their eggs was damaged when they escaped, so they offer me an extra deal- either I give them Sammy, or I promise my sword won't harm them ever again. Again, she's vague about which sword.

The latter part is easy, but we have to decide if we're going to go to Romania or Virginia, for a different VAT mission. In the end, we decide to go to Romania.

Customs and Customers

Pauline: The VAT isn't exactly going to cover the trip- just the airfare. How are we going to fund it? Levis, obviously. We hit the outlets and stock up on Levis and cigarettes. Which poses a problem when we get to customs. The Romanian customs want a little something before they let us into the country. That "little" something is like $20. US currency goes a long way.

We stumble into a cabby that speaks broken English, and we start trying to navigate Romania. We stop by a local market to turn some of our jeans into cash. Between the extra jeans, good old greenbacks, and that, we should be able to operate pretty well. I'm pretty sure Joseph got a gypsy curse placed on him. I'm not so sure.

The Palace

Pauline: We tell the cabby that we want to see the Parliament building, and he takes our meaning. He takes us to a creepy house bordering the property, where shady characters provide us with IDs and hard-hats. We use those to access the construction site.

Now, here's the main thing I want to point out: we didn't plan to end up here so quickly. We've never gotten a translator, and we've never gotten our hotel rooms. We're lugging all our luggage. Through a construction site. We bribe a foreman to get his golf cart.

We wander around aimlessly, and eventually find the chapel in the finished portion of the building. Inside is the finger bone of St. George, which is quite obviously what Rose wants. That also tells us a good deal about my sword, and why Rose wanted my word that it would never harm her again. Thank goodness she only asked for protection for her and her mate.

A KGB agent has joined us at this point, serving as a sort of "tour guide", and implicit threat. And explicit threat, since he's a vampire and all. That's going to be a problem, I think.

Translation

Pauline: Since we can't walk out with it then, we go to our hotel to make a plan. We order a translator for the morning, and then start talking about ways to get the priest to help us out. It may or may not work, but our translator knows where he takes his breakfast, so off we go and Koz tries his best.

It doesn't work, in part because the translator is working against us. Because he's in the employ of the Committee for Public Safety (ie, the KGB). We're stymied, for now.