NationStates

Rabbithole is a Noir-styled crime and conspiracy story set in the Mênnan Twin Cities of Shuhakallu and Mihêkallu. Opening on Shuhakallu Police Service detectives Tashê and Sha raiding a "tourist whorehouse" in the capitol, the story is set to spiral as their discovery of a secret film set-up leads them into a conspiracy with broader implications. Businessmen, politicians and celebrities from around the Isles might be implicated in a drama of sex, blackmail, murder and assassination, centered in a city where the law has little real say and where the ridiculously wealthy and the unbelievably poor are separated only by secrets and slums.


The concept of this RP is to maintain a gritty, noir-styled character story, while still exploring the potential for vast political repercussions in several nations by viewing the underbelly of business and politics. Characters in this RP might be aiding the investigation, such as foreign intelligence agencies, or they might be people involved for their own reasons, like the hired security of a politician trying to bury a secret...or reveal it.

Ultimately, the MacGuffin of the story is the missing drive of videos from the brothel. The contents are currently vague, but it may contain video files of politicians/businesspeople/public faces in compromising positions...or maybe someone revealed a secret during pillow talk that has even deeper meaning. I do see this as having the potential to escalate to murders, and maybe to rise to the level of much grander political turmoil.

Standard TWI rules apply. I don't really see the need for a character application, but please post your ideas and concepts here before posting in the IC. Once we have a core cast, we'll discuss the exact storyline, so that we all know exactly what is going on and can try and tell a cohesive, amazing story.

Again, it bears repeating that this is TWI ONLY. If you aren't in the region, please don't reply.

Thoughts:
- I have this vague image in my head of a foreign individual who's been living in MS for many years now, partly racist partly condescending towards the "natives", and he's been involved with some crime organizations as well as foreign intelligence agencies - whoever pays best. Think Dennis Hopper in Apocalypse Now meets Stellan Skarsgard in Our Kind of Traitor... I think.
- I might want to involve OCES in this - we'll see how the Uranium story develops.
- I do want to involve my "Land Deal" story in this (see third story in this news post). In short - a government organization has been hiding data on its surplus and investing it in off-shore accounts to make profit for high-ranking politicians.

Interesting. Maybe one of those high-ranking politicians is on the drive? Or maybe their opposition or something? It would provide a vested interest to get the HDD, either to bury it or use it.

Maybe whoever grabbed it attempts to try and sell it on the dark net or something, which brings down fire on their head? Attracts players from different locations who want it? Maybe the guy winds up dead...

Menna Shuli wrote:Interesting. Maybe one of those high-ranking politicians is on the drive? Or maybe their opposition or something? It would provide a vested interest to get the HDD, either to bury it or use it.
Maybe whoever grabbed it attempts to try and sell it on the dark net or something, which brings down fire on their head? Attracts players from different locations who want it? Maybe the guy winds up dead...

There's also a story I'm developing with Thuz, about my Minister of Defense becoming an informant for his intelligence agency. One option I'm thinking about is that the HDD contains his confession regarding this - which would lead both my agency and Thuz's agency to want that HDD. But I fear that might complicate things too much (both ICly and OOCly in terms of RP logistics), so I'm not sure if I really want to tie the stories for now. What do you think?

Ostehaar wrote:

Menna Shuli wrote:Interesting. Maybe one of those high-ranking politicians is on the drive? Or maybe their opposition or something? It would provide a vested interest to get the HDD, either to bury it or use it.
Maybe whoever grabbed it attempts to try and sell it on the dark net or something, which brings down fire on their head? Attracts players from different locations who want it? Maybe the guy winds up dead...

There's also a story I'm developing with Thuz, about my Minister of Defense becoming an informant for his intelligence agency. One option I'm thinking about is that the HDD contains his confession regarding this - which would lead both my agency and Thuz's agency to want that HDD. But I fear that might complicate things too much (both ICly and OOCly in terms of RP logistics), so I'm not sure if I really want to tie the stories for now. What do you think?

Up to you. You're thinking he mentioned it during pillowtalk or something?

Menna Shuli wrote:

Ostehaar wrote:There's also a story I'm developing with Thuz, about my Minister of Defense becoming an informant for his intelligence agency. One option I'm thinking about is that the HDD contains his confession regarding this - which would lead both my agency and Thuz's agency to want that HDD. But I fear that might complicate things too much (both ICly and OOCly in terms of RP logistics), so I'm not sure if I really want to tie the stories for now. What do you think?

Up to you. You're thinking he mentioned it during pillowtalk or something?

Yeah, believing that no way there's anyone spying on him in that hell-hole... P:

Ha! It's actually a fairly classy place as these things go in Menna Shuli. lol

Menna Shuli wrote:Ha! It's actually a fairly classy place as these things go in Menna Shuli. lol

By "hell-hole" I actually meant Menna Shuli itself. :)

jk. :P

Ostehaar wrote:

Menna Shuli wrote:Ha! It's actually a fairly classy place as these things go in Menna Shuli. lol

By "hell-hole" I actually meant Menna Shuli itself.

jk.

Won't dispute that most of the time.

It's rainy season, too. So let's toss "humid" and "hot" into the hellhole description.

So I kind of see next steps from my end being the following:

Interrogating the arrests to figure out who might have escaped with the drive. Referencing the (coded) datebook and not getting much (can be used later). Investigating the home of the person who might have the drive. Tracking them down from there. Finding them murdered, drive missing....

Don't know where things go from there.

So Menna, this is modern day right? If so, we may be able to tie this in with further investigations as a result of the unraveling RP and dodgy keveraite businessmen fleeing to menna and setting up business there to prevent prosecution.

Yeah, its modern day. What are your specific thoughts?

I would like to do some sort of old world-class assassin who is now retired, but because of a target picked years ago, He is now being dragged into this conspiracy. Maybe he killed someone's informer and they are trying for revenge. He also is getting hired by this organization's enemy to find the hard drive.

I need more details. Who is this organization? Also, the whole conspiracy links back to whatever is on that disk (which might be multiple things, it does cover several days of time at the brothel, and maybe some other file or something is on there). So you really don't need two reasons to be tied in, unless you're going for some sort of split loyalty, double-agent thing.

Menna Shuli wrote:Yeah, its modern day. What are your specific thoughts?

I haven't really thought of it too much since I haven't developed the nature of business and its owners a lot in Keverai yet, but if you need dodgy customers or businessmen you could refer to how the unrest in Keverai has scared much of the businesses who ran the sweatshops in the Keverai hills away from the nation and into Menna Shuli. You could also have one of these businessmen steal the drive and hand it over to a criminal syndicate if you want to put a wider multinational scale on it? I'm fleshing out an RP about criminal syndicates and extremist groups in Ainslie so I'll probably be in a better place to talk about that in a couple weeks time if you'd like to do that.

I had an idea of maybe Jorvvik being involved on an investigatory level. Sending in a Female agent as a sex worker to search for evidence of Jorvvikan women being trafficked to the whorehouse via cargo ships, one of the woman being a daughter of a very wealthy Jorvvikan businessman/ mafia don whose been reported missing.

Jorvvik wrote:I had an idea of maybe Jorvvik being involved on an investigatory level. Sending in a Female agent as a sex worker to search for evidence of Jorvvikan women being trafficked to the whorehouse via cargo ships, one of the woman being a daughter of a very wealthy Jorvvikan businessman/ mafia don whose been reported missing.

That's....possible. But I feel a bit weird about human trafficking INTO Menna Shuli: we have the largest population in the Isles and some of the poorest people. Seems like the rules of supply and demand would suggest a lack of necessity for imports when we have all the human resources we need on the cheap...

Ainslie wrote:

Menna Shuli wrote:Yeah, its modern day. What are your specific thoughts?

I haven't really thought of it too much since I haven't developed the nature of business and its owners a lot in Keverai yet, but if you need dodgy customers or businessmen you could refer to how the unrest in Keverai has scared much of the businesses who ran the sweatshops in the Keverai hills away from the nation and into Menna Shuli. You could also have one of these businessmen steal the drive and hand it over to a criminal syndicate if you want to put a wider multinational scale on it? I'm fleshing out an RP about criminal syndicates and extremist groups in Ainslie so I'll probably be in a better place to talk about that in a couple weeks time if you'd like to do that.

Right now what I am thinking is that there are going to be multiple, competing interests all looking for the drive. The guy who took it from the brothel is going to wind up putting information about it on the dark web to try and sell it since his operation was shut down by police. This informs several groups of its location, and they all want it for their own reasons: maybe somebody from their nation would be negatively affected by exposure and they want to prevent/cause that; maybe someone revealed information on tape that would be damaging/useful and they're after that; maybe there is other information aside from the video stored on the drive (for whatever reason). Regardless, I think that puts a fairly multinational scope on the story, although I'd like the action to remain centered in the Twin Cities, not too much globetrotting if it can be avoided.

Menna Shuli wrote:I need more details. Who is this organization? Also, the whole conspiracy links back to whatever is on that disk (which might be multiple things, it does cover several days of time at the brothel, and maybe some other file or something is on there). So you really don't need two reasons to be tied in, unless you're going for some sort of split loyalty, double-agent thing.

Instead of a target on his head, he'll be hunting for the drive (doesn't know what it is, thinks he just has to kill the guy) and kills the guy, but doesn't take the hard drive. Someone else takes it, so he tries to track them down. Since assassins are legal in Nepenisea, he might try to ally with the police.

Nepenisea wrote:

Menna Shuli wrote:I need more details. Who is this organization? Also, the whole conspiracy links back to whatever is on that disk (which might be multiple things, it does cover several days of time at the brothel, and maybe some other file or something is on there). So you really don't need two reasons to be tied in, unless you're going for some sort of split loyalty, double-agent thing.

Instead of a target on his head, he'll be hunting for the drive (doesn't know what it is, thinks he just has to kill the guy) and kills the guy, but doesn't take the hard drive. Someone else takes it, so he tries to track them down. Since assassins are legal in Nepenisea, he might try to ally with the police.

Legal in Nepenisea =/= legal in Menna Shuli. You'd be operating in my borders, so you have to think using our laws. You'd have to be operating secretly.

If he is hired to hunt for the drive, why would he assume he just has to kill the guy?

I might get the Bureau of Special Intelligence involved in this, alongside a Private Eye hired out by one of President Dyson's political rivals, both of which would also have a vested interest in obtaining the drive.

There will probably be several Dormill-Stiuraian people of influence hiding somewhere on the drive, who and in what manner they found themselves there is something I need to figure out.

Dormill and Stiura wrote:I might get the Bureau of Special Intelligence involved in this, alongside a Private Eye hired out by one of President Dyson's political rivals, both of which would also have a vested interest in obtaining the drive.

There will probably be several Dormill-Stiuraian people of influence hiding somewhere on the drive, who and in what manner they found themselves there is something I need to figure out.

If we could, I think it might work better organizationally to keep it to one group per player looking for the drive. I think it will just keep things more streamlined and organized. Although I'd like other people's opinions on that.

Menna Shuli wrote:

Dormill and Stiura wrote:I might get the Bureau of Special Intelligence involved in this, alongside a Private Eye hired out by one of President Dyson's political rivals, both of which would also have a vested interest in obtaining the drive.

There will probably be several Dormill-Stiuraian people of influence hiding somewhere on the drive, who and in what manner they found themselves there is something I need to figure out.

If we could, I think it might work better organizationally to keep it to one group per player looking for the drive. I think it will just keep things more streamlined and organized. Although I'd like other people's opinions on that.

It's fine, I'll send in the Bureau on a secret mission to grab the drive for Dyson's rivals. Plus using the Bureau gives me a great chance to completely rewrite both regular Bureau Agents and the Joker's Deck, which I admit I used way too sparingly in past RPs, when they should be a lot more secretive and dangerous than even the best possible agent.

Dormill and Stiura wrote:

Menna Shuli wrote:If we could, I think it might work better organizationally to keep it to one group per player looking for the drive. I think it will just keep things more streamlined and organized. Although I'd like other people's opinions on that.

It's fine, I'll send in the Bureau on a secret mission to grab the drive for Dyson's rivals. Plus using the Bureau gives me a great chance to completely rewrite both regular Bureau Agents and the Joker's Deck, which I admit I used way too sparingly in past RPs, when they should be a lot more secretive and dangerous than even the best possible agent.

Sounds good.

Menna Shuli wrote:

Nepenisea wrote:Instead of a target on his head, he'll be hunting for the drive (doesn't know what it is, thinks he just has to kill the guy) and kills the guy, but doesn't take the hard drive. Someone else takes it, so he tries to track them down. Since assassins are legal in Nepenisea, he might try to ally with the police.

Legal in Nepenisea =/= legal in Menna Shuli. You'd be operating in my borders, so you have to think using our laws. You'd have to be operating secretly.

If he is hired to hunt for the drive, why would he assume he just has to kill the guy?

Unknowingly hunting for the drive.

Nepenisea wrote:

Menna Shuli wrote:Legal in Nepenisea =/= legal in Menna Shuli. You'd be operating in my borders, so you have to think using our laws. You'd have to be operating secretly.

If he is hired to hunt for the drive, why would he assume he just has to kill the guy?

Unknowingly hunting for the drive.

How though? I mean, he's an assassin, right? If his employers wanted the drive, they would have hired him to get the drive. How can someone unknowingly be looking for something that specific? How can someone unknowlingly be looking for ANYTHING? How does that mistake get made? either he's the shittiest assassin ever or his employers are complete dunderheads.