2020-12-12 - Just Dance 2020 - Gray Harbor 5-0

Certain types that include law enforcement usually had a certain viewpoint of games and gamers, a conflict of ideals that had no doubt been put in display in the time Abitha had been employed at the precinct. A proponent for all things gaming, Abitha had staunchly defended the honor of the hobby, going so far as to argue some pursuits took just as much physicality and coordination as police training. She was vehement.

And so, Esme was presented with a challenge. An evening Abitha had cajoled or just straight hacked for Esme to be off shift, a laundry list of things to bring: comfy clothes, beer if she didn't like ciders or sours, and a computer.

It was at least an hour or two before closing in the shop proper, where Abitha had told Esme to come. Kyle was minding the shop, seeming to be reading from a textbook and taking notes.

Esme had been running herself ragged more or less. It felt like every lead she found, no matter what the case, was stonewalling her. It was extremely frustrating. Sure there'd been a few simple cases here and there that were open and shut but they did little to ease the stress she was feeling. More than once over the past couple of months she'd snapped at people over little things. So when she got the somewhat strange invite from Abitha set for one of her upcoming off days, Esme accepted it. She knew zero things about gaming or any of the popular games that were out, but at this point? Anything that wasn't work was probably good for her soul.

Esme arrived about an hour before One Up Games closed. She was glad to see that the gamer had been able to find a new location and reopen. She comes already dressed down in a pair of black sweatpants, sneakers, and a black sweater underneath her winter coat. She also is carrying a small duffel bag. Spotting Kyle, "Hey, Abitha around?"

The bespectacled wage-slave glances up, blinks seems to take a second to come out of reading mode and into recognition, then remembers, “Oh. Yeah. One sec.” He pokes his phone and taps a text out. He waits, reads a response, then slides off his stool.

“Back here.” Is all the explanation Esme gets, which would probably seem strange to a cop with a suspicious mind, but was also just as likely two awkward gamers wouldn’t think twice about ’step into this shady back room’. The back room was of course, mostly backstock, though one corner was dominated with a workbench and a diagnostic rig. There was a disassembled SuperFamicon resting there, some sort of chemical smell wafting as it had been freshly cleaned. A beep and a wirr is heard, drawing attention to a doorway with an electronic keypad deadbolt on it. Kyle points to it, though he hadn’t touched anything, then leaves Esme to it, figuring she would find her own way from there. He heads back into the shop.

Opening that door, of course leads to a set of steps up and into Abitha’s loft. There’s the sound of water running, dishes clanking, and topping the stairs would find Abitha cleaning up after arranging food. She was dressed in simple activewear, a tight sports bra spotted under the loose-necked tee she wore, angular lined leggings beneath that. She was barefoot, and the top of the landing being one step below the loft floor making the perfect spot for where shoes were cradled, an almost Asian demarcation for where one should remove them.

If it was anywhere else, Esme probably would be a little more alert, but she trusts Abitha and mostly trusts her employees, so she follows with no issues. Her gaze curiously peeking around the back room - not that she understood most of what she was seeing. She gives Kyle a little wave and then ascends the stair case towards the loft. Once at the top she peeks around again, spotting the green haired woman and smiled a bit. "Hey Mac." She calls, slipping her sneakers off and shedding her coat. She advanced a bit further into the loft, setting the small duffle back down carefully so she could shed her sweater, revealing the blue tank top underneath. "Thanks for the invite. Anything I can help with?"

“Hey-girl-hey.” Came the response, Abitha setting the last bowl aside, reaching for a towel and drying her hands. There were two plates of seemingly transparent rolls, pink shrimp visible through the faintly white film, some greens and oranges visible beneath of vegetables. There was a dipping sauce as well, “Nah, just finished.” She waves a hand To Esme to beckon her closer, then turns to the fridge, “And don’t thank me yet, we still gotta talk about work.” Oh sorry, Esme, looking for a night off? TOO BAD.

“Whatcha wanna drink?” Abitha asks, sliding the drawer out and looking down into it, grabbing one of the higher percentage Whitewood ciders. There was also a few sours from Elysian and Outlander. Ok, at least she softened the blow with plenty of available alcohol.

Esme groaned and opened up the duffel bag. "Bourbon." She pulled out the bottle that she'd brought instead of the requested beer alternative. In fact, she doesn't even wait for a glass, just opens the bottle and takes a longish sip from it. Swallow. Exhale. Silly her, thinking she could catch a break. "...Okay, now I'll take a cider." She stores the bottle back in the bag, letting it rest on part of the couch as she padded over to the plates and Abitha. She also claims one of the spring rolls off one of the plates and nibbles at it. "Well. You've cornered me. What's up?"

There's a flat look from Abitha, an assessment made of Esme lacking any telling expression. Well maybe there was since judgment, but doesn't Abitha look judgy kinda often? She pulls out one of the dryer tasting but lower percentage ciders, figuring from the bourbon that Esme didn't favor sweet and that the extra alcohol wouldn't interact badly with this choice. She tilts the bottle to a mounted opener on a plaque that reads "Ovary up and have a beer" beneath a picture of a crown and an eye patch. Popping the cap, she hands it over, then indicates the second plate of spring rolls as she moves to get her own and walk over towards the sectional to sit.

"Good news or bad news?"

Esme doesn't seem to mind Abitha's flat stare. In fact, she matches it for a second or two before Abitha retrieves the cider, a smile quirks on her lips when she spots the mounted bottle opener. "Cute." She murmured, sounding amused perhaps as she accepted the bottle from her and took a sip. She sets her half eaten spring roll back on the remaining plate and lifts it, following Abitha over to the couch. "Bad news." Esme chooses without missing a beat. Always better to lead with the bad news in her opinion. She settles in on the couch, sitting cross legged and letting the plate cradle in her lap. She lifts the half eaten spring roll back up and refocuses on the gamer, waiting.

“Bad news.” Abitha confirms, getting settled, crossing her legs beneath herself and settling her plate there, her cider put on a coaster, taking a small bite of her food. “I’m quitting down at the precinct. Not that much of a surprise since my shop is back open, but there’s a lot of aggregated data I’ve pulled that someone with actual law enforcement skill needs to sift through.” She was staring at Esme while she said this, perhaps driving home who that person should be, going on to explain.

“I mean, I’ve been reporting mostly just to Javier, cause we don’t know who we can trust, but... I mean...” She puffs a breath, her wavy hair shifting slightly as she makes a frustrated look, “I’m not a law person. I don’t have the morals, patience... Like... It ain’t me. Yaknow?”

Perhaps not what Esme was expecting to hear. Abitha leaving the precinct was a bit of a disappointment but there was definitely worse news out there. "I can respect that." She says finally. "Police stuff, Law enforcement stuff, it's not for everyone. And it's not like you really chose it." She agreed. "I can take a look...if I fail, maybe I can get Cecil to look..." Since she barely trusted anyone at the precinct as it was. She finishes off her spring roll, leveling a look towards Abitha again. "You've done good work though. Working within the law has a shit ton of red tape. I'm questioned my career path more than once..." She gives a little shake of her head. "What's the good news then?"

"Trick question. The good news is also the bad news." Abitha announces, her tone that of a circus ringmaster. She was already picking up her phone, tapping a few things, then making a tossing motion with the device toward her entertainment venter. Her wall-mounted flatscreen powers on, the screen loading onto it a picture of one Felix Monaghan. There were some bullet points under the word Copenhagen.

She takes another bite of her food and chews, letting Esme read and really take it all in.

Esme made a soft little, indiscernible noise, attention turning to the TV. Though her eyes widened seeing Monaghan's face pop up on the screen and skimming the information presented multiple times. "...Holy shit Mac." She said finally, moving her plate and bottle to rest on the floor so she could fully turn to the other woman. "Where the hell did you get all this?"

"A game console, actually." Abitha admits. She settles back into her seat, a slouch almost seeming depressed. "If I'm spitballing, I'd guess the info on that console was somehow related to the reason they burned down the Control Pad." The wistful look is dismissed with a shake of the head, green eyes meeting Esme's after a moment.

"They ran Lilith and Byron off the road trying to get it and blew up their car when they couldn't." There's a thoughtful look as she adds the next part, "Lilith mojo'ed it back together somehow and I decrypted it. You wouldn't think to check something like a game console for this sort of thing, but... I mean there it is."

"Why did Lilith and Byron have it to begin with?" Esme asked, mind gears starting to slowly turn. "It's an extremely clever way to go about things though." Was agreed. "I certainly wouldn't have thought about it." She glanced to Abitha again. "...Have you shown this to anyone else?" Liking meaning Ruiz. "This...could get a lot of people put away for a long time." And she had no issues tossing crooks in the slammer.

“I think it got pawned?” Abitha answers, though her tone was that of a question more than a statement. She wasn’t sure she remembered how they had it either. “And no... Not yet. I mean, I haven’t really seen Javier in a couple days?” This gives the gamer pause for thought, wondering if that were significant, then shrugging. She leaves out the part about telling Alexander and Sparrow about things, just like she left out the part about Joey Kelly and Easton Marshall’s involvement. For the moment.

“And yeah, I figured, but... this is dangerous info, right? I didn’t know who else to give this to at the station besides you?” There again was that questioning tone, though maybe a dash of hopeful sprinkled into it, like this was nose-goes, and she didn’t want any part of it.

"Good. I'll bring it to him. Because as far as I'm concerned everyone in that station besides me and a small handful of others, are crooked in some way, shape or form." She runs a hand through her hair. "And I don't have issues bringing down Felix Monaghan and his associates. I don't care how rich he is. He's no better than other criminal and he's not above the law." Esme's eyes narrowed lightly as she skimmed back over some of the information on the TV. Then she sighed and reached down to retrieve another spring roll from her plate. "This is good news." She added after swallowing a bite. "It's more of a lead than I feel like we've gotten in forever."

Abitha looks at least a little relieved, nodding as Esme confirms it wasn’t the worst idea to bring it to her. The gamer swipes through some more things, rendered pictures, an overhead view of Gray Harbor, there’s color added to it, like a heat map.

“Back to the other thing. Part of the bad news is this.” She explains, waving her hand to the places on the map, “This is location data for the patrol cars Liu and Hallisey took out. I fed it through a processor and got this. Basically where it’s warmest, they go more. I just don’t know if these places are part of their usual duties, but it’s a start. They didn’t seem that bothered to come harass me while in a cruiser, so I figure they’re probably just as cavalier for other things.” She adds a shrug, “If that doesn’t pan out you might know better what to do with this data.”

Esme watched intently as the other pictures were shown, the heat map revealed. She pulls her phone out of her sweatpants pocket and taps in a couple quick notes. "Wouldn't put it past them. " The detective agrees. "I'll see if I can't check out some of these places and do some poking around. I'm sure there's someone, somewhere, that wants to talk if there is something going on." Which there was. There had to be. She knew Liu was dirty, it was just a matter of pinning him. "And if anything, maybe it'll guide to other leads."

Abitha makes with the email, moving some things around into a package she was going to send to Esme anyway, then... stops. She considers for a moment, then looks over at the phone the policewoman was taking notes on. She holds out her hand,

“Hold up, we need to set you up something more secure.” Which Abitha would do, in short order, if allowed. An offsite encrypted email, something like proton mail with an anonymized name. When she hands the phone back, It was waiting for Esme to input her fingerprint and a password.

“Come up with a new password. This account can only be logged into from your phone, with your thumb and the password. If you email stuff to somewhere else, it’ll be totally anonymized.”

Esme paused mid note and looked to Abitha. "Oh, uh yes. That makes sense." She agreed and handed over her phone to let Abitha do her tech magic! "I didn't even know email places like this existed." She murmured, sort of in awe when she gets her phone back. The password is reset and her thumb print registered. "Suppose it lessens the risk of being tracked back to to certain things."

“Yeah, my insurance premiums are already high enough, I’d like to not get another arson on my record.” Abitha quips, though it’s probably woefully understated, as she’d much more likely end up dead instead. But who wants to dwell on that?

“You know... you and Javier can always come to me if you need someone digital.” Abitha begins after a moment. She sounded... guilty? “Like, I’m not trying to leave you two hanging.”

"Yeah, lets avoid any more fires." Esme agreed and grinned a touch. "Already planned on it. You may quit, but I won't let you get off that easy." She assured Mac. "Plus, I don't know if there's anyone in this town with quite the same skill set as you. You know? Quicker to pay you a consultant's fee than to send shit up to Seattle or somewhere for processing."

“Ooo, consultant.” Abitha intones as she was getting up, gathering the emptied plates and carrying them over to the kitchen. Esme’s phone had already pipped with all the info the nerd was sending over for her perusal. “That sounds way cooler than data analyst...” she was joking.

A quick rinse and popping them in the dishwasher, being a proper hostess, she wanders back over halfway, checking on Esme’s cider level. “And yeah, I know what you’re saying. If only there was some sort of cyber-security expert willing to help the police.” There was an eye roll and some deep biting subtext there, but Abitha doesn’t elaborate.

Esme snickered a bit, skimming over the information as she listed to Abitha. Her cider levels were getting dangerously low. "If only." She mused, head tilting to look up and over at Mac with a touch of a smirk. "Don't worry. At the rate this town is going, I'm sure the cyber-security expert will be wishing they hadn't volunteered to help the local PD." She finishes off her cider and relaxes back on the couch. "Now, do we still have work talk? Or can I turn my 'off day' switch back on?" Even though she's still browsing through some of the files Abitha sent.

Esme finds another cider placed down with a light click on the coffee table once Abitha had retrieved it. The gamer grins and swipes something on her phone, the files fading. She reaches down and picks up a air of controllers with wrist straps and holds them out to the police woman.

“Depends? How open are you to humiliation?” Abitha waggles her eyebrows in a taunting manner as she uses another set of controllers to turn something on. The Nintendo logo fades in, then the screen splashes ’Just Dance 2020’. Seemed Abitha was just as prepared to share vital information as she was to continue the defense of games.

Esme put her phone away as the controllers come out. "...What..." She starts to say, even though she's reaching out to accept them. "Oh lord." Seeing the game that is up and laughs, standing. "As long as you promise not to post any videos of me actively making a fool out my self...it's on." She grins a bit. Totally ready to fail.

Abitha pauses, taking a shoulders-back posture that seems far more formal than two women standing in an apartment in workout wear, raising one hand, palm outward, as if swearing to something.

“Mei-mei,” Abitha begins, probably the first time she’d ever tried a nickname out on the woman, and probably the only place she’d try out a nickname like that (But Maggi does it and Abitha wants to be cool too) “What we do here is sacred, and no one outside these walls will know.” She quickly drops the official tone, sounding more flat and hooking a thumb, “Also the blinds are closed and I actually have a physical flip-down on my streamer cam.” Which was visible. She had turned to start flipping through the songs, selecting one quickly, and picking two players. A large fat character had loaded onto the screen amidst a landscape seemingly dotted with hills made of molded jello. In the bottom right corner, there were actual white silhouettes of the two women, likely some sort of motion capture add-on to really assess movements for score.

“Now, you’ve heard of Despacito,” Abitha begins dramatically, which was really a toss-up given Esme’s knowledge of pop culture, but Abitha was just assuming since it was so meme-y. Her eyes train dangerously over to her new opponent, looking her in the eyes as she asks the loaded question, a Latin beat slowly fading in...

“But have you heard... of Shaky Shaky...”

Esme quirks a brow at the nickname. She can't remember the last time she had a nickname that wasn't just people calling her by her last name at work. She doesn't comment though, instead just nods. Confirming that all these protections are in place and no crazy videos are going to appear. Then she fully focuses on the television as that Latin beat fades in and Abitha asks her about the song. "...What is this abomination?" She asks in disbelief at what she's looking at. Though she had to reluctantly admit that the beat was somewhat...catchy. She gives Abitha bit of side-eye. "Alright. Show me how its done."