3739/Hunting down the Trafficers.

Hunting down the Trafficers.
Date of Scene:	26 January 2018
Location:	Unknown
Synopsis:	Summary needed
Cast of Characters:	Punisher, Black Queen

---

Punisher has posed:
    Frank Castle has been following the traffic in and out of the Chinatown restaurant for weeks. Besides that dust up with the Triads, these people had been very good at covering their tracks. Still, his paitence is beginning to pay off and he is starting to see a pattern forming. Right now, he is sitting in his black van with a notebook open against the steering wheel. He looks over the notes he has written in his tight, block handwriting. If he is right, people or payment could be moving here within the next day or two.

    The van is parked at Battery Park at the southern tip of Manhatten. It is night time, but the Statue of Liberty is still light up out in the harbor. Frank is guessing that the Triads are avoiding the harbor and would prefer to try to bring payment into the city in a less observable place.

Black Queen has posed:
The Triads have been keeping things underwraps pretty tightly but just a few days back there was a raid of a location that was linked to the Triads. Some lead bosses were there, a deal was being made in a shady little bar known for prostitutes and drugged up strippers. Not a lot is known about the raid other than, there were tons of cop cars outside of some bar, ready to charge in behind their meta-cop breacher, and then... the whole thing was called off - mid-raid. That address may have been a place Frank had previously, just a few days ago, but by now the whole place was cleaned out and no longer going to be used.

Tracking some of the members though was easy for someone with Frank's skillset. Time, patient, hard work and expertise all pay off in the long run. The harbor was clearly not the location where the money was coming in, though it seemed rife with containers filled with drugs, and some containers filled with women to be sold off after a time. The location where they go is unknown, at some point those trucks go underground and they don't pop up again. It's like they vanish, but money needs to exchange hands.

An auction house. All the details Frank has gathered together, the area that Triads are moving in Chinatown, all lead back to an old movie theater created back in the 40s that is now re-purposed as an antique auction house. All over the country various pieces show up, it's a black tie event, the city's top collectors are all invited. And the security looks to be dressed up Triad foot soldiers Frank has seen around. No one else would notice, they're just Chinese security in Chinatown, after all, but since Frank's been following them he notices quite a few of them. And at this time they are getting ready for a late night auction that's had no media marketing.

Punisher has posed:
    Frank sits in his van and brings up a small pair of binoculars to his eyes. They are a dark matte black so as to not reflect the obnoxious glaring street lights. He watches the Chinese guards move about slowly. He is marking down in his notebook the various times they pass a certain spot. Getting a feel for how big a security path each one takes. This much security doesn't come cheap, and no matter how well a group like the Triads tries to hide the path of money, if you dig hard enough, it will always tell you something. Frank has counted a couple of big limos pull up, but it is mostly smaller luxury cars. They don't want to draw too much attention to themselves, he estimates.

Black Queen has posed:
There's one vehicle that pulls up that is a shiny new luxury sedan, from Tesla. It's worth hundreds of thousands of dollars and although it is black, it is very shiny. Stepping out of the vehicle is Selene, and she's wearing a black dress like most, a formal gown is a better description. There's a long plunging v-neck in the front, on her ears she has a pair of earrings made up of a sunflower design but the petals are diamonds and the centers are onyx. Up one leg is a slit that allows her leg to come into view as she walks, though she gets out of the car about a block from the Theater and decides to walk the rest of the way. It's not super harrowing in this area of Chinatown, but there is something of a wait for the valet parking and Selene doesn't have Frank's patience.

The guards are staying rather close to the building, and there's a few on the roof, a few parties across the street in a local diner keeping watch discreetly while 'enjoying a meal'. And otherwise, most of the security seems to be inside. Down one alley though Frank can see a large truck, one that looks very similar to the kind that takes containers from the harbor even with the same logo. With a quick glance at some notes, the plates are different, but the department of transportation number each semi must carry on their door is the same. It had linked back to some Foreign owned corporation with a long Chinese name meaning something like, Dragon's Tail. And now it is here. Strangely only security are allowed back there in the alleyway area, and the truck sort of backed into it so it's hard to see any product that is actually being unloaded from outside.

Punisher has posed:
    Frank needs a better look at that truck. He is collecting a few things from the van before slipping out, but pauses as Selene walks down the street. He normally does not notice such things, but she is an eye catcher. He tears his gaze away after a beat or two, admonishing himself for getting distracted. He slips out of the back of the van and moves to the building next to the theater and alleyway.

    With careful movements backed by hours and years of experience, he climbs the fire escape quietly. He quickly gets to the roof of the building and is moving across to the fire escape that leads down the other side, down towards the alley next to the theater. He tries to get a better look at the truck, but the people know what they are doing and use the shadows to their advantage. Any lights in the alley way have been disconnected or broken. He is going to have to get closer. He begins to climb down slowly being careful where each foot is placed so as to not make noise. Again, it is paitence trained him into him years ago at Parris Island. He glances back towards the main street. Selene is getting closer. Maybe he can use her appearance on the scene as the guards, professionals too, can't help but turn to look at the dark haired beauty. He moves a hair faster as they get distracted. He drops the last ten feet from the fire escape rather than put down the ladder, dropping into shadows.

Black Queen has posed:
Selene is something of a distraction, when she walks past the alleyway there are Triad security who might be mistaken for oogling the woman, but others also watch her like they would anyone else. No one's supposed to come down the alley way, not even if they are an attractive woman. When she passes by those who are oogling stop, of course, and so do the ones who were just trying to make sure she didn't slip past the truck. To the entrance of the theater she goes, handing over some invitation and being allowed inside, disappearing into the auction house.

For Frank, the process is much harder. Moving about fire escapes, the building roofs, and then back down into the alleyway. The guards are trained, and good at their jobs, but Frank's expertise is in just such a situation. Honed by the military, but then also his post-military hobbies, having allowed him to gain the upper hand in infiltration. Sneaking about too long in the alley may still be dangerous, but from this vantage point Frank can see security guards moving... paintings, antiques, items that look old, though most not terribly interesting by any modern standard. On each item is a tag, there are red tags, blue tags and black tags. The black ones seem to be the fewest, the reds the most abundant... but no women are being carted or moved around, at least not visibly. The security are moving the items from the truck to inside of the building, and there are quite a few pieces here, and if Selene is a member of the buyers the pieces are probably worth a great deal.

From what Frank had learned, at least, Selene's a youngish 20-something rich woman, who inherited her wealth from her late-husband who was from and passed in Europe. That's where she got her last name of Gallio. Her wealth is mostly in antiques, paintings, real estate, things her husband never had an eye for but much of the assets she has have been converted to those types of things instead of in raw currency making her actual worth hard to identify. Unsurprisingly, she's also part of many elite rich people's clubs, even the heavily rumored about Hellfire club that is far more 'risque' than most, if any of the rumors are even half-true. That said, others who Frank has seen present were mostly identifiable as political wealthy sorts, private wealthy sorts, and a few bosses in criminal enterprises... not publically of course, publically they are just businessmen, but Frank's got more information about these so-called business men than most.

Punisher has posed:
    Frank moves slowly through the shadows. He pauses as security gets closer, but pulls back against the wall as he does. Slow. Deleberate. The truck is not as interesting as he was hoping it would be. He is working towards the service entrance to the theater now. The loading dock is appealing, but just too crowded for him to slip through. He certainly doesn't look Chinese so even taking out a security man to then slip in wouldn't work. Plus, he had dark paint smeared on his cheekbones, forehead, and chin to better sneak through the dark. He makes his way to the service entrance. It is open tonight with the event going on so he slips inside quietly just as the secruity turned their heads in a different direction.

    Once inside, he crouches beside the door. He pauses as the light has to be adjusted to. The hallway is full of boxes of supplies for the theater. Odds and ends that don't have an exact home in dry storage of the like. He uses them for cover as he gets his vision back.

Black Queen has posed:
Once inside the security becomes a bit lighter. Auction workers start to increase however, people moving things about, a hustle almost to get things properly in place and properly in order. Most of these folks are still Chinese, but don't stand out as particularly Triad members. They may be family members, or families associated with them, or just people under the thumb of the local Triad families. Off to one side of the building is an office door that's slightly open and a window to look in and out of the office to make sure work is still happening. The door isn't fully closed and it sounds like two voices. One more angry, and a heavier chinese accent, and the other much more american in nature. Both men. It sounds like a management dispute of some kind, but the exact words are too hard to hear from this kind of distance. Frank would have to leave his current cover and hope no one was going to come by to get a closer listen.

The storage area of this auction house is pretty large. It even goes up into the floors above. Where the front of the building is a theater with typical stage seating, albeit it only fitting about 30 people and a stage, the back is just like a theater warehouse. Lots and lots of space, a second floor that also presumably leads to the lighting control areas and the catwalks for anything that needs to hang or come down over the stage during a play. All this space has been renovated to maximize shelving, and there are already plenty of auctionable items inside but none of them have any tags on them at all.

Black Queen has posed:
Except for the ones being brough inside from the truck, of course.

Punisher has posed:
    Frank looks back and forth, trying to decide where to go next. He would like to hear what is going on in the office, but the cover is certainly less secure the closer he gets to the office. None of these auction bits seem to be what he is looking for. This looks like it could be a legitimate auction for the super wealthy judging from the guest list he had looked over and observed. Granted, an auction with ties to the Triads so the money certainly wasn't clean, but maybe not in the dirtpile he was hoping to find. Still, while he is here...

    He moves among the boxes, shelving, and auction items slowly. He gives one of the shelves a slight shake. Testing to see if it could possibly hold his weight. He decides against it as it looks like the temporary shelving so probaly would just come crashing down if he tried anything with it. He begins moveing towards the manager's office. He is trying to get close enough to hear what is going on. With an American in there, he is hoping for English speaking as he doesn't know any of the Chinese languages. He moves. Stops. Moves quickly again. Stops. Listens. With the hustle and bustle of getting ready for such an expensive auction, he is able to find a path closer even if he can't get right up to the door. In here, the security is mostly focused on the expensive items up for bid and making sure no one pockets some jewelery or other small items.

Black Queen has posed:
To Frank's advantage, workers are prone to being focused on their task. They aren't so concerned about a person hiding in the shadows as long as he doesn't jump out and grab them. They just don't notice. Normal people, perhaps a conundrum for people like Frank, are very unobservant to things he might find quite obvious. Like the door, being open still an inch or so. It seems like someone tried to shut it on their way in but failed, and just didn't finish pulling it closed.

As Frank gets closer to the office the thick accented voice isn't shouting so much as sounding very rushed, anxious even, perhaps a bit scared that gets turned into anger towards this American man who still looks of Chinese descent - if Frank peeks in. The words are broken up a bit by Frank having to move around to avoid being spotted, but he eventually can settle off to the side next to some shelving, where people don't seem to be going.

"You, you put the tags on right? Yes?" The accented man asks quickly.

"For the 50th time, yes, we did."

"Why not show on manifest? We missing, twelve pieces tagged. Black. Very important." The anger of the accented man getting greater as some papers are thrown from him toward the other man, "Someone fuck up. You. Wrong tags on some, too many reds and blues, maybe I take out of you? Hmm? Guest not get right item, very very bad for you and daughter. Maybe we take her, she go for good price back home. 'merican chinese mmmmm."

The other man starts to stumble with his words some more, "Okay, okay, I'm sorry. No need to threaten my girl. She's only 13, look. Some of the items, they seemed really... low-class, so I couldn't fathom why we would be auctioning them off with a higher price point. I mean, clearly, some of them aren't even that rare. Just, kind of old-" The man is cut off when he's slapped across the face.

The Accented man speaks up again, "Fix. You not ask questions, you deliver. Else... last you see, daughter on boat." And then there's footsteps as the one with the accent seems to be headed straight towards the door, probably to head out and oversee the goings ons.

Punisher has posed:
    Well, things just got a bit more interesting for Mr. Frank Castle. Looks like he found the right time and place after all. He moves quickly to the back side of the door and crouches down so that the man coming out would only see him if he turned completely around. He remains still even after the man apparently left in case the other man also hurries out. In the meantime, his eyes turn toward the shelves looking for more of the Black Tagged items. Esepcially ones that do not look terribly expensive. Granted, he is no art or antique dealer. Some of it will be guess work. If the opportunity presents itself, he will try for the small camera he keeps in his leg pocket, but too dangerous right now. He doesn't want to lose sight of what is around him while looking through a camera lens. He will try to remember key elements and put some down on paper when he gets a chance.

Black Queen has posed:
The black tagged items seem of various sorts. Some paintings, some pieces of work, though a lot of it recognizable from the late 19th century to early 20th century, and most of it clearly American. That, alone, probably seems to most stand-out feature of the black tagged items. They all look like American antiques. Things from the wild west days, wagon travels, even a Wells Fargo transportation box for currency movement. Rifles, and a few other confederate and union civil war pieces. Distinguishing them from the other items seems pretty easy in that regard, even for one without an eye for items. Everything else seems far older, or very clearly from European or Asian cultures of various kinds.

The American-Chinese man who was being berated and threatened remains in the office as the other man storms out in a huff. This error seems to be like one of those things that would come right down on him, so he was taking it out on anyone else. The office manager for the auction remains in the room, now, breathing heavily, trying to gather himself up. He is folding up his wallet that the other person had taken from him to look at pictures of his daughter and gather his personal home address, and now he's wiping his brow with his tie and just gathering his calm to present himself in a bit to his workers and to fix the mistake. That said, he doesn't seem terribly shaken up, not like a normal person might be. He isn't sweating too profusely, nor crying or otherwise breaking down. This is clearly not the first time he's dealt with the Triads or at least their kind.

Punisher has posed:
    Frank makes the mental notes and then looks back towards the office. The American could make an ally, or at least a source of information, if his daughter was in danger, but the lack of continued fear sets off a red flag for Frank. Without that fear, why would this man really change sides? He could take one of the smaller black tagged items. See if he could get more pressure put on the American, but Frank doesn't want to jeprodize the man's daughter on a gamble. A gamble that is not entirely in his favor as of yet. For now, he is trying to make his way through the warehouse and towards the front of the theater. He wants to see how the Black Tagged items are auctioned off. He looks for the catwalk over the stage slowly climbing up assuming no surprises are waiting for him at the top.

Black Queen has posed:
Frank easily makes his way through the theater transformed to auction house. There are stairs that lead up to the second floor of storage that are not currently being used. Tonight's auction features all new items brought in for it, and as such they remain on the ground floor for easy maneuvering to the stage. Even still, however, there's just one security guard standing on the catwalk up top. The Triads do not use radios, not like normal security. They often do shift rotations, long ago having decided that a rotation was better than relying upon technology that could easily be intercepted. It's an old style and something that most of the criminal organizations have given up on, but in this case it might play to Frank's advantage.

Due to the security mostly being external, Frank hasn't noticed any rotations on the inside. It seems more that the security guards were assigned a group of people to follow, or an item to protect, and as it moved through the auction house so did that guard. If Frank could take out this guard silently he may have a great vantage point to watch the auction for quite some time. And it isn't a moment too soon, as the auctioneer seems to have already introduced the wide variety of items that will be auctioned off, he's done his piece about the history of this particular house, and given some stories to add spice or mystery vaguely to the collection that's available this evening. Altogether, in the crowd, there's only about 20-30 people, and only a little over half of them have voting paddles since the person with them is either their hired escort or their spouse. It is a sea of wealth, and a sea of black expensive clothing, where amidst the crowd is Selene and she's not with anyone at all, and looking rather bored.

Punisher has posed:
    Frank comes up behind the sentry with practiced quiet. He is taller than the Chinese man so it is not a hard thing to get his arm around the neck, squeezing quickly, to cut off air and sound. The man begin to struggle, kicking out, as the oxygen is cut off but soon collapses in the stronger man's grip. Frank lowers him to the ground and moves out onto the catwalk. His eyes move over the crowd. He recognizes many from his survallience and just knowledge of the New York business world. Still, many are unknown as they work hard to stay out of the headlines. He now moves to get his camera out, taking some snap shots of the crowd, before trying to get some pictures of the items coming up. Especially the black tagged ones. As a black tag item will come up, he looks back over the crowd. Gaging reactions. Watching to see who gets interested in what.

Black Queen has posed:
The items come out one by one to an introduction of their history, their mystery, stories about how the item even got to the auction house - and leaving out any illegality that got it here. And the red tagged items start with pretty high beginning bids, and most people seem to get excited about them, at least a handful always. The blue tagged items get a few people interested, but as the prices move up its clear who wants these items to complete collections or because they are eccentric wealthy person with particularly odd tastes. And then a black tagged item comes out. About 9 of the people seem highly interested, and there are a few others who almost seem confused, especially when the starting bids are in the couple hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Selene, in particular, is looking around in idleness during the black tagged item sales, not bidding on any of those, and seemingly looking at and judging the person who ends up winning the item. It's as if she's dumbfounded by the purchase, but quickly shakes it off to look at the next item coming up. Her particular interests end up mostly being in the Eurasia areas, Mongolian, Chinese, Russian and a few Indian pieces she ends up being the highest bidder for, and there's nothing she bids on that she isn't the highest bidder for... all red tagged items. Though many of the others reserve their bids, the same group of 9 bid on those particular pieces, and after one person has earned 3 of them he simply gets up to leave. A few others follow suit after they get the items they came to bid on, and don't sit through even the really rare Mongolian cutlass that gets lots of bidding action, and some very perturbed looks from Selene as someone keeps raising her bid. Ending in the low million dollars for the sword, she still wins it, but seems quite put-out about the price.

During this process no one comes along to the catwalk, and if Frank remains for the entirety of the auction it will be about an hour and a half of non-stop stories, history and bidding battles of the rich.

Punisher has posed:
    Frank snaps pictures as quickly as he can of the crowd and items. Selene does seem to confuse him a bit here. From their last encounter, he thought she might have something to do with it as she seemed to be picking up a payment. When she pays little attention to the black tagged items, however, he wonders if she really is what she portrayed herself as. A collector of the rare and old with an eye for knowing the real thing. Everything he had been able to find on her had not pointed to anything nefarious, but still something had been tickling the back of his brain. Perhaps it was the connection to the Hellfire Club. That name had been turning up over and over again as he operated within the city. He would have to look closer at that group. He slowly backs up the catwalk and back to the storeroom. Damn, he hates having more questions than answers in a day.

Black Queen has posed:
As the auction comes to an end, the people present don't stick around to socialize. This was a competitive auction not some gathering to show support for a particular cause. And Selen stayed to the very end, items are not picked up here, there is no transfer into their fashionable cars. Deliveries will be made at another point in time. Each of the people head out and some of them call to get their drivers or cars to pull up, and then exit to get in their limo or fancy car. Selene doesn't produce a cellphone, she just starts her walk back toward the Tesla that's still waiting for her about a block away. Perhaps another reason she didn't get dropped off at the entrance, not one for electronic communication of any kind. How wonderfully eccentric.

Frank's time leaving is easier than it was getting in, especially now that he knows the path to take. If he lingers too long though the security will start their packing of the items, tagging them with names and addresses for the delivery. The process will begin to buzz like a bee hive in the next few minutes, more work is needed at the end of this auction than was ever necessary at the beginning.

Punisher has posed:
    Frank moves as quickly as he can to exit. He has pictures so he can connect people and items. He doesn't need to stay to get an eye on the shipping plans. He makes his way out of the theater and back up to the roof next door. He makes it there in time to Selene getting into her car which seems shiney enough to almost be alive with the glint of an eye. Again, there is something about that woman that sets his hackles up, but can't find any real reason. He will get back home and upload these pictures. See what can be determined and what the black tagged items meant.