Nakahama

Kazushi sighs.

"If she replaces her sister, I wonder if all this might be for naught," he says idly, gesturing around as he refers to the gathering in general. "Although it might be a mistake to have clans and corporations expend effort and resources only to then turn around and deny them the deals that were promised - that's a good way to get a planet blockaded or black-listed. No, she rushes and she doesn't have the time to set up contingencies that would allow her to drop her sister's promises, and we leverage that against her.

He pauses for a moment, trying to remember something from an old history class.

"If it comes to it, though, I vaguely recall a story about a Scorpion-backed extraction of a governor in the days before a hostile takeover... It weakened the replacement's position and left the original governor in the debt of the man who arranged the whole thing. We keep Yasuki Ayame alive and out of Umiko's hands, and we double our leverage. Can we arrange that?"

"This won't be easy to pull. We don't know enough and poking around won't allow us any time to learn. My suggestion is boldness and as investigation as we can do before Kotori san gets the results of her computer mumbo jumbo. The asset goes into temple," she looks at the Soshi, "if their chances of not be caught are good enough, while Bayushi sama and his partners distract as many people as they can distract." She looks at Kazushi. "Two totally random and honorable samurai are actually the best choice for this. In the meanwhile, Kotori san tries to collect intelliegence about the temple. I text the karo something alarming, but ambiguous and meet her along Hinata san for a confrontation. Depending on what she says and what we learn, we decide whether we will alert the governor or not. What say you?" She looks at each one of them respectively. "Who knows, perhaps we end up with the right intel to actually perform the stunt Kazushi sama suggested. It would be marvellous!"

Kotori blinked a few times in Hinata's general direction. Kotori. Just, Kotori? No honorific...? A slip of the tongue, no doubt. She quickly pushed that aside and refocused on the conversation.

"It seems... doable." Technically if she went into the temple she was indeed collecting intelligence, right? What was the point to maintain appearances if you simply admitted to sleuthing about so easily...?

She turned to Hinata. "You need not worry about favors or budget. It won't be an issue..."

"I say we move forward with this plan. We don't have enough time to plan our moves."

He double checks the items of his kit. The pistol under his armpit, his daisho, the mask.

"All we can do is scratch the crab's shell and see if any barnacles fall off."

"Ah! And someone should inform the clan through the encrypted network. In case we all go missing mysteriously."

"I can take care of that." Kotori nods.