About 03:10, back outside The Shooting Gallery, Docklands, NMK, Monday the 26th of April, 2055.

About 03:10, back outside The Shooting Gallery, Docklands, NMK, Monday the 26th of April, 2055.

Well, I've made it to the door without getting shot, so I guess the only thing to do now is go in. So it's through the first doors, past the sleeping doorman and into the bar. A careful look around shows the place is really quiet. Ace is behind the bar, looking even more chilled than he did last time we were in. Hopefully he'll stay chilled this time and no one will succumb to lead poisoning. There are only a few others visible in the bar and none of them appear to be plugged into reality.

I take a seat at the bar and ask Ace if he knows where I might find The Dragon. I try to get something sensible out of him, but he's too far gone on whatever it is he's smoking. It's certainly creating a decent purple haze behind the bar. The only clue I can get is the name of a person or a place, Tokyo Rose. I quickly finish my drink and then approach the most coherent looking of his customers, but they're no help either.

Getting increasingly concerned about the passage of time, I decide to head back out onto the street to try and find out if this Tokyo Rose is a red herring or not. I take a chance and wake the doorman as I go. I ask him where I can find Tokyo Rose and he directs me off down the street to the right.

The building's easy to spot when I find it. It's far cleaner in appearance than the others in the area. A fact that is helped by the somewhat unusual street light outside which is a curious old-fashioned, lantern-style affair. Even more unusual are the roses outside the building. I'd swear they're the real thing. A sign in the window is the final giveaway, as it says 'Tokyo Rose'.

I climb the few steps leading up to the door and step inside. Closing the door behind me, I step through a thin, semi-transparent, fabric curtain. The other side I find a Japanese looking woman, composing herself, as though I've surprised her to some degree. She's wearing what seems to me to be a very expensive silk kimono. I say I'm looking for Tokyo Rose, and she says "You've found her".

A quick glance around the room, with its lavish furnishings, and the soft, tactile, sumptuous, fabrics in rich, deep, warm colours, leaves me in no doubt as to the type of establishment I've entered. I politely turn down her offer of some 'entertainment', and say I've come to her in the hope of finding The Dragon.

She silences me, looks furtively about and then guides me quickly towards the back of the building. We pass a couple of secluded lounge areas where young oriental women are relaxing, wearing exquisite silk garments that at the same time seem to cover and reveal their lithe bodies.

Passing through a doorway into a far more simply decorated room, she gestures for me to sit at a table off to one side of the room. Remaining on her feet, she asks me why I want to find The Dragon. So I tell my story.

I explain that a medic friend of mine, Yuki, had taken in three young homeless children. The children had then been kidnapped and we'd received a message asking us to deliver a case to an address in the Docklands with no questions asked. If the case wasn't delivered by 6 AM today then the children would be killed. So what were we to do?

We were clearly out of out depth from the start. First, we almost got taken out when a group of Razor Boys were subject to a drive by shooting. Next, when we got to the address where we were supposed to drop the case, we were jumped by someone we later found to be The Dragon. Then an unfortunate misunderstanding, fuelled by impatience, frustration and a degree of trigger-happiness, led to a brief gunfight at The Shooting Gallery with some members of The Sisters.

That in turn led to a falling out with the Razor Boys, another misunderstanding, this time with a local ripperdoc, and six dead Jamaicans. Five of which I'm claiming as my kills, and that I'm making no apologies for, because they wanted to flambé us. Finally, it's led to me taking a calculated risk to find The Dragon and ask her for her help, despite all that has already happened.

Rose has been silently listening to my tale. After a moment she just leaves the room and I'm left sat at the table unsure of whether she's gone to get a drink, a gun or something else?

She returns a few tense minutes later, with a very attractive young oriental girl. The girl takes a seat opposite me at the table. She's got the most incredible eyes that seem to gaze deep within me. Rose introduces her as Naomi, but says that I might know her better by her street name, The Dragon.

Meanwhile, while I was sat waiting for Rose to return, I was on the receiving end of some radio chatter from Sykes as he and Roland went sniffing around Nanotech Industries. As usual with Sykes, you just get short, clipped snippets of information. What I get goes something like this;

"We're in the alley."
"There's a couple of really stinky dumpsters."
"Roland's climbing onto the roof."
"He's gone through the skylight."
"He says he's caught a guard."
"There's a suit and three heavies."
"Now he's been caught!"
"The kids are there!"
"What shall I do?"

I tell him to hide nearby where he can keep an eye on the building to make sure that whoever's there doesn't leave with Roland and the kids. Why am I unnerved by those dumpsters? I wish they'd looked inside them.

Naomi wants to know why we shot The Sisters in The Shooting Gallery. I explain again, as I did to Rose, but tying even harder to sound apologetic, sincere and regretful, yet trying not to sound too weak and contrite. I think I manage to pull it off. No, don't be so coarse, both my hands are on the table throughout the conversation. No matter that I find Naomi incredibly attractive, I'm on my best behaviour. My life, regardless of anyone else's, could depend on it.

Next, Naomi wants to know why I've come to ask for help. Again I find myself explaining that we're running out of time to save the kids, we're in dire straits and I don't know what else to do. Especially with Roland now having been captured, that's three of us effectively out of the fight and we can't hope to rescue the kids without the help of someone else.

Now she wants to know what sort of help I'm asking for. I tell her that the most I had dared to hope for when I set out to find her was that she might be able to help by creating a distraction. But with Roland's capture, we're even more severely short-handed than we were with the legless Crash and preoccupied Yuki. So I ask her if she'd be willing to consider coming in with us. I present her with the information that there is perhaps a relatively important ICorp executive present in the Nanotech Industries building, in an effort to help persuade her, and she seems interested.

She says she'll come in with us if we leave the executive to her. I tell her that's no problem, she can have him if she wants, my only concern is freeing the captives. Naomi also says that she may be able to get The Sisters involved to provide the distraction by stirring up the Jamaicans. But she wants to know what I'll be able to offer them.

I explain that I have very limited resources of any kind but that I'm happy to try and give anything that it is within my power to do so. But I don't know what I could give that The Sisters might want. Naomi suggests that if I was to give my word to take the fight to ICorp, in any way I could, that that might carry some weight with The Sisters. I can do nothing else but agree.

Naomi gets up and leaves the room. She returns after several minutes with another striking looking girl, also of obvious oriental heritage. Looking more closely, there's a distinct family resemblance between her and Naomi. Naomi introduces her as Oreo. She's the closest that The Sisters have to a leader. It's make or break time sports fans...