RP [Phoenix Team] - Something's Cooking

It ain't the aliens at the foot of my bed
It's more the aliens inside my head
I have a feeling something's cooking
XTC - Science Friction

>START!

Sargasso, Central View, Redfield
Redfield was old. Old enough that the buildings appeared to be a conglomerate of many different styles, built around and on top of each other as new owners came and went. Indeed, walking tours were frequently held to admire the alien geometries which sprung up organically as a result of all the otherworldly inhabitants.

"And if you look across the road, there's the Municipal Swimming Pool," the tour guide, a formless thing with a gossamer sash across its midsection directed one of its pseudopods towards the crumbly building. A series of domes had been erected over the open-air portion of the swimming pool whilst the check in building and its surrounds were clad in patchwork retrofits, rendering it hivelike; Strange as thin windows gave small glimpses to lights inside and shapes - sometimes human, sometimes not - moving inside, getting on with their days.

The front door had been re-purposed into a crude airlock, with a human standing out the front acting as the doorman, and the ticketing office just beyond re-purposed into a reception of sorts, "there are many other swimming pools in Sargasso, but this one ... serves as a controlled environment for alien species. Particularly Sourcia-derived ones."

Inside the confines of the swimming pool, hidden away in a private room within its twisty passages, two of Sargasso's public enemies - one red, one blue - were meeting someone in a room filled with steam and pale light, face to face with a vaguely humanoid appearing Sourcian, lounging in a mostly-liquid state on an opulent fainting couch, occasionally tensing up and resolidifying for her guests - she knew they preferred their dealings solid.

Luca Pavone was wearing a breathing mask with a transparent visor, occasionally wiping away a layer of condensation. "Didn't I see you in Wrackzilla?" He asked, looking around the room, seeing laminated posters covering the walls, each of a movie the Sourcian client had starred in - mostly monster movies and cheesy creature features. "Love your work." He complimented, nodding and wiping his visor again.

"Gaaaaooouuuuu~" the reclining sourcian rumbled playfully, eying the crude hiding behind Luca. "Those days are behind me now. I heard you're a much worse monster than I could ever portray, and I have a task for you and your ... delicious looking friend." Luca felt Yttrium's claws dig into his shoulder as she was trying to make herself scarce.

"Keep it together - we'll be out of here soon," he whispered to her. He wasn't enjoying what all the moisture was doing to his jacket either - hoping that his frequent waterproofing would keep it from going mouldy afterwards.

"But we should ell ee aay vee hee. She can't spell, by the way. Eeh ckss iih tuhh.." Yttrium enunciated very very clearly for someone who possessed no lips of any sort.

Luca shushed her as the lounging Sourcian let a light chuckle out. "Nervous~?" the Sourcian asked playfully.

"Hardly, been nervous lots of times." Luca replied, motioning for her to get on with it.

"Now, I have an old friend who retired to take up slime farming out in the boondocks. I have not heard from him, and reaching him is difficult." Its chest rose and sank as she breathed the muggy air. Luca wiped his visor of another layer of condensation, mumbling. "I have tried contacting him, but he has not been replying. Last message was ... two weeks ago - we normally chat daily, and I fear for his safety."

I'm sure there's more to this... Luca mused before asking for more. "Who is this person you're talking about? Retired from what, exactly?" He asked.

"They're bigger than mine" Yttrium let out a foul whispered grumble, her elbow grudging straight into Luca's shoulder. Luca sighed - she'd been comparing herself to a few people they saw on the way in jealously, groaning and jabbing her in the side.

The sourcian lifted a large hand up, pointing to a name which kept appearing on the posters: Gerald Ewings, director of monster movies. She took a lazy drag from a hookah nearby, blowing out a thicker white mist Luca couldn't smell. "He bought joy and purpose into my life." The sourcian waxed poetically. "Before, I was scouring the ocean floor for nutrients, like some single-celled organism."

Yttrium's exterior parts were rattling. She wasn't happy to be here. It took her a moment to tilt her head, watching the cloud as she puzzled the films from stories as best as her mind was able.

"...I've seen your new films" Yttrium spoke up.

Luca raised an eyebrow under his mask, looking at Yttrium. "New films?" He quizzed.

"They're more ... action based than her usual work," the crude replied, "more for a niche audience I'd say. There's a lot of acting feats she's capable of that humans can't do so directors who know what to do with that kind of talent are in short supply."

The Sourcian chuckled at the euphemisms Yttrium was using, covering her mouth. "If you find Gerald," Sourcian's long hand drifted towards Luca, itching against his chin and pulling some of the mask back, fogging the interior and causing Luca to hold it down before he couldn't see at all. "I'll show you myself, handsome~"

With his spare hand, Luca swatted the long fingers away, grumbling as a film of vaguely narcotic slime was left on his hands. "Cash will be fine, thank you." He replied, turning the wiles down and flicking the spittle off his fingers. "Where's this farm?"

"Its to the north..." Yttrium oozed a grumble, glancing back over her shoulder precariously. "Its to the north. Past the taller buildings, out on the swamps."

There was a nod of confirmation from the Sourcian, as the confirmed address was beamed to Luca and Yttrium's respective devices. Gazing into the palm of his right hand, the hologram was having some trouble with the mist in the room, but he could see the address on a map of Sargasso. "Well, let's get going then. I'll be in touch." Luca said, turning around with Yttrium in tow.

As they were leaving, Yttrium could feel something lashing at her rear. The crude glanced - a yelp on her part as a woman nearly seven feet of liquid and tightly built metal bounced like a school girl, flinching in reflex. The Sourcian chuckled as she waved them goodbye.


Sargasso, Northern Swamplands
Beyond the North Shore and out past the built up area was a band of forest and low mountains which surrounded Sargasso, framing the bay in the middle of it beautifully. Following the road along the coast through the jungle would eventually lead into a large stretch of low-laying wetlands and swamps. Out there on the dry parcels of land, people lived a simpler, agrarian life compared to the hustle and bustle of Sargasso's bay and districts.

Luca and Yttrium rode through the balmy evening, past outcroppings of rocks and stones standing out against the dark water, over wooden bridges raised over bubbling mires, following crooked lamps unable to stay entirely upright in the soft earth under their own weight.

"This place is really out in the sticks..." Luca commented, riding along on his Kestrel with Yttrium clinging to him on the passenger seat. He'd been riding slow and smooth to make sure she didn't shake herself apart in transit. "Should be the next corner on the left and all the way down." He saw a sign with bullet holes through it at an intersection, and made a left turn, headlights keeping the road ahead illuminated. Leafy vines crept onto the road from the underbrush every now and then, some thorny and requiring avoidance, others merely annoying.

Up ahead, they saw a small farming property atop some solid land, with a jeep parked in front of the garage, and an electric fence surrounding the place with a gate just ahead, closed. A mail box built from an old slime canister welded to four rods boasted the house's number: 742. Rolling to a stop in front of the gate, Luca dismounted and inspected the gate. A chain held it in place, but there was no padlock. Loosening the chains, he pushed the gate open and hopped back on, driving closer the house on a dirt road.

"Doesn't look like anyone's home," Luca made note of the lack of lights in the house, shining high beams from his bike onto the building and around. Off to the side of the property, he could see all the necessary equipment and tools for cultivating slimes: moisture traps, cleansing skimmers, a mobile processor, large horizontal silos of what Luca presumed to be the end product, and a warehouse where 'the magic took place'.

Despite the nobility required to undertake such a profession, nothing could strip slime farming of a distinctly malodorous, dirty smell; A by-product of the spawning process. The property had a large amount of free range space which occasionally lapsed into nutritious (to slimes) swampland, keeping the grazing slimes contained with the electric fence on land, and baffle-gates in the water.

With all the space, equipment and machinery though, there wasn't a sound, save wind whistling through the bracken, the croaking of frogs, chirps of creepy crawlies, and bubbling streams. "Nothing's turned on..." Luca observed, dismounting his motorcycle approaching the front door of Gerald's. The bike's engine was still running, shining light into the front window and onto the door.

It was clear Yttrium wasn't fond of the smell. Careful steps, sneaking along the side of the house - or as best as whatever something of her height could even be jokingly described as sneaking.

She rapt her finger on the door a few times, listening carefully. "Do you hear anything?"

Standing opposite her, Luca held his breath and listened, eyes darting at the door as he felt for his gun. A moment passed and he shook his head, looking down at the doorknob and grabbing it. When he twisted it, the knob popped out of its socket, clattering at the other side as the assembly on the other side fell to the ground.

He pursed his lips and lifted the knob up, peering through where the keyhole would have been in the centre. It looked as though it'd been punched through it. "Someone's definitely been here," he mumbled, giving the door a push. It stayed in place, stuck. Luca clicked his tongue in annoyance.

"Did she say we had to keep quiet at all?" Luca asked.

"I'd say its for the best we probably did," Yttrium replied -- ever so slowly pushing at the door on her side, creaking against her weight. "The wood looks rotten... Is the floor even safe to walk on?"

Luca had no immediate answer for the query, but he started moving around to the other side of the house, activating a light on his right hand and watching his step. Thick, heavy grasses had pierced through cracks in the concrete around the house, and a couple of slats of wood panelling had fallen out, paint chipped and crumbly.

"It's definitely a renovator's delight," he commented sourly as he peered around the corner and noticed something amiss, whistling as he shone light on a scene of destruction - a section of the house had been pulled away by something, and the walls still standing were covered in mud stains, and the grass was torn to pieces by a four wheel drive of some sort. "Oh boy," he said, beckoning Yttrium over, "this is a renovator's orgasm!"

The crude advanced with great care and slowness - balanced and paced as if tight-rope walking on her metallic feet. Every step made the house she was walking past quite upset from the sounds of things.

"What I don't understand is why its in such bad shape. Isn't ... Slime 'farming' supposed to be lucrative or something? Or ..." her gaze lowered.

"...Something's moving underneath us..."

"Come again?" Luca asked, looking at the ground behind the house, and spotting a mangled hole in the fence big enough to drive a car through, and probably where the free roaming slimes escaped into the wild. "I think someone drove through here, grabbed part of the house and- UARGH!"

Something grabbed him, pulling him off his feet and dragging him towards a cubbyhole underneath the house. In reflex, he fired his grapplegun at the grass outside, but the piton grasped at the muddy earth and didn't hold, reeling back in. He got a grip on the edge of the concrete in the back of the yard and held on with both hands. "Need a hand here...!" He signalled, remaining composed.

Yttrium took her metallic arm, slowly withdrawing it from its socket: Tossing it in Luca's direction. She was not truly humourless though: a thin rope of oily black goo connecting the hyper-extended limb to her shoulder as she clutched the framework of the house and did her best to stop him from going any further.

She wasn't... Quite as composed.

"Heeeiii! What is it what is it what is it?!" she screeched.

Yttrium apparently didn't like other slimes.

Grabbing on with his right hand, he had a death grip on his pistol, and looked at his leg - a long, greenish thing was wrapped about his left leg, pulsing and rippling with violence. He didn't know what it was, but he started firing into the underside of the house, red bolts of laser energy lighting up the night. In each red flash, Yttrium could see what Luca was trying to draw attention to: A section of the house's wall appeared to have been torn away from the rest, leaving an open area big enough to a few people to move through.

"Fuck's sake, get off me!" Luca cursed, stuffing his pistol into his jacket and reaching for a concussion grenade.

Dread filled the crude's belly, remembering the nature of explosions and how painful they could be: A reflex as the long black line began to reel in with quite incredible force.

"Nnnonononodon'tdothatdon'tdothatdon't--"

And then she saw the pin getting pulled off, and he tossed it under the house as he was being reeled back in. As it bounced along the ground, it could be heard beeping.

"...He did."

The explosion was short, sharp bang, intended to be used in an indoor environment which could take the most advantage of a loud sound bouncing off of many different surfaces, amplifying the concussive effect. Out in the open, it didn't sound anywhere near as impressive, but a white flash lit the underpassage of the derelict house, with burning white particles left over scattering on the ground by Yttrium's feet.

The Crude's gaze went from Luca to the gauntlet he was clinging to, to the long particularly dead looking thread connecting her to the latter. She tried to form motion - a faint wriggling enough to satisfy her demands that the distant part of herself was alive. But what of him?

"Are you alright?"

Being dragged along the ground and very close to the explosion, Luca was having trouble finding his feet, having flashed himself by mistake. "I ... I unh ... bad idea ..." he groaned, sticking a finger in his ear and trying to get the ringing noise out of it as he rubbed his watering eyes. "...what'd you say?"

"I um. Meant to do that. There was no incident involved." Yttrium covered herself verbally, nodding at Luca. "Crudes do not flinch in fear at the sight of slimes. Never."

He stood up and breathed, shaking his head as he peered around the corner again. Looking down at where he'd thrown the grenade, there was a long green splatter that went all the way to where Luca was being held. The tentacle which was holding onto him became liquid after the blast. "I think I got it," he indicated, moving into the hole in the back of the house giving Yttrium the thumbs up. "I appreciate the save."

Stepping into the hole he'd found, Luca and Yttrium could see a bedroom. The furniture inside seemed to be worth more than the rest of the house, with a functional albeit dishevelled bed, and a desk which had its drawers pulled out and inverted, all a manner of papers and documents scattered on a cushy looking rug. With of the wall had being ripped out, so too had the cables hiding inside it, now hanging loose from shears in the plaster.

Yttrium was soon attempting to start some sort of gas lantern before remembering her explosion not even days ago. A faint shiver had her deciding it was best not to - with a cautious eye hiding the metal thing in a cupboard where Luca wouldn't suggest its use behind his back.

She did however find a letter.

"Fancy looking... Can you read, Lulu?"

He grabbed it and flicked the light switch. The lights didn't come on, and he flicked them a few more times. With a grunt of annoyance, he lit up his arm again, and started reading.

"Ewings, darling, its Elena," he started reading aloud, pausing and looking at Yttrium. Elena was the duo's client, "I fear you're in danger with your new distributors, my friends have told me bad things. Get back to Sargasso ASAP, love you lots, yadda yadda yadda."

"Distributors...? For the slime? I thought they was usually sold at the market..."

Luca folded up the letter. "I think he might've been selling some off on the side."

"Don't you need a licence to do that? Sneaky..."

"Only question is, who did this?" He wondered, lifting sheets of paper over on the desk, looking for anything. Most of it were printouts detailing chemical status of slime batches.

"I'm a puddle, not a detective, so my guess is as good as yours."

Luca spotted signs that a computer had been here before, with some unplugged cables and wires hiding behind the desk. "Whoever got here first cleaned up. Start checking other rooms, they must've overlooked something."

An ajar door out of the bedroom lead into the room in front of the house, into a spartan kitchen with cheaper-looking furniture by comparison to the bedroom. Folding tables and chairs had been pushed around, and wicker place mats were dotted on the floor, one of which covering a hole. The fridge in the kitchen had been left open, food inside left to fester. A side door lead to the bathroom, thankfully untouched by the mayhem which unfolded.

Outside and near the hole in the wall the duo had entered through, there was a shed attached to the side of the house, built from corrugated iron and a timber more solid than anything else in the rest of the building combined.

Yttrium did the common sense thing and checked the shed first, for the shed was where strange substances like paints, oils, plastics and vapours lived. Not that Yttrium had any sort of ulterior motive for being around them -- oh no. Perhaps she could ask them questions, she decided. After jimmying the lock away and pulling the door open, she was greeted with a most pleasant smell of idle hydrocarbons.

The interior space was thin, with the wall on her immediate right sporting all shelves, full of paints, petrols, chemicals, and other 'fun' things. The wall on her left was covered in tools with chalk outlines for each one, all held in place with nails. At the end of the room, she saw a work bench with pencils and pens left on it, a lamp, drawers, a lined paper book left open, and a paper map of the local area and the immediate property with some pins on it hanging on the wall just above. A sheet of corrugated plastic provided a rudimentary skylight in the roof.

Yttrium was collecting these things greedily. All of them. All wrapped within a bag of clear imitation plastic formed from her shoulder and a delighted hum. She soon emerged with the bag, resembling a thief of sorts with a sly expression - eye scouring to assure the coast was clear.

"Lulu?" she grasped hoarsely. "Luluuuu???"

She could hear him inside opening and closing things. A couple of moments later, she heard a "Yeah?" from inside.

"Do you see anyone? I thought I heard footsteps," Yttrium said - covering for herself as she collected more.

He stopped his search and looked out the windows. His motorcycle was still humming outside the front door, and gazing out the hole in the bedroom, he couldn't see anyone. Yttrium could hear him moving around. "Nah, why?"

The tall crude soon returned, disappointed at the mud matting her synthetic limbs as she hurried through the wooden catwalks over the mud and grass and the battered house back toward the door. "Oh, no reason. Err... Did you leave your keys in your bike?"

"It's a biometric lock. Only I can ride it." He explained, watching her return from the shed and traipsing through the marsh. "Find anything interesting in there?"

"Yttrium things" she said, tapping her fingers on the bag possessively.

He raised an eyebrow and hopped out of the hole, heading for the shed himself and right past Yttrium. "Not things about Gerald or his whereabouts?"

"Just some documents and writing. I couldn't make out anything specific, though so I brought it all. Bad lighting."

Luca sighed as he entered the shed and turned the light on - or tried to - remembering the power was out. Grumbling, he shone a light from his grapplegun into the shed, spotting all the empty shelves first, and seeing the workbench at the end of the shed. "Oh aye, I see something." He called out, approaching and examining the map on the wall, and grabbing the workbook, flicking through it. "Oh, super. I think we have a lead..." he mumbled, less than enthused at the destination. He took both pieces of documentation and started heading out again.

"How is this old rickety building even still together?" Yttrium tapped her fingers on the support structure quite delicately.

Moments later, there was a loud bang.

Luca froze, ducking low and using the grasses and bushes in the field as concealment, thinking it was a gunshot. "What was that?"

"Ehee..."

Yttrium's arm was trapped beneath the same structure she'd been testing., between layers of brickwork and wood. On the other side, the black bag of goodies she'd collected. Luca slowly approached the building and watched Yttrium's predicament, puzzled.

"Its okay, I've got this." She assured him. She pulled several times, each time with increasing strength and exasperation. "...No I haven't." She admitted.

Luca sighed, shaking his head as he walked around her, looking at where her arm was trapped, and her bag of goodies on the other side. Peering into the bag, he could see all the 'Yttrium Things' she'd mentioned.

He had a question, tapping his finger against the side of his head. "What were you doing?"

"Stuck. You?"

He examined the structure Yttrium had found herself caught in, walking around it. After a couple of passes and relocating her bag outside, he cracked his knuckles. "This might hurt a little, get ready to pull," he warned. She could see his right arm starting to crackle and arc with unshielded energy, as he grabbed her other arm stuck in the wall.

Luca breathed in, and breathed out, assuming a stance as he held Yttrium's trapped arm. He let out a roar and thrust his fist into the wall, showering Yttrium with splinters and brick dust. The wall begun to fold in the middle, the house slowly falling in on itself as Luca pulled Yttrium's arm parallel to the wall, and stepped out of the hole. Behind him, the house neatly collapsed.

As clouds of dust rolled through them, Luca held his breath, waiting for everything to settle as crashing echoed through the moor. A few moments later, all was still. "I think it looks better like this." He coughed, holding the gynoid's arm. "If anything Gerald can buy better now."

Yttrium raised her grip, pulling Luca's feet faintly off the ground quite easily. She found herself surprised -- coughing through her eye with what appeared to be a mouth as the ball slid back making room for lips, teeth and a tongue.

"Ayugh... Gagh... How did you do that if you can't even lift me?" She questioned. Luca shrugged at her, grimacing as he was coated with a layer of dust.

"Let's get going." He directed, brushing himself off, and shaking the dust out of his hair, grumbling. He tossed Yttrium's arm back to her and grabbed her bag of goodies. "I've got what we need," he indicated, tapping his jacket - she could see the folded up map between his under-armour and the jacket. "We have to head back to town; Next stop, Devil's Depths..."

He whistled, motorcycle pulling up beside them, and he mounted. "You familiar with spelunking?"

Yttrium visibly frowned - her normally glossy exterior matte with dust and mess. "Does this involve sand?" She whined. Luca shook his head. The relief on her part was palpable.

"Sounds fine to me, then."

>TO BE CONTINUED...!

 

Sargasso, Barrier Island, 55 Midway Beach
Luca was stopping by the warehouse, opening a crate which had showed up after Johnny Longhands stopped by yesterday. Inside was a small stash of ammo and concussion grenades. However, Luca had called in another favour from Elena after being unable to coax Yttrium into Devil’s Depths. The Sourcian client said she’d ‘planned for this’ and had a contingency, who was en route to 55 Midway Beach. After getting himself kitted out for the evening, Luca was waiting for this new arrival to show up, feet up in the kitchen.

From the street, the address 55 Midway Beach looked like an old garage or warehouse, with a roller door, a corrugated iron roof, and dirty white bricks adorned the occasional tag or graffito breaking up the monotony and grime. Just off to one side of the roller shutters was a doorway in, currently locked tight. A nearby streetlight hummed, drowned out by the sounds of a party on the beach just a few streets over.

The low, dull roar of Breyja’s bike was audible from a distance. She wasn’t one for subtlety if it wasn’t needed. That and no one really questioned a well armed and armoured woman with a merc’s license why she was tearing down the road. Most days. Today she was being told she had a nice paycheck waiting for her, and the possibility of steady work.

Both were fine for her as she stopped at the curb, kickstand down, and glanced at the address on the inside of her ballistic eyewear. “This had better be the place.” She leant back and pulled the rifle from the straps across the front of the bike and stepped up to the door, glancing up at the light, shaking her head and giving the door a knock fit for someone twice her size.

Hearing the knock, Luca sat up and started ambling over. Breyja could hear footsteps jingling with equipment coming closer, stopping just behind it. For the sake of caution, Luca raised his pistol as his hand was around the doorknob. “Are you the contingency?” He asked, standing away from the door in case the answer was ‘no, with prejudice’. Breyja was briefed to introduce herself as such from the Sourcian client who was employing this chump, too.

An ear flicked in annoyance, could he be any slower? It had to be a guy, they sounded heavy coming upto the door. And her tail merely flicked slightly in annoyance when she heard the hand on the door handle, “Contingency? I’m a walking damned catastrophe if you pay me enough. But yeah,” she paused, “oh right, there was a briefing I should have paid a little more attention to, Luca Pavone, yeah? Gonna leave a girl out here in cold? Or gonna let me in? And if you’re holding a gun, I’d like to announce, beforehand. I’ve got a SK-UM Type 59 Railgun. I reaaaaaly don’t want to have a shoot-out here tonight.”

The door flung open as she was monologuing, and she saw a greaseheart man in a red jacket standing there, with what looked like a bionic right arm from the elbow down, and enormous sideburns. He had a Mark Eight in his hands - a memento from his days in the UDD. “You sound like a Friday night on two legs,” he remarked, lowering his pistol and grinning. Looking into the warehouse, Breyja could see a Kestrel Dual-Sport bike which had seen many, many miles, and a small arsenal crate.

Breyja came up to the middle of Luca’s chest. And she was loaded down for bear, or at least a decent fight. She brought her SK-UM ‘59 to port arms and glanced up. “Fee Fi Foe Fum, what damned beanstalk did you fall from?” Leaning to the side, she made a soft noise. “Thee bike’s nice too.” Her attention went back up, glossing over the crate to offer her hand upwards, “Breyja Umaeki Sarn. Uh … Maidenhand, not catgirl, the bio-augments are handy, I get top heavy with the rifle.”

Luca took the bionic woman’s hand and gave it a firm shake. Breyja noticed that his right hand didn’t feel like a bionic or an augment - it felt more like a gauntlet or glove. A tingle shot through her hand as he stopped shaking - little sparks hanging in the air. “Right then. So, we’re heading to Devil’s Depths to do hostage rescue, or at least get a lead on where our hostage is.” He gave a quick overview of what to do. “I have a map to a location called ‘The Cistern’, and I believe it’s connected to Hilderbrandt Cultivators’ shadier activities as of late…”

Getting further inside the warehouse and under its fluorescent lights in the kitchen, Breyja could see some maps, and other collected information about a ‘Gerald Ewings’, the package to be rescued. On the wall behind her, she spotted a map of Sargasso, with pins down at a few locations. Red ones marked spontaneous fights, blue ones marked client addresses, yellow ones marked targets.

Breyja slipped the rifle onto her back as she shook Luca’s hand, pausing visibly when she felt the tingle. “Well. Thats new,” not even five minutes in and the guy was already starting to turn out as interesting as the job was. After a few moments of absorbing the details and letting him get into the meat she nodded, “Normally I’d say this is a bad situation for an untested and untried pair to be working together on an operation like this.”

She gave her hand a shake as her right hand tabbed the butt of the SMG slung on her right thigh like a pistol. She was carrying mil-grade gear so she at least had to know her stuff. Or that was how she wanted it to look. She followed Luca inside without much fuss, ensuring the door shut behind her.

The layout and pinboard was a nice touch, as was the maps which she was doing her best to eyeball as she wandered towards the setup, “And also, this kinda reeks of hasty. I haven’t even been boots down in Sargasso very long and I’ve got a job with a guy rocking a signature UDD piece, a job, and - good lord," she examined the pinboard, fingers tracing the map, "you’re a busy guy aren’t you?

The man in red scoffed. “I’m an odd jobber for fun and profit, and I have a lot of clients.” He downplayed himself as he paced over to the arsenal crate and grabbed a UDD Service Carbine, hanging it over his shoulder as he headed over to his motorcycle and mounted it, roller door opening slowly. “There’s always something to do. You ready?”

Breyja tilted her head as she listened, nodded along and then when he retrieved the rifle, “You’re that Luca Pavone, aren’t you?”

Luca could be heard chuckling, but not answering her query as he started his bike.

She checked the map, the picture of their target, and lowered her glasses over her eyes, letting them take a good look at the map and the area around Devil’s Depths before she turned and gave him a grin, “Let’s go ruin some people's days then huh? Do you need me as long range support? Or should I ditch the rifle for the SMG and bring my backup pistol? My medbags on my bike so I’m sure I’ll need that.”

“I’m anticipating close quarters, bring the SMG.” Luca outlined as he gave his carbine a pat. Not quite a rifle, not quite an SMG, and very mobile. “Leave what you don’t need over there.”

Breyja didn’t need to be told twice as she rubbed her chin, “I’ll bring both. The wonders of Scout armour. Modular.” She strided back outside as Luca started stroking his rifle and starting his bike. Greasehearts were so uncouth. Her armor creaked as she dropped into her bike's seat and snagged the pistol from the inside of the plating as it slid over her legs, took a moment to ensure it was strapped securely to her left thigh and started her bike as well, letting it give up a throaty roar as it warmed up. Running a hand over her left forearm sent the images from her headset to the bikes navigation computer as she leaned back and sent Luca a message: [Anytime you’re ready, Boss. Let’s go be bad guys.]

With that, Luca lead the way on his Kestrel, engine roaring to life as he piloted his bike out onto the street, and towards the highway. The route was plotted with a GPS tool, and the route was sent to Breyja. Together they rode into the night, following the highway.


Barrier Island, Devil’s Depths
The two riders went off a ramp on the highway, down into the forest growing on the northeastern side of Mt. Cartwheel. The enormous tourist attraction on top of the mountain was turning slowly that evening, lights inside with but few silhouettes watching the dark forest below. Devil’s Depths was the antithesis to the Cartwheel, a complex series of caverns reaching down into Barrier Island, occasionally intersecting with public utilities, and a hideaway for smugglers thanks to how easy it was to obfuscate and transport goods without the long eye of the law.

Breyja took the ride in silence, though she was far from idle as she kept a running list of contingencies running in the back of her mind. Some of the more amusing ones were sent to Luca. With illustrated scenario’s usually ending with then torching the place of Breyja offering tips on committing war-crime scale bioterrorism. In the end she settled into scanning her surroundings, “In the name of the creators … This is a law enforcement’s nightmare down here. No wonder this job’s paying so well.”

The road took a turn into a darker corner of forest, streetlights partially blotted out by vegetation in the breeze. “My partner wasn’t peachy keen to fight in a cave.” He sighed, following the road, going from paved asphalt to dirty gravel, wheels sliding against the pebbles as Luca lead the way through to the mouths of several large caverns, framed by the trees. Inside, lights could be seen as more front-facing entities who lived in and around the caves made their homes. “I figure our targets won’t be expecting anyone around this time.”

Breyja gave a low grunt as they entered the darker forest and Luca expanded on them going cave diving apparently, “That’s why you put the word out that you needed a specialist?” Well, he’d gotten one.

“Mm,” Luca replied, rolling into a more secluded area of the cave mouths. The ones with helpful signs instructing visitors and non-locals to turn the hell around on pain of death or misadventure. He rolled to a stop in front of a cavern with a cliffside balcony which overlooked the beach. From up here, Luca and Breyja had a view of the the north-eastern side of Barrier Island, looking down at Wayward Mall, the bridge crossing to North Shore, and out into the dark Barrier Bight. Up in the sky, the other moon-colonies were visible shapes amidst the smattering of clouds, and glowing a bright green in the sky was the enormous gas giant Sargasso orbited around, partially framed in shadow.

Something about the views never got old, but tonight, these two hellraisers would have to do dirty deeds away from Traveller’s, and the police’s prying eyes. After dismounting his bike and hiding it amidst some undergrowth, Luca examined the cave before him, listening to the noises inside over the dripping of spring water. He could hear quiet sounds of movement from deep within, echoing off of the walls. “There’s something coming from down there, hard to tell how many,” he said, looking down into the hole, and seeing a dancing light near the bottom of a long shaft into the mountain.

Pulling up to their insertion point Breyja pulled off the ballistic glasses and tugged the goggles she had resting atop her head. She’d spent all of her money. All of it. On putting herself out with better gear. She was tired of being the butt-monkey-conga-line of bad news bears disasters. So she had new toys and in this instance, helpful ones. With the vehicles camouflaged and after a brief appreciative look skyward to mutter a prayer to whatever deity had seen fit to keep her alive this long she unslung her SMG and sidled up to the hole and hummed softly for Luca’s attention. A tilt of her head inwards and the sensors did their thing, full spectrum and she had to tune out the background noise she didn’t need before she got a good picture of what was lurking ahead.

She held up four fingers, then three on her left hand, and then hooked her thumb inside. Abbreviated hand gestures she hoped he understood. Seven bodies, different makeups, and she even made walky fingers to show they may have to deal with roving patrols inside before she gave him a grin and a thumbs up. Luca nodded back at her as he looked for something firm. Spotting a beam keeping the craggy cave ceiling up, he raised his right arm and a hook shot out of it, stabbing itself into the wood and fixing itself in place. A couple of tugs, and Luca hopped into the centre of the hole, hanging from a cable. He gave Breyja a nod. “You got a way down?”

Watching Luca anchor himself and then get ready to rappel down was amusing as she peered down the hole and took stock of the whole situation, “If this were anything but a hostage situation? I’d just run down the angle and hit the ground shooting. But, we’ve got a hostage to worry about so, stealthy it is.” She’d turn and slip over the ledge, SMG back on her leg since it would require both hands and feet for her to pull this off as she started her imitation of arachno-woman, “So how are we doing this?” She was doing her best to keep her questions short and low, since handsigns were moot and useless here.

“Slow and steady,” Luca replied, lowering himself down into the hole and gingerly stepping down the hole, little by little. For someone his size and carrying his sort of equipment, he remained quiet by keeping his pace slow, and keeping an eye on where his legs were. Breyja, however, was able to keep an eye on what was going on ahead as she clung onto the rocks, moving down at her own pace. The light the Maidenhand saw at the bottom initially became more defined, as well as the sounds of people moving about. A loud thump could be heard echoing through the cave, covering the sound of Luca slipping on a wet rock.

Continuing, the duo found themselves entering a larger cavern within the earth, large enough to harness the breeze flowing from above, the sounds of running water bounced off the dimly lit walls. A weird phosphorescent fungus was growing and glowing a sickly green all over the ceilings and walls. After Luca dangled down into the cavern and eased himself onto the cavern floor, he called his line back, the hook bounding down from above and back to his wrist. Another thump could be heard, followed by the scraping noises of wood, coming from further up in the cavern, towards a honeycomb of passages. Luca pointed in that direction for Breyja behind the safety of a stalagmite.

Breyja gave Luca a flat look, she had meant once they got into the cave itself. But she could easily roll with the situation, the sound of Luca slipping made her freeze until it was safe to move again as the sound had been covered by a loud and fortunate thump from below. Luca had the joy of lowering himself down, Breyja however waited for Luca to hit bottom, grabbed his line and abseiled face first to the ground, using the line to guide her and slow her before landing in a three point crouch. It wasn’t loud enough to be heard beyond the two of them and she made a noise when it became obvious other noises had covered their entrance.

She moved low and swift, finding cover and letting her sensors bloom now she was down in the cave. IR, passive sonar, binaural hearing, and a few other spectrums of sight and sound were available. The passive sonar gave her the most as the ambient noises of seven jagoffs down the tunnel gave enough noise for her to have the system give her a limited map of their surroundings, updated each time someone made noise. Fishing out her ballistic eyewear she held it up, pointed at Luca and threw it his way. That way she could feed him the same things she was seeing.

The honeycomb up front became her target as she nodded at Luca and moved cover to cover until she was just before them, letting her passive systems do their thing. They had plenty of options. This made her a happy little monster as an ear flicked back towards Luca and her tail flicked lazily behind her as she waited for him to catch up. He was willing to roll with wearing sunglasses indoors, since he’d done it plenty of times before. The larger soldier moved from cover to cover with his head down and his eyes ahead, looking at the blips on the radar ahead, superimposed by the glasses. He noticed two of the lugs grouped together, at what he presumed was the entrance.

After catching up and spying at what Breyja was looking at from her vantage, Luca lifted a grenade from his belt, and held it in Breyja’s direction - she recognised it as a police-grade concussive flashbang. He wiggled the black-striped cylinder with an impish smile, and nodded at her as he tapped himself on the ear. It was going to get loud. Which only made Breyja groan quietly as her ears flattened themselves to her skull, Text floated across the screen, I thought we were rescuing a hostage, not giving them advanced warning shit went ploinshaped on them.

She did however take a moment to fish out a set of ear filters and stuff them into her ears in preparation. She had expected gunfire, but not a flashbang so she hadn’t prepared accordingly it seemed as she let Luca know she was ready with a middle finger in his direction. He blew a kiss her way and moved into position, stashing the grenade back onto his belt and raising his carbine. He took a moment to reach into his jacket and pull a suppressor out, screwing it onto the threaded barrel. Staying low and by the walls, he lead ahead, looking at two men in black uniforms standing by a floodlight, cables snaking all over the floor, haphazardly covered by wet floor panellings. Some sort of operation was taking place here.

He recognised the logo and the general look of how the two rifle-carrying men held themselves. The appearance of tattoos, slouching, terrible sense of awareness, and barely-retouched wild hairstyles showed their penal recruiting pool as Gruppen Tanhauss’ cleanup and dirty work squad. They were Vogeljäeger Security. To Luca though, they were a colossal pain in the ass. They were only convicts with guns and drugged to the eyeballs on combat stims while their captains had combat-ready bionic augmentations. In short: Painful. These guys… He grimaced, taking aim at them. They’re like a bad smell nowadays.

Breyja materialized at Luca’s right elbow when he threaded the silencer on instead of opting for the grenade. That pleased her to no end as she gave his hip a gentle nudge and gently lowered his aim to one of the nearby cabled as she pointed at the two men. Shifting her SMG to her left hand she produced a faintly vibrating, the sonar picked up on it enough to give Luca that, Mono-edged combat knife the length of his own forearm before she canted her head with a grin. She’d point to the guy on the left and change the grip on the knife before she used it to slice the cable, plunging the area into darkness.

Between the sonar and the ballistic eyewear's light amp, Luca could easily see her as she started snaking up the walkway towards the man she’d pointed at, These guys are about to be dead guys, get the guy on the right would you, Dear. Only a moment later did two shots ring out in the cavern - aimed at the right goon’s centre of mass. Breyja’s target on the left suddenly snapped to attention as his friend crumpled, raising his rifle in the direction of the incoming fire and cursing, but unable to confirm where it came from. As Breyja lined up a shot, he was groping for his radio.

And that had been what Breyja had been waiting for, when the goon reached for his radio, she leapt. All of her enhanced musculature and training carried her into the man’s upper body, at some point and time she’d holstered her SMG in the charge so she could grab the goons weapon and prevent death spasms from triggering any shots as her sword-like combat knife slid into his mouth and up into his brain. She looked like a rodeo girl as she went down with the man and turned to her side to see if she now had a second date in the man Luca had just shot.

Examining the wounds from the other sentry, Luca had a pair of clear shots under their arm, without the front plate of their rig vest to protect them. Breyja was reasonably certain he wasn’t going to get up with two bullets in the heart. Approaching from the dark, Luca moved in, looking down the passage the sentries were guarding. “Shanks a million,” he quipped, stepping over Breyja’s target and looking at the map ahead.

The passage ahead continued for a few metres, then made a right turn a couple of metres into a square room with many boxy shapes, like a storage room of sorts. Moving onward, Luca approached the corner, sticking to the wall and getting in position, signalling Breyja over as he peered over a packaging crate for edible gourmet slime. He recognised the branding on the box: “Hildebrandt Farms, I wonder what you’re up to…” He mumbled, spotting a few more ahead, and recognising the acrid, mossy, smell of slime spawning cultures - It was all over Gerald’s property. “Smell that?” He asked.

Retrieving her knife from the man's skull and using his vest to clean the blade before sliding it into its sheath Breyja suppressed a whistle as she slowly frisked her target for anything important, datapad, money, you know, the usual. Sentries might not have much info but they did tend to carry something most times. Stupid ones were usually known to carry radio freqs and passwords written down so they could remember it.

As she was asked if she could smell something she gave Luca a grunt as she stepped up beside him with her ill gotten gains, “I’m trying not to, honestly. I recognize nothing here other than I know it’s probably an illegal slime factory? Counterfeit slime… is that a thing?”

“Not quite counterfeit. More forcefully appropriated from local produce and repackaged without royalties,” Luca explained a bit of what he’d uncovered so far on his end to Breyja, “by an aggressive foreign corporate entity that wants to buy Sargasso up for cheap by running everyone outta business through subsidiaries, and causing other acts of mayhem to get ahead.” He sighed wistfully, smiling. “They’ve given me a purpose in life again~”

The amount of information contained in that comment was startling. And amazing in it’s simplicity, “Right. So, they’ve given you a reason to be. That’s dandy. They’re going to be giving me a steady paycheck from the looks of it if I’m hunting them while I’m here.” She checked her sensors, “Roving patrols down that corridor. I would assume our targets likely tied up and stuck in a room with some goon.” She didn’t bother hiding her annoyance at that as she looked around, “Are we leaving behind any survivors?”

“If they got the V, they gotta go,” Luca said, referring to the corporate hit group’s logo. “Our package needs to stay in one piece though.” Hearing footsteps approaching from a patrol, he shut up, guessing the guards were coming to investigate the power outage at the front area. Staying in position, Luca watched four sets of flashlights aiming around the corridor, watching and scanning before two of the soldiers at the front begun to move ahead, into Luca and Breyja’s lines of fire.

There was a soft noise of annoyance, “Right.” The knife went back in it’s sheath and there was the soft creak of her grabbing her SMG, “Try not to shoot me in the back?” she’d slide out around the first crate, and carefully make a roadie run to another grouping of crates, staying just ahead of the sweeping beams of light. She paused for a second and glanced upwards and smiled, then leapt right up and held herself firmly to the wall by snagging the corner of the support beam and wedging herself into the space behind it as best she could. It put her up out of a normal person's line of sight as she braced the SMG to her shoulder and watched the dancing crosshairs in her vision. A soft azure light blinked twice in the corner of Luca’s vision when she stopped moving.

She was quietly waiting, almost to the point of not breathing as she waited for the two goons to walk by her, hoping that they didn’t have any augmented vision as she was reasonably sure she’d avoided their lines of sight and being spotted with her little stunt of scaling the beam to get above them.

The two Vogeltruppen walking by had a distinctly oily smell following them, despite their layers of equipment, and perhaps a full body scrub and sandblasting prior to suiting up. They were also wearing some manner of face-concealing gizmo, perhaps gracing them with a combat assistance suite to make up for their lack of tactical acumen and awareness.

“You’d think a town like this pays more,” one of the mercs mumbled to his friend, beam of light looking around and casting shadows in Breyja’s direction.

The other, who was closer to Luca’s concealed position replied: “I was told there’d be tinian belly dancers,” he seemed genuinely disappointed. “I can’t even get into any of the good clubs around here.” The vulgar chatter was casting doubt on the combat suite theory.

Luca raised his eyebrows as the merc closer to Breyja pointed out why his friend was banned from everywhere on Butterfly Lane: “That’s cause you can’t keep your mitts to yourself and you have difficulty understanding what 'no' means, dickhead.”

The horndog scoffed. “Not my fault they got big scaly norks that are begging to be grabbed.” The masks the goon and his friend were wearing did wonders to dehumanise them - not that they were really worth keeping around in the first place.

Nothing in their AI’s programming was telling them to shut the hell up while investigating suspicious activity in an area with poor visibility, and with two of their own suddenly going quiet and not responding to radio calls. Luca was less than pleased at the commentary, and quietly wondering which sewage pipe Tanhauss consulted for their hit squads.

It took effort for her not to drop from her hiding spot and begin spraying rounds. She was a Maidenhand, and she was a professional. That was what she was using to keep herself in check. And she even had a epiphany, Two more down the corridor. 10 seconds to decide - You hit these two, I sprint down the corridor and hit the other two? whatever she had planned it must have been quiet devious. After this she wanted a nice hot shower to clean off the filth she felt in she was bathing in down here now.

Luca, however, was a Greaseheart, and was under no obligation at all to act professionally. He acted immediately, popping up with his carbine, yelling “Surprise, dickheads!” and opening fire at the two designated targets shortly after Breyja proposed the question. A barrage of automatic fire ripped through the two targets - the sounds of the gun’s action cycling rapidly and shell casings clattering combined with the cave’s echo-friendly acoustics made the suppressor on the end of his gun seem a bit farcical.

With the trap laid and the bait set, Luca ducked down as suddenly as he got up. Unsuppressed return fire started roaring back through the corridor, blinding flashes lighting the gloom. Bullets struck the walls; plumes of shattered rock and dust spraying above Luca, while the crate he was behind was thankfully sturdy enough to withstand fire - or whatever was inside of it was heavy.

Breyja could see the two remaining guys using tactics, unexpectedly. “Flank him!” A throaty voice called out, with one man splitting off carrying a shotgun and moving around, while the other, armed with a submachine gun, was keeping pressure on Luca’s position with bursts of fire and strong language. “You motherfucker!”

Or so they thought. A clunk was heard near the floor, and in a gap between pieces of cover a red blur whizzed past. Looking at the radar, Breyja saw Luca hook himself from one place to another, and pulled himself along the ground, powersliding - and the flanker hadn’t noticed during a darkened break in the covering fire.

That poor flanker, unawares of Luca’s change in position nor Breyja’s tactical use of Luca as a target slid down the wall then kicked off it in order to place a booted foot upside the flankers head, followed by the opposite legs kneecap forcefully introducing itself to the man’s temple, her SMG’s muffled coughs made Luca’s carbine sound like a tank was in the tunnel in comparison as a subsonic mix of AP and Antipersonnel WadCutter rounds found the other man and gutted him like a fish. The man between her legs was finished off with a twist of her hips and a rewarding snap of his neck, “Clear.”

Luca and Breyja could hear more footsteps coming, and the radar program used between them was picking up more possible targets. The number had grown from two remaining targets from the initial sweep, to ten. Something had spooked them, and Luca was quick to get out of the corridor and into the open, with the concussion grenade in his hands. “They seem angry,” he pointed out, matter of factly as he scanned the room.

The room built inside of this cavern reeked of the distinct slime smells. In one corner large glass tanks stood, swirling with a series of slowly rotating blending sticks. Labels on the tanks and return addresses indicated they were from Gerald’s farm. Near the tank’s faucet, cartridges and canisters used to store the foodstuff for production were spilling out and laying on the floor, all labelled with Hildebrandt Farms’ logo.

However, the product hadn’t come from Hildebrandt at all. Luca whistled, snapping pictures. “Elena’s not gonna like this,” he pointed out as he kept an eye on the two exits on the other side of the room: Doors clamped shut due to the security breach. Looking up at the ceiling, he saw beams and structural supports, and grappled his way up and towards the corner, with the conc grenade in his hands. Bolts could be heard retracting from the doors, and so were the sounds of Vogeltruppen itching for a fight and/or vengeance for their prison buds.

Once again, Breyja spent a few moments to combat loot the bodies she’d taken down, and was in the process of piling them over in a corner as Luca took stock of the situation. The lockdown didn’t worry her too much as they’d have to eventually open a door. The fact that so much of the stuff was being counterfeited however made her whistle, “That's a lot of purloined goo.”

Which gave her an idea actually as she scooped up a canister, took a grenade off a nearby corpse and emptied the powder into the canister, then repeated the process twice more and grinned defiantly from the centre of the room as Luca ascended upwards she held her ground and popped the pin before sending the improvised explosive rolling across the floor to rest harmlessly next to the door. She was holding the detonator in her other hand as she gave a surprised shout when in full view and dove back towards the entrance.

She was less worried about getting shot and more hoping they took the bait and enough of them stepped out for her to catch a big chunk of them in the midst so Luca could drop his own brand of hell into the mix. When the doors opened, Breyja's attention getting scheme drew five Vogeltruppen into the room. The two leading the charge were dressed in heavier combat armour with a strength-assistance frame built around them. Though it was entirely possible the armour was worth more than their contributions to society combined.

The heavies didn’t even notice the canister, and the guys behind them certainly did when Breyja’s thumb depressed the detonator sending shards of canister and slime everywhere. Anything was a bomb if you provided it enough explosive force, in this case she’d added enough to ensure that the door wouldn’t be shutting, and hopefully thinned some of the group out as her SMG came up over a crate and began laying down shots in two's and three’s in the general direction of the oncoming heavies.

Some of the splatter managed to reach the ceiling, making Luca cover his eyes as the stuff was sprayed around and at the Vogeltruppen who were hanging back. They were knocked to the ground and out of the fight from the blast, but the two in heavier armour stayed upright, mildly annoyed at the sudden explosion. They realised their intruders had laid a trap, and started returning fire with assault rifles when Breyja fired at them, moving faster than their friends did. One of the heavies tossed a fragmentation grenade through the air - leaving a distinct red trail as the fuse indicator lit up. It was poised to land behind Breyja, forcing her into the open.

Luca intervened as the pin for his concussion grenade fell onto the floor, seeing that she needed some breathing room. Soon, the cylinder found its way between the two heavy troopers, and exploded in a loud bang - echoing all over the walls and floor, and blinding the two heavies first, and possibly Breyja second.

Breyja had thankfully kept her earplugs in as the room suddenly got a lot louder between the explosion, the chatter of assault rifles and, yep. That was a grenade being flung at her. Followed by the sound of Luca’s own grenade going off and her vision darkened sharply for a few seconds and her ears pinned back, even with the plugs in the explosion was sharp. She wasted zero time mantling the crate and hitting the ground rolling as the shockwave of the frag sent shards everywhere and a blastwave of debris from crates filled the air. Something impacted the back of her calf and steadily stung as she stood up and emptied her entire clip into the nearest of the two men at near point blank range.

Their tough armour was able to deflect the odd round fired, but a stream of bullets at close range ripped holes in their composite plates. Ringing and visors overloaded chaff and static gave them no way to avoid the incoming fire, and they both fell down with a crunch. A few moments later, Luca could be heard rappelling down from his ceiling perch, inspecting the carnage. Four men behind him were floored from the improvised gel explosive, littered with holes and shards. The two guys closest had their legs shredded while those behind them caught the blast with their mid-sections.

The green stains on the ground were joined by growing patches of red soon enough. The trails and flicks blended in just right with the jacket Luca was wearing as he looked ahead, hand over his nose. "What an amazing smell I've discovered…" he grumbled, stepping ahead through the right of the two doors, into a passageway running left, while to the right there was a stony wall and scaffolds. Looking ahead on the map, he pointed ahead to a small room connected to a larger room at the end of the hallway with three figures, one prone. In the larger room however, the remaining fighting force was moving about frantically before settling into a semicircle around the only way in. "They know something's coming."

At the end of the hallway and to the left, there was a door to another room with nobody in it. What was notable about it was the thin looking artificial wall between it and the assembly hall.

Breyja slipped the spent mag into a pouch on her lower back and glanced at the wreckage of the body that had been below her before she crouched and inspected the chunk of metal sticking out the back of her calf, it’d hit her above the boot where the bodysuit she was wearing had indented enough for the chunk to hit and penetrate. Fishing out some foam she took a breath, pulled the chunk of metal from her calf with a low growl and sealed the wound before glancing Luca’s way. “I wouldn’t bottle it and sell it though, unless you think the military could use some of it? ‘Ode de jerkass’ has a nice ring to it?”

She had a grin on her face as she looked at the display and whistled quietly, popped a round into the head of the heavy. “Never leave loose ends, and always have a plan to kill everyone you encounter.” As she eyeballed the display she reached back and unlimbered her railgun, and motioned to the artificial wall, “How many do you think I can hit with one shot?” Her smile was anything but friendly. They’d tried killing her. Didn’t matter that she and Luca had given them all unsolicited tickets to the hereafter forcibly, “the trick … will be getting in there without getting caught. You pack anymore of those lovely concussion grenades?"

"Sorry love, all out," Luca replied, swapping the magazines in his carbine. "I get my ammo resupplies irregularly, or on-site most of the time." In a way of speaking, he was disguising the fact that he'd appropriated most of what he was using from things he'd defeated or routed.

"If I’m quick and we time it right, I can sprint into the room when the grenade goes off. I can worry about muscle damage from sprinting later.” She’d fish about herself and look around, eyeing the heavies before crouching down and relieving them of the few frags they had and offering them to Luca, “Whelp. Onsite requisitions, no better time to find out how suicidal they really are, neh?”

"They won't expect us to be the suicidal ones." He replied. "They're probably thinking we're going to come up with a clever counterattack."

As they were approaching the door, they could hear someone yelling angrily in a Teutonic accent. "We have two bogeys, they're hot shit, let's make them dead shit. Mages, fireballs at the ready!" Luca could be heard grumbling.

Breyja’s smile couldn’t have been more angelic, “Oh, I like you. After this, how about a few beers on the client's dime, huh?” as they got closer to the doorway she heard something that made her pull up short when she heard ‘mages’ and ‘fireballs’, and cast a glance at Luca, “How about I just shoot through the door and save us the trouble now?”

That seemed reasonable to him. "Sure."

She nodded as she dropped the visor down over her eyes, and lined up a shot on the loudest one in the room. “You would think that they’d have learned to not talk so loud.” She of course, was whispering. Mostly. The other half was through text onto Luca’s visor. A soft whine preceded the charge up for her shot before she fired, the recoil was prodigious as she used it to spin out of harm's way should they have decided to fireball the door in retaliation instead of stare at their boss's head suddenly becoming a fine mist. And the hole in the chest of the guy behind him.

When the first shot rung out, Luca wasn't prepared for how loud accelerating a flechette into terminal speeds - the sound could be heard from the entrances to Devil's Depths. The hole in the door the team were looking at was around the size of a fist, but the exit penetration looked much more jagged and spalled.

Shortly after the railgun fired, bullets begun ripping at the door, followed by two large, fiery explosions blasting it off its hinges and sending the ruined metal sheets bouncing onto the floor. The Vogeltruppen were charging in - and Luca realised that the corridor he and Breyja were standing in didn't have much in the way of cover. All he could do was hug the wall near a support, and blindly fire back.

The first rule of combat, for her, was if there was no cover. Lay down. As the door came off it’s hinges, Breyja had to respect the amount of return fire being hurled their way. Sadly for the mages, she now had a nice view as the rifle spoke once more and smote everything in it’s path. Sadly she wasn’t looking to die today as she rolled to the side putting herself between Luca’s legs, or around them, as her SMG added to the confusion. For Luca something was vibrating about boot level. [Careful, that low level vibration's my SMG. Don’t want you walking into it.]

He realised he couldn't stay where he was with him and Breyja occupying the same space - if another fireball came through, or a grenade - they'd both be finished. Luca jumped from his position with his right arm extended, firing a line at the ceiling ahead and launching himself forward with a start, reeling himself up and over before landing in the thick of the approaching Vogeltruppen. In such close quarters, the rifles they were using would work against them as Luca started engaging in … fisticuffs. Breyja saw him punch a trooper in the helmet, and deflect another trying to strike him with the butt of their rifle.

After knocking one guy to the floor with a push/pull judo throw, he was able to close the gap with the surviving mage. Breyja saw the device wrapped around his right arm start glowing, and he sent a fiery-looking punch into the mage's gut. The armoured magician went flying back into the room they came from with the sound of at least three ribs breaking from the impact of the punch, while two Vogeltruppen remained.

As Luca went flying, bullets whizzed past him as Breyja started adjusting her aim to compensate and keep heads down. A short lull later and she was up and moving as well, kicking off the wall and in a few instances running along it to change her vectors as she fired into the melee, each guy Luca hit, was followed up by a trio of rounds as soon as they were clear. The poor mage Luca sent flying picked up a hitchhiker as she fastballed a grenade into his chest watched it bounce upwards and then burst in his face. She obviously had little love for mages. That left two combatants as she turned her bullet hose in their direction and the chatter of her SMG resumed.

There was a flash of steel as one of the remaining soldiers drew a knife, and tried to thrust into Luca's chest. The blade was intercepted, and the force of the thrust was redirected around Luca by stepping on his foot and pulling him with it - and into the Vogeltruppen's remaining partner. A couple of moments later, they both found themselves riddled with bullets, to add insult to injury. "Only two potential hostiles left, and possibly our package," Luca stated, moving into the room ahead. Breyja spotted that he'd been hit a couple of times by enemy rifle fire - his jacket sporting a couple of redder looking spots than usual. "Got any Spray on you?" he asked, clutching his side - such was the price for being a daredevil.

Breyja gave an appreciative whistle at the carnage they had wrought. Some of her Maidenhand sisters would have chided her for the sloppy work. But then again, she was also working with a new, and as far as she could say, just as reckless companion, “Yup, client didn’t tell you I’m a medic, did she?” She fished out the biofoam and chuckled. “I’ll get the rounds out when we get back to your safehouse, the foam will keep the holes clean and numb. Kidna like scabbing. New-gen stuff. Why it’s just now hitting the markets is beyond me. But hey.” She was working on Luca as they walked because patching people up on the go was better than them stopping to recoup when the remaining two hostiles - sorry, potential hostiles - could cap their package.

It must've been a generic derivative or a similar product - the Cluster had enough medical companies dotted around it, say nothing of Tanhauss in Traveller. "Nah I used to get similar treatment in the UDD - but who would leave something so useful laying around for the average civvy?"

“I’m not an average civ, I buy my stuff straight from ‘The Market’ if you catch my drift. My original posse was a Merc unit. BlackStar, low key group, gunrunning, topple-a-government-for-hire types. When I came of age, kicked me out and told me to find a real home. So, I’ve been in and out of house militaries my whole life. Learned the markets. And where to buy the good stuff.” She shook the can and pocketed it, “Shits expensive, yo. Adding it to your bill.” She hefted her rifle, grinning, “And claiming my share of the loot off the bodies. So. Shall we go say hello to the remaining dregs and collect our paycheck?”

Something about Breyja's past as explained by her made Luca evaluate just how many paramilitary units he'd seen during his EAD days. "He's not a paycheck, he's a person with motivations, hopes, and dreams." He clarified as he rolled his shoulders and approached the last door, cracking his knuckles. "However, he also makes kickass action movies, so I have a vested interest in keeping him alive for that reason." He added, chuckling. "I bet these Vogel goons haven't heard of Return of Kaiju Terror."

Breyja gave Luca a grin. “No, he’s the target, Saving him collects our paycheck. I’m not some money thirsty merc.” She lifted an eyebrow at him slightly as she brought her rifle up to her shoulder and eyeballed the charge. “I swear, every one of you greasers is the same … cheesy action flicks and fondling your tools.” Then again, the same could be said of Maidenhands and their ability to be a one person catastrophe when sufficiently provoked, or a whole family of trouble.

Without another word, Luca evaluated his options, putting away his carbine given the small dimensions of the room ahead, and drawing his pistol instead. He executed a breach and clear drill with what he had available: His boot, an energy pistol, a desire to get things over with quickly, and a rough idea of where the two targets were. Crashing through the door and firing at his two targets swiftly, he didn't bat an eyelid as he took another pair of lives. The flashes of light from the business end of his pistol were so familiar, as was the body count. Exact number unknown.

Looking down, he saw someone dressed in a bright yellow jumpsuit with his arms tied behind his back, and blindfolded. The man appeared to be in his forties, with a few wrinkles around his face. He looked starved, appeared to delirious, but above all else: scared. There were loud noises a moment ago, and they all stopped after two people fell down after a pair of loud zaps. Footsteps rumbled closer to him, prisoner's blind gaze waving around the room before hands grasped him, and turned him over onto his belly.

Luca drew a knife from his boot, looking at the duct tape bindings and slicing them away, pulling the prisoner's hands out of the sticky tape and pulling the sleeves up to give his wrists some air - friction sores, moisture, and chafing from the jumpsuit were in full view. "Wh… you're not one of them…" the prisoner moaned, unsure of whoever was rescuing them.

"Naaah, we're the pizza guys, relax!" Luca said, clearly having a laugh at the situation , and Breyja was watching his back. "I had a quintuple order of large pepperoni, garlic bread, and killing to deliver, right Breyja?"

While Luca breached and cleared, Breyja was taking the time to ensure there weren’t any other surprises. Mages cloaked up, boobytraps of unknown origins and the like. She was also combat stripping everybody in the room as she went and loading the loot into a pair of what looked to duffel bags, “Yeah, there was so much he had to bring me along to carry the extra!”

"O-oh… did either of you save a slice for me?" The prisoner responded. He was still blind, but the hope of rescue had put some fire in his belly. The prospect of eating proper food overrode clear thought.

Taken aback by the question being posed, Luca looked at Breyja and whispered a question to her. "Wanna get some on the way back?"

She’d returned to the room by the time Luca was asking if she wanted pizza. The look on her face was priceless as she covered her mouth and the professional slipped off for a moment to reveal a ‘yer fuckin’ with me right?’ look. Slinging the bags she’d give him a thumbs up, [Really? Couldn’t wait til we dropped him off to ask me on a date?] Luca shook his head and pointed at the captive.

"They probably haven't had a decent feed in weeks," He outlined, looking behind him, trying to gaze through the walls at all the slime storage equipment he passed by earlier, "he's probably been eating nothing but slime!" His face wrinkled up as he considered the idea - poor bastard.

The thought of eating nothing but slime made Breyja gag as she looked at the equipment. If it was valuable and not nailed down, she’d snagged pretty much everything on the poor sods they’d smashed through, “Good point, Pizza sounds great, He’s riding with you. Got my hands full with all this stuff.” She jiggled the duffels and the clatter of equipment underscored her reasons. Her bike wasn’t particularly big. “I place police response sometime in a few hours when locals get curious about all the noise.”

"Right then, c'mon Gerald," Luca hauled the captive film director over his shoulders, letting his gun hang by his side, "Elena's worried sick about you." Even so, he kept a hand on his pistol in case there were any other unwelcome guests in the complex. His caution proved to be unnecessary as he and Breyja sauntered towards the entrance to the bunker, then back into the natural cavern system. On the way out, Luca passed his pair of specs back to Breyja. "Won't be needing these."

Breyja glanced at the guy, and managed to suppress a grin as they went along. This was priceless. [How long do you think it’ll be before he’s gushing about -his- daring escape?]

Luca looked up at hole he initially clambered into Devil's Depths from. With Gerald in his arms and a distance to climb on damp limestone, Luca fired his grappling hook at the pipe at the very top, and slowly started rappelling up the wall with his charge. "Daringly escaping to a pizza place sounds like old times." His boots crunched against the wall with a sound Breyja hadn't heard previously, each footstep breaking into the rock to give him a grip. What other technological wizardry bristled on Luca's time-tested equipment?

Breyja for her part was now laden down with two bags of loot, and took her time in following up the wall using Luca’s footprints as handholds. “I know a few mercs who would categorize this little trip as a cake walk and demand a chance to do it all over, with gusto and pizza, myself included. I’m all for Pizza. Hopefully non-slime based?”


Barrier Island, Wayward Mall, 24-Hour Pizza
In the civilised world, one of the metrics people use to measure their quality of life is the accessibility of services. This can include public utilities and private services like electricity, water, connectivity, food, and income one way or the other. Above all else though is pizza accessibility at any and all hours. Thankfully, the 24-Hour Pizza was doing exactly as advertised, selling and delivering pizza at all hours - not necessarily good pizza, but pizza. Its base of operations was sandwiched between a pair of risque shops turning tricks in Wayward Mall.

Joining Luca, Breyja, and Gerald was their client Elena, who Luca had arranged to meet on the way back with a phone call. The Sourcian actress was wearing a pressure suit which covered about ninety eight percent of their tall, lanky, definitely-not-human-shaped body. Only their face and a short bowl of hair was visible. She had one of her long arms around Gerald, holding him by his delirious shorthairs. "Oh, you two performed admirably~" She cooed, leaning in closer to Gerald and giving him a peck on the cheek, causing him to jump a little and mutter. "I'm so glad he's safe."

"Thanks for coming in on such short notice." Luca said, holding a slice of margherita pizza, and trying to disregard the two 'handmaids' standing outside the booth. They happened to be armed heavily to protect the celebrity Sourcian … from something. "Do your two henches want Pizza too?" He asked, pointing the pizza towards one. They did not bat an eyelid, and Luca despondently took a bite out of it himself.

Breyja had opted to keep her SMG and her massive combat knife on hand in the booth under the pretenses of someone had to remain armed, she had shucker her armor and was currently rocked back with the skinsuit unzipped to her navel and her sports bra, which looked to also be made of the same bullet stopping material as her bodysuit, on display. She was currently munching on some unholy concoction of BBQ, sausage, extra cheese, and what looked like pineapples and bacon.

As Luca got despondent she finally perked up and laughed, “We’re glad to have brought him back safely. Pardon our lack of professionalism right now, but we had to...unexpectedly wade through some unpleasantness beyond the scope of the job in order to return him.” It was a very soft, very subtle hint that the woman may not have been truthful with them and Breyja wasn’t happy, but she respected the woman enough to be polite about it.

She tossed an arm around Luca’s shoulders, grinning. “And Luca, if you’re so starved for female companionship… That you have to try warming up the woman's bodyguards. Might I suggest the stores next door?”

"Unless they want to kick my ass and I don't have to pay them, I'm not interested," he replied, taking a bite of his pizza and munching away happily. One of the henches turned around and gave Luca a stink eye, to which he replied by wiggling his eyebrows at them.

The large Sourcian chuckled, tightening her grip around Gerald, who was reaching over and getting a slice of margherita for himself. Elena didn't seem to mind. "Such are the risks of the job, and you two seem to be very good at managing them." She intoned, sensing the Maidenhand's discontent. "As for payment, I shall deposit the funds into your respective accounts tomorrow, after I do some…" She squeezed Gerald with a lurid grin, making the man squeak. "…catching up."

The pint sized terror on legs just grinned openly as the guard gave Luca the stank eye. She was trying to not laugh, truly but in the end she’d glance towards Luca and snicker softly. However the other woman's words… She cleared her throat as she switched back to business mode, “You may have paid for my services independently from his, but I don’t work on ‘I’ll pay you later’ money. You can easily wire the money to us, securely, and without trace right where we are sitting.” She had a rule, and the rule tended to be ‘I get paid on delivery, not when you feel like it’.

"The joys of hiring contractors with different sets of rules…" Luca pointed out, taking a sip of cola. "Hell, I don't care if you pay me two days later - I like getting opportunities to fight."

Elena pointed a slender finger at the Maidenhand meanwhile. "I am a flexible person-" she could have been literal, but wasn't "-so I shall pay the Sarn seven hundred and fifty thousand UC, as agreed upon." Her long digit wobbled towards Luca. "And I shall owe you a favour." Luca seemed completely fine with this arrangement, continuing to skoll his drink. As for Yttrium, she would find a three hundred thousand UC windfall in her accounts.

Breyja grinned as she conjured up the unspoken innuendo on her own. That poor bastard was in for a long night, She wasn’t going to make waves about the amount because she actually had not specified a number, and had instead accepted the woman’s words at face value when she said she’d pay. Nodding slightly, “I thank you, quite a lot. And if I came across as… Impolite, I apologize. I or We, may have in a fashion misunderstood one another's terms." Elena nodded to Breyja. "Though I do, and I mean this, welcome any other jobs you may have for me. Especially if they’re with sir works for favors over here.” She’d glance at Luca and lean in, arm still around him, “Wait, so … you’re -not- getting paid? How’s that work out?”

He finished his cola and gave Breyja a tired look. "Do you know how powerful a favour can be?" Luca asked, crushing the can - sparks bouncing from his palm. "Favours got me my warehouse, my ammo supply, and out of a bind or two." Plus, he got paid every fortnight from the UDD's veterans services, and a little extra for his EAD work.

Breyja checked her account mentally, saw all was good and then glanced at Luca, “Huh. You know what? As confusing as that may be to a professional merc… That makes a lot of sense.” She rubbed her chin, “You looking to hire?”

"I'll keep in touch."

>FIN!