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A Shadowrunner's Tale.

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SnowDragon

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« on: <11-10-14/0759:03> »
Bit of a something I wrote a while ago that I've cleaned up that involves a handful of my longest running (And some of my best) characters I've created. It's one of my shorter works at a little under 3 A4s but it hit the spot. I'm likely to do more with them because they're fun to work with!

Anyway, enjoy!

~~SD

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Seattle, UCAS. The year, 2072. Sunlight had only just begun to shine down on the city and Sound it was connected to, after a week's worth of heavy rain. The streets were still wet, and the creatures who lived there still carried umbrellas incase it came back. Many things had changed in the world today from what most remembered as the turn of the 21 century was closer than the turn of the 22nd. She knew of none of them, the world itself a blur to her mind, a blur of uncomphrendable slights, insults and carefully measure words and stealth she simply failed to understand. When one did not have the upbringing. Or the education. One mnerely had to focus on what one understood and ignore the rest.

Lights shining brightly before fading, replaced by new ones, highlighted by the purple twilight in the sky as the sun rose from behind the horizon and the metroplex, the massive skyscrapers piercing the air where they did not belong. The sound, a constant stream of explosions thousands of times per second, protected by glass and metal structure. The velocity she could only detect by vision rather than physical feeling. Hands, not wings upon the wheel ahead of her as she directed the vehicle, one of the few things she understood within this human world. The glasses across her eyes provided her with the augmented reality display, speed, heading and if she so required, GPS directions to a location. But all that was from her car. Top left, four visual displays from eyes that were not her own, labelled by name. Cameras build into their glasses that gave a visual feed to their teammates, so each could see what the other saw.

"Contact in five-zero," in her left ear, the voice male, but it meant little to her own thoughts as she remembered, past, present and tried to predict the future of events she would shape yet to come. Of actions done, about to be done and not yet even thought of. "Icepick, checking in. Transport ready."

"Spots, communications jammer online."

"Titanium here, crew chief in position and ready for cargo."

"Sparky here, locked and loaded." The silence that prevailed afterwards prompted another word. "Feather?" She blinked, that had been directed at her. She *thought*, still a physical act, unlike the rest of them to key in her microphone, the glasses touched to the sides of her head picking up the mental action and connecting transmitter to microphone.

"Feather, target in sight," she spoke quickly, voice higher in pitch than a body of her stature would have guessed. Leathery crackling in the air as hands gripped the steering wheel just that little bit tighter, looking right ahead, through and at the augmented display through her glasses, the object of their attentions marked with red. Beside her, her passenger, with a two handed firearm rested in her lap, single hole balaclava over her face, revealing just her glittery liquid blue eyes. Unlike the driver, she seemed remarkably calm and well controled for the situation.

"Focus, Feather," she started, that voice stern, but not harsh, as if teaching a promising student who's mistakes had lead them to self-doubt, "breathe and remember task. Follow the steps and nothing else." Feather nodded, letting out a breath she didn't know she had been holding. Breaking into buildings and stealing things to sell to the highest bidder was one thing, and granted, it had kept her well fed and warm, but this was another thing entirely. This group had saved her life indeed, and she had skills that could certainly help them, but this was new.

The white panel van that was next to them on the left hit it's far side indicators and merged one lane over, passing a large yellow school bus filled with uniformed children. Public school, not rich private school kids. Why she made that distinction it was not immediately clear, but she pushed the thought from her head like she had been taught and told. It didn't matter now. The truck was close, and there weren't any other vehicles between the low-to-the-road high end sports car and the target, only slightly wet tarmac and wind resistance. She dropped the hammer and the vehicle roared, a sound all too loud for her ears but it brought a grin to her face nevertheless when inertia took offence and pushed both passengers back into their leather seats as the blood red Westwind leapt forth. A metal clicking next to her, the camera in Sparky's glasses showing her it's origin as the woman yanked back on the gun's charge handle, preping it for action.

The wingman vehicle didn't have the acceleration nor the speed to follow the angular racing bred vehicle, but fell in behind the truck itself and in front of the bus they had just raced pass. A window rolled down, wind rushing in as Sparky readied that gun of hers as Feather pushed the Westwind right in front of the truck with ten metres to spare, the engine winding down as she held that distance.unhitched her seatbelt and the car let out a constant warning beep as a safety measure. Pressing herself upwards until she had upon the windowledge and opened fire. Shell casings in golden brass littered the road as Sparky went rock and roll, and in the rear vision mirror, one could see the bullet holes filling the truck's front, the glass cracking all over, driver more or less flinching as he was struck several times. Quicker than it had started, she was out, the barrel smoking from heat as the truck rolled on, out of control. Praying the reinforcements held, Feather jumped on the brakes, the velocity metre dropping rapidly until they were smacked right up the rear by the box truck itself. Metal crunched and screeched, but the vehicle didn't kick out of control, it all holding together somehow. All four tires locked up as the Westwind struggled to bring the pair to a stop, ignited rubber scent and thick grey smoke flooding the air.

Before it had even come to a halt there was more gunfire, the occupants of the van in the rear spraying down the back hatch of the box to kill any guards within, thick heavy bolts of gunfire from a light machine gun, yellowy orange sparks spitting out across the road, even as the school bus skidded to a halt behind the entire action. Cameras in her glasses all showing bright yellow muzzleflashes of unsuppressed weapons, supersonic cracks ripping through the air and echoing into the far distance. Pushing open the door to her left and yanking the Hammerli 620s from the paperwork slit low on the inner door, clicking the safety off with a thumb, Feather clambered out of the car, stalking towards the side of the truck. The second she left the car, it's augmented display faded from her eyes, purely showing the camera views of her comrades, the vehicle's display being replaced with the smartgun system of the Hammerli, an orange spinning crosshair whirling towards where her rounds would land if she fired. Not two steps in, the side panel of the vehicle popped out and a man in white uniform, black armoured vest leapt out, Uzi in hand. No longer thinking, just acting, a motion to the left alligned her sidearm and she yanked on the trigger twice, a pair of rattling metalic booms ripping through the air as she struggled to control the recoil of the heavy rounds. First round striking true, but the second whizzed off into the air, never to be seen again, the guard knocked flat on his arse from the impact straight to his vest. Still moving, Feather fired twice more, putting a round through his thigh and the pavement beside him, hands shaking out of worry by the time she was standing over him, pumping the last two into his shoulder and head, the bolt locking back with a solid metalic sound. She had practiced this, so many times, but it had not become part of her yet. Button press, ammunition holder falls out. Reach into pocket, get a fresh one. Flip it over, put it into handle. Flick switch, middle of gun. Ready.

And after it was all done, she moved up to check the inside of the truck, seeing Icepick, that heavy set troll, eight feet tall and as wide as a dinner table's shortest side hefting a crate, what they were actually here for, that wooden shipping box what they had been paid to take. With it all clear, she turned and ran back to the blood red racing bred, keeping her gun at the ready. The radio crackled to life. "Titanium here, Cargo secured." Soft thumping against soft leather as Sparky slipped back into the car proper as the Van's huge engine roared as it powered to life with it's cargo onboard, tearing pass the pair and off the next off-ramp. Slamming the door behind her, Feather followed suit, and with a screech of tires against tarmac, floored it, tires squealling

SnowDragon

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« Reply #1 on: <11-13-14/1216:28> »
Seattle, UCAS. 2072. A wide black couch with padding made out material too devine to be something real sprawled out to her left and right, fingers fiddling with a fold of fabric she had liberated from one of her pockets. The room, almost as expansive and wide and tall as the furniture she sat upon gave her some peace of mind, a wide open space that wasn't closing in around her from all directions at once. A television built into the wall showing a slowly spinning view of the top five floors of an elborately constructed building that from the outside, appeared to be almost entirely constructed of glass. The table, coffee table midway between the large screen display and the couch too good to be true where rolls of blueprints, weighed down with an assortment of empty handguns, magazines and paperweights, papers spread across the table which dealed intelligence upon individuals, companies, timetables, emails. The cream white room had been darkened only a few minutes before to make the display and the apparant glow of the various commlinks and other such electronic devices out here more stand-outish.

Feather turned her head, surveying the room. Titanium stood on the left of the television, in a grey uniform with black hexagon lines all across it in a weirdly visually disruptive pattern, staring at the screen with an intensity rarely seen from the human woman. Sparky was somewhere behind her, in the kitchen which joined directly to the living room. Spots and Icepick were both on the right hand side of the same couch she was sunken into, having their own little private discussion about some of the information on the table. Out of sight, there was the distinct sound of a suppressor being screwed onto the end of a cold metal barrel. Titanium turned to the group, hazel eyes turned to her team whose eyes in turned joined her own. The briefing and colaboration of all the information they already knew.

"Our objective, as you know, is this, the lab floors of the Damiler Chemical building, formerly S-C-S Design. Our employer, formerly Mister Johnston, A-K-A head of the Direct Responsibility Foundation. We need to retrieve documents from the president's office, located here," With a soft click of a button on a remote hidden in her hand, the display stopped rotating, and displayed a room in red, on the toppermost floor. "That prove he gave the order to issue production on dangerous chemicals. Also of note is the lab floors, here." Click! And five floors of the building went red to join the president's office.

"The next primary objective is to trash the labs. Every file we can find, every computer and every beaker and bunsen burner." Spots took the moment to chime in, the young looking human speaking with a firm, low voice that spoke years of expierence beyond what his current physical appearance might impart.

"They will likely reboot from an offsite backup server, but the resultant damage will set them back months and cost millions."

Titanium waited for him to finish before continuing. "It's a thirty story building, with helipad, located just outside the high density border eco-zone, as you can see here" Click! "Normally, this wouldn't be an issue, but, as Sparky was quick to point out, an Aztec office is located inside on the twelfth floor, which means any alarm will likely bring heavy reinforcements. To this end, we got ourselves an early christmas present." Feather just stared at her blankly, never having understood that expression. The cargo hauler we assaulted this morning was carrying a new set of RFID cards and a rotorcraft transponder, pre programmed."

"The cards will get us through to the floors we need and the rooms we need access to without making a fuss. Any personnel inside we encounter are to be scrapped. Smooth, simple, single motion entry and short stay tactical control. Icepick," Titanium finished, turning to look at the giantic troll, who ahemed and tried to put on his most professional voice.

He didn't do a good job. He never did. "The labs won't be a problem. We've got some left over acidic gas from the last job. One cylinder per lab in a dispersal pattern with a big gooey chunk of explosion. In the centre of the floor, they'll blow up anything and everything including any drywall the fools put together after this place was built. The acid takes care of anything left."

With a soft little smirk for his crude, yet oh so effective methods, Titanium turned to Sparky and then to Spots, addressing them both while looking at neither completely. "You two are on security detail." A pause, then "We're not being paid for hostages." Then, she finally turned her attention to Feather, who hastily scrambled to jump her before being prompted on what to say. She was beginning to have quite enough of that. It wasn't mocking, but it was all the same.

"I'm on document detail in the president's office. Locks, desk, the lot. And," She could almost barely contain her glee at the finer details, of which she was acutely familar with. "Anything expensive worth reselling for transit back here." Titanium looked pleased. Immensly so. The screen went back to slowly spinning counter clockwise, the rooms of interest no longer highlighted in that baleful red colour.

"It's a feel gooder, that goes without saying. There's a lot of people out for justice over this one. But, having said that, the courtyard in seven minutes, fifty kay awaits." With that final reminder of the payday at stake here, Titanium left the television screen to rotate that single picture surrounded by nothing but empty purple space aside from a few sparse letters flickering across the screen. Feather reached for her Hammerli sitting on the blueprints, which swiftly rolled up into a tight cylinder of information the moment the weight was lifted. Now idlily fiddling with the firearm instead of the piece of fabric.

Lab workers and people who willingly produced objects that would harm or kill others for no reason what so ever. No wonder people like those around her were in a booming industry.