Chapter Forty-One

By the time I made it back it’d cost me eleven hundred credits in cabs, mag-train fees, food and drinks, and I was exhausted, the general crud of the sewers and undercity was well and truly baked in now, and I was exhausted.

Reign and the others were asleep, and I was forced to shower as quietly as possible, before climbing into bed and collapsing.

I was well and truly goddamn done with the day!

I managed a handful of hours before waking and checking my messages, finding that Bowdoin had been as good as his word, thankfully, and he’d passed the details to some lunatic called Skeeter. I’d had a call with him from the back of a cab while I was out delivering medikits, and fuck I distrusted him instantly.

He had a face that only a mother could love, and she’d have to have a thing about rodents with lopsided teeth, not to mention a twitch that made me want to know what the hell he was doing to make him so… wrong.

I was also absolutely certain I didn’t want to know.

He’d sworn blind he could get me the passes and have us all registered as permitted and loaded with the required explosive charges, signed affidavits and checks performed etc. for a mere fifty thousand credits.

Each.

I’d told him who and what I was, and he’d been utterly unimpressed, telling me that he basically didn’t give a shit, and that he did deals with people more dangerous than me every day.

Then he’d asked me if I liked the warehouse I was living in, and had sent me a live feed of Reign who was oiling her rifle.

I’d warned him off, and he’d just smiled, agreeing that he’d keep his mouth shut about our location and anything else that I contracted him for, but that the price was the price.

I offered him thirty thousand and told him to take it or fuck off.

He’d apparently been willing to accept less than that, as he grinned and took the ten thousand deposit, agreeing that he’d provide the passes and data tomorrow.

One of the passes was in my inbox now, and I transferred the rest of the money, getting the other passes literally seconds later.

The relief when I checked the registered city systems and found all three passes were live and mixed in with the rest as having been issued at various times over the last two years was immense.

Of slightly more concern was the easily found ‘minor’ detail that one of the upper management of the department had a break-in last night. They were screaming blue murder in all the news reels over how they’d find the fucker that did it. Apparently they left ‘DNA evidence’ in the form of a turd of improbable dimensions inside of one of the bugger’s real silk pillows.

I just hoped that the ID was secure for now at least, and I planned to sort a backup as soon as I could.

The knowledge of quite how fucking many suits were registered? That on the other hand terrified me. I knew logically that the vast majority were corpo drones, doing bodyguard duty and other shit, but still.

That the AI’s checked the registration on all suits constantly and cross referenced constantly meant that even black ops suits had to be registered in one way or another, or as soon as they were out on a job, they’d be reported. Sure they might be hiding in a van and painted and so on, but that wouldn’t stop an AI from spotting them.

No, they had to be showing on the system as permitted, and when I’d spoken to Skeeter, he’d been adamant that it was easily fixed.

Now, he’d apparently proven he was right, and I had no choice but to shrug and move on.

I checked the various other messages I’d gotten, finding that I had apparently been discovered as some long lost prince’s son and there were a million credits in an account just waiting for me to connect my account to it, sure, right. I had a subscription for ‘horse cock enhancement pills’ approved and more.

Hell, some fucker had even tracked down the aircar and seen that the extended warranty had expired on it.

There were twenty-seven messages from that bastard in four hours.

The rest of the messages were crap mainly, and I sorted through them as I dressed and made a coffee, having Reign steal it, then Luna and Gessh come out, filling their mugs and taking one for Dondo, before going back to bed.

Then I made a second pot of coffee and actually got to drink some of this one, as Reign and I made small talk. Then I moved down into the warehouse section properly and checked on the parts, laying them out as I checked for damage and missing sections.

“How long to fix it?” Reign asked, having followed me down and was leaning against the door jam with a coffee in one hand and wearing just her underwear and a smile, which definitely made me want to drag her off to bed as soon as possible.

“Two, maybe three days,” I said, checking things over. “I also need to get some more parts, and I don’t trust Oshbob to get them for me.”

“Like what?”

“Ammo, for a start,” I said. “Fuel rods, filters for the air filtration systems… all the little consumables that you never think of I guess. They were always just ‘there’ in storage when I needed them.”

“And you’ve got none?” she asked, straightening up.

“No, there’s a standard loadout in the transport case,” I assured her. “But that’s it, once it’s gone it’s gone. The rest of it I’d need to get the parts in and store until we need them. Most I can probably get from Gunther, he’s got a mil-tech surplus store, but some parts, like the fuel rods? He won’t be able to get, and I don’t want to be in Oshbob’s pocket for the normal day to day running gear.”

“No, definitely not,” she agreed. “Give him that kind of power over us all and we might as well just start working for him.”

“Exactly,” I said absently, checking a circuit board and crystal connector. “I’m thinking Stinger…”

“Sounds like something they could get,” she said. “Look, do you need me for the next few days while you do this?” She gestured at the suit and I shook my head, frowning over at her.

“No, why?” I asked, a little surprised.

“I’m thinking we take them up on the offer of training,” she said. “Todds is a stealth specialist, sure, but Gessh, Luna and me?” She shrugged. “We’re not so much specialists as… well.”

“You’re a hell of a sniper,” I assured her.

“And am I as good a shot as this Sync we’re going to rescue?” She asked bluntly.

“Well…” I broke off and winced as I thought about how to put it.

“Just fucking say it, Harry.” She sighed, and I knew I was in trouble when she was using my first name.

“No,” I said after a few seconds. “Reign you’re fucking good, genuinely you are, but Sync was a sniper elite in the APS for years, she trained and upgraded her mods to be able to kill anything that lives. If you had the same training, I’ve no doubt that…”

“So unless I want my job to be ‘chief sucker of Kabutt’s cock’ I need to improve,” she said grimly. “I’m second in the team, I run all the various bits and bobs, and I’m good at that, you give me the list of the shit you need and I’ll sort it, but unless I’m to be made a mascot, I need to be as good as I can be. That means taking advantage of the offer of training by elite assassins. The girls feel the same way, and I’m sure Todds won’t turn down the kind of experience these people have.”

“Look, Richie and Sync…” I started, then winced. “Richie is a tech, sure he’s lethal in and out of his suit, but he’s all about the drones and the hacks, he wouldn’t want your slot, and…”

“And Sync is a sniper,” she said nodding. “You’ve said it before, that’s all she’s interested in, but how long until she or he decides they want my slot, or they just start doing the job because they know what you need and because they’ve worked with you for years longer than us? No.” She set her coffee cup down and walked over, taking my hand and pulling me to my feet.

“I’m not a pet, and I’m not a charity case, nor your toy,” she said, staring into my eyes, searching for the right words. “I earned this slot as your second, and they’ll take it from me over my dead body.”

“You did,” I agreed, shutting up and she put her hand over my lips.

“And so, part of the responsibility of the second, is looking after the team,” she said. “We need things, as a team I mean. We need equipment, we need training, and we need a heavy. That’s my new slot.”

“As a heavy?” I asked, stunned, looking at the slim, beautiful woman before me, as the image of Fergie swam up in my mind. They couldn’t be more different, and not just because he was seven feet virtually of solid muscle and ginger beard.

He weighed damn near as much as the suit, and carried the massive heavy weapons of his station with pride. Reign was a sniper at heart, waiting for the perfect shot, while Fergie would take great pleasure in turning a square mile into a zone that still wouldn’t sustain life in our grandkids lifetimes.

The contrast was insane, and yet… Reign was a hell of a shot. If she could bring that fixed perfection to the role of a heavy? It was frankly terrifying.

The heavy in any squad was a position of excessive concern to everyone. Nobody sane wanted a plasma caster strapped to their back, the power to melt the fucking planet and set fire to its atmosphere was a terrible thing, and they spent at least as much time checking the ‘do not’ details as they did the ‘do’. Because of that, generally their targeting?

Well.

There was a reason that a heavy operatives chosen style was referred to as a ‘to whom it concerns’ weapon, rather than the intensely personal experience that is a sniped round, but if Reign could overcome that?

I was torn between utter terror and a sense of wonder.

“Okay…” I said after a few seconds, “So you’re going to see Stinger and what? Get training for a few days?”

“That and more,” she said honestly. “Luna and Gessh and I talked about it while you were out playing delivery boy, and we’ve talked about it a few times before as well, ever since the mission at the tower really. She shrugged, moving over and hopping up to sit on an empty bench nearby.

“That’s cold,” she complained, frowning down at the metal under her bare legs, then shaking her head as she went on, dismissing the chill. “So, at the tower, we basically hid in the van, that was it. Most of the mission we were less use than a chocolate fireguard. No, don’t try to sugar coat it, seriously, we were.” She held a hand up when I opened my mouth to respond.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“That’s the nature of some missions,” I said. “For assassination runs? Let’s face it, I’m crap at stealth, I tend to just shoot every fucker in the face, Luna and Gessh are much the same, but you? You’ll be sniping at extreme distance and then we drive off. I’ll be useless on those missions.”

“Yeah, that’s true, and its fair, but my point is that unless the job went sideways, us girls couldn’t have helped you. Todds? If he’d been in the squad then he could have, but only up to a point. We’re going to have a lot more strength and depth with Richie as a hacker—”

“Tech,” I corrected. “He runs drones and interference, mostly electronic warfare, spying and countering the other teams, he can hack stuff, but he’s not that great at it.”

“So we’ll still need a hacker?”

“Yeah,” I said. “If we’re to grow into the kind of team I’m hoping we can? I’d prefer a dedicated hacking team in the office behind us, with Richie acting as liaison and link. That’s for the future though, and sorry for interrupting.” I winced as I realized I derailed the conversation, again.

“Yeah, so anyway.” She sighed. “We’ll have a lot more options in the team, but unless there’s a need for standard soldiers? The girls are going to be massively outclassed, and I’m just the second rate sniper in the team then as well. We don’t want to be the mascots, or the pets.”

“There’s always a need for the ‘standard’ soldier,” I said. “I lead my team, and yet I’m not carrying any heavy weapons, I’m carrying the same loadout as Two...” I broke off, shaking my head that I’d automatically slid into thinking of the roles in the squad as I used to.

“Okay, look as team lead? I’m ‘One’ we might want to start using those monikers again for our missions in future actually, just in case, keeps our identities safe from at least some people. Two is a ‘standard’ soldier’s billet, same as I carry, heavy assault rifle, spare ammo, and an expanded battery compartment, as well as additional loadout for the team in case we need it. My armor usually carried the ‘mission pack’ which was whatever we needed, be that a retrieval unit for radioactives or whatever.

“Two and I carried the same weapons, and so did Four and Five, all four of us able to swap ammo. The difference was that while I was lead, and Four, Scott, was the assault and melee advance, with Richie as Tech, Two, Barnes on our last few missions, didn’t have a specialist role.

“So he was a standard soldier,” Reign said nodding.

“Yes and no.” I shook my head. “He was a generalist, which is what I think you’re meaning. He wasn’t a specialist in any one area, but he was a damn good shot, he could run a basic hack, he could reload, repair and use the heavy weapons. His expanded battery? It was to form the Soldier/Heavy symbiote. When Fergie—Three—was up shit creek and deployed his really heavy weapons? He needed to lock his armor, to stay in place as the power core charged them.”

“That’s…”

“It’s a design flaw,” I said. “We all hated it, but it meant that the firepower he could lay down was horrific. He’d drain his core to the dregs, and anything that he didn’t like he’d shred. The flip side of that was that as he charged and his systems came fully online, he was vulnerable in ways the rest of us weren’t. One of the reasons the ‘heavy’ operator stands out in any crowd is that their armor is fucking heavy, okay? Like its half again as thick as a normal operator.

“They still die on a regular basis because they’re seen as the highest threat unit on the board. That’s where the symbiote comes in. The soldier billet is also one that needs serious balls, because they don’t have that expanded armor, or the insane levels of firepower to defend them, but they do have an enhanced battery, and they can link up to the heavy and overcharge their shields.”

“So, what are you saying here? That we should become the sacrifice pawns?”

“No,” I said quickly, then sighed. “At least, that’s not my intention. What I’m trying to say, and doing a piss-poor job of it, is that every single role in the squad is needed. The ‘standard’ soldier as you call it, is fucking needed, they’re a generalist, but they don’t have the weaknesses that each of the specialist classes do. The sniper that waits for the perfect shot?”

I got a nod from her, to confirm she understood that example.

“Well, they can only do that, if they’re really well hidden, or if they’re backed up by the soldiers. Otherwise, as they’re waiting for their perfect shot, others stumble over them and fucking kill them. As team lead, I can’t be watching the overview and planning the objectives, or having Five work on hacking and drone control without knowing that there’s someone watching over us. All the billets are needed. For us that means that we’ll need soldiers.”

“Like me and the girls?” Reign asked and I shook my head.

“No, honestly, I think Luna and Gessh will fall into the ‘Four’ role perfectly. It’s an advanced melee and close combat role, primarily focused on martial arts—as much as they can be performed in a suit—sword wielding and close in slaughter. You send the Fours in when something needs fucking up badly and fast. That’s perfect for the sisters.”

“It is, I guess. So you’re saying don’t focus on things like hacking and stealth or whatever for them when we go to the Stingers, instead ask for close combat training?”

“Definitely,” I said. “If we can get everyone suits? Then we’ll kit them out to carry expanded power cores most likely, they’re certainly brave enough for the role, but we’ll need to talk about that further down the road. It’s not something we need to focus on now. If they’re going to go and train though? There’s wooden training swords in that box over there…” I gestured to the right box on the rack nearby.

“I’d like them to work with those, I know they’re bigger than the swords the girls have currently, but hopefully Oshbob comes through with the plasma blades soon, and if nothing else we’ll take the fuckers from the black ops teams’ dead bodies. I’d like the girls to get used to the size and weight of the plasma sword, they’re a lot different to the ’normal’ swords they’re used to,” I finished.

“Okay, I’ll talk to them,” Reign promised. “We were getting a bit worried about that, so it’s a relief we’ll actually be needed. So…”

“Yeah?”

She winced. “What about me?”

“Honestly?” I asked. “I’d been damn happy with the idea of you as my second and as a sniper along with Sync. She could teach you some insane tricks, but you’re very different, I was happy with the idea of you both in that role, with her specializing in it and you focusing on life as my second.”

“And now?”

“I think you’re right,” I said. “I think we need a heavy… but I’m not sure if you could do it.” I saw the look on her face at that and I moved on quickly. “I don’t doubt your skill or dedication, I mean physically first of all. Your body is magnificent, and listen to what I’m saying before you hurt me, okay?”

“Go on,” she said in ‘that’ tone, and I winced, knowing that when a woman invites you to ‘go on’ like that, it’s an invitation to bury yourself as deep as possible before she murders you.

“You know I love your body, and I worship it given the chance,” I repeated. “But physically? You’d need to at least double your muscle mass, carrying the full ‘heavy’ loadout weighs as much as the armor. The operator needs to be massively strong. Again, your body is wonderful, but I don’t know if you could do that.” I saw the flinty look in her eyes, and I moved on quickly. “Also, the reality of the heavy’s weapons are that they’re area of effect a lot of the time. You spent years learning to be an amazing shot, while the heavy role is more about reducing an entire area to blackened cinders.”

“Right,” she said, but I saw a little waver in her resolve.

“I think you could do it, again, just like you probably could pile on all the muscle you’d need, probably. I don’t think you’d like it though. In fact? I think once you got past the love of the firepower? You’d be bored. You’re a sniper at heart.”

“So what? We just do without a heavy?” she asked, and I shook my head, then grinned at her.

“Oh no, I’m just thinking that you specialize even more,” I admitted. “There’s a single crossover between the sniper and heavy roles, a singular point of convergence, and they’re elite.”

“I’m listening.”

“Railguns.”

“Railguns?” she asked non-plussed. “I carry a railgun, it’s basically what every slug thrower is at heart, that’s my usual sniper weapon a—”

“No,” I said. “Not like this. Your slug thrower is a powerful sniper rifle, but its built on the sniper rifle frame, it’s a ‘normal’ gun, just specialized for accuracy and a little additional force, right?”

“A lot of additional force,” she corrected.

“Sure,” I agreed. “A lot of force, but that’s it. A heavy sniper though? Very, very few of them, it’s a sort of joke in the APS corps…” I hurried on, seeing that look in her face as I misspoke. “…not that the role is a joke of course, just that because all of us are heavy compared to normal soldiers, it’s like saying the ‘heavy’ role with heavy weapons is actually that of a ‘heavy, heavy, heavy soldier’. Its seen as overkill, right up until you damn well need it.”

“And you need it when?” she asked, clearly not sure what I was getting at.

“The heavy railgun is a weapon that ends battles,” I said. “Every single round is individually loaded and designed for that specific railgun. Tailored to perfection. Fergie and Scott died when we fought an assault mech, literally, because most of our weapons couldn’t do much damage to that much heavy armoring. They were the titans of the battlefield for a reason, right?”

“Yeah?”

“Well, had we known that there was going to be one there? Fergie would have taken the heavy railgun instead. One shot, one kill,” I said. “A single round would have torn through the heavily armored pilot’s compartment and that would have been it. Game over for them. The scavs that were hiding behind masses of metal and firing over the top? No problem. Fire straight through, kill them all,” I explained.

“Then why the hell didn’t he carry that normally then?”

“Because they’re slow to reload, limited ammo and he was shit with it. Sync could use it, more or less, but she hated it, liked the utility of the normal model of sniper railgun, like you do, not the heavy, as well as the stealth field coating and the mobility of the sniper role as she did it, rather than the additional armoring of the ‘heavy’.”

“So you’re saying…”

“I’m saying you will still be my second,” I said. “That isn’t in question, and neither Richie nor Sync would contest that, believe me, team leadership is not one of their goals, not in any of the conversations we had. Hell I had to practically order Fergie to undergo the second slot training. None of them wanted the responsibility.”

“And the role?”

“Heavy sniper,” I clarified. “Get a railgun, a real one, not a standard sniper rifle, Stinger can arrange it. Learn with that, then, if you’re happy with it? We’ll start on the exercise routine you’ll need to carry the heavy version.”

“How bad is it?”

“The exercise?” I asked, and she nodded. “At least an hour a day, every day, in the gym. Cardio and so on won’t cut it, you’ll need specialist weight training, as well as possibly internal augments later on. I know Fergie had to have his heart and lungs replaced to be able to power that frame. Something to think about further down the line.

Also, if you’re going to train with Stinger? If they have a melee specialist, take advantage of that, it’ll be easier for me to build on it for the plasma blades if they train you as well.”

“Okay, thank you.” She sighed, smiling a little sheepishly. “We were getting a bit worried that when you got your old team back…” She shrugged.

“That I’d not want you?” I smiled, moving in close and kissing her gently, then deeper. “Believe me, I want you alright.”

“As your second?” She kissed me back, then wrapped her legs around me and pulled me in closer. “Or as chief cocksucker?”

“Well…” I breathed, “I’d hate to have to pick one skill over the other, but clearly if it has to be one…” I waggled my eyebrows and ran my fingers down her sides.

“Well, I suppose you’ve made me feel a little better, and you did do all the running around for us with the medikits…” She breathed into my ear, gently kissing my neck. “Why don’t we go upstairs and share a quick shower? Before I take the girls to go see Stinger I mean?”

“Hell yes ,” I agreed fervently, grinning and I stepped back and she hopped down from the bench, then took me by the hand and led me back up the stairs like we were teenagers.

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