The con is tomorrow and the last thing I want to be doing is half paying attention to this proofs lecture. The last week has been plenty productive for Anna and me, but there are still a few details we need to finish on our props, and I was really antsy about having enough time.
My phone buzzed, and a quick glance showed it to be from Molly.
Ex4ctPlac3: Check email, will be at east side in 5
A bit confused I pulled my laptop out of my bag and flipped it open in my lap.
CONFIDENTIAL
Molly and Sam,
FBI have tipped us off about the currently unfolding deployment by Org A currently occurring in Orchardville.
Ideal case for Agent Scott’s abilities.
Come to the usual room ASAP.
Mary
Hooo fuck.
I tossed my laptop back in my bag along with my notes then booked it out of there, not exactly a subtle exit given how much noise that entails for me, but times a wastin.
Molly had barely stopped the car as I reached it, I roughly tossed my bag in the back seat after pulling the door open before throwing myself into the seat. My weight made the car rock and the seat groaned in response, she barely left time for me to pull the door before a lead foot hit the floor. The civic made its best attempt to roar as it pulled away, but it was far too sedate a vehicle for it to sound impressive.
I am not sure it’s possible to cross the distance between campus and the facility any faster given road laws were soundly ignored as the car rolled its way around traffic horn blaring. I dared not distract Molly from the drive and she didn’t seem much inclined to say anything either, besides occasionally cussing. I was surprised we hadn’t picked up a flashing red and blue follower as she charged down the ramp to the underground parking garage.
After roaring down the three levels to the bottom of the garage, she didn’t even bother parking in a proper spot instead stopping right in front of the security door to the facility. We dashed through the halls, sometimes around confused people. Oh hey, there’s someone I recognized.
“Hi Kat,” I said as I passed her. “Bye!”
“Sam?” Her curious voice came from behind us, but we rounded a corner leaving her behind.
Molly kept pace with me right up until we got to the meeting room, technically I could have gone a lot faster, but that’s a bit dangerous in here with the possibility of hitting someone emerging from a room or something. I flopped into a chair with a creak before spinning it around to face a somewhat bemused-looking Mary, my long black skirt trailing a bit behind. I had the thought that I keep on wearing skirts on days with fights, Alternatively, I wear skirts a lot, I think it might be that one.
“You are meeting up with riot police at King and Corbett as soon as you are ready.” Mary said wasting no time on the background and indicating an intersection only a few blocks away. “They should be there in fifteen or less.”
She flipped the projection over to two pictures, one of a building I somewhat recognized as a dumpy little office unit nearby and the floor plan of one part of it. “The building has very little substantial structure to it, and we believe there should only be a handful of armed mercenaries involved. The plan is simple, police go in the front door as a distraction, you two go to here-” She indicated a side door. “Molly slam them all the moment you think you can. Go get your pistols.”
Molly whooped while launching herself out of the chair and I followed her.
A brief mad dash where I did go a bit faster began from there, I went ahead of Molly and charged to our office a few turns of winding hall later. At one point I had to do a side jump to dodge an artifact engineer I vaguely recognized.
Getting through our door, I slammed the code in on the locker before rammed rounds in magazines as fast as I could, Molly turned up a few moments later and started getting the rest of the gear together. I took the offered holster from Molly before strapping it on, I tossed one mag in its holder and the other into the butt of my pistol as I pulled it free from the rack. I grabbed my badge and shoved it in the other pouch we had gotten for my holster. A quick check showed Molly ready to go having buckled the holster belt over her hoody as she slammed the locker closed, she had already taken the two magazines I had loaded for her.
It was a little further to the CRD car as we dashed by her personal one still parked at the security door, but it had way more horsepower, flashing lights, and a siren. We abused all of those when we shot out of the garage like a bat out of hell, before swinging a right and screaming down the road. I was extremely glad we were before evening traffic, as we had a pretty much straight ride down the four-lane road. Idly I noted the hood was still bent as we roared past the rows of small shops, I guess the new one still wasn’t in yet.
A few light and traffic ignoring turns later and we encountered the armored APC-like vehicle that our police force had, for some reason that eluded me, we slowed down a little to keep pace with them. Glancing over the I saw the guy in the passenger seat giving us the eyeball, not sure what else to do I gave him a thumbs up. He shook his head and turned away.
Rude.
I saw the office in front of us now, so I drew my pistol and racked a round into the chamber but left it on safe for the moment. The APC turned away from us a bit as it aimed more for the front while Molly skipped the curb, carving our way through the lawn before slamming on the brakes as we came up beside the building.
I flipped the safety off as I slammed my door open, trying to avoid damaging it, as I heard Molly do the same on her side. As I rounded the car, I saw her rack her pistol and collect at the door, I heard the scream of a megaphone from the front of the building that I assumed was our distraction. Molly nodded as I approached, not seeing a reason to delay I primed a kick before slamming the door as hard as I could.
I think that goes to the top of my doors kicked off list, which admittedly is only two but still I think that’s more than most people do in their entire lives.
The thing fucking rocketed through the open-concept office that was currently occupied by a glowing, blue-rimmed portal towards the back of the room on my right, I was leveling my pistol into the room as it made its journey already evaluating the threats present. Several shocked individuals had been taking cover behind stacks of crates in an otherwise barren room, facing the police out front. A few of the people had rifles that were peeking out around the impromptu cover towards the front of the building, but there were already a few heads turning our way.
Before anything further could happen, it was like the hand of some god descended on the room, people were just crushed to the floor with any resistance being ignored.
I blinked slightly shocked.
I knew Molly’s gravity was a big deal when she was in range, she had used it on me a lot in training after all, but this was going all out on a bunch of normal humans with muscles instead of steam and actuators.
I immediately entered and started surveying for anyone Molly had missed, since she had the jump and didn’t need to defend against any shots, it looked like she found every person in the room without issue from what I could see so far. Glancing over revealed the portal was already beginning to wink out of existence, but for just a moment I saw shocked faces in a warehouse on the other. It was an entire team of uniformed… employees? Agents? That I assumed must have been associated to Org A directly.
Not wanting to leave them available if Molly lost her grip on anyone still in the room, I started stamping on rifles to crush them as I got in reach of them. Somewhat regretting whatever damage that might cause to my sneakers. As I looked around for anyone else, I noted that there were carts that looked to have the larger portal device parts on them laying abandoned in addition to the stacked crates.
“Clear!” I shouted once I had checked anywhere a person could be hiding, including kicking through a bathroom door that wasn’t nearly durable enough to come off entirely.
This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
There was a whoop from Molly where she was looking in the doorway grinning. “Fuck yeah, I was useful in a fight!”
“Never doubted it.” I answered with a smile back, while clicking the safety on and returning the pistol to my holster. If someone got loose, I was confident I could easily take them so long as they didn’t have a gun.
There was a clatter of a door opening from the front of the building as a group of fully armored and armed cops started slowly filing in through the front door, typically late and looking kinda confused.
“Hurry it up,” I said annoyed. “We don’t have any restraints and Molly can’t keep it up forever.” The car did have our everyday carry bags, but I wasn’t going to leave to go looking for restraints if these cops already had them. The one I assumed was the leader looked at me shocked but prompted the others to move up and begin cuffing the mix of mercs and people in uniforms matching those of in the warehouse that I assumed were from Org A.
Molly released her grip on the people as they were cuffed, and once they were all accounted for, we followed the procession out the door while a few of the cops stayed back to mill around in the room. As we emerged into the bright afternoon light, I noticed how many more vehicles were arriving. Oodles of police cars and support trucks including one whose back immediately opened to accept the captured Org A people.
Oh, hey. We are still in the city proper so uh that’s a lot of people standing around watching too, not quite sure what to make of that.
Molly started towards our still shrieking and idling car, I followed her a moment later wondering if people were recording us or something. She turned off the ignition before starting to lean against the doorframe, giving me a wide grin and offering a high-five. “Now that’s what my fights are usually like, get in close and prevent it ever starting. Nice door kick though, I’m pretty sure that bought us a few seconds.”
I returned the high-five carefully avoiding too much force, then joined her in leaning against the car. “I guess we are waiting for the others then?”
“Yep.” Even as she was answering a couple of CRD-marked trucks came into view up the road, before they rolled to a stop in the grass near us. Mary, Peter, and a few other artifact engineers poured out, the engineers heading around us to the office while Mary stopped in front of us.
“I take it from how you two are hanging around it went well?” She asked with a smile and a raised eyebrow.
Molly grinned and gave a thumbs up. “They didn’t have a chance. I probably injured a few slamming em down, but they’ll be fine.”
Mary nodded and leaned in close, before quietly giving an explanation. “Good thing, one of them is probably an FBI asset.” I nodded while noticing a CTV truck rolling to a stop up the street, Mary followed my eyes to glance over as well before turning back and shrugging. “Can’t always avoid them, don’t worry about it.”
I looked down, my shirt and skirt aren’t too rumpled looking at least, then a thought crossed my mind. “Hey Molly?”
“Hmm?” She responded while adjusting her hoody to look a bit less squeezed under the holster.
“Uh could you message Anna to her I will be late?” I asked a bit sheepishly. “Reiko would work too if you don’t have Anna herself.”
“Sure, but can’t you?”
“Nope, my phones in your car back in the garage still.” I answered while patting the sides of my skirt. “No pockets.”
Molly doubled over laughing as Mary got a smile.
The two of us mostly just hung around for a while, occasionally chatting with Mary as she came and went. We saw her give a brief statement at one point to the reporters along with some police officer, we were too far back to hear and were mostly distracted by a discussion about nonsense we had seen in classes anyway.
“So, like the guy had a fucking George Foreman grill he pulled out of his bag.” Molly was saying while chuckling. “Then like while the prof was staring at him started fucking putting burgers on it.”
“No way, you’re fucking with me.” I denied.
“I’m serious, I have a picture and everything.” She flipped through her phone and showed it to me with a wide grin, I almost folded over laughing with puffs of steam coming from my mouth.
“What happened to him?” I asked grinning myself.
“The prof said he had to get at least one, he fucking did too!”
When we had recovered from the latest burst of laughter, I found that Mary had returned with a smile on her face. “Ok you two, we may as well head back and get a quick debrief done. Probably no more than five or ten since I’ve heard it all like a dozen times already.” She said with an eyeroll.
We piled into the car, I took the back seat as the lack of leg room or height was not an issue for me in the least. The more sedate pace made the distance seem much more substantial than the rocket ride out had seemed, looking out the window saw the sidewalks were starting to pile up with the post-work on a Friday crowd and the roads were packed with people on their commutes home.
It took longer for Molly and me to pack away our gear than the following meeting lasted, given the total description was kicking a door in and ‘owning some fools’ as Molly put it.
I grabbed a quick dinner with Molly and a still confused Kat before Molly offered to drop me off at Anna’s. I kinda forgot about checking my phone until I was already at her door, at that point it seemed a little late, so I just pressed the doorbell. Although as I did, I realized this had probably been the first time I hadn’t actually been on time for something I had planned with Anna.
Oops.
“Hi Anna, sorry I’m late.” I said when she opened the door.
“I saw you on the news!” She blurted out in response. “You had an actual gun!”
“Oh, uh yeah.” I had a guilty smile and started rubbing the back of my head, still standing in the doorway. “They looked at us that closely then?”
She started jerkily nodding then stepped aside to let me in. “Yeah, they would do these panning shots occasionally and always end by zooming in on you two.” She explained as I took my sneakers off.
“I hope it doesn’t scare you.” I admitted quietly, placing one hand on my other arm and rubbing it up and down while looking away after straightening up again.
“Why would I be scared?” Excitement jumped into her voice. “It’s cool as hell to see you out there like that!” I blinked up at her suddenly beaming face, she continued unperturbed by my confusion. “Plus that holster really emphasizes your boobs! It doesn’t really fit your current costume, but we need to get something like that into something else!”
I darted forward to hug her, tears in my eyes.
“Woah Sam, did you think I would be upset?” She said a moment later while rubbing my back. “I told you before that I’m not the least bit scared of you.”
I nodded not quite trusting myself to speak.
“Come on Sam, we need to get the last bits together for tomorrow.” She said while gently leaning towards the stairs down.
----------------------------------------
She had my cannon up on the main workbench, it was just about done but there were still details that I was painting. Most of my progress had been on last weekend, I had gotten a crash course in painting props in a simplified version of her style, but I had done a couple of evenings when I wasn’t bogged down with assignments.
When I had initially seen it broken down into metal or black spray-painted pieces it hadn’t looked great, kinda like the parts to a cheap toy. Anna didn’t seem concerned though, instead, she had given me a few plastic tubs with handwritten labels full of thin grimy looking paint that she had me heavily paint the pieces in.
She had laughed at my dour expression while I considered the now filthy-looking pieces. “Here, scrub it back with this, just like you’re cleaning something.” She said offering a rag she had dipped in thinner, I accepted it with an uncertain expression. After a few moments I realized what she had anticipated, when the grime was left only where it naturally would be the metal no longer looked as flat and cheap.
“Great right?” Anna said with a grin “Give it a bit to dry while I show you weathering the plastic…”
That had mostly been something she called ‘drybrushing’, she used a thicker paint in a few shades of dark grey that she would almost entirely take off a brush before really going at an example piece giving it a distressed look. Once I had done something similar to the others, she had me go in and sketch a few little lines here and there to imply scuffs and cuts on rubber.
Then we were back on the metal, where she had me go through a series of different things depending on what kind of wear would probably be present at any given spot. Drybrushing edges for shiny worn metal or a brushed metal surface, sponging on and wiping back spots of corrosion, dark discoloration for burnt gunpowder implications, etc. Some of it was kinda unrealistic, but she pointed out that for a prop we were selling the idea of something, not always the reality.
For tonight we were mostly past the main work, so I was mostly doing things like picking out details in the fire selector or painting fake bullets for the massive magazines that would be on my webbing. Anna had designed the one on the gun to be removable with a few removable rounds in it, but it wasn’t interchangeable with the others. The magazines for the webbing just had a single round that was only going to be partially visible in the simple pouches we had made, they were essentially just there to fill in the space to look right after all.
A glance up from my cannon showed that she was still working on her snake gun shoulder prop. It was mostly 3D printed which had saved enough time that she could do other things to it, mainly going wild with electronics. It would have a few motors acting on cables for making it have a few simple movements along with a remote she had in to go into her left palm, I think she had been talking about having it do some automated stuff too, but I wasn’t sure if she would be done that in time.
“I think I got everything as good as I am getting it.” I declared after I finished correcting some wear that looked a bit off on the foregrip.
“Hell yeah, let me see.” Anna said while coming to lean over me after jumping out of her chair.
After a few critical moments of examining it as I cleaned my brush, she grinned at me. “I think you’re done, and we have a whole couple of hours to spare, that’s perfect!”
I reached up to give her a peck on the cheek. “All thanks to your help Anna, I literally couldn’t have done any of this without you.”
She hugged me and I could feel she was jittering with excitement. “Do you want to try it all on tonight then?”
“Hmmm, well last time I tried it on we kinda consumed the rest of the evening, and you still have a few things left.” I pointed out with a mischievous grin.
She flushed while pausing uncertainly then after a slight delay nodded before returning to her desk, looking more than a bit dejected as she got back to running wires. I gave her a second to get into it then walked over and draped my arms around her from behind.
“I am more than happy to indulge your every fantasy,” I said quietly into her ear as I heard her breath hitch. “But I also know you were excited for this weekend, and I would hate for you to feel disappointed because you ran out of time.”
She twisted in her chair to smile back at me. “Going with you is a fantasy I had, so I guess they aren’t mutually exclusive.”
“There’s the right attitude!” I said cheerfully, then recognizing an opportunity to tease her a little, hugged her head into my chest.
Having her head in my admittedly small bosom felt surprisingly nice, I can’t say I had a chance to try this before given how much shorter I am. Realizing I had been holding her just a little too long I released her while steaming up a touch, and here I had just been telling her to focus!
She had a bit of a goofy grin as I pulled back. “Can I get more of those if I make progress?”
I giggled.
“Of course.”