It felt all kinds of wrong being classed as a tiger cell and not even having a vehicle at our disposal. Also, other than a desk with a wobbly leg, literally the only other furniture on hand were shipping crates stacked into some semblance of chairs or bed frames. Not even a mattress in sight. It wasn't the result of squatters or anything like that, it is a military facility after all, even if it's an old one. No, the current lack of amenities, other than a few low grade auto turrets to keep the squatters and pests at bay was likely due to the last crew selling anything that wasn't nailed down when the cell fell apart.
There was another downside the girls hadn't seemed to notice yet, but I wasn't about to bring it up. The compound was literally in the middle of a manufacturing zone, meaning no cafes, convenience stores or anything of the like for a radius of around five kilometers in any given direction. Good from a security point of view, not so much from a convenience one.
On the plus side, this place was fucking huge, just as Sumiko had promised. I was expecting to be assigned maybe a couple of room... at most a floor in a nameless military complex somewhere, but the AI had snagged us a facility that was on par with the veterans barracks that Bri and I had lived in until this morning. Admittedly that brought with it a whole different set of problems, at least for a tiger cell like ours currently numbering in the very low single digits.
Ever the semi professional soldiers, the girls had both nearly ripped me a new one when Sumiko first spoke on the comms without announcement. Couldn't say I could fault their logic, allowing my 'girlfriend' of two days to invite herself to chat over a secured military channel? Yeah, probably not the best idea so I had to give them that one. Surprisingly the girls complaints had nothing to do with protocol or regulations though, Bri and Dani of the opinion that if Sumiko wasn't going to start hanging with us for at least part of the day jealousy would inevitably set in, then we'd all be in the shit. Especially with the 'access' they figured I had granted her, it took some fast talking and thinking on my feet but we were all getting along like a house on fire over the shared comms now. Their initial reservations completely forgotten as the four of us chatted back and forth like a group that had known each other forever.
With the barren and filthy compound we now called home surrounding us, to say the mood had calmed down considerably from the celebrations of the night before would be an understatement. Brianna was down right depressed.
:// Aw common Breezy, it can't be all bad.
Sumiko tried to sooth Brianna over our new Tac. channel.
:// Hmpf.
Was all she got in reply. Daniela grinned at our lover and pulled her in for a hug, rubbing her shoulder.
:// I was thinking that maybe... if a certain someone can be a good little girl, there might be presents involved.
The AI teased.
Bri was suddenly much more attentive and grinning at me sideways, her grumbly demeanor now pretty much just for show.
I winked and smiled at her, then the conversation was interrupted as several trucks pulled up into the compound and veritable legions of techs began swarming the vehicles to supervise the unloading of the various servers and gear required for Sumiko's data center.
Brianna stopped and blinked at the trucks, then looked between me, Bri and the vehicles again.
:// What did you buy her? I'm gonna start throwing tantrums!
Daniela was beside herself.
I snorted a laugh. Brianna's wide eyed and excited expression turned to pouty bitch in less than half a second at the sound.
:\\ That's a baby sitting job Bri has to do first.
I made up on the fly.
:// Who are they?
She asked with an interested tilt of her head.
:\\ It was part of the deal I had to accept to get our application approved so quickly.
I answered as Sumi feed me a bullshit response through our private channel.
:// What did you do?
Daniela turned and asked as though talking to a child... or a cranky Brianna actually, come to think of it.
:\\ Not much really, the army wants to install a server farm on the second basement floor.
:// But... that's the main armory. Where are all the shinnies are gonna go?
Dani was horrified at loosing all that precious space for the... I don't know, fifty million or so rifles she had planned to purchase to fill the empty shelves.
"You'll be the only gal on the block with an air conditioned armory." I scooped her up from behind and spoke in a conspiratorial tone of voice with my chin on her shoulder.
"With scrubbers?" She immediately went into negotiation mode, pulling on my hands and holding them in place on her stomach.
"Err... sure?" Why someone would need environmental scrubbers in a storage space was beyond me.
"Wait... what exactly are you planning on doing in there?" I asked suspiciously, standing to look down at her with a raised eyebrow.
Spinning in place she squinted and grinned at me at the same time, unable to decide between annoyance at giving up some room, or being cute to stop me asking questions.
"Yeah okay, no idea." I gave up and sighed. She pecked me on the cheek as a reward for not prying.
"I don't understand daddy, you want me to baby sit them? I don't know shit all about 'puters." Brianna grumbled.
"I know baby girl, but Dani and I have to go pick a little something up, and it's probably not the brightest idea to let a bunch of strangers just go wandering willy-nilly all over our nice new base is it?"
She rolled her eyes and kicked a rock as we walked across the hard standing of the compound to touch base with the lead tech.
"We do?" Daniela asked.
"Yep, can't leave my hot sniper babe out of the whole 'presents' situation."
"aww."
"She might shoot me, and snipers can be very sneaky when they want to be, more trouble than their worth." I said conversationally with a grin. She punched me in the arm. Yeah okay, I may have deserved that one.
* * *
So like most ringers I had of course 'window shopped' around the various arms dealers as a matter of course, so I knew exactly where I wanted to go first. Dani hip checked me and glanced up with a silent question when I steered her into the Arasaka Arms outlet. Primarily known for their vehicle designs, like all corporations however they had their fingers in many different pies all at once.
"It's gonna just about kill me, but we need wheels."
"Sooo... what are you gonna get me?" She asked with a twinkle in her eye as she snaked her palm into my back pocket and hugged into my side as we idly checked over some of the displays. With her question she started steering me to the rather expensive looking sniper rifles on a nearby wall.
I chuckled and threw my arm over her shoulder, quickly spinning her in the opposite direction to point out the display vehicle in the corner.
She sighed, clearly not a fan of the classics. "I guess beggars can't be choosers."
"Hey come on. Nothing else says get out my fucking way like a ten tonne block of steel on wheels." Humvees were truly a thing of beauty in my humble opinion. Why? Because they were literally fucking everywhere and had so many different load out options that no one ever really knew what they had on their hands until after they were dead. (preferably)
So about now your probably calling bullshit on the fact that a design that was nearly one hundred years old could still be considered suitable for front line service. And I'd say fuck off, appreciate the classics man! In all seriousness though, militaries the world over never let a good thing die. Just about every serious arms manufacturer out there had a licence to produce their own particular brand of the vehicle, and these weren't your grand pappies hummers. New polymers, fuels, engine and assembly technologies... all that jazz ensured the classic design was almost constantly being redesigned and re engineered from the ground up on an almost yearly basis by someone, somewhere. In the bigger outlets like this one you could even select your options and watch your truck being built real time over the course of a couple of hours.
We began tinkering around with the options console to see what we could see.
"oooo" Dani found something interesting, I glanced over to see what specifically she was looking at.
"Babe?"
"Hmm? She looked up innocently.
"I am not putting a sniper rifle into the turret of an assault truck."
"pfft spoil sport."
If you hadn't picked up on it by now she was definitely a kill 'em before they see you type of girl, I could appreciate the sentiment, but I wasn't expecting to be seeing very many open fields in the city were the kilometer or so effective kill range would come in handy.
"How about this?" I looked up to get her opinion, that's why she was here after all.
"Yeah fifty cal is okay, it's a bit... standard though, don't you think?"
"Classic baby, the word your looking for is classic."
"pfft."
I rolled my eyes and scrolled through the options. She wasn't wrong of course, but fifties, much like humvees, had been around for ever. Ammo was cheap and the modification options were near endless. Hmm. Same could be said for the trusty thirty calibre machine guns as well.
In the end I chose a linked .50/.30 remote turret system complete with upgraded targeting software but a standard friend or foe identity system which would draw data from Tac.1 and our HUD's to identify targets. The thirty would be able to take out all but the heaviest ground troops, the fifty could be used on the heavy troops and 'soft skinned' vehicles. Basically meaning that once in a hot zone if you had literally anything that could be considered a weapon and you weren't either ringer, military, or police, you were going to call down hell upon yourself in the form of three thousand rounds a minute. It was just one vehicle, but boy did it give us a big leg up in both deployability and survivability.
Well, that was assuming the bad guys would play nice and not shoot back. With that thought in mind I reviewed the armoring options and ended up getting the up armoured options for the crew compartment and the non magnetic polymer composite body shell. Despite the cool 'techy' nature of the name, the armor was far from light and added around an extra three hundred kilograms to the overall weight. The upside being that only serious hardware and a lucky hit was going to be taking this bad boy out.
Daniela clicked her tongue in thought next to me looking over the choices I had made. And nodded her head approvingly.
"If your going for the upgraded rate of fire the hoses are gonna get thirsty. I'd add drums to the back, it's just the three of us at the moment so not like we need the space for anything." She made the selections as she explained her reasons, it didn't add much to the overall price, so I added two drums of ammo for each. That's 15k rounds per drum for the .50 and 25k rounds each for the .30 cal. I chose standard armour piercing rounds, cause why not? They weren't that much more expensive than ball.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
"I was wondering how I might offset the weight of the batteries under the hood if I went electric so that will work nicely."
"I thought you were all about the classics? What about the roar of the mighty diesel engine?" She asked playfully.
"I'd much rather have a silent ten tonne box of death with the performance of a sports car." I smirked back.
She stuck her hand in my back pocket and pulled herself into my side to review everything with a cute little smile before we finalised the order. The only thing she changed was the colour, from olive green to matt black.
"Yeah, okay, does look kinda cool." She grinned at the sample image.
The good thing about every man and his dog having a licence to mass produce hummers? They were damn cheap. I could buy another three of the things off the showroom floor with my savings alone. Probably ten or more if we went down the second hand route.
"Ah, just window shopping I take it?" A junior sales rep had finally bothered to take the time to track us down in the off chance we were serious about the purchase and was doing that annoying upside down reading thing they all seemed so good at.
I could understand his hesitation. Ringers weren't permitted to purchase the upgraded armour, rate of fire, ammo capacity, or targeting mods we had selected. But tiger cells? Fuck yeah they were.
"Depends on what extras you can offer to seal the deal." I looked up at him blankly.
"Oh! Okay. Hmm let me see here." He made a show of checking through his tablet where we couldn't see what he was up to, but was mostly surreptitiously checking out Daniela in her skin tight pants, knee high combat boots and torn off singlet top. She had her shoulder holsters for this outing, which only enhanced the shape and size of her breasts, squishing them together between each sidearm.
He glanced up at her briefly then quickly focussed on his screen when she put her hand between her cleavage, that just so happened to be directly in his line of sight, and pointed at me. I would have left it at that, but then his eyes returned to her chest.
"Keep checking out my woman I'm gonna poke out your eyes." I said calmly. I didn't have a problem with looking, I was just bored.
Dani smirked at him when his cheeks flushed red and stood on tip toes to peck my cheek, before looking at him sweetly and batting her eye lashes, enjoying our little game.
"I can throw in a front ram bar for free. Just steel, no upgrades." He said quickly. His eyes twitched and jumped all over the place when I just watched him without responding. Well everywhere except in Daniela's direction. Gotta get your fun in where you can right?
Dani punched my arm playfully after what seemed like a full minute of silence had passed. "Leave the poor guy alone."
He glanced at her. I shot my hand forward causing him to loose his shit and throw his tab' in the air as I swiped the chit in my hand over the confirm order section of the screen and chuckled.
"How long?" I asked him as he looked down to his broken device and back to me a couple of times, internally debating if he should say something.
"Three hours?"
"Two."
"That's what I meant, two hours, no problem."
I moved past him and pushed my index finger against my ear, the universal signal I was 'on comms', giving him an excuse to run away. Seeing a picture of Dani's nearly fully exposed cleavage on the cracked screen I made sure to stomp down on the device extra hard as I headed for the door to grab some food while we waited.
:\\ Hey baby girl, how's it going over there?
I asked on our open channel.
:// Never mind that, our man is getting all protective and shit, so hot.
Dani gushed.
:// aww.
Apparently Sumi was still on channel, so I guess they hadn't finished yet.
:// You two better not be getting into any brawls without me.
Bri chuckled.
:// No, but he did break some poor kids tab'.
Daniela threw me a sideways grin as we walked.
:// Daddy you big meanie!
:\\ Kids old enough, he should know how to get his perv on without being caught. Anyway, everything okay over there?
:// Yeah, I'm just bored. They're army techs so they know not to go wandering. Something about blah blah secondary satellite blah blah and their done.
:\\ Well, that's very informative, now I know exactly what they are up to, thanks for the update.
I said sarcastically.
:// They'll be done in an hour. Not like you'd know what they were doing even if I told you.
Bri answered dryly.
:// Just in time for the next delivery.
Sumi said happily.
:\\ Huh?
This was news to me.
:// My father was in a tiger cell so I know things on base can be a little... basic. So I got you all a little something to celebrate.
The first part of her answer was absolute bullshit, but I couldn't exactly call her out on it.
:// aww thanks Miss Sumi!
:// Wow, thanks Sumi. Your the best girlfriend of a lover a girl could have.
Dani tried to make light of the situation, but it was clear she appreciated the effort.
:// Anything for my man and his girls.
The AI chuckled.
:// Anyway, I should probably start doing some work or the boss is gonna get pissed. Talk to you all later tonight?
Sumi finished.
:// You better girl.
:// Bye Miss Sumi, thanks for keeping me company.
:\\ Talk later babe.
I closed the channel, that was the agreed upon signal that the AI would be offline for anything up to twelve hours during the data transfer. If it took longer, I'd likely never hear from it again.
:>> Go for Tac.1
It was almost as if they were listening in, waiting politely for the conversation to finish instead of just butting in. I was getting paranoid, I shook the thought from my head and responded.
:<< Still waiting for the wheels to be delivered boss.
I answered with a curse under my breath. I had potentially just put us out of the running for our first well paid OP. The hummer would have been immediately registered to our cell on purchase, having a vehicle meant your potential call out window increased from two kilometers to anything up to three hundred, depending on specifics. Unfortunately it was still being built.
:>> Acknowledged. Wait one.
Daniela and I turned to look at each other with bored expressions as we awaited the outcome, standing slightly off to the side of the busy walkway just outside the front doors of the arms outlet. A woman I didn't know walked over and hung around awkwardly glancing our direction. At my raised eyebrow and acknowledging nod she walked over more confidently, she was what ringers referred to as a reaper. Hand to hand combat specialists that went into combat with swords of all things, typically high on stims and combat enhancers for the extra survivability. Sure they were cybernetically enhanced and had the strength of a bull, but that was only because bits of them had been either shot or hacked off over the years in combat and replaced with robotic limbs. But god damn was she a cutie!
"You are alpha yes?" She asked in a french accent, my knees melted.
Dani turned and openly ogled the woman. First time I'd seen her look like that at a chick, someone has a reaper fetish me thinks.
"Yeah, stick around if you like?" She smiled and nodded, surprised at my offer.
"How you doin'?" She turned to Dani, testing the waters.
Reapers were generally shunned by other ringers, they had the reputation of berserker's in combat, typically finishing an OP covered in blood and chunks and various other pieces of people. Sometimes even missing limbs of their own and smiling about it. I could see how it was off putting. During the war I'd had cause to work with several reapers during urban combat OP's hunting down wolves so I had become somewhat desensitised to the mayhem they could cause when they really got their blood up. Put it this way, I'd rather have them on my side than not. Especially when they have smoking hot bods, even if various bits are cybernetic in nature.
I watched as Dani was blushing and openly flirting with the reaper while she made small talk. Small things like touching the girls arm when she spoke and playing with her own hair, standing with her arms behind her body and pointing her tits at her intended target when she wasn't openly stroking and fondling the girls various cybernetic bits under the guise of discussing her modifications. You know, basic things that womanisers like myself picked up on quickly.
:>> This is Tac.1. Draugr Alpha stand down.
:<< This is Draugr Alpha. Stand down. Wilco. Happy hunting.
And just like that we lost our first gig.
"You are tiger cell alpha?" She asked in her sexy accent, a little surprised but with a smile, extending her hand to shake.
"Yeah, new cell. I'm John, this is Daniela." I didn't hesitate and took the robotic hand in my own in greeting.
"We have just met, yes. I am Clea. You are same cell?" She looked sideways with a grin at Dani as she nodded her head vigorously in response, big puppy dog eyes looking up and focused on the reaper adoringly.
"Forgive me for becoming so forward. You are not... stand offing... err... frightened like the others?" Her blonde eyebrows were knit in concentration as she focused on her words, choosing them carefully as english was clearly not her first language. She could read me the labels on medical swabs for all I cared and I'd hang on every word. She waived a hand to indicate the people on the crowded path giving us a wide birth.
"No, I've worked with a number of reapers over the years, love your work. Dani there is probably about to jump your bones so she obviously doesn't have a problem."
Dani froze like a deer in the headlights at my words, biting her bottom lip and giggling nervously, her eyes quickly flashing between me and Clea as the reaper turned to look at her.
"Jump my bones? You mean... fight? She looks more like bitch in heat." The teasing tone in Clea's voice apparent.
"Oh my god!" Daniela tried to hide her face in embarrassment as her eyes bulged out of her head at the rather rude, but totally correct assessment.
"Save me." She buried herself under my arm hiding her face against my chest.
Clea shared a look with me and we both laughed good-naturedly at poor Dani's predicament. I hugged her close in case she tried to run away.
"You are... joining?" She asked with a wave of her hand in our direction.
Dani whimpered, half laughing and half crying with her voice failing her as her mind immediately went to the gutter. Clea tilted her head at the response and looked to me with a confused expression.
"She thinks your talking about sex."
"Oh my god, so embarrassing, will you stop it already!" She mumbled into my chest.
"No. But is good. I mean... umm... contract. Signing... together?" Clea was becoming frustrated with not being able to find the correct words. I knew what she meant, and needing to quickly grow our team I was going to ask her if she wanted to sign up anyway. I just thought her flustered expression was super cute, embarrassing Dani so thoroughly in the process just meant bonus points in my book. And if I understood her correctly sex is good. Woot!
"Wait, I have sister, she has better english. Is still buying." Clea turned and stood on tip toes to try and figure out where her sister may be.
My eyes were of course immediately drawn to the curve of her hips and shapely rump as the reaper stretched and twisted as though putting herself on display purely for my benefit in her off duty skin tight black synth skins as she tried to see over shelving and around displays.
"Are we in heaven? Did she say she has a sister?" Daniela stuck her head out from under my arm now the attention was no longer focussed on her as she took in the same view in appreciation.
"Didn't take you for a reaper creeper." I teased. She slapped my stomach playfully and shushed me but didn't otherwise respond.
Daniela and I sighed contently in unison when Clea began jumping up and down on the spot waiving a hand over her head to get someones attention. Clea's... clone walked over, both Dani and I twisting our heads back and forth between the twins as though watching a tennis match.
"Yep. Heaven." Dani said, embarrassment now forgotten and emotions under control she was standing loosely by my side.
They exchanged a few quick words in french, the new girl looking at me with a sly smile and raised eyebrow as she listened to her sister. In short order the two walked over to continue the conversation.
"Bonjour, I am Lilou." She said in her melodic accent. Dani melted again.
I held out my hand to shake. "John, this is Daniela."
"It is a pleasure to meet you both. Clea mentioned you are both tiger cell, Draugr? And you are the Alpha yes?"
"Correct, yes."
"This is unusual for here no? It is common in the legion to have young leaders, but not so much here hmm?"
"Yes and no, I'm a blade, and there are only three of us Draugr at them moment." Two hot french sisters that are both reapers and former foreign legionnaires... my brain was about to explode.
"Oh I see, still very new then. What is a blade? You mean like a reaper sword? But you have no upgrades how can this be so?" She made a point of slowly examining my entire body, apparently looking for any cybernetics, of course reapers thought of them as upgrades. There was no mistaking her hungry eyes though.
"No, blade is slang here for special forces. Comes from the dagger in the SAS crest."
"Ah of course, it all makes sense." Lilou turned and updated her sister on the conversation so far in french.
They spoke quickly back and forward before Lilou again turned around, watching Dani and I carefully she smiled a winning smile.
"We would very much like to join your Draugr cell." She said hopefully with a quick nod.
"Well I gotta tell ya..." The twins hopeful expressions hardened, expecting the all to common refusal.
"... when two absolutely stunning french women..." They both looked at me oddly.
"Sisters." Daniela interrupted. "Hot twin sisters with sexy accents. And swords. And cybernetics. Don't forget the swords."
We all stopped at Daniela's interruption and turned to look at her, she wiggled her fingers loosely in an embarrassed wave.
"Okay let me start again."
Daniela nodded her head approvingly.
"Wait. You... think we are pretty? This is what you mean by hot, yes?" The confusion in her voice was evident. People didn't shy away because a reapers augments made them ugly, well not unless half their face was missing or something, which wasn't the case here. They became stand offish because of a perceived reputation of blood lust. I challenge anyone to go into a modern combat environment armed with only swords and come out the other side both alive and clean. Because of the stories doing the rounds and the misunderstandings that circulated because of them, people in general, civilians in particular, wanted absolutely nothing to do with reapers. Shunned by society in general they typically gave up on forming any sort of lasting bonds, let alone a relationship, at least one with anyone that wasn't themselves a reaper.
"Let me put it this way, Bri has a fire hose in her panties and I'm at half mast just from listening to you talk."
Daniela was slapping my arm repeatedly now trying to get me to shut up with her face completely beetroot red. Both Clea and Lilou looking at us with amused expressions, a little bit of confusion thrown in at my words for good measure.
"Australian's" Lilou commented quietly to her sister as though that explained everything, she nodded sagely in response.
"Lets grab some food, oh and welcome aboard."
"Ouais?" Clea asked uncertainly.
"Ouais!" Lilou answered with a little clap of her hands in excitement.
I guess loosing the OP wasn't going to be such a bad thing after all.
All it took to break the ice with the two new girls was holding out my elbow towards Clea as we walked to the dinner. Upon realising my intent she jerkily placed her arm through mine, but quickly relaxed when I pet her hand. She was stepping in closer and closer as we walked, becoming more familiar and returning my touching and gentle strokes the longer we walked. By the time we made it to the eatery, just a five minute walk away, she was tightly snuggled into my side, relishing the touch of another that wasn't afraid to give her the attention she had lacked for so long.
Daniela and Lilou had likewise walked side by side snuggling, Dani saw what I had done with Clea and quickly followed suit with Lilou. The french girls didn't leave our sides and maintained the lingering touches as much as possible at all times, even as we ate.
After lunch Daniela and I alternated between driving duties and... entertaining the french girls in the back seat of the hummer. Crass but true, no time for details the story has to move on man!
As Lilou had explained to me much later "It felt like being invited back to humanity." Some powerful words right there, and a good indicator of the lasting bonds that people can make with the simple act of being nice to each other. Oh and fucking. Don't forget the fucking.