UNCS Light of the Stars
2232-08-12
1730
Tyse Vinaro, player name Columbus, sat alone on the corner of the Six Guns bar, nursing his virtual alcoholic drink alone and watching the clock edge closer to the designated time. Sipping at his drink, he looked around as the once desolate bar started filling out with players coming in after a day of work. Players waiting for their friends to come before heading out, or were solos looking for anyone willing to party.
Listening in on the conversations, Tyse found himself disappointed to hear nothing interesting, just more of the usual raids, heading out deeper into the red zones and finding bigger and harder firefights along with better loot.
A firefight might get his blood pumping from the raw experience, but he always found more fulfillment in discovering what a devastated, post war world would look like. It was the setting, the puzzles and the lore that kept him coming back. He enjoyed finding out that the hulk he was sitting in had started off as a colony ship carrying tens of thousands of people in cryogenic sleep. From the materials it brought, it built an orbital factory. Even parts of its hull had been reprocessed for material. It was then converted into a mining and processing ship where it continued its duty, leaving for the mineral rich asteroid belt and coming back with holds brimming with metal stock to be further processed in the same factories it built.
It kept on its duty for a better part of a decade until war erupted between the corporation that claimed ownership of the planet and the people who worked and lived in it. The now old decrepit mining ship was then converted into another purpose. Guns were installed, sensor arrays once calibrated to detect rocks in space now tracked missiles hurtling towards the ship. Holds were retrofitted with missile bays, enough to overwhelm any capital ship that dared to come in close. Missiles that managed to pass through its impressive defense envelope would bear only little damage, as the thick hull built to withstand asteroid strikes was made thicker.
Once the ship that provided for everything the colony and its people needed, now stood between the faceless and formless entity that served humanity's oldest sin. Greed.
Tyse smiled wistfully at that. It reminded him of the many stories of resilience, creativity and human tenacity he read when he was but a child.
Now he felt that he was part of it.
Still, with all his research, he failed to glean more about the final days of the ship. Little was known about the prior events before the ship breached the planet's atmosphere and crashed in the middle of Vale city. A cursory glance from both the outside and the inside of the ship showed no catastrophic damage that might signify it taken out from a fight. The following crash debris also suggest that the ship entered the atmosphere at less than terminal velocity and very much intact leaving Tyse to only scratch his head.
His theory ranged from sabotage, to a successful boarding action forcing the captain to scuttle the ship. Even more vexing, Vale City contained the Corporate headquarters, why not land it near or in the middle of friendly territory. Still, a lot of his theories were founded heavily on suspicion due to his lack of credible sources. The logs of the ship were all gone, either erased or hidden.
What information he did find, was a court martial hearing concerning the ship's captain accusing him of transporting and using biological and viral weapons on the inhabitants of Vale, killing 90% of its population the hour following its crash.
It made little sense. the ship was a battle barge, slow and armored. Although its holds were fitted for as much ordnance it could carry, biological and viral weapons hold little utility in ship battles.
Looking back at the time, Tyse finished his beer and stood up from his seat at the corner, dodging groups of players as he headed out the bar.
Outside, he lowered his sniper's hood and looked at the floor as he walked down the halls. Eyes darting around the corridors, he watched the players walking by, making extreme care to not raise attention to himself and blend along with the other players.
He learned that shortly after fleeing Clade City, 200 Kilometers North of Vale, the SRT guild had place a bounty on his head following a disagreement and him breaking off a deal. Although far from the guilder’s influence, an affiliate or member might be able to find out who he is. Trading favors for prestige within the guild would be a far acceptable trade for a KOS status within the safe zone of the ship.
He still thought that putting a bounty was an overreaction following some hurt ego, but who was he to judge, he sometimes found it hard to understand people, even the closest to him.
As for the reason he broke off the deal, the limits and details of the deal between him and the SRT changed whenever they thought they could get away with it. It was old tactics. They were buying time, which is why Tyse broke off the deal the moment he realized he could just buy the support he needed all on his own. He would be in command, no favors owed, and there would be no strings attached.
It was a mistake approaching them with the possible questline. No doubt about it. Now, Tyse had to keep another problem in mind, and making sure that trying to track him down for it would be more trouble than its worth.
Arriving at the Armory, he entered to find the room filled with players lining up to buy guns, ammunition and whatever else they needed from the prickly Armorer standing on the others side of the counter.
One of the few advantages of building rapport with NPC’s was that they don’t exist in a vacuum, but is a part of a network. It was common knowledge but few have the patience to try and casually cultivate relations like him, allowing Tyse to get established in this new location with ease after a few choice letters of introductions from other NPCs he had higher relations with.
He raised his head and hood a fraction and the two exchanged looks. Waving his hand, Stoner sent him a signal telling him that his man is already inside, waiting in the range he reserved a few days prior.
Despite having a large pool of available players, his requirements of being a good shooter while having their level between 10 and 15 narrowed his choices significantly. There were of course, a flood of level 10 and 15 players willing to earn coin playing the game, but no reputable mercenary would risk vouching for anyone whose skill they didn't trust completely. In a game where paranoia and betrayal was the norm, the value of someone's word held very little. But on the other end, businesses and players who held the reputation of never breaking theirs would never risk anything that would put that reputation into question.
In looking for his mercenaries, Tyse used an intermediary to make sure that his name was never dropped. It reduced the chance of being tracked and minimize the chance of hiring a SRT guilder or affiliate. Otherwise, he could just inadvertently lead the clan to the location they wanted and earn him a bullet to the back of the head after a job well done.
In the end, he managed to get 3 players fitting his niche requirements interested. It cost Tyse a little sum, more than what he had allocated. Either way, he could afford it, and the price was still within reasonable range. Years, decades ago, he wouldn't have even spent a second to refuse spending money on a game, but what's the use of wealth if it was not spent? He asked himself this question more and more as he got older. Gone was the time when he had to scrimp and scrape to save money. His family was more than provided for, it wouldn't be irresponsible for him to keep some money aside to spend on frivolous things.
Taking a deep breath, Tyse headed to the range, where he found two people. Both stood with their backs to him. It was a man and a woman, the woman had a small rifle, AK style, fitted with a suppressor and a sight, hanging off her back with her belts lined with magazines for the rifle. As for the other man, the gear he wore made him look just about to head outside. He wore a plate carrier filled with magazines, a full set of camouflage gear but instead of a helmet, he wore a ball cap with an electronic headset. As Tyse approached, the two swung to face him where he could see a more contemporary, but still antique, rifle, held in his hand. An MDR, Tyse guessed, remembering seeing it when he was a kid and in the movies.
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Tyse caught the man as he looked at his hands, his eyes, then to the rest of his gear as he approached. It reminded him of the many bodyguards he saw work, making him only wonder for a second why the man was so thin.
"Can we help you?" He asked.
"Don't worry. Its me."
"Sorry. That's not how it works."
Tyse sighed, opening his messages, he felt like he was in some cheesy spy movie. He pulled the code up and muttered a string of random letters, and numbers. The two then said their own codes completing the handshake protocol and making sure that everyone present was exactly who they say they were.
"I was expecting three people to be present." Tyse muttered, looking around.
The two looked at each other. “Just the two of us here.”
“Well then.” Tyse said, looking down at his list, “Just to confirm. You’re Hartdegen?” he asked, the name coming from one of his sources, FirstChild, fixer, mercenary, well liked and respected in the circles he ran in.
“Yeah.”
“Then I assume you’re Ylenka?”
“That’s correct.”
“I see. It seems that there was some kind of mistake, I’ll be back shortly.” Tyse said, and headed back out. It seems like Stoner’s man was not present, albeit he is willing to wait, but not too long.
“Stoner." Tyse said, cutting the line. "You said your agent is waiting inside, but I only found two."
“He's right there. Saw him walk in. The guy with the shiny new MDR.” Stoner said, waving for the first playing in line to wait. "Name's Hartdegen, last I remembered."
“I see." What a waste, the same man using two slots. Tyse sighed. "Can I ask how you decided to recommend him?"
"I told him to impress me. But he did more than that." Stoner grinned, "Make him shoot and you'll see."
Tyse nodded, "turns out that there was simply a misunderstanding. Thank you for clearing it out."
Back at the range, Tyse found the two waiting for him. Ylenka was making final checks on her rifle while Marcus was checking his vest pouches with magazines, a lit cigarette dangling on his lip. Noticing that Tyse was back, Hartdegen looked up and nodded.
"Aren't you going to check your rifle?" Tyse asked, seeing as Hartdegen didn't seem interested in checking his.
"Already did." Hartdegen replied, "It's ready to go."
"Well then. The both of you fit the niche requirements I needed, but the reason I had you two gather up here is that I only needed one to come with me."
"Figured as much." Ylenka said.
Tyse nodded. "I have set up a course taking in mind the best approximation of the location we would be heading. Each will be given a two runs at each course with best scores tallied. Please know that having the highest score will not assure you the position as I will be observing and would be the final judge of who to choose. I hope you two understand?"
The two nodded.
"well then, who will go first?" He asked to which Ylenka glanced at Hartdegen and gave him a look. He sighed, raising his hand to volunteer.
"can I at least get to walk it first?" Hartdegen asked and Tyse nodded.
"Fair enough."
Up on the catwalk overlooking the course, Tyse and Ylenka stood by the panels allowing him to control the range. He watched, and wondered what Hartdegen was thinking. Professionals in their fields usually have parts of their work seep into their daily lives, like how bodyguards look at the hands first, ship captains having fuel levels pulled up in one screen while having the current market price in another, all the while, trawling through the web finding or bidding for their next contract. For Tyse, it was being able to estimate how much cargo would cost getting from Mars to Earth from a single look. He would then follow it up with what else he could cram in the hold to get as much out of a single trip as possible. but as he retired, his thoughts soon went on looking to the past. He sighed, running his hands along the railings, he whispered. "Such a shame, old girl. I'll find out what happened to you."
Hartdegen finished his walk and headed back to the start. He stood by the button, testing his gear to check for any snags and practiced a couple times on shouldering his gun. Done, he gave Tyse a wave to which he nodded. Squaring up, Hartdegen punched the button, his posture hunched slightly and looking forward, with his rifle held low.
Range courses usually start with a beep and a target popping up ahead, Tyse didn’t thought to do it any other way, but the difference between the ranges was that his setup had tighter tunnels, low ceilings and most important of all.
Darkness.
Tyse smiled as the lights shut off with a loud mechanical click. Red light turned on above them, providing enough illumination for Tyse to reach up and lowered a screen. It showed a view of the range in the green filtered glow of night vision. Through it Tyse could see Hartdegen below, still hunched and looking intently forward when the buzzer beeped followed by targets clanking into position.
It was fast, Tyse watched Hartdegen raise his rifle and turned on his weapon light, hitting the first target twice in the center mass and taking it down. Despite having no night vision device, Hartdegen didn't seem to be bothered by the darkness as he simply sprinted forward towards the next corner and peeked around. He then flicked his light for a second before taking down the target standing in the middle of the narrow hallway. Another target popped back, peeking around the corner on the other side of the hall. A couple of shots and the target fell down.
“Two targets down in five seconds. Three in seven.” Ylenka muttered beside him. She then chuckled to which grew to an amused laugh, enough to be distracting.
The hallway ahead was long and tight, Hartdegen then peeled out of the corner and shuffled forward, rifle still on his shoulder. Unbothered by the lack of light, Tyse watched as he stuck to one side of the hall and switched to the other, randomly flicking his light for a second before turning it back off.
“What’s so funny?” Tyse asked.
“That I actually thought that I could take him, hustle him out of some credits since he looked to be some chump poser since there’s no way the ranker was level 10. Turns out it was the other way around.” She said, just as Hartdegen entered a room and multiple targets popped out from the ground one second after the other, simulating an ambush. Unperturbed, Tyse simply watched Hartgeten as he calmly pulled up, lights on as he always did and transitioned between targets all after taking them down.
“I guess this is what top 2 rifleman in the region is like.” Ylenka chuckled looking over to Tyse. “I’m not going to waste your time to try and convince you that I can do that.”
“I think you’re mistaken. The top 2 in the leaderboards is Vector.”
“The top spot in the range has just been moved, Vector is third place now. Youre looking at the second.” Ylenka chuckled. “Anyway. I concede, I know when I’m beat. But Don’t tell him that, it would be nice if you have him run the course one more time. I’m sure he won’t mind.”
Glancing at Ylenka, Tyse pulled up the leaderboards to confirm
Rifle Leaderboards: UNCS Light of the Stars Player: Time: 1. Killswitch 4:24.25s 2. Hartdegen 4.26.01s 3. Vector 4.26.92s 4. Noobs4BrekFast 4.28.01s ...
“I see.” he muttered, looking up at Hartdegen in a new light as he continued down the course and finished with little misses and times faster than he initially thought, coming out at 5:41s after all the penalties and misses. Tyse had little idea if it was good but still breathed a sigh of relief as this step of the plan was looking bright. “I’m going to make him run again, in exchange, I need you to do commentary when you can.” He said as the lights turned back on.
“Sure.” Ylenka replied.
“Run it back! Second run!” Tyse yelled. Hartdegen nodded from below, raising a thumbs up, and walked back to the start of the course. As he walked back, Tyse watched him check his mag, put it into a dump pouch on his waist and rearranged his mags, pulling from his rightmost pouches and putting them to the leftmost ones. Back at the start, he then reached over to his dump pouches and laid all his partial and empty magazines atop, before walking back to the start.
Hartdegen hit the button, turning the range back into darkness. Tyse looked towards Ylenka, who started commenting.
“Unlike the first run, he's using high ready. I prefer it low. You know, stock pressed against my shoulder, barrel pointed down. That way, the gun wouldn’t be blocking my vision and I could just swing it up and line up the sights. But its simple preference since running at the low ready can have you kicking the barrel of your gun if its long enough. Keeping it at the high ready keeps it out of the way.” She said as the range reset, drowning them in darkness once again. Down below, Hartdegen snapped the rifle on his shoulder and tapped the target ahead of him.
Tyse listened as Yelenka continued on her commentary. He never knew there could be more nuances in shooting. All he knew was simply do your best to keep the sights aligned, shoot and hope for the best. With it, he looked at Hartdegen in a new light and wondered for his background. Maybe he could ask, being his prospective employer, but doubted whether it would be answered.
Somehow, despite Ylenka backing off on the last minute, he was feeling confident keeping Hartdegen on his payroll for the coming operation.