If there was something akin to a well-established rule of the True Reality, it was that Revenant just couldn’t catch a break. Establishing a routine? Nope. Getting some time to focus on his own emotional development? Lol no.
Something, inevitably, had to blow up and force them to improvise or at least respond to said explosion.
In this particular case, it’s because their scouts found a corpse. One that was slightly out of place.
***
“Leaving Ball Python to come check on corpses is starting to become a routine thing.” Revenant comments as they are heading towards the site. One of the scouts is leading them there. The rest of the group is composed of himself, Revenant, Lieutenant Colonel Palmer and Humility.
Once again, a standard corpse investigation team. He’ll involve Overhaul if they need an autopsy.
Revenant is accompanied by two of his praetorians of course. He refuses to leave Ball Python without them, he knows well enough how squishy he is in the end. No amount of skills can save you if you get shot before you can use them, and for all his abilities, he doesn’t have another set of eyes behind his head.
He has people to be his eyes instead.
“I’m not even going to guess how many corpses have to be scattered throughout this piece of shit maze.” Palmer comments. Revenant can’t help but agree. Millions by now, probably. And that’s if you only count the citizens of New Springfield.
After their brief encounter with the Truthseekers Corporation, Revenant can only wonder how many of those corpses still walk.
“Yeah, and we still didn’t find any good route going upward.” Revenant replies, before sighing painfully. “I’m almost of the mind to just start digging up. We have the abilities to do that.”
Palmer glances back at him.
“That’s a big asset, but if we try to dig up blindly, we might end up encountering things or people that we probably shouldn’t run into.” The soldier replies. Huh. Things? How curious, Revenant thought that most of the scary things were state secrets… unless he speaks of aliens.
“That’s why I’m almost of the mind.” Revenant replies. “I consider this the worst case scenario. The sort of things that we would engage in if, say, the transhumans found us and we needed a way out of the siege.”
Hopefully none of that would happen. They set up a lot of traps and at least some comm relays around to be able to contact the frigate garrisons real time, which was a big help, but…
Transhumans would walk through it, just slower. They just don’t have enough firepower to hold against it.
“Makes sense.” Palmer nods. That asshole is totally testing him, isn’t he? Worst of all, he can’t have an issue with that because it’s the perfectly logical thing to do. Revenant would have done the same in his place.
Humility says nothing, that damn traitor.
They reach the corpse five minutes later. Virtue is standing by it, wearing a modern combat armor in the colors of her old hero uniform that she pillaged off the pirates and had repainted.
No helmet. Officially. Who the hell installs optical camouflage in helmets just to make them invisible so that people can clash with their heads outwardly exposed? For no other clear reason than aesthetics?
Modern Mankind. Wow, those guys are insane.
The rest of the armor is too heavy and large to bother with proper optical camouflage, it's combat armor not a stealth suit.
She’s the only person waiting for them here.
The corpse is that of a woman, judging by the shape. She is lying on the floor by the wall, in a pool of blood. Seems to be mostly fresh, dead maybe for a day, in an environment that’s far from wet and warm.
Death by a single slash to the chest. Deep. Revenant had already seen such cuts. Someone had a run-in with their friendly knight, and the knight didn’t like them.
To be honest, seeing the large svastika proudly emblazoned on the corpse’s shoulderguard, Revenant can only endorse that fact. For some reason he doesn’t feel like it was used here as the Buddhist symbol.
It might be the all-black bodysuit worn under the nearly all-black light body armor. All black and svastika? Yep, Buddhists. No doubt about it.
There is an assault rifle lying quite close to the corpse. It’s slashed nearly in half, it seems that its owner tried to use it to parry the knight’s blade. Unsuccessfully. On a sidenote, Revenant’s approximation of the threat level of the knight is raised further - as it seems that the rifle was destroyed by the same slice that killed the soldier.
That was some terrifying cutting strength. Very damn nearly to Black Knight’s level. And that man had a superpower to act as an explanation for how kickass he was.
“Deep reconnaissance unit of the Reich.” Palmer comments while kneeling in front of the corpse for a better look. He then glances at Virtue “You found the other two?”
“Only a trail of blood.” Virtue responds. “One of them was injured. Since there was a lot of blood, the corporal decided to go after them, just carefully and not far. They’ll continue on for half an hour and, if they don’t find the guy, they’ll go back.”
In Revenant’s opinion, taking Virtue with them offered them enough firepower to eliminate the enemy efficiently and without risking anyone’s death. Not a lot of trust between both sides, regardless of their past history together.
Irritating, but understandable.
“Our knightly friend is good.” Humility comments, the AI standing slightly awkwardly. “Got them into a trap, slew one, shot another one and then probably pursued the third one, planning to come back after the second if they didn’t bleed out on their own, once they’re done.”
Sounds like the deep reconnaissance unit comes in thirds. Makes sense. If they are attacked by overwhelming force, one of them stays behind, the other two flee on different routes to deliver the warning to the main force.
Or, if possible, all three flee on different routes, making sure that the enemy can’t intercept them all.
Or, at least, that’s how it sounds to him.
“The real problem we have right now…” Palmer replies, with a worried frown on his face. “... is that those guys are typically attachments on at least division level. Even if we’re facing a part of it, it might be… nasty.”
“So, what’s their threat designation, again?” Revenant decides to comment. He realizes the mistake immediately, as Humility and Palmer look at him in an instant.
“They don’t have any.” Palmer says, his voice suddenly sounding… vaguely hostile. And very suspicious. The man squints at Revenant. “They’re an ethnopolity.”
Virtue stops leaning back on the wall behind Palmer, glancing at Revenant nervously before clearly getting ready to jump at Palmer’s back if things go bad.
Oh, well, that’s just spectacular. Revenant just tripped over the dumbest thing possible - namely severely overestimating the common human decency of the Confederation by believing that the modern iteration of Nazis must be a fringe space threat.
Thankfully Revenant isn’t easily flustered.
“Do you seriously believe…” Revenant looks at him calmly, but with a faint smirk visible on his face once you focus on it. “... that's how it should be?”
The tension in the air seems to have lessened down a little.
“Fair, they should have been kicked out long ago.” The officer admits while standing up from the corpse. “You should work on your emotional expressions, I thought you were serious for a moment.”
If they were characters in a comedy film, he would be contractually obligated to respond to that with nervous laughter. However, this would end with Virtue having to stab Palmer to death before he could draw his weapon and shoot Revenant. So… let’s stick to poker face.
“I know.” Revenant nods faintly. “On the other hand, once you get to know me, the lack of expressions while speaking funny things make them additionally funny. Except, my humor is sometimes odd. Just wait until you see me refer to our favorite transhuman as ‘Humility’, because it clearly has a superiority complex, we all know how many people transhumans killed, and I find it hilarious. ”
Palmer glances at Humility (who does exactly nothing, merely standing there, probably in shock), before his face returns to Revenant.
“You have a fucked up sense of humour.” Lieutenant Colonel judges. “But that one wasn’t half-bad.”
It’s perhaps best to make sure that any potential slips of the tongue concerning Humility will be taken as racist joke towards the transhumans. This way, the chances of them all being murdered over it are significantly lessened.
It’s bad enough that Palmer’s already suspecting them even more than he used to.
***
The corporal and her men return a few minutes later. They didn’t find the corpse, instead the blood trail ended rapidly. The Reich’s scout must have realized that the knight was pursuing their colleague, and quickly patched their wounds to not bleed out and make it harder for the attacker to track them.
They agreed to have the corpse carried back to Ball Python, in order for Humility to see if it can salvage any interesting data from the computer in the woman’s armor.
Palmer stayed behind with Virtue and his soldiers; they decided to keep looking for the injured scout, just in case he or she were still pretty close. Which was unlikely, but… they should be alright even if they were.
“That was…” Humility speaks once they are in a safe distance from Palmer’s group, with only the two praetorians accompanying them. “... close.”
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“Tell me something I don’t know.” Revenant replies, before sighing. “That was way too close. I managed to backtrack out of it and turn it into a joke, but even pretending to be a goofball with a weird sense of humor won’t work for a long time if that happens again.”
“Permissions to speak, boss.” One of his praetorians speaks up suddenly. The supervillain glances at the man before nodding. “We still suspect Palmer of being more than he claims to be, right?”
Mauricio Menendez, Revenant remembers all of their names (and more). Came from the ATF’s Special Response Team. Was yet to shoot any dog, at least while in Revenant’s employ.
“Yes.” Revenant replies. “Any additional evidence to support that idea?”
“He all but called you out on your lies.” Menendez replies. “While alone with you, Virtue, the AI and the two of us. In a situation where we could all gang up on him and then make some tear-inducing story about something killing him before we bravely repelled the attack. He’s either insane or thinks that he could fight us all off and get back to Ball Python to sound the alarm and gang up on the rest of us with the local civvies.”
“And that’s… a fair point.” Revenant admits. Hey, his bodyguards are fucking skillful in what they are doing, he’d be a dumbass to not listen to their opinions. “And he immediately knew that the Reich’s deep recon units operate in threes.” He glances at Humility for confirmation.
“Correct.” Humility promptly delivers it. “There is a high chance that Palmer is a spec ops member, and certainly not one native to New Springfield. If I were to risk a thesis, a veteran operative from a major APD country that picked a small and peaceful ethnopolity as his retirement place.” Wow, bad luck mate. “The chances of him carrying a significant amount of cyberware or bioware implants are high.”
Fucking great. Sounds like Clockmaker but with a military background instead of mad scientist one. Pain in the ass, no matter how you look at it.
“No way of easily detecting those?” Revenant asks. “No magical scanning technology that we can use to see that he has more metal inside than a Skynet Terminator?”
“Military-grade cyberware isn’t supposed to be easily detected.” Humility replies. “If there were ways of easily picking it up from a distance, someone would find a way to make a weapon that could be automatically guided towards them. Not to mention some large-scale detection measures picking up their ‘energy signatures’ or something equally vague, making all attempts at ambush or sneaking around pointless. Help me grab an appropriate tool and touch him with it without him noticing, and then I can tell you if he has cyberware enhancements.”
The AI doesn’t have to mention the fact that if he actually had cybernetic enhancements, the chances of fooling him enough to do that quietly were pretty much close to zero unless they have just the right individuality at their disposal.
“And if he has bioware implants?” Revenant asks.
“Those are even harder to detect.” Humility replies. “I can tell you that something’s odd with his body if I get some samples of his blood, urine or feces, although not much more than a rough ‘yes or no’ based on the presence of foreign substances.”
Well, that’s just spectacular. What were the chances of Palmer showing up for periodic medical checks and Overhaul getting a proper read on him? Low. That guy was cautious and clearly suspected them of foul play already.
Another batch of the VAA elite mooks was about to get unleashed upon the world. Mostly because Revenant needed someone to guard the new resurrection chamber. Seven trained combatants, although of slightly lower caliber than those he handpicked for his own security detail.
Most of them are still from the special ops. Alternatively, the best of the regular soldiers of the People’s Liberation Front that got through special training to more or less measure up to were from the special ops units. They were very good, just not the best of the best.
Unfortunately, there was one big problem about it. One that became apparent right now. Namely, Lieutenant Colonel Palmer.
Placing permanent guards in and around the resurrection chamber will be a big flashing sign that there’s something important to be defended there. And if Palmer is an infiltration specialist?
Ball Python was about one kilometer long and one hundred meters wide. A big ship, as far as ships went. It wasn’t a dedicated warship - pretty much a flying can, designed to withstand the stress of its own acceleration and environmental damages that one can expect in space (like, say, micro-asteroids).
It wasn’t a warship where the majority of the hull space was taken by multiple layers of armors interspersed with impact dampeners and laser-reflecting materials, supposed to protect the crew even when the ship was hit by something with impact strength measurable in kilotons of TNT (or megatones, once you were talking about capital ships).
Ball Python had a lot of space. One kilometer long and one hundred meters wide labyrinth of corridors and rooms… with only god (and Humility after getting acquainted with the technical data of the ship after killing one of Lucifer’s kiddos that was the ship’s AI) knowing how many utility shafts, maintenance corridors and vents.
Multiply by five, because the ship had five decks. Two lowest were cargo decks, now mostly taken over by the civies. There were enough empty transport containers (pirates never got to fill them with stolen goods) to give everyone a reasonable measure of privacy, the only problems were bathrooms but they already dealt with it.
Revenant didn’t ask.
Officially it was a Hangar Deck (I) and Cargo Deck (II), but they were both full of containers and they had no usage for the hangar as there was nothing but a maze wall on the other side of it.
Above those two was the Engineering Deck (III), which included the ship's main reactor, engines, and a lot of area for maintenance of stuff and a small factory that could actually produce new things (like spare parts) in case of crisis.
Then, Enviro Deck (IV). Medical bay, life support, aeroponics section. Everything you needed to keep the place livable. Water recycling and oxygen production were done there, too.
Final segment of the ship was the Command Deck (V). Bridge, all the places where officers worked. Yes, there was a place left for the ship’s equivalent of accounting. Also, Commodore Veenstra’s alcohol cellar.
Each deck had its own separate quarters and mess halls. A big waste of space, then again, the ship’s interior was large enough that it wasn’t a problem. However, doing it like that made additional sense.
If a large explosion or other malfunction, say, caused decompression of one of the decks and left the ship drifting uncontrollably in space, you were going to lose ⅕ of your amenities and food supply. Losing the enviro section that way would still be a death sentence, but…
Redundancies were the key to success, it seems.
Revenant & Co seized the Command Deck for themselves. It was nice. Comfortable. Partially luxurious even. But… There were maintenance corridors, utility shafts and vents that connected it with Enviro Deck.
According to Humility, if you knew the design of this place, you could get from the Hangar Deck to the Command Deck without leaving those. And while cameras were there too, it was still… risky.
To summarize the description of Ball Python - way too many entrances to Command Deck to keep guard on them all. Even if they sealed some of them (and they did), it wasn’t going to be enough.
Palmer, if he really wanted and prepared it for a while, could get in and do his own investigation. The sort that would help him discover that the things weren’t as Revenant and his ‘mercenaries’ claimed them to be.
The mysterious knight was at least more or less deterred by having to get through a tightly guarded entrance. The one and only truly defensible chokepoint (which made sense as civilian ships weren’t exactly designed to resist a boarding attempt).
Revenant remembers how quickly the pirates fell when he broke through it. Even with AI/LUCIFER descendant trying to use the environment against them, it simply wasn’t enough to deter a group that managed to surprise the defenders so well.
Fucking pain in the ass.
“So, the Nazis are still around?” He decides to change the subject for a moment. He’d like to say ‘to a more pleasant’ but… there isn’t a lot of pleasantness in this.
“Regretfully.” Humility replies. And it’s the ‘Slaughterer of Billions’ speaking. “Like a lot of other mistaken ideologies, kept alive by one or two ethnopolities. Pact of Steel is an ethnoalliance where all the ethnopolities that no one else wanted to ally with gathered up. The Galaxy’s Designated Bad Guys, with way more assets and firepower than all the BANDITs combined.”
Sounds absolutely great. Revenant can’t help but groan painfully. Hey, he might be a war criminal, but he draws a line at genocide. There is a very big difference between shelling a hospital or two and killing millions of civilians for ideology.
“Wait, didn’t you mention that there were fascists working for Destro?” Humility realizes something. “And then, through the PLF, for you?”
“Don’t compare General Ripper to those guys, especially when Old Man Rippy’ will be around.” Revenant decides to prevent future murder attempts. “He is an African American, to begin with, I don’t think those guys would like him. Also, do you want to know what was the first thing he did after seizing control of the Fascist Party?”
“Skin a child alive as a bonding activity?” Humility asks back. Wow, Pact of Steel has to be composed of horrifyingly nice people for the AI to default to that.
“Killed every member of its leadership that ever said a single nice word about Hauser or Delacroix.” Revenant replies. He could say Hitler, but let’s be real. Even the Iron Pact’s propaganda mostly omitted that guy. He failed to seize the Western Europe, he failed to capture Great Britain, and his empire fell in a few years under the burden of its own failures. You, regretfully, couldn’t say the same thing about Karl Hauser and Eugene Delacroix. “Because he is more of a hyper-militant American nationalist who thinks that democracy is weak, young people of our times are effeminate and we need to establish dictatorship so that we can focus all our strength on kicking the Iron Pact and the Union of Progress and Freedom down the stairs.”
His dragon, Demonologue, was a bit more complicated. Then again, his individuality literally made him demon-like. Really not the most favorite person of both Thorn and Virtue. To be honest, Revenant didn’t like him either.
“Sounds dumb.” Humility comments. Yep, Revenant doesn’t disagree with that. Abolishing democracy to conquer the bad guys? He fails to see the point of becoming someone to defeat someone.
In a twisted way, if taken out of context, it does make him a hypocrite.
“Sure, sure, but the point is, I might be a villain but I have to draw a line somewhere.” Revenant admits. “If you want someone who doesn’t mind those guys, ask Archvile. One of the Villain Academy graduates had a villain name starting with ‘holo’, and since his individuality was about generating poison gas, I guarantee you that the rest of the word wasn’t ‘gram’.”
Humility keeps walking in silence, while turning its face plate towards him. How is he supposed to explain that Sanguine Pact was a trade guild equivalent for mass murderers and serial killers? No one there was even remotely sane. Although they were pretty useful.
You just needed to scratch them in the correct place and they would go on a rampage right when you needed it, completely unaware of the fact that you forgot to prepare them an exit strategy.
Killing two things with one stone and so on. Revenant had a long list of people that were completely expendable, a slightly shorter list of people that were scheduled to die in a way benefitting his plans and a very short list of people that he wanted to preserve at even a high cost.
“So… we’re picking the hostile option?” Humility asks back, clearly looking for clarification.
Revenant suddenly realizes that for those guys to be somewhere around, Visitor must have read them as bad guys. Completely ignoring the fact that they were an ethnopolity.
Based Visitor? He can expect Decay to say it that way. His wife was a mutant, those weren’t exactly super loved by bigots. It’s as much of a berserk button to him as what Revenant has when Onslaught’s involved.
For personal reasons, not because of some heroic motivations.
“Unless I find a way to manipulate them into, say, engaging the transhumans for us?” Revenant replies. “Yes. I’d prefer them to not find us, so I can’t help but hope that the knight wiped all three recon troopers before they got back to the main force and the Reich’s group’s too busy to send more people to investigate. Unless you have another opinion? I don’t know a lot about them aside from the historical baggage.”
“Not really, no.” Humility replies. “I told you that I’m a scientist more than a commander, I’m letting you choose the course of action, accepting my role as an advisor. I just wanted to mention that attacking Confederation citizens while not being legally a part of Confederation is tantamount to announcing your hostility to it and will warrant treating you as a new branch of BANDIT.”
God fucking dammit.
“Don’t worry though.” Humility continues. “Since it’s those guys, even if you attack them all, you can expect the representatives of at least several ethnoalliances to support you in the court simply out of spite for the Pact of Steel. The entire Pact is a collection of all the worst of the worst that Mankind has to offer. This doesn’t make you popular. They just have a bit too many guns to be kicked out.”
How reassuring.
“I hope that you’ll find out how many guns we’re dealing with right now and how far they are.” Revenant comments. “Because we need that intel before we decide what to do next.”
Sooner or later they’ll need to move upward. Except, where to? They need a defensible location at the end of the road, something that they can capture and hold while moving their stuff to after abandoning Ball Python.