Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Ennik was still pretty mortified. It wasn’t that the end result wasn’t effective—the eight mercs lying in ambush were dead, and it only cost two grenades—but his grenade and the ensuing fireball had nearly killed them all. Still, feeling a little sheepish about that was better than the feelings he was ignoring. The bodies were charred, blackened and smelled the way burned bodies always smelled. It brought back too many memories. The way Delacroix was moving told Ennik that he wasn’t the only one.

Baja. It always came back to Baja…

After setting up the demolition charges for the stairs, Ennik joined up with the rest of the group in the mine’s main tunnel. Delacroix was finishing up tamping the charges to blow the tunnel. The charges struck Ennik as a good plan, if a little overly paranoid. Mind you, this all revolved around the Bear, and the CEF. And they had already ran into four Mordred GRELs. There was no such thing as paranoia.…

The face on the trideo display was all wrong. It looked exactly like Ekaterina’s. Ti Coravan had told him that along with Elizabeth, Kat had survived the camp. But it couldn’t be Kat. She wasn’t caught up in all this Abacus–Tantalus stuff. She couldn’t be. Then again, Elizabeth had been subjected to all sorts of medical experimentation. Maybe Kat… the thought brought the taste of bile to Ennik’s mouth. This was one hell of a reunion. He needed a smoke. He needed a drink. He needed to say something, anything, to the trideo display of his long-lost sister.

“Hey Kat, how’ve you been?”

“Hey Kat, it’s me, your little brother, Ennik.”

“Hey Kat, you look good for a woman who I thought was shot to death by the CEF.”

He couldn’t say a word. He had nothing to say, and he was shaking with emotion. Ennik knew that Ekaterina Kazzov was working for the Bear. He didn’t know for what. And he knew that she had seen him via that trideo conversation. She didn’t even have the decency to acknowledge him…

“So, that was my sister, Kat.” Ennik coughed up the dust and soot from the mine.

“What?!” Lyta spat.

Ennik staggered over to Pig Pen. The gear’s sensor eye flashed in recognition, and he slowly clambered up into the gear’s open cockpit. The comm channel was coming alive.

“We have twelve contacts, in-bound.”

“Twelve? Those aren’t terrible odds.” Delacroix’s voice was devoid of irony.

Ennik strapped himself in and Pig Pen gave him a tactical sit-rep. He nodded to himself, cigarette still between his teeth. He allowed himself a small smile. His whole world was set on its head. He knew he eventually would have to face down his older sister, one of only two of his six siblings to survive the War. He knew that she was working with the Bear. He knew that it was going to get much, much harder. But that was ok. Kat was working for the CEF, and if there was one thing Ennik knew how to do, it was fight the CEF.


Heavy Gear Roleplaying Game

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Hermes 72 - Heavy Gear RPG - Most artwork Copyright 2002 Dream Pod 9, Inc.