Wordslingin'

More gunfights! More intrigue! More... swamps? It must be Heavy Gear!

[Josh the GM has been trying to come up with a way to get Gade out of the action for a while, since his player has left the game due to the birth of his child. For now, he's sending Gade to another nearby city, despite the PCs' protests.]
Brock: "I find this all very convenient."

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Contemplation on a knife's edge.

The sound of his alarm pierced through the veil of sleep and pried his eyes open; another bad day’s sleep. He was relieved they wouldn’t be staying in the besieged capital much longer; he needn’t adjust his circadian rhythm to living by night. Rising from bed, he winced as the fresh wound pulled against his bandages. Shot three times in two days, a new record. After his so-called morning rituals, including tending to his injuries, he headed out in to the night to find Basal waking to another day of benighted activity.

He meandered through the foreign quarter until he came to a souq. He ate a fresh sweetened meat-filled bun while he looked at the wares for sale. After 4 cycles of war, there were precious few luxuries but one stall peddling various cutlery and weapons caught his eye. Bartering is an art, one he was rather adept at. There are various steps to the process, but there are also techniques; one is switching to the sellers language for the home stretch, it throws them off and expedites the process. He got the items he wanted for a good price.

Once he had returned to his room, he lit a few candles and unwrapped his purchase. He drew out a blade and let the feeble light of the room reflect off its surface. His mind's eye remembered the candles, the hushed silence, and the vaulted gloom of the mosque in the Badlands quarter of Peace River.

His blade glinted as it emerged from the niche and found his victim’s throat. The SRID agent was calm and honest, he told the Doc that only death would stop him from tracking him down; the choice was a simple one. Since then he had killed a lot of men and women, usually through the crosshairs of a scope. But the first one, the first person he ever killed was especially intimate, a knife to the jugular. They say your first is always special.

The push-blades fit snugly in his palms; he roasted them over the candle’s flame, letting the soot darken the reflective steel. His thoughts also darkened, for a trauma surgeon, the Battle of Baja was bad, but the last two cycles in the jungles of the ESE had been worse. Oddly, it had never bothered him. In fact, quite the reverse. His detachment upset him; he wanted to feel pain and suffering so much it made him sick.

As a physician he knew there were mental disorders which explained a lack of empathy or remorse. But he didn’t meet the diagnosis for antisocial personality disorder, he wasn’t a psychopath.

He turned the blades over and over. In his mind he did the same with his notions of good and evil, wrong and right, guilt and remorse. He felt some of these things, he wasn’t emotionally despondent, but he didn’t feel them like others did. He felt guilt when life was lost to no avail, remorse when death purchased no greater goal.

He came to the conclusion that for him, life and death were commodities to be traded. He could kill without feeling if it served his larger purpose. His actions occurred in a moral vacuum, only the results mattered. He wasn’t a psychopath or a sociopath, but he was functionally callous. Still, there had to be a first time and he had never killed anyone until the mosque in Peace River, until he met Kain Delacroix.

The moral standards of society, even one warped by the trauma of the War of the Alliance, taught him murder was wrong. Delacroix showed him that killing wasn’t always murder.

Killing could be used as a tool, a means to an end. But he wouldn’t use it as a blunt instrument; he had been schooled in surgical precision. Once he was committed to a goal, he would do what was necessary to attain it, but only just what was necessary. He reflected on the tools he used, his sniper rifle, his pistol and his knives: Efficient and precise.

He had killed a lot of people in his life, too many to count – admittedly though, in his most morose state he had tried. And every time Delacroix was there: an effigy for the morally treacherous belief in killing for a cause. There was, however, one number he couldn’t forget: 358. The victims of Lance Point had not perished at the point of his knife or in the reticle of his sights, they fell prey to the sweeping ravages of his ideals.

He could feel those deaths; there was no clinical dispassion about the cost he had paid for NuCoal. In many ways those deaths were different from all the rest but for some reason he could only think of one: that was the only time Kain Delacroix showed moral outrage.

He slid the dark blades back into their sheaths, and his memories and contemplations back into the corner of his mind. He strapped them under his wrists and pulled down his shirt sleeve in concealment. In a fight he could pull them out quickly and deliver a lethal blow instantaneously, without pause for deliberation or doubt. Efficient and precise, as killing should be.

Righteous Peregrination

The barnabus iguana farted loudly. Brother Herbertson coughed, but didn't retch, as the warm blast of gas hit him full in the face. He knew it was never wise to hitch a wagon to a barnaby, but the pack animal was all he had available. He had gotten used to the smells and sounds the animal made, though he worried about the supplies in the wagon.

He chuckled.

Basal's night time activity never ceased to amaze him. The ruined city actually achieved some semblance of normalcy nocturnally. Merchants hawked their wares--what little they had--people congregated in bars and drank what passed for rotgut and beer, and repair workers tried their best to deal with whatever damage the previous day's shelling had done. The lizard-drawn wagon trundled past the ruins of a slum block. Brother Herbertson watched as survivors helped guide a Ground Hog work gear remove debris. Dead bodies, charred and broken, were piled up nearby.

He sighed.

Four cycles of guerilla seige warfare: most of the city-state had been destroyed many times over. Battles were hard fought in the clausterphobic ruins of a once proud city: a Basalite excursion would execute a raid via the Undercity; MILICIA or Emirate troops would retaliate with shelling, or a sniper would be ordered to pick off civilians. The lines were ever-shifting, and the seige never-ending. Brother Herbertson marvelled at the tenacity of the residents of Basal. Baja had been this bloody, but it hadn't lasted four cycles.

Baja. Brother Herbertson thought back to the Revisionist mission he led back then. It was his first posting outside of the Norlight Confederacy, and he took to the task of administering aid to the needy of of the ruined city with a steady zeal. When the Bajans moved underground, he knew his work there was done.

The wagon jostled as a wheel hit a small crater, knocking Brother Herbertson out of his reminiscing. Why was he thinking about Baja anyways? It was so long ago. 18 cycles since he first set foot in that hellhole. He began unloading what meager supplies he had scrounged for the mission. Then he found time for a short prayer for the dead he had seen on his brief excursion. His prayer beads still gave him comfort, even in the squalor of the mission. He looked around at the tired, dirty faces of the children, the bandaged wounded, and the homeless who now lived here. There simply wasn't enough for everyone, but no one complained.

Then it hit him: Kain Delacroix, Sam Tarmalin, Doc Chambers and Gade Vonyran. It had been at least 15 cycles. And there they were, talking to Srivan Irshan in that bar, looking more-or-less the same. He hoped they were coming to volunteer. Somehow, he knew that they hadn't. Still, the thought sent a warm chill down his spine: he had promised himself that if he had ever seen those four men again, he would pray that the souls of those they killed would have a happy afterlife with the Prophet.

But he caught himself thinking that those who served the tyrant Masao, those who had turned Basal into a bloody warzone, did not deserve any such reward.

Selling guns!

Peace River
Paxton Sales and Marketing
16am, 10 Winter, TN1935

"Kessler did it again!"

"Huh?"

"Take a look."

The datapad clattered on the table, and Karly Mullrose flicked it up and into her palm. She dismissively thumbed at a couple of keys and then her eyes widened. On the screen was a little thumbnail picture of Paxton's Head Operating Officer, Milani Dubeau-Slovenski. That meant that whatever else was contained in the datapad was serious stuff. She opened the message.

"...ESE trade mission..." Karly mumbled to herself, scowling, "mercenary contract for demonstration team..." she looked a little puzzled, as Paxton had its own demonstration teams for its products, "discretion and exclusivity..." so Paxton was hiring a private mercenary group to act as a demonstration team in the Eastern Sun Emirates, "please provide Ms. Kessler with material and logistical support."

Karly Mullrose put the datapad down and scowled.

"Kessler's behind this?"

"I think so. This comes all the way from the top," her coworker replied.

"So the little prole thinks she's got what it takes to keep up with the big boys? Fine. I bet you she doesn't last a week," Karly spat, "get me the requisition list, and we'll make sure it's filled to the letter."

___________________

Dear Dr. Tomohiro,

I've sent your request to individuals more suited to dealing with it. I have heard, indirectly, that your request to be a "Paxton Arms Sales Consultant", along with two (three?) others has been approved, so long as Ms. Maia Kessler tags along as supervisor. But I don't know the details. Ms. Kessler will provide you with more information.

I am pleased to hear you haven't quite fallen off the face of the planet yet, but maybe you should stay out of the Badlands for a while longer. I've read the report Tom, and it doesn't look good.

Warm wishes,
Helena Hitachi
City Administrator,
Peace River

Tom: Dispatches

Maia - Pre-management days

Maia Kessler, in the cycles before her promotion to management.

(Photo credit to Kalamakia of Flikr and Georges for the antiquing. I know the clothes aren't right for the middle of the Badlands, but I really liked this picture. It was the closest thing I could find to the feel I want for Maia, at least for her early days before she got herself all spiffied up.)

13 May 2010 (Part 2) Wound up, wound down

Maia held her face neutral as she stepped into her room and gently closed the door behind her. From the inside pocket of her flack jacket, she pulled a short cylinder and watched as it immediately started blinking red. She sighed and began walking around the room. It was a game they played, she and the SRID, or whichever of their subsidiaries worked in this godforsaken region. They bugged her room, she removed the bugs, they left her alone for two or three days, and then it started all over again.

She found one new chip behind the headboard, another stuck under the sink, and crushed them both under her boot. She did one last circle of the room, just in case, but the bug detector stayed dark. Carefully pocketing it again, she sat down on the bed and pressed her palms to her eyes. That had been too close today, decidedly too close. Sometime since she had arrived her, she had gone from "technical advisor" to "cheap hired gun," and she wondered whether Ershan wasn't right that she was just another merc.

The two men she'd lost weren't going to look good on her report. The Basal Free Revolutionary Army wasn't a renewable resource, and any losses were more difficult for the rebels to replace than the ESE. But for all that she mourned them, she couldn't think of what else she could have done. The lookout just had the bad luck of not ducking back fast enough, and Vee, her nominal partner... she had seen the tripwire soon enough to avoid hitting it, but not fast enough to warn him. She could still see the explosion behind her eyes. She was probably going to dream about it tonight, and wouldn't that be as fun as a scorpion in your sleeping bag?

She shrugged off her flack suit and breathed a sigh of relief. Only superficial damage, and not even that much of it. It could have have been worse. Easily worse.

She walked over to the shower stall and paused. Even after a dozen cycles in the poles, she still couldn't get over the way they wasted water. The first time she'd had a full-body water shower, she'd felt dirtier stepping out than stepping in. She used as little as she could, and she could still hear Tanya's voice in her ears lecturing her as only a small child could about the scarcity of water. What she wouldn't give to transport just 10% of the jungle's supply to Peace River, and solve the scarcity problem forever. Maybe they'd give her a medal. She smirked.

She slipped on a dress, braided her hair, put on her makeup. She could hear the city waking and gearing up for action. She had no idea what Basal was like before the rebellion, but now its people were nocturnal, the work crews clearing away rubble under the cover of darkness so that the sun shone over a city ever-so-slightly cleaner than it had left. Of course, the day would probably bring another series of bombings, so the struggle was never-ending, but she admired the Basallites for their tenacity.

She picked up her PDA and headed down to the hotel's lobby. There was more paperwork to do, always more paperwork. Incident reports, requisition forms, and the order from Kain Delacroix... or, rather, make that Mr. Hannibal. She still wasn't sure what to think of the foursome that had mysteriously appeared in the ruins outside the city, not even any sense of which direction they were turned. Kain made her distinctly nervous, their gunslinger seemed to be ever-so-slightly off in the head (though maybe, she admitted, that was due to the gaping wound in his stomach), their mechanic insisted on being belligerent on first meeting, and the doctor... Doctor Chambers, Big Damn Hero and possibly also Big Damn Traitor. She wasn't sure who to tell about him, or even if she should. Stepping out into the lobby, she decided she'd sleep on it.

She settled herself into one of the lobby chairs, her head swimming but her face carefully neutral. If she got her paperwork done in time, she promised herself she'd send a letter to Celina. Not that she'd have anything to say beyond pleasantries, not when messages from her private terminal could be intercepted, but the thought cheered her up anyway.

Across the lobby, the team's mechanic -- what was his name? Gade something? -- was sitting with a pile of weapons and a stack of rubber composite seals. No doubt whatever he was doing was important, obscure, and interesting. Curiosity piqued, she put her PDA into its carrier at her hip, got up and crossed the room, a polite smile coming easily to her lips. To hell with it, paperwork could wait.

Appropriations

>logon… >

>hermes72.con BESE.net 2 PRBL.>

>locate packet… >

>hhitachi001.ctz.>

>connecting…>

Dear Helena,

I’ll save us both time and come right out and say I need a favour. This saves you from having to read through a bunch of idle chit chat about one thing or another and me the trouble of providing disingenuous excuses for not staying in touch over the last couple of cycles.

I need to borrow a Paxton employee. I know this isn’t your department, but you can pull strings and you and I both know why you will.

Her name is Maia Kessler and she is currently idle in Basal. I’m going to help her to do her job and sell Paxton arms. Tell her bosses to tell her she is going on the road. She can do demos or fact finding, whatever way they want to write it up as. She will need three consultants and my name will be at the top of the list for her to contact. I’ll take care of the rest.

I’ll use some of my not inconsiderable skill to make sure the venture is solvent for Paxton and my entourage and I will make sure nothing happens to your promising young manager. I worked hard enough to make sure people like her exist so you know I will.

Give us a season; I will have her back in Basal safe and sound sometime in summer at the latest. Also, make sure she has a decent expense account. You know I’m good for it.

I know you’ll come through, it one of your character flaws, your dependable. I hope this request finds you well, I also hope I can take you out for diner to thank you for this in the not too distant future.

Affectionately yours,

Tomohiro Chambers.

>sending…>

>transmission ended>

>logoff Hermes72>