Private Altered

[The Fool]

EMPLOYER CHECKLIST

• The Progredior Institute
  
• MACHINERY DESIGN SPECS (6/6)
  PLAT DESIGN SPECS (5/5)
  SHIPPING MANIFESTS (10/10)
  PLANT AI (0/1)
  

THIS WICKED TONGUE​

NEW ASSEMBLY PLANT, HORUS RESEARCH INC.
TERMINUS

Roman led the way cutting through swaths of guard droids with each pull of his trigger. The vornskr revolver loudly thundered through the tight, brand new, grey corridors of the assembly plant. Blood trickled down his left shoulder, lip, forehead and chest. Whatever they were creating here, Horus Research had no intention of parting ways with it. Preliminary info hinted at a tighter security than usual, hence the big paycheck with this job, but nothing like military-grade fortress.

Years ago, even in his best form as a commando for the Nebula Front, he would've barley survived this but that's where cyberware came in. Something his ex-wife had urged him to have and ironically had saved him from her betrayal a year later. Presently, the implant gave him all that he needed to take point boldly and charge straight at the enemy with little to no consideration beforehand. This was the real face of Roman Hayato that his Captain had never seen prior.

Censored and filtered backgrounds, masquerade masks, both him and Rackham kept demons at bay; behind the somber alcoholism, behind the happy-go lucky smuggler's grin.

"Are you sure this is the right f*cking way?"

Something told him it was and something told him there was a nasty surprise up ahead.

Wynter Rackham Amea Virou Cable​

 

[Amea Virou]

The Fool // Wynter Rackham // Cable

For a moment Amea pointed the blaster to cover their rear. Almost nothing seemed to quite catch up to them, but there was an occasional shot taken for the sake of causing them to fall back and seek cover. Some droids were smarter than others, some braved the fire, and the rest were nowhere to be seen.

In truth, part of Amea was disappointed for it. The chance to pull the trigger on something that wasn’t alive was a welcome change. An unusual one, but a welcome one nonetheless. It meant that they were predictable. At their heart droids followed nothing more than the orders given. The current droids orders were complex, but they were still just that: orders and algorithms. It helped being someone who understood droids in situations like that.

Still, just because Amea was a savant with droids didn’t mean she was any better than them. More than a few had already hit her where it hurt. Bruises had spread across her shoulder, cuts and scrapes had been carved into her skin from slips and falls on their way for the exit.

It felt weird to reflect on it at this moment. Hell, it was practically idiotic to even consider it, but part of her couldn’t help but feel that this very mission was yet another step further away from sho she once was. Because this wasn’t at all who she had once been. There was no proof of to say she was wrong either, of course, but it was definitely there in how her muscles seemed to tense each time that she readied herself to break open a lock or the way she felt a tension go away as she put her feet on the ground inside an unsecured window. It was there in the way her entire body seemed to freeze with each pull of the trigger, each catch with the recoil.

They were all reminders that seemed to say she was going against her habit, and truth be told she didn’t hate it. While the first notch had been the most difficult to acquire, it grew surprisingly easy with each shot that she took. Coupled with the fact that most people who had been on the receiving end of her barrel had wronged her in one way or the other and… Well, that just made it easier.

It had been a slippery slope, but here she was, getting her kicks robbing corporations for other corporations. Playing a willing rat stuck in a maze, teetering ever so close towards becoming an even greater suicide mission than anticipated and she loved every single second of it. Her nerves were steeled, her will firm in its focus.

“It’s up ahead, just keep pushing.” She called back to Roman as he took the lead. “Second corridor on your left.”

 

[Cable]

NEW ASSEMBLY PLANT, HORUS RESEARCH INC.
Terminal City, Terminus

The Fool | Amea Virou | Wynter Rackham​

The smell of charged o-zone clung to her like a second skin. The gaudy arc light blaster in her hand rumbling out blast after blast of concentrated, electrically supercharged kinetic force into the ranks of the on coming robotic horde. Paying little heed to cover; the reckless figure of Hayato made for a more compelling target for the limited tactical analysis of the older generation mark fives. It would take them zero point six one one two seconds to recalculate for her presence, ample enough time for her to take advantage.

Although how she knew that...

Her head abruptly throbbed causing her to lose a pace. A silent curse slipping from her lips as she clutch fired the remaining percent of her blaster's power pack without the razor sharp focus it had mere moments before, forcing her to duck behind the smoldering form of the lone GONK droid that had been in the wrong place at the wrong time while she reloaded.

Six weeks ago, she had been up to her elbows in design schematics and engineering reports on one of the most prestigious ship yards in the Inner Core. So sure of herself, her place in the galaxy and the work at hand. A different world, a different woman. Content, if not happy. But it had all been a lie. A factitious life made of binary code, a reality of nothing but ones and zeros, perhaps a bit more complex than the droids attempting to halt their hurried advance, but ultimately no different.

Now she was running and gunning with the scum of the galaxy like it was second nature - and the thought that maybe it actually was frightened her far more than any gunfight ever could.

"We're getting too boxed in here," Cable yelled over the endless din of blaster bolts, slug rounds, curses and digital screams. Adding her own blaster back to the cacophony as she ducked back out and pressed passed Hayato and Virou, tapping her on the shoulder as she broached the first of those left sided corridors. Blissfully no legion of droids awaited them, only a rather poignant and hopefully not prophetic dead end. "We're going to have to rethink our extract route. At this rate, we won't be able to come back this way again."

As if to underline her point, a section of the corridor ahead abruptly blew inwards from the right hand side. A wall of flame and debris heralding the appearance of a large, bulky looking high end attack droid. Far more beefy and built for purpose than the older mark fives they'd dealt with thus far, it stood a good eight feet tall and had long, lanky arms that ended with a nasty set of autocannons. Worse still, a second, third and fourth ducked through the hole it had blasted through. All armed similarly, all turning to face them. Weapons whining as they heated up.

"Definitely won't be able to come back this way again."

 

[Wynter Rackham]

Amea Virou | Cable | The Fool

This was practically like ol' times for Rackham.

Back in the old days, when he swung the fences for the Sith, killed whoever needed killing. How often had he infiltrated a Republic base, to take out this General, or breached a Jedi Temple to take out a Master? Too often. It was like second nature at this point. A skin suit you slipped into when your vacation was over.

It scared him how comfortable it all was.

Take position, cover, crouch and keep close. Always on the move. Even the pain felt good. The way his bones creaked, the parts of skin blistered by plasma excretion, the blood seeping from numerous shallow cuts.

If Hayato was reckless, Amea cautious, Cable analytical, than Rackham was lucky. A handful of times he had paused them, tugged them back, pointed them in another direction. More often than not that gut feeling paid off. He had never understood it. Not the Force, the Sith had checked him for that, but something nagging at the back of his ribs whenever something wrong was about to go off.

Too focused on what was in front of them to realize his gut was SCREAMING when those high-end droids came around through the wall.

"Oh, feth me sideways..." A growl there, before he clipped off a cryo-ban nade. "I will lead them off, y'all breach the room." The door they needed was around the corner, but it was highly reinforced steel. They couldn't just break through that with these fethers breathing against their necks.

 

[The Fool]

Second corridor on your left, he heard Amea say and his mind trailed behind his muscles. Roman never understood whether this 'lag' effect between mind and body was due to a lack of cyberware calibration, a glitch, or something else entirely. Whatever it was, it could save him as much as it could kill him.

Cable flashed before him, taking point beside him just as the quartet waltzed sideways into the corridor out of the fray; it was only a momentous bliss which quickly revealed itself to be nothing else but the fire. Machinery behemoths literally made a flashy entrance and the four fixers booked their tickets for a ride down the Styx. Business class, right at the bow of the boat.

And that's when Wynter came, 'nade in hand, stubbornly seeking to get a refund on those tickets. If not for himself, then for the other three. A valiant move. Horse shit. Cap' Rackham was a mad man, no dispute there, but Hayato seriously doubted the tooth pickin' smuggler captain's end would come at the hands of metal titans. Yeah, they were scary but this karker cheated death on a too regular basis. Space magic, Roman had doubted once, but could never find out so he buried that conspiracy about Wynter along with the other hundred of mind boggling speculations.

They backtracked to where they were supposed to breach and Roman found a window of a breather to call at Virou, "Alright, space chick, you came recommended for this shit - open it up." he jerked his head at the door. If Wynter took the giant droids' attention, all Roman and Cable had to do was keep Amea survive the incoming waves of normal-sized droids till she could open the door.

God knows what awaited behind it.

Amea Virou Cable Wynter Rackham

 

[Amea Virou]

Cable // The Fool // Wynter Rackham

Well crap, this wasn’t it. Amea came to a screeching halt along with the rest of her crew as they found themselves at a dead-end. Heavy footfalls began to sound out from behind the wall before a loud explosion revealed its source all too clearly. Needless to say, the only logical option was to run and that was exactly what they seemed to do.

Space chick. There were worse nicknames.

“Sure thing, slick.” She exclaimed and knelt down by the door to withdraw her tools. The powertool found its way into the slot before it expanded to poke at its innards. From behind she could hear the sound of blaster fire pouring towards them.

It was like surgery, or hi-jacking a train. All Amea needed to do was find the artery, or kill the conductor. The tool spun around, clicked and hissed much like its owner did until the door opened. A warm gust of air puffed past her with a distinct change in temperature. Heat radiated from within the confines of the room she had opened. Amea withdrew her tool and glanced inside.

“It’s open!” She called out and pushed into the room, for better or worse. “It’s a… Generator of some sort.”

As the others stormed in she forced the door close to buy them time. Sweat began to pour in a near instant before she ran up to the others.

“This was not in the building plans.” She exhaled. “Just like so many other things about this job so far.”