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Changeling Part 88: Manufacturing problems
🕑 Added 2025-05-14 16:23:08 +0000 UTCThe Beacon was a familiar ground for Nestra now. She had walked its many halls as a baseline, as a gleam, and as Crescent. While the gazes changed, the labyrinthine corridors of Threshold’s heart hadn’t. The Beacon was a jewel and gate, the pulsating core of the city as well as its most dangerous spot. Her destination this time wasn’t the bridge world, but a seemingly unimportant level situated on the south side with a terrible view of the Town Hall’s midsection. She was let inside the department after a cursory inspection, soon picked up at the (terrible) waiting room’s coffee machine by a neat aug in an expensive suit. His skull implants shone a pleasant gold, as much jewelry as they were tools.
“Miss Palladian, welcome. I’m Captain Villar. Would you like some more coffee?”
Nestra gave the vending machine an accusatory glare. Sadly, it remained unfazed.
“Not that disgusting swill. I have drip coffee in my office.”
“Ah, please lead on.”
Thus baited, Nestra was led to a semi-spacious office with actual windows — a luxury in the Beacon. After making the both of them a fresh cuppa with the help of a sneaky kettle, Villar sat behind a wooden desk, inviting Nestra to join him on the other side. The room was tidy. A great many pictures adorned the wall, most of them of teams in hard hats in front of massive machines.
Villar crossed his fingers with an apologetic smile.
“Before we begin, I’m sorry but I need you to sign these. Those are NDAs.”
Nestra sighed, reaching into her bag to pick up her visor. She went over the documents freshly dropped on her like a group of unwanted guests. They were… thorough.
“A noncompete agreement? Really?”
“It’s standard operation procedure, I’m afraid,” Villar explained. “You see, the factories in question are joint-operated by Touhei and the city, and we’re bound by common agreements. Unless you were planning on going to work for Gidung or a foreign corp in the next two years?” Villar finished with a raised brow.
“I’d rather drop the entire work safety manual on my bare pinky.”
“Just as I thought. Look, it looks stringent but I can summarize the content: don’t share what you see anywhere except in your reports, which you will keep secure; don’t mess with the machine operation unless your life is in danger and in general, don’t do anything that will cost Touhei or us money if you can avoid it.”
“No talking no touching unless it’s for the job. Got it.”
She still skimmed the articles in case there was a hidden clause to buy her liver at a competitive price - or worse, an unfair one. There wasn’t. Villar patiently waited while she read, his face unreadable. It was as he’d said though. There were no traps she could see. Eventually, she was done.
“Right. Now for the explanation. I will send you two files. The first is the initial report Touhei gave us. The second is the summary of the work of your predecessor.”
“My predecessor?” Nestra asked, frowning.
There had been no mention of… actually there had been no mention of anything.
“Let me start from the beginning. What do you know of Depth Six?”
“It’s a buried factory somewhere in Threshold’s south that’s responsible for, hmmm, weapon manufacture?”
“Correct. Specifically, it’s a joint venture between Touhei and the city to manufacture and store a wide variety of equipment ranging from basic bullets to fighter jet frames with a focus on artillery shells, all at a guaranteed, competitive price. It’s part of a wider agreement between the city and the corps called GROUP-5 that makes sure, to summarize, that we’re prepared for anything.”
Nestra nodded. She wasn’t super familiar with the agreement but it came up in political discussions enough that she’d heard about it. Nobody wanted to find they were short on shells when the city was running at a kaiju and tide combo every year, minimum.
“As part of the agreement, Depth Six also stores a limited amount of fuel for mana generators in case the city finds itself in need of emergency energy production. No juice means many of our essential systems simply stop functioning. Turrets, radar, coms, hospitals. You name it. Depth Six has spare parts and reserves for everything, but what interests us, here, is the fuel.”
Villar gave Nestra a pointed to look to see if she was following. There was only one source of energy that was safely stored, extremely efficient and without a risk of getting expired.
“Mana stones?” she hazarded.
“Mana stones. Quite a bit of low quality mana stones suitable for running emergency generators. As you can imagine, the value of the inventory numbers in the hundreds of millions of creds, just for the stones.”
“And someone’s stolen them?” Nestra gasped.
Villar nodded before correcting himself in a hurry.
“Well not all of it, but there’s definitely been some skimming. One month ago, a manual check of the warehouses revealed discrepancies between the reported and measured weight of several containers. The inspectors took the container out and revealed the contents were not quite as advertised. It was subtle but it was there. Further inquiries revealed similar issues with other containers, and after more search, they are fairly certain that the original amount of mana stones was properly delivered.”
“How?” Nestra asked.
“It was measured and confirmed by Touhei, the city, and the guilds upon delivery using redundant checks with pictures saved on the servers of at least seventeen different entities. A theft inside of the warehouse, while… unbelievable considering the safety measures, is still more likely. By far.”
Nestra nodded. It made sense to her.
“And there is the discrepancy between reported and actual weight you mentioned before. I assume it’s a warehouse-specific problem?”
“It’s an internal problem of Depth-Six, yes. So in total, we estimate that the loss incurred would be at around 5.2 million credits, but it’s worse than that.”
“Because our security was cheated so easily?”
“There is that, of course,” Villar agreed, “but just as important, the stolen goods were mana stones. They are a strategic resource pain in literal blood. We can increase production of specific ores if we want to. In fact, we can’t even extract and use everything from every portal naturally occurring within the city walls.”
“But we use all the mana stones.”
“There is a near-infinite demand for magical energy that doesn’t come from a gleam’s core. We cannot, and I need to be transparent here.”
He leaned forward on the table, eyes boring into Nestra’s own.
“We cannot allow mana stones to be stolen from us.”
“Ok,” Nestra replied. “Now explain why me? Because I may have a weirdly successful track record but grand theft isn’t exactly my specialty.”
Villar nodded.
“You are not brought in because of a specific knowledge, but because you’re scrappy, resourceful, and exceptionally good at surviving assassination attempts.”
Nestra’s mind blanked. Surely she had heard it wrong.
“You brought me in because I’m hard to kill?”
But Villar did it. He nodded.
“Yes, or at least that’s what Special Affairs recommended. Your predecessor, Sara Wong, is currently in the ICU with a traumatic brain injury caused by a falling stone as she left her branch office. A freak accident caused by a loose shipment of debris transported by drone from a construction site.”
“But you suspect foul play.”
“We cannot prove it,” Villar said, “and I am myself inclined to accept it could indeed be a freak accident, but there have been simply far too many perfect alignments of planets to make the heist even possible. It’s uncanny. So yes, we need someone who will watch out, just in case.”
At least he looked apologetic.
“You will get full support from our team, of course. We need you to be visible, talk to people, ask questions. Sara might still wake up with no sequels. Hell, I’m not even sure about the assassination angle.”
“I get it,” Nestra replied, a little sour. “Where is the accident report? You’re not sending it as well?”
“Sandra Wong’s accident report? Oh! Of course.”
“It would be the same group trying to silence her. Arguably.”
“Of course, of course. Here. And I added the contact information of Health and Safety Inspector Furzi, though we closed the case due to lack of evidence. He can answer all of your questions.”
“Right.”
“Read the reports, familiarize yourself with its contents and in two days, I’ll bring you in to meet the team.”
***
Nestra needed some time to digest the whole case so she decided to visit the Sunflour to spend an afternoon eating pastries and sipping on cappuccinos. Threshold had obligingly provided her with a locked datasheet with a nifty effect: it could only be read by facing it at 90 degrees. Trying to read over one’s shoulder and the sheet would look completely opaque. It also used its own secure internet connection and there was a pretty cool biometric lock just to open it. Nevertheless, Nestra took it with her when she went to the toilet just in case.
The file itself was not meant for newcomers.
Without the time Nestra had spent with her nose in the logistics aspect of District 15, there would have been no way in hell she could have followed those reports since they were meant for professionals with a good understanding of the biz. As it was, Nestra had now acquired an approximate understanding of a great many topics, so she could get most of what had happened. As far as the preliminary report said, the crystals had definitely been delivered. The questions, then, were when, and how and by whom? And where were they now of course. And it turned out there were no definitive answers beyond the certainty this was an inside job. Someone had most likely tampered with the system using their credentials, but they’d done an incredible job hiding their tracks. There were no signs of break ins. Too many people and legal entities had access to the measurements and could have made modifications: Touhei, various agencies, and of course, the hundreds of employees within Depth Six’s own ad hoc structure. Similarly, there were no records of the containers being opened though obviously they had been, but the warehouse itself was visited daily. It was a case of too many suspects and no clues. Sighing, Nestra opened Sara Wong’s case notes.
They were a mess. Or rather, they were meant as a memory aid, not as something that could easily be passed on. Nestra could only rely on the weekly reports, which were sparse in details. It looked like Sara Wong didn’t like to share her suspicions, preferring instead to list where she had gone and who she’d talked to, or which reports she had read. There were a lot of them in the two weeks she’d been in charge of the case, but Nestra only focused on the latest ones. Before being hit by a rock, the woman had visited Depth Six’s security office twice but she’d required no additional reports from them. What she had requested were reports on the ventilation system and door security. Maybe she was onto something. Hmmm.
Nestra had finished her cursory reading by the late afternoon, but she still had one day before meeting the team and that left her time to check what had happened to her predecessor. With a sigh, she decided to cold call Detective Furzi. He picked up after three rings with a tone full of suspicion.
“Yeah? Who’s this?”
“Hi I’m Clytemnestra Palladian, Sara Wong’s replacement. I would like to talk about her ‘incident’,” Nestra greeted and she made sure to make the hyphens obvious.
“Yeah you really do. Ah, look it’s a little late and my wife will kill me if I miss dinner again.”
“I think I can wait for an evening. Tomorrow?”
“We can have breakfast on the way to the precinct.”
Furzi gave her the coordinates of an absolute dive specializing in donuts — not beating the allegations there. With her schedule prepared and her brain a sieve, there was little to do but find a way to distract herself. She approached Sereth who was busy chatting up late customers dropping in for their dinner desserts. It infuriated her that he could be so smooth about it, leaving most of the ladies and some of the men blushing messes with his big stupid goofy smile and words and ugh it was so unfair the males could just use their shapeshifting skills for social purposes. She couldn’t wait to get the portal things. Awkward social gathering? Portal out. Tax collectors? Portal out. Pizza cold? Portal to a volcano for half a second.
She snuck on him. He knew she was there, of course.
“I bet I can beat your ass if you don’t use any fist weapons,” she whispered.
“It appears my little sister has been secluded for too long,” he replied. “Now she is delusional. Some fresh air and exercise might do her some good. As a good brother I can also temper her hubris through careful reminders.”
They left half an hour later, and Sereth was absolutely not careful. By the time she had dinner with Stibbs and the frustrating lug, her entire body ached again from being slammed into a mountain. But hey, it was good cardio.
***
Furzi was not what Nestra had expected after being sent to a dingy corner shop off the main road. He was impeccably shaved in a tight fitting designer vest that showed the soldier's build: lean and fit, without too much volume. He was cutting and eating a pastry with an actual knife, picking each slice with great care. The smell of the nearby espresso made Nestra blink.
The woman behind the counter was a dark-haired baseline with graying temples. She took Nestra’s order with the careful, polite gaze of someone who didn’t trust gleams. The coffee was absolutely extraordinary. Furzi smiled when Nestra closed her eyes in contentment.
“I come here every week,” he explained. “Anyway, let’s talk about the case, and there would be one if I had my way with it. Sara Wong was hit by a stone allegedly dropped from a transport drone carrying clutter away from a renovation site in 17, not too far from here. She would have been brained but she got lucky in her misfortune. See, the stone hit exactly where her skull aug was and since there is a plate, the impact was spread across her entire skull instead of caving it in. She got a major concussion and the doctors don’t know if she’ll need reeducation but, you know, it should have killed her.”
“And you don’t believe it’s a freak accident because?”
Furzi smiled. He grabbed a datasheet from a shiny leather case, playing what appeared to be the security footage from a lobby.
“This was recorded at the entrance of Manufacturing Compliance department’s local office. Watch.”
A woman in a suit, with straight dark hair walked confidently out of a security check. She opened the gate, stepped outside, then fell on herself. If Nestra hadn’t seen the fleeting image of the stone, she would have believed Wong had simply fainted.
“Huh. The trajectory of the stone…” she muttered.
“Straight down. Right? But it shouldn’t be straight down.”
“Inertia,” Nestra realized.
“Yes! Yes, precisely. The drone is moving, well, not fast, but the stone fall’s angle is just strange.”
“Do you have the drone footage?”
Furzi nodded. A few clicks and he played it.
“Can’t share it on your visor, sorry. Even if there is no case,” he added.
“Don’t worry about it,” she said, waving his concerns aside.
Nestra could feel Furzi’s gaze on her as she checked the footage. She ignored the drone’s camera recording because it only showed the front and back, not directly under the main body, and she didn’t care about it anyway. What interested her were the flying coordinates.
“We got altitude, bearing, and speed,” she confirmed.
Furzi frowned.
“So?”
“So we can prove if the stone could have hit Wong or not. Ready for a little bit of science?”
“I know what you’re trying to do, but my captain will never authorize the use of the scientific division unless we can give him something concrete.”
“Don’t worry,” Nestra replied. “I know a girl. I have my own experts. Hey, Stibbs? Yes Saturday is still good. No, I’m calling about work. Ready for some consulting? Two thousand creds? Riel. Ah yeah I forgot, I’ll just bill them then. Ok, sending you the details. See you soon.”
***
The stone pinged against the wall before falling down at a wide angle a good ten meters away from the office’s entrance. It was the same stone too, taken from the evidence locker with Furzi’s captain’s blessing.
“Attempt number 40. Result: failure,” Stibbs said, her voice perfectly professional. “Should we continue?”
“I think that’s enough,” Nestra replied.
Having one of Stibbs’ drones replicate the construction drone’s path and then releasing the stone had yielded various results depending on when exactly they released it, or where it eventually bounced. Even by hitting a corner with perfect accuracy, Wong’s bane had never landed less than five meters away from the entrance, and then only at a low angle — not the almost vertical trajectory seen in the footage.
“I think the demonstration is conclusive,” Furzi said with sheer excitement. “I will ask that a case be opened in the attempted murder of Sara Wong.”
Nestra felt pleased with herself. Nothing like a bit of ballistic science to start the day off the right foot. She didn’t share Furzi’s bubbling enthusiasm, however. While her little experiment was enough to convince others and herself that Sara Wong’s mishap had been a cleverly disguised murder attempt, the implications were enough to freeze, well maybe not because she was ice-resistant now. But it was enough to chill her blood. Assuming Wong had been neutralized because she was becoming a danger, Nestra was facing someone, or several someones, who had successfully heisted over 5 million creds in heavily regulated crystals from a Threshold secure vault, and then almost killed an inspector, and then almost got away with it too. Not just that, but the skillset required to carry out all tasks meant she was dealing with security system and IT expertise, the ability to stalk and murder someone, the… ability to fly? She could only assume someone had picked up then dropped the stone from, well, maybe the roof?
“It’s definitely a group,” she mumbled to herself.
“A group that’s willing to kill to cover its tracks,” Stibbs said, her attention firmly placed on Nestra. “My beloved told me you have been… a little careless recently?”
Fucking tattletale.
“Beloved, huh?” Nestra countered.
“Well I can’t very well use the… foreign term out here in the open now, can I?” Stibbs replied.
Ugh. Bah. Sereth and Stibbs calling each other loving words in Aszhii.
“Ew. You two are disgustingly sweet. Elope, already.”
“Don’t joke about it!”
Come to think of it, why were they romantic terms in Aszhii when the two genders never courted each other? Ah well, she didn’t really care.
“Ok, enough of this. I’m going to need to prepare a few things before tomorrow. See you later!”
***
“Gorge, my good old friend,” Nestra said with the flashiest smile she could manage.
“No need for threats,” the bald fucker replied with a worried glance at her pearly whites.
His warehouse had turned from ‘barely hidden fence’ to ‘respectable small business’ with the addition of potted plants and fresh asphalte. He wore an actual suit that did little to hide that he was strapped. To Nestra’s left, a secure window led to the main entrance. Cameras whirred quietly in the cold air.
“So what’s this about?” Gorge asked.
“Well I’m heading into the lion’s den and I’m going to need some defenses.”
“More guns?”
“No,” Nestra replied. “Anything the Window Maker can’t handle will probably be too fast. No. I was thinking something a little bit more defensive.”
The old cop nodded, gaze distant. Probably thinking about his inventory.
“What are we looking at?”
“Well,”Nestra replied, hesitating.
Gorge gestured that she should follow while she searched her words.
“My predecessor got a literal stone thrown at her head. She’s in the ICU with brain damage.”
He whistled.
“Riel. I know you’re a raging bitch but who did you piss off to get the suicide assignments every damn time?” Gorge noted in a conversational tone.
“They pay the big money,” Nestra lied.
“If that thought comforts you… Speaking of big money, what’s your budget?”
Nestra gave that a thought. She was, currently, disgustingly flush. Contrary to most ace raiders her rank, she wasn’t saving to start her own guild, or investing in the stock market so all of her disposable income was meant to be disposed of. If she got killed as a human, her true self would be revealed and that was a shit thing to happen around Depth Six which had two and a half security cameras and a dog per square meter.
Ok maybe she was exaggerating, but her priority was to keep the masquerade up for as long as possible and if that meant covering her soft D-rank human flesh in armor, then so be it.
“500k? Maybe more?”
Gorge stopped at that.
“You’re willing to drop half a mil on body armor?”
“I’m willing to drop that much on staying alive. I can’t wear a helmet at work, sadly, but covering everything else would be nice.”
Gorge brushed a scarred hand over his pale skull. He hummed.
“Well, I… hold on. Give me a minute. Gotta make a call.”
He walked away. Nestra only followed him to the warehouse slash range because standing in the corridor was lame. Gorge’s voice echoed in the open space.
“Rudy? Yeah, it’s me. Listen, you still got the class 4? Yeah. Yeah, I do. Yeah, right away. Bank transfer. How soon? Yeah it’s urgent bru. No, we will pay right away, but toss me all the options. For sure. 550. Yeah. I’ll tell the client.”
Gorge turned to Nestra, giving her a measuring look.
“What do you know about the class 4 series?” he asked.
“Fuckall.”
“Well, three years ago, Touhei answered a bid by the city to equip their gleam special forces with under armor. Their option was deemed too costly. The functional prototypes made their way to an old mate of mine. Interested?”
“Can it be worn under normal clothes?”
“Baggy ones and people will notice but yeah.”
“You’re serious? You have a military grade skin suit for gleams?”
“And the helmet. Comes with shock absorbers based on non-Newtonian fluid pockets. Bulletproof. Fireproof. Electricity proof. Mana conductive to help with your spells. Comes in cobalt blue. And you’re cleared to buy it with your level of accreditation. Just… you’re not supposed to be able to afford it. Of course, I will make sure the source of the money stays perfectly secure so no one can trace it back to you unless they abduct me.”
Nestra only had to give it one second.
“Riel bless whoever decided to give me access to all this stuff.”
Gorge paled. He remembered the naval cannon.
“Riiight. Let me send the specs to your, ah, other self’s secure phone? That would lower the risk of someone finding out.”
“Sure. I’ll, uh, get changed. In your bathrooms. And send the payment if I do like what I see.”
Nestra was pleased. The Bellerophon was a cool piece of gear, no questions asked, but it was also raider gear. Moving around in it would just make everyone panic and for good reasons. Unannounced raiders in full gear out on the streets of Threshold often only ever meant one thing: a breach. That tended to make people nervous.
Frowning, she realized there was one last thing she could learn to make herself safer, just in case, since the enemy appeared to be tech-savvy. It was an electric raider exclusive too so she had no reason not to use it.
It was just easy to learn too, just… really inelegant. But whatever. Staying alive was more important.
***
Villar met Nestra at the very same antenna where poor Wong had been stoned in the not fun way, a bad omen to be sure. He nevertheless led her past the security gate and then up a flight of stairs. The office was one of those large cubicle ones which Nestra thought might not be the best idea when people worked on stuff that required NDAs but what did she know? The ‘team’ that was supposed to support her welcomed her in the meeting room.
All two of them.
“Hello everyone. Let me introduce you to Special Agent Clytemnestra Palladian,
a highly decorated MaxSec veteran and raider. She will be replacing Sara while she recovers.”
The two other members of the team gave her awkward nods. Between the high tech skin suit peeking on her collar, her obvious gleam nature, and the fact Sara hadn’t even woken up from her coma and might never return, Nestra wasn’t sure what was worse. A man with a stubble and auged eyes mumbled something even her improved senses couldn’t pick up. He’d been looking at his shoes after the first second of her entering the place, and between his short stature and terrible posture, she had a perfect view of his balding scalp. The other team member was a tired, older baseline with badly applied makeup and around 30 kg of extra baggage around her waist. A crack team they were not.
Nestra shook her head. She was being a judgy bitch. People could be exhausted and still perform at the highest level. Coffee was popular for a reason.
“And here is Neil Goode, our IT expert.”
“I, uh, I have two other projects to help with but I should have time tomorrow for any help you might need,” he mumbled.
What the fuck?
“And this is Nora Sugiyama, who provides administrative support. She has been working with Sara for close to a decade.”
The poor woman sniffed. Ok, her first impression had been correct. Nestra considered giving Villar some face but, fuck it.
“Can I talk to you for one second?” she asked.
Villar seemed vaguely offended, but not enough to resist Nestra heading towards the exit. She picked an empty meeting room, closed the door on a concerned Villar who immediately reacted by crossing his arms, a defensive gesture if there were any. Nestra had trouble reading the rest of his face.
Then she realized she didn’t have to.
“Is this a joke? Where’s the rest of them?” she asked.
“Miss Palladian, I understand your remark, but so far we have been trying to keep this very complex case under the radar and Sara —”
“She’s in the hospital because someone tried to kill her.”
“We don’t yet know that for sure,” Villar warned with a stern tone.
“I absolutely do. I was with Furzi yesterday and we proved that the stone couldn’t possibly have fallen from a drone traveling at this speed and with this angle. This was a murder attempt. You have an agent who got disabled by a — actually let me summarize from the start because I want to make sure I am not dreaming the whole thing,” Nestra spoke at low gleam speed, voice rising with every second.
“You got 5 million creds worth of goods stolen, goods of a strategic nature, from one of Threshold’s supposedly most secure facilities, with obvious insider help, and the only inspector you put on the case almost got brained, and the support team you have assembled is a part time IT and a grieving admin? Did I get that right?”
“It’s more complicated than that. We have limited means and — “
“Then call for help!” Nestra screamed. “This is a huge case! Why isn’t the cavalry here? Is it a politics thing?”
“Please, Miss Palladian. Calm down,” Villar said, and he took a step back.
There was genuine fear on his face, though it was well hidden. A spark arced between Nestra’ clenched fist and the metal frame of the closest chair. She looked down. Icy tendrils snaked on nearby water bottles. The air smelled faintly of ozone.
She’d lost control of her mana and the class 4 suit had helped spread the love. With a start, she realized she’d been talking at low gleam speed too.
But she wouldn’t apologize.
“I need an actual team, not whatever overworked dregs you can rake from the back office. No excuses. Get me one.”
“I’ve sent the request out this morning considering the… circumstances.”
“This morning? This morning?”
“I already called for reinforcements, Miss Palladian,” Villar replied, yelling in turn. “They sent just you! I am as upset as you are!”
“I bet you’re less upset than Sara and I’m her replacement. Do you see where I’m going with this? I’m risking my life.”
“I didn’t know that!”
“There’s a lot of not knowing going around in this service. I’m going to Depth Six. Get me a team before two days or I’m out. I’m not putting my life on the line if the city cannot be arsed to do the bare fucking minimum. Cheers.”
“Miss Palladian this is highly disrespectful,” he told her back.
But when Nestra turned, he wouldn’t hold her gaze.
“Write me up in your report if it makes you happy, but I said what I said. Two days, no more. My life is precious to me.”
***
With a name like “Depth Six”, Nestra was hoping for, well, something cool, but the sad truth was that it was just the sixth underground installation built and the entrance just looked like any dropoff corpo warehouse from the outside: bland and boring and full of barriers. It was drizzling by the time she parked her roadster in the deserted guest parking lot. Making her way in required going into a security airlock for pedestrians while the boatload of delivery trucks took another route. The scanner beeped the moment she stepped in. A security officer with a face plate gave her an apologetic look from behind his reinforced glass.
“Ah, sorry, we were told you’d visit but the system says you’re armed and… is that a full body armor?”
“I have clearance,” Nestra replied.
“Yes yes I just… need to get you approved. Sorry. Hmmm, weird, there seems to be a glitch?”
Nestra’s blood froze. She didn’t think. Electric mana poured from her core, bubbling inside of her body.
“If you’ll just… oh sh —”
The security system whirred to life. Nestra raised her arms in front of her. No hesitation, just release.
Shock. Pain. Her nose. Something hit her rib. A wave of electric arcs exploded out, frying the entire booth and forcing the guard back with a yelp in an improvised EMP blast. When no other danger came out, Nestra lowered her hands.
Two turrets hung limp from the ceiling, their cannons still aimed at her. There were two black rubber balls on the ground that corresponded to the number of times she’d been hit. One had flattened against her armored boob (it still hurt dammit) but the other had hit her arm and though it was fine, it had pushed her fist into her nose. She’d basically punched herself.
“Ow!”
She sniffed. There was a little bit of blood but it wasn’t broken. Before anything more could jump her, the mag lock was suddenly opened by a panicked guard. He’d ran around to help her escape the room before the system could reset.
“Thanks,” she grumbled.
“Fuck me that was dangerous. You ok? Thank Riel you have a thick skull, haha.”
If looks could kill. While the guard withered under her glare, Nestra reached for her visor. That was it. If Villar was too slow, maybe Special Affair would listen.
And then she realized that, of course, she’d fried it. It was dead and smoking.
“Dammit. It’s only 10AM.”
Comments
Redeyes Eclipse
Did they try to assassinate her instantly insanity
Antony Claughton
not beating the allegations ==> not beating the stereotypes suit peeking on her collar ==> suit peeking out her collar
Antony Claughton
kaiju and tide combo every year, minimum ==> when the corp originally triggered the Ley line in District 15 I’m pretty sure kaiju attacks were mentioned as being normally every 2 years, with the previous one ‘only’ 12 months ago. Obviously the last 12 months have been extreme due to human stupidity.
AntiClimax she her
It has always been "window maker". I'm guessing because it puts window sized holes in walls and men's chests.
Sierra
Hopeing we get a scene where some one goes "She's only a D-class threat, we can kill her with enough force!" Then Nestra busts the door down "That's when I saw still a baseline" and then beats them up.
InLucidReverie
They are a strategic resource pain in literal blood. => paid in Nestra greeted and she made sure to make the hyphens obvious => air quotes (this is a hyphen - ) potted plants and fresh asphalte => asphalt “Anything the Window Maker can’t handle will probably be too fast" ... window or widow?
MrrC
Really really good point. I completely missed that.
Sam I Am
Those were two kill shots, btw. One to the head, one to the heart. Additionally, just because they took over the system doesn’t mean they knew what ammo was loaded. Even full auto rubber bullets would likely be lethal.
Kemizle
I know Nestra is a melee raider but I think she should develop some cantrip level ice and electric skills that are useful anywhere on earth. Idk about ice but shouldn’t she be able to connect to technology with her powers?
RonGAR
Glad Nestera is taking her safety/human life, seriously. Glad she is finding proper bal between risk and 'challenge'. -------- Nice to see Gorge back. Our pal is moving up in the world! Happy to see it. --------- Need to see more of Nestra's mother. Sucks that I've been wanting to follow up for weeks, since Nestra unburdened her soul, yet barely hear anything from or about her mother, father or 'brother'. THATS what i need to know more about. Not feeling great bout being tossed into another 'case', with so much still unresovled in her family. SMH. --------------- Till next week.
