- Downtown Seattle. 001225
- Damnit this stunk. The filth of the city filled his eyes and nostrils even as the cold tried to freeze the life out of him. Huddled infront of a drum fire he tried to warm his fingers and toes through the rags he wore. The abandoned city subway was the closest thing Derek had known to a home in nearly a decade, and he shared it with roughly a dozen other 'urban displacees.' None of them were around now, all out trying to gather handouts from the holiday shoppers as they came and went on the subway. Even though it was noon it was dark here in the subway. Rats scuttled by through some of the garbage over to his left. Derek stood to stretch his legs and get the blood flowing, no sense in having his pals come home to find his body frozen. Clatter echoed through the station as a garbage can was upturned behind him. Rats couldn't do that. He turned around just in time to see the pale arms snap into his face. Then he let the darkness swallow him as his body collapsed to the hard concrete floor.
- A beat Cop and his partner turned up at the section of subway three weeks later. In all fifty persons worth of clothing, scrounged food, and shelter were found there. One splattered spot on the wall by some spent brass cartridges were the only evidence that anything was amiss. Two days later the Detectives found no rumors or word on the street that a group of homeless had relocated for any reason. It was as if all fifty of them had vanished.
- Manhattan Island, New York. 010501
- It didn't make sense. Why would David Birk flee from his parents when his father was the CEO of Ares Technology, the largest security provider and leader in security technologies in the world. A man that gave his son everything, including his own studio apartment on his sixteenth birthday, seemed unable to think of a reason his son would walk out on him. David's sister couldn't tell him or his investigators anything either. Stacey only knew that Dave had recently met an alluring and very intelligent woman at one of his fathers bars in upstate last month. For Detective Larry Schroder this made no sense, but hopefully the Feds showing up could help out, as it was recently upgraded to a kidnapping crime.
- Blacknet Conference Room 45. 000401
- Jolly:Welcome Everyone.
- Levithian: So tell us T, what is the latest.
- Micro: Damn L, waste no time.
- Toaster: Verily my good Sir Spook. tee hee It would seem that we have the Environment Interface that has so eluded our good geeks for so long ironed out. They have it working perfect, even for you Sir Knuckle Buster. It will begin being in all computer operators wishing it. The neural jack, or data jack will improve everything.
- INXS: Shut the frag up, dork.
- Toaster: And for Sir Gunslinger we have subdermal armor, improved layered ballistic fabric, and cybernetics for augmentation. Toys for thy pleasure will be available for Protective Agents to buy on their salary or once appropriate feathers doff their caps.
- INXS: Damnit you drekhead. Lets get down to business.
- Jolly: Whoo-wee. Touchy aren't we I.
- Toaster: But for truth our Good Lady Death is right. Let us get down to it.
- Levithian: Lets not forgot why we started this game in the first place.
- Micro: Yes, the goods can't be forgotten either.
- INXS: Ok. The One Ball is gonna breed; we can't allow that. Incubators have to be shut down, and copy cats dissuaded. The Dealers can't get anymore solidarity; we'll harass them. Last, Meats have to insulated.
- Jolly: Damn, you make it sound easy. How do we keep the Meats insulated?
- Micro: Easy, we make them do both of the above. Let us not forget about the importance of a good smoke screen.
- Levithian: I can go along with that. The One ball is our biggest problem, their incubators are secondary. They gotta go in the pocket.
- INXS: Then what about the recent outbreak in Togo J?
- Jolly: Easy. B U R N I T.
- INXS: How do we deal with the Ultra-Net M?
- Micro: I'm already on that. Me and T have got a plan, and it'll be done in a month.
- INXS: L. Tell us about GT.
- Levithian: Well they are new on the scene. I've got Protectors looking into them, with the new assets. The assets are still C-6. But you all are cleared.... ha ha ha
- Jolly: LOL
- Levithian: They look ripe, but the level of saturation is hard to tell. Hopefully it is what we are looking for.
- Toaster: Our Blessed Knight of Lead will agree that shredding Incubators with Meats is very productive.
- Jolly: How true, cyber slut.
- Levithian: I'll have Men running that down as to their involvement with the Incubators or the One Balls.
- Jolly: Then we're agreed. And I've already got the team assembled.
- Corporate Boardroom. 010301
- Cold eyes watched the stars flare over the Sound below and the ships on her calm waters. The moons reflection looked as if on a mirror. Empty seats around the table, polished lamps hung from the walls, and one man sat at the head of the giant black ebon table that sat in the center of the aneseptic perfect white room. Below revelers cavorted in the streets, though not a carouser he had reason to be joyful. But joy was a foreign emotion. This certainly would be a new year.
- The Web ran deep, and so it began. Involving many who would never know their dance, and others who chose their partners. Thus, with the players in place the music started.
- Whitehall, Stone Mountain Georgia. 010515
- Deep within the antiseptic corridors beneath Stone Mountain Georgia the newly formed Omni-team poured over the list of available agents to join their crew. Each was a specialist in their field and unequaled by any on Earth, as were the people they had to choose from. Each had at least five years of experience, while their eldest had a whole decade. All team members were hardened and had dozens of missions under their belt. These truly would make an outstanding team.
Agent Dossiers
- |Dodger
|Kham
|Dog
|Greerson
|Burke
|Beggay
|Neko
|Otter
|Lambeck
|Takuan
- Picking three for standby this month would be difficult.
- Docks, Seattle. 010420 2300
- In the shadows, two hunters waited. Sitting at the intersection for almost ten hours was getting long, but if their quarry showed up it would be worth it. Deacon waited behind a dumpster, dressed as a bum. Wearing a Monocrys lined trashed trenchcoat, he concealed a massive arsenal of weapons: HK USP .45Super with smartgun, XM-8 holdout shotgun, twin 10 gage whipit shotguns, dual 9mm Berettas, and a 7.62 XM-25C Carbine with nearly 400 rounds of ammo. Sadly, he felt underarmed, compared to his accomplice in crime, Solo. Solo carried his trademark dual autoshotguns, dual gattling carbines, compact flamethrower, and nine pistols to boot. Waiting inside the first floor windows of an old run down shop that had long been abandoned, Deacon knew Solo would be keeping his cyber-eyes peeled. Deacon thumbed the tri-remote control in his pocket while his other hand flipped the safety on, then off, on his USP in a nervous habit.
- "I've got them. Two trucks and a sedan, inbound. North street." Deacon subvocalized through his implant communicator in his neck.
- "Roger that. What do you think." Solo echoed.
- "I say we fuck us all these cows," replied Deacon, making reference to a running joke between them.
- "Copy. On your mark. Mooo," answered Solo.
- Deacon waited for the first truck to come to a complete halt at the stopsign. The north street passed just infront of the shop front where Deacon knew Solo would now be hunched, with one gat carbine in each arm. As it started to roll forward, Deacon pressed the first button. A parked delivery truck accelerated from a dead stop on the near side of the street, running perpendicular to the target truck. It flew in motion as another similar truck pulled out from an alley behind the truck after the sedan. Both screeched to a halt, one just in front of it's target, and the other behind. Trapped between these obstacle, pairs of gunners stepped from the vehicles. Security officers engaged the blocking vehicles with a certain exuberance that came with training.
- Deacon squeezed the second button. Both blocking vehicles exploded in a fire curtain of death towards their captives. Security men were swept off their feet by a hail of deadly shrapnel and lead balls. The lead and rear trucks were splattered, as their paint and windows were being destroyed in the blast.
- As Solo emerged from the storefront behind a micro-smoke grenade as a cloaked avatar of death, Deacon stepped up and fluidly brought his Carbine to his shoulder. Short controlled bursts burped from the muzzle brake. Suppressed but not silenced, the rounds impacted the lead truck, turning it's cabin into a ventilated mausoleum. Solo ground out two long bursts from each carbine: through the back flaps, the cabin and the engine compartment. Gasoline exploded and the truck tipped over; telling Deacon that the back was cleared. Pouring fire into the rear of the truck, five men foolishly exited the truck with the intent of returning fire. They took cover behind the wheels and body. Switching to the other magazine of armor-piercing and smart-linking with the grenade launcher under his barrel, he fired a Electro-Mag round into the trucks center of mass. The white phosphorous round burst on impact showering all the men in the lead truck with white hot globs. As they burned to death, he switched to thermal vision, and fired double taps at each of them until they were all horizontal.
- Walking calmly he passed the lead truck. Overcoat blowing in the cool summer evening breeze he switched magazines and grabbed his USP in his off hand. Rounding the fender a grim scene greeted him. Solo stood over the bodies of five men, each nearly rent in half by the ten inch custom razors extended from his knuckles. Two cowered in the car, firing at point blank into Solo ineffectually. Muzzle flashes blared from the driver compartment, opposite where Solo was forcing entry. Thumps of impacting rounds interrupted Deacons stride, but he kept moving up. Instantly turning towards the shooter, he loosed six rapid-fire shots from the USP. With that threat silenced, he moved towards the main car. Before he could take three steps, Solo had moved with a celerity Deacon had never seen. Covering the twenty yards to the car in but a second, the tore the shooter in half. Throwing his bloody corpse and the SMG out into the street with the rest of the carnage. Grabbing the mark's limp body, Solo exhaled, "They shot him before I cold get to him."
- "Get what you can. I hear something." True enough he did. From the alley opposite where his trucks had driven, a sedan much like the one Solo was looting for intel, spun to a stop a mere twenty yards from Deacon. The passenger side faced him, it's windows rolled down and muzzles leveled. The driver side doors opened and two men got out, taking places over the hood and trunk respectively. Before they fired their first rounds, his Carbine was up and the USP was trained on the driver's head. Three .45 Super rounds decapitated the driver, while his companions poured fire onto Deacon. Knocked from his feat, he fell to the ground and rolled. Releasing his grip on the USP it clattered to the ground, hung by it's lanyard. Coming to a crouch after the roll he walked a continuous burst through the trunk gunner, into the back seat gunner's face, and then diagonally across the passenger's back as he tried to dive out of the car.
- Turning to Solo, "Hey. Did you find what we needed?"
- Standing at his side, before Deacon could turn, "Nice. Messy, but nice. Oh, Yeah I got it. Hopefully it'll have something useful on it." Handing Deacon the briefcase, he turned and tossed a WP grenade into the car. Turning to again be shoulder to shoulder with Deacon, Solo matched his stride. They slung their weapons in a graceful and natural motion. Arms loosely at their side they both walked from the scene of death and destruction. Three billowing clouds of thick arcid black smoke rose into the sky. Infront of them, a newspaper blew into the street, the wind whipped their longcoats at their calves as they briskly marched towards the subway. Sated, the hunters rested.
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