OIC (32)
MegaZone23
"And now we meet again, for the first time, for the last
time."
--Dark Helmet
ReRob entered the Mecha Combat Training Room from the
port side. He turned on the wall intercom, selected the
bitcher on the other side of the gym, and maxed out the
volume.
Vixen heard a noise from the east side of the MCTC.
Impossibly loud and distorted for a human, and far too low to
be Kei or Yuri. All combat systems are already operational:
no need to do anything but scan the quadrant, and listen to
the message:
"You! Yes, you! Stand still, Lassie!"
Attack coming from behind: analyze. Too large to be a
slug, too fast to be thrown, poorly aimed at her right
scapula. Defense: a step to the left; executed. Determine
nature and trajectory of attack as it passes, and check along
path for assailant. Knife, extremely well-balanced,
familiar. Blood on the blade; why isn't that knife in
somebody's neck? A flick to the right to face the
assailant...
She turned, and caught what seemed to be a humaniform
mirror way out to the west. It was actually a man in a VR-
065 Cyclone. The faceplate was up. The brown eyes, the
French nose...why isn't he dead?!? The pilot spoke:
"I know precisely what you are, Shasti. And I don't
take no shit--" He flicked his faceplate down, activating the
external speakers, "from a machine." His RLAMF units warmed
up, singing a monotone dirge.
Shasti had no weapons systems to warm up: in her
"Vixen" persona, she was only fitted with a VR-038 Light
Combat Cyclone. The advantages of this 'mech are the extreme
speed capabilities. Combined with her innate combat
abilities, she stood a good chance of defeating ReRob's
RLAMF-1's just hand to hand. Even so, she wasn't going to
play those odds. She wielded a Gallant H-90, an armor
piercing handgun. "Then it's time to dance. Computer:
audio. Duran Duran, James Bond Soundtrack. 'A View to a
Kill.'"
I'm severely boned fighting Shasti, ReRob thought, but I
stand a chance against Vixen herself. I wrote her, and I
should be able to make her hesitate. If I can draw her out,
and fight defensively until then,...but then, I always fight
defensively. He laid down a ninety-degree arc of laser fire,
caught Shasti's foot as she leapt, and failed to do any
severe damage. He then remembered that he was in the
training room, and the doorway sent the 'mech an automatic
safety mode message. The cyclone was intentionally failing
to produce any real damage. However, Shasti's Gallant was
burning decently sized holes in the supports and obstacles.
"Road Hog, Safety Override! Execute!"
Now he was doing some real damage. The room should be
missing entirely in about two minutes. He took a flying leap
for good measure, and narrowly avoided a shot. He re-located
Shasti, and spiked the external speaker. "Just one thing,
Shasti."
"What?"
"How the hell did you get Vixen?"
Zark!
"Why, I hacked into your account, darling," she replied
sweetly. Her voice and face hardened and she continued
arrogantly, "Your password is annoyingly simple."
"People never think of the three-dot password, it's
supposedly illegal with our system. But I found a way to
circumvent it. Thanks for the tip, I'll have to change it
later on today." He fired a double blast to keep Shasti from
getting a bead on him.
"Getting optimistic, aren't we, ReRob?"
"But still, you impersonated the legend for two slottin'
weeks, and fooled me! I'm the one who wrote the character.
How did you work it so perfectly?!?"
ReRob talked for a little too long and took several
rounds to the head. There was little faceplate armor left,
but it was still intact. "It was easy. You had a hundred
kay of data on your "nature girl", and I was built to take
slotted personalities." ReRob returned fire and blew a hole
into Perrault Hall. The fight quickly moved, since there was
more room. Fortunately, they were playing Star Trek V: The
Final Frontier. Thus, the only one who was actually watching
the show was John Trussell, who hadn't seen it before. He
was already getting a bit fed up with the movie.
"You mean you've got her entire personality slotted?!?"
"As we speak! It's sitting in the background right now,
and I intend to erase it from memory as soon as I'm done with
this little entanglement."
ReRob saw Trussell out of the corner of his eye.
"Schmuck! Get out of here!"
"Well, I was kind of watching this movie..."
Shasti punctuated her words with blasts. "The
incredible thing about it was that it was so easy! I didn't
think I could find anybody with a set-up like yours. I mean,
after all,--"
"What does God want with a starship?"
Shasti and ReRob spoke in unison: "Keep out of it,
Kirk!" Trussell, fed up with the movie, got up and left.
ReRob knew that Shasti was set-up for close combat. The
Obliviator, on the other hand, was built for the open
battlefield. It was time to make some room.
"RoadHog: Check for EVA!"
"Cleared for EVA. Environmental systems to 85 percent
capability. CVR sealed. Life support guaranteed for two
point five hours"
"Eve: isolate and evacuate Perrault Hall and MCTC.
Override code Sierra Hotel India Tango!" ReRob heard blast
doors sealing, but he wasn't going to wait for a computer-
controlled evacuation. He invoked a manual override, blowing
away a large portion of the ceiling. Explosive decompression
forced both Cyclones into hard vacuum.
People on the bridge saw two unmistakable mecha: ReRob's
"signature" Obliviator and the violet Light Cyclone he made
for Vixen. The safeties were obviously not on, they had
blasted a hole onto the weather deck (and not even in the
MCTC!) and were intently attempting to kill each other. A
quick chorus of "? the fuck?" followed, and then they found
ReRob's frequency.
"ReRob, this is Zoner. Knock that the fuck off!"
"No can do, Zoner. I just hope that you boys can pick
up the pieces when I die." And he switched into the standard
frequency of Vixen's suit. "Vixen, are you there? Can you
read me?"
Shasti closed for the kill, despite the efforts of
ReRob's RLAMF units. But, almost to her surprise, she did
respond: "Yup, I'm here with the rest of us."
"You can stop the rest of those personalities. You just
have to try hard enough!"
"I,...I can't!" Shasti breached the armor on ReRob's
upper right arm, amputating the arm and exposing the stump to
vacuum. "I'm just lucky she's letting me use her vocal
chords!"
ReRob's LSU kicked into overdrive, in a vain attempt to
keep the pressure up, despite the hole in the suit which once
was its wearer's arm. Rob realized that he had only a half-
minute of oxygen left: he might be able to survive longer
than that, but even a Detian can't talk without air. And
talk was his major weapon. It was, as the cliche goes, now
or never.
"Well then, before we part, I need to know just one
thing."
"Sure. Anything, for you..." Another blow knocked
ReRob off the deck and sent him spinning out of control. He
righted himself, and stopped with relation to the Wayward
Son.
"Why?"
"Why what?"
ReRob brought his left RLAMF forward. "Why did you get off
with that stupid credstick, when you could have any guy you
wanted?"
Vixen froze. Back when she was a Shadowrunner, that
little fact had been brought up by the Dweller during an
astral quest. That hurt her, more than life itself, more
than all those years she spent running from Lone Star, corp
cops, and wannabe samauri before she got Awakened. Her
entire mind froze for an instant, and her body with it.
ReRob didn't dare hesitate. He fired an overload burst,
turned his fiber-optic barrels to molten spaghetti, and hit
her square in the chestplate. There was very little left of
her CVR chestpiece, and she floated there, her boots
magnetically stuck to the deck.
ReRob's suit was just as motionless.