This is a story about a traitor. It is also here that I put in all the roleplay that my in-game character lacks. I believe that it is safer to describe my character after the round has ended. People who have already been stunned and killed while writing a "Halt!" or "What are you doing in maint-URGH!" sort of message will understand what I mean.
This round took place today, January 02, 2015, but I like to think of it as belonging to Schofield's past, before he was a Head of Security.
Its title is owend to the fact that I used no telecrystals. I have proofread the story, but only once.
A Badass Charles Schofield
Alright, let's do this. Syndicate agents never knew their objectives until they were finally aboard their target space station. That's because there's a (very slight) chance that they will be caught by Nanotrasen while attempting to infiltrate one of Nanotrasen's many stations; while there was absolutely no risk of an agent producing any sort of solid proof against the Syndicate - this sort of deal was done virtually and anonymously - if an agent were to tell Nanotrasen that the Syndicate, for example, is attempting to assassinate a certain bright young scientist, Nanotrasen would make sure that said bright young scientist was quickly, secretly, and safely escorted to another solar system.
As Charles was teleported into arrivals, his memory implant finally activated. He was given a code phrase and a code response and wondered why he would ever communicate with another syndicate agent. He was also given a PDA code that apparently would allow him to acquire certain, for the lack of a better word, tools which could be used to get his job done. Bollocks, he thought. Charles didn't trust the Syndicate, and he'd probably be long dead before he decided to use any tools but those made by himself.
His job was to make sure that a certain xenobiologist named Gage Sutton never reached the Central Command. He didn't really know why they wanted him dead. What he did know was that the Syndicate paid very well for certain jobs, and Charles needed some money: he had big plans, and big plans usually require even bigger amounts of money. The job that he was given was "Staff Assistant." He had tried to sign in as a Station Engineer, but Nanotrasen said he lacked "essential skills for the engineering department." And then they said that the best job he could get with such a curriculum was "Staff Assistant." They're gonna see how unskilled I am, he thought to himself as he walked to the Head of Personnel's office. Fortunately the Head of Personnel wasn't as demanding as Nanotrasen. It was not uncommon to see changelings being hired into the security staff, the very department that was supposed to protect the crew from the menaces of outer space.
A couple minutes later, he was walking into engineering with a new ID. He didn't even have to be convincing. As he ented his new department, he saw the purple tint in the air that implied a plasma leak. He backed off, set up his internals, and walked into his new department. He was almost surprised to see the first dead body of the day.
After quickly relieving a dead engineer of his hardsuit, Charles was thinking about how he would kill the scientist. Disable Gravgen. Disable Tcoms. Walk into Science. Stun him. Cuff. Drag him into space. It was not the perfect plan, but it was good enough. Of course it'd require some time. He would need a jetpack. He'd need to know where Gage was. He'd need a defined and clear escape route into space, possibly through false walls in maintenance. And, most importantly, he'd need to attach signalers to the Gravgen's and Tcoms' APCs.
After learning the airlocks' wires, Charles hacked into the Captain's office. If he was going to take a jetpack, why not the blue one? Everyone hacked into EVA. He even wondered why there was still a maintenance airlock in EVA. No. I'm hitting the big boss's office. And he did. He hacked his way in. He took a hand teleporter. He took the jetpack. He looked at the antique laser gun. Oh god, so tempting. But I don't need to draw that much attention. Not yet. The AI might screw me up. Two things Charles failed to realize: numer one, there was no AI. Number two, if he didn't want to draw attention, walking around with the Captain's jetpack was a bad, bad choice.
Alright. Now I just need to set up the signalers in the AP...
The emergency shuttle has been called.
You've gotta be kidding me.Alright. Plan B time. Go in without an ID, get him, drag him into space. But first let's pay a visit to the detective's office.
His plan was to break the detective's locker with an emitter. He was surprised to see that the detective was braindead. He happily hacked his way in through maintenance and dragged the detective after him. He found a quiet place and stripped the detective clean. Charles took his radio encryption key, his revolver, two speed loaders, and his PDA. He wondered whether he should space the detective through waste disposals. He decided not to. He probably won't be coming back, anyway.
Now Charles was armed. He knew the wires. He just needed to find Gage. And then he heard his target screaming over the common radio channel: "XENOBIOLOGY IS BREACHED!!! SPECIMENS ESCAPING!!!" Thank the gods. He now had an excuse to go to science. He was going to fix stuff.
As he arrived in Xenobiology, he saw his target. His mood suddenly lightened. He was going to get the job done easily. No one was around. Because of that shuttle call, there would be blood. Lots of it. It wouldn't be pretty, but it would be done. Gage was dragging a red slime around, and the slime seemed to be smiling. Alright, focus. I need a path into space. He knew he only had to drag Gage with him. As soon as they were out, Gage wouldn't come back. He had a hardsuit. He had the Det's revolver and 18 bullets. Enough to crit him twice. He's gonna be on the ground after the third or fourth shot. He's gonna be unconscious after the seventh. But the first three shots are crucial. He knew precisely what to do as he hacked airlocks, preparing his escape path into space. After he finished a false wall, it was time to get on with his plan. He went back into xenobiology. And then he saw the medical cyborg.
It's funny how a cyborg can ruin even the most thorough plan. If Charles had a jetpack, he would have managed to outrun the cyborg in space. But although Charles had brought an engineering hardsuit, he didn't want to draw so much attention by walking around with the captain's jetpack.Aside from that, the medical cyborg could manage to inject some tricordrazine into Gage before Charles snatched him. Charles decide to wait until the borg was gone; he stepped outside of his target's field of view, hid inside a locker, and waited. And waited. And waited. And then Gage left xenobiology, dragging his red slime after him. The slime was smiling, Charles was sure of it. He didn't know slimes had a face, much less emotions.
Charles didn't make a move immediately. He was going to wait until Gage was standing still, perhaps distracted. He needed to land the first three shots, and hitting a moving target was hard even for him, especially if your target had a slime behind him. Charles also needed to be quick: Tcoms were still online, and he didn't want give Gage a chance to scream for help. Charles expected Gage to get into R&D and stay there. Oh, for fuck's sake, was what Charles thought when Gage left the science department.
He followed Gage, always staying outside of the scientist's field of view. The scientist stopped by the bar; aside from his target, Charles noted that there were three people around. A Security Officer called Waldo, the clown, and another person he didn't care to examine.
Charles knew that the shuttle would be arriving soon. If Gage made his way into escape, he'd have more than three people to worry about. He dropped his hardsuit by the bar's entrance: Charles needed to be as fast as possible, and he needed both hands to quickly reload the revolver. The hardsuit had to go. He positioned himself behind his target, a distance of about six meters [three tiles], and pulled the revolver.
*BLAM* *BLAM* *BLAM* *BLAM* *BLAM* *BLAM* There was a short pause as Charles reloaded the revolver. *BLAM* *BLAM* *BLAM* *BLAM* *BLAM* *BLAM* Charles looked at his target: Gage didn't even scream. He probably didn't notice what was happening until it was too late. Time to grab and run, Charles thought as the first laser shot hit him in the head.
Born and raised in NoxStation, Charles had lightning-fast reflexes. He dodged the next two laser shots and quickly figured out an escape route. He noted that the shooter - which Charles didn't have time but to glance at - was between him and the central corridors, so Charles grabbed the unconscious scientist and made a run to bar maintenance. The shooter fired six more times before Charles reached the familiar darkness of maintenance, and Charles was hit once more. While his wounds slowed him down, Charles had meson scanners and no flashlights. In the darkness, his pursuers wouldn't know where to go, but Charles would. Charles cursed silently upon the realization that he had no hardsuit. He could just have dragged the Gage's body into the Fore Starboard Solars and be done with it. He decided make his way back into the bar and take his hardsuit back. He went through Library.
He didn't like the fact that Gage was leaving a huge blood trail behind. He liked even less to learn that his hardsuit was gone. He couldn't flee to space. DAMN IT! He knew he had to get rid of the body. Alright, alright. Engineering maintenance. Get to the old Incinerator, space the body. He made his way into the old Incinerator. He wondered whether to bolt the airlock behind him. He didn't. As he finished placing his target into the disposals unit, he felt his left arm melting.
Charles had reloaded the revolver on his way into the old Incinerator, but he didn't bolt the airlocks behind him. He didn't expect to be followed, and that was a very serious mistake. Of course that he didn't have much time to appreciate that: he was again, this time in the head.
At this point, Charles was badly wounded. He could no longer see his shooter, nor the second guy who had also arrived with the shooter. He had six bullets left. And he fired his revolver.
When he lost sight of his shooter, he knew it was over. He knew he wasn't walking away of there. And then he was very angry. He was angry because he knew was going to die.
As he cursed his decision of not bolting the airlock, something weird happened. He heard the *click* which indicated that he had fired his last bullet, and the laser shots stopped coming. He tried to run to the maintenance tunnels. He heard the disposals chute activating and thought to himself that at least his target would die. What was very weird was that, running to Engineering Maintenance, he saw his shooter lying on the floor, with the Captain's Antique Laser Gun beneath him. He wondered why the second guy didn't pick the laser gun up and finished him. Instead, it seemed that his second pursuer was trying to make him slip on a banana peel. He grabbed the laser gun and discharged it on the shooter. And then he ran for it.
He pulled his first-aid kit and patched himself up. It would always be a mystery to him how someone could be brought from the brink of death with a single ointment. But he didn't had time for mysteries: He had to escape.
He decided to take cover behind a wall and wait for his pursuers. As the Antique Laser Gun was recharging, he checked his revolver. Six spent bullets. No loaders left. The Antique Laser Gun would have to serve.
From the old Incinerator, it was a long straight way to Engineering Maintenance. Charles didn't expect to kill them, but perhaps, by firing some good shots, he could convince them not to come running straight into a man with a laser gun. That could buy Charles some time. In the end, Charles fired four times. His second pursuer was hit twice. But that didn't stop him, and as Charles ran out of ammo, he was forced to retreat.
Half a minute later, as he tried to leave through Engineering Maintenance's fore exit [near to cargo bay/HoP's line], he saw the shooter again. Only now he realized that his shooter was wearing a clown mask. The shooter pulled an e-gun. Charles pulled a laser gun. Charles ran back into engineering maintenance, firing behind him. He got seven shots out before he finally collapsed due to the disabler beams. As he lay on the floor, he wondered whether his laser shots would convince his shooter not to follow him. If not, Charles would be as good as dead.
When Charles got up, he went further inside Engineering Maintenance. He took a minute to regain his breath and decided to take the same exit. He was going to arrivals. He was surprised to see his shooter lying on the floor, e-gun beneath him. He later realized that his laser shots had more effect than he expected.
His shooter was still alive, gasping, and it was only now that he realized that his shooter was, in fact, the Head of Personnel, Drew Bode. It didn't occur to Charles that he could still save his shooter's life. He left the Head of Personnel's dying body naked in Aft Port Solars maintenance as he walked out with a new ID and a new e-gun.
The shuttle had already arrived as Charles, from the Arrivals Security Checkpoint, erased all security records. Beepsky will not be arresting me, thought Charles as he made his way into a locker and hid just outside in front of the Arrivals' pods.
Two people got into two different pods. As the timer neared thirty seconds, he wondered which pod he would take. He saw that one of the pods was having its inner airlock hacked shut, and he suddenly knew which pod to take. As he hacked shut the outer airlock behind, he wondered whether to kill the pod's occupant. No. Enough killing for a day.. He quietly prepared to unbolt the inner airlock and to stun whoever was inside. As the timer reached twenty seconds, Charles jumped into action. The pod was unbolted, the occupant, disabled. He quickly restrained the occupant with a cable and jumped into the pod.
On his way to Centcom, he apologized to his prisoner.
"Sorry. I don't trust you."
"I thought you were gonna kill me. Thanks."
As the pod docked into Centcom, Charles wondered which kind place had people thanking you for not killing them.
Spoiler:
On a side note, I got shot five times by lasers. The only thing that kept me alive was my hardsuit helmet. I was shot just enough times to be critically wounded but not unconscious. I saw my death in the form of a laser gun fired by a clown (HoP had a clown mask). Managing to hit the HoP even after I lost sight of him made this round rather special for me. I went to the brink of death and came back on top.