Save Scumming - Chapter Thirty-Eight (Patreon)

Okay, second... third attempt at the cover's typography. Thoughts?

Chapter Thirty-Eight

This time, I went in with my full gear. Not changing beforehand was... stupid of me. 

I took a taxi to a block over from the warehouse, only making a quick stop along the way at a convenience store to buy a burner phone. I found an alleyway, got changed in it, then tossed my clothes and unneeded gear into a dumpster. I was pretty sure no one would steal that. 

So, I was geared up, anonymous tip-off sent to keep Timothy busy, and I was more or less mentally prepared.

I walked into the warehouse with a bit of swagger. It helped, really. When I walked into sight of that skinny woman and the borg, they both jumped, but the borg went for a gun first.

I put two rounds into him, then jumped to the side as fist-sized ball of fire streaked past me. The woman was screaming at me, a lot of rather rude things about my parents, my mother in particular, my heritage, and my promiscuity. She was kind of almost right with that last one.

I ducked behind a container, then winced as a wash of fire shot past, then another. So, I ran around the far side, then leapt out again, already rising my gun to shoot.

She was covered in flames, thick fire that didn’t burn her or her clothes, but which were scorching the ground around her.

I fired, then fired again, and yet she retaliated with a pair of quick-moving little fireballs, then a much slower gush of flames.

I hissed and bounced away, only taking the very edge of that fire, but it still stung like hell. Crap, this was a lot of magical firepower, pun not intended. Was this what a normal, non-newbie D-ranker could put out.

Ducking behind cover, I flicked my gun open and tugged out four empty shells, then replaced them.

She was still swearing, and had shifted to actual slurs. 

Bit of a potty mouth.

A glance around the corner showed her stumbling, hand clutching her lower arm that was pissing blood.

So, I’d hit her, or at least nicked her.

I made a mental note to shoot both of them a lot faster if it came to it. Then I jumped around the corner, rolled, and came up in a clumsy pose on one knee. I fired three rounds, then waited. 

I think a couple might have hit, because she went down with a gurgle.

“Holy crap,” I muttered.

I stumbled over, watching the flames die out as she did. For a moment, I just kind of stood there, then I went over and sat on the bench she’d been sitting on. My ears were ringing a little. The revolver was... strong, and loud, and kind of heavy, which made it hard to snap-fire at anything. I’d mostly gotten lucky there, I think. 

But... crap. I wasn’t made out for this killing shit, even if it wasn’t ‘real.’ 

I took a moment, then stood and... didn’t loot the bodies. That was a step too far. Instead I checked out the RV. There was a little sign within that said ‘leave no signs.’ It was clean. Like, very clean. Actually, now that I looked, the area around the portal was clean too.

This wasn’t a professional outfit, by any means, but they had managed to keep things real quiet for an entire week, at least until that Ojou woman broke out seemingly on her own. That was something. There was a lot of money on the line to find her by the end, and I imagined a lot of bounty hunters and bored rankers were sniffing around. 

So... they might have had good info-sec even if they looked a bit like amateurs. Or the looks were deceiving.

That might have been it, actually. I’d been a corpo soldier for a while. My idea of ‘competent’ came in company colours and regulation uniforms. The borg and the woman were dressed in casual streetwear. They could be from just about any street in Fortress ENE except maybe city centre, and even then, maybe. 

In a way, that was professional dress too, because it let them blend in so well. That woman was obviously a pretty decent mage. Leagues better than I was. The borg had a hundred K in chrome on him. These weren’t nobodies off the street.

And looking around the RV, I discovered nothing about them. Even their trash was tossed out of a window and directly into a bin at the back, one that looked like it had been burned up on the inside a few times. Likely the woman. 

So they weren’t leaving traces behind.

Crap. Maybe this was more than an uppity street gang nabbing a corpo princess for a big bounty. Had they ever released a statement? I didn’t think so. Or if they did, it wasn’t made public.

Enough. 

I could speculate forever, but right now, I needed to get into the portal and see what was going on.

First, though, I grabbed that compact SMG. A Myalis Arms Purr8, chambered in good old 9mm. I think it was vaguely modelled after the Mp9, but with a more rounded body and boxier magazine. Thirty rounds, and Jack the borg had two more magazines strapped to his leg. 

I looked the gun over, then sighed and tossed it aside. It had a fancy all-electronic firing mechanism. It meant that the user could dial in the rate of fire, or lock anyone else out from using the gun. 

Expensive trash in my hands, then. But I made note of it. I wouldn’t mind grabbing it, and I was sure that Jane could unlock this thing if I asked nicely. Maybe file off the serials if borg here hadn’t already.

I check on the woman, but... nah, no guns on her. Too bad, but it made sense, she could fire balls of fire and act as a one-woman flamethrower. She didn’t need a gun.

Might have saved her if she had one. Or if she chose to wear any amount of armour... or a lot of armour. My revolver was punching way above my weight class.

With all of that done, and not much gained for it, I came to stand before the portal. There was nothing to it. I jumped in.

I landed a little awkwardly on the other side, then ducked down and swept my surroundings. I was in a courtyard? A castle? The walls were all large stone blocks, and there were parapets around, as well as a staircase to one side leading up the wall. 

The way onwards was obvious, there was only one doorway here, and it was open at the bottom of a short set of stairs.

A man was nearby, only just starting to look up.

I moved over quickly, and while he was still reeling in shock, I punched him in the nose.

Right, this was the ‘go loud’ timeline.

Wincing a little, I stepped back, then shot the man twice in the chest.

He didn’t go down. Instead, he took both blows like a champ, then staggered towards me. Earth and mud rose from the ground, coating his legs then jumping up to his arms.

I stepped back, then put four more rounds into him.

That did it.

“Christ,” I muttered. A second D-ranker who wasn’t a total noobie like me. And all those shots had to have made some noise. I moved to the side of the entrance and reloaded, then when a second guy ran in, I shot him in the back. 

More reloading.

Maybe I should have brought that Myalis Arms handgun with me. It was so much faster to reload.

I didn’t know how many were left in here, but no one ran in, so I poked my head around the entrance and looked within.

There was a corridor, more steps going down. The roof was arched above.

“Okay,” I said. Then I spun around and moved in, run raised, eyes peeled. It was dark in here, but they’d strung up a line of lights, feeding off a set of car batteries at the entrance and winding down into the corridor.

There was, soon enough, a T-junction. The string of lights went left. I went left as well, only pausing to look around as I noticed a lot of bones on the ground. Portal world decorations? 

I wasn’t sure.

The passage to the left led into a corridor past a doorway, and then a room. A long, narrow room, with cells on either side.

I moved in, slow and careful. “Hello?” I called out.

There was motion in one of the cages, and I brought my gun around, only to pause. The lighting was poor, but I could recognize Miss Ojou. 

She stared at me, eyes going wide, then she shouted. “Behind you!”

“What?” I asked.

Which is about when something struck me in the skull with the force of a sledgehammer.

***