Jaenys got a gun

"Poor devils," Jaenys thought. The smouldering mess of wrecked and twisted metal and corpses of clan miners lay all around, barely distinguishable from the charred earth, victims of an orbital strike she'd just called in. Underpaid, undertrained, and underequipped, their only defense had been to set up turrets in a desperate holding maneuver, no match for the lethal precision of Omni-Tek's elite security forces.

Some days their distress calls to the clan networks resulted in the clans' own security forces mustering a defence and the fighting would get ugly. Today wasn't one of those days. As Jaenys unloaded her last burst into the dying control tower, she radioed the base: "Pleasant Meadows Site 4 secure, sir. Get your planters ready in 20 minutes. Jaenys out." Seconds later the tower exploded, spraying fine notum residue into the air.

Now a tense waiting game began. ICC rules of conduct on notum mining meant that an unclaimed site was anybody's game, and with her own organisation's contracts full, careful coordination and hope that no clan group would attempt to lay their own control tower in time was all she could do. If they did, they would have to destroy the tower immediately and hope no more clan security would show up. If the site remained under clan control by the end of the day, there would be no payment.

She fidgeted with her JAME Prototype Blaster, a weapon packing incredible radioactive punch, but bulky, slow and sometimes unreliable. The other Omni-Tek agents, all elite operatives in their own right, seemed unconcerned and were backslapping and chuckling about the defenders' futile attempts. It had been a slaughter this time.

But her eyes stayed on the horizon, peering for any sign of a clanner who might attempt to intercept the Omni-Tek forces arriving with their control tower. There was always one or two, sneaking in at the last minute. "Those bastards are always late," she muttered aloud to no one in particular.

For her colleagues, it was just work and a chance for short-lived thrills in a risk-free world dulled by insurance tech. For her, it was personal.

((Haha I never thought I'd do this but bored at work, meh xD))

(( Kate demands more in the name of leets everywhere! :D ))

The radar picked up a fast moving dot, possibly a yalm, but moving incredibly low to the ground. Jaenys ran after it for a second, but then it shot out of range. No point chasing, she thought. Soldiers weren't the most mobile of professions at the best of times, bogged down by heavy armor and weapons. Traffic wasn't all that unusual, but it always made her nervous.

Her comms opened up. "November Whisky Two-Niner in position and ready." The planter had arrived, early enough for them to actually rendezvous for a change. She ran back to their position to find an aging bureaucrat, evidently with much higher security level than her, fiddling with the controls to call in the control tower. The rest of the operatives were huddled around him, telling him not to worry and assuring him the clans were too scared to pull anything when intel put most of their security off-world at the moment. But the crat evidently was more comfortable filling forms and pushing paperwork, and was hardly the sort to be out in the field trying to wrest control of a notum site after a bloody battle.

Jaenys tried to relax him a little herself. "Just hit the code as soon as ICC gives the all clear and you'll have your site. Probably a bigger bonus this year too," she chuckled. The crat smiled sheepishly.

One of the enforcers on the scene pulled out his blades. "You see this KAIROTERA? I'll stick it into any clans necks for you," the atrox said. Flashing it so close to the crat probably did little to ease his tension, even though the rest of the operatives broke out laughing. And fortunately, the crat didn't pay much attention as he hit was busy entering the code.

Control Tower - Omni

"Good job," Jaenys breathed at last. With the site in place it was time to set up their defences. The crat called in a cannon turret then zoned out with his grid converter without a word, evidently relieved to be out of there. A minute later, one of his subordinates teleported in from the grid and set up a turret. "Some decent support for a change," she said, smiling. It was a poor ruse, the kid they'd sent looked barely out of school, didn't even have a weapon and was being made to man a turret, possibly not knowing how to use it. Still, something was better than nothing and he looked enthusiastic enough. Probably his first field job... as cannon fodder.

"Enemy spotted." It was the enforcer. "Some gimpy agent, I'll take care of it."

"Where are you?" Jaenys replied. "Need help?"

"Naah." A pause. "He dead. Haha, easy mea..." Static, then silence.

"**** where is he?" she commed to the other operatives. No one replied. She swore futilely into the comms. "Report positions, all ops"

"I'm in position at the control tower, ma'am." It was the kid in the turret.

(( ... Ooooo :O ))

((haha <3 nice one.. :p))

(( Very nice indeed - more... ))

Two - maybe three - orange dots flickered on the edge of her radar. If the rest of the operatives were already at reclaim, these weren't average agents she'd be up against. And there weren't all that many agents at this security level to guess who they might be.

"Overconfidence is their problem... you've got to bait them," Jaenys thought. Maybe she could move between them and the turret then draw them across and hope the kid is alert and targets the same agent. Then she commed the kid. "You picking up anything on your screens? Probably small, blipping in and out, look hard."

"Uh... ma'am," the kid stuttered.

"What is it, what do you see?" She continued to look for a place with good vantage for the turret but difficult pathing to trap the agents before they realised the ploy.

"I don't have this area map uploaded."

"..." Jaenys scowled, but then bit her tongue. "Ok be ready and fire your full salvo as soon as you see them. I'll come in from the west." The layout scouted, she moved to engage them - too late for regrets now, she thought, as an aimed shot ripped through her reflecs and tore across her ribs.