The crisp morning air, the birds gently chirping in the trees, and the sounds of nature flooded my consciousness. Despite my grizzly line of work, I was a man of the outdoors…
"Which is, honestly, pretty damn hard to find in the concrete jungles of Seattle", I thought contemptuously. I'd been wet working for almost a decade now, since I was 17 years old. Oh how the years had changed me.
The name is Surgio Traven, but everyone calls me Big T. As a teenager I had good grades, great friends, and was getting ready to join the UCAS Army and try my hand at the Ranger Regiment. I had dreams and lived by the moto of, "go big or get the drek out." It was ironic, because, by my 15th birthday I goblinized into a Troll in the second wave of U.G.E., and kept growing larger and larger through my teenage years until settling at a mountain of 3.5 meters and a massive 300 kilograms of iron muscle. No one stood in the way of my aspirations; I rarely fell short of them as well. I possessed martial abilities the likes of which were hard to come by on the streets. Physical training and constant studies kept me on the bleeding edge, and with no cyberware. People think I must have had some hidden chrome, but when it came down to it I didn't have the desire for it. Countless soldiers and runners opt.'ed for extensive surgeries that were unrequired. I always believed in saving the chrome for when it was required to do your job. Sure I couldn't punch through a car-hood or cut through an engine block, but I have the equipment which can make me pretty deadly. I have my faithful Barret 151 to which I gave the designator of Raphael, my old .45 Blackhawk, and my dicote covered short blade. I was strong, intelligent and always aware of the situation to the fullest extent of my capabilities…
"You're getting old, you crazy tusker," my partner, Chiro, said. To which I gave a quizzical look. "You're day dreaming, never used to do that when you were active duty. Your old age and this life is getting to you," she replied with a chuckle.
"Well Chi-Chi, I'm not cut out for any other line of work and I've got bills to pay off," I shot back, with a hard edge in my voice. Thankfully she said nothing more and peered through her spotters scope and I did the same. We were observing a certain Mr. Smith which we were employed to "dispose of," shall we say. Guns for hire, mercenaries, assassins, however you put it we were killers for a living and we performed our jobs with cold efficiency.
I had known Chiro since I was active in the Army, she was one of the first women to be allowed through Ranger training and she passed with flying colors and gold stars; a true testament to the blood in her veins, and the iron-will of her Japanese heritage. She had very subtly been replacing her body with iron and chrome over the years, she laughed at my so called naiveté in the realm of cyber. She used to tease me until I activated an experimental weapon, a portable electromagnetic pulse emitter designed for attachment to a weapon, and her chrome fritzed out on her while I suffered no ill effects on me other than buying a new com.
She jokingly nudged my arm by way of apologizing and smiled at me, she forgave my irritable attitude easier than anyone else. She saw more than a mountain of muscle and dull sounding speech patterns common to my people. I turned to her to smile back when I noticed something, just a quick flash in the building next to us. As if something were reflecting off a smooth glass surface. I frowned and flicked my eyes over there, she nodded and that's when my personal secretary got a message, "Eyes up and on target, this is sent as an automated message if you don't return signal. Rip and Roll are positioned and ready to work. Kosher? -Slyther "
I signaled back that we were positioned and ready to complete our business.
Rip and Roll, the elf twins, started zeroing in on the target's apartment on the streets bellow us and making their way into the lobby of the luxurious apartment complex across the alley. They entered and I switched my sights to a thermographic filter to track their progress up the elevator until Chi-Chi could make visual contact with the two again. We saw them moments later arrive on the 10th floor of the complex and stroll down the way, our job was to make sure security didn't come up, and if they did, take the fragger's out. Sly and his chummer, a dwarf by the alias of Trench, were to make the actual killing shot. While Rip and Roll were to "sanitize" the apartment and retrieve a data chip containing incriminating evidence to our employer. A concoction of propane and gasoline to destroy all evidence of our arrival and departure, I was concerned for electronic recording equipment but was told the building had none, besides what was in the renters own dos and installed by his own private security. An effective team, we did our jobs with professionalism and covered every detail, our rep on the street was steadily becoming well-known and that of quality work.
As the twins walked down the hallway I noticed something move in the apartment; a movement of shadows against shadows. Just as I'm about to signal to Slyther about a possible second contact, the twins reach the door and gun fire ripped through the door and tore Rip (or Roll, I could never really tell) to shreads. While the other ducked out of the way with fine-tuned wired reflexes, I opened fire with my Baret and slung some .50 caliber mayhem into the apartment, hoping I could hit the shooter from pure luck. I saw no muzzle flashes, heard no concussive waves from the weapon, and just couldn't see a thing. I was flying by the seat of my pants and only prayed I could keep the last surviving twin from turning into swiss cheese, and by god I could have sworn I did something right in a previous life because the gun fire stopped after the last round from my magazine. It looked like the last twin was stumbling down the hall, and bleeding profusely. I glanced over at Slyther and Trench, but they were already sliding down the drainpipe on the side of their building.
Chiro, already following suit, quickly dived off the building and latched on to the ladder designated as our quick escape. I leaned over and quickly snagged my personal secretary and keyed in the detonator code for our impromptu ordinance in the apartment.
All hell broke loose.