"LADIES AND GENTS, GET YOURSELVES READY FOR THE SOME OF THA BLOODIEST, MEANEST, MOST BRUTAL FIGHTING WE'VE SEEN SINCE THE FACKING ROMANS WERE AROUND!" An announcer called over the crowd of roaring masses that filled the Pacifica arena to its fullest capacity and then a bit more.
"GET OUT YOUR GOON MATES, BECAUSE I'M WILLIAM WILLAS, SERVING AS YOUR ANNOUNCER FOR THE BRUTALITY OF THIS TREMENDOUS BREKKY OF AN EVENT. WITH ME IS KERRY EURODYNE AND VICTORIA ARMSTRONG, TWO FINE CUNTS FROM THIS HERE NATION WHO WILL BE HELPING ME WITH THA COMMENTARY."
"Glad to be here Willas."
"Did you just call me a cunt?"
"VERY SOON THA FIGHTERS WILL BE CALLED IN BY OUR TWO REFS DOWN IN THA CENTER THERE, MR. BLUE AND MRS. RED. MISTAH SMASHA WAS CALLED AWAY TO DO SOMETHING, AND THEY OFFERED TO ACT AS SUBSTITUTES. MAKE NO MISTAKE THOUGH, THESE CUNTS ARE CLAD IN DAIONI BORG FRAME, MEANING THEY CAN TEAR YOU ROOT RATS APART FASTA THAN YOU CAN SAY 'GOODNIGHT IRENE'!"
David admitted, this guest star announcer was a pretty funny guy. He felt the easy going smile on his face grow as he listened. Glancing around the room though, he saw nothing but glares and frowns… Most of which were directed at him. Made sense, he didn't try to hide his identity. They likely would have tried to attack him were the room not lined in Animal and Tyger guards.
He thought about it for a moment before letting a wide, mocking grin take over his face and angling his face a little bit up. In short, he copied Katsuo's iconic expression.
Judging from the immediate deepening of their frowns, and the occasional growl directed at him, it worked perfectly. He made a note to tell Katsuo that his face was infuriating later, and thank him for it. It was serving him well here.
There were two main entrances to the arena. So about half of the numerous participants were packed into this massive side-room waiting to go in. He wasn't sure how many exactly, but judging from a rough headcount there was maybe… five-hundred fighters? It was more than three-hundred, but less than seven-hundred. The arena couldn't hold much more than that.
At least, he didn't think it could hold much more. The audience capacity was like 500,000 or something, and the arena was for football games originally. It would be a little cramped for a while until the fighters started dropping. Then the space would open up some.
Eventually the announcement bell rang, and he started walking confidently towards the brightly lit arena, through the access tunnel. His visor fell forwards to cover his face in response to a mental command.
He was clad in his most recent 'upgrade'. His plastech duster, his visored helmet, his exposed chrome arms with blades mounted. He was going to put shotguns on them, but techie recommended smgs and made a pretty convincing argument about it.
…He still liked shotguns more.
Regardless, he couldn't have either for the arena fight, so instead he got some monoblades mounted instead. On his waist was the sword that Smasher only gave him a few lessons on, and that was about it. It felt strange going into a fight without a gun, but it wasn't like he was going to lose here.
He was David fucking Martinez. Six months ago Arasaka needed to call in Adam Smasher to put him down. He had been training under the guy since. There wasn't a single guy in this arena that could stack up against that. There wasn't a single guy here who could stack up against the fuckers that he's already fought before.
"What do we do with a drunken sailor?"
One heavy footstep at a time. His entire form was indecipherable, indistinct and unrecognizable save for a vaguest black-blue silhouette.
"What do we do with a drunken sailor?"
His organs felt like they were being used like punching bags.
"What do we do with a drunken sailor?"
…That was fucking infuriating.
"EARLY IN THE MORNING?!"
The blinding light of the arena was automatically compensated for by the smartvisor of his helmet, but it still was enough to bring him out of his thoughts. He blinked away the memories and walked to the box that was marked with his number in holographics. Number seven, for some reason.
Apparently in the brief seconds it took for Smasher to sign him up, six other people had signed up already. He would call it a bit odd, but then again he understood the appeal, so he didn't comment on it. It would be hypocritical or something.
He nodded at Aoi and Akai who were standing in the center of the arena, backs to one another to look over the entire space. They were called in by the new president of Arasaka to handle the referee position while Smasher was off Smashing something. Judging from the enthusiastic jerking of Akai's 'ear' sensors and the calm wave of Aoi's, they were happy to see him too.
They were chooms the last time he talked to them, and they haven't tried to screw him over yet, so he was fine with them. He just didn't talk to them very much.
He rolled his shoulders, cracked his joints, and loosened up. One sprain last week and Katsuo and Becca still hadn't let him hear the end of it. He wasn't about to throw an easy match like this from getting a cramp in his neck.
…Wait, his limbs were chrome, it shouldn't be possible for him to get a cramp in them. Right?
He pondered this mystery for a while, waiting for the announcement of the start of the brawl. Glancing around him, he saw that each fighter was roughly three feet from another other fighter. Meaning the first few seconds were going to be a clusterfuck of immense proportions.
Alright David, lesson one, prioritizing targets. He had to make space for himself first, so everyone around him had to go in his first sandy usage at minimum.
The fighters were arranged in a pentagon sorta shape, each had five guys nearest to them. In front of him were two, a weedy looking guy holding some knives, and a bulky guy with a baton. To his sides was a short guy with a monokatana, and a fat guy with brass knuckles and chrome arms. Behind him, there was a guy holding… a harpoon gun? Was that allowed?
Alright, priorities. First to go was whoever could keep up with him even a little bit in sandy speed. Next was the guy with the monokatana and the other with a harpoon gun. Last was the guy with the baton, then knives, then brass knuckles. Prioritize the thing most likely to get through his armor, then the things with the most range in descending order.
That panzerfucker taught him that. Bastard's arms were half again longer than his own. That was a distinct advantage on top of him being way fucking faster than David was.
…And hitting harder. And having more armor. And being more experienced. And having an AI on his side…
…How the fuck did they win against that monster? He made a note to kiss Lucy, and hug Becca, the next time he saw them. He didn't want to know what that fight would have been like without them by his side.
Goode was a bastard, he could fuck right off and stay dead.
"LADIES AND GENTS, CLENCH YOUR ASSES AS WE PREPARE FOR THE STARTING BELL! ANY SECOND NOW, THE FIGHTERS IN THE ARENA WILL DESCEND INTO A FACKING GOREFEST FOR OUR ENTERTAINMENT. IT'LL BE FACKING PREEMSOME!"
"That's right Willas, but first, a few words from our sponsors for this event…"
David grunted irritably and ignored the ads being read out. Eventually, they finally got along to the good part. That being the countdown to begin.
"FIVE!" Willas called out over the microphone.
"FIVE!" The spectators echoed in a loud roar.
"FOUR!" Willas continued the countdown.
"FOUR!" The crowd called out again. David did a spit-take as he spotted a few flags waving in the distance with his face on them. How the fuck did they even get those?
"THREE!" Willas was practically screaming in his announcements.
"THREE!" The crowd returned, and David tore his gaze from the girls that were… uhh… displaying their support with raised shirts. He had an output already dammit!
"TWO!" Willas sounded like he was the most excited one here, and for all David knew that could be true.
"TWO!" David rolled his neck, and brought up his hands to crack his knuckles.
"ONE!" Willas called out a penultimate time.
"ONE!" David let a cocky grin fill his face.
The bell rang.
His sandevistan activated.
The world slowed to a crawl. The fighters around him included.
Heh. These guys weren't worth jackshit.
He stepped once to the left, and backhanded the guy with the monokatana. In slow motion, his head spun around with a crack, and his jaw broke off with a spray of gore. Said gore hung in the air.
They were just meat.
Continuing his rotation and taking a step back, he let his monoblade slide out of his arm, and cut the guy behind him in half. The target began to move to the side, three chunks of him floating gently through the air with a crescent of red following.
Stomping his foot, he twisted his body and spun as he stepped forwards. Letting his monoblade on his other arm slide out as he built up some rotational energy. Holding his arms close for one final spin-step, he threw them out for the last twist.
He cut the guy with the baton and the guy with the knives in half at the same time. Doing this in panzerfaust would mean shaking his limbs a bunch to turn himself into a lariat-buzzsaw with one limb and only one rotation. The monoblades served him well enough in exchange here.
Normally doing spins in the middle of a fight was stupid and going to get you stabbed in the back. That was something Adam drilled into his head many times before. But against targets that didn't have speedware? All that meant was a little extra force to use.
Also, it was preem as shit whenever he got to pull it off.
One last guy, he looked a bit more durable than the other for. Those arms were armored.
So David didn't go for the arms. He stepped forwards and kicked the dude's knee, feeling it snap under the force of his chrome leg. The guy started to fall forwards, and David felt his sandy about to expire. He readied a spin-kick against the dude and glanced around the arena.
He saw other guys with speedware doing similar things to the people around them, cutting down a field of people moving in slow motion. None of them were quite as fast as he was, but there were some that were decently close.
His sandy finally expired, his body spun into a twisting spin-kick against the guy's jaw, shattering it much the same as the first he killed.
He wasn't worried about them dying here, mostly because he could already see the Arasaka agents with sandys come out to collect the bodies and bring them to the huge collection of Trauma Team members off to the side of the arena.
David would have to go for the brain if he wanted any of his targets to permanently die, and he wasn't particularly feeling like doing that. Everyone was just here for a good fight, so he wouldn't ruin the mood with actual death.
Err… permanent death that was. He was pretty sure all of the guys around him were actually dead.
…What's the difference between 'death' and 'actual death'?
Questions for later. He had a battle royale to win.
"A FACKING BRILLIANT FIRST NANO-FACKING-SECOND FROM THOSE WITH SPEEDWARE! ALREADY HALF OF ALL THE CONTESTANTS ARE NOW TAKING A SICKIE FROM A BAD CASE OF BEING BRU-TAL-IZED!"
"I have to say, I wasn't expecting them to go out that fast. Goes to show how fast speed is to a fight. One second you're there and the next you're gone."
"Every merc worth their eddies in the world knows the importance of a sandevistan. It's a rudimentary implant for a reason."
"WELL WE'VE JUST SEEN A FACKING SICK DEMONSTRATION OF THAT FAT-TITS! I THINK I'M POPPING A STIFFY FROM ALL THE FACKING RED IN THERE NOW, IT'S A GADDAM AUSSIE CHRISTMAS MIRACLE DOWN THERE!"
"The fuck did you call me!?"
—
Fighting under a stealth system was nothing new to him. His old Dragoon had no less than two such systems installed for such, although he almost never had to use it these days. An automatic smart-camo system, and an thermal damper to counter IR cameras. It worked well enough for the vast majority of his mission profiles.
The 'Gashadokuro' had more than two stealth systems. It had five.
A stealth-foot to help negate footsteps and tracks, a chameleon-paneling to blend into the background, an onboard ECM generator, a sound-canceller, and an ACPA-grade radar and IR stealthing system.
The thing had a cloak of sorts as well, made of that same chameleon stealthing system to help him carry things around without revealing his presence. That, and the gravitics sub-system let him reduce his weight profile to nearly nothing, countering seismic sensors as well. Adding in the stealth-foot and that trick he pried out of the first panzerbot fight and he wasn't making a noise while moving.
The best way to detect him at this point was by tracking the disturbance in the air as he moved. Which is why he moved very slowly into position over the Ganges river.
The Ganges river was used for everything in neo-India. It was a river of pure filth at this point, naught but black water with a fine layer of oil and garbage on the top. It was the most important transportation system in the entirety of India, especially for the corporate target that the Old Man wanted destroyed.
Adam would have grinned if the already grinning skull of the new frame allowed him to. It had been ages since he was allowed to do nothing but kill. He intended to get his time's worth out of this mission.
How do you kill a corporation? The easiest way was to take down their leaders and cripple them financially so that other factions moved in and devoured them. He didn't know jackshit about that, so he intended to do something different.
How do you kill a corporation? You kill everything it relies on.
They had three nukes, each with a one-kiloton yield.
Using the gravitics, AV thrusters, and the increased cooling capacity of this frame's sandevistan, he could move hundreds of miles per hour.
The plan that he and Goro came up with? Nuke the most important dams of the most important river, then attack the production facilities, then attack the HQ. The resulting flooding would devastate the entirety of the Indian lowlands.
A company was a resilient thing, it could take on debts and loans and favors to stay afloat. If the country itself was crippled, then they couldn't do that. They would have to dissolve or take on influence from foreign powers, which would mean the end of them as an independent power regardless.
Goro and Oda were already in position to attack the HQ. His job was to drop the nukes and head for the production facilities. It had taken them a few weeks to make sure they had the right intel before this went down. Targeting was the most important factor in a fight after all.
The signal came to him through an ECCM connection. He expanded his ECM as far as it could go and began the slaughter.
Above the first dam, an unseeable giant with the face of death hurled down a Brahmastra.
It disappeared, and before anyone could prevent it, the Brahmashirā astra struck the towering concrete wall's base. White death burst like a lovely flower over what was once a major fortification to channel the power of Holy Ganga.
A few minutes later another Brahmastra struck a second dam.
A few minutes after that, a third struck the third.
In the devastation, very few noticed the attacks on the production facilities and HQ of an arms manufacturer happening in the hours to follow. Most were much too busy with their cities suddenly disappearing under a great flood.