Week 72: I'll Make My Own Range, With Black Nukes, and Hookers

In a shitty industrial estate located in an indeterminate part of Seoul, Stephen stood atop an empty warehouse and surveyed his new domain. Just in case anyone was watching him, he'd been unable to resist the urge to don a cowboy hat and a duster that flapped majestically in the wind, his sniper rifle slung at his side, one foot resting on the lip of the rooftop as he stared outward with a steely gaze.

He still didn't look good. [Fail Looking Good by 7]

Nonetheless, he now owned this warehouse, and couple of other warehouses and buildings next to it, and the land around them, and these lands were going to be put to the finest use imaginable for any place on earth - people were going to shoot things on them. He automatically mentally mapped lines of sight and cover locations as he looked about the estate, working out the best places to put Tansai, Silvia, and whoever else turned up through their exercises in tactical marksmanship - the mix of urban and open landscape provided a good combination of terrain for the practice. All that was needed now was for his erstwhile students to show up - along with Hugo, who had gleefully volunteered to run around and be shot at.

The Stephen Lincoln Sniper School is open for business, ladies and gents, he smeakered on the Oracle public channel, before pointing an arm forward, firing a bracer-mounted grappling line and zipping away to another rooftop to lurk in wait.

[But he fails his Stealth/Agility roll by 4.]

"Target, reporting for duty!" Hugo smeakered happily, pulling up with Silvia in his black and plum colored X500. It was a pretty car for pretty agents, but the huge figure that piled out of it was a massive, combat equipped Nuke. He chuckled and smiled at his housemate, running his fingertips down her arm before scanning the area for Stephen. He couldn't see or hear him, but he figured he would show up.

"You looking forward to shooting at me, picarita?" He began to stretch his back and leg muscles, a grin on his face.

EDIT: Stephen is a jerk and by the way even in his combat armor Hugo looks fantastic. pass Looking Good by 6.

"I'm on my way over." came Tansai through the smeaker channel. "Got anywhere I can park a lorry?"

Sure thing, just rumble on up and park wherever you like, Stephen smeakered good-naturedly as he aimed. Hey, Hugo! Think fast.

The muffled click was almost inaudible as he squeezed the trigger and the rifle discharged, the low powered SMART round tracing a gentle arc through the air before terminating its flight path on Hugo's reinforced forehead and exploding in a splatter of red mist and squidgy bits. [Pass PerTac by 13, 32dmg (but it's pacifier rounds)]

Oops.

"Que--?" started Hugo, turning to Silvia before his head exploded. His body fell over, the force of the impact causing him to smack into the hood of his car and slide down it into the ground. Brain matter, or what looked like brain matter, possibly clumps of blood, and bright red, liquid blood went everywhere.

Despite being headshot by a sniper rifle, Hugo's biostatus monitor showed him as uninjured, though his blood pressure briefly spiked. "..hhkknnunguuu.." The noises coming from Hugo's mouth were wet and slightly confused.

At that moment, Silvia's combat instincts went into overdrive, with her brain lagging behind ever so slightly. As she got out of the car, she had seen the shape of someone crouched on a rooftop (Perception+Observation pass by 12), and they had apparently just shot Hugo. Probably killing him, by the look of it.

Before her conscious thoughts even had a chance to catch up with her well-honed instincts, she was crouched with her sniper rifle out, positioned to get maximum cover from the still-open car door. She sighted at the mysterious assassin and fired, still before the situation had entirely registered. The shot was accurate, despite the speed of the firing, but not as much as she would have liked - more of a graze than a real hit (Per+Tac is a pass by 8, although damage is only 4. Ignore 2 AV, if that's relevant, due to the ammo used).

Finally, her brain caught up with her reactions and she realised that Hugo was making noises and his biostatus looked fine. And that Stephen had smeakered them beforehand.

Hugo? Are you wounded? She tried, worry clear in her smeakered voice, along with a certain hesitancy. ...Stephen? Was that...you?

Sheee-it, girl, I hope nobody ever throws you a surprise party, Stephen laughed, raising his head back over the lip of the nearby rooftop and offering a little wave. Damn fine reflexes, mind you. Guess I ain't so sneaky up here as I figured I was.

Having made himself known, and now relatively confident Silvia wasn't going to shoot at him anymore, he flipped over the side of the building and gracefully slid down a drainpipe to the ground, landing perfectly in a crouch [AgiAth pass by 4], but as he stood up and began to walk towards Silvia and Hugo, one of the long coattails of his duster revealed itself to have become snagged on a loose fitting of the drainpipe, and with one mighty stride the rest of the coat ripped itself free of Stephen and fell in tatters to the ground behind him [Looking Good critfail on 2/2].

He stopped, turned, stared at what remained of his jacket, and began to scratch his stubble. "Gen-u-ine Western jacket my ass," he grumbled, before turning again to address the newly arrived pair. "Hugo! You gonna finish that siesta anytime soon, amigo? Didn't shoot ya that hard," he called over to them.

Tansai pulled up in her behemoth of a truck, jumping the gap between the floor and the cab before stretching her limbs and beginning to head towards the meeting point, hopping over a crumbling wall. As Silvia's worried questions came through, she picked up the pace a bit, hands reaching for her plasma pistol before she rounded a corner and saw Stephen's coat being destroyed. "Do surprise parties often involve shooting people?" she asked through smeaker as she walked towards the others, hands in pockets and leaning forward. Her hair and clothing were messy from the drive, but she still looked fairly decent, her sea-green eyes sparkling and her vidskin shimmering slightly (pass looking good by 6)

"I hope you guys brought a spare gun for me, since I'm still not technically allowed them." she continued. "I'll try not to break this one."

Hugo had moved into a sitting position, and was wiping realistic looking synthetic gore from his eyes. He had registered Silvia shooting with some affection, and Stephen's reply only got a booming laugh. "One day I'll shoot you just as hard and you see if you stand up." He was chuckling still, and he got himself to his feet. He looked down at his clothes with a frown. "And this shit better come out with BioCleene. They charge me a fair bit when it doesn't." But it was hard for the millionaire to have any malice in his words.

He gave a brief wave to Tansai and then kissed Silvia on her forehead, wiping his hands on his combat trousers before rubbing her back comfortingly. "Damn good shot from you though."

Hugo normally kept his covert shield on, and the fact he could have been easily murdered didn't even register with him.

Thanks, Silvia said to Hugo, slowly standing and holstering her rifle. Sorry, Stephen. I guess I uh...overreacted a bit there. Her tone was very much embarrassed, and she was flushing and looking down, with just a quick glance and smile towards Tansai.

She was now revealed to be wearing combat trousers and a sleeveless dark green vest top, as per usual, but despite her attire, she was looking good, her stance a lot more open and confident than it had been a week ago (Pass Looking Good by 3).

"Well now, looks like the gang's all here," Stephen declared, when the little band had assembled. "Y'all lookin' forward to a good day of shootin'? Silvia there seems to be in the spirit of things already!" he laughed, nodding towards her. "Don'tcha worry nothin' bout that shot, it bounced clean off me anyhow, and I'd've done the same if I were you."

Then he turned to address Tansai, grabbing the rifle slung at his side by the foregrip and holding it up for her to see. "Now Miss Tansai, I might just regret this, but I'm gonna be lettin' you borrow my rifle here for today, 'cause I know she's in fine shape and shouldn't be givin' you any problems with jammin' or any of that nonsense. You just take good care of her, alright?" With that, he slid the rifle's carrying strap off his shoulder and held the weapon out to Tansai, expectantly.

Tansai took the weapon fairly gently. "Thanks. Hopefully this one shouldn't melt inside." she said smiling, the edge of her lips appearing around her fairly small blue face mask she was wearing today. She carefully swing the strap over her shoulder and adjusting her stance, forehead wrinkled in concentration.