Save Scumming Interlude - Mizu the Angry Flame - Part Two

Interlude - Mizu the Angry Fla - Part Two

"We're going where?" she asked. She was still feeling a little tired, and who could bla her? It was half past nine-thirty in the morning on a Saturday. She should still be in bed at this hour, not geared up in the back of an APC.

It was her, rcer the leader of Yellow Squadron, Steve, and three others from Red Squadron. She'd worked with them a couple of tis, but for the most part, her job stuck her with her team. Not that it always felt like a team. When shit went a little pear-shaped for her, they were never quick to jump in and help.

"Podunky," rcer said. He shifted, as if trying to make himself comfortable in his seat. There was no use for it, though. Whoever designed the seats in this thing deserved to be immolated. They were basically just two long wooden planks with paper-thin padding, and they were the lucky ones. There were only six of them in the back, and her knees kept bumping into Clive's next to her. The E-rankers had ten fully-geared troopers in the sa space.

"Where the hell is Podunky?" one of the Red Squadron guys asked. It was a fair question, the na sounded made up.

"Small town, about two hours out from Fortress ENE," rcer said.

"Two hours?!" she said.

"Chill, Aokawa," rcer said. "It's warm enough in here."

She tempered herself, the temperature around her dropping. It wasn't like the heat would bother her much. But still. Two hours?

"It's a long ways out, I know. But that just ans that I have plenty of ti to fill you in."

They all groaned at that. rcer liked his briefings a little too much.

"Fortunately," he continued. "There's not much that I do know, and so of that is classified."

"What can you tell us?" Clive asked.

"It's a developing situation. An allied corporation, Synthcorp, have discovered an active D-rank portal in one of their compounds. They've reportedly been fighting it for a while. The portal breached this morning."

"When?" Clive asked. "If it breached, it must have been active for a while, no?"

"I don't have all the answers," rcer said. "What I do know is this; two squads of E-ranked soldiers have failed to contain the issue already. Synthcrop needs this dealt with and in a private sort of way. We're to go in, close the portal, help anyone from the corp we can, and we're to close our eyes about anything else we see. No body cams, no cute pics with your augs. I need you to digi-sign these NDAs as well."

She hated this kind of thing. The secrecy, the bullshit. She'd bet a week's pay that there was so skeevy shit going on, and they'd never be allowed to tell anyone about it.

What was the point of being a D-ranker if she was stuck dancing to so corpo fiddle?

She couldn't get to C-rank soon enough, only she was worried that it would only an that the fiddle player would be switched out for another. She grit her teeth and signed the damned NDA, though.

"We'll be fighting orcs," rcer said. "Humanoid, so level of tool and weapon use, so base tactics. Consider them stronger and tougher than the average human. We're unlikely to see any magic enemies, and they will go down to modern weaponry, so conserve your magic where you can."

Mizu tuned him out as he went on and on about the monsters they'd be fighting. As long as it could burn, she didn't care. She could take them on.

The ride was, predictably, boring as hell. Podunky was too far away, and her squadmates were chaffing on her nerves.

She hadn't been with them for too long, but in the ti she had been... well, recently they'd proven their worth. When she ssed up once, they tossed her under the bus. Then there were more fuckups and each one was like a whip smacking her back. She had a lot of anger, sotis. It fueled her. But now? Now it felt like so of that fire was directed towards her allies.

She kept a lid on it though. No point in exploding at anyone.

So, she crossed her arms and glared holes into the floor for the entire two and a half hours it took for them to arrive. When they did, she was quick to grab her gear and jump out of the back while fixing her helt in place.

Podunky was... yeah, it was so shithole little nowhere town. Cute little hos and whatever. The Arican rural dream. Not her kind of thing, and not her problem.

"Ah, you're here," soone said, and she refocused. rcer was standing taller. Not at attention, exactly, but looking like he was the proud leader of a Storm Chaser squadron. She moved up to be a little closer, though she was above saluting and all that.

The man across from rcer was a reedy little suit. A corpo sort through and through, she could practically sll it on him.

The man extended a hand, and rcer shook it. "rcer, Yellow Squadron leader, Storm Chasers."

"Daryl Dudley, Foxfire Legal, special situations division, attached to Synthcorp," the man said and Mizu almost flinched back. A lawyer? Ew, gross.

"So, what's the situation so far?" rcher asked. "Are you in charge?"

"Unfortunately," Daryl said. "The manager in charge has been found... wanting. And also, dead."

"The orcs?" rcer asked.

"The... monsters have been found capable of using human weapons, so it's not impossible that an orc snuck into his office on the second floor and shot him several tis in the chest," the lawyer said. "But my legal senses tell that it's sowhat implausible. In any case, yes, I'm currently the ranking Synthcorp officer."

"Fantastic," rcer muttered. "I'll let you know right now that we're not here to solve HR issues for you."

"Understandable. Currently, the situation is sowhat precarious. These fine locals were warned, sohow, about the situation and have co out to assist."

Mizu looked past ti, and yeah, there were so fire trucks, fire volunteers, and a bunch of cop cars. People were milling around. Not civilians, exactly, but not far from it.

There were also a lot of dead orcs. No one had bothered to move them, so they were just left out to rot. The sll wasn't exactly pleasant, but it was muffled by the thick odour of gunpowder in the air.

"And the situation in the compound?" rcer asked.

"Sowhat less delicate, and moreso. We're not allowing any civilians to enter. Your team is to gain access to building five, find the portal, and close it. If you deem it possible to rely cull it..."

"If it's breached, then no," rcer said. "That'd be against several laws, and regulations."

"Understandable," the lawyer said. "Your discretion is assured?"

"We're good at our jobs," rcer said. "Anything else to be aware of?"

"Ah, yes, one thing. The local resistance was led by soone. A young D-ranker. Possibly a local? She went in to take care of things on her own before my team and I arrived. She assisted in killing many of the orcs here, it seems."

"And she went in solo?" rcer asked.

The lawyer nodded.

Ballsy, that. Mizu wasn't any sorta genius, but she could do so math. There were a lot of orcs here. Two dozen or so by this entrance, more just within. The breach was big, so this wasn't so barely-D-ranked portal that went haywire.

That woman was dead.

rcer gathered the team up, including the ten E-rankers who looked like they needed a good stretch after being stuck in their APC for so long. Weapons were checked, and Mizu checked her new handgun. It was nothing like her old revolver, just a dinky .45 that barely made her arm tingle when she fired it.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not ant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

She had the standard-issue assault rifle as well, and a combat knife on her hip, in case things got ssy, but with so many of them, she doubted it would co to that. Anything that got close would get toasted.

rcer took the lead, moving them into the compound with the E-ranker team split into two five-man squads to take the rear right and left while the D-rankers took the centre-front.

They started encountering dead orcs almost as soon as they started to move in. One here, two there, most of them with blown out heads.

There were a few dead people as well, but fortunately it didn't look like there were that many.

She felt a small pit form in her stomach, then it filled with flas. Synthcorp was going to cover all of this up, weren't they?

People stuck their heads out of nearby buildings, then when rcer told them to evacuate out of the compound, they did so, running by. Though he did stop one man, in a security vest and ard with a shotgun. "Did you kill these?" rcer asked.

"Huh? No, it was that woman, with the mask," the man said before running on.

A woman with a mask? Mizu felt a shift in her gut, but dismissed it. Nah, it couldn't be.

She was still pissed at that one bitch who stole her revolver, humiliated her, and stole that little E-rank portal. She needed that portal most of all. Advancent was getting tough. Worse, her 'behaviour' had forced her into redial training for a week, which ant missing another portal run with the team.

That pissed her off most of all. C-rank was the goal. Reaching it would be breaking the shackles. Not all of them, but so, dammit.

She refocused, scanning her gun left and right, but nothing jumped out at them.

They made it to one of the buildings, deeper into the compound. A dead orc was keeping the door jamd open.

"Lights are still on inside," rcer said. "Single file."

She was the third in, so she had a few monts once they were past the antechamber, to inspect the place. It looked a whole lot like so sort of butcher place to her, which was weird. Wasn't Synthcorp's whole thing plants?

"Fuckers," she muttered.

"What was that, Mizu?" Cliver asked.

"Nothing," she replied.

The portal was in a room at the rear. A suspiciously built one, with barricades, and an armoury right before it. rcer sighed, and Mizu kind of sympathized. This was gonna need more than a simple NDA. The corp had been farming this portal for a while.

A recurring portal that breached? It could happen.

"Yellow Squadron is going in first," rcer said. "Steve, Clive, in the lead, then the rest of us. E-rankers, follow in after. I want five of you to remain here, guard the portal."

That was a pretty normal distribution. The truth was that sixteen people in one portal could get a little crowded. Dropping that down to eleven helped, at least a little.

The other D-rankers cast so buffs all around, and Mizu bounced on the spot, limbering herself for the fight to co.

Soon enough, she was walking through the portal.

The space on the other side was a poorly-lit room. She scanned it, gun to her shoulder, magic on a hair trigger. There were so human bodies to one side, placed carefully in a neat row, and there were dead orcs.

"Clear," Clive said.

The rest of the Storm Chasers ca in, and they mostly positioned themselves to face the one exit out of the room.

"By the numbers," rcer said. "Catch."

They all received an update on their HUDs, a map of the portal in a lot more detail than what anyone would have if this was a normal portal.

Recurring portals often followed similar patterns. They were never identical.

"Dammit, rcer," she said. "I don't like this."

"Suck it up," he shot back. "We're going ahead and right. It's the fastest path to the boss room. We're not here for a full-clear."

She grumbled, but went with it.

They walked out into the first corridor from the entrance area, and within found an orc. He was on the ground, neck slit. Interestingly, the lights ahead were out, so all they could see of it was the body half-hidden by the dark.

"Lights," rcer said. Newest update provided by novel~fire~net

They all took a mont to turn on the flashlights on their guns, and so flicked on belt lights as well.

"Soone took out the torches," Clive said. He gestured to a torch on the wall, of the hanger for it, the torch itself was on the ground, doused in the dirt.

"Could have happened mid-fight," rcer said.

They moved on. At the first intersection, they found three more orcs. One sliced across the neck, the other two stabbed in the back.

"What the fuck," Steve muttered.

Mizu panned her light around. Sothing about this was wrong. The dark banished by her light felt a little too dark. Where were the enemy? This was a breach, wasn't it?

"They all died to lee wounds," Clive noted. "Sword and knife cuts."

"How do you know?" rcer asked.

"Angle of the cuts. Soone shorter than the orcs took out that one's neck, the stab wounds at all aid at the kidneys," Clive said. He flashed his light against the wall. There was an arterial spray there, low, maybe at Mizu's hip height. "Look at that. Blood splatter, but from pretty low. If that's from the neck, then the orcs had to be kneeling. Could be a cut to the thigh."

"Let's keep moving," rcer said. He sounded calm. Mizu glanced over, noted how his grip was tighter on his rifle.

Yeah, she was kind of spooked too.

The next room was long and narrow, with an exit right across from where they entered. The room stretched out to the right. There was a forge at the end of the room, the coals still glowing yellow-orange, and next to it was an orc with its head shoved into the fire. There were more of them. Three orcs, left on the ground, dead.

"What the hell," Mizu muttered.

The next corridor was no better. Two orcs with slit throats, then there was a small room at the end of the passage where another was slumped against the wall, dead.

"Christ," Clive said.

In the adjoining corridor were four more orcs. These, at least, looked like they'd put up a fight. They had weapons out, snarls locked on their dead features, and their wounds weren't as clean and precise.

Still, that just made her realize that every orc up to this point had been killed while unaware that they were being hunted.

The next room, at the end of that passage, was lit. There was a door, but it had been left ajar.

rcer moved up, carefully pushing the door open with an elbow.

Within was a resting space. There were a few chairs around a fireplace on one wall, so chairs, and to one side a table with a few jugs on it. Garlands of garlic hung from the ceiling and it looked like the back end of the room was a small kitchen of sorts.

A woman was sitting on one of the larger seats. Her legs were crossed, one over the other, the back of her boots resting on a heap made from two dead orcs. Her eyes were closed, and her hands were folded on her stomach.

Next to her was a sword, still in its sheath, but learning up against the arm of her chair, and on her lap was a revolver.

She knew that woman.

"Deadline!" Mizu snapped.

***