Stray Cat Strut Chapter Fifty-Eight - Gimmick

Chapter Fifty-Eight - Gimmick

Not all samurai have a gimmick, but nearly all of them do. These sotis form from necessity or preference. A samurai adopting a certain kind of weaponry might specialize in that. Others prefer taking a certain role, and will purchase equipnt according to that.

Still others will find a the, and over ti, will push and develop that to its sotis illogical extre.

--Fa-Fa-Fashionista, On The Evolution of Trends, 2057

***

Cat?

I jumped a little at the sound of my na. It didnt take much more than a second to place the voice though. Gomorrah, talking to through my augs. Yeah? I asked.

I was stationed just outside of the headquarters in the middle of town, watching the last of the civilians running over. A few other families, and the rare single person, had been joining the file of people filtering into the big building behind .

That ant that there were probably still hundreds of people in the town. Id need to figure out a way to gather them all up and bring them over to the headquarters. Easier said than done, I figured.

Cat, I found the third Samurai. Hes livestreaming things from the east-end of town.

Seriously? I asked.

Yeah. Thats where the antithesis are mostly coming from. Its probably for the best, actually, the headquarters arent too far from the eastern edge of the town, so anyone who wants to find cover will have him between them and most of the aliens.

I nodded along. We still need to let people know.

Ive been working on it, she said.

Really?

Do you think Ive been sitting up here enjoying the Furys AC and twiddling my thumbs? Atyacus and I broke into all the televisions and phones and augs we could reach in Black Bear and have been directing people over to the company headquarters. I might have to swing around to escort so of the groups closer to the edges, theyre too far to be able to run over here.

Right, I said. It was easy to forget that I wasnt the only samurai around. So now what? We sit pretty and snipe at any aliens coming our way?

I was thinking you could head over to our new samurai friend. We both know how great you are at making nice with people, Gomorrah said without a hint of sarcasm. She was pretty good at the whole deadpan thing, though.

I nodded along. Fair enough. Itll an being closer to the action too. Ill leave my cats here to guard the headquarters. Worst case scenario, none of us should be too far away. Do you think Atyacus and Myalis can work together to keep an eye on the civvies?

They should be able to manage. Especially if your drones are around to see any antithesis before they cause any trouble.

Right then. I shifted my shoulders and looked about. Most of the civilians on the street were running over. The last of the line had filed in and only the stragglers remained. The cops had mostly gathered out by the front of the headquarters, so of them were passing out riot armour and shotguns and such. They were gearing up for a protracted siege. I bet there were a few folk in the headquarters who would be willing to volunteer to man the walls as it were, but so far there hadnt been all that many aliens to deal with.

I had so ti to look things up. In situations like these, with a stealth hive, there tend to be so patrols of lower-level antithesis on the fringes. Then a lot more stronger ones closer to the middle of the hive. We might have trouble later.

Would they even co this way? I asked. Sure, theres people for them to eat, but thats it. Arent trees and grass and shit like that on the nu too?

Myalis was the one that replied.

The antithesis tend to prioritize things. First taking out any threats, then subsuming any local biomass that isnt dangerous. Its why they tend to attack people in an area first before focusing on retrieving bodies and other sources of biomass. A stealth incursion tends to function under similar rules, though with a much greater degree of restraint and subtlety.

Cant say Id call the antithesis subtle about anything, I said.

They might surprise you, then. And that surprise may well be deadly. I would encourage you to be more careful than usual, but your usual level of care is nearly nonexistent.

I snorted. Fine. Gomorrah, I guess I should head out and et our new friend first. Maybe we can create a barricade or sothing to stop the aliens from coming this way.

Our goal is to kill them, not just keep them out of the town, Gomorrah said.

We can go around murdering them after the towns properly secured, I said.

Thats fair, I suppose. Ill be moving around and watching over the last civilians moving around. Keep in touch if you see anything strange, or, god willing, a miracle happens and you have a good idea.

Thanks, I muttered in reply. If youre done being snippy, Ill let you go.

Are you admonishing for being snarky? Its half your personality.

I huffed. Yeah, its my gimmick. Yours is being a sexually repressed pyro-nun. You dont see rubbing myself on people and then lighting them on fire while reciting verse, do you?

That... is a lot to unpack, Gomorrah said. But I think a blanket fuck you would work as a reply.

I laughed as I cut the connection. Id have to think of so more insults as I walked. I stretched my back one way, then the other before finally setting off and around the headquarters fence.

Myalis, can you connect to... uh, do the corpo cops have a number I can text?

They do. Here, most of them are connected to this chat system.

My augs shifted and a chat box appeared, hovering before . Plenty of chatter between different people, all of them with nas like A-Green and M-Armstrong. I was tempted to snoop, see what they were saying, but all I could see were status reports and a few questions and answers being fired back and forth. Real professional stuff, without even a to liven it up.

S-Cat: Will be heading east to et other samurai and aliens. Keep inford. Cats staying near headquarters.

I waited until I got a few affirmatives, then minimized the chat box so that it was out of the way.

It was ti, at long last, to be stealthy.

I shifted my Icarus grenade launcher so that it was tucked under my long coat, then I brought my Whisper around so that the crossbow was cradled against my chest. And then I activated all of my stealth things.

My coat warped then went invisible. I was now little more than feet and hands and a big crossbow. Presumably a head and helt as well.

I tugged my coat on tighter and kept on walking. From the glimpses I caught in the windows of the hos and little businesses I passed, I wasnt impossible to notice, but I certainly wasnt as visible as I would have been otherwise.

Not as stealthy as Id want, I said.

You could be better, yes. Youre mostly hidden, visually, but the parts of you that arent will give away your position. You can also be identified using other senses. Many antithesis can sense changes in air pressure, others can sense heat, and of course acute hearing is quite common across many models. And that only covers so of the more basic senses.

Hmm, I muttered. Yeah, I guess thatll be the next step. Im sure theres shit for that?

Of course. The solutions that cover every possibility do tend to be a little more expensive. Unless this incursion is far more profitable than I predict, I dont think that kind of expense would be in your best interest.

Bit by bit then, I said. Well patch whatever holes we find as they co up.

I shifted Whisper so that it was tucked against my shoulder and approached the next corner a little more cautiously. The streets here were vacant, so ads behind glass storefronts still playing, and the single red light strung over the intersection blinked, but otherwise there wasnt much of note.

Black Bear felt weird. Maybe that was just being a city girl though. The place was more open than I was used to, with no hovercar traffic and buildings that I could look up to without craning my neck back.

I kind of expected to see cows or whatever there was in the countryside, but I figured this wasnt quite that kind of place. Myalis, can you slip into the towns caras and such?

There isnt much as far as security infrastructure goes.

Thats alright. I just want to have more eyes around us. Do you know where that other samurai is?

The Vanguard is just ahead.

My ears twitched as I started to hear sothing. It was... music.

Heavy tal music, interspersed by the grumble of a chainsaw.

I started to feel sowhat concerned.

***