Secret Outpost? Pt. 2
10 Oct 2024Dwayne "Nova" Smith
June 15th, 2330Spacers. So many Spacers. Literally from the moment I jumped into orbit around Denebola I-b I've been beset by Spacers. 5 ships. Count 'em. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 of the bastards were waiting in orbit, with 2 Freestar Security ships only occasionally firing at them. Of course as soon as I showed up they started shooting. All of them. At once. Aimed at me. Forget the Freestar Sec ships, I guess. And did those FC cowboys help? Hellll no. Typical FC... I had to take out all 5 of those Spacer ships myself. It's a good thing Sarah and Walter agreed to let me do a full overhaul of the Frontier or I'd be so much space dust at this point. It cost a couple hundred thousand credits, but damn was it worth it.
Landing only continued the fight. They must have either seen my ship coming on sensors or had a lookout posted at the landing pad because as soon as I stepped out of the landing bay I had some Spacer jackass yelling at me to "Get lost! The Lair of the Mantis is our find, our haul!". Asshole even gave me a 5 second countdown. That was his mistake, gave me time to count each head and take aim. Waited till he got to one and then dropped him, along with his two flunkies.
The Mantis huh... Sure buddy, sure. I guess this facility is a little off the beaten path. And it certainly doesn't look UC built, too irregular. And it's not, *ahem*, rustic enough to be FC built. Probably just an old pirate base if I'm being honest. But if the Spacers want to think this is somehow the "Lair of the Mantis" to make themselves feel better about looting an abandoned facility, then I guess that's on them.
The Spacers must have been in the facility for a while, because they'd dragged an old weapons case outside through the snow and they'd been using it as a table. Had some ammo and a few empty Chunks packages on top, but inside is what really mattered. Found a mint Calibrated AA-99 with the word "Instigator" stamped on the barrel. It even had a large magazine and 4x scope. I maintain that the Beowulf is a superior mid-range rifle, but the AA-99 certainly isn't bad. I even had one with a stabilizing barrel once. That thing handled like a dream. I think I'll head back to The Lodge after this and pick up Sam, Barrett and Sarah to go soothe Vlad's worries about this Andreja chick, so I'll sell it to Anya over at Centaurion when I get back. She seems to have a soft spot for Allied guns.
Four more Spacers around the corner, two by the door and two across the courtyard made for the next challenge. They'd heard the shooting earlier and were on guard. I crept along the walkway as quietly as possible, but the metal didn't muffle my footsteps the way the snow would have. Didn't matter though, the two by the door only took one shot each, but the two across the courtyard ran for cover before I could pop 'em. I put a recon laser on my Beowulf recently and it lit those two suckers up perfectly. All I had to do was sit and wait. They did eventually peak out of cover to try to see where I was, but the Chameleon field built into my boost pack and my helmet kept me hidden. Embarrassingly it took a few shots, but I did eventually catch them both out of cover.
After I picked through their pockets I did a quick sweep of the exterior of the facility, just to make sure there were no more wandering around outside. Dropped off the loot I'd grabbed on the Frontier and then double checked my inventory before I delved into the "Lair of the Mantis". Swapped my Beowulf for my Regulator, took a deep breath, and opened the door.
The first room was empty, save for some trash and a few open toolboxes. What I saw when I turned the corner though almost turned my stomach. Two dead Spacers, caught in some sort of trap. Not sure what got the first one, but his whole top half had been turned into pasta sauce. I didn't examine the second to know what killed her, but obviously something. I could hear voices up ahead, so I cleared my head and focused, trying to guess how many there were based on the conversation. I guessed there were only two. I guessed wrong. There was a third a little further up the hallway. Didn't matter though, after I dropped the first two I ducked into cover back in the hallway I'd come from and waited for the last Spacer to turn the corner. He didn't last long.
I added a binary trigger to my Regulator after my last bounty job and this was the first time I'd used it in combat. It certainly made me shoot faster... Almost too fast. It also effectively halves my capacity, which, on something like a Sidestar or an Eon wouldn't be too bad, but on a Regulator? Having functionally only 4 shots is a pretty big deal. I suppose I could swap it with the Urban Eagle I carry for picking off heatleaches and small animals, but that thing just doesn't quite pack the same punch. I don't know, I guess I'm just being stubborn. I think I'll swap it back to a regular trigger when I get back to the lodge, though.
Anyways, back to the Spacers. The one from down the hallway had a slate in his pocket. A logbook, just like this. Turns out pasta sauce was named Carver, and the other was named Jiang. At least I think. Doesn't really matter anyways, to be honest. I did find out from the log that there were apparently two different groups of Spacers working together on this score. The group hallway guy was from, run by someone named Livvey, and a group run by some guy named "Iron Dave". I don't know, they don't exactly wear identifying colors, so it's damn near impossible to tell who's who. Very weird to see two groups of Spacers working together, but hey, it's a big universe, crazier things have happened.
I gathered up all the loot I could carry and headed back to the Frontier to unload. That's where I currently sit, uh, right now. Gonna grab a quick bite to eat and then head back in. So yeah.
Dwayne out.