We Solemnly Swear We Are Up to No Good

[Διμι]

Reserved for Chaos

[chaosshade]

Jurgen couldn't help but smile. He ducked behind a heap of construction materials and changed into the exoskeleton before hefting the PKM and checking it. Although he missed his MG36, it would be replaced in due time. He just needed to get back to the Merc HQ. Soon after, he followed the other man up the fire escape and pulled out his PDA. "I just need to make a quick call to the ambush waiting for us," he explained, doing a little work before flipping to an normally unused channel.

"Kira, the ambush at the construction failed, revert to plan B," he said, waiting for a reply. When none came he grew worried. "Kira? Please respond." Static replied and he sighed. "Looks like something killed the backup team..." he explained, flipping his PDA back to its normal channel and pocketing it. He followed the bandit's lead, still weary of him. "So what's your name anyway, bandit?" he asked, not giving his own name. He shifted a little before moving along behind him, approaching The Burner Tunnel.

"We just have to watch out for zombies and mutts beyond here," he explained, taking the heavy machine gun in hand and cocking it. It had a much different feel from his MG36, mainly that it had a longer barrel, changing the balance point somewhat. "I'm more worried about getting the Duty logos off instead of the paint," he said, kneeling and picking up a fireball artifact.

[CHECK]

[Διμι]

"As the Dutier mentioned, the name is Lutiy." the bandit replied, weaving carefully around the heat waves in the tunnel. Several artifacts still lay scattered about, and the mercenary picked up one. The bandit left the anomaly field undisturbed on his part. He didn't need the riches, as he had money sufficient to fulfill his immediate designs.

The man exited the tunnel. The ambush force mentioned by the mercenary was nowhere to be seen. Evidently, the men had either left the area, or were lying dead somewhere nearby. "So much for slowing down our pursuit..." Lutiy muttered grimly. In the time they had been gone, the two stalkers gained a considerable lead on the task force, but Lutiy did not expect it to stay this way for long.

"I suggest we make a stop by the ecologists' lab," Lutiy continued "they'll probably have something to get those Duty marks off your suit, not to mention that I've heard that you people are on good terms with each other now." He looked around cautiously before walking down the road in the direction of Lake Yantar. "Haven't been to that place since my Freedom days," the bandit noted "sure was a hellhole back in the day, and it's probably not much different now."

[chaosshade]

"You could say we're on good terms with the eggheads now. Wolf was a rash fool for attacking them. He would have gotten the information if it wasn't for him... him and that stalker..." Jurgen sighed, spotting a group of corpses a little ways off. "Kira!" He moved as fast as the exoskeleton allowed him to, kneeling near the exo-merc's corpse. The cause of death wasn't immediately apparent until he turned the woman's corpse over. The neck armor was shredded and bite marks were visible.

"Stinking Bloodsuckers..." he growled before slipping into Grecian and cursing several times. "Luity, check the other bodies for anything useful, this group had artifacts on them," he explained, taking the woman's G36 and slinging it over one shoulder. He also took the Flash from her belt, leaving the other artifacts because they were low-level ones. "It would have taken more than one 'sucker to kill these guys... we should move..."

Out over Yantar, he was able to see flashes of lightning and the sky looked as though it was burning. "What the hell...? A blowout!?" he shouted, unable to tear his eyes from it. "Lutiy, we should hurry and get to the bunker, we should be safe from the blowout there," he said, standing and moving quickly, leaving behind a number of weapons and artifacts that he would have otherwise taken.

[CHECK]

[Διμι]

Despite his less-than stellar moral stances, Lutiy left the corpses be, undisturbed. Looting bodies of stalkers he himself had not killed was not something he was prone to doing. Although he knew this would only give their pursuers more weapons to use, he was scarcely worried. The extra gear would only weigh a stalker down, and a rookie with a bigger gun, was just that, still a rookie. And rookies were no more than food to play with.

Although, he mused, there seemed to be more to some of the loners in the squad, none of whom, surprisingly enough, had died. For one, there was the young incepted Dutier. Lutiy had been genuinely surprised at the man's concentration and marksmanship. There seemed to be nothing at all special about the Frenchie and his female companion, although they had shown considerable daring in storming the mercenary stronghold.

Lost in his thoughts, he had not noticed the sky getting more and more stormy. Blowout? the bandit thought. He judged the emission to be roughly half an hour away. Checking his PDA, he noted the eggheads' bunker was still roughly a mile and a half away. "We should step up our pace if we don't want to get caught in the middle of this thing. We have barely enough time to make it."

[chaosshade]

Jurgen swore again in Greek and started jogging down the road to the bunker. "Go on ahead, I'll catch up. Sakharov is getting hard of hearing, make sure you speak clearly," he said, watching as the sky grew more and more angry. His PDA chirped, but he ignored it, more interested in saving his hide instead of answering the message. He arrived at the door to the lab, stepping into the airlock before being let inside. The building shook and his vision blurred. He smiled at Lutiy and laughed. "Certainly cut it close..." he said with a laugh.

Slowly, he approached the counter and smiled as the elderly researcher approached, "Hello hello?" Jurgen placed a small collection of spare artifacts on it then pulled out his PDA and flipped it to the Merc falcon logo he had stored on it. Sakharov nodded, but steadied himself against the counter as the ground shook. "Damn... not again..." he grumbled. "Just a moment, my good man, I have a package for you," he said, connecting a small cable to the Merc's PDA and transferring 5,600ru to it.

The scientist walked away, stepping into a storage room and returning with a pair of fairly heavy looking boxes. "A female mercenary dropped these off asking that I give them to you when you arrived, Jurgen," he explained, sliding the pair of boxes across the counter. He blinked, but braced himself against the wall as the ground shook again, causing Sakharov's pet rat to squeak. "It's all right," he said, reaching over and rubbing the rat behind its ear.

The Merc pulled out his knife and split the tape on the first box. Inside was an SR-25 with an M204 attached to the under-barrel mount and an MG36 with another M204 grenade launcher rigged to it. There was also a smaller box inside, which he split open as well. It contained what at first looked like eight grenades, but closer inspection revealed four of them to be M576 buckshot canisters.

How did Kira know I would be needing this stuff... did Nail message her before his death? he thought, setting the first box on the floor and cutting open the second one, which was, as he guessed, a new exoskeleton. "It's too bad she's dead..." he sighed, checking the new suit over. There was a letter in one of the pockets.

Jurgen-
If you get this, I've probably been claimed by The Zone. Nail messaged me after you left for Rostok, telling me Rurik was coming. I put this together for you just in case things went badly. I would have delivered it myself, but it was too much junk to carry.

Love,
-Kira

He smiled and folded the letter back up, putting it in his pack instead of back in the suit. He stepped into the bunk area and changed out of the pilfered Duty exoskeleton and into the Merc one. He stepped out, leaving his helmet and mask off for the time being. "Sakharov, I'm selling this stuff," he said, putting the Duty exo, the PKM, the G36, and the Merc Suit vest all on the counter. The scientist did a little math and transferred another 86,500ru to Jurgen's PDA.

The Merc was still as the ground shook again. "What the hell...? The Blowout should have passed by now..." Sakharov's face was very pale suddenly. "You all right, old man?" he asked. The scientist didn't react right away. "Sakharov...? Hello?" he asked, waving a hand in front of his face.

"I... it's nothing... I hope..." he said, sliding a blast shield open and looking out toward the factory. Something seemed to be troubling him, but the Merc didn't have any reason to pry. That was when he remembered the message one his PDA and disconnected it from the scientist's. He flipped through the messages and found one from Seth.

'Jurgen. What happened at the construction site? What are those Dutiers up to? Get yourself back to the Dead City as fast as you can, I'll try to wait as long as I can for you there. Those people cannot be trusted.'

Jurgen's eye twitched and he sighed. "Lutiy, we have to hurry to the Dead City. Finish your business here," he growled, not sending a message back to Seth. He attached the sling for his SR-25 and hefted his MG36, loading both the M204's on them, a buckshot canister into the rifle's and a grenade into the heavy machine gun's.

[CHECK]

[Διμι]

The bandit looked up from his seat. "I have little business here." he said, standing up. All the gear he would need, Lutiy had on him. And he would need preciously little, he thought, when facing down Seth. He nodded a silent goodbye to the scientists in the bunker, feeling somewhat apologetic for not bringing them an artifact or two. If there was ever a faction that did not share a dose of animosity from the bandit, it would definitely be these guys, Lutiy thought. There didn't seem to be any rationale behind this sympathy. Some things are just the way they are.

Following the mercenary out of the airlock, Lutiy took in the momentary silence that always followed a blowout. He knew the serenity would not last, as all the mutants awoken by the emission would soon scurry out of their holes into the open, waiting to pounce upon an unsuspecting stalker.

The occasional violent shaking emanating from the Zone's center was certainly unusual. Even during a blowout, tremors were usually small and very ephemeral. The shockwaves that had rattled through Yantar, however, were nearly powerful enough to damage the bunker itself, which rested on gyroscopic foundations with enough springs installed to dissipate even the most momentous impact.

Yantar was certainly quieter these days, Lutiy thought as the factory entrance loomed ahead. No zombies could be seen in the vicinity, only a large bloody smear across the concrete of unknown origin, and several semi-decomposed bodies. However, the fact didn't make the place any less creepy than it was two years ago. The bandit walked over to the gate, doing a mock curtsy and ushering move at the mercenary, prompting the latter to enter first. "Only after your armored honor." the bandit smiled.

[chaosshade]

He followed Lutiy outside and up the road that led to the factory complex. "Did you hear that some lone stalker shut off the kymaniov emitter here single-handedly with a little help from Kruglov and Sakharov?" Jurgen asked, looking around the complex. It was mostly deserted from what he could see. There was a distant moan from a zombie, but he felt it wasn't a threat.

He checked one of the mags Kira had included with her package and couldn't help but smile. She'd made sure to have the rifle reworked for 7.62x51mm, giving him some much-needed punching power. The mag well was also set up to not only use the C-Mags but also the regular rifle mags from the SR-25. The M203 that had been affixed to it had obviously needed some customization to fit the new weapon.

There was suddenly a rushing sound in his ears and he looked around, his vision blurring and a dizzy feeling filling his head. "Lutiy... do you feel that...?" he asked, hearing the rushing noise again. Suddenly there was a tingling feeling on the back of his neck before crying out in pain. "AAARGH!!!!" He looked around frantically as the pain suddenly lessened but couldn't find the source.

[Διμι]

"What's going on, mercenary?" Lutiy drew his AK, his eyes scouring the area for movement. Whatever it was that had traumatized the mercenary so, seemed to have no tangible effect on him.

"Wait here." he told the merc calmly, walking through the gate into the compound. He thought he could see a figure shamble around a corner some distance ahead, but whatever had moved was quickly gone from sight.

Whatever this was, it wasn't good, Lutiy thought. Even if whatever was in this factory had no effect whatsoever on him, the survival of the mercenary by the gate was of vital importance to his plans. The bandit took another careful look around, delving deeper into the courtyard, but finding nothing.

Cautiously, he turned back to the gate. Jurgen seemed better, as whatever had affected him seemed to have backed down for the moment. Lowering his AK, Lutiy beckoned for the merc to follow him inside.

[chaosshade]

((Wow, okay, sorry I haven't posted in more than a week on this one!))

Jurgen slowly got to his feet, still feeling slightly dizzy. He shook off the feeling of unease he had and followed Lutiy. "What the hell was that...?" he asked, being much more watchful of his surroundings now. As they neared the largest building in the factory complex, the rushing feeling returned, but it wasn't accompanied by the head-splitting feeling. He stumbled to the side and blinked.

"W... what the hell is that?" he asked, pointing to at what appeared to be a man shambling across the ground. It bellowed and reached out, the head-splitting feeling coming back. "AAARGH!!!!" He fell to his knees and held his head. "W... what's going on!?" he shouted, the head-splitting feeling rocking him again. "L.... Lutiy... k... kill it..." he managed before crying out in pain again.

Chattering voices began filling his mind and he saw a specter of a snork he'd killed drifting slowly toward him. "G... get back...!" he cried weakly, opening fire with his heavy machine gun. The specter vanished only to be replaced by a new one, this time of a bloodsucker. The chattering was growing more intense as the shambling figure neared.

[Διμι]

Lutiy watched as the humanoid mutant slowly walked around the corner it had disappeared to into the clearing. The mercenary beside him sank to the ground under the effects of whatever hocus pocus this thing was exerting by staring directly at him. He had to get the mercenary out of the danger zone.

The bandit grabbed the mercenary by the exoskeleton's pneumatic fixtures on both shoulders, making a tremendous effort to drag him behind a large half-pipe of concrete. The mutant was already near, hardly thirty yards away. Slowly, Lutiy walked back into the clearing.

The mutant stopped in its tracks, extending one hand and staring directly at the man in front of it. Instantly, Lutiy felt his head ring with only a hint of physical pain as a powerful voice cried out in his head, seemingly echoing between the walls of his cranium.

Уходи отсюда мужик.

Lutiy drew his Beretta, aiming directly between the creature's eyes. The words intensified.

Уходи пока цел.

Lutiy pulled the trigger, his aim not in the least affected by the creature's effects. The round blasted a small hole in the figure's head, carrying grayish matter out of the other end as it exited. The mutant dropped to the ground as the voice dissipated.

"Come on," said the bandit, helping the mercenary uneasily to his feet. "It's over, whatever it was."