“Entry team, be advised: intel suggests one or more VIPs have contracted with an armor company for security.”
“Acknowledged, command. All units, form wings of three. I don’t want anyone caught on their own.”
The soldiers acknowledge the order, oblivious to the recon drone perched overhead.
The Interplanetary Society for Archeo-Eschatology’s quadrennial summit is a vast, bustling affair. Hordes of scientists, exquisitely catered meals, and dull presentations given on fascinating topics by people with more smarts than public speaking ability.
Katja is not an archeologist. Or an eschatologist. She isn’t even endothermic. Between the too-cold air and the crowds and the noise and everything else, she is completely out of her element.
So of course, naturally, she’s sitting in the corner wearing a heated vest and having a conversation with a security contractor about farming.
“I’m not saying the new EvCo crop line is bad,” the mech pilot says, waving their hands in that animated way humans are so fond of. “But we got some stuff from them in ‘06 and it was, um… extremely flammable.”
“Really? That seems like a problem. But how did it taste?” Katja’s feather crest puffs up a bit with interest, and she notices the mech pilot glance at that for a moment.
“I don’t actually know. We ended up repurposing the whole crop for explosives during the Blade Wing occupation. Then I joined the military, did my tour of duty, went private-sector, and now I’m here working security for a scientific conference.”
“Speaking of that, shouldn’t a security contractor be, I don’t know, securing the perimeter or something?”
“Oh, yeah. I’m running drone overwatch, so I have some freedom to…” They trail off, attention suddenly focused on an alert on their hand console.
“Something happening?” Katja asks. She almost hopes something is, because it would be better than the party so far.
“Maybe. Looks like we could have a perimeter breach, but I don’t want to alarm anyone just yet.”
“Stampede? I’ve never understood why humans do that.”
“Yeah, me neither. Do uh… whatever you are… not do that?” Their face reddens. “Sorry, that was rude, wasn’t it?”
“A bit, yeah. But no, our threat responses are wired a bit differently than yours are.”
“Good to know.”
”Primary targets spotted. Are we go?”
”Affirmative. Grab the targets and get out.”
Katja has just realized she’s been talking to this person for half an hour without even asking their name, and has just opened her mouth to do that when something explodes.
There’s screaming, smoke, a symphony of disruption, and the next thing Katja knows the mech pilot has pulled her across the table before tipping it over for cover.
“Do me a favor and stay put, okay?”
“Okay.”
Morgan Sharp, callsign RAVENS, leaves their reptilian companion sheltering behind the table and sprints out the room, across the hall, and into the maintenance closet where they’ve stashed their mech, Unkindness Thereof. They climb in, already interfacing with their drone swarm as the mech’s reactor finishes warming up.
There are six hostiles in the ballroom, and another three on the roof of the building. The latter are easily dispatched by stun net, but the ones indoors pose a greater problem.
They’ve taken hostages—three prominent scientists, it seems—and are arrayed in a tight circle facing outwards, using the hostages as shields. Morgan can get them all with drones, but not non-lethally, and it will call for a distraction.
They’re debating whether taking Unkindness Thereof into the ballroom would be an appropriate distraction when one of the drones spots a flash of green darting from behind a table.
Gods damn it, they think. I kind of liked her.
Katja, from her position on the floor, can just make out the same sight as the mech pilot who just ran out of the room. She sees the drones overhead, and she sees the soldiers focused on the drones, meat-shields raised.
She hisses to herself in frustration, takes a deep breath, and makes a decision.
Katja doesn’t have the endurance of a human, but she knows she’s a lot faster in a short sprint. She’s pretty sure she can do this without dying. She hopes.
And so she sprints across the room, through the crowd, and though she’s never been in a fight in her life, she leaps.
The soldiers, eyes upwards focused on the drones, do not see her until she’s already on top of them. Literally. A five foot nothing blur of claws and feathers. One of the men goes down, bleeding from his face.
As distractions go, it’s a good one. Five sharp cracks in quick succession as the drones overhead fire coil-gun rounds, and the remaining soldiers fall.
There is more screaming, and Katja is dimly aware of it as she sits and stares at the blood on her hands. Red on green. Strange.
“Hey.”
Katja looks up to see the mech pilot crouched next to her, a worried expression on their face.
“You alright?” they ask.
“I- I think so,” Katja answers. “Never done this before.”
“That was the stupidest thing you could have done. You could have died. I’m glad you didn’t, though.”
“I told you: wired differently. Engineered species.”
“Speaking of,” Katja continues, “before we were interrupted, I was about to ask for your name.”
“Morgan. Morgan Sharp,” they reply. “And you are?”
“Katja. Just Katja—it’s a long story.”
“Well, nice to meet you, Katja, just Katja.”
“Likewise.”
“Hey, are you doing anything later?”
“As long as you don’t make that joke again, I’m free.”
“Cool. Oh, and you might want to go wash your hands.” Morgan gestures in the direction of the washrooms.
“Oh. Right. Yeah.”
Morgan watches Katja walks away, trying to ignore the headache the paperwork for this incident is going to bring on.