Chapter 20: Responsibility

  “Samurais don’t give equipment to normies unless they’re super new! I mean, I get it, not giving randos alien super weapons sounds reasonable, but who the hell doesn’t want some of that tech!? I want alien super weapons!”

  –Most people, everywhere, 2057

  ***

  I was… probably not ok. The few projectiles from those model fives that made it through my armor hadn’t been fun to deal with. “Altany! Get me some super napalm again! Got to make another flame wall!” I decided to give myself a second or two to take some meds.

  I needed another shot of model five venom! Those hits started to get painful again, even with the KP-Kicking. It probably took quite a lot to get through those painkillers.

  Incoming, both on your shotgun and coilgun.

  I didn’t waste time, folding the super paw as I’d come to call it and leaving it on my back. My shotgun reassembled and I jumped on one of the corpses.

  I had to reinforce my walls with fire so the model threes wouldn’t jump on them! I couldn’t put the super napalm on top of the walls since it would disintegrate them. Hence, I had to stand out in the open for a bit. Yeah.

  The moment I finished with that, I fired at the mouth of my funnel. I took some shots during the time I had no cover but I handled them… not well, but I handled them.

  The Quicker Copper Coating was also helping me react to projectiles and dodge or block them much better. I could always tell when a new muscle group finished integration because I felt so much more control over it! I could do this, I could…

  A spine hit me in the back of the head and I fell forward, a bit too close to my improvised hell on earth. Apparently, my armor had enough fire resistance that I didn’t suffer massive burns instantly. Just a few very painful ones to my closest limbs. Thank you again, drugs!

  I quickly extricated myself without too many burns and returned to my fortress of corpses. I’d added to my walls by using body after body. It was grizzly, macabre, but also metal as hell!

  The KP-Kicking ‘ve affected my judgement. Anyway, I’d finally created a funnel! Time to give me some time! “Altany! Six turrets! The good ones!”

  A bit of space, fucking finally! This situation well and truly humbled me. Even if this lesson fell on the very painful side of things, I’d make damn sure to remember it! I did good in close quarters combat, not open battlefields… yet.

  Even if my specialty would always be CQC, I also wanted to be able to do this kind of shit! I’d get there, I was sure… ish, sure-ish, yeah. God I needed a break…

  My style required funneling, for now. I just didn’t have the tools to deal with a swarm on all sides! My continued survival stood as a testament to how much I’d spent on my defenses.

  The fact that blood pooled inside my armor stood as a testament to how much I needed to upgrade those defenses!

  Projectiles started thumping into my turrets almost instantly, but they kept the smaller little shits at bay. I put myself in a corner of my fucked up castle, looking at the space I’d created. The floor was littered with corpses, but the turrets kept it clear of living assholes.

  The ground made wet sounds with every step. The long dead grass might actually be brought back to life with all this fertilizer. Would I have to destroy it all after this? I didn’t care much about landscaping but it’d be nice if we could build a park here for the kids.

  I deployed my shield in front of me and relied on echolocation to alert me if needed. Thanks to the blaring sound of the music, I received a good picture of everything around me. I panted like I did after a few hours of fun with Robin. I needed better cardio… maybe a better set of lungs? Or heart?

  “Altany!” I called out as spines thumped into my shield. “Gimme all the fucking meds, fast like please?” Thanks to my upgrades, none of my muscles could get sore, but everything around them sure as hell got inflamed.

  Bone upgrades sounded more and more appealing by the second too. Pretty sure I had a few broken ones even with the reinforcements. KP-Kicking’s a hell of a drug, kids! Don’t do it.

  Incoming. I am adding a minor stimulant and emergency nutrient replenisher that should help with your exhaustion.

  I took everything as fast as possible. I’d been battered hard. The impact redistribution gel lining of my armor really showed its worth, but that still meant massive bruises and blown blood vessels in places.

  I wondered how I’d upgrade my armor more. Thankfully I also received some nanites for my colonic injector and for me.

  If you plan on taking so much damage on a regular basis, may I insist that you spend your token on medical utilities class 2?

  “Yeah… That’d probably be smart…” I answered as the last of the meds I’d had to administer one handed kicked in and I relaxed ever so slightly. That mild stim and nutrient replenisher felt like heaven as well.

  Just in time too, since a model six pushed through the fire and bowled over my damn turrets as it collapsed.

  Another one stepped on an area where the antithesis had smothered the flames through sheer volume of meat! I prepared for a fight, switching to more destructive warheads in my Tunneler.

  That was when its head jerked down hard and brains splattered the ground. The bastard just up and died, right there. “What the…”

  “Look up Mad Panda!” Came over comms. A gleaming white blur ran on one of the sky bridges.

  A smile spread on my face. “Went all in on your gimmick finally, eh?”

  “Oh hells yes partner! Thanks for the advice! I’ll keep the ranged assholes dead or suppressed and shoot down the bigger bastards. Think you can handle the rest?” I laughed.

  It was pure giddiness. How the tables had mother fucking turned! “If you can do that, I can keep distracting the fuckers! I do my thing, you do yours, Johnny Law!” Now, it was a fair fight.

  “Oh, Altany, sweet sweet Altany, since I’m shooting way too fast to aim, why not some high explosive fragmentation rounds? My armor can take some stray shrapnel right?” Just like that, my mood got back up with a vengeance!

  ***

  Roger had given up hope until that message. His hiding place was crap, like really fucking bad. A damn maintenance corridor. At least the doors had some reinforcements to prevent the residents from stealing or fucking with the place.

  They got banged up by some of the xenos, but still stood strong. That distraction had bought them time too, good time!

  However, one door would fail pretty fucking soon. Probably a big model out there bashing it in. He’d seen the tactical map, where everyone was supposed to meet before everything went to shit.

  They’d ended up on the ‘ground’ level of this section, three floors down from the rendezvous. Yeah, sure, that had been the boss’s rendezvous and every floor had made up their own solution, but seriously, theirs sucked hard!

  It extended into the floor below, which meant that they received refugees from both sections and dealt with danger from both. Even at this depth in the megabuilding, they’d been noticed.

  “What do we do?” Ming asked, as if he’d fucking know! He had no idea!

  “Shoot the bastards when they come through? How the fuck should I know?” Why had he been elected as the temporary leader? Seniority?

  That new kid hadn’t fought in the purge, true, but if they survived this, he’d accept all the new enforcers as veterans! Bella was purge generation though, and looked a lot calmer! Calmer than him for fucking certain! Why didn’t she take command?!

  There were three of them. Roger was a gun-fu fanatic, but now his two pistols seemed pitiful compared to everything out there.

  The new kid had an SMG and must have had talent if the boss picked her, but still…

  Bella used her high caliber bolt-action, awesome accuracy but against a horde? They were so fucking fucked!

  The banging came harder, and harder. The metal dented, but the fucking wall around it concerned him most. This place hadn’t been built to code! The cheap ass concrete around it crumbled a bit with every hit.

  “Get ready!” He shouted to everyone. They only had a few more people with guns, not even militia. They were fucked, but Roger would die before letting the plants eat kids. He took a few deep breaths.

  They could do this. They could do this! Yeah, the boss was coming! They had a real mother fucking samurai! They just had to hold! People trembled, clearly terrified. Maybe he had to remind them?

  “Everyone! We’ve got a fucking Samurai now! You know the boss! He won’t leave us! We just have to hold on until he gets here!” More concrete fell, they were coming. Louis said he didn’t promise to get there on time. Because he wasn’t a liar…

  “Fuck the corps, fuck the government, they don’t give a fuck about us, but the boss does! Any other samurai I wouldn’t hold my breath, but this is fucking Panda! We just have to buy time for him!”

  “Come on! Everyone! Get your fucking guns ready! Bella, focus on the bigger cunts! That rifle might do something, aim for headshots! Everyone with something other than pistol caliber, do the same! Me and Ming will handle the little shits! Common Bear-Yakuza! We got this shit!”

  He sounded a lot more confident than he was, but it got a few cheers. Guess the time had come for that ‘blaze of glory’ death he always imagined.

  *BOOM*

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  The wall around the door crumbled forward and there they were. The huge beast and his little friends. Everyone froze, but someone had to start shooting! Roger decided it’d be him.

  He unloaded into the little shits then everyone else opened fire. The trunkless elephant moved back, apparently deciding to let the dogs take them on. Didn’t want to risk himself? Whatever.

  He fired constantly. His pistols were aug-linked and he had a lot of practice, so every bullet hit. Maybe not always headshots but still! He was good! Well trained! It wasn’t enough.

  On his last two bullets, he ejected both mags. He’d designed and 3D printed a piece of super convenient kit. His magazines were on his thighs, pointing forward. With the ease of practice, he brought his pistols to them, slammed the magazines home, twisted both to the side and pulled up and out.

  Reloaded without having to holster either of his guns! Super fast and Roger felt proud of his invention! It wasn’t enough...

  He kept firing, and so did everyone else. They had a desperate fire in their eyes. Things weren’t hopeless! The boss was coming!

  Even if Roger knew that Panda may very well not be on time, he clung to that hope. Without it, he’d have to consider shooting the kids to spare them the suffering. He had to believe, had to…

  The head of the model six exploded! An incredibly loud ‘crack’ followed right after! Like the sonic boom of bullets but so much more powerful! Then a blur passed over it and he heard a bunch of shots!

  The enforcers didn’t stop shooting, the boss taught them better than that, but they realized quickly that, well, there were no living targets!

  “What the fuck?” Roger kept his guns up. The enemy of my enemy might still kill him and collect on his bounties.

  “Hey! I’m Mad Panda’s partner! Here to evacuate you guys! Come on! We got to get moving! Fast!” Smart guy. They’d have probably shot him if he just came up. Roger decided to follow one of the most important lessons for enforcers: Fucking roll with it.

  “Everyone! Time to move! Fast people carry the kids and elderly! Get to it!” An enforcer telling them what to do did wonders for cooperation.

  “Who the fuck was that?” Ming asked and he almost wanted to slap her out of her daze.

  “He said so, boss’s partner! Reload and prepare for fuck’s sake!” That did the trick.

  The samurai walked into view now, hands empty and visible. “Lila’s coming for escort! You’ll have to meet her in the middle. Any enforcers?”

  Roger raised his hand, holding his pistol up. He didn’t want to holster anything just yet. “There’s me, Bella and Ming. We’re low on ammo but we can probably handle some shit.” The… cowboy looked at him. His legs were bent wrong, like… a horse’s legs!

  He’d seen it on his feed for advanced super expensive prosthetics. Losing a leg really fucked with the suggestions from the algorithms.

  This weird guy’s hands were shiny, something like chrome but with wavy things. He smiled at him.

  “Dual wielder?” Roger didn’t really know what to do so he just nodded. Then, in the weirdest fucking display of speed he’d ever seen, the guy started talking with his mics off at an insane rate. It looked absolutely bizarre.

  “Little gift from me, from one akimbo fella’ to another.” Then, Roger jumped as a box thumped in front of him. “Gimme a sec, be right back.” Said the cowboy before taking off extremely fast! Did he step on the wall at one point? Fuck it.

  Everyone got ready to move, their hiding spot blown. At least people here knew how to run away, and almost none of them were fat. Two meals a day keeps you lean and… nah, just lean.

  Roger opened the box and found two high caliber pistols. Just looking at them, his augs connected seamlessly. Then, he heard a voice in his fucking head!

  Hello, I am Altany, vanguard Mad Panda’s AI assistant! As an enforcer of the Bear-Yakuza, you have been granted permission to make certain purchases to safeguard the lives of those around you.

  That voice made him freeze. What, in the ever loving fuck, just happened? He’d seen the footage Lila sent everybody, but in person it felt very fucking different! On top of that, the boss had granted him permission to use his points? What. The. Fuck.

  Points were mythical! The most powerful currency in the fucking world! He got stuck in a mental ‘what the fuck’ loop… In an instant, he’d been granted the key to a life of ease without struggle! He’d just have to sell his guns after the incursion and he’d be set for life! However…

  He looked behind him and saw the children as well as the extremely few who lived long enough to be elderly. He saw his community, the one that had gone through hell too many times to count. Besieged by corpos, the government, gangs and aliens.

  They needed him now and would need him after this was over. Fuck, they could expand, empty those hellholes they called brothels upstairs. His wife had come from there. She’d died a few years ago. Never got a chance to have children…

  Now he got it. The boss knew him, trusted him and believed in him. Fuck, he trusted him so much that he’d given him the key to everything and still knew he’d do the right thing! “What can I buy?” He asked, steel entering his voice.

  Ammunition, medicine for the injured or anything that would help safeguard the innocent.

  The samurai came back, holding two boxes. He quickly handed them to Ming and Bella. “I paid for those and that pair, mixed our catalogues. He’s already been spendin’ on you guys like crazy so I thought I’d help.” He said with a smile.

  That new samurai… cared. He actually looked like he cared. Was it only because they were protecting all the people behind them? Probably. Whatever.

  “Oh! Also these, cooked up by Altany with a cyber-warfare catalogue. Super cheap but should help you get a direct connection even if your augs are crap and also improve them slightly. Been runnin’ around and handin’ those to every enforcer. Also there’s some self-installin’ armor with your name on it in there. Literally, your name’s written on them, it’s a bit customized.”

  The samurai handed all of them little data sticks, and in a daze they all brought them to their ports. Those damn things fucking melted!

  Roger worried about burns but no, the things just infiltrated their augs and played with them a bit. He could feel the little nanites fuck around but that was the least of his worries at the moment.

  Connection established outside of pitiful net. You should be able to hear and interact with me no matter where you are in the building. I am currently updating a map of the seven floors of this section using the enforcers as cameras and relays to supplement the pitiful state of security around here. I have plotted a secure enough route for evacuation.

  A 3D map of this section’s seven floors appeared in his vision. It had color for places with xenos and grey for lacking intel. The center… “Jesus fucking christ, what’s happening in the courtyard?”

  The cowboy smirked. “Mad Panda’s creatin’ a distraction. I think we’ll get some nice footage out of that. I have to go back to supportin’ him and the other enforcers. They ain’t got the tools for hard resistance. Yall gonna be alright?” There was a route with few xenos, but not none. They had a long procession of people to protect…

  “Oh fuck yeah, I’ll handle the rear.” Ming said as she got out a red and black… was it an SMG? The barrel looked a bit too wide for that. Some sort of bullpup with a drum magazine. That apparently satisfied the cowboy as he took off running.

  “You said we can save the boss points with bulk?” Said Bella while looking down the sights of some sci-fi long gun with her red cybernetic eye.

  It had always looked just a bit strange surrounded by her almost completely black skin. She’d been talking to the AI but Roger still felt too dazed to listen in before.

  The barrel was slightly less wide than the SMG’s but had two little metal rails inside the barrel. She pushed down, apparently it was a lever action. “Would one high capacity drum magazine and several sticks save on points?”

  In a single buy, it would. This weapon uses no propellant so the helical magazines can hold a high number of projectiles. It will need to be recharged eventually. It is a good strategy, I propose the same for you Roger.

  Roger jumped a little at being directly addressed by the god level AI but he handled it well! Mostly… “Oh, uh, right, alright. Yeah, these pistols can handle a drum mag then?”

  They can. Your rather ingenuous, for a human, device for reloading is compatible with the design with straight magazines. However, I believe I can get you a better version once you earn more points. I have been keeping track of what all enforcers have earned. I predict my vanguard may wish to give you some access.

  I want to be clear, I will advocate for the well being of my vanguard first and foremost, but he places a lot of value in you. He believes you could be an asset for your community and humanity.

  Did the AI remind him of how much the boss had spent on him? He had no idea and a strong feeling he didn’t want to know!! It was so much! He couldn’t earn, steal or beg for this much wealth in his lifetime! He looked behind him again.

  The kids were cocooned by the adults, all of them afraid and too thin. Some were shaking, but many had been through horrible shit before. They were tough. Tougher than they should have to be… “That’s why…”

  Yes, you’ve had a great and terrible responsibility placed upon you. Is that something you wish to discontinue?

  No judgement there, just a genuine inquiry. He didn’t feel defensive over it and just answered. “I’m good, you guys?”

  Ming glared. “My son’s in there, I’ll kill any fucks I need to with a fucking spoon if necessary! Boss just gave us better tools for the job, I’m way the fuck in!” “Same…” Added Bella distractedly, playing with her new optics.

  They also, very clearly, all wanted some god damn payback.

  ***

  Now that the long range fuckers were being dealt with, mostly, I could focus on the fight! The Quicker Copper Coating kept integrating more and more of my muscles but the way it affected my thinking speed helped even more.

  My reflexes became much better, my movements more fluid, my blocks more solid, my hits quicker. Still not anywhere close to being able to grab a horde’s attention however, even with all the upgrades.

  I needed Johnny’s support. I needed the shots that came from everywhere thinning the herd. I needed to get stronger so my badass melee weapon could pass though more fuckers. I needed to be quicker to hit the right spots and dodge rather than tank more. I needed to think faster and react faster to aim faster and kill faster!

  At this point, my kill count wasn’t even that good compared to Johnny since I didn’t have time to aim well. It felt so fucking frustrating! I hated not being enough…

  One thing that helped: Altany’s definition of high-explosive fragmentation rounds!

  The name undersold it. She told me they were expensive but I didn’t give a fuck! I didn’t have what it would take to finish the job cheaply, or, well, at all! The mini-grenades exploded hard enough that the shrapnel hurt me from twenty meters away!

  They stretched my barrel to the limit at 30mm, and kicked hard! I used them whenever I found a big enough bunch of little assholes. It helped equalize things, thank the mesh! Everything hurt… probably. Drugs were fun!

  I then remembered those stories about the people getting themselves killed because of the high and slowed down. I needed to be careful for fuck’s sake!

  I essentially faked being a higher tier samurai with consumables but had to remember that I wasn’t! Overconfidence would get me killed quickly. I couldn’t die! Robin would be mad at me if I died!

  He’d be mad at panda… Fuck that one was bad. Drugs apparently made me unfunny! No! The horrors of substance abuse were real!

  This is interesting. The parts of your brain linked with humor activated before your pain sections took over the exact same signal wave.

  “I’m not telling you…” I pushed out in between large breaths.

  Let me guess, it involved your name and Robin?

  How the fuck did she do that? Okay, well, that one might have been a tiny bit obvious.

  “Tell me when the civilians are safe. I’ll retreat towards the shelter then create a barricade, I’m a bit… fucked up…”

  Ah! I am glad you noticed, I was getting worried for a moment that you would do something reckless, like jumping into a horde of antithesis without a plan.

  “It worked didn’t it? How’s that net upgrade shit going? Can you connect me to Lila?”

  Fully functional. The expenditure of points in your enforcers should start providing a profit by the way. Since you are literally on the front lines and they are acting as support to you, while under your command, the point loss is much smaller.

  Did you want to give them some of the profits? I would suggest calculating after investment and ammunition expenditure if you go this route.

  I took a cardio break by switching to my once again reloaded shotgun. Super-buckshot was coming into its own as probably my perfect ‘all rounder’ ammo. Cheap and effective as hell!

  Thanks to the Tunneler’s peculiarities, I could add more propellant and shorten or lengthen the barrel at will. I still kept specialty or particularly effective slugs/warheads ready to use at a moment’s notice.

  “Sounds good! I’m footing the bill for the essential stuff and starting kit, of course, but any extra they need or want, they can earn themselves. Plus, it’ll encourage them to make more profits! Communistic socialist capitalism whatever the fuck is at play here! Bit busy to talk over whatever the fuck system this is…”

  The exhaustion was creeping back in. Altany might have been trying to distract me from how messed up I felt… and was…

  Connecting to Lila now…