>>5598970>>5599164“You’re on the Marion Center’s payroll?” You snap back, glowing eyes in the dark following you as you slowly maneuver around the outer perimeter of the room.
“Would be, perhaps. But our investors insisted on having this meeting in person, in the dead of night, in this shithole. And they can’t exactly do that if the lights are off.” He replies, an air of smug confidence projecting through his voice-altering mask. Even when his baton twirls in the air, it feels as though he never loses control of it.
“Something special going on tonight?” You counter. “The kinds of things they usually do in venues like this don’t tend to require a security detail.”
The merc pauses briefly from drumming on the glass. He lays an extended index finger as a divider across the mouth of his mask, static issuing from his speakers as a pointed—‘shhhh’.
“You ain’t even look like corp-sec,” You continue, unfazed. Your gaze flits briefly away from his for an instant at a time, looking for some means of triggering a manual lockdown. In the hyperbaric suite, this would be easier. You could potentially start a fire—break a valve or puncture a tank, then cause a spark from afar—that would trigger locking firebreaks or the release of asphyxiant gas, forcing a tactical retreat. Here, there must be some countermeasure against radiation or the leakage of hazardous materials. You can see some manner of manual emergency switch on the wall nearby the entrance, and you continue circling the room’s perimeter.
“We are no ordinary security. Think of us more like ‘exception handling’. ‘Modern problems require modern solutions’, as they say. New technology and new appearances, affording our services to high-profile clients.” A hissing issues from the speakers that sounds like a little laugh. If his mask could smirk, you imagine it would be. “I am Ruyi. Artisan. Torn, truly. I’m not being paid to catch rats, after all. But bringing one back now would be a fine proof of concept, and an excellent show of good faith for our prospective clients.”
Tension lingers, thick in the air from the very moment his free hand falls toward his hip from the glass. You must draw first. You shoot from the hip with a flick of the wrist, retrieving your suppressed pistol and squeezing the trigger before your arm’s moved far enough to aim. The muted *pop* dissipates into the air, quieter as it reaches your ears than the sound of glass shattering. Ruyi is fast, ducked low behind the waist-high wall beneath the window, moving before you can take a second shot. Distracting him, thankfully, was more important than hitting him. You dart the rest of the way to the emergency switch, open the case, and pull—
> “Please remain in place and stand clear of emergency shutters. Please remain in place and stand clear of emergency shutters.”> [[ Continued ]] 