Chapter Ninety-Three - For Want of Power I was back on my bike in Fortress ENE. The Reload hit me with a bit of a shock. "Alright," I muttered as I kicked the bike on. What did I need? I had a few thoughts on how to properly tackle the portal. But if I wanted to do it well... hmm. I rode out of the parking garage and turned right rather than left. I had a bit of time to waste because it seemed that I was probably years late to the breach opening. Synthcorp were really playing with fire. They were probably making enough to justify it, though. What were a few losses in personnel here and there compared to the likely millions they were making a year? It looked like things were just coming to a head. So, the ideal way to solve this problem, for Synthcorp, would be to cull the orcs in the portal, and then leave things as they were. If I didn't want to make an enemy of them, then that's what I'd do. Go in, clear up to the boss room, then back out. Too bad I wanted to do this for more power. A near-C-rank portal would be good eating as far as my growth was concerned, and I had no reason to care about Synthcorp stocks at the end of the day. I pulled up in front of the fast food joint that was up in front of Full-Auto Stranger-Danger, then pulled out my phone and sent a text. I didn't get a reply, but that was fine. I walked through the restaurant, then to Jane's place. It looked like it was closed up for the night... or the morning, rather, but I knew she mostly slept here, so I started banging on the door. It took three minutes for her to open it, and when she did, it was to shove the twin barrels of a shotgun up and into my nose. "Fuck you want?" she asked. "Hey Jane," I said. I reached up and carefully pushed the barrels away from my face. "Got a bit of an emergency. Could use some help." She blinked a few times, clearly still half-asleep, then sighed and lowered the gun. "What is it?" "I need a few items, and quick," I said. "Urh, Beanstalk, it's... fuck, it's like four AM. Can't you do your shopping at a reasonable hour, I just went to bed?" Jane groaned, then turned back and walked into the shop. I followed her, blinked as I couldn't see much with most of the lights off. "What are you looking for, Beanstalk? I'm charging extra for this, by the by." "That's reasonable," I said. "I need a few things. A body-cam, if you have one?" "I think I do, yeah. Why do you need that? Filming some POV porn?" ᴛhis chapter is ᴜpdated by N0veI.Fiɾe.net "No," I said. "I'm going to seal a breached C-rank portal that's run by Synthcorp, and they're not gonna be happy about it. I want video evidence that I can leak after the fact, make them look bad if they try anything." "Oh shit," Jane said. She rubbed at her face. "Beanstalk, what are you getting involved in?" "Trouble, mostly," I said. "Also, hypothetically, if I was fighting orcs, what kind of gun would you suggest?" She blinked. "Uh. We talking big muscle dudes?" "Greenish skin and all," I replied. "I've seen people use shotguns on them, and it kind of works. Buckshot doesn't kill instantly, though." Jane rubbed at her face. "Right, I might have something for that. But it'll cost you." She moved around the shop, a little sluggishly, but not too badly so. In the space of twenty minutes, I had a small stack of items on the table before me. "This is a body cam," Jane said. She had brought that over first and had immediately connected it to a phone charging cable. The body cam was a small rig, designed to be worn on the front with a small metal plate at the rear. It was a lot of straps, but that was fine. "It'll break up your look a bit, and these aren't designed for breasts, so sucks to suck, but you'll manage. HD camera, can hold... I dunno, a dozen hours of video? Let the battery charge up." Jane raised a gun next. It was rather short, maybe two feet long, in a bull-pup configuration. From the front, it looked like it had three barrels almost. "Twin-tubed bullpup shotty. Five shells a tube. The tube switch is here. It's pump-action, of course. They're pretty reliable from what I've heard. Crow-Tec CTS tactical." This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there. There was a picatinny rail on top with a fold-up holographic sight, probably not too accurate, but at the ranges I'd be shooting it didn't matter overly much. Jane slapped a pair of large boxes onto the counter, then a smaller box on top of that. "Slugs," she said, tapping the two larger boxes. "And this is a small box of flechettes." "Flechettes?" I asked. "Small, long, metal bits with itty-bitty fins. Basically, imagine shooting a bunch of needles at someone," she said. "They're barbed, and designed to keep a wound open. Nasty, apparently, but really good against more fleshy portal monsters." I picked all of the boxes up. The flechette box had ten rounds, the bigger two had twenty each. That'd work out. "Do you have a bandoleer or something?" I asked. "No. That'll ruin your look. I've got a belt with loops for shells, though. But you need to wear it half-cocked, or else it doesn't look cool." I chuckled. Same priorities as ever. It ended up costing me a neat thousand-five. I winced at the cost, but... yeah, it was probably worth it in the long run. I hadn't thought about it initially, but there was potential here for some good blackmail. I didn't like it so much, but it would maybe mean some pretty big gains, at least financially. I paid up, told Jane to have a nice nap, then ran off before she could get any ideas. The ride back was going to be a long one, but I had time to think on the way over, and I planned on using it. Putting everything I knew together now... hmm, no, I still didn't know enough. Well, whatever. I had a new toy to play with. Next loop, I'd see if I couldn't get in touch with some of the locals, figure things out from the outside. And I needed a closer Save. These drives over were so damned boring, it was unbelievable. I made it to Podunky, stole a ladder, placed it up against the wall then... took a quick nap. I was tired, and the drive only made it worse, so I found a dry spot, regretted not asking Jane for a sleeping bag or something like that, then rested for a cool fifteen minutes. When I woke up, it was to distant shouts and the muffled thumping of guns. So, that had started. I climbed the ladder, jumped over the other side, then checked my gear and turned on the body cam. I loaded two flechette rounds, one into each tube of the gun, then loaded the rest with slugs. The last shell, another flechette, was loaded directly into the chamber. The first orc I saw was stomping out of the building with the portal, bloody cleaver at his side. I introduced his face to flechettes, then lowered my gun to look at the results. Kind of gross, but yeah, that extra bit of penetrating power did work. There was still fighting going on inside, so I ran in, and discovered two of the security guards caught in hand-to-hand against a pair of orcs. They were using their shotguns as clubs, and mostly getting their shit rocked by the bigger, stronger orcs. Fair enough. I could barely keep up with them, and I was a D-ranker. I put a shell into the back of one orc, not quite killing it, but knocking it down and injuring it enough that the guard was able to start smacking it with his gun. The other orc and guard were moving around too much, so I dropped my gun, letting it fall by my side with its sling, then pulled out my sword and ran across the room, ending the run with a lunge that speared the orc in the lower ribs. When it went down, I found myself looking at the two guards, both panting. A third was nearby, dead. "Seems like you need some assistance," I said. "Who... who are you?" one of them asked. "Concerned local," I replied. "I'm going in that portal." "We... we're retreating," the better off of the two said. "This is too much. We need assistance." That explained where they'd been last time, then. I nodded to them, then walked past, towards the portal. Time to see how deep in I could get.