Chapter Ten – Done Dirt Cheap

Chapter Ten – Done Dirt Cheap

“Samurai have catalogues for nearly everything. Some are more broad than others, while some focus almost entirely on a single narrow field. Those latter ones tend to be dangerous at higher classes.

The Protectors make the business of killing xenos fun and easy.”

— Excerpt from an AMA by ‘Salamander Storm’

***

It didn’t take all that long for everyone to start getting ready to move. Say what you will about kids, when shit hit the fan, most of them were damned fast to adapt. I left the remaining adults and the older teens like Marie and Lucy to figure out how to get everyone moving. In the meantime, I stepped out and into the corridor.

“Myalis?”

Yes?

“I’ve got thirty-seven points, right?” I asked. “I need something to defend myself, and the kids, with.”

I see. There are two readily available solutions. Acquire a decently powerful weapon for yourself; this will allow you to take care of large sums of enemies on your own. Obtain a batch of weaker weapons for your allies. You can perhaps afford six very simple kinetic handguns from your Class I Kinetic Handguns catalogue. Every alien killed with one of these weapons, even if it’s not by your hand, will afford you a small number of points, perhaps even refunding the weapons over time. There is always the middle ground, a combination of the two.

I looked around the entrance of the vault and took in the group. I wouldn’t trust the kittens with a gun. But some of the older folk? Baldy was a bit of a wimp, but I bet he could pull a trigger, likewise for the teacher lady.

“What kind of guns do you have for cheap?” I asked.

Might I suggest the Foxteeth Model D. Small, reliable, easy to aim and with semi-automatic action. Its magazine holds fifteen rounds of 9×19 parabellum. They come with a single magazine. Five points each.

“Okay,” I said. “Cool, yeah. Can they take out those,” I gestured to the corpse of the alien I’d shot deeper in the corridor.

A well-aimed shot can. Most smaller Antithesis models are surprisingly fragile. They rely more on numbers to overwhelm rather than individual strength.

“Is that going to be a problem?” I asked.

As soon as the Antithesis have secured the area immediately around their landing site, they will begin to send out forces in droves. It will be a problem, yes. I would advise either obtaining equipment to fight off large numbers of adversaries, or leaving the area.

“Damn. Okay, I need a gun for myself. Something in the, uh, twenty point range, I guess. No point in saving anything if it’s the choice between having something that can save me and not.”

For twenty points, I would suggest the Trench Maker. It’s a heavy-duty universal feed handgun. You can load any standard ammunition between five and twelve millimeters. The barrel and chamber expands after scanning each individual round, allowing you to fire nearly any type of standard small-arms ammunition.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

“That sounds a bit gimmicky,” I said. Not that I know shit about guns, really.

It comes with an ensuite targeting system, an extra magazine of incendiary armour piercing rounds… and a laser pointer!