Theater 3, chapter 2

Season Three, Chapter TwoUnity on the Bounty
It was cold, but only the same cold as yesterday, and any other day he could remember since, well since whenever. See, amongst other things that were a bit different, the temperature never changed nor the humidity down here.
Zee adjusted the sight one more click for windage, now that could be a problem, depending where you were, here, it was 2 clicks of a problem, now near the ridges it could be 8 or 9 clicks of a problem, on a bad day, 12+ and a prayer !
Another thing that never changed, was some thieving ba&%$d’s trying to run off with someone else’s hard eared livelihood ! Today, that was not going to happen. Zee lifted three fingers, a signal to Art and the Dodger as to what he could see of the opposition, Art lifted three in return, but then the tell, Dodger lifted four !
He followed this with a thumb, meaning he’d got a bead on the 4^th, an OK from Art just left the timing, Zee would give them 3, patting “Lizzie“, his prized possession. At just over 1.8 m and weighing in at 55 kilo’s, his Astarte’s pattern Mark VIII heavy needle sniper rifle. Similar to the Deatwatch Mark IX, a little shorter, a fraction heavier, not tailored to fit with no built-in Cogitator, but more importantly, unlike the Mark IX unlicensed possession of a Mark VIII was not subject to summary execution. And alive was good in Zee’s book. He cupped the gun to his shoulder, held up 1 then 3 fingers, leaving Art number 2 and Dodger the 4th, the one the two of them could not make. Zee was no show-off, taking two, just damn good at what he did and with the Mk VIII, he was in possession of a far superior piece of kit with which to do it ! The numbering was always North -South, unless prearranged alterations required other considerations. The same suited, you didn’t need too many distractions in this job, the job itself kind of provided those for you. The timing 1 - 10 in quarter minutes, why, he had no idea, might have read it in a book or seen it of TV someplace. He held up three fingers. 

“Three,” Zee mentally counted down the quarter minutes.

……

“Two.”

…..

”One !”

With two gentle squeezes, the first one lost his head, well enough of it to ensure what was left would not miss the part that had gone and number three he dropped with another clean head shot as the guy turned to see what had happened to his partner in crime. Zee then swung the scope and saw thumbs up from Art and the Dodger. Relief flooded him as the tension released his muscles and fully opened his diaphragm, and boy did the air taste sweeter than he remembered. A chill shivered its way down his relaxing muscles, then a Crow let out its grating call like a nail on rusty tin. Always a good sign for if there was anything moving down there, he’d not be so keen calling his buddies. Chances there would be Kites circling above soon too, and with darkness not to far off it was time to move before more of the fauna lit them up surer than neon !
15 minutes later Zee arrived at the Land Speeder, an old Tornado variant stretched to add a third seat and additional internal stowage space and with a whole heap of extra goodies, many of which flirted with “legal“ for domestic use. She went by the name of “Eileen II” and represents a very good night at cards, as well as the “firm‘s” most expensive investment to date. Art was in the process of stripping off the camo nets and disposing of the heavy foliage they’d used to tidy her away.
“Nice one Art, clean as it looked ?”
“Guess, did you see how the lad did ?”
“I know, how’d he make that fourth, kind of eyes we had don’t you miss them ?”
“Yeah, but that’s why we bought in the kid, never was a job for old men and cripples”, Art laughed, tapping his Cybernetic left leg a result of working the wrong gig with the wrong “friends”.
“Guess that makes me the old man then.”
Zee took the netting, rolled and strapped it away as Art thumbed the engines, two AS 9-60 Ramjets, and whilst waiting for the systems to power-up, swung out the rig for the pintle-mounted Heavy Bolter, sliding it out, testing the smoothness of the run and tensioning the .998 calibre Bolt feed as he did every time, one of his life’s rituals that Zee for one found reassuring. Couple of minutes and they were hot and circling the sight of the shoot out as Dodger waves them in and Art was steering with one hand whilst stressing with the cargo net release with the other, until his nerves get the better of him an Zee reached over and tapped the auto-pilot to on
“There was a reason we paid good money to have that up-graded, I think not dying was one of the considerations Art !” he shouted over the noise of the thrusters levelling them out.
Below, Dodger had all four bodies stretched out ready, their possessions in a separate pile that he was sifting carefully, with a third passenger, even with the power modifiers, they didn’t have the capacity to haul trash, so they had to look to less than 3 tonnes, and some of that was them, add another four bodies, ammo, weapons…. suffice to say it could be tight. Zee belayed down the to give Dodger a hand shifting the bodies, and whilst Art was securing the nets top-side, he too gave the men’s possessions a perfunctory look.
”Anything take your eye Dodge, reckon you’ve earned yourself a bonus.”
“Well, this kind of..” Dodger held up a Hellgun.
“Better but a whole heap hungrier than a standard Lasgun, but…” Zee leant over and picked up a seemingly standard holstered Laspistol
”One thing I don’t understand, did you holster that for transit ?”
"No, why ?”
“Well look at the gear they have here, one Hellgun and three ex-Guard M35 Lasguns, the Galaxies most commonly encountered Las weapon bar none. But wait, why use an M35, when you’ve a Mars pattern Laspistol tucked away ! As good, not quite the range, but with more of a punch than the 35, this is a Mars Pattern Mark IV Command Laspistol, given to Guard Officers once they attain a field command. Question is then, why’s it in the holster ?”Zee tossed Dodger the pistol.
“Anything look or feel strange about it to you ?”
“Meant to weigh, …. 900 grams or thereabouts right ?”
“Arts got you all wrong Dodge, you can listen !”
“Knock it off Zee, you know I listen to you guys, even your ‘remember when’ tales that would send most folk into a coma ! Point is, this here probably weighs a little over 1,000, was one of their better guns, but it’s still holstered, and even buttoned too, in which case I’ll wager it’s a ‘life assurance’ piece.”
“Give the lad a prize, sling it over by those rocks. And as Dodger did so, Zee took up one of the M35’s, giving it a once over, feeling it still held some heat from having been fire ready, he guessed it was not another trap, and loosed a round at the holstered pistol, yelling, “Fire in the hold !” to alert Art of the following, “Crumph !” as Pistol and Holster disappeared in a ball of flame and a strong smell of Promethium.
“Some form of Thermite charge, enough to take your hand and most of your arm I’d say, so yeah, an insurance piece, and Dodge, sorry, it was a good gun, but even Harvey wouldn’t attempt to disarm a ‘life’ piece, and he’s insane ! Tell you what, I’ll have a chat with Art so as when we get the Bounty on these four, we’ll cash all this with Spence and see what he has “out-back” as I’m sure you could use a decent side-arm for starters, your M36 Pattern is more suited for what we do than a Hellgun, that back pack alone weighs in at some 10 kilos and it’s real cumbersome getting in and out of Eileen, so we cool with that ?”
“We’re always cool Zee, we three are the Ice-men !”, at which set the two of them laughing, deep happy laughter that soon had Art going as Dodge re-told the story of the too-good-to-be-true Mars Pattern Insurance Piece on the run back to Fort Speake, the one place that afforded anything like a secure, stable community in these parts, where lay the “firms” second largest gross asset, the Scarp Lodge.

As with all the buildings around and including Fort Speake, Scarp Lodge was literally cut straight into the cliff, the only thing that afforded the original settlers any security. Art swung the Land Speeder over the Pad, easing down on the throttle, dropping it feather-light as ever, legs still on full extension after having “dropped -off” their cargo at the Bondsman’s and cashed-up. Zee keyed in a further series of number’s, opening the Lodge, having already de-activated their security protocol’s, being shot out of the sky by their own Flakk Missiles or sliced and diced by their “on-point” Lasgrid was not the kind of homecoming he had in mind. 
They had got lucky ay Spence’s, for to start with, he was four sheets to the wind, and so more than eager to please, but a new toy of this calibre was always gonna cost ! Whilst Dodge was helping the Bondsman unpack the last piece of “cargo”, Art and Zee had a board meeting, which swiftly concluded that the lad was worth further investment. They both liked Dodge, he was amenable, attentive and bright, with a near natural affinity for fire-arms that matched even Zee’s. More importantly though, he listened and did not appear to out to prove anything, none of which they now knew was an act. They’d given him a room at the Lodge some fourteen months back, when he’d begun his training for real, too long to sustain an act, and long enough for Art to do all the back-ground checks he was so infamous for, even the Imperial Guard hired him from time to time. Even so, it had been 10 months before they had taken Dodge on a “live-one”, for it was not a job you learnt the basics on, those were a pre-requisite !
And Spence did come up with the goods, at 1,750 less their profit from the sales, Zee reckoned it worth it for an Absolution Pattern Sniper Rifle. Not a Las weapon like Zee’s Mk VIII or Art’s older Mk IV, the Absolution Pattern Sniper Rifle was a ballistic weapon firing solid slugs. Still a very effective bit of kit though against all but heavily armoured targets, but as they had no Astarte’s hunting planned, it was unlikely to prove an insurmountable problem. Spence had cut them some slack though, throwing in a tripod, silencer, a telescopic sight and 800 rounds of 50/50 HE and AP. Zee took one look at the telescopic sight, rejected it and after an extra 250 changed hands, he was truly happy with a 0X29, a copy of the X30 Scope on the Deatwatch Mark IX, and a surprisingly good copy at that. Dodge was simply immersed in a blissful trance that provided Art and Zee with many a cheap laugh at his expense. 
But now was time to unwind, time to get the first decent nights sleep in three days, for tomorrow would be a very long one indeed, it had taken him nearly two to sight-in “Lizzie”. 
 
Mk