Mort is a planet of mixed blessings for me, the city's layer of smog and clouds keeps the sunlight from burning my tender skin. On a downside however, the eternal rain makes my wings heavy with saturation that requires my deathsuit to cleanse the feathers frequently.
Shivers on SCAF bikes and their bigger brethren, the Kilcopter pilots are another menace to anything airborne, sheer speed and gung-ho attitudes the main problem. Word got around the pilots eventually that strafing the "Downtown Angel" was a terminal activity. Not that anyone strafing an SCL2 Necanthrope ever got the chance to repeat the process on a regular basis.
Down here, below all the glitzy skyscrapers is my hunting ground, the premiere predator amongst a nation of predators, even so a predator must keep her eyes peeled for potential rivals. I am one of the few with my clearance who still bothers with a hands on approach to problems, problems that make Kilcopters look like annoying flies, SLA industries has lots of problems. Regardless of all the propaganda that is generated about the good things that come out of Downtown, 99% of my territory is just plain bad. The remaining 1% I like to divide up as being .3% 'useful' and .7% 'evil'. My only concern is that .7% of the population that is 'evil', not that I'm any angel myself! Don't let the appearance deceive you, oh yes, I'm a naughty girl but with my charred eyelids nobody ever expected anything else. Heartbreaker, life taker and blood drinker, but for the thousands of innocents that may die at my hands it is a far preferable fate than what others offer. Parody, the only honesty that many will ever know.
Even before the change I was by all accounts "a bad little bitch", not that I remember much at all before entering the White. It comes back and whispers to me every now and then in my rare moments of peace. I'm not schizophrenic, just sharing the fractured memories of someone else that never came out of the White, she wasn't very nice either but we don't agree on much. I share this slender 5"5' frame with a sentient deathsuit and a Gore cannon that like to wrap itself around my shoulders like a science-friction cloak, it likes to drink warm blood too. My vassal Brainwaster boy, a.k.a. "Number 4" a.k.a. Villein spends most of his life wondering if he will wake up in my embrace, or worse yet, the gore cannon's. A fear that is largely but not completely unjustified really, it does keep him on his toes though. Villein is just like the rest of the 99.3% of society on Mort. It thrives on fear, darkness, pain, uncertainty and sexual frustration, gives them a primal reason for survival. Take all that away and the little bastards start to stick their noses into things they shouldn't. That's my job, I bloody the noses of those who aren't distracted enough by TV and survival. It would be unfair to say that I'm not part of the 99.3% as well, perhaps I over simplify too much but it's the only way to take it all in.
I don't have delusions of grandeur, tall poppies get noticed and culled in short order. If I do my job well no one will notice and then Mr. Slayer is happy, Mr. Slayer's happy then I live another day. All this trouble to masquerade reality to protect billions of unemployed plebes too self-interested to see past their own miserable existence. Sometimes I wonder if they if they really need the protection that SLA offers, death wouldn't be much of a change for most. Death, there are far worse things than death that a living person wouldn't understand and only those like me who have transcended can only truly understand. From corporate high-flyer to unemployed waste of skin, we look after them all. We safeguard their souls from the likes of which that are far worse than the likes of me.
Villein doesn't like living in Downtown, I think he was used to a more refined existence before coming into my service. Refined things are lost on most Brain Wasters anyway, unless they can find some creative way of breaking them. His little friends don't come around much anymore either so I guess he gets lonely here when I'm away, I really shouldn't have eaten the last fellow but I couldn't help it at the time. There's something about my looks, smell and their own hormones that keeps bringing them to me I'm sure.
I might not be the biggest Necanthrope but I am proudly one of the prettiest, unlike many others that come back from the white hideous monsters. Sepulcher, my friend says that I wear my ugliness on the inside instead, maybe she just feels jealous because she turned out nasty. A far cry from the Ebon girl I went through the academy with that was always a popular hit with the boys, most boys kept away from me back then but there was someone special a long time ago. She refuses to tell me his name and the council has whipped all records of his existence so that I don't look back too far, "for my own good", apparently.He flinches as I adjust his Deathsuit's collar, expecting a beating for failing to wear it properly but I haven't the time for fun there are more important things to do. I suspect he is beginning to enjoy the odd thrashing, "have you read it?" Luckily he hasn't even unfolded the datafax in his hand, I warned him once and made all kind of threats but it's in his best interests if he doesn't know too much. There isn't much you can hide from a detective like me and lying is just one of the things I am good at picking up on, I've always loved a good mystery unlike most of my former race that only really seem to enjoy destroying things. The Ebon race shares only two unifying traits, ebb skills and the transformation to Necanthrope, apart from that they may as well be humans and Shaktars.
He struggles under the weight of some of my heavier pieces of equipment while I read my fax, its brief, they don't tell you much except to get myself down to the "anomaly" and an address. FEN 17mm Longslide magnum pistol, and its bigger brother a 17mm Surekill carbine are my two old favorites. The things I look for don't always require a bullet but its always safer to go prepared rather than find myself wanting, indeed many secrets are far more lethal and harder to see. A small handheld computer will uncover many mysteries that are terminal to most people, that's how I ended up where I am. Not for any special combat skills or being a honey pot for men, SLA has plenty of muscle and sex appeal but most of them couldn't find their nose if it wasn't stuck on. As a special treat today I let Villein practice his Red thermal on the fax paper, he succeeds in incinerating it with a flair that would shame a New Paris drama student.
Unfortunately a lack of control on his behalf leaves scorched carpet and second degree burns, not to mention a room full of smoke that smells of burnt hair. "Roll around a bit", my words are lost on Villein who is in agony with burnt fingers and lungs full of smoke, at least one of us thinks its amusing. SLA Industries doesn't take kindly to Ebb's with red thermal abilities, if the Fire Dept had its way they'd be shot on sight. He still doesn't know how to heal himself yet so it's up to me to patch up the mess."Sorry mistress, it got away from me", gets stuttered out between clenched teeth. Had he been wearing his deathsuit properly there wouldn't be any need for this, I re-knit the tissue back together in seconds. "Next time we do this in the bathroom", the little two bedroom apartment can't take too much more of this and getting a new place to live can take months without hefty bribes. For all the rain we get, the tenement blocks still go up like tinderboxes and spread quickly. Leaving in their wake thousands of deaths, and homeless, frazzled tempers give way to violence as the "habitually challenged" get frustrated with their predicament. Not that it takes much to get the bored and unemployed up in arms, still it gives the Shivers something to do and fires generate the best thermals for flying. "Clean up the mess and here's some money to get you by until I get back", the 300 unis would keep an unemployed family fed for a month but it's the best I can do to heal the last of his sulking. For all my horrid ways I find it hard to get angry with him, he makes me laugh and it's a rare person that can do that. I've gutted orphanages to catch a seditious criminal and ordered the deaths of thousands to protect the truth but I can't get angry at one young, slightly stupid, sulky Brainwaster boy who has destroyed my bedroom carpet.
Ten levels down where the sun has never shone in 900 years, through the tangle of walkways and buildings are where I'm heading. Low light goggles protect my pale blue eyes from the rain and giving everything an unearthly green clarity. By level 9 my white skin, hair and feathers are grey with grime and pollution to match the surrounding buildings in cover. Rivulets of greasy stuff that once was water roll down hundreds of metres of steel and concrete where its channeled into a maze of sewers somewhere below in the gloom. A rooftop shelter is a good place to clean my water laden wings and take a quick break from the rather strenuous activity of flying, too much water in them and I could fall like a rock. Some children nearby are experimenting with the theory of gravity too, 50 stories down some poor sap is going to in for a surprise as another 2 litre bottle goes over the edge. Shivers are a popular target and the little buggers are surprisingly accurate, aged between 10 and 14 they probably learnt "dew dropping" from their 12th generation unemployed parents. They will probably be born and die in the same apartment block just like their parents too, no money to go anywhere else and with everything provided by SLA not much excuse to even hit street level. The really old people are almost genetically agoraphobic now, not that many live past 50 anyway. Bad diets, serial killers, drugs, suicide and pneumonia all conspire against them along with the way fate deals her hand.
Flux rushes through the Deathsuit cleaning the filth out, under the small shelter on the roof the kids still haven't noticed me, the eldest among them chugs back some more of the Brown Dog beer before handing it back to his companions. His sister by the looks of it will be next thrower, a skinny blond waif with arms like twigs is having trouble lifting the bottle full of water. The rest press against the rusty mesh surrounding the rooftop for a better view while two others pull back a section that's come loose, "chuck it over Jilly!"
The bottle with a length of bedsheet tied to the neck is hurled out to begin its descent, cries of excitement go up as the bottle takes 12 seconds to reach maximum velocity to impact below. There isn't a direct hit this time but the glass tears through skin and clothing like a hand grenade, several of the miscreant gang have finally noticed my presence. They've been caught red-handed and some of the younger ones are beginning to cry, their anxiety heightened by the fact that I am in the doorway off the roof and there's only two ways off it. Eddie the elder boy as I now know him is being egged on by his cohorts, advancing slowly his bravery dissipates as my smile reveals sharp canines, he could be a handsome lad if he bathed regularly. His face goes pale like ash making his brown eyes look dark under the mop of unruly dirty blond hair, "can we go miss? Please don't tell the Shivers". He proffers 5 uni to the gatekeeper out of his pocket hoping to achieve something, I let his 5 friends go past but Eddie has a minor debt to society and I'm thirsty."Operative Parody, Necanthrope Operatives Drax and Sepulcher are at the mobile HQ just around the corner. If you will just follow me ma'am", the Stigmatyr Captain in white Dogybone powersuit begins leading the way. The rest of what looks like two platoons take up picket positions behind us. "Bit of a block war going on up there ma'am. I don't know if it has anything to do with the situation though, Op's Sepulcher might know more." Cpt Thomot is a rare breed of operative outside the usual circle, an unmodified human without any biogenetic implants and enhancements. That doesn't make him and the rest of the two platoons full of Shaktars, Wraith Raiders and humans any less dangerous, we only take the best and they have a war-world loadout in equipment. "Theres a sewer service entrance not on any of our maps up that ally Captain. You might want to put a few soldiers on it", I don't know level 14 that well but you pick up a few things over time by reading the architecture. This secret I don't let onto very often, otherwise I'll get hauled off to a cartography department, "thanks ma'am I'll get someone onto it asap." I'm in sight of the 5 APC's and the big 22 wheel armored transport that make up the HQ so Thomot leaves me to find my own way in. Gunfire rolls up the canyon of buildings like a thunderstorm as Block 1014A and Block 1013B are busy shooting the shit out of each other. Underneath it all are the Dispersal Shivers and the Fire Dept, assembled trying to avoid the hail of CAF bullets, rain and hurled debris. Nobody really knows what sets off a block-war, its usually boredom and gangs though that help it along. In this case it looks like a TV transmitter has been down for a week and the inhabitants started noticing each other instead of Gorezone, Captain Contract and Alien Sex Channel.
"Darknight probably bombed the transmitter and dumped a whole truckload of drugs and guns down here", Sepulcher interrupts my reverie quietly. 'Reminds me of Dante except without the mud", a look of disdain crosses her skull like visage briefly. "Dante is not something I care to remember Parody, don't mention it to Drax either. It only gets him excited".
Sepulcher looks like a gray, dehydrated and very dead Ebon wearing a suit and top hat, we went through Meny together except she went into the Business studies and I went into Investigation. Once she was a young, vain Ebon girl but the white changed all of that, now she's just like the rest of us except better spoken. "Code W03, what's the situation with damage control and do we have a suspect?" She leads me over to the circle of APC's, I can't see Drax but I sense he is close and that is disconcerting. "Suspects have done a runner but we have an Op squad that where witnesses, the main area has been sealed off as well as we can. Having a bit of trouble getting more reinforcements from HQ that aren't biogenetic. We have to move quickly Parody, that block war is moving in our direction. Abit slowly but it is coming", a sneer reveals a mouth full of sharp teeth behind black withered lips. Firing from Power Reapers splits the dull roar of civilian weapons fire in the distance, "looks like Thomat has contact. Come girl, we have witnesses to interrogate".
Stormer 313's don't smell good normally, when they are reduced into what could be called "soup", they don't smell very good at all. Our little squad of 6 had two 313's with powerarmor and Reaper cannons, quite a lot of firepower in anyone's book. Now both could be poured out of their armor, they had a scout too with reflex enhancers and infrared night eyes. He was dead as the proverbial doornail, black liquid coming out of his pores and eye sockets like grease. I scoop us some of it into a sample jar while Sepulcher looks on apathetically, "Human scout SCL 9.2, Harv Macon", a quick note in my computer is the last record anyone will have of his existence. From now on he will be 100257C, the stormers don't matter and they didn't have a family or anyone else who cared. The human is the most interesting as I haven't seen this effect before, "send these back to the guvnor, maybe they can determine it quicker than we can. No other obvious causes of death that I can see. Working quickly a team of Thomat's grunts pile the three bodies into a Bushranger gunship that was on aircap above us moments before. The downdraft of its rotors is nearly enough to tear my feathers out, there is still no sign of Drax which is making me nervous. Hopefully Sepulcher has kept him away from our other three witnesses, given half a chance he will start torturing them for no particular reason. Especially the women, Drax likes his girls.
"Dreadnought, Brainwaster male SCL9, Blue, Ebon female SCL 8 and Marcy Brand, human female SCL9", they are an odd mix of characters who would have made a good squad. But right now sitting in their underwear they are hardly dangerous, "are you an Investigation unit from Internal Affairs? Because if you are there's about 16 different clauses you've violated and I fully intend to report them!" Miss Brand is something of a lawyer, a very loud-mouthed variety with average looks and verging on chubby. Unlike the two ebb's she isn't frightened, more annoyed than anything else and she never shuts up. "Miss Brand, where were you when the squad was hit?" For a moment I've interrupted her stream of verbal diarrhea, "I was in the APC filling out some reports, I wasn't required on site so I was looking after the vehicle and saw nothing. Now answer my question!"
She's telling the truth, unusual for a lawyer, maybe that's the reason she feels so incensed apart from being in a bra and panties. Marcy has begun dribbling sub-clauses again so I tell her she isn't required further. "Oh good. Necanthrope or whatever you are, you won't hear the end of this!" I borrow Sepulchers umbrella and lead Marcy outside, "what is your name, SCL and department you winged fiend?" That's cut it for me, I've had enough of her crap. "Parody, SCL2, department of Stigmatyr and this is Mr 17mm", her eyes widen in alarm as my pistol appears in her face. I can outdraw Wraith Raiders so she doesn't even get a chance to complain about her brains decorating the side of the APC. Red goes well with black, purple looks nice too.
Sometimes I wonder how people like Dreadnought become operatives, he is possibly one of the dumbest Brain Wasters I have ever met and I have met a few. For the first 3 minutes all he did was stare at my cleavage and answer 'yes' to anything I said. Persistence, a spray of teargas and the use of voice rather than my charms gets out of him what I want to know. Sepulcher managed to get an image out of his mind and transfer it to disk for later reference. I now have a picture of our suspect, Dreadnought gets kicked in the groin and we're all happy.
Blue isn't able to tell us much more, she just sits there weeping and running her fingers through her bright orange hair. She doesn't want to die, Sepulcher seems to think that she's wired on combat drugs too so I take a little blood and put it into my computer. "It doesn't match her profile and she isn't registered as user of Ultra Violence or anything else?" So, while I sit down at my computer watching the numbers roll over, Sepulcher keeps a close eye on our shaking mess that is reluctant to even speak. I pull aside Sepulcher and speak in a whisper, "you didn't tell me she was dead", alarm bells start ringing through both of us as Blue's whimpering begins to heighten. "Loaded to the gills with Shatter and half a dozen other things that don't even register on the analyzer." We could terminate Blue out of hand for possession and use of Darknight drugs but that would be beside the point, for starters she's already dead but somewhere along the line the body forgot to tell her.
"Message I bring!" The whole back of the APC feels like a freezer at those three words, Blue starts tearing at the restraints like a mad thing even though the chromed steel cuts to the bone to cause horrific wounds. Dead eyes begin rolling in their sockets ablaze with mischief, "dead like me you are SLA", her giggling is beginning to annoy me now that my own fear has passed. Between the both of us we manage to restrain the girl while Sepulcher tapes her mouth shut with duct tape, she's as strong as a full-grown Frother, which makes this hazardous to say the least. "Don't let her bite you Sepi!" Even with me punching Blue repeatedly hard enough to break her neck it hasn't stopped her, "that's the general idea Parody", she snarls out of frustration at my lack of assistance in the matter and Blue nearly claims a digit. "Look Parody! Stop hitting her, its not working! There that should to do the job", Sepulcher jams a shoe in Blue's mouth and tapes it to her forehead, then proceeding to wrap up the torso like a cocoon with the rest of the sticky gray tape. In one of her rare fits of rage Sepulcher storms outside to find Dreadnought still chained to the APC's trans-axels "bloody wasters!" A gunshot rings out half a second later.Sepulcher has the two ebbs and Marcy's corpse on the first Kilcopter out of here, undoubtedly to the deepest, darkest regions never to be seen again. I smell Drax even before I sense him, burnt lemongrass and ashes fills the back of the APC. "You didn't give me the woman to be cleaned, don't you care about your squaddies no more?" I have to be careful around Drax, especially now that he has me cornered in the APC and he gets off on that type of thing. "She was still warm and no one was likely to stop you", his bulk covered in black rags of ECM cloak occupies most of the vehicle and a 12.7mm assault rifle is carried menacingly in one hand. He's bigger, stronger and older than me but I'm quicker so I make a bolt for the exit. My wings hinder my progress and the next thing I know I'm pinned on the floor with his iron grip on my neck making it hard to breathe. "Not as warm and sweet as you my precious, you don't visit anymore, maybe I can remind you what you miss out on", Drax yanks out a handful of feathers which gets a scream out of my closing windpipe he undoubtedly enjoys. I could try to gore his face off but it probably wouldn't kill him quick enough and I know I'm in trouble when he starts tickling me with the feathers because its more like being groped. "Parody is busy Drax, she doesn't have time to play", Sepulcher's flintlock rifle with its glyph's ablaze is shoved in his face. He's from Brain Waster stock but not stupid so he backs off slowly but surely, she's just looking for half a reason to let fly and he knows it. Drax saunters off smelling my feathers like a bunch of flowers, friends are one of the few things I still value over any other.
Theres a dropship coming down nearby, scattering water and rubbish over everything, "I managed to get some company Militia. Not much good in a W03 but that riot is out of control now." Up the road the civ's have turned their guns on the Shivers. Prop's hired by both sides take over an APC and proceed to turn its twin reaper cannon on the hapless Shiver units and fire crews. Red BPN's are being issued to every Op within 20km, not that many will get here in time. Hordes of angry civilians overrun the Dispersal Shivers and are they are forced back towards our site. "You better shake your ass down to that scene, we might not have much more time". Darknight snipers are starting to come out of the woodwork making life extremely dangerous for everyone, "thanks Sepi, I'll see you soon". Behind me a main battle tank emerges from the belly of the dropship, good old SLA, always upping the ante.The abandoned Shiver station has already been cleared of any squatters and vagrants but the upper levels aren't what I'm interested in. Its down below in the vehicle depot near the holding cells that the operatives ran into trouble, now I know why. Flux taints the air like a gas grenade and the whole depot reminds me of a tomb, except for the shaft of light coming out of the floor. As I get closer the whole are vibrates in a sub bass hum, shadows flicker at the edges of my vision and a familiar whispering beckons me closer from the back of my mind. The presence of so much raw flux causes my gore cannon to writhe excitedly, caressing my back and thighs gently. I record the scene with a minicam mounted on my shoulder, hopefully anything I miss will be understood by a specialist elsewhere. None of the glyphs around the entrance to the white are recognizable to me but there are sixteen shell casings and some blood stains I can use. The shells are DN0035N 13mm pistol rounds, not common outside a war world but the occasional batch turns up on Mort from time to time, usually followed by trouble. Running the blood through my analyzer turns up mixed results. It takes awhile to decipher the mixed DNA strands but there are at least 3 Ebons and the rest are humans. "Sepi, its Parody." I can hear gunfire over the comlink making me wonder what's happened to her up there, "goddamn Sepi, pick up!" Seconds tick by like hours until a burst of static interferes, "I'm like getting shot at here, don't call me Sepi! He's at 10o'clock Thomat and the fucker's got a rifle!" She doesn't swear very often but it's a good indication that things could be better, "Sepulcher, I'm escalating this to W03 to a W02 and we need an ebb containment crew down here yesterday!" We've never gone to W02, in layman's term that means the shit has hit the fan. "Patching it through now", hopefully my guvnor will pass the clearance through soon, not that getting him out of bed at 3am is going to do anything for his disposition. If the situation turns out bad from here on in they'll lock me up in a room full of people like Drax and I really don't want that.
The problem with leaving an entrance to the white unguarded is that the door swings both ways, disturbances in the flux are easily detected by Necanthropes. Already things on the other side are mustering, drawn like moths by the living and the violence close by. Drax and eight soldiers make their way down towards the white, "W02 Parody, better hope you're right about this", he hisses through sharp black teeth. 'Just do your job and let me worry about that. I have a lead to follow up". I'm glad the soldiers are there otherwise he'd be doing unwholesome things to me by now, things that make even the vilest among us afraid. We only keep him around to kill things, he's very good at it, one day maybe he'll pick a fight he can't win and I will get a full nights rest. Free of distractions I follow a trail with my senses that leads away from the white and its background noise, a scent unlike any ebb user, blunt, corrupt like various sewer gasses. Something is going on that doesn't feel right, Darknight have tapped into something more than urban terrorism.