#... his aim is terrible BUT he's runner and a track star

[jonathanbyersphd]

Ok, but what if I like maybe put Miss Never Done A Single Thing Halfway In Her Life and Mister No Matter The Personal Cost in a frog heistian situation in which they end up participating in a tennis tournament at the Roane County Country Club in the summer of 1985 simply based on Nancy having a tennis racket in her room in s4?

[contraloci-blog]

Fool Me Once - Ch. 4

Felix survives the fall. Locus leaves Chorus.

One way or another, though, they’re still going find each other.

AO3

Ch.3... Ch.5

Ch. 4

A week later…

“A'rynasea.”

The little ship immediately zipped out of its hiding place among the stalactites of the cave that Locus parked it in. It hovered in the air before him, humming quietly, and he pressed his palm against its smooth chassis. The ship flashed its lights once in recognition of its owner and a small hatch opened in its side.

Locus grabbed the bar above the opening and swung himself in easily. The hatch closed behind him as the consoles lit up for him. A 3D map of the star system lit up and he took only a cursory glance before tapping his usual coordinates. Chorus.

A'rynasea gave him a soft chirp before it shot out of the cave with alien smoothness. He sat down as it dashed out of atmo and pulled out his guns from the underside of the console. The sniper, shotgun, and rifle were all clean – should be, since that was how he left them the last mission – but he disassembled them for another clean anyway. Non-existent dust and grease was rubbed away, and Locus imagined it was his own soul that he was wiping clean.

If only it were that easy.

He rubbed a fingerprint off of the rifle’s stock. Twelve targets, Locus thought, minor hold-up, should experience little to no difficulty flushing them out. Jungle is available for cover if necessary. No nearby settlements, noise tolerable.

No, he couldn’t clean off his soul. No amount of repentance or remorse could take back what he did. The lives he took as a monster would always remain on the other side. He had to fix this in the only way he was capable of. He’d turned his weapons on the innocent – now, it was time to turn it on those who deserved it.

Had he been a believing man, then he could have thought of it as balancing the cosmic scales.

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Entering and leaving Chorus’ atmo space was still easy. It didn’t have the satellite coverage that it used to, leaving whole patches of dark space where the planet once used to be lit up. A'rynasea settled on a plateau that rose out of the jungle, high enough that no one would run into it, and under cloak so sensors or eyes wouldn’t see it. Locus dropped from the hatch as soon as the ship was settled.

His HUD read out the terrain. The beacon he’d set was ten kilometers away, so he had a small hike before he found his targets. Locus rolled his shoulders and felt the armor respond soothingly.

Everything looked to be in order. Locus crept into the jungle.

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The hold out that his targets hid in wasn’t terribly inspiring. Four metal containers had been lined up in a row, their openings facing the same direction, with small barricades in front of them in semi-circle. There were fences as well, but they were only knee-high. The barbed wire wrapped around them would serve as a deterrent for the local fauna, but it was useless against any human assailants.

Not expecting assault, Locus decided as he peered into his scope for more details. He sighted two targets sitting around a fire pit, and a third working on the satellite dish on top of a container. A fourth was chopping wood. That left eight unaccounted for.

He trained his sights on the one on top of the container. The woman had body armor on, but it wasn’t a full set like his, nor did she have a helmet. She would fall instantly, provided he scored a headshot.

His sights drifted lower, considering the angle. If he shot her there, she’d drop from the container. Her fall would create undue noise. Even if he did angle it so that she stayed on the container, she was too close to the two by the fire to go unnoticed.

His sights drifted from her. Locus scanned the perimeter, looking to see if any of the other eight had decided to come in while he’d been examining the woman, but he saw no one. Perhaps some of them were in the containers. Perhaps they were out for a reason.

If he hit one now, the chances of the rest scattering into the jungle were high.

Locus reached up and adjusted his HUD for motion sensing. The four people in sight immediately grew red outlines that brightened when they moved.

He took aim again.

Let them run.

He pulled the trigger and the woman on the container collapsed.

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Locus nabbed one more before the other two disappeared into the underbrush. He watched his second target – a man – fall over and got up to begin his pursuit. The sniper rifle went to his back and he took up his shotgun instead. He still had tracking on one runner.

This one was panicked. Instead of trying to regroup with his fellow, he was running in a random direction without a weapon or a plan. Locus ghosted after his red outline, steps silent, and was one him before he could even get a hundred meters away from his camp. He didn’t even need his gun to take him. The man tried to wrestle him, but he was unarmored, unaware, and unprepared – Locus smashed his fist into his jaw and he crumpled.

He caught him before he could dash his head on anything. He cuffed him to a tree to secure him, shook his arm out, and turned his attention on the others. He had nine more to find.

As he hefted his shotgun, however, Locus realized he probably should have asked the man about his compatriots before knocking him out. The thought hadn’t even occurred to him. It had been as if… he’d expected someone else to just cover that.

He shook his head. There wasn’t someone else.

Locus switched from motion to heat. The jungle became a wash of yellows and reds – and a pinprick of white frantically moving away from him.

He moved to run, but a twinge of pain halted him. After a moment, he began to circle after his quarry instead.

∙∙∙∙∙∙∙∙∙

The last one was brought down by a shot to the knee. He fell over mid-run and tumbled through the foliage before coming to a stop, screaming his head off. Locus phased into sight, driving his screaming into a higher pitch, and held out his hands mollifying.

“I’m not here to kill you,” he said.

It did not stop the screaming.

Locus sighed and fetched biofoam from his hip. He held the man down and ignored his flailing fists as he jabbed the end of the canister through his bloody pant leg and sprayed a generous amount. The man’s voice cracked as he shrieked.

“You will survive,” Locus said as he pulled the half-empty canister back. The bleeding abated. Soon, the pain would be nullified too. “I have questions for you.”

“Fuck you!” he screamed.

“It will not take long. Answer me quickly, and I will provide further first-aid.”

“- motherfucking piece of shit –“

“Your camp has twelve people in total. I have seen only four of you. Where are the rest?”

“- hope you die, you son of a bitch –“

“Do you need something else to numb the pain?” Locus asked futilely. He twitched his head to avoid the middle finger.

“- you’re fucking crazy!”

The air whooshed out of him. Locus clenched his fist and stomped on the instinctive surge of anger. It curled back inside of him, hot and tight, and Locus counted to ten. Then twenty.

“I’ll take that as an affirmative,” Locus muttered and pulled a hypo from his hip pouch. He jabbed it into the meat of the man’s thigh and injected it, releasing a heady mix of anesthetics. The man jerked in his grasp for a few moments but he steadily grew weaker as his expression grew dazed.

“What’s your name?” Locus asked.

“J-Julio Martinez.”

“How many people are in your camp?”

“Tuh… twelve? I’m not sure…”

“In your camp, there were only four people. Where are the other eight?”

“Sandy… died… of an infection last night,” Julio said, his eyes glazing over, “and – and Sydney, Chan… and Park… went to get more medicine.”

“That’s four people. There are four more left.”

“I… I dunno… man, it’s so bright…”

“Focus.”

“Are you… an angel…?” Julio asked, reaching up for Locus’ face. He sighed as a hand brushed down the side of his helmet reverently.

“This is useless,” he grumbled and let go of Julio. His wound was stabilized and the anesthetics were good for another six hours; he’d been safe here until Locus could come back for him.

“Wait, angel… come back…”

Locus stepped back from Julio. “Not an angel,” he grunted. “Furthest thing possible.”

He had the last known route of four now. The closest inhabited area here was…

Locus brought up his map to check.

Camp 10-B.

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