[Necromunda] Bad Heir Day (Shift 010326, M42)

They called her Dirty Harri, because of the chemicals, and the smoke from cheapjack bolter rounds, and the way she always seemed to get stuck with medscort duty when someone needed the doc. They didn't smirk when they said it, though, because nobody wants to be on the bad side of a big sister with two big guns - especially not when she's the one holding your hand when the kalma wears off.

Didn't stop Jenna chatting in her ear, though. Jenna Vive, eldest of three, fosters and foundlings all come into the crew together. Avemaria and Evan Jellicle looked to Jenna for guidance; Jenna looked to Harri, and she needed a lot of it when there was a plan in play.

"Shut up, Jenna," Harri was saying, squinting down the length of her piece, propped on a high wall with her sister. Jenna's lasgun sat next to it, tracking across the field of fire: this way, that way. "Jo's doing the talking. Let her do her thing. See if this crew'll shut up and stand down, yeah?"

"KK, but what if they don't?"

"Bertha's down there with Tabs and Mari. Jo doesn't come down that tower, nobody else comes down alive. It's the plan, Jenna." 

They called her Smokin' Jo, which was dumb as hell: her guns didn't smoke. Las and plas were clean, dammit, that was the whole point! Some of 'em - not the little sisters, who knew she could catch them - called her Rudegirl, which was... fair enough. Didn't make much sense sending her up to meet this guy though, this bounty hunter or whatever the hell he was with whatever the hell this crew was. On the way up she'd clocked a couple of squats, couple of even shorter things - all teeth, pointy noses and ears, lugging autoguns heavier than they were - and Sanchez didn't seem all that human either. Airy. Distracted. Talking to her like she wasn't there.

All in all, he deserved the plasma burst to the face he got. All that armour didn't seem to help him much, 'specially when she gave him a taste of the las to make sure he stayed down. Down and... smoking! KK, that made sense now...

Jo didn't see the shift of a camo cloak, or catch the glint of light off a silenced long-las barrel, from the next hab over. First she knew about the sniper was the scorch of a bolt taking one side of her hair clean off. Frazzled and fragged-up, she backed up against the wall, swayed a little, and fair near went over the side.

 

One shot, two shots: plas, then las, and Jo bouncing off a wall before she went face down. Harri didn't see the shooter, but Jenna had: say what you like about the girl, she could track a shot and lead a target if she had to.

"Sniper! Gotta be across the block."

"Go in! Get the range. I'll cover you."

Jenna didn't need telling twice, scrambling the wall and crossing the walkway to the next roof across, lasgun up. Soon as her feet hit something solid, she whipped it up and snap-shot across. Good thing she'd been fast, too: down on the ground a hunched figure with some fancy autogun was rattling the gantry behind her, and she had to drop and roll. Harri whipped her bolter around, and - chk, chk. chk, chk.

Dry. Mother's minge. 

 At least she'd clued in the girls down below; Bertha, Mari and Tabs were hopping the barricades, setting up in the wrecked hab between them and the tower. Circle of death out of every window: hot lead and bad chems ready to hose so hard it didn't matter none of those three could shoot straight.

More autoguns were cracking chunks off the rooftops now; the little hook-nosed mutie guys were decent shots, and it sounded like a couple more were coming round the tower, trying to cut Harri and the girls off. Good plan, really. Exactly why Annie and Angel were out doing the same thing. Exactly why Evan and Ave were coming up behind to hold the side streets, make sure they could cut and run.

 

The crack and boom of Angel's shotgun going off almost drowned out Jenna's voice from the next rooftop along.

"Stash! Looks like ammo. Can't get it open - "

You couldn't get the sisters these days. Tabs and Mari were the same: couldn't figure out how to crack a keypad and open a door. Harri took her fingers off her trigger, crossed them, and half-ran, half-rolled onto the gantry, expecting another rattle of autofire.

Nothing doing. She still kept her head down, though, crawling past Jenna and up to - hell yeah, hell yeah, it was an ammo case, and even if it wasn't she was sure she could land a needle from here. Who goes for a sniper with a shotgun, Angel? C'mon now.

Harri stuck the stock of her bolter under the lock, slammed a practiced hand against it, and felt the whole side give way...

If she'd not been against the wall - if she'd stopped where she first touched the box - she'd have been over that drop and the little sisters would be scraping her off the dome floor. As it was, Dirty Harri had smoke on her face, burns on her bolter, and a reminder that you can put things that aren't ammo in an ammo crate.

She... needed a moment. Just to stare at the dome roof for a bit. Wait for her ears to stop ringing. They could take their time, and all - she wasn't in a rush to hear Jenna laughing at her.

That, it turned out, was that. The big boom she'd set off had been the last straw, convinced Sanchez's crew it was time to leave their boss-man down and run for the hills before something really big arrived. Jo had slung herself down the ladder and was waiting for her when she stumbled down to solid ground again; so was Tabs, who was just glowing with admiration.

"The scummer was, like, DAKKA DAKKA DAKKA, right at me, and Annie just ran straight through like the bullets weren't no thing? And she whipped the little frakker, like BZAAAAT, all round her head? And then the guy Angel shot? He shot Annie, yeah? And she like, bent? Like she was gonna do a backflip? And the beam went straight over her, like FREEEEEEM. So frakkin' clean!"

Annie - Queen Annie, now - caught up with them a few paces forward, coat hanging off one shoulder and arm hanging around Angel's back.

"Hit your own guy next time, Stabitha, a'right?" said Angel, and their little sister flushed and shut right up. Harri rolled her eyes - she could see the laser lines across Jo's scalp and Annie's meshed-up jacket, and that meant they'd been lucky as all hell.

"Who shot first?" said Annie to Smokin' Jo, and Jo turned her toe in the dirt and tried to look nonchalant.

"Worked out clean," she managed to say, not looking her queen in the eye.

"Yeah. It did. Nobody got shot so bad they won't live to regret it. You good, Harri?"

"You should see the other guy," said Harri, and Jenna put her fist in her mouth and turned away, a little too theatrical-like.

"KK. Jenna, get your ass back to camp and fetch Noisette. We got the fans, we got the heat, we got a chymist who can earn her keep. Eva 'n' Ave, grab the deed and get it posted somewhere these sump eaters can see it. Harri, Jo, you're with me. Let's go shopping."