A sudden uprush dispels the dark. Pernell Arai opens his eyes to find
himself in a bright, sterile medical facility.
\u201cThere you are Mr. Arai.\u201d
\u201cWhere am I?\u201d
\u201cIt\u2019s okay. You\u2019re in Orison. Looks like your regen was successful. How
are you feeling?\u201d
Pernell draws a few deep breaths then wiggles his fingers and toes. \u201cA
little sore. What happened to me?\u201d
\u201cAfraid I can\u2019t help you with that. You suffered a traumatic injury though,
don\u2019t think they\u2019ll be any scarring though, so you\u2019re lucky there. What\u2019s
the last thing you remember?\u201d
Parnell\u2019s memories come flooding back. He\u2019s dancing with Sergie. He\u2019s
on a beach in Cassel basking in the glow of Goss\u2019s binary stars. He\u2019s a
kid struggling to steady a gun to shoot cans in an abandoned building
on the outskirts of Archibald Station.
\u201cYour brain activity looks normal, at least,\u201d the doctor says while
navigating screens on her datapad.
\u201cSorry, I\u2019m remembering things. It\u2019s just a lot at once.\u201d
\u201cAll good. I ask because your last imprint was quite a while ago. If you
don\u2019t imprint frequently your short-term memory can be a bit hazy. You
know that, right Mr. Arai\u2026 Mr. Arai?\u201d
Pernell shifts his eyes from the window\u2019s stunning vista over Orison
back to the doctor then nods knowingly. \u201cSorry, still settling back in.\u201d
\u201cTotally understandable. Well, all your vitals look good, so you\u2019re free to
leave. Obviously, take a little time for yourself, and maybe imprint a bit
more frequently. Might make things easier next time.\u201d
Pernell thanks the doctor then leaves the hospital in a daze wearing
the clothing provided to him. Wind whips across the Cloudview Center
platform chilling him to the bone through the thin material. Still, he
stops to enjoy the sunset spreading vibrant color across the sky. He
even leans over the railing ever so slightly to take in the cloudbank
below. A sudden rush of vertigo overcomes him. Pernell takes a quick
step back then wonders if that\u2019s how he died, like a fool, falling off an
Orison platform.
He sits on a nearby bench and closes his eyes. No recent memories
surface. Eventually Pernell stands and walks across the platform
knowing full well that things could be worse. At least he remembers the
location of his hab.
Back at his Green Circle hab, Pernell opens a closet to change. For
a second he\u2019s shocked to see his favorite helmet missing. Of course
he was wearing it when\u2026 He pauses again, hoping something will
come back, but nothing does. Instead, he recalls how he quit tailing a
target in the backstreets of Fujin City to buy the helmet from a pop\u0002up stall. Something about it suited him and it had served well, keeping
him safe. That is, until now. Only later did he discover it was an early
and exceedingly rare CC\u2019s Conversion helmet. One that is immensely
valuable to him in many ways, and now potentially gone forever.
Pernell pops open his mobi and scrolls through his inventory. His heart
sinks when he sees what\u2019s missing. It must\u2019ve been a big op if he took
so much stuff. There\u2019s enough of his gear still in storage, but he feels <\/p>\n\n\n\n
so disconnected from this collection of odds and ends that it\u2019s like
browsing through someone else\u2019s closet. He can\u2019t remember the last
time he wore half this stuff. Shoving the dull ache of loss aside, Pernell
grabs his backup undersuit and stuffs his right leg into it, praying it
still fits.
Circling above the surface, it doesn\u2019t take long before Pernell spots the
bunker\u2019s support structures. He slows the ship and adjusts course to
keep his distance, unable to trust his memory enough to know whether
or not the spot has turrets. It all looks vaguely familiar, and the more
he circles the more he feels like he\u2019s been here. If he had to bet, this is
where he died.
Pernell found this spot after checking his mobi for his recent job history.
His last gig brought him to this bunker, which would explain why he
took so much stuff. In the past, he would\u2019ve assembled one, maybe two
people for something like this, but Pernell started doing jobs like this
alone since coming to Crusader. At first it was out of necessity, since he
didn\u2019t trust anyone, but as his confidence grew and the credits rolled
in thanks to getting to keep one hundred percent of the payout, he
soon found himself scrolling his mobi specifically for similar gigs. Plus,
if Pernell was being honest, he found the rush of facing down a hive of
outlaws all on his lonesome to be incredible.
Now, contemplating landing back at the bunker where he died, Pernell
wonders about the wisdom of not bringing back up. He\u2019s already at a
disadvantage wearing his second-hand gear with some asshole in the
bunker probably getting ready to shoot him with the carefully calibrated
weapons they\u2019ve undoubtedly looted from his body.
Slowing the ship\u2019s thrusters, he spots a turret and sets his sights on it.
He primes a missile and pushes in. To his surprise, the turret doesn\u2019t
care. He takes his finger off the trigger and buzzes the bunker. When
that doesn\u2019t prompt a response from the turret either, he loops back
and lands without incident; glad it didn\u2019t cost him any munitions to set
down near the entrance.
He climbs out of the ship, quickly double checks his unfamiliar gear,
and hustles toward the bunker. The outer doors are already breached
and slightly open, showing a sliver of the elevator inside. He unholsters
his pistol, a near pristine Arclight II, and enters cautiously. A few steps
inside, a hail of bullets strike his ship. Pernell spins to see that the nearby
turret is now very active. His ship\u2019s shields flare for a moment before
they blink out, and he barely has time to avert his eyes as an explosion
sends ship debris flying across the landing pad. Job done, the turret
returns to rest. For a second Parnell feels woozy and steadies himself
against the door. When it passes, he takes a second to contemplate
his next step, activates his mobi, and sends out an emergency beacon.
Then he collects himself and steps onto the elevator. Certain that it will
take a while for a ride to arrive, and that he didn\u2019t come all this way not
to get his helmet.
Once inside, Pernell gets deja vu. He knows a lot of the prefab bunkers
around Crusader were built using the same modular design, but this
one feels strangely familiar. He creeps in quick and quiet then peers
around a corner to see a grenade coming his way. Instinctively, Pernell
rolls forward and takes cover behind a stack of crates. The blast knocks
a few atop him, which he quickly kicks away and starts firing. A figure
falls and Pernell rolls through the swirling smoke to a new position. He
holsters the pistol, unslings his P4-AR rifle, fires, and watches another
figure fall. He pushes forward, drawing fire from another concealed
position. Pernell weaves behind cover until he\u2019s flanking the remaining
combatant. He swings his rifle up and focuses on a hazy shadow within
the columns of smoke and squeezes the trigger until the figure falls.
Pernell takes a moment and lets everything settle. His ears are still
ringing from the initial grenade blast, but the bunker is otherwise quiet.
He gets up and crosses to the last figure he shot. His heart sinks when
he sees what\u2019s left of the distinct shape of his helmet. Now bullet-ridden
and modded to match the gang\u2019s colors. Something about seeing those
colors makes memories flood Pernell\u2019s mind. He looks around the space
and it all comes back. Including the fact that there were four of them last
time. Pernell hears footsteps behind him, and before he can raise his
rifle, everything goes black.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A sudden uprush dispels the dark. Pernell Arai opens his eyes to findhimself in a bright, sterile medical facility.\u201cThere you are Mr. Arai.\u201d\u201cWhere am I?\u201d\u201cIt\u2019s okay. You\u2019re in Orison. Looks like your regen was successful. Howare you feeling?\u201dPernell draws a few deep breaths then wiggles his fingers and toes. \u201cAlittle sore. What happened […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":9582,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[90],"tags":[89],"class_list":["post-9578","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lore","tag-lore"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/tbac.space\/members\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/ScreenShot-2023-01-04_23-03-18-023.jpg?fit=2560%2C1440&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tbac.space\/members\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9578","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tbac.space\/members\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tbac.space\/members\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tbac.space\/members\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tbac.space\/members\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9578"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/tbac.space\/members\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9578\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9586,"href":"https:\/\/tbac.space\/members\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9578\/revisions\/9586"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tbac.space\/members\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9582"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tbac.space\/members\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9578"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tbac.space\/members\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9578"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tbac.space\/members\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9578"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}