The Hallowed corridors of Ozuth-Kai. Although there are countless ruins of races long past in the Augustine Sector, few hold the minute, perfectionist craftsmanship of those long abandoned halls. Safe from the sizzling heat of the jungles of Vamnos III, their delicate engravings fill every inch of the former temple, built of a highly resistant material made to be all but indistinguishable from stone. Their statues, carved with machinery so precise they could have been considered artifacts of their own, hold their eternal, silent keep, staring at all pilgrims and explorers lucky enough to happen on such an masterful ancient treasure.
"Move it, move it, move it!"
Bullets whizzed through the considerably-less-well-maintained corridor as three figures ran with all their might from their very angry pursuers - or at least, two of them did (the diminutive white-haired man with the cybernetic tail and the rather tall being in the hazard suit), with the last one, a man in an colorfully bizarre looking shirt, just barely keeping up with them as he carried an heavy, spherical cylinder-dotted, piece of machinery in his arms. Through sheer luck, he had not been hit yet - though as he felt his hair be singed by a shot of laser, he began to run even faster.
Turning around a corner, they entered a large rotunda, entirely empty save for a large, square slab of jade-colored stone in the middle - some sort of sacrificial chambers, perhaps, and the closest thing they would get to some good cover in those halls. Wasting no time, the trio vaulted over the table, before turning around, and beginning to unleash a hail of fire against their pursuers, who immediately scrambled for the alcoves in the corridor walls where the statues stood.
"So much for a 'simple quick trade'." yelled the man with the tail as he swatted a grenade back into their pusuers with his tail.
"I've no problem with shooting a pirate chief between the eyes, but did you have to do it in front of his entire band?!"
"He was reaching for his gun! They started accusin' us of stabbing them in the back! I didn't even do anything! This time!"
"Could you two leave arguing for when we are not being shot at!?" Interrupted the man in the suit, burning a hole straight through one of the pirates as he continued to level shot after shot of his laser rifle upon them. "Where are the others?!"
"They were left to watch the ship, but I haven't had a sliver of luck contacting them! The damn temple must be interferring with our communicators."
With no way behind their backs and more and more pirates flooding into the room, the three had no choice but to continue their stand, exchanging fire and shooting at any pirate who got brave enough to leave cover. Yet this battle of attrition was slowly being lost. Though their skills were many, many times superior, one had no gun, the other was no fighter, and the third continued to fire less and less with each passing moment as the gun threatened to overheat itself into failure.
"How are there so many of th-" A sudden rumble. Dust falls from the roof. It happens again. The two groups momentarily stop their shooting, hiding in cover while trying to figure out the source of the sudden noise. It happens for a third time - and some of them begin to fear the temple may be beginning to fall apart.
Suddenly, an explosion rings out, shaking the foundations of the room itself as an man in a costume literally bursts through the wall in a hail of fire, smoke and shrapnel, a sonorous war cry leaving from him as he bursts into the fight with all the subtlety of a madman. An pirate unlucky enough to have been close to him attempts to fruitlessly raise his weapon against the armoured figure, and before he can react, his entire upper torso disappears in a hail of plasmashot as the invader levels his oversized gun. Shaken into action, the criminals let loose an shower of bullets upon him to little effect as the maddened behemoth begins to clear out one after the other, each shot of his plasma gun boring holes into the walls itself as they erase the very body parts of the unfortunates to be caught in it's blast, and all the meanwhile, the man does not stop screaming once.
Driven to desperation, one of the still living pirates grabs a power maul and charges their assailant, dodging his attention as he finishes turning another one of his former colleagues into a puddle of burnt meat-goo. Throwing all his might, he swings the weapon, aiming right for his chest, to crush it in one fell swoop!
Yet the thing simply bounces off, and the assailant simply turns with an enraged scowl.
The pirate does not have time to regret his life decisions before his blood and teeth are splattered on the ceiling of the corridor by an swift whack of the weapon's barrel that is marked by a sickening crunch, and with that, the fight is at last over. The scrapper trio are left completely speechless as their seemingly doomed situation turned into a one-sided slaughter from a power-armored freak. The freak then turns to them, finally realizing their presence, and smiles.
"Oh, Hello!"
MEET THE SHOTGUNNER
"So...what's your name, friend?" asked Steele, cradling the settling bruise in his left eye
"Specialist Sergeant Joe! Codename Shotgunner! " barked out the man in a gruff voice, as if he had been reading out a title.
"Ah, an military man, then! But from which army?"
"The greatest of all of them, of course! The Federation Army!" There was great pride in his voice as he said it, his patriotism more than obvious.
"I'm guessing you're not working with them anymore if you were in that planet alone."
"That is correct, moustache-man. I served my years like any proper citizen should, and now I get to enjoy my retirement and do what I truly love - shooting things and people in exchange for copious amounts of money!"
"Well, that's good to he-"
Suddenly, a pair of hands slammed on the table. Staring down at the two were a set of very, very angry indigo eyes. "Are we finished with the casual talk? This is supposed to be an interrogation!" he exclaimed, pointing at the rather considerably sized cuffs holding Shotgunner Joe in the chair he was tied to. "Did you forget what this psycho did?!"
"Ah...yes."
"Give it to me! Give! It! To! Me!" Joe exclaimed as he tried to pry off the artifact from the hands of the three as they held it back from him in some bizarre manner of tug of war.
"L-let it go you damn freak! Are you Insane?! Heyreddin, do something!"
"Alright, Doing something." replied the drone as he raised his sniper rifle. A beam of flashing light echoed throughout the room, throwing the man backwards with the impact even as it did not manage to so much as penetrate his helmet. His eyes immediately shifted to the drone.
"...Shit."
"Now, I realize we might have started on the wrong foot-"
"His 'foot' broke Heyreddin's helmet! And his face! Now he's stuck in the infirmary, and Screw is gonna to have to repair his suit again!"
"Headshot for a Headshot, maggot. That's the law of the battlefield. You should be thankful i did not turn you cowards into my firing targets!"
"You call that a gun! I have seen children wield bigger guns than those, you sissy! Yelled Joe as he continue to swing his shotgun up and down like a club, bullets from Jack's Needlegun and the lashes of Lorik's tail plinking off his armor as if they were barely even there. Yet as all seemed lost, a sliver of hope, for the easily recognizable form of their crew's bruiser, Reth! "I heard the noises! Are you engaged in com-" He was stopped midsentence as said shotgun then slammed itself onto his face after being thrown like some manner of projectile.
"We should have simply let Reth punch through this idiot's chest."
"Punch through my chest? That skinsuit-wearing pansy wouldn't know how to punch through someone's chest if it was made of jelly!"
Joe skids across the ground, sent flying throughout the room from the psionic brawler's enhanced blow.
"Now, now, there's no need to continue being angry, we're trying to talk here!" Jack says in an futile attempt to defuse the argument.
"He used me like a bat! He picked me up by my legs, and used me like a bat!"
"Correction. I used you like a flail. You are too floppy and weak to be used like a bat."
Lorik continues to scream as Joe spins him over his head in a mad charge, stepping over the fallen form of Heyreddin, swinging the scientist like a weapon against Reth as he attempts to figure out a way to disarm the man without hitting his crewmate. He can do little as the hit connects and he is slammed into the ground by the force of a weaponized body at full speed.
"We had to call the entire crew just to pin this freak down so I could inject him with some tranquilizers! I have seen alien beasts that were less unruly than this man!"
"You know what? I think you're right - and I have an idea." Jack says, a mischievous glint appearing in his eyes, much to the scientist's confusion.
"Joe, you sure as hell know how to scrap. How would you feel about...a change of employer?" The doctor freezes, as if not believing the words he is currently hearing. "What?!"
"I'll do it."
"Have you gone insa-
"In that case, let me be the first to welcome you to the Wings of Pandora!"
THE END!
"You know, I never asked...why were you attacking that base in the first place? You got hired to take the artefact or something?" says Jack as he releases Joe from his cuffs, Lorik having stormed out in anger."
"Negatory. I was just there to kill some pirates." he answers quite casually.
"...But then why did you try to steal it? Do you even know what it does?"
"No. I just like the way it looks!"