title: Soldier of Fortune aliases: [] tags: [FA] author: [RetroInferno] id: [38216587] date: 星期六, 十一月 12日 2022, 5:08:37 下午 modified: 星期六, 十一月 12日 2022, 5:57:38 下午

[TOC]

Soldier of Fortune

Author: RetroInferno Source: Soldier of Fortune

A hired gun accompanies a kaiju sent directly into a warzone.

"Six fucking figures, Mason. A few hundred thousand dollars a year. That's how much a mercenary can make!"

"Really?" asked the man in question. "That sounds too good to be true."

"Well, if you play your cards right, you can too! It's a high-risk, high-reward kind of deal. You'll find plenty of work with us, but staying in the army might have been the safer and more stable option, not gonna lie…"

Mason fiddled with his assault rifle's optics, albeit the occasional bump in the road threw him off as he rode in an infantry fighting vehicle. "You say that, but the base pay of a private is garbage compared to those numbers. I used to make twenty thousand dollars a year. Well, assuming I didn't get hazard pay or something... so... fuck the army!"

His new superior shook his head. "Here's the thing. You're not accounting for the benefits. Sure, six figures is nice and all… but the army will pay for your housing, food, and healthcare to such a point that your living expenses are practically non-existent. As a mercenary, though?" He cocked his head to the side. "You gotta pay for all that shit yourself, including your ammo and equipment. Plus there's only steady work when there's a conflict going on. Meanwhile, the more conventional military will still pay you and provide plenty of perks during peacetime."

As the two spoke, Mason tried to avoid elbowing any fellow mercenaries sitting next to him. "Well then. Still seems like you come out with an advantage, even if you're spending half of it on your basic needs."

"Maybe, but that's not all. People will treat you like a hero for being in the army, but they'll also act like you're a monster if they figure out you're a PMC. They're idiots."

Another mercenary snickered. "He's right. Whereas this sort of gig tends to be an in and out kind of thing specifically because of stupid stuff like that, you can actually build a career in the military."

"But you're forgetting something." said Mason, who pointed at a white emblem embedded onto his torso. Like the others, he wore black kevlar armor adorned with a Titan Industries logo shaped like a crossbow. "Even if there's not some kind of war or insurgency going on, acting as armed auxiliaries for this corporation's bioweapon or whatever means there's gonna be plenty of work for now."

"Sure." said his superior with a shrug. "It's just… risky. Unorthodox."

"Just remember to keep your distance from the damned thing." interjected another hired gun. "They named it Nir… and she doesn't care if you're in the way or not. She'll still go to town. Otherwise, yeah, it pays well if you're careful and keep your head down."

"That explains a lot…" said Mason, his eyes darting between several members of his new unit, "But are we here to help Nir... or are we keeping an eye on her in case she disobeys our employer's orders?"

Most of the mercenaries remained silent or scratched their heads.

"It's best not to ask too many questions." said his superior. "Nir is like a sledgehammer. We're more like scalpels. We can clear out a building and secure any hostages while she's only capable of demolishing the entire thing." He raised a finger for emphasis. "With that in mind, new guy, it'd be for the best if-"

Without warning, there was an ear-piercing bang and a white flash, blinding Mason. A sharp pain suddenly surged in one of his legs. Everything went black. He faded in and out of consciousness, up until he regained it several minutes later as another mercenary dragged him across the ground. Seeing their Infantry Fighting Vehicle enveloped by flames and smoke rising from the hull made what happened extremely obvious as gunfire erupted from distant buildings…

The convoy was being ambushed.

Their attackers employed the usual strategy of destroying the vehicles at the front and the back of the formation. RPG rockets swirled towards other transports trapped between them. Scorching sands surrounded Mason on all sides as his comrade hauled him away from the road before letting him go, while survivors from his unit simultaneously retaliated with suppressing fire. A glance at his injured leg revealed bloody bandages hastily wrapped around it. Worse yet, his assault rifle was nowhere to be found. White noise made it sound like his ears were ringing, and the color black momentarily enveloped his vision again as he blinked several times.

Shaking his head brought the man back to his senses. He could hardly see their attackers from his new position, but they were fully exploiting the situation. Whether they were insurgents or rival mercenaries wasn't entirely clear as one of them fired a machine gun from a building within an adjacent village, causing his comrades to hide behind their sparse cover. One mercenary met his end when he couldn't find any, resulting in the machine gunner cutting him down like a scythe through wheat. Another hired gun that peeked around the corner of an intact vehicle received a bullet through the eye socket... culminating in red mist, brain matter, and skull fragments erupting from the back of his head before he collapsed to the ground.

"Jesus Christ!" exclaimed Mason as his body tensed up. Adrenaline surged through his veins as he ignored the pain pulsing through his leg and went into a prone position. He rapidly crawled in the opposite direction of the gunfire, taking advantage of the road's elevation to find cover. Once he was on the other side of a nearby sand dune, he grabbed a pistol strapped to his waist and ducked down.

Over time, more mercenaries joined him as they moved away from the convoy. Only IFVs and manned machine guns stood a real chance of fighting back against their adversaries until they were targeted by either snipers or anti-vehicle weapons. Mason's only superior missing in action only added to the chaos. However, he could still see soldiers from his unit on the road, whether they were alive or not, as the living ones moved from vehicle to vehicle to find safety.

"SCATTER! SCATTER!" repeatedly shouted an unarmed mercenary scrambling over the road, much like mason, albeit he pointed at the sky. "SHE'S COMING TO DEAL WITH IT!"

Mason raised an eyebrow and looked in the direction the mercenary was pointing, then he found himself awestruck upon spotting a titanic figure approaching them on the horizon...

Nir.

A product of a bioweapon research program. An amalgamation of several different deadly creatures. Her draconic and bipedal form made humans look like ants in mere comparison since she was as large as a kaiju. As a result, she partially blocked out the sunlight due to her sheer size. Everything in front of her became covered by a massive shadow as she walked through the desert, resulting in a situation where the only thing clearly visible about her dark figure was a pair of menacing red eyes staring down at the little humans fighting one another.

Others didn't bother waiting for Nir to arrive. They ignored the ongoing firefight as they sprinted in several different directions, including some groups abandoning their gear. Only a few mercenaries remained afterward. On the contrary, Mason couldn't do much in his current position thanks to his injury, but a few other hired guns stayed near his location to provide covering fire for those still falling back or outright retreating from the road.

Over time, Nir came closer.

She appeared increasingly larger.

An RPG rocket even spiraled to her chest, but she completely ignored the tiny projectile as it detonated against her metallic torso plate. At best, it aroused a huff as her nostrils flared. She clenched her clawed hands as she got closer… and Mason couldn't tell if her facial expression contained more indifference or annoyance.

More concerningly, Nir was moving directly towards him. The Earth itself seemed to shake as she made her approach and literally kicked up a storm with her clawed toes sifting through the sand. Although her movements were graceful and gradual, long strides befitting for a leviathan easily allowed Nir to close the distance. Mason contemplated trying to move in a different direction to get away, but instead, he found himself paralyzed as he looked up at Nir, who paid him no mind.

His eyes went wide once she stepped right to him, shaking him to the core of his very being as other mercenaries stopped firing their weapons and realized what was about to happen…

Time seemed to slow down.

When Nir lifted her foot to take another step, it blocked Mason's view of the sun. Leathery blue hide practically replaced the skyline. Sharp claws reminiscent of knives on her three toes glimmered in the sunlight, which connected to sharp and angled organic blades on her ankle and heel to turn the digitigrade foot into a deadly weapon… which was now descending directly towards him.

The gravity of the situation became quickly apparent. Nir either didn't know or care that he was there… and the tension in the air became palpable. Mason reeled as he tried to crawl away, up until Nir's foot finally hit the ground with a resounding thud. Short-lived shouting and screaming simultaneously stopped. Clawed toes cracked the concrete road while crunching and popping reverberated throughout the vicinity. Meanwhile, Mason ended up in a small gap between Nir's toes, sparing his life as she stepped away, then sand fell from her foot that washed over him like rainfall.

When Mason regained his bearings moments later, the blood drained from his face as he gazed upon the aftermath.

Massive footprints marked Nir's path of destruction. He was right on the edge of one, where her foot formed vast yet shallow holes from her soles and toes. Pivoting his head revealed that the few mercenaries who remained behind were nowhere to be seen. Whether they managed to get away or met their ends was unclear since no bodies were in sight. However, there was the barrel of an assault rifle sticking out of the sand, catching Mason's attention since it was in the center of a single footprint serving as ground zero.

With some hesitation, Mason peeked over his sparse cover to gaze upon the road. Some vehicles were crushed, compacted, or dented. This even included a damaged tank, an incredibly unusual occurrence, but it was still significantly smaller than just one of Nir's toes at the end of the day.

Nir herself was standing on the edge of the village. As before, gunfire and rockets greeted her, but the bullets didn't do anything to her leathery hide. Rockets managed to deal some damage, tearing some flesh asunder, but something unusual happened when her body rapidly regenerated the otherwise trivial damage. She sneered afterward. Consequently, the shooting abruptly stopped. Nir merely sighed and rolled her eyes in response to all the humans aiming their weapons at her.

"How pathetic." she said in a soft tone, albeit it sounded like thunder from Mason's perspective. "Let's just get this over with..."

With a huff, Nir assumed a more defensive stance. She spread out her legs. Then she looked down at a house where several enemy soldiers were barely visible from the windows. She rapidly grabbed the entire structure with a clawed hand and tore it from its foundations using surgical precision. The whole house ascended towards the sky in several seconds. As she held it within one hand, Nir annihilated the entire thing with a simple squeeze, forming a fist with rubble and debris falling between her fingers as she compacted it into a ball.

It served as yet another tool for her sparse arsenal when she tossed it like a stone. For her targets, it was like a giant boulder being thrown at their positions, eviscerating buildings and vehicles alike as it tore its way through their forces.

Following this attack, Nir glanced down at others nearby, who fired their assault rifles at one of her muscular legs. Lifting a foot made them stop in their tracks before they tried to flee. Nonetheless, a powerful stomp was Nir's response. Multiple structures were flattened underfoot alongside any of their occupants, causing what amounted to a miniature earthquake, then she grinded whatever remained into dust with the organic blades on her heels assisting her with that particular task. Whether it was intentional or not, Nir's finned tail with white fur running up and down the spine caused some collateral damage during the process. It swooshed left to right, knocking down a few tall buildings, not to mention fanning any humans as if strong winds were trying to blow them away.

If anything else, Nir was like a natural disaster as she delivered death and destruction to anyone in her way. A force of nature. There was no hint of emotion as she carried out her task of eliminating hostile contacts within the abandoned village, much like a storm sweeping through a settlement. Additionally, her neutral facial expression just screamed indifference. Merely being near her position proved to be extremely dangerous for any humans nearby since something as simple as flexing her toes could rupture the ground, killing or injuring anyone or anything too close to them.

Such was the nature of a living weapon.

As Nir continued to behave like one, a swift swipe of her claws cleaved a tower into two pieces. No more work was required on her part as she walked away. Her stone-cold demeanor remained unchanged as an enemy sniper screamed and slowly fell to his death. Half the village was demolished by this point… yet even more damage was being done as she simply walked among the remains and ruins, scanning the horizon for any hostiles. A foot or fist would abruptly slam downwards whenever she spotted a surviving one, treating them no differently than insects that needed to be exterminated.

Mason couldn't help but shudder at the scenes unfolding before his eyes… and he had a particularly disturbing thought.

Nir was unarmed.

She could render human weapons and armor completely useless with nothing more than her natural capabilities. Despite this, more enemy soldiers tried to engage her. Nir casually disposed of them using nothing more than her hands and feet as if she was pulling weeds, making Mason wonder what she would be capable of if she had proper armaments and protection of her own.

A short distance away from the village, cold war era tanks and men mounting technicals surged through the desert while firing their machine guns and cannons at the gargantuan bioweapon towering over everything.

"Great." said Nir with a sneer. Her voice boomed and echoed before she spoke once more. "Additional secondary objectives to terminate." She looked at the ground to huff and puff, blowing air from her flaring nostrils like a bull, and her horns alongside crimson red eyes only enhanced the intimidating effect. "So be it."

Something about the situation sprang Nir into action since she stopped effortlessly eliminating her foes like a war goddess. Instead, she broke into a full-blown sprint. Entire sections of the village were torn asunder as she left it behind, allowing her to build up momentum… culminating in the kaiju-sized bioweapon diving to the ground.

Nir's elbow hit the ground first. As a result, tremors erupted near the point of impact, disintegrating already damaged buildings within the village as if they were sandcastles. The enemy vehicles had virtually no time to react to the situation. She proved that literally anything could be used as a weapon by wrecking them with nothing more than the weight of her body, either crushing vehicles or sending them flying away with a flurry of sand erupting in multiple directions, much like waves of water... albeit among a sea of sand.

From there, it was over.

The entire village was now in ruins.

Mercenary and hostile forces alike were scattered like seeds in the wind.

Slowly, Nir stood back up while wiping down her lower torso. "Good riddance." she said to no one in particular. Afterward, Nir stomped her way back to the road, then she ended up near Mason again.

Naturally, he freaked out.

Nir stopped in place as he squirmed on the ground. Lowering her head, she narrowed her eyes, then glanced down at him. Her eyes, with black sclera surrounding the iris, immediately went wide upon spotting him.

"Ah... how typical." she growled. "So useless. You dogs of war always get in the way. Regardless, you all live and die by the sword at the end of the day, so that problem simply solves itself."

With yet another huff, Nir walked away, leaving the injured human to his fate. Her finned tail fanned over him as it swooshed, blowing his short hair back while the distance between the two grew over time. Things finally started to overwhelm Mason as he lost his grasp of reality, rendering him a witness to events beyond his control rather than an agent of his own actions as he gradually passed out.

It would be hours until mercenary reinforcements found him alongside any other survivors.

NIR AFTER ACTION REPORT

Version involved: Nir-Mk1

Event: Engagement against ██████████ in [REDACTED]

Executive Summary: Nir was deployed to fight conventional human forces in a third world country. Hostiles utilized unorthodox tactics. They waited for Nir to pass by, then they engaged accompanying mercenary auxiliary forces. Nir backtracked to eliminate the hostile contacts, getting sidetracked during the process before she focused on her primary objective once again.

Interviews with surviving mercenaries provided some contradicting reports. One claimed that Nir made some derogatory remarks towards the mercenaries, which would be uncharacteristic since she's usually silent and emotionless. Another counseling session might be in order. Otherwise, it was a routine mission besides our private military contractors taking much higher casualties than usual from abnormally competent foes…

Providing extra hazard pay to those involved should help smooth over some issues arising from the incident.