Demise

[Boss]

Jeff landed on Kreuzberg Depot in New Berlin. There had been a minor...incident with two members of the esteemed Rheinwehr, but as far as matters went, it was fairly low on the list of concerns. He hopped out of the cockpit without waiting for a ladder, at the same time flicking a button on his wristband. With that touch, the canopy of his Upholder smoothly lowered and locked, and a small antipersonnel turret under the chin descended and began staring down any Junker that dared get close.

"Wass der teufel? Liberty Navy, here?" A startled mechanic emerged from the engine manifold of a unique mongrel of a ship that only its owner could love. Unfortunately, he had a wrench in his hands when he waved them above his head. Jeff instinctively dropped to one knee, unholstered his pistol, and created three new holes in the man's chest. Before the body hit the floor, Jeff was walking towards the bar as if nothing had happened, leaving a stunned deck crew and pooling blood behind him.

"Bartender. Where can I find this man?" Jeff slid a sheet of paper across the bar towards the be-paunched man cleaning a glass with a smudged rag. It stuck just past halfway there on an as-yet uncleaned spill of liquor. The man squinted, set the glass down. Tucked the rag in his generous belt, in front of a grimy apron that strained to cover the entirety of his rotundity. One ham-sized hand stretched out and grasped the sheet by a corner in fingers larger than most bratwurst. He handled it with surprising dexterity, given his physical condition.

He took out a pair of reading glasses with his other set of meaty fingers, and perched them on his bulbous nose. On the sheet was a single name: Albert Horner. "Mein herr, I do not know this man." A patent lie. The tiny beads of sweat that formed on his bald pate were not simply the heat. Jeff leaned against the counter, and those who listened closely could hear a faint click. The bartenders eyes widened.

"Your assessment is correct, mister Heinkel. Under your counter, now pointed at your head, is a .357 Magnum chambered Detroit Arms PD-16. It currently has, in its chamber, a round designed specifically to penetrate a hard surface, such as this counter, then impact a soft target with the mangled remains. It's proven very effective in urban combat. Mister Bullet wants to play chicken with your face, and the only thing that's gonna make him not play is your mouth moving very very quickly and saying what I want to know. Clear as mud, right?"

"Bu-bu-bu-bu-bu..." Jeff rolled his eyes and pulled the trigger. In the silence that followed, a fly's heartbeat could be heard.

"Where. Can. I. Find. Albert. Horner." Nobody moved a muscle. Jeff was getting ready to speak again when he saw one of the patrons reaching into his coat. The .357 found a new friend, and suddenly everyone seemed to want to help the Spectre.

****************

Jeff caught Horner just as he was entering the queue for the Bering jumpgate.

"Attention smuggling vessel, drop your artifacts and I might let you live." Jeff loosed a Supernova burst against the ship's shields, collapsing them instantly.

"Woah, woah! Hold fire, HOLD FIRE, DAMMIT! Who told you we were smuggling? If it was Heinkel...It was, wasn't it? I'll kill that bastard!" Jeff allowed the captain to rant, then suppressed the shields with his pulse cannons.

"Five seconds to comply, sir." He cut the smuggler's tirade short. "I'm not in the mood for this. I've got places to go, people to kill. You're very close to being on that list."

The smuggler gulped and quickly began punching buttons on his console. Jeff enhanced his end of the image and caught "...apons Cons..." at the top of the board. "My dear sir, you're not trying to activate your weapons, are you?"

In reply, the vessel erupted in cannonfire, the hodgepodge of scavenged plasma, laser, pulse, and tachyon weapons leaving a multihued trail across the sky. Jeff merely noted the green light on his Supernova.

Flicked the safety cover off.

Blew the ship into a billion flaming bits.

beep...

beep...
beep...

...beep...

beep...

...beepbeep...

.....beeeeeeeeeeeeee

The scanner located the artifact amongst the debris and fed the data to the tractor beam. A brief flash of transfer, and two of the required devices were now possessed.