What Do You Mean I'm The Captain Of A Yandere Mercenary Company?

Just saying, if you were expecting the AI to suddenly start talking and introducing itself like some kind of sentient intelligence… That didn’t happen.

It did, however, connect to my personal terminal and displayed several lines of text welcoming me as a new user of the power armour.

We would have explored more using the AI but we decided to leave it for now. We’re still in enemy territory after all.

Once the others were done arranging the loot inside the room for easy transportation, we left the storeroom and locked the door behind us.

”Do we have any updates on how the others are doing?” I asked.

Amber pulled up her personal terminal and projected a screen in front of her, displaying a map of the station.

The top half of the station has been coloured blue while the bottom half remained red, showing how much of the station we currently control.

Incidentally, the blue part of the map stopped right outside where the security room of the station would be.

Just saying, there is indeed an ’armoury’ room inside the security room but it was less of an armoury and more like a weapons locker. Most likely there was only enough space to store a few guns for the security forces of the station in the event of a pirate attack or a worker uprising I suppose.

”Seems like they met some unexpectedly heavy resistance outside of the security room. Should we go and help?” Amber asked.

”Of course. We could claim more loot if we were to participate, right?”

”Naturally~”

”Then what are we waiting for?”

I did a quick check on my equipment before leading the way down to the lower floors of the station.

Along the way, signs of firefights could be seen dotted all along the corridors as dead thugs littered along the floor with bullet holes, burn marks and blood splattered along the walls and floor.

Occasionally, I would also see a dead Merc as well so it seems like we did suffer casualties on our side as well.

That’s to be expected so we didn’t make much of a fuss and simply continued on.

Soon enough, we came to a part of the station where we could hear the exchange of gunshots from around the corner, prompting us to quicken our pace to join the fight.

When we turned the corner, we realised that it led to a T-junction and our Mercs were split up between both sides of the junction while a rain of energy bullets fired down the middle, preventing them from moving.

It wasn’t even a burst fire sort of suppression but a constant barrage of bullets, almost as if the thugs had infinite ammo or something.

I ran towards the closest Merc and tapped him on the shoulder, making him jump and spin around to point his gun in my direction.

I kind of already expected such a reaction since I would have done the same thing as well so I caught his wrist and made sure to point his gun upwards.

He tensed up but quickly relaxed when he saw me.

”So… Sorry…” He apologised.

”No need to apologise, who can tell us what’s going on here?”

He quickly pointed with his free hand at a guy with two cybernetic arms crouching at the corner with an assault rifle in his hands.

I crept up to him and several of them turned to me in surprise when they saw me for some reason.

I then tapped on the guy’s shoulder and he turned around to shout at me, ”WHAT?!”

His voice made me wince back in surprise and for some reason, his face actually paled when he realised it was me.

Oh right, I’m supposed to be his client, so shouting at your client like that might not be a good thing for a Merc.

”Ah… Ermm… My… My apolog--”

I waved his apology away, ”It’s fine, we’re in a battlezone now so forget about that. Give me a sitrep on the situation.”

He nodded, ”It seems like the people we were facing off earlier were used to buy time for them to set up this choke point. The station is also designed so that we won’t be able to go to the lower levels without getting past this area.”

”And what are they using to keep firing down the corridor? They don’t actually have infinite ammo do they?”

”We don’t know. They’ve been firing non-stop for at least ten minutes already. That Merc tried to charge with some shield but look what happened to him.”

He pointed to the other side of the corridor and I realised it was the Merc who helped us break through the machine gun emplacements when we first docked our ship.

Seems like he’s still alive but he lost his legs, which I guess shouldn’t really matter since they were both cybernetic so he could have them replaced once we got out of here.

”Anyone have any ideas? Do we just wait for them to run out of ammo?”

The guy grimaced, ”We don’t know. We already tried throwing explosives but the corridor’s longer than we thought and we can’t throw or launch our explosives far enough to reach them.”

”Is there no other way through here? Like a vent system or some secret passage?” I asked.

Ries shook her head, ”The blueprints showed no such path… They really designed it so that there is only one path through…”

Shit… Are we really stuck here then? Or do I have to ask Mara to help us deal with this with her Psionic abilities?

I would rather not do that though so maybe we can just retreat?

”The bullets are fake.”

I turned to see Lea looking at the space in front of us that was still being lit up by the barrage of energy projectiles.

”They’re fake?” I parroted her.

She nodded, ”It’s a projection. Look at the burn marks on the wall… They disappear after a while so that it can be projected on a different spot. The sounds of the guns must be coming from hidden speakers around the station.”

All of us turned to look and, sure enough, I saw that one of the supposed energy bullets hit the wall to leave a burn mark that stayed there for a few seconds before it disappeared, even though another quickly took its place.

As expected of Lea to be able to spot that.

”So… They’re illusions? But a few of us got hit by it though?” The Merc pointed out, gesturing to the few Mercs that were laying at the side tending to their wounds.

Lea paused for a moment, ”I believe the barrage of bullets is a projection but they do have weapons trained here in case anyone tries to rush into the corridor. The projection is just there to buy more time for them. Perhaps they are hoping for reinforcements?”

I made a face at that, ”In that case, we need to clear this out quickly… But even if we know that they are illusions, it doesn’t change our position right? They’ll still shred us into pieces the moment we step out.”

Lea then wordlessly disappeared as she activated her new personal shield’s secondary function, leaving only a really faint outline on her.

”Are you sure about this?” I asked, stopping her before she went towards the corridor. ”What if they have something that can see through your invisibility?”

”In that case, I would just roll back into cover, Mistress. The shield should be able to withstand a few shots before breaking.”

”Are you really, really sure about this?”

”Yes, Mistress. Please let me clear the way for us.”

I nodded at her, letting my Alv move towards the edge of the wall before she went prone.

Despite me saying that, I turned to Mara and gave her a look.

No words were exchanged but Mara nodded to show she understood what I wanted from her.

If Lea started getting shot at, Mara would use her telekinesis to pull her back into cover.

I watched Lea slowly inch her way to the edge of the corridor, her body barely visible at all and turning completely invisible when she stopped moving.

When she moved enough of her body into the corridor, I saw an energy round go through her and couldn’t help but reach out towards her in worry.

But then I realised that she was completely fine and nothing happened at all.

She laid herself still and soon she was completely invisible again.

I held my breath, hoping that they would not fire at her or have any equipment that can see through active camo.

Nothing happened for what felt like an eternity before Lea pulled the trigger, her outline appearing for a brief moment before disappearing again.

I didn’t need to look to know she had definitely hit whatever she was aiming at and sure enough, shouts of alarm came from the thugs down the corridor.

Without missing a beat, Lea fired another round and I could hear shouts of panic coming from there.

Guess I was worried for nothing in the end.