Flash Fic: Stupid Games

 Lennox's right eye twitched a little in rage. Mercenary though he might be, even he wouldn't deliberately target kids, human or otherwise. It was...tacky. "Mac," he said quietly.

"Yes, Major?" replied MacIvar without delay.

"I believe an interview with the chief of police is necessary to...clarify certain irregularities. Take Cleo with you. He adds a sense of gravity to a conversation. Wouldn't want the local constabulary thinking we were insincere about respecting local laws and customs."

MacIvar's smile could have cut throats. "He does at that, Sir," he said, a look of great anticipation spreading across his face. "Return to base after the conversation?"

"No. Stand by there once you're done. Might need to requisition some additional resources."

"Understood, Major.

---

"Hey, what're y--" The cop never finished their objection as Warrant Officer Cleophus Barnes stroked the trigger on the shotgun before he'd fully cleared the door. The syrupy "dropsy" round splattered over the cop's torso, quickly soaking through the uniform, the diluted pseudoatropine rapidly spreading throughout the body to interrupt the cop's voluntary muscles. Before the cop hit the floor, Barnes was already through the doorway, the next round loaded and unleashed in the blink of an eye.

MacIvar followed close behind, his own shotgun sweeping in Barnes' wake, making sure nobody would be trying to shoot the towering warrant officer in the back. He wasn't particularly worried, but he trusted Barnes to do his job, and Barnes trusted MacIvar to do his own.

As they approached the chief's office, an arm hooked around the door frame, a machine pistol in hand. Barnes and MacIvar ducked into opposing doorways, crouching down as the hallway filled with bullets.

"Mac," Barnes said in a rumbling bass that felt like it came from beneath the floor. "I don't think he's in the mood to talk just yet."

"He does seem a bit anti-social."

"Think you can get a flashbang in there?"

"If I can't, I'm in the wrong line of work." MacIvar pulled a device about the size of a hockey puck from a pouch on his load bearing gear, then held down a button on the device until a small blue light began to flash. He shifted position, briefly leaned out to judge the distance, then sent the device skating over the floor. It bounced off the door frame and spun inside, a thunderous explosion shattering the windows a moment later.

MacIvar rushed forward and forced the police chief to bend over his own desk before securing him with his own restraints. Barnes strode past the door, the shotgun roaring twice more before he came back to the office.

"Building is clear, Mac."

"Good work as always, Cleo." MacIvar turned his attention to the police chief. "You and I need to have a conversation. If you're smart about it, we'll be on our way before you know it."

"Do you know who I am?!" bleated the chief.

"The douchebag playing lookout for the local kidnappers and or child slavers," MacIvar said flatly. "That does not make people happy. Cleo, do I look happy to you?"

"Not especially, Mac. You unhappy about him shooting at us? I know that kind hurts my feelings when it happens."

"Nah. Him shooting at us is understandable. Maybe not 'smart,' but certainly understandable. What's got me unhappy isn't just that he's birddogging for slavers. It's that he's using Pokémon as bait."

Barnes' blocky head nodded slowly in agreement. "Can't really blame you feeling that way, Mac. Candy, I can understand, and it is classic. But Pokémon? That's just low."

MacIvar pulled out a recording device and set it down next to the chief's head. "Now, if you could see your way toward telling us where these assholes are laying up and where they've stashed those kids, it would do a lot to soothe my unhappiness." He reached down and drew a dagger with a slender blade. "You do want to make me happy, don't you?"

The police chief's eyes went wide with terror. "They'll kill me if I tell you!"

"Before we get the chance to?" Cleo asked in puzzlement. 

 Fixing a hateful glare on MacIvar, the police chief snarled, "Fine, you trigger-happy bastards!  His name's Konstantin Detlav.  Pirate captain, currently running the Jan Zizka.  And he's the meanest son-of-a-bitch you'll ever meet!  Along with his whole damned crew!  They're using a warehouse at an abandoned transshipment depot as a holding area for the cargo.  Warehouse Nine-Alpha.  It was used for livestock and other biological-related cargoes."

MacIvar glanced over at Barnes. "Detlav? Does that yutz never learn?"

"Always struck me as a bit slow on the uptake."

"The Major is going to go completely spare," MacIvar grumbled. He checked the action on his shotgun, made sure a pseudoatropine round was in the chamber, then shot the police chief. As he stripped the chief down to his underwear, he placed a comm request to Lennox. "Major, it's Mac. We've got actionable intel. Our primary target is Detlav. He's holding the kids in a warehouse. Cleo is passing the information over to Oracle. You should have a locus in about two minutes." He dragged the chief out of the office by his heels, heading for the jail cells. "Yes, I know you told him to piss off towards the periphery. I was there, if you recall." Securing the chief to a bunk, MacIvar sighed as he started to bring another disabled cop towards the cells. "I know, Major. But the guy's a pirate and a slaver. Not to mention kind of a whack job. Yeah, yeah, all that 'New Terra Crusade' bullshit he spouts. Probably picked that up in Acheron Supermax to protect his pucker."

Barnes assisted MacIvar in securing the cops in the cells as the conversation wound down. "All right. We'll get some ground transport scared up for a large evac. Rally point Tango, half a klick from TZ. Maybe have Benning and Mikkelsen meet us there. Might be some bumps and bruises need seeing to." MacIvar paused as he slapped a strip of welding tape over the door lock and whacked it with the butt of his shotgun, fusing the cell door shut. "Radio check in 45 minutes standard. Mac, out."

"Bad?" asked Barnes.

"He is livid. Oracle's already sent out interdiction warnings on every public channel. Has them on ninety second standard loops, so nobody gets to whine they weren't warned when Bucephalus shoots them down. The Major's grabbing a shuttle back up to Bucephalus and telling the ready company to prep for a hot drop. And he's going in with them." MacIvar smiled thinly at Barnes. "Something about keeping his drop certification status up to date."

"Riiiiight. 'Cause the last thing that anybody would want is a lapsed drop status." Barnes shook his head. "I assume we're on cleanup detail."

"School bus drivers. Getting the kids back home from their unscheduled field trip." 

(This piece originally appeared on r/humansarespaceorcs, with some re-writing here to provide a bit better connective tissue.)