TODAY ON ARSENAL OF HUMANITY, YOUR SLOG FOR ALL THE POWDER ON MODERN ARMS: WE HAVE AN EXCLUSIVE LOOK AT THE LSR FIRING RANGE!
I'm your host, Mauser Ruger Baretta Smith & Weston Nestle Springfield. Today we've got a special treat for you, live after this broadcast, we'll be following along with humanity's 8th Paragon "AK-47" Aris Firenze and her teammate Paragon "Swift"... I-Can't-Pronounce-This-Name-And-Don't-Want-To-Offend... as they pick out weapons for the upcoming Wager to decide the fate of Humanity!
Hah-hah... No pressure ladies.
So snipe that Love Button and Subscribe, submit your biodata for authenticated-exclusive content, and get those reaction videos ready because today it's GUNS GUNS GUNS!"
>Obligatory gratuitous explosion sequence.<
"I don't like grenades," Arin put her foot down. Well, a foot down, as she half-sat half-leaned on her teammate, who continued to be an inanimate boulder in the middle of the armory floor.
"What's not to like?" Cherry frowned.
"Well, for one thing most of these are ceramic. For another, I don't want things dangling off my body that can explode from a lucky plasma shot."
"There are mini-grenades. Look, they have the disc ones with the monopole floaters. They go in a straight line once you throw 'em."
"I'll only take grenades if I know they won't blow up in my face. And absolutely nothing hackable... What about D-phase storage just a little wrist vault?" Dimensional phase storage was highly convenient, though devices small enough to be man-portable could cost as much as a space station because of the rarity of success in the production of stable time-phasic metavault crystals, even by the Hekatoncheries races.
"Banned."
Unfortunately they were banned for Warsport.
"Ugh."
The concierge took the box of grenades away and another immediately took the man's place. He was wearing a green, yellow, and black badge whose symbol Arin had gotten very familiar with since the wild drone attack... "Paragon, can I interest you in these custom designed vogels from the Human Collective Defense Union, Africa Chapter?"
"I don't play well with electronics. And especially not when their weapons tried to kill me last week."
"Hear him out," Cherry elbowed her.
"The HCDU Africa Chapter wishes to extend a sincere apology to you. These have been custom-designed to your capabilities, and will come without obligations on your time or resources. They're unhackable, but relatively simple."
"Unhackable? That's a laugh." Aris got elbowed again by Cherry. She rolled her eyes. "How are they unhackable?"
"They feature no electronics or tracking, just a neodymium core, with a bi-magnetic switch feature for rapid on/off safety, configuration changes, and maneuverability. While a little heavier than standard cutting vogels, the weight has been carefully calibrated to facilitate cutting and stabbing, even during flyby attacks. All metal elements are integrated with seamless welds, so that only a magnetic psionic like yourself can use them properly. A truly bespoke weapon."
Arin reached out with her power and floated one. She could feel how her magnetics played with the vogel, including the slight sense of something like a fold in the magnetic field of the neodymium. She pressed a bit of power into the field and Schick! The vogel extended edges around all sides.
A few maneuvers, guided by her hand, proved that it was indeed quite agile, and once she had a sense of its magnetic fields, she was able to integrate the other three into the thin, deadly satellites they were designed to be.
"Okay, I'll bite, these things are actually pretty cool," she smiled.
"They'll take up your four tertiary allowances," Cherry reminded her.
"I don't care, I can definitely work with these over grenades."
At her level, she was allowed any combination of two ranged or melee weapons for a primary and secondary, one additional layer of armor or a shield, and four tertiary arms, of which there was a huge list of what was and wasn't allowed. Basically anything that left a crater larger than a beachball was banned.
Drones were allowed, but if they had firing options they were considered primary weapons. At least with the HCDU drones, it was like having four steerable throwing knives.
"These things have a name?" Arin asked.
"The HCDU wishes to leave the honor of naming them to you. But they recommended Langstertlaksman, which means Long-Tailed Shrike."
"What's that?"
"A species of bird known for impaling its victims."
Arin grinned with feline savagery. "I like it. But I'll butcher that name, so let's just go with Shrikes."
"The Africa Chapter is honored by your magnanimity. There is also a bespoke modification suite in their container if you wish to add cameras, decorations, or make repairs. Shall I deliver these to your team for evaluation?"
"Yes please." The moment Arin approved, a pair of PSB guards appeared at the side of the concierge to escort him and make sure he wasn't up to anything.
"Ready for armor?"
The next activity was a bit more involved.
Arin quickly worked through the shields and decided they weren't for her. While her combat suit was designed to keep her alive its capabilities were limited to keeping combat below the speed of light, facilitating knockouts when hit too much, and showing off how hard she'd been hit.
"Anti-psionic head protection is a must."
"I have an implant to keep people out of my head," Arin reminded her.
"This is the pro circuit. Every extra layer helps."
"Fine. Just keep things light. I prefer to be mobile."
Upon hearing her, several concierges started visiting with large crates.
"For the Paragon, a bespoke space-rated armor system from..."
One after another, for what felt like hours, Arin tried on a vast array of armors. There was power armor, mech-grade armor. The classic anti-ballistic armors felt nice, but would do next to nothing against plasma weapons, which she knew Paragon X wielded. The ones with integrated shields were all too heavy and stiff for her to feel comfortable in. And while she was tempted to take one with a float-unit, she recalled that there was a reason the saying went "a flying target is halfway out of the arena."
She was about to give up hope and pick the lightest anti-ballistic armor when she saw a small box, tucked away and unnoticed amidst its huge peers.
"What's that?" she asked, pointing to the box.
A mouse demi-human concierge blinked and picked it up. "I don't recognize the box..."
Arin tensed as she opened it. Unknown boxes could mean another assassination attempt...
"It's an Ainaxian shield generator!" the concierge declared after a quick scan, which showed as a red pulse to her eyes.
"Alien tech?" Arin asked. "Who are the Ainaxians?"
"They were subjugated by the Zyr last millennium. I think the 2800s?" Cherry marveled at the tiny little device, no bigger than a belt buckle, and seemingly flexible enough to put anywhere. "But what's it doing here?"
"Am I even allowed to use it?" Arin asked. Her immediate idea was to use the oval device with a hair tie. She had a similar-sized black one that might make a good decoy, since trinkets, embellishments, and marks of honor that did not equate to armor or weapons were allowed.
It wasn't uncommon to use tech from other species, but it was frowned upon if the source of such an exchange was unknown. Especially from historically unaligned species.
Paragons were supposed to use their own species' tech...
"Hold on, let me check the rules," Cherry said.
Arin had spent the last week in "dark mode." No netsphere. No social networking. No videos to distract her from the cavalcade of mediocre interviews and officials wanting to associate with "Humanity's Last, Best Hope."
"You know, for a sport where the only rule is 'Knock'em out of the ring,' there sure are a lot of rules." Arin complained for the thousandth time.
"The rules are there so no-spawn matches don't end in ten seconds," Cherry said for what felt like the millionth time. "The rules apply to exchanges between Warsport qualified races... but not from a subject race to another. So technically it's not disallowed. It's just Earth and Gla'nur" - the Ainaxian's homeworld - "don't have a relationship. Though the Ainaxians are a geliform race, so even if the Zyr can't assimilate them, I have no idea why they would reach out like this."
So it was technically allowed...
Still, as the challenged, the Zyr insisted on a no-spawn, no-capsule match. Meaning only one ring-out each and no capsules containing combat items would be deployed during the match.
Basically vanilla Warsport.
Cinbar agreed on the condition there be no time limit. Which to Arin kindof fit given how "fast" her teammate had been. Earth had to agree as the host, because they would be providing the stage. After the debacle of the 4th Paragon's fight against Paragon X, hover stages were out, but that was the only hint Arin got of what might be Humanity's last arena for Warsport.
As soon as she touched the shield emitter, a small pulse of psionic energy passed down Arin's arm and into her nervous system.
In that moment, she felt warmth. Love. Regret. A desire to be saved... Such human-like emotions, there was no doubting what it was.
"Arin?" Cherry asked the moment the message was done.
"Psionic impression. I think... it's a cry for help." Arin said. "I'm using this."
Cherry stared for a bit but then shrugged. "Alright. The Bureau of Sports is going to shit a collective brick though. To say nothing of the Body Politic."
"That's what you're here for, right? To handle them?"
"Yeah, but there's 'handling' and then there's betting Humanity's future on unproven alien tech. For all we know, it's a Zyr trap."
"Psionics can't lie. Not through imprinting," it was a well-proven fact.
"No, but they can omit the truth," Cherry countered.
Having "read" the message, there was no way to go back and delve it.
"I have a good feeling about this," Arin said. "Has my gut ever steered us wrong?"
"Yes. At like, every other restaurant when we both ate."
"You know what I mean! In the Paragon Games."
Cherry sighed. "Let's just head to the next armory. Our host is waiting for us."
"Host?"