Twelfth Jump (Deus Ex:HR) Part 4

The Four Companions: Cierra

            It was a full two years before anything of note really happened. I honestly do not know how I managed to miss this fact, but it was fairly easy to notice once I was aware of it. I had been chatting with Celestian and she had brought up the fact that Lina and Fia had been teasing Cierra about her weight fairly frequently as of late. It was possibly because Cierra had recently been wearing a sweater-dress of sorts, which made her appear a little fluffier than usual. She wasn’t fat, she was simply curvy and the dress ended up hugging her form in such a way as to make her appear as if she had been gaining weight because of the thickness of the cloth.

            Once that had been brought to my attention, I waited a day or two before, while Cierra was out of the house and Lina was calmer, before I pulled Fia and Lina off to the side. “What did you want to talk about, Tadek?” Fia asked as she closed her book, Lina pulling a sheet out from nowhere as she spoke. “Are you finally going to model for me?” She looked so hopeful, but I had to crush that hope… In a way.

            “No, simply because I know what you are going to do to said painting. Now then… I have gathered you both to talk to you about the fact that you have been teasing Cierra recently.” Lina frowned as her hopes were crushed and even more so once I mentioned what they had done, even Fia kind of glancing off for a moment. “You both know for a fact that she isn’t fat… Teasing is fine, but from what I have heard she doesn’t take well to it. You can tease her about other things, but don’t mention her weight. Alright?” They started to speak up, but I gave them both a stern glare to silence them. “Need I repeat myself? Fia, need I remind you that I stopped everyone from mentioning your hair? Remember how the teasing made you feel?”

            “No, Tadek. I understand… I’ll stop teasing, Cierra.” Fia spoke for a moment, holding her head down while Lina was busy folding up the sheet. Still no idea where she pulled it out from. The copper-haired medic thought about it for a moment before giving me a wide grin. “Only if you give me a little kiss on the cheek.” She stated, Fia letting out a small gasp. Scandalous! “Fine. One moment.”

            The both of them gasped, Fia quickly looking through her book, muttering something about the ‘direct lover’ archetype or something like that as I walked off. I came back with a small amount of tape and a Hershey Kiss. I actually knew what she wanted… but, I wasn’t going to pass up this moment to just get blank stares. I took the chocolate and tapped it to Lina’s cheek. I technically did what she asked, heh. “There you go. A kiss on the cheek.”

            Fia simply looked toward me with a look that practically screamed ‘Really?!’ while Lina was bright red, her jaw having dropped. As I walked away, all I heard behind me was “Really?! That was on purpose! Fia, stop giggling!” It was Lina screaming, but I simply grinned and went on my way.

            Over the next few days, Cierra had been asking me to help her with dinner and the like recently, which I did. Mostly it seemed to be so that I could point out exactly what I would enjoy for my meals and for the constant influx of sweets and sugar that she sent my way. She even agreed to allow me to teach her DnD from the rules that I could still remember after such a long time. It… Went rather poorly, but it was still kind of her to allow me to ramble on for a full hour about nerd stuff. Something I haven’t done in quite a while.

            In return, however, I had agreed to help her out with carrying a piece of furniture back that she had been planning on purchasing for the apartment. While we were out, another group of those Humanity First people came to hassle us. A rather large group that was located outside one of the LIMB clinics in the city. Cierra had purchased a coffee table and, as we weren’t expecting trouble, neither of us had our weapons with us besides what was implanted in my body.

            She left me with the table for a moment as she went to talk to them. Considering how good of a negotiator she was, before and after perks, this shouldn’t be too difficult. Heck, the group was actually listening to what she had to say. My augmented eyes caught sight of a laser dot line, moving from one of the nearby windows to Cierra. Everyone paused for a moment as it seems they saw a moving dot on Cierra’s head. With a quick motion, I chucked the table (Still in box and thankfully a mix of metal and wood.) into the path of the bullet before rushing forward. The cardboard of the box sprayed into the air as the bullet collided with it. There was no sound, meaning it was silenced… That would require it to be subsonic.

            Before the sniper could take a second shot, I moved in the away and took the second shot, pushing Cierra down and keeping her close so that she wasn’t as large of a target. “Shit! Everyone, take cover! Get out of the streets!” Fucking conspiracies trying to cause something. It was obvious that they switched targets, attempting to shoot on other individuals. To try and distract them, I unfolded my right arm.

            Two of the panels on my arm snapped up, the hand and wrist splitting open before folding back to allow the integrated blade slide out as a bayonet. The barrels of the storm bolter snapped up with the panels, the autoloader moving to slide in the first banestrike bolt that I kept loaded in the arm. That seemed to catch his eye and, if that didn’t, the four-round burst of explosive bolts along his cover did. Because of my augmentations, I was able to actually see through his cover… However, not the area behind it. It was a very weak form of ‘x-ray’ vision.

            Cierra was helping everyone get the fuck out of here and to take cover as she did not currently have a weapon or armor. Unlike me, she was still very squishy. A pair of obviously augmented individuals came running up, forcing me to turn my attention over to them, sending a few more off-world rounds in their direction until the clip, very quickly, ran out. Considering every time the ‘trigger’ was pulled spent two rounds out of the ten internal, well… Yeah.

            My arm folded back up, trading it for the stake thrower in my other arm while the monomolecular whip extended from the right, my fingers wrapping around the handle once it was present. For the stake thrower, it was a basic setup with the panels at the top of my arm dropping down to the sides to allow the ‘wings’ of the crossbow to appear and for the bolts to be unimpeded. Before they came to me, they actually stopped, glancing off as if they were hearing something before pulling back and running off. “Well… Guess they know now.”

            Me and Cierra left as soon as we were able to, not even staying for the police, simply heading home for the day. Once we were back at the apartment, she let out a sigh of relief and, before I could stop her, she wrapped her arms around me and gave me a tight hug as thanks. “Thanks, hero. Hehe, I won’t charge you for the food I make for a week after that. Kept me from becoming that swiss cheese that you find in the grocery stores.” She stated with her usual, large smile. Though, what I wasn’t comfortable with was the fact that she physically carried me into the apartment.

            I gave everyone a look of worry and mouthed the words 'Help me.' They all simply laughed as I pried apart the tall woman’s arms and ran off. I had to go reload my arm, after all.