SNIPER

Gatchaman/Battle of the Planets Fanfiction by Katharine, June 2002.
Characters (c) Tatsunoko Productions; Sandy Frank Enterprises.
Fiction (c) KFM, written for fan appreciation only and not for profit. Please do not reproduce without permission from the author.



"Are you in position, Olivia?"

"Yes," the Devil Star replied, speaking into the thin communications wire that curved from the receiver in her ear. "The point is in sight."

Olivia surveyed the area with long and studious deliberation. She was not in uniform; a simple but impeccably tailored black pantsuit with a gray collared blouse dressed her tall and lithe frame. Her face was unmasked; smooth and finely hued shades increased her natural beauty. Her hair was her own, an undyed fawn that was trimmed short at the nape of her neck, yet was styled to lengthen down the sides of her face from a center part over her brow into soft inward curves that touched her collarbones. She had designed her looks to garner a multitude of mental images: business-minded Parisian chic, Wall Street British-pub punk, Small-Town girl-next-door done good in the Big City. And below her spread the city, a sprawling metropolis she scanned from thirty stories up.

Her position was the roof of the WorldCom building, a giant glass structure in the heart of the financial district. Her point of focus was the entrance of the giant Commerix headquarters, three marble-framed revolving doors of six-inch thick impact-resistant glass. At the front of the building was a crush of news reporters and spectators, police and corporate security. They did not concern her. Nor did the helicopters cruising overhead, covering the rooftops. She was confident they and their heat-sensitive optics would have trouble spotting her, as long as she wore the suit with it's thermal-degree-mixing fabric, and the skin-cream and hair gel with like properties.

She kept herself low to the ledge within the shadow of an air duct, even though her carefully planned position put the sun directly at her back and made visual contact from the ground impossible without blindness. Moving calmly, she opened the small leather-clad case that to the uninitiated looked like a simple brief, and began to assemble the high-powered rifle it contained.

It was her favorite rifle, a finely crafted weapon as slim and elegant as herself. Its twenty inch barrel was intricately machined, its action engineered with Swiss-watch precision. The stock was constructed of a weatherproof polymer, and its metals were brushed and coated with equally effective heat-mixing compounds. She assembled it carefully, taking her time to make sure the barrel's diaphanous metal threads attached properly to the frame. She mounted the scope last, an instrument as long as her forearm and as tightly calibrated as a genome computer. The scope connected seamlessly to the action's mounts; she had no need to recalibrate it. Finally she loaded the rifle with a single round. It was a specially-loaded armor-piercing cartridge of her own design: an alloy-jacketed seven millimeter bullet that shelled a harder titanium core. It was a configuration that would instantly fragment on impact, sending chunks of steel and lead splattering into soft tissue and muscle as the core blasted mortally through organs and bone. She was the finest sharpshooter in Gallactor's entire organization, and would not need more than that.

She settled into a sitting posture behind the ledge, holding the rifle back enough so that only the last quarter-inch of its silencer extended over the edge. Brushing her hair back, she nestled its butt into her shoulder, and laid her right cheek along the stock. It would be an easy shot, and afterward she would just as casually disassemble the weapon, descend through the building's service elevator system, shedding a few layers of clothing as she went, and exit through the front doors like any other employee. If people or security saw her leave, their impressions would depend only from which angle they spotted her from. From the side, a businesswoman with Parisian style; from the back a stockbroker with British-punk looks; from the front a Small-town Girl who'd done good in the Big City, with the same Iowa-innocent hair she must've had in high school.

The view through the scope was incredible.

It was as though she were standing at the doors herself, recorder in hand and ready to belt out questions to Commerix's Chief Financial Officer along with every other reporter present. Questions about his scheduled subpoenaed testimony about certain clients' improprietous business practices, questions about the recent custody of the corporation's president by the police.

Inevitably the CFO appeared. He was completely surrounded by more police and security, a short pudgy man who showed his fear in bright sweat that shone across his forehead and brighter blotches of red that colored his cheekbones. He was wearing a bulletproof vest over his neat three-piece suit, a hulking garment that shielded his neck and torso. The policemen hustled him through the shouting mass of reporters towards a large sport utility vehicle, packing themselves into a protective barrier that encircled him as they moved.

"Target is in sight," she coolly reported.

"Very well," her contact replied. "Please proceed at your discretion."

All at once Olivia felt very calm. There was no apprehension in her posture, no urgency in her motion. She remained as still as the building, and focused on the CFO. Her body relaxed behind the rifle, her breaths slow and quiet. The rifle became an extension of her body; she became a part of it. As her eyes followed the man, the rest of her body also moved as though her eyes guided her reflexes instead of her mind. She was patient, confident in her skill. The CFO's bald head bobbed into view behind the bodies of the reporters and police.

She had no trouble dropping the crosshairs onto his forehead.

She brushed her finger against the trigger, preparing to apply the pressure that would obliterate his head, and starve the justice department's investigation of clandestine fund transfers from Commerix to certain offshore accounts that through other business dealings and launderings ultimately led to the coffers of the nation of Hontwalh.



"Target is in sight," the Peregrine quietly reported into the thin communications wire connected to the receiver in his ear.

Jay Randall, the second in command of G-Force, was stretched out behind a massive Heckler and Koch MSG90 rifle on the roof of the Wells Fargo Bank building, forty stories of smoked glass and steel. He was not in uniform, wearing instead the black fatigues of the Earth Defense Command's Special Forces with his head covered by an equally black bandanna. It reduced his profile into nothing but a shadow, blending perfectly into the darkness of the roof, allowing the wind to pick up nothing but a few wisps of his hair below the bandanna's cloth. From his carefully chosen position he could easily see the Devil Star sitting behind the ledge of the shorter building below, the sun blazing at his back and making it impossible for her to see him if she turned.

"Outstanding," his commander replied. "Go at your discretion."

All at once Jay felt very calm. There was no tenseness in his muscles, the motion of his cerebonics slowed into a patient thrum. From the helicopter far above he and the rifle looked like a single unit, a silent weapon nearing detonation. Through the rifle's scope, the nape of the Devil Star's neck shone very light in the sun, a slim and lovely curve below the layered plane of her hair. Jay dropped its crosshairs into position there, focusing at the base of her head. His finger brushed against the trigger, preparing to apply the pressure that would sever her spine and deny Gallactor a chance to escape the scrutiny of their financial holdings.

And squeezed.



*****

(c) KFM June 2002.  Disturbed World Productions/Canon Fodder, Inc.