16. Hopkirk Vanderfine

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The Hunt for Hopkirk

A water planet! Seriously?! The whole reason I put a crew together, and started on this insane life was because I wanted off a water planet. I hate those places now. I’d actually considered abandoning this bounty just because it’s a water planet. That’s not fair on the crew though. They joined up on the promise of creds and adventure, and this bounty hunt for Hopkirk Vanderfine will certainly provide both.

And so it is that we find The Stone Shark heading through the Staurolite system, specifically to Stauro Delta. Of course, because my life is cursed, and I’m starting to think the ship is inhabited by demons, the trip there was anything but smooth.

Surprise Wormhole!

Cruising along when all of a sudden we get sucked out of hyper. Massive gravity well off the port side of the ship. The nav computer is automatically compensating but not quite well enough. I jumped into the pilot’s seat and started sorting things out. It would seem that we’d blown right past an unmarked Worm Hole. Of all the things to turn up.

The good news is, they can be handy, if stable and safe. Most aren’t but it’s worth risking a probe to find out. In short order we rigged ours up and despite some misgivings we fired it off. It started providing some data back to us but nothing we could use. Just as it started to look hopeful, the Worm Hole ate it. We got a great view of it lensing slightly then disappearing to who knows where. That was 50 creds down the literal tube. Rather than risking another, we moved a safe distance away from the area then dove back into Hyper. Hopkirk Vanderfine was the real prize.

The Hunt Begins

We ‘splashed’ down near the location Starburn had for Vanderfine. Conveniently, he wasn’t difficult to spot, I’m pretty sure he was fishing when we arrived. He’d set up camp on a small series of land bars. The sort of place people live on a water planet, because, you know, ‘It’s just lovely.’ Ugh. This one looked to be a small island that was submerged with the various high points rising above the water line. That would account for the layout of the buildings and the appearance of the aquatic trees.

With various bridges running between the different bits of dry land, this was going to be a maze of annoyance, or we’re all getting our feet wet. The only good news so far is that the water wasn’t deep enough to require us to swim.

Splitting into our regular fire teams, I went to the west, while Starburn and his squad went to the east. All hell immediately broke loose as Vanderfine’s Gang starting trying to take us out. They were a pretty tough bunch as these things go, a step up from your standard low-level enforcers. We learned this when the grenades started raining down on us. So. Much. Frag.

We’re barely into it though when we discovered that we were not the only ones interested in the Bounty. A damned Trophy Hunter Alien turned up almost immediately to join the fight. The only good news was that it seemed totally unaware of who Hopkirk actually was. It went all out on killing everything in sight. Sadly, that meant us as well. There’s always some Complication with these Bounty Hunts.

First Kills!

Regardless we got ourselves off to a reasonable start. Starburn turned the Caesium Sprayer on a couple of Hopkirk’s gang and fried a Recruit and, ironically, a Burner. That took one of their heavy weapons out of action which suited us just fine. Meanwhile, I powered up my Energy Shield and Sarge took one of the scopes to better Co-ordinate Fire.

While Sarge was fitting the scope we noticed a figure on the move between the trees. It was going so fast it reminded me of Jammer, our old Runner. Wasn’t him though, which was a good thing because Lo-ball dropped to a knee, paused for a beat, then shot him. It was an amazing shot, he timed it perfectly for when the Runner just stepped out of cover. The guy flew backwards, rolled down the side of the embankment he was on, and fell face first into the water. Dead man’s float. The tide started pulling him out into the open sea. He’d be gone before long.

A Brave Move

Back over on Starburn’s side of the fight Doc and Switch made a bold move, they spotted a Recruit that was isolated out on his own and ran in to grapple him. Pairing up in hand to hand combat they seemed to work pretty well and between them took the Recruit out. Good news for us.

It wasn’t all going our way though. We could see Vanderfine moving through the trees near some buildings, but we couldn’t get to him or shoot him. Wolf had managed to wound a Grenadier but not kill him. Wolf’s shot had all but blown the guy’s leg off so he couldn’t move. What he could do though was lob frag grenades at us continually. Everybody in range was trying to kill him but nobody could. They either missed or whatever body armour Hopkirk had supplied these guys was a cut above normal.

A Stupid Move

The Trophy Hunter was working out well for us though, he was more interested in Hopkirk’s crew than ours, but I think that was mostly down to range. He certainly was trying to kill us. The damn thing’s invisibility shield though was really messing with us. Couldn’t get a bead on it to take it down, then I got a lucky break. Depending on your definition of lucky. It appeared right in front of me. I’m not sure it had actually seen me so I took the chance and dived into Combat with it.

It didn’t notice me until I was right on top of it. As I closed the distance it spun round to face me with some kind of spear. The ends crackled with electricity so that seemed unpleasant. It had the reach and was able to swing first, I rolled under the spear and came up behind it. As I did my Grav Hammer caught it on the back and blasted it forward a half-step.

If you’ve never encountered one, a Grav Hammer is a great tool, its integrated density circuits amplify the mass of the hammer head on impact. It hits a lot harder than it should given the size of it. I’m honestly impressed the thing was still standing.

It started to spin to bring the spear to bear on me but I smashed the Grav Hammer into its shoulder and blocked the turn. In an amazing feat of reaction speed the alien used the blow from the hammer to accelerate a turn the other way. Damn thing nearly took my head off. I managed to duck just in time and the spear sailed over my head. I blocked the backswing on the haft of the hammer and was immediately locked in place. The strength of the alien was overwhelming me. It kept pushing forward with the spear and was moments away from making a contact. The crackling energy tip was inches from my eye. Desperately I kicked out at its knee. They took a half-step back to avoid the blow and that was the opening I needed to slide the spear off the hammer haft. The sudden loss of resistance to the forward pressure of the spear caused the Trophy Hunter to stumble towards me. I side-stepped backwards to create space and swung the hammer as it turned towards me. I barely dodged the spear as the hammer connected to the side of its head. The density circuits were maxed out and the aliens skull caved in. It dropped to the ground stone dead.

Given the obviously deserved reputation of these guys for being total bad-asses, you might be wondering what the fuck I was thinking. Honestly, I was mostly pissed off at being on a water planet and this thing was getting in the way of the plan.

Burn ‘Em All

While I was throwing hands with the Trophy Hunter, Starburn and his squad were still trying to advance. They were making slow progress but were edging forwards. Starburn incinerated a badly wounded Trooper and caught a Case Cracker in the same blast. They really shouldn’t have lined up like that. I’d say you live and learn but they certainly didn’t.

Hunter and Sarge were maintaining cover on our side of the battle. Turns out Hopkirk really did bring all the toys. Hunter leapt in front of Sarge as an Armoured Trooper popped up to shoot him. Hunter went down, possibly dead, and Sarge dragged him back into cover. Nitro opened up on the Armoured Trooper and all but cut him in half with his plasma chain Rapid Fire.

Having ducked back behind cover Sarge had a line of sight on the seemingly immortal Grenadier and finally dropped him with a shot through the chest.

The End of Hopkirk

At this point Hopkirk was in sight and on his own. His entire Gang was dead and only he was left. I could see him looking around for support and he was about to turn tail and run. Before he got the chance I sighted down my carbine and put a round through his sternum. He crumpled to the ground, dead as can be.

Knowing that these guys were well equipped we picked over the remains and salvaged what we could. It may have been top notch but most of it was broken. Expensive but fragile. Still, we did find some usable stuff. In addition to the 400 cred bounty on Hopkirk we found a compact form shotgun. Handy little gun that packs the same punch in a smaller size. One of them was carrying a Pick Caster, no good to us so we marked that down for sale. Should bag us about 200 creds. The rest of the stuff was grilled bread product.

We logged the bounty and picked up Hunter who was wounded but coming round. Looked like he’d be just fine with a bit of rest. We headed back to The Stone Shark and made for an outpost to sell the Pick Caster and pick up some supplies. Time to get off this damned damp planet.

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Stargrave is published by Osprey Games and was created by Joseph A. McCullough