! written by u/Legionx37 on 2014-10-12

"This egg salad is bullshit", Kevin huffed as he slammed his barely-tasted sandwich into the trashcan by the vending machines.

"Why would you ever buy an egg salad sandwich out of a vending machine in the first place?", I replied before taking a big, purposeful bite out of my Heart-stopper.

"Because I don't want to die of a coronary this afternoon, Mr. Burger Shot", he quipped.

"At least I'll die happy", I grinned.

Kevin turned to the coffee machine, apparently deciding on a liquid lunch, while childishly mimicking my comment.

I was about to bite down on another mouthful of beefy heaven when the klaxon near the break-room door sounded, startling Kevin enough to drop his change. He cursed our dispatcher as a few quarters rolled under the vending machines, "Fucking hell, Clara! You can just use the goddamn intercom, ya know!"

Stifling a chuckle, I stood up, tossing the remnants of my lunch into the Burger Shot bag it came in, greasy with its given bounty, and chucked the caloric conflagration into the trash.

"Don't mind him, love. He gets crabby if he misses lunch when he's on his period", I cooed.

"Got a lift ticket out at Sandy Shores. Who wants it?", the voice of our dispatcher queried through the speakers.

I looked to Kevin, but all I got back were eye-daggers, so I raised my hand, despite the fact that she couldn't see me, "I've got ya, love. Skids up in 2."

"Roger that."

Standing up, I snatched my aviator shades from my front pocket and flicked them on in the closest I could get to a single motion, giving Kevin my best Maverick impression. "Don't worry, Goose. We can play shirtless volleyball when I get back. I know how that makes you happy when you're depressed."

"Fuck you", he responded.

"Not without buying me dinner first!", I chimed as I made my way out the door to the helipad.

I'd gone through all my checks in record time, which had me feeling pretty good, and was quickly on my way to the client. Some kinda big shot up-and-comer in town, according to our dispatcher. Personal Merryweather service like this wasn't cheap, so you had to be making some kinda moves in this god-forsaken town to afford such high-level luxury service. Somehow, I doubted he earned his fortune in the pictures.

The LZ was somewhere just north of the Sandy Shores airfield, which made me wonder why the guy didn't just charter a bird from there to wherever he needed to go. But hey, he was the big-shot, and the big-shots can waste their money and time however they want.

I was just past the penitentiary, the airfield coming in sight, when I knew this was going to be one of "those" days.

Explosions dotted the landscape, the airfield a hornets nest of violent activity. I could see at least 5 destroyed, burning wrecks of what I assume used to be LSPD cruisers. A riot van was overturned near the western end of the airfield runway, someone using it for cover to fire on the 10 or so non-destroyed police vehicles that were fast closing in. Somehow, I knew that was my client. Since the fuzz were between him and the birds by the hanger, I knew why he called.

Shouting over the choppers loudspeaker, I began my decent, calling to him, "I'm coming in! Clear the LZ!"

His AK (which I could now see was solid gold) lit up like an epileptic lightning bug, pouring screaming hot lead out from behind the riot van and nearly tearing the top off of an approaching cruiser.

I was probably about 20 feet from landing behind the overturned riot van before the cops caught on that I wasn't one of theirs and started fiercely peppering my bird.

My client answered back by tossing something towards the cruisers. The small objects rolled under the closest officers vehicle before detonating, sending the car and the charred corpses of its passenger and driver into the night sky.

"Hmm..", I said aloud, mildly impressed, "...grenades. Not bad. Don't see people use those much anymore. It's all sticky bombs these days."

I was now touching down behind the riot van, and I got a good look at my client. I was always eager to see what crazy outfits these rich psychos dressed themselves in. It usually ran quite the gamut. I'd seen guys in animal masks, hockey masks, short shorts, flight suits, underpants only, $5,000 suits with a mohawk, a pair of jammy jams and a beer hat, ...the works. Once I even dropped some ammo to a guy I swear didn't have arms, but still had hands somehow, just floating there at the end of nothing by his waist. This town was crazy.

As I touched down, safe behind the armor of the riot van, I got my first, and last look at the client. He was wearing an owl-head mask, combat cargo pants and black combat boots. His torso was bare of clothing, but covered in tattoos. He was now holding a pink .50 cal, sprinting towards me.

After approaching to about 10 feet, he suddenly stopped and raised the gun towards me.

Fuck. It was one of these. I sighed and waited for the inevitable pop.

After the muzzle flashed and everything went black, I opened my eyes again. I was back in the break room, Kevin sitting at the lunch table, smoking a cigarette and reading the paper.

"Another wanna-be pilot, huh?," he said from behind the financial section.

"Yeah. Fuck those guys, man", I relented as I flopped down onto the old couch in the corner.