Free Cloneworld - 04 by Andy Remic

moved sideways, feet not so much clanking as sliding. She obviously thought something bad was beyond those double doors. Franco wiped his sweating hands on the only bit of cloth available; his underpants. Shit. What I'd give for a decent Permatex WarSuit right now! And a Bausch & Harris Sniper Rifle with SSGK digital sights. And a D5 shotgun! Oh, for a D5 shotgun!
    As they reached the doors, Mrs Strogger suddenly stopped. She glanced at Franco. "Lots of chefs beyond," she said. "Bad ganger chefs, if I'm not very much mistaken, and they're all fast and tough, and jabber-jabber when they attack. I am not at full power; I need a recharge socket. There will be a recharge socket in the prison kitchens."
    Franco nodded. "Let's do it," he said.
    Mrs Strogger suddenly reared up, and slammed both fists against the doors, wrenching them from their hinges and catapulting them across the prison kitchens. The doors whammed, spinning and crashing through pans of bubbling soup and a hundred steel plates and trays and pans, and the air was filled with an eruptive, explosive cacophony of clattering metal, of screaming steel, of raining kitchen appliances. In the midst of this sudden chaos, Franco saw about twenty chefs, identifiable by their trademark starched white uniforms and their cheery tall chef's hats. Each chef was a big, cheery-looking chap, with a bearded, happy, fat face, wobbling jowls, and a serious overhang of gut from maybe ten thousand excessive tasting sessions. In any other setting, the whole scene would have appeared friendly, convivial, a jolly jaunt into the world of prison cooking; but within the blink of an eye, the cheery plump chefs had armed themselves with knives and cleavers, machetes and skewers, and a hail of weapons flashed through the air like the deadliest of archery fire...
    Franco unleashed a burst of green laser bolts, which fizzed across the kitchen expanse, blackening steel, knocking over pans of bubbling broth , and knocking two chefs backwards with chomping, hate-filled faces and waving machetes. They disappeared behind the steel cupboards as Franco grunted and hit the ground fast. Knives and skewers clattered overhead, falling around him with a musical tinkling of steel. Franco glanced left, at the razor-sharp cleaver. His eyes narrowed. "The cheeky bastards," he said, reaching up to grab a steel tray from the work surface. He stood, holding the tray up as a makeshift shield, and looked down to where Mrs Strogger was cowering behind a large cupboard. "A bit of help wouldn't go amiss, you big quivering pussy!" he snarled.
    "I need my recharge socket!" she whimpered. "I need more power, more energy, more zaza zoomph!"
    Franco stared at her, then sighed. "Great," he muttered. "Stuck in a firefight with a useless bloody pacifist pussy org!" Something heavy bounced off his tray with a mammoth clang! and Franco cursed, raised his laser cannon, and shot a chef in the chest, blowing the hapless culinary maestro backwards through the swing doors and out of sight. "That's for making fucking celebrity TV programs," he muttered, and ducked as another chef appeared, this one with a rifle.
    There came a whiz and ping as a projectile ricocheted off the wall behind Franco and embedded itself in Mrs Strogger's thigh. She didn't seem to notice.
    Franco aimed his laser cannon over the steel cupboard, watched the chef reloading an ancient battered Crack Rifle, and Franco shot him in the stomach. "That's for flooding the Festive Market with shite cookery books," he snarled, spittle launching from his aggravated lips.
    "Aaah," said Mrs Strogger, as if taking a huge and relieving dump, as Franco watched, nervous now, as fifteen chefs appeared carrying Crack Rifles. They started to load the weapons, hunkering down behind steel benches, their tall white hats wavering.
    Franco glanced down. Mrs Strogger had slumped down, opened a flap at her groin, and extracted a long thick black cable, which she'd plugged into an IWS -