#voop

"...And I tell you, I vooped 'em so good there wasn't even one iota left."

"I mean, yeah, there shouldn't ever be any... iotas left when you take someone out with a fusion rifle. That's their whole thing. That's what they do. They disintegrate."

"Well, yeah, duh, sure—but y'know how sometimes you don't land the full burst and just, like, wing what you were aiming at, and it just burns a chunk out of something—"

"OK, but that's not a proper hit though. And even when you miss a few bolts you can still achieve total disintegration. It just depends on the charge strength of the bolts and how much energy you impart to the target—but the point is if you do enough damage any fusion rifle should completely vaporize whatever you hit."

"Right, sure, but sometimes some of them leave a little bit of, like, dust or whatever behind, right? I'm just saying this Awoken kit is not like that, it really doesn't leave anything to sweep up, no grime or residue or nothing."

"Well... actually—"

"OK listen: I just learned the word 'iota' and I wanted to try and use it in conversation, alright? Light's sake. You gotta be such a hardass all the time?"

[Huh. So that’s what happened to Voop.]

“With this, I can finally voop-spray the pain away.”

“I have questions.”

“I anticipated you would! You see, after months of careful excavation of the Europan ice, I’ve finally recovered and restored this Golden Age fusion rifle, and—”

“Why go to all that trouble? We have fusion rifles at home.”

“We certainly do, but none of them emit a horizontal spread! For some reason, no foundry or City weaponsmith has yet constructed the type of polarized emitter muzzle necessary to fire a horizontal fan of bolts.”

“Why does that matter?”

“Because I’m curious, and would like to be able to mortally disintegrate my enemies more easily with the forgiving geometry of a fan-shaped discharge.”

“Fair enough. Does it work?”

“I am scheduled for Crucible matches all afternoon, during which I intend to test the efficacy of the weapon and perfect my voop-spray tactics! Would you care to join me, match queue availability permitting?”

“Uh, yeah. No matter how it goes, this’ll be fun to watch.”

"So you think you can voop?"

"Uh... yeah. It's not hard. You take aim and hold the trigger."

"How wrong you are, novice."

"Dude, I'm at least three hundred years older than you."

"Granted... yet when it comes to the art of voopery, it seems you have not yet begun to learn!"

"Voopery? Seriously?"

"It is a fine art, requiring both a fine instrument and fine sensibilities."

"Uh-huh. Fine."

"To voop is not merely to discharge a weapon in the vulgar sense, but to unburden one's soul through—what are you doing?"

"Loading my... vooper. See, this one's Vanguard issue, from before your time. Been using it since before your Ghost started rummaging in the junk heap you were rezzed out of. Gonna show you I know how it works."

"And how do you intend to do that?"

"...Run."

“Time to ring in the new year.”

“What are you talking about? Solstice was last week, it’s already the new year.”

“I’m allowing leeway for calendrical variations. And there’s still plenty of ringing to do after the first week anyway. The Dawning continues, after all.”

“OK, granted—but what does that have to do with a fusion rifle?”

“How better to kick off the festivities than with a little voopage?”

“What festivities?”

“Are you deliberately missing the point here or are you, like, tired or something?”

“Sorry, definitely the latter.”

“Partying late again?”

“Shruggernaut kept me up all night playing some weird ancient game. Pops, or... poms, or something. Didn’t quite retain the details after drinking her nog all night, but you sit on the ground and slam little discs into a stack of other little discs... I didn’t really get it, but Shrugs was alarmingly into it.”

“Lucky you, spending the night at Edna’s. Sounds like you had a real good time.”

“It wasn’t like that... She had half a dozen people stay late, mostly her Titan friends who are apparently all obsessed with this stupid game. Dammit, what was it called? Dugs?”

“Sounds like you need to clear your head. A little voop will be just the thing.”

“I don’t know why you think a fusion rifle is going to help with a hangover.”

“Well, if the brisk air on the Europan ice doesn’t do it, then total disintegration will.”

“You wanna... shoot me?”

“Why not? A quick voop, you’re evaporated, your Ghost brings you back, and poof! No hangover.”

“...I think I’ll try coffee first.”