"Acceptable. Half now, half when they're dead," the woman said, taking out the equivalent of five hundred Batavian Dollars in credits, setting them on the table. As the closest one to them, Amy took the credits and handed them to the rest of the mercs, keeping all the money in the open so none of them would - incorrectly - accuse her of trying to steal from them. Once they all had their money, hands went to weapons. Amy flipped the safety off on her flechette pistol - each one propelled to unnatural force thanks to micro-gravity generators - and slowly pulled the weapon from her belt as the toughs drew closer. Their client hunched over a little more, hiding her face as best she could, and then-

"Now," Amy murmured, jumping to her feet and firing her gun, the metal spike flying out of her pistol into and through the neck armor of her target, leaving one of the toughs gurgling and pawing at his neck as he tried to breathe. There was a chance the guy could survive, so as the rest of the mercs started shooting, Amy fired again, hesitating only for a few breaths as she nudged her gun to the left slightly, accounted for the man's movements and then -

The spike this time embeded itself in the man's eye, punching all the way through his skull and flying into the floor almost exactly where she'd intended it to.

The toughs that survived the first rounds of shots started to shoot back, and Amy ducked to avoid a spray of plasma bolts that burned through the air just above her. She rolled under the table as she heard one of her fellow mercs get hit and peeked out from under, firing right into the chest of another tough. [i]Next time, wear your armor in the bar, Amy.[/i] 

The whole thing took less than a minute and a half - two of toughs were left, but as the rest of the bar had reacted to the fighting - no doubt mostly just wanting to not get shot in the crossfire - the two had found nearly every gun in the taproom pointed at them, and they weren't stupid enough - apparently - to keep fighting at that point.