2304
August 19, 3093
The Late Night Alibi
Galaport, Galatea
Lyran Alliance

“Look, Alex, I know you’re looking for that big thing, but the unit just does not have the reputation that they need to do that sort of work right now.” Nathan Hooker said calmly, for the seventh time. “You have to start small and work your way up. That’s how this works.”

Nathan sat at one of the four tables closer to the bar with three other men and one woman, another man lurked not far away and made sure that the table was as private a place as possible. The other three tables there were empty because of that third man 

The bar was not the best of places, certainly not what he was used to but it was where his client was drinking so that was where he went. The other occupants of the table looked at the youngest man there, waiting for him to say his mind… which he did frequently.

“It’s crap.” Captain Alexander Yau replied and took a drink from the beer bottle in front of him. He made a face at the taste, but said nothing. Cheap Capellan beer had one thing going for it… it was cheap. “We need the cash, Player.”

Nathan winced slightly at the nickname he’d been hung with but continued on. “Yeah, I know. Trust me. Still, what we need to do right now is get you and… “he made a vague gesture towards the various tables that filled the Late Night Alibi, most of which were filled by the mercenaries of Chaos Incorporated “… everyone else working and bringing that money in.”

“So you can get your cut?” Alexander suggested then smiled at Nathan’s pause, waving off any concerns or excuses the other man had going through his mind. “It’s all good, Nate. I understand that no one in this life works for free. What do you have in mind?”

“I’ve got three possible contracts with the Combine and another working for some corporation at their holdings on the edge of the Periphery. That’s really about all there is out there.”

“What about the ones from the Lyrans and the Davions that I saw on the board?” Alex took another swig of his beer, barely keeping from making a face this time. “Don’t they want their stuff done too?”

“Yeah, but by someone that they trust and have worked with before.” Nathan said. “Like I told you earlier…” 

“You’ve got to work your way up.” The mercenary captain finished. “Right. So, what are the Dracs offering in the way of contracts?”

“There’s three of them. One on Kessel, a garrison duty positon to supplement the 52nd Dieron Regulars. One on New Samarkand for cadre duty with the 5th Sun Zhang Cadre. Last one is a details classified contract with no DCMS support or liaison.” Nathan clucked his tongue at that one. “Better pay then the others too, which screams ISF or some other black op to me.”

“Let me make sure I have these right. The first one is to be expendables for whatever’s too dangerous for their own people to want to deal with, the next is to baby sit and play pop-up target to the new kids, and the last one is to play spook. Great choices there, Player.” The edge on Alex’s sarcasm could have cut ferro-fibrous armor. 

“No one said it would be easy, Alex.” Nathan replied. 

“What’s the last one? The one working for the corporate people?”

“Garrison duty on Landfall, which is on the border of the Free Worlds League and the Periphery. Protecting corporate holdings on the planet and killing the pirates that have been hitting the place.”

“That doesn’t sound too bad except for being that close to the Periphery.” Alex mused and looked at Nathan. “Which one pays the most?”

Nathan grimaced. “The one that looks like it’s working for the ISF or some other intelligence agency black op, of course.”

“Of course.” Alexander agreed. “What about the rest?”

“All about the same pay, really. The cadre work is a little more money, but not much and not as much as what the potential black op pays.” Nathan shrugged and took a drink from his whiskey sour. “If you want money, it’s the black op one. If you want an easy time of it, go to New Samarkand.”

“I cannot see this crew playing patty cake with a bunch of young samurai.” Said Tynon Lu, the head mechanic for Chaos Incorporated and lifelong mentor and friend to Alexander. He was easily the oldest man at the table and probably in the running to be the oldest man in the bar with the exception of the bartender / owner himself. “There would be an honor duel before the end of the first week.”

“Which would end with one of ours shooting one of theirs PDQ.” Lieutenant Tiana “Risky” Ander-Hsien supplied. She led the unit’s platoon of battle armor troopers and was the toughest person in the bar by far. “It would just be bad.”

“I have to agree.” SRLT Jackson “Madman” Tallman said. Like Alexander, he was a MechWarrior, and helped to run Chaos Incorporated.

“Thoughts on Kessel?” Alexander asked, his gaze flicking back and forth between the three other mercenaries.

“Garrison duty is all well and good, easy pay and easy duty. But I don’t think that’s all the Dracs have in mind when they hire someone with those kinds of terms.” Tiana replied. “I think you’re right that we’ll get stuck on the sharp end of someone’s stick and the Dragon won’t even shed a tear over our loss.”

Tynon nodded. “I would agree with that assessment of the contract.” He quirked an eyebrow at Nathan who just shrugged which made Tynon nod again. “Yes. I think it would be best to find a different contract.”

Alexander flicked his gaze to Jackson who held his gaze for a moment then nodded. Alexander returned that with a slight lowering of his chin and looked at Nathan. “You sure about the other being a black op?”

“Nope, but it feels like it. When they don’t tell you everything about a contract, that means that there is something they want to hide from you. When they don’t tell you everything about a contract and they tell you there’s no support or liaison for it either, then not only are they hiding something from you, they want to hide it from everyone.”

“Makes sense.” Jackson said then took a drink from his beer. “I don’t know if we want to put our head in that particular lion’s mouth or not. Black ops tend to be… messy. Especially if you are the only loose end in the operation… people that do black ops work don’t like loose ends.”

“That’s valid.” Tiana put in. “I think I almost walked into something like that at one point… by accident mind you.”

“How do you ‘accidentally’ get into a black op?” Tynon asked. 

“Wrong LZ at the wrong time.” She replied simply. “The unit I was with started to get set up in a LZ after we landed and this lovely man with a Rabid Fox patch on his fatigues indicated that it would be much healthier if we got the hell out of there right then. The captain was a newbie to the field and started to argue with the man, who then drew his pistol and shot him in each leg just as quick as you please. The rest of us started to draw down on him but then half a dozen Infiltrator suits popped up out of nowhere. We all stopped and the nice man repeated his instructions: get the hell out.”

“Then what?” Jackson asked.

Tia shrugged. “Kept our hands away from our weapons, grabbed the captain, and got the hell out. That’s what you do when lovely young men with Rabid Foxes patches on their fatigues say that sort of thing.” She took a drink from her beer. “And that’s why I always look sideways at anyone named ‘Lynch’.” 

“Probably a good call.” Nathan interjected. “I’ve known several guys and gals named ‘Lynch’ and most of them were a little… spooky. And not in the ghostly spirit way.” He took a sip of his drink then noted the looks from everyone else around the table. “What? I meet lots of people, okay?”

Jackson raised his hand and waited until Mia looked at him. “What about the captain?”

“He got sent to a medical facility somewhere and went back to Supply but with a decoration for getting wounded in combat plus a promotion to major because of his heroism.” Tia shrugged. “The rest of us went to the Capellan March and shot at Sun Tzu’s boys and girls while they shot back.”

“Right.” Alexander interjected. “So that brings us back to square one. Am I right?”

“What about the corporate contract?” Jackson asked. “Yeah, it puts on the edge of nowhere, but it pays and we don’t have to worry about our employers killing us so we don’t talk about what happened.”

“I don’t know about that one either. Something just sounds… wrong.” Tia replied. “And I am relatively sure that it’s not because I don’t like corporations and all their trappings.”

“We have to put all of that behind us.” Alex said. “It no longer matters who we fight for and it doesn’t always matter who is right. All that really matters is that we get paid because we are now mercenaries, who fight for whichever flag our employer flies but only so long as he pays his bills.”

“That means we can go work for House Davion, right?” Mia asked sweetly.

Alex paused and contemplated his almost empty beer for a moment before looking at Mia. “Let’s not get too carried away about this whole mercenary thing.”

They all laughed for a moment, Nathan only following the crowd because he wasn’t in the least amused and wasn’t sure where the joke came in, but everyone did indeed laugh. After a moment, things settled down and the talk about contracts paused while Pammy… it’s what she introduced herself as… came by with a fresh round of beers and another whiskey sour for Nathan. 

Waiving Nathan away when the man started for his wallet, Alex paid her with a couple of twenty C-bill notes and waited for her to leave with their empties before continuing. “I think we should look hard at the corporate job. The pay is lower but the contract looks to be a cake walk and all we have to do is shoot at some pirate types from the Periphery when they come calling.”

“Not everyone from the Periphery is running around in an UrbanMech that was built in the late 20’s anymore, Alex. These guys could have some good gear.” Jackson pointed out.

“Valid, but we know that anyone we face on the other contracts is bound to be packing serious heat… like ULTRA heat or top-shelf units from the Lyran Alliance.” Alex replied. “If we hit the Periphery, then we at least have the chance to shoot at your UrbanMech instead of some hardware from the Wobbies or the Clans.”

Jackson pondered that for a moment then nodded his agreement. Alex’s eyes went to the other mercenaries at the table, looking for objections. When none were offered, he nodded and looked to Nathan. “Get in touch with those corporate people and see what you can find out concerning particulars of the contract.”

“I can do…” Nathan started but stopped when the door to the bar crashed open and several people came piling in from the outside. Civilians screamed or made their way to cover, but the mercenaries in the bar, many of them troopers from Mia’s battle armor platoon, went for their sidearms and sighted in on the intruders. However, one of the mercenaries acted differently.

LT Vincent “Crow” Hobbs stepped from the position he’d occupied since Alexander sat down and put himself between Alexander and the doorway. His hands snaked inside his leather trench coat, each one coming out with a machine pistol. A small red beam danced from each weapon and landed on the face of the woman that was standing in the open doorway. The two men that were with her slammed the doors shut and locked them, ignoring the protests from the bartender. The woman made no movement at all but her eyes blazed.

“Crow… lose the guns. “the woman said, her voice harsh and almost as cold as her glare. “It’s me.”

Crow said nothing and kept his weapons trained on her until Alex stepped up beside him being very careful to not touch the other man. “Crow… stand down. Its Sara.”

After another moment, the tall MechWarrior nodded and put the weapons away then stepped back to his normal place, a pace behind and to the right of Alex, who was moving towards the woman. “Sara… where the hell have you been?”

For a moment, Lieutenant Sara “Bandit” Hammond continued to glare daggers at Crow, who ignored her, before focusing on Alex. “We were out having a good time and things went south… fast.”

“How south?” Alex asked, his voice tense. It was never good when Sara said something went “south”. 

“Like polar ice cap south.” She snarled and stormed towards the bar, shouldering her way past Crow in the process. “Vodka straight. Two shots. And none of that cheap crap either… something from Tikonov.”

While the bartender scrambled to obey, Sara looked at Alex. “So we went to this bar and it turned out to be a heavy gangster place, right? All sorts of pinstriped suits and slicked back hair all over the place but we were there so went ahead and got some drinks so we could relax.”

“You have a fucked up idea of how to relax.” Snarled Simon Grobler, one of the techs that Tynon had signed on while rounding up techs for the unit’s Mechs, as he marched by on stiff legs. The man was a wizard with BattleMechs but had the double handicap of knowing how good he was on top of being an asshole, which he also owned up to.

“You were not complaining earlier.” Sara snapped back. “Fucker had a girl on each knee and a drink in his hand and he’s complaining to me?”

Alex cut her off with a swipe of his hand. “Sara, what the hell happened?”

“We were having a good time, drinking and making some noise then these two guys with broad shoulders and no necks came up and asked us to leave. We refused and they insisted.” She looked away from Alex and slammed back one of her shots before continuing. “When we protested, more of them came closer and things got a little… difficult.”

Alex closed his eyes. “Did someone get shot?”

“Yes. Several people actually.” She licked at her lips. “But they looked like they were going to draw first so we just beat them to the punch.”

“Fuck.” Tia muttered and glared at Sara, who ignored her entirely.

Jackson spoke up at this point. “Where’s Rudi?”

“He was one of the guys that got shot.” Sara dropped her eyes as she replied. In the silence, she turned and snapped back the second shot then motioned for the bartender to give her another. “He went down when things started and the rest of us backed out, guns blazing. I got the guy that got Rudi and maybe another one too… he was to the back, not one of the muscle boys, but one of the guys in the back of things, looked like he was giving orders.”

“We got four or maybe five of them, but only because we opened fire first.” LTJG Mitchell “Rooster” Pine said as he approached the gathering. “Me, Bandit, Rudi, and Grobler… Rudi went down, I got hit… “he indicated the makeshift bandage on his arm. “… but we got the hell out and came back here since we knew this is where you guys were.”

“You brought a bunch of pissed off gangsters here? After shooting holes in them?!?” Tia demanded then stormed off to the door, looking through the windows herself.

“Any ideas who it was you were shooting at?” Nathan asked, his voice nervous. “Because some of these guys who look like the guys you were describing are serious players in the world and not just this one.”

“No clue who they were.” Sara admitted. “And we didn’t bring them here, we did some serious moving and some back alleys to make sure we weren’t being followed. And we weren’t… there’s no way they could have caught us in my Jezebel.”

“Fuck. Your getaway car was a hot pink, 3094 Maserati hovercar?” Jackson growled. “Sure, there must be a billion of those on the roads.”

Alex licked his lips. “Sara… did they see your car?”

“Only when they were shooting at it.” She assured him and drank the next shot. Calmer now, Sara continued. “Alex, I don’t think they saw the car, but if they did then they would be able to identify it and… yes… “she nodded towards Jackson. “… Jezebel is easy to recognize. So if they saw her, then they can find out who she belongs to.”

“Hammer… Sickle… door.” Mia barked as she marched back towards Alex and the group at the bar. The two men she barked at went to the door to act as look outs, weapons drawn but at their sides. She never looked to see if they would do so, but knew they would all the same. She looked to Alex. “I didn’t see anyone out there, but that could just mean that they aren’t here yet.”

“Let’s not stick around. Get everyone rounded up and we head back towards the base.” He ordered. “Mia, get some of your people on alert there… have them suit up. It might be overreacting but then again, it might not.”

“It’s probably not.” Nathan said. “These guys are going to be pissed that you killed some of their people. Plus, you left a body behind and I am sure that Rudi has ID on him, including his MRBC card showing he’s a registered mercenary and with what unit. They’ll know to load for bear and BattleMech if they come calling.”

“Yeah, definitely suit up.” Alex said and turned to Jackson as Mia started to gather her people inside the bar with shouted orders. “Get the rest of the MechWarriors together and the techs and get everyone moving. We move as a pack and don’t get separated from each other no matter what. Got me?”

“Got it, Random.”  Jackson replied, using Alex’s callsign to show he was on a war footing. He then moved towards the MechWarriors that were gathering. 

Alex turned to where Sara and her wingman, Rooster, were standing. “You two get with some other people and hitch rides. Your little Jezebel is going to get shoved down the hill and left behind.” When Sara started to protest, Alex stopped her with a gesture. “Call it the price of fucking up, Bandit. You may have just pulled down some serious shit on us because you were out having a good time in the wrong place.”

Again, Sara started to say something but stopped when Rooster reached over and squeezed her forearm. She looked at him and he shook his head. With a sigh and a sniff, Sara nodded her understanding before tucking Rooster’s arm into hers and heading towards Jackson. Alex’s eyes followed her as she left then closed for a moment as he said a silent prayer to any deities that might be inclined to listen and be merciful. He doubted that many were so inclined.

“Risky.” He said and Mia looked over at him. “Get a couple of your guys to get that damned car down the hill and plow it into something. Don’t let them get hurt but trash that damned car but good. It can be a part of our reconciliation message to whoever these guys are.”

“On it, Random.” She replied and started barking orders, pulling off a squad of battle armor troopers to get rid of the car.

Alex looked to the bartender and reached into his pocket, pulling out a folded over band of C-bills. He peeled off several hundred C-bill notes and tossed them on the bar, paused, and then peeled off two more, adding them to the pile. The bartender watched but said nothing.

“These are to apologize for us causing trouble for you.” Alex explained calmly to the man, who had been listening to everything that was being said with eyes growing wider every moment while a bit of nervous sweat was forming on his brow. “By all means, if someone were to come here and inquire after us, feel free to cooperate fully with them. Protect yourself by telling them everything you have heard and do not feel that we would hold that against you. This has nothing to do with you or your establishment, so there should be no repercussions against you as long as you tell them everything about us that you know.”

Alex turned away then stopped and turned back to the bartender while reaching into his coat. The bartender’s eyes went wide and he stepped backwards, causing Alex to smile slightly, despite himself. “Don’t worry… okay?” Alex chuckled a little. He felt bad about scaring the bartender but it was still amusing as hell right now. He continued into his jacket and pulled out a business card then placed it on the bar. “If they come and want to talk to me about this, then they can contact me here.”

“Of course… I… “the bartender took the card and placed it into his apron, quickly followed by the C-bills. “You should go.”

“Chaos Incorporated… “Alex called out loudly, drawing the eyes of all the mercenaries left in the bar. He put one finger in the air and made a circling motion with it. “Let’s mount up.”

As the other mercenaries left the bar, many with weapons still drawn, Alex turned away from the bartender again and headed towards the door himself. Crow and Tynon followed him out into the parking lot where more than a dozen motorcycles and another half dozen cars, all full of mercenaries, were idling.

Alex and Crow went to their separate motorcycles while Tynon got into a car with a couple of his techs. Tia and a pair of her battle armor troopers moved their motorcycles up with his. The squad that had taken care of Sara’s hovercar roared up in an open topped SUV and fell in with the other vehicles that were already heading towards the base.

With a heavy sigh, Alex motioned his ‘command group’ forward. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

A Join Post by,
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 3838
Contract Count: 3838


0927
August 21, 3093
Mercenary Billet #332
10km N/NE of Galaport
Galatea, Lyran Alliance

“What…?” A bleary eyed Captain Alexander asked in a soft voice that he hoped would not annoy the gnomes that were rapping out a thrash metal beat in his skull with industrial-sized hammers. When there was no answer, he felt around for a moment and then picked up the still buzzing communicator and pressed the talk button. “What?”

[[Captain…]] 

That brought Alex a little more awake. No one called him by his rank with the opening of a conversation unless there was a problem. And there always seemed to be a problem.

[[… there are several gentlemen here that are wanting to speak with you concerning an… altercation last night at a club.]] 

Belatedly recognizing the voice at the other end of the communicator, Alex asked. “Define ‘several’ for me, Flush.”

Trooper Monty “Flush” O’Neill responded in a lower voice. [[I count five vehicles, about four in each of them. All in suits, all packing heat, and all looking serious about talking with you.]]

“You suited up?” Alex asked as he stumbled out of bed, almost tripping over the blond that was between him and the edge. 

[[Fuck, yes. You said to be expecting trouble, so Risky told everyone to suit up for gate duty.]]

“Good.” Alexander grabbed a jumpsuit that didn’t look too badly battered and started to pull it on. “Stall them and I will be out there in about 15 minutes or so.”

[[Right. Sure.]]

“And call up the rest of your squad.” 

[[Called them first… like I am supposed to. Pinky is just coming online now.]]

“Right… I knew that. Carry on.” Alexander dropped the communicator and went back to pulling his jumpsuit on. The blonde on the bed stirred for a moment but then went right back to sleep. Alexander found himself trying to remember her name, then shoving that thought to the side as being really not that important right now. Maybe later.

He looked at her for a moment and noticed that the tattoo between her shoulder blades said “Place drink here” and had a dotted line circle about the right size for a can or bottle of beer. It was then he decided that her name would not be important later either, but having one of the troopers get her the hell out of here and then him seeing the doctor for a check-up would be.
Alex stepped into his MechWarrior combat boots, snagged his pistol rig, and headed out the door buckling it on. The jumpsuit was a maroon color with a number of logos on it… most of them being either associated with motorcycle shops or tattoo parlors. The jumpsuit was one of the survivors from when he had done a stint of racing before hanging that up as being too damned dangerous… which was when he set his sights back on being a full-time mercenary MechWarrior.

After strapping on his pistol and settling it in place, Alex pulled a communit from his belt and settled it on his ear. “Random online.”

[[Copy that, Random.]] came the steady voice of Lieutenant Nigel “Woody” Atwood from the main communit in the base. [[ Entropy, Anarchy, and Bedlam are online. Others are scrambling. Crow is moving to meet you. Madman, Ice, and Thorn are online and powered up, but waiting your word. Dice is coming online. SITREP is tame.]]

Alex mulled all that through his head as the lean figure of Lieutenant Vincent “Crow” Hobbs joined him, saying not a word as he did. Somehow Crow had gotten it into his head that Alex needed a bodyguard and that Crow was the one to do it for him. Alex had no clue where the man came up with that particular idea, thinking that it might have been Tynon’s doing, but had yet to regret Crow’s presence. He'd saved Alex’s ass a time or four since becoming a fixture in Alex’s shadow.

He set his mind back to Woody’s report… three squads of battle armor were online with the other two getting ready to go right then. Four of the unit’s MechWarriors were in their Mechs but only three were currently engines on and ready to go, but they were holding in place. The appearance of the Mechs could possibly be seen as a threat and that was really not where Alexander wanted to go with this situation at the moment.

And if it was, he had twelve battle armor troopers suited up right there with him and a lance of Mechs only a whistle away. His hand rested on the reassuring weight of the 12mm autopistol on his hip. The extended magazine gave him a solid 25 rounds to play with if he needed or wanted them. Of course, if it came down to him needing the pistol when he had Mechs and battle armor all over the place, then things would be in one hell of a bad place. 
 
Alex arrived at the front gate to see six black SUVs parked just outside. A number of men in dark suits, all wearing sunglasses, stood near the vehicles, most of them with weapons hanging off their shoulders from slings. Hands rested either on or near the weapons, but none on the triggers… trigger guards maybe but not the triggers.

He also noted the mercenaries that were about… the entire platoon of twenty battle armor troopers was there, all suited up in their Fa Shih battle armor. Several of the other mercenaries in the unit were there too, MechWarriors with their hands on their gun belts, hanging close to their weapons’ handles. The two intel officers, Lieutenants Felix “Ghost” Cornelius and Janis “Amber” Rider but they were off to the side instead of being in the middle of things, like they did. 

Neither Lieutenant Sara “Bandit” Hammond, the instigator of this trouble, nor her wingman, Lieutenant Junior Grade Mitchell “Rooster” Pine were anywhere to be seen. That was more than fine as far as Alex was concerned… if they weren’t immediately visible then it might help keep things calmer and this whole thing could get resolved quickly and without bloodshed. Maybe.

As Alex got closer and became visible from around the others, a door on one of the SUVs opened and another man stepped out. He wore an air of menace around him like others might a cloak and did not seem the least bit intimidated by the amount of firepower that was arrayed in front of him. Alex smiled to himself… he’d see how long that lasted if the Mechs stepped out of the hanger.

Alex stopped just inside the now open gates with Crow a few paces behind and to the right of him, and several of the battle armor suits looming nearby. He squinted at the man in front of him, who was slowly removing a pair of black leather gloves from his hands and handing them over to another man, who tucked them away.

“Morning.” Alex ventured.

“Good morning.” The other man replied, his gaze wandering over the assembled mercenaries then landing on Alex. 

Alex shivered slightly as the flat grey eyes locked on him like a targeter but he kept it hidden as best he could and smiled. “I’m Captain Alexander Yau… I’m the commanding officer for Chaos Incorporated. I would assume that you’re from the people that some of my guys had a…” Alex searched for a good word. “… an altercation with last night.”

“Frank Rossi.” The man replied. “And I do represent Mr. Anthony DiLeo and his associates. They would be the ones that your… people… had that altercation with.” Rossi pulled off his sunglasses. “Though we better describe it as a fuck up of a shootout in the middle of a bar. An unnecessary shoot out at that.”

“I happen to agree with you, Mr. Rossi.” Alex began. “So, I’d like to talk with…”

“Right now, Mr. DiLeo has you talking with me.” Rossi interrupted. “He would be here himself, but cooler heads prevailed and he is dealing with other matters.” Rossi spat on the ground. “Like a funeral for his son.”

*Oh shit. * Alex thought, remembering Sara talking about someone in the back of the bar getting shot… someone that looked like they were giving orders. “I… see.” He licked his lips. “Please extend my condolences to Mr. DiLeo and the rest of his family. I apologize for this situation and for my people in their role in it.”

“Their role was to start it, Captain Yau.” Rossi replied, his eyes narrowing. “Mr. DiLeo’s first thought was to have you turn over the blonde bitch that started it, but again, cooler heads prevailed. Because we know that you wouldn’t do that… not without a fight anyway. And while we could win… “He noted Alex’s quickly smothered look of disbelief and poked Alex in the shoulder with one finger. “Don’t you fucking doubt it.  You got those tin soldiers here and the Mechs out in your hanger… all ten of them… and you could fuck some things up, but we would win.”

Neither the poke nor the sudden change in Rossi’s demeanor did anything for Alex’s temper. “Mr. Rossi… you’re right. You won’t be getting a hold of any of my people. Now, while I understand your boss’ anger and might even agree with it, do not threaten me until you are damned ready to back it up.”

Rossi smirked. “I’m glad we’re having this discussion out here. Man to man like this. Makes me feel good.” He sniffed and looked away for a moment then suddenly turned, punching Alex in the jaw as he did. “That made me feel better.” 

Alex staggered backwards and kept from falling only in part because Crow stepped up to catch him. An autopistol appeared in Crow’s other hand which prompted several of the gangsters to bring their weapons up. The members of Entropy Squad stepped forward, raising their guns as well. Everyone in the area froze as the tension went up several notches.

Rossi stood there, smiling with his arms open in invitation. “Go ahead and shoot. I don’t give a fuck.” Seemingly oblivious to the reaction it might cause, Rossi reached into his coat and pulled out a cigarette case then a cigarette from it. Leaving the cigarette unlit, he stuck it in his mouth and started to put the case away as he continued. “You can shoot me fucking dead right here and it won’t mean a thing to me or anybody else.” 

 He plucked the cigarette from his mouth and pointed it towards the mercenaries behind Alex. “Besides, while your tin boys here will kill all of us, it won’t happen before you die too. Then, with me dead, Mr. DiLeo won’t have a voice of reason going on at his shoulder and he gets to do this his way… old school ways. Then the real war will start and your people… including and most especially Sara Hammond… will get very dead very soon. One at a fucking time.”

Alex stood, pushing Crow’s gun arm down as he did. He then waved the other mercenaries down because Rossi was right and if things went down like that, then all hell would break loose. “Since he knows that I am not going to give up any of my people, what does Mr. DiLeo want?”

“Fifty million C-bills. Cash.” Rossi replied. He smiled slightly, reminding Alex of a snake. Behind him, Alex noticed that some of the gangsters had relaxed and lowered their weapons. Unfortunately, that didn’t mean all of them did. Rossi continued talking, drawing Alex’s gaze back to him. “And he wants it immediately.”

Alex paused and blinked at that, unable to say anything helpful for a moment. He had a feeling that he knew where this was going. “I don’t have that kind of cash on hand.”

“You have Mechs.” Rossi said, nodding towards the hangers looming at the back of the billet, confirming Alex’s fears. Rossi continued to talk, motioning in the air with his hand, the still unlit cigarette being used to punctuate what he said.

“Given they are used; you’d only get like 35 million from them if you sold them back to the DMM’s broker but you’d get another 11 million for the two Slayers and all of these… “he waved towards the platoon of Fa Shih suits. “… rice burners. Considering that doing such a thing would make your people have to disband, that’d be close enough for Mr. DiLeo.”

Alex could feel the mercenaries behind him tensing. This was getting closer to just becoming another blood bath that would lead to much worse things, of that he was sure. “I can’t do that, Mr. Rossi. I won’t.” He met Rossi’s eyes. “What other recourse do we have?”

“See… I knew it would come to this.” Rossi smiled and wagged his finger at Alex. “I knew you’d go off and try to wheel and deal this. Maybe you do some jobs for us… make a trade out of it. Your skills for our not killing you fucking dead. I told Tony that this would happen.” Rossi reached over and smacked one of the other gangsters in the shoulder with the back of his hand. “Didn’t I tell you this would happen, Tony?”

“You did, Mr. Rossi.” Tony confirmed in a voice that sounded like gravel in a cement mixer. Tony’s weapon, an automatic shotgun with twin barrels, was one of the weapons that hadn’t moved and it was pointed at Alex’s chest.

“I did.” Rossi’s smile slowly transformed into a smirk. “Thing is, there’s not a damned thing that I need done that I couldn’t already have done by half a dozen other outfits that are, one, already in my pocket and, two, are not a collection of fucking losers and misfits, running from their fucking pathetic shadows.”

Alex reddened slightly at that and could hear the shifting of the Fa Shih troopers behind him. In front of him, a number of the gangsters shifted as well… their hands sliding towards their weapons or bringing them up slightly, readying to fire. “Thing is Mr. Rossi… if we can’t deal and you try and force us to sell or give our Mechs up, that’s going to kill us just as sure as a bullet from your guns. That being the case, it’s not going to happen like that.”

Rossi grinned from ear to ear. “It’s going to happen the way I say it will, Alex.” He finally lit the cigarette, took a drag from it then tossed it onto the ground, rubbing it out on the cement with his foot. “Filthy habit… don’t take it up.”

He spat on the ground and looked at Alex for a moment before continuing. “Tell you what, Alex. Because I like you… you’ve got a week, that’s seven days, to come up with either 50 million C-bills, the titles for all your gear, or Sara Hammond.” He shrugged and dug into his jacket again, pulling the cigarette case back out. “While I would really like to meet Ms. Hammond, I really don’t care which one it is you decide to do.”

Rossi removed a cigarette and snapped the case closed. “What I really don’t want to see happen though is for you people to run. If you do that….” He shook his head and lit the cigarette. “… then I look like an idiot and Mr. DiLeo will be pissed off at me. And then, I have to kill you and everyone else in your unit in a spectacular fashion, just to make a statement.”

He took a heavy drag from the cigarette and blew the smoke into the sky. “I would lose face and have to do a lot of work, just to make sure everything looked good and was creative enough to make the coroner really work at identifying the bodies.” He tossed the cigarette on the ground next to the first one, again rubbing it out with the toe of his highly polished shoe then looked at Alex. “You aren’t going to make me do that, are you Alex?”

“Of course not.” Alex replied, his face rigid as if it had been chiseled from stone. “What makes you think I would do that?”

Rossi said nothing, just headed back to his SUV. When he reached the door, Tony opened it for him and held it as the smaller man stepped into the vehicle. Taking that as a signal, the other gangsters started getting into their own vehicles and drove off as a unit, leaving only a dust cloud and highly charged level of tension behind them.

Alex cleared his throat and opened his communit.  “Woody… give me an open mike.” He waited for a moment as Lieutenant Atwood opened the channel to all the live communits for Chaos Incorporated. “Staff meeting at 1000 hours. Everyone else, pack your gear. We are going to be making Mr. Rossi look like an idiot.”

Posted by,
Captain Alexander Yao
Callsign: Random
CTF-4L Cataphract
Head Cat Herder
Chaos Incorporated

Word count: 2862
Contract count: 6700

1019
August 21, 3093
Mercenary Billet #332
10km N/NE of Galaport
Galatea, Lyran Alliance

“What the hell are we going to do?” SRLT Jackson “Madman” Tallman asked as he leaned on the second hand dining room table that served the staff and officers of Chaos Incorporated as their conference table. The smaller room was packed with the staff and officers of the unit, each of which was generating a good amount of noise.

“Not panic would be a good start.” Lieutenant Mia “Risky” Anders-Hsien replied gruffly, her voice pitched to cut through the rest of the conversations going on, as she tossed a damp headband on the table. She was still hot and sweaty from standing around in her Fa Shih battle armor, waiting for something bad to happen. The “meeting” with Rossi couldn’t have taken more than twenty minutes, but it had felt like hours. “I say we just kick the front door down on their house and kill anything in a suit.”

“I think that might get the cops involved pretty damned quick, don’t you?” Lieutenant Sara “Bandit” Hammond snapped. She was more rumpled than the majority of the people there, sleep having eluded her most of the night, and what little she got involved lots of tossing and turning.

Tia rounded on her, eyes blazing. “Well, I don’t know.” She snarled back, her voice raising as she continued. “That thought didn’t seem to be a priority for you when you were starting a gun fight in the middle of a goddamned gangster club!”

Sara stood as well, getting into Tia’s face. “That whole damned night was a fuck-up, but I didn’t know what was going to happen with all of it, alright? I fucked up and I know it.”

“About time you figured that out too!” Tia stepped in so her nose was only a centimeter or five from Sara’s. “And now everyone in this unit might have to pay for your little night of fun.” She held Sara’s gaze until the other woman dropped her eyes then stepped back and looked at the only person actually sitting at the table. “Give her to them, Alex. It’ll clear everything up and teach this… teach her a lesson.”

“No, it won’t.” Jackson said. “It won’t teach her a damned thing. All it will do is get her dead and get us a bad rep for not taking care of our people.” 

“Like the rest of this isn’t going to?” Tia asked, gesturing to encompass the situation as a whole.

“We aren’t giving Sara to anyone.” Captain Alexander Yao said in a low voice as he slowly stood up then glanced at Sara, who wouldn’t meet his eyes. “I can’t say the thought didn’t cross my mind but it’s not going to happen. I wouldn’t do that to Sara or anyone else in this unit.”

“Alex…” Sara began then stopped speaking like she ran out of words when Alex met her eyes. She looked away from him and then around the room, not really looking at any one person. Saying nothing else, she quietly sat down in one of the chairs at the table.

“At this point, there is nothing we are going to be able to do about this that won’t ruin us one way or the other. So, we are going to get a contract and get the hell out of here.” Alex said. He nodded towards another occupant in the room, Nathan Hooker, Chaos Incorporated’s contract officer. “Nathan hasn’t been entirely brought up to date on the situation yet, but that’s more because of a lack of time since it happened.”

Nathan “Player” Hooker, Chaos Incorporated’s agent and contracting officer waved away the excuses. “I was asleep.” He remarked, which was obvious to everyone in the room. Nathan’s hair was sticking out in a dozen different directions and he was wearing sweats, neither of which was normal for the man. “it was a good sleep until I was woken up by one of the Mechs scraping against the side of the building while it was trying to ninja its way around the place.”

“You try getting a 60-ton Mech to move quietly.” Jackson said around a bagel. “Dice was doing his best to remain sight unseen until we needed the heavy stuff.”

“I know, I know. I am just bitching.” Nathan grumbled. “Still, we’re going to lose our deposit and have to pay for repairs to the building on top of that.”

Alex rubbed at the bridge of his nose with one hand. “Nathan… “

“Right, right. Not the time and different priorities right now.” Nathan pulled a noteputer from the battered hoodie he was wearing and consulted his notes. “With this whole thing with DiLeo, our options have just shrunk all to hell.”

“What do you mean?” Jackson asked then finished the rest of what was in his mouth before continuing. “I figured getting all the way out to the Periphery would do it for us.”

Nathan shook his head. “Guys like DiLeo have their hands everywhere and in every place. There are few places in the majority of the Inner Sphere that I wouldn’t be worried about him getting a hold of us somehow.”

“What do you suggest then?” Alex asked, not looking at Nathan as he spoke, but peering into the cup of coffee that he was slowly stirring with a stylus. 

“Go black.” Nathan replied. “Head into the Combine and do that black op for the ISF.”

“I thought you said that was a bad idea.” Tia stated. “Something about getting out there and being tied up as a loose end.”

“That could still happen.” Nathan agreed. “The thing is, we are out of options right now. If we stay anywhere near open field, then we have to worry about DiLeo’s goons showing up. By going deep into the Combine, which don’t like outsiders coming into their business uninvited in the first place, and then doing so during a hush-hush black operation, then we get double covered.”

The room went quiet as this was mulled over by the men and women present. Alex looked around the room.  “We should get comfortable because we aren’t leaving until we have a solution to this. So let’s everyone have a seat.” He suggested and sipped at the coffee in front of him. When everyone else was sat down, Alex looked them over. “Now does anyone have any other ideas besides Nathan’s? Or any comments on it?”

“It’s probably our best bet.” Lieutenant Felix “Ghost” Cornelius said from his corner of the room. He was one of the two intelligence officers that helped out with that sort of work for the unit. His number two, Lieutenant Janis “Amber” Rider was beside him nodding. “If nothing else, it buys us some time until we can figure out what to do about this DiLeo guy.” 

“Do you know him?” Alex asked.

Felix glanced at Janis, who stood up. “Anthony DiLeo was born on August 19, 3003 on Skye. His father was the don of a local crime family that was pretty successful but didn’t really get anywhere on the major stage. When his father passed and he took over, Anthony broadened the scope of the family until they had operations on about thirteen worlds.”

Janis leaned against the nearby wall as she continued speaking. “When the Clan invasion hit, he helped supply the guerilla forces using his transport network and was rewarded with a blind eye towards certain operations plus a bit more leniency if he was prosecuted for things that didn’t involve drugs, kidnapping, or murder.”

“His network became a network of informants, passing intel on the Clans back to the Lyrans and the Federated Commonwealth, in that order. When the Civil War hit, he turned his favor to Katrina and supported her against Victor’s people whenever he could.” Janis gave a wry smile. “As you can imagine, when everything ended, he got a bit more leniency for his operations from the next Archon.”

“He hides most of his business behind a network of transports and manufacturing of low end consumer goods.” Felix continued. “Small appliances, cheap electronics, and anything else that he could put together without having to employ a bunch of engineers. These operations make him more legitimate, but he keeps the other operations going on under the table… for old time’s sake if nothing else.” 

“What’s he in to? I mean; does he deal drugs or girls or what” Jackson asked. The room went silent for a moment and he looked around at the faces studying him. “What? A guy can’t be curious about something?”

“He’s into a little bit of everything, except drugs.” Janis reported. “He apparently had a nephew that OD’d at some point so DiLeo dropped out of that business entirely, almost overnight. Reports say that he did it at the request of his sister, the mother of the nephew in question.” 

Felix gave a grim smile. “Of course, he did it by selling it off to other families and collects some funds from them in the form of transport fees and that, but he does not sell drugs. Oh… and he doesn’t deal in human trafficking. No clue why.”

Mia looked back and for the between the two intelligence officers. “Why the hell do you know all this about this guy? Sure, if he was a hotshot military type, I could see it. But a local mafia don? Did you have to do a book report in spy school or something?”

“Something like that.” Janis replied with a small smile.

“Right.” Mia leaned back in her chair mumbling something under her breath about “fucking spooks” and ignored the knowing look and grin that Janis and Felix shared between each other.

“Still… he doesn’t have any serious operations in the Combine.” Felix continued. “That’s part because the Combine is so xenophobic and part because trying to cut in on the yakuza’s turf is just not profitable enough to do.”

Alex nodded his understanding. “Thanks, both of you.” He took a drink of his coffee then shoved the cup and saucer way. “Anyone else have anything to add?”

Lieutenant Nigel Atwood’s voice came from the opposite end of the room, where he had set up a remote hookup to the rest of the communications system. “Captain?”

Alex looked over at Nigel. “What’s up, Woody?” 

“I just got a message from Captain Heartwell of the STELLAR BREEZE… he’s breaking contract and won’t take us anywhere.”

Alex blinked and he stood up. “What?”

“Apparently, he’s been hired at three times what he gets from us to haul some fruit by a company called Cranston Orchards.”

Felix sighed. “That’s a front company for DiLeo.”

“Rossi wants to let us know that he’s watching us.” Alex said and then nodded. “Woody, send Captain Heartwell a thanks for letting us know about the change in transport and that there’s no hard feelings.”

“We’re going to need a new ride.” Jackson stated. “And we have to move fast before DiLeo closes out all the other possibilities we have.”

“We have to assume he has.” Nathan said and looked over at Alex. “You should check out some of the… less legal operations out there.”

“Wouldn’t he have those locked down too?” Mia asked. “That’s his business, right?”

Sara shook her head, joining the conversation. “There’s always someone out there that operates outside the law and the big sharks.” She looked over at Alex. “I know people. I can find someone.”

 Alex nodded, glad she was stepping up to this instead of hiding. “Get it done. I want us off this planet within 24 hours… sooner is better.” 

“You got it.” Sara said softly and rose out of her chair in a smooth motion. Without another word or a glance back, she left the meeting. 

He looked over at Nathan. “Get in touch with the Combine reps and get that contract secured. Everyone else, get your gear together and be ready to roll the hell out of here as soon as Bandit has us a ride.”

“Consider it done.” Nathan replied as he started towards the door, pulling a compact communit from his hoodie pocket. He stopped just shy of the door and turned to face Alex. “You know I am going with you, right?”

“Everyone is going with us on this run.” Alex assured him. “I am not leaving a single soul behind.” 

Nathan nodded and turned back to the door, already talking quietly into his communit as he left the room. As more people rose from the table, Alex’s voice rose above the general noise generated by not quite a dozen people in a room meant for half that. 

“Jackson, make sure the Mechs and the techs are ready to move… all the things loaded and can drive out the minute we have word. I want at least two Mechs on hot standby at all times with at least one of them manned all the time. Four hour shifts.” Alex looked at Mia. “Two squads on duty all the time. A third on standby. Everyone else getting stuff packed. Rotate your people as needed. Woody?”

“Captain?” Nigel looked up from his transmitter.

“Full ECM deployed from here on out, including full encryption on all our comm channels. Do something creative and make sure they can’t hear us.” 

“On it, boss.” Nigel stood and left at a jog, his transmitter in his hands with cabling trailing along behind him. Others in the room were moving as well, heading to get things accomplished and move the unit.

“Let’s move it, people.” Alex ordered and looked up, realizing that he was alone in the room. He sighed and started muttering to himself as he gathered his things then headed towards the door.  “Well… right. Good work, people. Keep it moving. No… no, I got the lights. See everyone out there.”

He flicked the lights off and closed the door behind him, not quite slamming it as he did. Alex paused and took a deep breath then a second one. Feeling more in control, he forced a bit of energy into his stride and headed towards the outside of the main building. There were things to get done.

A Joint Post by,
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 2386
Contract Count: 9086

1053
August 21, 3093
Mercenary Billet #332
10km N/NE of Galaport
Galatea, Lyran Alliance

Lieutenant Sara “Bandit” Hammond stared at the mirror with the scissors still in her hand. Her long red hair was now shorter… much shorter. Where it had gone down past her shoulders in thick ringlets, it was now bobbed off just below her ears. She licked her lips and wiped away a single tear that leaked out unbidden.

“Stupid thing to cry about.” She snarled and started cleaning up the lengths of hair scattered across the floor and the sink. The sink was easier… brush the locks off into the trashcan held just below the edge of the countertop. The hair scattered across the floor was harder but only because she lost ten minutes trying to find a damned broom. She swept the hair into a pile where it would be out of the way and then went for the box on the sink.

The hair color was guaranteed to stay in place for weeks without fading. All she cared about at this point was that it would stay in place for the next few days until they got the hell out of Galatea. The entire process took twenty minutes of applying and waiting for it to set, time she used to finish cleaning up the hair and returning the shears to Pierce Will… one of the medical assistants. He tried to talk her up a little, but Sara cut him off and headed back for a shower… she didn’t want to be rude but time was important.

LTJG Mitchell “Rooster” Pine walked in the room carrying an armload of clothes as she was rinsing off. Not caring if the man was there, Sara stepped out of the shower and started to dry off. Having never been one for modesty, this was not the first time that Rooster had seen her naked so he wasn’t as rattled about it as he had been. He did take a moment to admire her though.

“You know what, Bandit?” Rooster asked as he watched her move the towel all across her naked body.

Sara stopped what she was doing and dropped one hand to a hip, leaving the towel dangling from that hand and leaving nothing to block Rooster’s view. “What, Rooster?”

“You missed a spot.” He reached over and turned her around by the shoulder then rubbed off a double handful of bubbles from her back with a second towel then turned around and headed for the door. “That and you have a nice ass.”

He plopped into a chair in the other room and called out to her. “The clothes are over by the sink. I got your… ‘good slutty clothes’, just like you asked. Quite a selection to choose from so I limited it to things that I figured would make a dead man… er… rise.”

“Thanks.” Sara replied, giving Rooster’s the finger through the wall. She took a moment to throw her towel over the top of the shower door then began getting dressed. She slid into a black thong then pulled on a pair of mesh leggings that stopped mid-thigh. A pair of purple short shorts went on over those. With practiced ease, she clipped the leggings to the shorts and slid into knee high black leather boots. 

After a moment’s consideration Sara grabbed a white, long sleeved shirt with cut outs that revealed skin in various places and pulled it on over her head then settled the cut outs in to the proper places. A long, black leather vest went on over the shirt and did double duty as a fashion statement and a place to hide her pistol. The hammerless revolver only carried five rounds, but it would do in a pinch if there was trouble.

To complete the ensemble, Sara put on large hoop earrings and a gaudy gold necklace that were just over the top enough to be noticeable without being too tacky. Under cover or not, she did not do tacky. The last thing she grabbed was a small handbag with a fake gold chain as a strap… it was just big enough for a large folded over stack of C-bills, lipstick, nail polish, a communit, and a small automatic pistol with a spare clip.

With her look complete, Sara stepped out of the bathroom, stuck a pose, and looked at Rooster through her midnight black bangs. “How do I look?”

“Like a hundred C-bill an hour hooker. So, perfect.” He replied, putting down the noteputer he’d been tapping on. “Wait… you don’t have any makeup on.”

“I figured that I wouldn’t if you were tossing me out the morning after.” She shrugged.

“Good point.” He pointed at her head. “You should take off an earring and be putting it on as I rush you the hell out of here.”

“Nice touch.” Sara said as she removed one of the hoop earrings. “C’mon… I need to get out of here before I lose my nerve.”

Rooster nodded and came up out of the chair, following Sara out the door and down the stairs. Both of them ignored the comments that came from the few people they encountered… they were on a time table after all. “Who are you going to get in touch with?”

Sara glanced at Rooster and shrugged. “Dillan.”

“Whoa… I thought you were going to go for someone disreputable, not disreputable and a fucking drunk loser.” Rooster stopped and waited until Sara turned to face him. “We do not need to get tangled back up with that guy. He almost got you killed.”

“No, he almost got you killed… I was just in danger of being wounded and made a total idiot of. Fortunately for the both of us, only the last part happened.” Sara said, heat in her voice. “Now, let’s get this done.”

“Sara…” He began.

Sara closed her eyes and brought him to a halt with her upraised hand. Rooster only used her real name over her callsign when he was trying to be sensitive and touching. “Just stop.” She growled. “We don’t have time for this, Dillan has a ship that is available for hire, he won’t just roll over and do what DiLeo says, and he owes me… and he knows it.” She licked her lips lightly and dropped her gaze to the stairs. “Besides, we don’t have much of a damned choice right now.”

Rooster said nothing for several moments, just looked at her then finally sighed. “Well then get your tight little ass out of here and get in touch with that rat bastard.”

Sara walked out the door with a stumble, like she had been pushed out the door by Rooster, who was close behind her. The two argued loudly about the rush and her getting paid for staying all night and other related topics before he shoved her out the pedestrian gate. She turned and hurled abuse at him as Rooster walked away, at least until Trooper Stephen "Wager" Wagner waved her to move on. 

Sara wasn’t sure he recognized her right off, so took a moment to hurl abuse his way just for kicks. He didn’t flinch or seem to be even fazed by any of it until she winged a rock off his helmet. Then he just turned towards her and revved up the mini-gun on the underarm mount of his suit. She screamed and ran as best she could in the heeled boots she was wearing. 

When Sara rounded the corner, she stopped at the sight of four suited men that were lounging around a black SUV, one of the vehicles that had been at the gate this morning. Obviously they were staking out the billet, waiting for Alex to do something that would make Rossi or DiLeo madder. Deciding the stopping would be a normal reaction for anyone that ran into the middle of four well dressed and obviously armed men, Sara just continued forward and past them.

She ignored their comments but put a bit more sway into her walk then turned and winked at them just before rounding the corner of the building. Sure that they wouldn’t leave their posts for a hooker, Sara was confident in playing things up just a bit. It helped stay in character and was just fun as hell to boot. Once she was a couple of blocks away, Sara hailed a cab and paid extra to get to the spaceport as fast as possible.

1127
Landing Pad 69
Galaport Interstellar StarPort

Sara sighed at the landing pad sign and shook her head, knowing that Captain Dillan Fowler would not have accidentally gotten landing pad “69” … the man would have paid to make sure he got it. With a snort, she stalked towards the Union class DropShip with its pedestrian hatch open and the snapping light of a welder coming from inside.

No one was there to stop her, so Sara walked into the MARIANNA’s open hatch with the ease of familiarity and looked around. She saw two men standing close to each other, the one holding a plate of sheet steel in place had long black dreadlocks that trailed down his back like a bundle of myomer while the one welding had a topknot of bright red hair at the top of his otherwise bald head.

Sara waited until they finished the bead of welding they were working on and then whistled a shrill tone that got both men’s attention.  She waved as they approached, leaving their tools behind, and greeted them when they got close. “Hey Bryan… Weasel.”

Weasel peered at her for a moment and flicked his head to get the topknot out of the way. “We know you, lady?”

Sara rolled her eyes and pulled part of her sleeve up, revealing a tattoo of a rose made of barbed wire. “If you didn’t, I wouldn’t have let you do this to me, even as drunk as I was that night.”
“Fuck me… that’s Bandit.” Bryan reached over and hugged her tightly then stepped back, holding her at arms’ length. “Course, you seldom dressed out like this when you were hanging about the likes of us.”

“I needed to get away without some people knowing it was me.” She said as a short explanation that really didn’t explain anything and then looked at them both. “I would love to chat, but I am on a timeline. Is Dillan about?”

They exchanged glances and Weasel spoke up. “He know you’re here?”

“He has not a clue.” Sara replied.

“You’re not going to shoot at him, are ya?” Bryan asked with a wary expression on his face. He’d felt the revolver at her waist when he’d hugged her.

“What? Again?” Sara forced a smile. “You know I never do the same thing twice, Bryan. Not my style.”

The two men chuckled and exchanged another look. Weasel shrugged and Bryan nodded then offered his arm to Sara. “C’mon then. I’ll take you to the man.”

Leaving Weasel to finish the welding, Bryan and Sara talked as they went through the decks of the MARIANNE, using ladders as the lift wasn’t working… again. They were stopped by any crewman that saw them but Bryan would shoo the crewman away, saying that they were in a hurry and had no time to talk as they were off to see The Man.

Bryan got her to the door of the bridge, kissed her lightly on the cheek, opened the door, and turned away to head back down to the Mech Bay, leaving Sara on her own. She took a deep breath and stepped onto the bridge. Dillan was standing on the command chair with the top of his coveralls off and tied at his waist, revealing a fit and muscular torso plus a few scars of various, violent origins. Sara shut off the memory of tracing those scars before and continued further into the bridge.

He noticed her approach when she scuffed her boot along the hard metal deck… on purpose… and looked down from whatever he was working on in the ceiling. Dillon started to say something sharp and probably unpleasant before he stopped and really looked at her. He blinked several times as he recognized Sara’s face and jumped down from his perch to approach her.

Dillon drug her into his embrace with long arms and held her tight for a long minute. When he let go, his head dipped down so his lips could brush hers lightly before stepping back. “Sara…” he said breathlessly. “I… you… this is a surprise.”

“Yeah. Tell me about it.” Sara said, feeling slightly loopy from the emotions stirred by seeing him, memories, and the kiss, light as it was.

“Uh… I don’t know how to ask this, so I am just going to say it up front.” He took a deep breath and looked to the left side of her body at about waist level. “You’re not going to shoot me, are you?”

Sara couldn’t help it and stared laughing. Dillon smiled and joined in after a moment but trailed off before she did. Sara decided that the tension of the morning had just been too much and she really needed the laugh so just enjoyed it and the moment. When she stopped and was able to catch her breath, Sara plopped down in a chair, shaking her head.  “No, Dillon… I am not going to shoot you.”

“That’s good.” He replied as he shrugged into his overalls, covering his chest back up to Sara’s hidden dismay, and zipped the coverall most the way up. “So, if you are not going to shoot me… which I appreciate. And despite the fact that your company almost always makes my day better, I have to ask: why are you here?”

Sara smiled; Dillon was always one to get straight to the point. “I… no, we need your help.”

Dillon narrowed his eyes and looked at her. “Who’s we? And what kind of help?”

“The ‘we’ part is ten Mechs, two Aerospace fighters, a platoon of battle armor, and accompanying operators and techs. What we need is a way off of Galatea and into the Draconis Combine before we piss a certain person off any more than we… well… more I, as in me, have already done so.”

“You and yours are the ones that DiLeo is all up in arms and waving people off about?” Dillon asked with wide eyes. “And you want me to help you? No wonder you aren’t trying to shoot me… you are trying to have someone else do it.”

“Dillon…” She started.

“Sara, don’t… “He raised one hand in what was a stopping motion.

She threw her hands in the air as she turned away. “It’s just that… “

“Really… just… “He waved his hand at to make her stop but she continued pacing and talking. 

“We have to do something or…”

 Dillon reached over and grabbed her by the shoulders, startling Sara into silence. He smiled at her in a way that was meant to either be comforting to one in need or calming to an insane person. “Stop. I’ll do it.”

“You will?” Sara asked, her face brightening. 

“Yes.” He replied and released her. “For one, it will piss DiLeo off to no end, which I am just fine with. Second, I have seldom been able to say ‘no’ to you…”

“Wait, what about when…” She stopped when Dillon leaned in close and placed a finger on her lips.

“Let’s not ruin this moment with details, okay?” He requested. When she nodded, Dillon moved his finger but did not lean back. “Third, I owe you.”

Sara bit at her lip and nodded. “I’ll let Alex… Captain Yau… know.”

Dillon looked at her for a moment. “Is he ‘Alex’ or ‘Captain Yau’ to you?”

“When you put it in that context? He’s ‘Captain Yau’. Otherwise, he’s just my friend, Alex.”

“Good. Then I won’t charge him more for a rush job.” Dillon smiled and leaned back in his seat. “When do you need to be off planet?”

“Less than six days…. Rossi gave us seven, but I really don’t want to count on him.”

Dillon nodded. “So your gear and… what? A total of forty some people?”

“A total of 63 people, all said and done.” She replied. “I made sure of the number before I left, because I knew you’d ask.”

“Five days.” Dillon replied. “We can lift off in five days. That gives me enough time to get all the repairs I have to have done taken care of and get fueled up in a discreet way. Let’s say your Mechs make their first step on MARIANNA’s ramp at 0300 on the 26th.”

Sara nodded. “I’ll make sure we are ready. Thank you, Dillon.”

“Hey… this isn’t a favor… I still expect to get paid for doing this. I just agreed to the risk because it was you asking. If your boss had been here, I probably wouldn’t have said yes… at least not at standard haul rates.”

“What about a JumpShip?” 

Dillon shrugged. “Not to worry. I know the captain on an Invader class vessel that’s sitting up there right now. He’s scheduled to leave on September 8, heading in the direction of the Combine. He’ll get us two jumps closer and then we can take it from there.”

“Good, I’ll let Alex know the plan. Maybe he and Nathan can figure something out after that.” She looked at Dillon then leaned in and kissed his lips softly, almost a mirror of what he did when he first saw her. “Thank you, Dillon.”

He nodded. “I’d invite you to stay but…” 

“We’ve got things to do. Other things.” Sara smiled. “Can you get one of the guys to drop me near the billet?”

“Weasel and Bryan have a new street rod they want to put through its paces. They’ll get you there.” 

“Thanks.” Sara turned to go then stopped and looked Dillon up and down once before meeting his eyes again. “It was good to see you.”

He grinned and returned the once over. “Likewise.”

Sara turned away and left the bridge in a hurry, hoping like hell that Bryan and Weasel were still in the Mech Bay. She had things to do and not much time to do them in.

Posted by,
Lieutenant Sara Hammond
Callsign: Bandit
SL-17R Slayer
Air Boss
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 3083
Contract Count: 12,169

1433
August 21, 3093
Mercenary Billet #332
10km N/NE of Galaport
Galatea, Lyran Alliance

Lieutenant Tiana “Risky” Anders-Hsien brought herself to the guard house with the rest of her squad in tow. It wasn’t Anarchy Squad’s turn at the gate, but part of the problem of running around with the commanding officer was that if she went somewhere, so did you. Tiana waved them to a halt and stepped closer to Confusion Squad, the ones that currently did have duty at the gate.

Master Sergeant Andrei “Ram” Ramius turned to his commander and nodded slightly, which was about all the nod one could get while wearing Fa Shih battle armor, and greeting her through the speakers on his helmet. “Lieutenant.”

“What’s going on, Ram?” She asked then followed his gesture away from the billet that Chaos Incorporated called their home. A small group of armored vehicles and infantry… Galatea Militia to be precise… were parked across from the billet and obviously watching them. “Huh… how long they been out there?”

“About twenty minutes.” Ram replied. “I called it in after it got to ten minutes and they didn’t look to be going anywhere.”

“You think they’re looking to get frisky?”

Ram shrugged as best he could in the armor. “No clue, but I would hate to discount it as a possibility and then get caught flatfooted.”

“Agreed.” Tiana said and looked at the group again, recording what she saw through her visor. A pair of APCs with turret mounted machine guns were supplemented by two more APCs armed with short range missile launchers on top, a pair of Bulldog medium tanks, and a Partisan anti-aircraft tank. Not a large force, but a formidable one that would probably last until they got reinforced. She grinned a toothy, not quite pleasant grin… maybe they would last.

She opened a commline to LT Nigel “Woody” Atwood, the unit’s communications officer and the one manning the main communications console. “Woody, this is Risky.”

[[Copy you, Risky. What’s up?]]

“I am feeding you images my helmet cam. Any idea what these guys are about?”

[[I think they are here to make an incident and an excuse for the locals to take a hand in DiLeo’s revenge. So, if you shoot them then we get branded as outlaws and the entire militia gets sicced on us plus whatever mercenary units that want to make a few quick C-bills by squishing us.]]

“Yeah, I got it. Does Random know what he’s going to do about this?”

Captain Alexander Yau’s voice cut in over the commline. [[Not a damned thing. Just sit tight and only fire if they fire first… we’re in enough trouble without having the entire planet out to kill us. Random out.]]

The commline clicked dead in her ear and Tiana scowled. “Right. Thanks.” She flipped her external speakers back on. “Hold position, Ram. Fire only if fired on and make sure your shots count because I don’t know how many we’ll get before it all goes to Hell.”

“So charging out there, screaming my fool head off, and shooting at them in a reckless fashion is out?” Ram asked in a dry voice.

“For now, but keep it in the back of your mind.” Tiana replied and clapped her senior NCO on the shoulder. “You’ve got about an hour left here so make sure to pass on the information to whoever is next in the barrel, okay?”

Ram turned his head to look at her. He said nothing for several long moments before replying: “You got it, Lieutenant.”

Tiana sighed. “Yes, I do know that you know what you are doing and that you know that I know that you know but you also know that I have to let you know what to do when things happen or it will just drive me nuts.”

Ram smiled and turned back to watch the small group of militia troopers. Tiana couldn’t see the smile on the Master Sergeant’s face because of his helmet, but she could hear it in his voice when he said: “I know.”

She cuffed him on his armored shoulder and turned away, intent on heading back to the barracks. After having been armored up for most of the day, Tiana was ready to get out of the suit and take a damned hot shower. However, thoughts of that fled when she heard the screeching of a set of tires and the shouts of “incoming” and other similar comments from the troopers around her.

Tiana spun around and spied the large black SUV that was speeding for the gates. Like the other troopers near the gate, she raised the machine gun on her right arm and began warming up the multi-barreled weapon but not firing it. The rules of engagement, especially with the militia watching, were very clear: do not fire unless fired upon. 

The SUV skidded to a swerving stop not seven meters away and one of the back doors opened. A naked man was tossed out, quickly followed by a duffel bag before the door was slammed shut and the SUV sped away with a screech of tires and roar of a powerful engine. The militia troopers did nothing to either stop the SUV and it didn’t look like they would be either.

When the vehicle was out of sight, Tiana charged forward, heading towards the man lying in the street. The rest of her squad followed her, weapons up and looking for something to shoot. Over the commchannel, Tiana could hear the traffic going back and forth between Master Sergeant Ramius and LT Atwood, including the call for a medical team and a head count of the people on base. 

“Dammit…” Tiana breathed as she spotted the single bright purple feather dangling from the right ear of the man on the ground. Combining that with the series of red starbursts across a black cloud tattooed on the rib cage, Tiana knew exactly who it was lying there. “Risky to Woody… I have Ross Wynkoop here and he looks pretty bad.”

[[Can you confirm its Wynkoop?]] Woody asked in a harried voice. Tiana figured he was passing information along as quickly as he could to whoever was on his shoulder, but too much was going on to not give him some sort of pressure about things.

“Oh yeah, it’s him.” Tiana replied as she turned the man over. Ross coughed, spitting up blood as he did. His face and body was a mass of bruises from where he’d been badly beaten. Just to add some contrast to the heavily purple bruises, there were cigarette burns across both forearms and on several parts of his torso. He’s also been deeply cut in a number of places by something with a razor edge and the cuts were bleeding freely.

With the rest of Anarchy Squad surrounding her, Tiana popped off her helmet and set it on the ground then pulled off the machine gun on her arm and the armored glove as well. “It’s okay, Ross.” She said gently as she tried to carefully put her hands on the badly damaged tech. The man began screaming and crying the moment she touched him. “Oh God, Ross… it’s me, Tiana. Everything’s going to be okay now. Your safe.”

“Tiana?” Ross managed to say in a mangled way. Tiana could see the broken teeth in his mouth as he talked. “Oh God… Tiana… it hurts…”

“It’s okay, Ross.” Tiana felt tears starting to form up in her eyes but pushed them back. How anyone could hurt Ross was beyond her; he had to be the gentlest man she’d ever met. Lord only knew how he’d gotten caught up in the mercenary trade and survived as long as he had. “Helps coming.”

She looked up and spotted three of the medics coming, two of them carrying a stretcher and the doctor sprinting ahead with a bag in his hand. She reached over and gently held Ross’ left hand, trying hard not to cause more damage. “Duke’s here, Ross, he’s going to take care of you.”

“Dan… where’s Dan at, Tiana?” 

“Dan? Dan Goodfriend? Was he with you?” Tiana asked but left the question alone as she was jostled by the arriving doctor.

“Don’t leave, Tiana…” 

“I’m not leaving, Ross. I am just getting out of Duke’s way.” She said as she scooted to the side on one knee, clearing space for the doctor, keeping her hand on Ross’.

Dr. Wesley “Duke” Forrest went down to one knee beside Ross and started talking to him in a calm and clear voice while inspecting his injuries. In between the inspection, he glanced over at Tiana and then to her hand. She nodded and slowly lowered Ross’ hand to the ground. Ross didn’t seem to notice as he was caught up with Duke’s voice.

Tiana paused in getting up only long enough to pick up her equipment and refit them to her battle armor. The last to come on before she glanced across the street was her helmet, which immediately filled with hostile action alerts. While the militia had done nothing when Ross was dumped out of the SUV, they had come alive when the battle armor had left the gate. 

Heavy machine guns and other infantry weapons were pointed towards the small group and the turret mounted weapons on the APCs were now manned and swung their way. The two Bulldogs had also swiveled their flat turrets towards the small group, bringing a total of two large lasers and four SRM4 launchers to bear. Even the quad cannons mounted on the Partisan were now pointed towards them. 

Tiana snarled in her helmet and flipped them off with her armored glove then opened a commchannel. “Risky to all troops… armor up. Also requesting that all ready five units deploy. We could get into a shooting war here pretty quick.” 

Master Sergeant Ram and the rest of Confusion Squad rushed forward, forming up on Anarchy Squad and widening the armed and armored wall of pissed off mercenaries. A moment later, Tiana could see the ready five squad, Disorder Squad, as they charged towards the gate to reinforce the two squads that were already deployed. She smiled at that, her troops may not be the most disciplined troopers off the firing line, but once the ball dropped, they got it all done right. Her smile broadened slightly when she felt the familiar tremors caused by BattleMechs on the move.

From the hanger inside the billet, the massive WHM-8D Warhammer piloted by LTJG Anthony “Bear” Greenwoode lumbered into view, followed by a TDR-9SE Thunderbolt piloted by LTJG Fiona “Ice” de Wynter. The two Mechs alone would have been a formidable pair to face even against other Mechs, but to the militia forces, they were more than enough to make them think twice. When LTJG Felix “Dice” King and his bone-white OSR-4L Ostroc appeared as well, it was enough to cause a panic.

Tiana turned back to the militia and could see frantic movements on their end. The officer in charge was waving his arms and screaming at the other militia troopers. All of the armored vehicles swiveled their turrets away from the mercenaries and COAX mounted weapons were abandoned by their operators as the troopers ducked back inside the relative safety of the armored vehicles. 

The infantry scattered, taking refuge wherever they could and hoping they would be overlooked if the Mechs started firing. Apparently more orders were issued and the infantry left their cover and piled into the APCs as all of the vehicles fired up their engines. As the infantry loaded, the Bulldogs and the Partisan began moving. Before the APCs finished closing their hatches, they were following suit and leaving the immediate area.

With the immediate danger gone, Tiana went to the duffel bag that had been thrown out of the SUV with Ross. She felt the weight of it when she picked it up and noted the large amount of dark red liquid coming out of the saturated container before putting it back on the ground. Reluctantly, she opened the bag up, looked inside, and then looked away.

“This is Risky… stand down. The militia have left the area. Thanks for the quick support.”

The deep voice of LTJG Anthony “Bear” Greenwoode came over the commchannel a moment later. [[Dice and Ice are going to do an interior perimeter check. I am going to hang out for a minute or ten, just in case.]]

“Appreciate it. Sing out if you need support.” Risky replied. “Bedlam, Disorder, and Entropy squads: stand down. You’ll get your turn at the gate soon enough. Anarchy, help cover the doctor with Confusion Squad.”

The confirmation calls came in fast and furious from the various squad commanders and Tiana noted each of them. Everyone was performing at their best, despite the circumstances and the huge amounts of pressure that everyone felt. She was proud of them. After a moment, she swapped to the command level channels. 

“Risky to Woody… patch me to Random.” She requested in a tired voice.

After a moment, Captain Yau’s voice came over the comm. [[What’s up, Risky?]]

“Ross is getting taken care of right now. Duke has him.” She paused. “They threw a duffel bag out of the vehicle with Ross.”

There was a moment of silence before Yau’s voice came over the commline again. [[What was in the bag?]]

“I don’t know who the blonde is, but the other head belongs to Daniel Goodfriend.” She replied quietly. “Alex… this shit just went way south.”

Posted by,
LT Tiana Anders-Hsien
Callsign: Risky
Fa Shih Battle Armor
Battle Armor Commander
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 2289
Contract Count: 14,458

0732
August 22, 3093
Conference Room C
Mercenary Billet #332
10km N/NE of Galaport
Galatea, Lyran Alliance

“Okay. I want to know what happened.” Captain Alexander Yao growled out as he leaned over the conference room table. He was not a large man, but the grim look on his face and the waves of anger that rippled from him made it very possible for him to be more intimidating than he normally could be.

“I know that he was seeing a woman and they had spoken of marriage.” Tynon Lee said quietly. The old Chinese man had a look of sadness on his face that was worse than anything that Alex had seen on him since Alex’s mother had been killed.

“He must have snuck out to see her and gotten caught.” LT Tiana “Risky” Anders-Hsien said.  “Or been lured there by the girl and then handed over.”

Tynon shook his head. “I do not believe she lured him there… at least no more than any woman has ever lured a man. But, even then, I do not believe that it was done with evil intent.”

“Why was Ross with him?” Alex asked the table in general.

“Ross Wynkoop is a good man and a good friend. He would not have let Daniel leave alone, not if he knew his friend was leaving the base.” Tynon replied then shook his head. “He is also a gentle creature and would have fared terribly with what they have done to him.”

“I say we go over there and kick their damned asses up between their eyes.” SRLT Jackson “Madman” Tallman growled. “Drop the entire unit on his fucking head and then see how many threats he makes about swimming with the fishes.”

“If that happens, we are going to have some serious shit come down on us.” Pointed out Nathan “Player” Hooker, Chaos Incorporated’s agent. “I mean serious shit. They don’t let that kind of thing ride here. There’s too many mercenaries around to stand for it.”

“He’s right.” Allison “Nanny” Sloan spoke up. She had been Chaos Incorporated’s legal counsel almost since the unit’s inception and worked at one of the better law firms in Galaport; Sloan, McCall, and Muir Associates at law. Her nickname of “Nanny” had been hung on her by the unit in much the same way that Nathan had received “Player”. 

“Fuck that. This son of a bitch deserves what he gets.” Jackson snarled. “And I’ll take my Centurion for a walk through anything the city wants to throw at us to make sure he gets it. For Daniel and for Ross.”

Allison looked over at the mercenary. “I’m not arguing against that or against him deserving it but those types of actions will break the law.”

Alex made a calming gesture towards his XO. “Chill, Jackson. We don’t want to have something like that on our hands right before we leave.”

“It would solve a lot of problems for us really damned quick.” LT Sara “Bandit” Hammond said quietly from her corner of the table. She wasn’t sure of the reaction she would get on this subject, especially since it all really started because of her and several bad decisions a couple of nights ago. To her surprise, no one, not even Tiana, made a comment about the problems being her fault. 

“Maybe.” Alex agreed, his voice flat. His gaze went to another occupant of the table. “Duke… how is Ross doing?” 

“He’s stable.” Doctor Wesley “Duke” Forrest stated and pulled his glasses off to clean the lenses idly. “He’s got some internal injuries that I’ve stitched up… lucky nothing got ruptured with all the damage he took… and a broken arm that I set, but he’ll be okay after some time to heal.”

Alex nodded at that and paused, lost in thought. “Jackson.”

“Yeah?” The MechWarrior replied, his voice hard.

“How ready are we to leave?” 

Jackson looked at Alex with surprise on his face. “You want to know how ready we are to leave?” He stood up and brought his arms out wide to indicate everyone and everything on the billet. “With all of this going on and you still want to know that?”

“Yes.” Alex replied quietly.

“You want to turn tail and go? Let this mother fucker get away with hurting our people?” Jackson all but snarled and smashed his hand flat against the noteputer in front of him. The screen on the noteputer cracked under the blow, letting out a small puff of smoke as it died.

“What I want…” Alex yelled back then visible got control of himself before continuing and looked at Jackson, his face set in as neutral a tone as possible. “What I want is to know how ready the MechWarriors and their BattleMechs are to pack up and get onto a DropShip then leave this damned planet.”

“We’re fucking ready.” Jackson replied, his fury still visible but his training taking over. He threw himself into the chair behind him. “We can go whenever. Mechs are ready and our people have their worldly possessions gathered.”

“Good.” He looked over at Tynon, his voice easing some. “What about your mechanics?”

“We are ready. There are some loose ends here and there, but nothing we can’t either lash onto the top of something and take or just leave with no problems.” Tynon reported then shifted himself slightly. “The mechanics themselves are less prepared, but could be ready to leave in an hour or two.”

Alex nodded his understanding and said. “Tia?” 

“Not as ready.” She admitted. “We’ve been running everyone on ready alert and gate duty and patrols and all that shit. We haven’t had much time to pack things up.”

“Make time.” Alex commanded. “Grab some of the MechWarriors or techs to help out if you need it.” 

She exchanged glances with both Jackson and Tynon, both of which nodded their agreement then returned the nods. “Yes, sir. We’ll get right on it.”

Alexander brought his gaze to Sara, who sat up straighter in her chair under the scrutiny then cleared her throat. “Yes, we’re ready. Both of the Slayers are still at the star port so all we have to really deal with is our personal stuff. The few parts and other expendables we need are stored out there.”

“Okay. So get your asses along with a couple of techs, if they can be spared by Tynon, over to the star port and get the last of it put together. We won’t be able to load the fighters onboard your friend’s Union at this point, but if you can get the rest of it put on there, that would be nice.” 

“Ah… you sure about this?” Sara asked, nervously. “I don’t want to get caught with my ass in the wind out there.”

Mia cleared her throat. “I could send a squad with her.”

“Send two.” Alex suggested lightly.

Mia’s eyes widened at the suggestion. “But I need people to man the gates and… “

“Send two.” He repeated and looked over at Tia. “Do what you need to do to make it happen, but send two squads.” After a moment, he shifted his gaze. “Tynon, if we still have those utility trucks that we rented, then get them half loaded with things that can be loaded onboard the DropShip now and not missed. That should still leave enough space to get the battle armor and everyone else on board. All of it can get on that Union with hopefully little notice.”

“We have the trucks.” Tynon confirmed. “They are overdue to be returned but I will handle that after we get this loading done.”

Mia spoke up, cutting off any response from Alex. “Rules of engagement?”

“Fire if fired upon or otherwise threatened.” 

“Do hostile looks count?” Jackson asked in a dead pan voice.

Alex looked at him for a moment then shrugged and turned his attention back to Tia. “What the fuck. Sure, hostile looks count.”

Tia smiled her “not so nice a person smile” at that, bearing teeth as she did. “You got it.”

“Alexander…” Tynon began, catching Alex’s attention. “How will we know what is not essential and to load? Are you expecting us to get into combat before we leave Galatea?” 

“Jackson, have the MechWarriors help with perimeter guard including gate guard. I’ve found that a BattleMech standing at your gate goes a longer way than a ‘no trespassing’ sign.” Alex said ignoring Tynon’s question then looked over at Duke. “Doctor, how are your people doing with the move?”

“We’re ready to go whenever you give the word, Captain.” Dr. Forrest replied. “We don’t normally get a lot of severe injuries so our supplies are pretty well packed.”

“Thank you, doctor.”  Alex smiled slightly to the older man then looked to the man and woman dressed in rainbow colored chef’s shirts at the end of the table. “What about the Lanes? Are you two coming with us?”

Emmit “Cook” Lane glanced over at his wife, Andrea “Chef” Lane, and then down to the table. “Yeah, we’re coming. I don’t think it would be very healthy to stay if DiLeo is really gunning for anyone and everyone that’s associated with Chaos INC.” 

“Give us a couple hour window to work in and we can have our essential products together.” Andrea stated. “Maybe six hours if you want us to pack every last spoon and split pea.”

“You should get things started anyway. Contact Tynon if you need more hands and he’ll see what he can give you from his staff.” Alex turned to the last people at the table. “Ghost… Amber… you still with us?”

LT Felix “Ghost” Cornelius nodded. “We are. I don’t know how much good we’ll do you but I have to agree with Mr. Lane, staying here after playing with you guys don’t sound too healthy.”

“I, for one, will take my chances here.” Allison spoke up as she stood. “I work for my firm and while you are my clients, I do not have any other ties to your unit.” She looked to Alex. “When you return or if you need my services, you can contact me here on Galatea.”

“I may have to do that, Allison.” Alex replied. “You just be careful and watch your ass.”

“I will.” She promised. “That being said, I am going to get out of here and get back to the office.”

Alex nodded. “Thanks for coming over. We’ll be in touch.” He paused for a moment. “If you change your mind, let us know.”

Allison smiled slightly. “I’ll do that. Be safe. All of you.”

As the lawyer turned and left, Alex brought his attention back to the rest of the table. “What about you, Woody?”

The communications technician looked up in surprise and blinked at Alex for a moment before answering. “Ah… yeah. Of course, I am going. You guys need me to help you coordinate things on and off the battlefield. Plus, I don’t know if you know how to make contact with anyone outside the compound on your own.”

Alex chuckled at that but knew he was not far from wrong. “Thanks, Nigel.”

The tech shrugged and went back to monitoring the commchannels to make sure no one was trying to do something bad to them while they weren’t looking. He suddenly looked up at Alex. “What about Manny?”

Alex looked at him blankly for a moment before it hit him that Nigel was referring to Emmanuel “Manny” Stromstein, the unit’s accountant. “Oh… Manny. I sent him a message and he said he was just going to lay low. Besides, I seriously doubt that anyone is going to lay a hand on him… he knows too many people and has the books on even more.”

“Okay. I just wanted to check.” Nigel replied and went back to his work. 

“That it?” Alex asked, looking at the people crowded around the table. 

“What about going after, DiLeo?” Tia asked quietly. Alex could see the steel gleam in her eye that said she wanted blood.

“I think it would be a good thing to do.” Jackson spoked up in agreement.

“I still think it would solve several serious problems.” Sara added. 

“You’ll bring the militia and the cops and anyone else on DiLeo’s payroll down on us.” Nathan pointed out. “I know for sure that Doogel’s Demons and The Wayfarers are on his rolls. Maybe the Sky Knights too, but don’t quote me on that.” 

“Do they bunk at his place?” Jackson asked

“I don’t think so… and for sure not all of them.” Nathan replied.

“Then no sweat.” Jackson said with a smile. “We’re in and out before anyone even knows what the fuck happened. Lots of problems solved plus blood for blood. No one should get away with fucking with us.”

“We aren’t doing anything.” Alex said loudly. “Not right now anyway.”

He looked around the table, waiting for someone to disagree, when no one did (to his surprise), Alex looked at Nathan. “What do we have lined up for work?”

“The Lyrans opened up a new garrison contract… also out on the edge of the Periphery.” He reported. “But my contacts are shying away at the moment. Seems that the word is out that DiLeo is out to get us and no one wants to get in the middle of an impending fight.”

Alex nodded and rubbed at the bridge of his nose with two fingers. “What about the Kuritians? Will they still play ball with us?”

Nathan smiled. “I just got word back from their liaison late last night. We will receive full orders once we arrive on Meinacos. To make it better they are going to let us hitch a ride with a merchant JumpShip that’s in the area… one of theirs.”

“Hot damn.” Jackson said with some enthusiasm. “Something goes right for us for once.”
Alex smiled at that and nodded his agreement. “So we’re signed and sealed on that?”

“Once you sign the documents and send them out, yes.” Nathan replied with a smile.

Alex frowned at that. “I thought you had the power to do that in my name?”

Nathan shrugged. “I do, but they insisted it be you, not your agent.” He shrugged. “There’s probably verses on that subject in the Art of War or something. Or it’s an honor thing. You know how they can get.”

“Then get me the documents and I’ll sign them.” He looked around the rest of the room. “Alright people. You all have orders. Get to it. Ghost… Amber… I need you.”

The two intelligence officers nodded and settled back down into the battered couch they’d taken as their own. Alex waited until everyone else was gone and the door closed before he sat down in a nearby chair. “I need to know the ins, outs, and layout of DiLeo’s compound out of Galaport. The one he normally stays at, according to all the rumor mongers. “

“You got something in mind?” Ghost asked. 

“Yes.” Alex replied and said nothing else. “And I need them in the next four hours.”

“You’ll have them.” Amber replied. 

“Good.” Alex gave a slight smile, one that did not promise good things to the people he was thinking of. “Once we get those, then the party can really begin.”

A Joint Post by,
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 2571
Contract Count: 17,029

2205
August 23, 3093
Eastern Balcony
DiLeo Estate aka “Il Fortezza Grande”
114 km East of Galaport
Galatea, Lyran Alliance

“And then she looks at me like I’ve done somethin’ wrong and I’m like what the hell?” Eddy Carbone says, bringing his hands up to about shoulder level. The sub machine gun hung off the tactical strap across his chest bounced around as he spoke. “So what? I looked at that waitress? It’s not like I was bending her over the table or nothin.”

“I told you that datin’ dat broad was just gonna be trouble.” Stephen “Stevie” Stacks said and pointed at Eddy with the toothpick he plucked from his mouth. “She’s high-maintenance and trouble, Eddy. You gotta dump her before it causes you some serious pain.”

“I gotta say that Traci is a high-maintenance broad, but if that rack she’s packin’ is any indication, she’s a good time in the sack.” Robby Stabile added in, a smirk on his face.

Eddy thumped Robby in the chest with the back of his hand. “I don’t think you need to be thinking about that sort of thing. Pain-in-the-ass, high-maintenance broad or not, she’s my pain-in-the-ass, high-maintenance broad so you keep your mind off her and her rack. Got it?”

Robby held up a hand in surrender, leaving the other on top of the combat shotgun he wore on his own tactical strap. “I don’t mean no disrespect or nothing, Eddy. I was just sayin’…”

“Yeah, I know what you was saying.” Eddy scowled at him before turning away to look over the rail of the balcony and the spread of the ocean that the house overlooked. Behind him Stevie swatted Robby as well and the two had a silent conversation consisting of hand gestures and shrugs that basically said “What the hell you doing talking about Eddy’s broad like that?” and “I was just saying!” but really didn’t accomplish anything and stopped when Eddy turned back around.

“You guys really think Traci is high-maintenance like that?”

“All I’m saying is that I never see her drink water or a beer when she can drink champagne… and she always seems to find the champagne, ya know?” Stevie said. “And I’ve seen her play guys off on each other… that’s how Ricky Giovanni got himself banged up because she told Donnie V that Ricky was hitting on her.”

“Uh… “Robby held up a hand. “Ricky was hitting on her.”

“Yeah, but only because she was coming on strong to the man when she was seeing Donnie V still.” Stevie explained. “She was making it sound like Ricky went up and just grabbed her ass right outta the blue or something, instead of doing it after she was playing the tease and all that. When Ricky got out of the hospital and was able to move around pretty good, he went right up to Donnie V and apologized from the bottom of his heart. On my mother’s grave, I saw it happen.” 

“That was a long time ago.” Eddy stated, waving the topic away with one hand. “She’s changed from then, knows what’s good for her and what isn’t. And I am good for her.”

“I know that’s right, Eddy, but is she good for you? See, way I figure it, you gotta watch out for broads that can be like that, especially if you are trying to climb the ladder.” Stevie explained. “With Little Tony out of the picture now, Mr. DiLeo is gotta be looking for someone to step up.”

“Yeah, but he’ll turn to guys like Rossi or Johny the Wise or someone like that.” Eddy shrugged and pulled a cigarette case out, then a cigarette from it, and tucked the case away. Robby stepped up and offered a light, which Eddy lit his cigarette from and took a deep drag before continuing. “There’s no way, he’d be looking at someone like me to do things at that level.”

“Not right now, sure, but if he brings Rossi or Johny or even Lucius Lupo from the East Side, then there’s a spot to fill. That’s what they’re talking about in the meeting in the Big House.” Stevie grinned and lightly poked Eddy. “You take that lower spot and then you can start moving up from there. Be a man that’s moving up in this place.”

A rough laugh, sounding like a hyena in a gravel mixer, came from the stairs at the other end of the balcony. Tony “The Boulder” Cicero, one of Rossi’s trusted crew, stepped out on the balcony with two others in tow. The other two men, Little Larry and Frankie the Young, were also laughing at Eddy’s expense, deep chuckles coming from their mouths. Two more men, who Eddy recognized as Alfonso Williams and Georgei Wong, stayed at the top of the stairs. All five were packing large automatic weapons with drum feeds on them and looking at the other men with faces filled with amused cruelty.

“You think that Mr. DiLeo would want someone like this puke in his main crew?” Tony the Boulder asked Stevie and whapped Eddy on the shoulder, making the smaller man recoil back involuntarily. “When that happens, you make sure to visit me in the old folks home. Am I right, boys?” 

Little Larry and Frankie the Young both laughed and made sounds of agreement. Neither of the two were very bright, but they didn’t need to be since what they did for the DiLeo organization really didn’t require much in the way of brains. The two thugs stepped closer, all but facing off with Robby and Stevie. In return, Robby’s hand moved towards his shotgun, making Frankie grin and swing the assault rifle he carried in one massive hand towards him. Robby’s hand went away from the weapon and was used to wipe away some of the sweat from Robby’s forehead.

“You dumb asses are keeping an eye out, right?” Tony snarled. “Doing your part to make sure that everything’s cool for the bosses, right?”

“Sure thing, Tony.” Eddy said as he brushed at the lapels of his suit jacket. “Ain’t a damned thing going on over here that we don’t know about.” He chuckled. “Not that there’s anything going on.”

“Best stay that way. Just because those mercs left town, don’t mean that we can relax. Hell, they could be trying to sneak their asses in on us at any point.” Tony growled and poked Eddy again, this time grinding the blunt end of the sausage-sized protrusion into Eddy’s shoulder. “And you’d best hope that nothing happens to sneak past you and leave you alive, cause I won’t. You got me, Eddy?”

Eddy stumbled back a step, raising both hands in surrender. “Sure thing, Tony. Whatever you say.”

“Damned straight whatever I say.” Tony growled, staring hard eyes at Eddy then Robby and Stevie. After a moment, he smiled and stepped closer to Eddy then straightened the other man’s tie. “You boys just keep on keeping on and I am sure that someday, you’ll get to be something big in this organization. Hell, you might even get to scrub the toilets.”

That brought laughter from everyone… deep rumbles from Tony and his crew; more forced and strained laughter from Eddy and his two companions. Tony and his crew were still laughing as they walked away, picking up the two men they’d left at the top of the stairs as they did. Eddy and his crew stopped laughing the minute that Tony and his men were at the top of the stairs. It wouldn’t have mattered one way or the other; Tony and company had all but forgotten about Eddy and his crew the minute they turned away.

“That mother fucker is going to get his, that I can fuckin’ assure you.” Eddy growled out and turned back towards the ocean. “No way he gets to disrespect me like that.”

“Fucking outrageous is what it is.” Robby agreed as hate-filled eyes followed Tony’s progress along the stone-paved trail that went all around the perimeter of the estate. “You should have taken him down, then and there, Eddy.”

The three men stopped talking as an Enforcer BattleMech stomped past their position. The medium Mech was one of the four Mechs that had been hired by Frank Rossi to help beef up the security forces of Il Fortezza Grande. The other three Mechs included a Blackjack, a Grasshopper, and a Guillotine; between them they made a potent deterrent against most local forces. The Enforcer’s steps rattled the surrounding area, but it moved on in the route that it had been assigned to.

“I shoulda.” Eddy said when the Enforcer’s footsteps echoed away. He rolled his shoulders back and looked at his crew.  “I shoulda taken him down right then and there. It was just that he had the drop on us with all them guns pointing our way.”

“That means he’s scare of you, Eddy.” Robby said as he got closer to Eddy. “I could see that fear in his eyes when he was talking to you. That’s why he was laughing so much, so you couldn’t see it too. But I saw it, I know I did.”

“Now… Robby… let’s not get too carried away here…” Stevie began.

“No.” Eddy cut Stevie off sharply. “No. Robby’s right. Why else would he be coming over here with that much firepower if he wasn’t scared?”

Stevie licked his lips. “You know, I think I saw that Tony and his guys were on roving patrol. All five of them were stuck together… like Rocko’s group that came by an hour ago.”

“That’s what he wants you to think.” Eddy turned and poked Stevie in the shoulder. “That mother fucker Tony just knows that he’s gotta watch his back when he messes with me. He might be big shit with Rossi and his crew, but I’m big shit with Johnnie Even’s crew. Top of the pile shit, no less, and I don’t gotta take that from nobody.”

“I agree with you, Eddy. The man shouldn’t be disrespecting you like that… he’s got no place doing it. Still, we can’t just go off and saying stuff that might be getting Tony the Boulder on us.” Stevie explained in a calm voice, trying to diffuse the situation. 

Robby smirked and nodded towards Stevie. “Fucker’s scared of Tony.”

“Don’t you start…” Stevie started and pointed a finger at Robby just to have Eddy step between him and Robby.

“He’s right.” Eddy growled as he stood almost nose to nose with Stevie. “You’re scared of Tony.”

“Fucking right, I am… cause I’m smart!” Stevie yelled. “That man works for Frankie Rossi… he’s Rossi’s top man. Rossi’s the one that has Mr. DiLeo’s ear and works as his right hand. Tony works as Rossi’s right hand… his extremely large and well-armed right hand. No way I wanna get on his bad side.” He poked Eddy back.  “Especially just to make you feel bigger.”

“What the fuck did you say to me?” Eddy said, his eyes going hard.

“I said that Tony makes you feel like a little man and he scares the shit out of you, but you’re too fucking stupid to admit it so you start acting all big and bad about it.” Stevie roared out, punctuating his words with his finger stabbing the air in front of Eddy’s face. “And if you don’t get your head out of your ass and stop listenin’ to dumb fucks like that wise ass over there, then you’re gonna get dead before you can do anything good for yourself!”

Eddy smashed his fist into Stevie’s stomach and then another fist into the taller man’s head when Stevie bent down in reaction to the first punch. Stevie started to go backwards then was helped by Eddy’s well-polished shoe. He landed hard on the floor of the stone balcony and bounced his head off the stones. As he laid there dazed, Eddy brought a foot down on Stevie’s chest and brought his submachine gun around so Stevie could look down the barrel.

“This is what happens to people that doubt me, Stevie.” Eddy snarled. “They get the business end of a 14 mm round punched through their brain. You got that?” When Stevie didn’t respond right away, Eddy stabbed him in the chest with the barrel of the weapon. “I said: you got that?”

Trying to blink away the stars and reeling from pain, it was all that Stevie could do to nod and mutter. “I got it, Eddy… I got it.”

“Damned good thing.” Eddy poked him with the submachine gun again before stepping over him and walking in the direction that Tony the Boulder went, pointing at the silhouette of the focus for his rage. “And that mother fucker is going to get his too.”

As if he had called down the heavens, an unfamiliar whistling sound came followed by a series of explosions that lit up the sky. For a brief moment, Eddy was sure he could see Tony and his crew in the light of the explosion just before they were torn apart by it. The whistling continued and more explosions followed, shattering stonework and setting fire to anything that would burn. The Enforcer came back in view and fired its autocannon several times before being engulfed in a wave of explosions itself. 

Everyone at the estate knew they were under attack. 

To Eddy, it seemed the sky was on fire. 

Posted by,
SRLT Jackson “Jack” Tallman
Callsign: Madman
CN9-D Centurion
Executive Officer and Chief Window Washer
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 2276
Contract Count: 19,305
 
2147
August 23, 3093
7 kilometers south
DiLeo Estate aka “Il Fortezza Grande”
114 km East of Galaport
Galatea, Lyran Alliance

SRLT Jackson “Madman” Tallman slowed his CN9-D Centurion down to a steady 40 kilometers per hour to make sure that all the Mechs in his reinforced lance stayed together. The Mechs were moving by starlight visuals and sensor feeds, trying to keep themselves from both getting tangled up in some unseen ravine as well as out of sight of the enemy. The DiLeo Estate was a good ten klicks north of them and hopefully didn’t have roving patrols of Mechs or vehicles wandering about the badlands at 2200 hours. While he had wanted to play a pivotal role in the assault, Jackson really didn’t think that would include a 20 klick march through the badlands to set up an artillery post, still that is what Tempest Lance was designed to do.

The five Mechs that made up Tempest Lance were all armed with an LRM launcher. While this could include a minimal amount of LRMs, like the LRM10 rack on his Centurion; it also included the twin LRM20 racks on LTJG Kylie “Red” Fong’s ARC-4M Archer. At 70 tons, the Archer was the heaviest Mech in the lance but was quickly followed by the 65 ton CRD-5S Crusader that LTJG Parker “Thorn” Rose piloted. His twin LRM15 racks were supplemented by a pair of SRM6 racks, two medium lasers, and a flamer, giving him better short range armament than any other Mech in Tempest Lance.

The last two Mechs were twins of each other and heavier than his Centurion’s own 50-ton weight. The APL-2S Apollo came in at 55 tons and sported two LRM15 racks along with a pair of medium lasers each. The Mechs were named after the legendary Greek god of the sun, who was also a twin. All of these things seemed to be most appropriate as these two Mechs were piloted by twins. LTJG Franklin “Right” Morgan piloted one of the two Apollos while the other was piloted by his twin brother LTJG Adrian “Left” Morgan.

Between these five Mechs, Tempest Lance could put 140 LRMs into the sky in one salvo and had done so on numerous occasions, usually crushing whatever their target was. Even with an anti-missile system installed on a Mech, which was still rare even with all of the advanced technology available, the wave of missiles that could be brought down on one target would normally result in the target going away. Permanently.

Jackson smiled to himself at that thought. While it wasn’t technically the most honorable way to fight a battle, pouring LRMs on some unseen target using coordinates sent back to you by a spotter with no chance for the target to fight back, it was a damned effective way to fight. Especially when you used a variety of missile loads with various sub-munitions designed to lay minefields or drop globs of inferno chemicals or used guidance systems to follow up on a nearby enemy unit. 

However, despite the effectiveness of the LRM barrage, Jackson really wanted to get into it with enemy Mechs and hoped that Chaos Incorporated would grow enough to allow him to lead that sort of unit instead of the missile boats of Tempest Lance. And maybe get a slightly bigger Mech so he could better fight at the closer ranges he desired. Fighting at that close range was where he’d made a name for himself back in the AFFS and that’d be where he’d find glory again.

Jackson’s attention was deflected from its thought process to the present by the chime of at timer that Jackson had set up. It was actually a chronometer that had its band destroyed so he’d epoxied it to his control board and used it as needed. Right now it was telling him that they were not where they needed to be when.

Snarling at himself, Jackson squelched one time on Tempest Lance’s commchannel to draw the attention of the rest of the lance on him. He then put the Centurion’s humanoid left arm in the air and made a fist then pumped the Mech’s fist up and down twice before accelerating to 50 KPH. The need for speed did not remove the need for silence across the commchannels. Hopefully that would be fast enough to get Tempest Lance to where it needed to be close enough to the appointed time that it wouldn’t throw everything off entirely. Minutes later, the DiLeo Estate showed up on his radar and Jackson smiled. They were still about 3000 meters out, but they would be in range for the LRMs in mere moments. 

Ratcheting up his visual magnification, Jackson surveyed the area along Tempest Lance’s path. There seemed to be a couple of patrols out there… single vehicles, probably loaded with bad men carrying automatic weapons… nothing to worry about. However, the ping that he received that showed a BattleMech was certainly more worrisome. A single Mech wouldn’t be enough to stop their attack on the compound… even if that Mech was an assault class machine… but it could delay them from doing so and could also cost the lance a Mech or two itself. 

Trying to keep an eye out for that Mech while not actively pinging for it on his radar, especially in the broken terrain of the badlands leading up to the estate was going to be a challenge. Still… the enemy Mech was not their primary target… the estate was. Finding that on the radar would not be a problem. Jackson centered his targeting computer’s crosshairs on the center of the estate and waited.

A green light on his targeting system caught his attention and Jackson grinned despite himself. He squelched on Tempest’s commchannel again and brought the Centurions’ left arm up and made a fist while slowing his Mech down. The rest of the lance slowed as well, stopping their Mechs alongside his.  They were just outside of the 630 meters’ maximum range for their LRMs and within range of the enemy patrols. Each MechWarrior took a moment to make sure that everything was showing green, that the first rounds of LRM munitions were loaded, and they were ready to rock.

Moments later, Jackson started seeing green lights come up on his communication board, one for each of the other four Mechs in Tempest Lance. When the last one lit, he started his Centurion forward and at 590 meters from their designated target, stopped again. He adjusted the microphone of his neurohelmet and said one word.

“Go.”

One hundred and forty missiles leapt from nine LRM racks, arching into the sky on their separate tracks and beginning to come back down towards their designated target. Before they had even gotten half way to their target, another wave of missiles loaded into the various launchers of the Mechs’ LRM batteries and were fired, this time to a target point some twenty meters away from the original one.  

Jackson smiled and adjusted his microphone again before swapping to another channel, designated as the company level channel before the operation had begun. “Sky is on fire. Say again: sky is on fire.”

The code phrase would be what set everything else into motion for the assault bringing the rest of Chaos Incorporated into the fray. Jackson smiled when his radar pinged and he began moving the Centurion farther forward; time to get stuck in.

[[Briar One deploying.]] Sergeant Dalton “Spiral” Ye said over the commline as his squad of Fa Shih battle armor, known as Disorder Squad, jumped off of Left’s Apollo and began moving forward under their own power, leaving the Mechs behind and heading towards the estate.

[[Briar Two deploying.]] Sergeant Carl “Pinky” Pinkerton announced, following Spiral’s move and leading Entropy Squad from Right’s Apollo. His squad formed up to the left and just behind Disorder Squad, moving with them towards the estate.

The first APC came bouncing over the top of the ridge with dust billowing all around it. The high explosive, armor piercing round from the LB10X autocannon that made up the Centurion’s right arm punched through the thin armor that the vehicle sported like it wasn’t there. These small APCs would be great for deterring civilians and maybe even other armored vehicles coming to snoop around, but they were nothing to a BattleMech.

Jackson laughed and targeted the next APC, which was trying its damnedest to swing around and get away. The crosshairs on his targeting system pulsed gold one time and the LB10X bucked again, sending another HEAP round downrange. The second APC faired just as well as the first when the 100 mm round pushed through the armor on its rear then exploded inside the vehicle. The APC tumbled ass over nose twice before coming to rest in as a fiery heap of twisted metal.

A beam of scarlet energy cut into the Centurion’s right torso, catching Jackson slightly off guard. He’d been so absorbed in the destruction of the scouts; he’d forgotten about the Mech that his radar had picked up. The radar pinged again and Jackson targeted the Mech that was racing towards his position, followed not too far behind by a second Mech. 

His warbook made the first Mech out as a GLT-5M Guillotine, a configuration that was almost 40 years old these days, but still something to be reckoned with, especially as it outmassed his Mech by a solid 20 tons. Jackson dropped his crosshairs on the enemy Mech and opened fire with first his LRMs and then his LB10X as he began moving. Several LRMs peppered the enemy Mech, but the LB10X missed entirely. 

Cursing, Jackson opened up his communit. “Grinder One to all Grinders; enemy Mike Bravo incoming at bearing 142, 300 meters and closing.”

[[Grinder two on it.]]  Red’s voice came over the commline. A moment later, the Guillotine was wreathed in explosions as forty missiles pounded on the Mech and surrounding landscape.  The enemy Mech staggered slightly as almost 20 of those missiles crushed armor plating from all across the Mech’s body. It was still up though and continued to move forward.

Jackson and Red both fired again, sending more missiles and a stream of autocannon rounds towards the Guillotine. The Mech staggered as the round made impact, shattering more armor plating before rending the Guillotine’s left armor from its body, sending the limp cartwheeling into the badlands. The Guillotine started to move to a closer range but suddenly stopped and seemed to be moving in a frenzy.

[[Briar engaging.]]

Jackson smiled and slipped his finger from the trigger of his weapons before he could fire again. The Fa Shih battle armor had intercepted the Guillotine and were tearing into it with their small lasers and armor-peeling claws. He checked the rest of Tempest Lance and noted they were starting to move forward and were no longer firing their LRMs into the estate. That meant the rest of the unit was inside the perimeter and destroying everything possible.

[[Grinder Four to all Grinders; engaging second Bravo Mike. Warbook shows a GHR-7K Grasshopper.]] reported LTJG Adrian "Left" Morgan from his Apollo. A moment later, both Apollos and the Crusader opened fire with their LRMs. The Grasshopper stumbled when the missiles made impact and almost went flat on its face before the MechWarrior recovered. 

Both Jackson and Red swung their Mechs around and opened fire on the Grasshopper as well. Another fifty missiles and a stream of autocannon rounds went downrange towards the enemy Mech. None of Jackson’s missiles hit, but the autocannon rounds slammed into the Grasshopper’s right leg, shattering armor with their impacts. Of the 40 missiles that Red put into the air, eighteen hit the enemy Mech, impacting all across the enemy Mech, including landing two against the Grasshopper’s head. 

Despite this damage, the enemy opened fire with his own weapons. Both light PPCs carved into Red’s Archer, one across the left torso and the other ran up the center torso, not quite making it all the way to the cockpit. Electrical wash slid over the 70-ton war machine and Red fought her Mech’s controls at the loss of armor. A single ER medium laser carved across the Archer’s left torso, melting away more armor from the already damaged Mech. 

While Red fought to keep her Mech upright, the rest of Tempest Lance opened fire again. The Grasshopper was enveloped by 100 missiles and dropped to one knee as explosions went off all across it. At that point, the enemy MechWarrior decided that he’d had enough and leapt backwards, heading to imagined safety of the estate. Jackson silently wished him well of what he’d find there and turned his Centurion to helping the Archer steady itself.

“You good, Grinder Two?” he asked.

[[Great.]] Red replied. [[I think I bit my lip pretty good, but I’ll live.]]

“If that’s the worst thing we have to worry about, I’ll be happy.” Jackson replied. “Alright Grinders, let’s get in there.”

The five Mechs moved forward as one, but Jackson paused at the now downed Guillotine. It’s left leg was separated from the rest of the Mech and the Fa Shih had begun tearing open the cockpit to get to the MechWarrior inside. One of the battle armor suits stuck it’s left arm into an opening in the cockpit, ignoring the bullets that the MechWarrior shot at it, then doused the entire cockpit in flames. After a moment, the trooper leapt off and headed towards the estate with its squad mates. 

Jackson nodded in approval. Chaos Incorporated may have started this fight, but the DiLeo people had made it no-holds barred, war to the knife. Jackson would be damned if he would shy away from the dance after the tune had been called. He started his Centurion forward to join in the rest of the fighting.

Posted by,
SRLT Jackson “Jack” Tallman
Callsign: Madman
CN9-D Centurion
Executive Officer and Chief Window Washer
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 2,342
Contract Count: 21,647
 
2217
August 23, 3093
Mech Bay One
MARIANNA Union Class DropShip
12 km above surface
4 km West of DiLeo Estate aka “Il Fortezza Grande”
114 km East of Galaport
Galatea, Lyran Alliance

[[Sky is on fire. Say again: sky is on fire.]] 

As the phrase came across the commline, Captain Alexander “Random” Yao braced himself inside the cockpit of his CTF-4L Cataphract as the MARIANNA, the Union class DropShip he rode in, shoved itself through the atmosphere at its best speed. They had to cross the 4 kilometers between them and the target before effective counter measures, the local militia, or some other force responded to their assault. 

Alex watched the radar feed he was getting from the MARIANNA’s bridge with intensity. They only had one real shot to pull this off and it had to be a good shot at that. If anyone of value escaped, then much of this would be for nothing. However, the plan they had made after finding out about the big meeting of DiLeo’s bosses should work well enough to make sure that didn’t happen. Mentally, Alex reviewed the plan and hoped it would go somewhat close to how it had been envisioned.

First came the initial deception. Chaos Incorporated abandoned their billet at 0200 the morning of August 23 and loaded aboard the MARIANNA then headed out of Galatea, burning out of the atmosphere at 1.5 Gs the entire way. Once out of range of anybody that really cared what they would do, the MARIANNA slid behind one of Galatea’s moons and waited. When the LEAPING LADY, another Union class DropShip and friend to the MARIANNA, flew by, the MARIANNA turned off its transponder and slid in tight enough with the LEAPING LADY that their radar signatures merged.

The MARIANNA then dropped away when the two vessels were under Galatea’s radar and moved to drop off the various portions of Chaos Incorporated to their assigned areas. When this was completed, the MARIANNA with the remaining forces left aboard, flew into the mountain areas and waited for everything to be in place and the bosses for the DiLeo organization to arrive at the DiLeo Estate for their meeting.

During all of this flying about, the Mechs and battle armor of Chaos Incorporated were painted in a flat gunmetal grey paint scheme with no trim coloring or other symbols to show who they might be. They had all turned off their Identify Friend/Foe transponders, in an effort to conceal their identity. With few if any enemy Mechs on the field, everyone was certain they would know who was who just by sight. Alex made another silent prayer that everyone was right about that.

On the MARIANNE itself, while Captain Dillan Fowler would not allow the ship’s name to be painted over, he did allow them to conceal it with sheet metal that was tacked on with welds on the armor plating.  The sheet metal wouldn’t be able to stay over the name when the DropShip went back into the atmosphere, which satisfied Captain Fowler. 

While anyone with a brain and a copy of Chaos Incorporated’s TO&E would be able to figure out who it was, proving it would be a more difficult thing and that was all that really mattered. As long as it could not be proven who had smashed the estate, then there was no one to prosecute under the law. Alex also had a hope that the local police forces wouldn’t look to hard for someone that had removed a large thorn from their side.

According to the plan, as the DiLeo bosses would be meeting, the six BattleMechs of Tempest Lance would be moving in by land towards the estate with two squads, Disorder and Entropy, of battle armor riding with them. Once in range and as close to 2200 as possible, they saturate the area with the LRMs that all the BattleMechs of Tempest Lance carried. Their initial salvo of LRMs would be trigger for the rest of Chaos Incorporated to attack with the “sky is on fire” phrase being the code to begin the attack.

When the code came through, two of the three jump capable Mechs of Lawless Lance would leap into the estate from the ocean, landing on the eastern edge of the estate and begin destroying anything that would burn or blow up. This unit would carry two squad of Fa Shih with them, Bedlam and Confusion Squads, to act as infantry support and to help clear the interior of the estate.

As the jump-capable Mechs landed, the LRM barrage would fall away from their projected landing zone and begin to slowly withdraw to the other edge of the estate. The barrage would continue to batter the estate but let up slowly to make sure that there would be little chance of friendly fire incidents. The LRM barrage would halt entirely when the MARIANNA arrived on the scene.

The MARIANNA would arrive carrying the other three BattleMechs of Lawless Lance to the estate and do a hot drop of the Mechs into the middle of everything with Anarchy Squad riding along on Alex’s Cataphract. The MARIANNA’s arrival would also be the trigger for Tempest Lance to close in on the estate and help in leveling anything that was left. 

The MARIANNA would then land just outside the estate, waiting for either the Mechs and battle armor to form up on at the LZ, after they were done leveling the estate, or the DropShip would leave if enemy forces threatened it. If it had to leave, the MARIANNA would rendezvous with the ground forces at one of several pre-selected landing zones. Which one would be used would be determined by what went wrong between the opening shots and the time for pick-up. 

Alex had long ago decided that it was best to figure that something would indeed go wrong and make multiple plans to accommodate such things. Of course, there was always the chance that the plans for things to go wrong would also have things go wrong, but one could only plan so much before one went out of one’s fucking gourd with trying to plan things. 

Much to the disgust of Lt. Sara “Bandit” Hammond, the two Aerospace Fighters of Havok Lance would sit in their cradles aboard the MARIANNA, ready to be launched only in the case that their support would be required. This would be the case, primarily, if the militia or another force tried to come to the rescue of the estate or otherwise assaulted the ground forces as they attempted to withdraw. Alex decided that this was the best punishment truly available to him for Sara having landed everyone in this mess to begin with.

[[Eagle One on the ground. Beetle One deployed.]] LTJG Fiona “Ice” de Wynter reported as her TDR-9SE Thunderbolt completed its leap from the beach to the top of the bluff where the estate stood. Alex could hear the whoosh of missiles being fired and pictured Fiona’s cold smile as she wreaked havoc on the estate.

[[Eagle Two on the ground. Beetle Two deployed.]] LTJG Felix “Dice” King reported, echoing Fiona. His OSR-4L Ostroc had been paired with her Thunderbolt as both Mechs were equipped with jump jets. Alex knew that Felix would not be as happy with the upcoming slaughter, as he preferred a stand up fight against someone who might be a challenge. Still he would not shirk his duty and would do everything he could to remove the threat that the DiLeo organization presented Chaos Incorporated.

[[Beetle One deployed and engaging.]] The commline robbed LTJG Isabella “Cutter” Fisk’s voice of its normal singsong tones. Her battle armor squad, Bedlam Squad, would be moving to the left of the jumping Mech’s position and moving across the estate to pry out any defenders that might be in the buildings.

[[Beetle Two deployed and… ow! Fuck!! Beetle Two engaging!]] Master Sergeant Andrei “Ram” Ramius reported. Alex hoped that whatever had made Ram curse was not something that would get the man killed. 

A female’s voice came over the commline, interrupting Alex’s thoughts, and began the countdown. [[Green to drop in ten… nine… eight…]]

Alex felt the clamps release from his Mech and he started the Cataphract out of the Mech cubicle slowly, trying to make sure he kept the Mech upright and well balanced. Captain Fowler was good to his word though… the MARIANNE was rock solid and steady during its descent. The doors to Mech Bay One opened.

[[… four… three…]]

Alex brought the Cataphract’s throttle up to full and stepped out of the Mech Bay as the voice over the commline said: [[one]]

The Cataphract dropped the ten meters between the MARIANNA and the ground without the aid of any jump jets, but Alex prayed louder and flexed the knees of the Mech at landing. One or both did the trick and the 70 ton BattleMech landed in the middle of the DiLeo Estate… fondly known as “Il Fortezza Grande” or “The Grand Fortress” by its owner… with only minor damage to its legs. The Mech landed in the middle of a garden, smashing several pillars made from a local white stone as well as a fountain.

“Skyfish One is on the ground. Deploying Crab One.” Yao said into the microphone of his neurohelmet. He lined his crosshairs up on the staggering form of an Enforcer, which his warbook tagged as an ENF-5D. The Mech was badly mauled by the hail of LRMs that had been pounding it and the estate as a whole. When his crosshairs flashed gold, Alex let loose with both the Gauss Rifle and ER PPC mounted on his Mech. 

The Enforcer took the ER PPC blast in the left arm, ripping the already damaged limb off the medium Mech while the Gauss rifle round punched through what remained of the Enforcer’s left torso. The basketball sized nickel plated slug entered the front of the Enforcer, shattering what little armor remained, and went out the back of the Mech, taking much of the Enforcer’s engine out with it. The Enforcer dropped to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut, shattering another fountain that had somehow survived the LRM barrage. 

[[Crab One deployed.]] Lt. Tiana “Risky” Anders-Hsien called out over the comms as her squad of Fa Shih battle armor leapt clear of Alex’s Cataphract and headed into the estate, cutting down whatever resistance they found on the way in. Risky led her forces directly towards the main house.

[[Skyfish Two on the ground.]] growled out Lieutenant Vincent “Crow” Hobbs as his GAL-2GLS Gallowglas rode its jump jets down from the MARIANNA and landed beside Yao’s Cataphract. Despite Yao’s protests, explanations, and finally almost issued orders; Hobbs had refused to go with the other jumping Mechs up the bluff and chose to fight beside Yao. Rather than make things worse by ordering his “bodyguard” to leave his side when those orders would not be followed. 

[[Skyfish Three on the ground.]] Grunted LTJG Anthony "Bear" Greenwoode as his WHM-8D Warhammer came to a staggered landing in the middle of the remains of the fountain that Yao had damaged during his own landing. While the Warhammer didn’t land as well as Yao had; it did the job well enough to not fall over then brought itself entirely under control after a moment of imbalance. 

The three heavy Mechs started forward, following Anarchy Squad towards the main house, and firing their weapons on any target that presented itself. Pop-up autocannons hidden around the estate were destroyed, normally before they fired more than a few rounds, none of which were enough to truly threaten the marching BattleMechs.

[[Engaging enemy Mech. Bearing eight-nine.]] Crow reported. His Gallowglas fired its right arm mounted Gauss rifle as well as both large lasers at a Grasshopper that had just landed inside the estate’s perimeter walls. Like the earlier engaged Enforcer, the Grasshopper had been battered by LRM fire. Unlike the Enforcer, there were also burn marks across its armor showing that Tempest Lance had engaged it at closer ranges. 

Alex brought his crosshairs on the Grasshopper even as it staggered from the impact of Crow’s Gauss rifle slug catching it low in the center torso or one of the large lasers carving more armor from its left arm. When the crosshairs pulsed gold, Alex let fly with both of the Cataphract’s main weapons again. His Gauss slug pulled the rest of the Grasshopper’s left arm off along with some more armor from the left torso. The ER PPC’s bolt shattered nearly a ton of armor from the Grasshopper’s right torso and spun the Mech in that direction.

[[I have tone… locked.]] Bear called out and fired his Warhammer’s weapons on the Grasshopper as well. His ER PPCs carved into the enemy Mech’s right leg, removing most if not all of the armor there and dropping the Grasshopper to the ground. As it fell, six SRMs also spiraled into the Mech, shattering armor plates all across it. The Grasshopper crashed to the ground and did not move.

Alex pumped one fist in the air, barely missing one of the braces attached to his command couch and opened a commline to the entire unit. “Ever forward. Clear everything. I want nothing… not a stone, not a statue, not a fucking grape vine left standing. Skyfish One clear.”

Posted by,
Captain Alexander Yao
Callsign: Random
CTF-4L Cataphract
Head Cat Herder
Chaos Incorporated

Word count: 2,257
Contract count: 23,904

2231
August 23, 3093
DiLeo Estate aka “Il Fortezza Grande”
114 km East of Galaport
Galatea, Lyran Alliance

Lieutenant Tiana “Risky” Anders-Hsien pushed forward in her suit of Fa Shih battle armor, ignoring most of the small arms fire that was coming her way. Someone had gotten a bright idea and fired several 12 -gauge slugs into her breastplate and helmet. That particular asshole lived only long enough to register as something besides a blurry man-shaped figure. She had let loose with the anti-personnel machine gun fitted under her left arm, filling him with somewhere between five and twenty-three 12 mm rounds… she was sure about the five of them, but not so sure about the other eighteen.  

[[You good, One?]] Corporal Frasier “Jackal” Kearns asked as he stepped around and in front of her, shielding his commanding officer with his own body. The sounds of shredding paper filled the room as he laid waste to anything over a meter in height with his mini-gun.

“Fine… I’m fine, Four.” She replied through gritted teeth. The slugs to her chest had done little thanks to the thick armor there, but her head rang from the slug that hit her helmet. “Just need a minute to get my breath back.”

[[We’ve got you, One.]] Specialist Jay “Radar” Carter said and laid a hand on her shoulder to let her know that he was there. 

“Everything okay?” Risky asked her communications specialist, who monitored all of the communication channels so she didn’t have to deal with everything all at once. 

[[ We’re five by five.]] he replied as he continued to sweep his own mini-gun across his sector of the room. 

“Good. “She groaned slightly then stood up, waiting for a wave of dizziness to hit. None did so she took another breath and started forward past the other two members of her squad. As she stood the commline came open with Captain Alexander Yau’s voice.

[[Ever forward. Clear everything. I want nothing… not a stone, not a statue, not a fucking grape vine left standing. Skyfish One clear.]]

“Right. Right.” Risky stepped past her two squad mates and started deeper into the mansion that seemed to house most of the mobsters that had holed up in the estate. “As the man said: ever forward.”

The fourth member of the squad trooped past her, shoved her shoulder through the expensive off-world wooden door and continued on, spraying her mini-gun at anything that looked to be threatening or perhaps didn’t go with the rest of the décor. Specialist Laura "Twitch" Pandini was thorough in her work if nothing else.

[[Good thing she didn’t get a flamer.]] Jackal groused as he followed Twitch’s lead, applying short bursts into anything that might have been somehow missed by his squad mate. 

“Too true.” Risky agreed. Normally Twitch worked as a sniper, perched somewhere far away from the main action and going with the creed of “one shot, one kill” that snipers adhered to. When she was working the battlefield “from the ground”, as she put it, Twitch had a tendency to use way more rounds than necessary. Everyone figured she was making up for being so frugal with her ammunition when she sniped and let it go.

Risky opened her commline with a flick of her eyes to the proper area of her HUD. “Crab to all: clear as you come and converge on the main house. Crab squad is deployed inside and meeting medium resistance. No sign of the big fish.”

[[That’s going to be a problem.]] Radar noted and let loose a short burst of chain-gun fire. Risky figured he hit what he was aiming at since there was no return fire and Radar had stopped shooting.

“Agreed.” Risky replied and let loose a burst of fire from her AP weapon. The goon that had popped up from behind a bar went down a bloody mess, his automatic weapon arching up to put holes into an expensive chandler hanging overhead. “Damn… I am not complaining, but this is slaughter.”

[[I might feel sorry for them if they wouldn’t gladly cut my throat from behind in a dark alley.]] Jackal said in a level voice. He shredded several hundred thousands of C-bills worth of furniture with his mini-gun in a neighboring room then fired his underslung grenade launcher into the same room, blowing the windows out and setting things on fire. [[But since they would, fuck them.]] 

“I hear that.” Risky said and moved to a steady trot. “Three, don’t get too far ahead.”

[[Copy.]] Twitch replied. The sound of her mini-gun died down and Risky figured that Twitch had stopped moving forward to let the rest of Anarchy Squad to catch up. 

As the rest of the squad entered the room, Twitch stood up and was then knocked back down when the report of a heavy machine gun filled the room. A stream of 16 mm rounds ripped through the room with tracers streaking across the area on a regular basis, the phosphorous-filled rounds set fire to anything they touched that might burn.

As one, the other members of Anarchy Squad dropped to a knee and returned fire, spraying and praying that they hit the source of the heavy machine gun rounds. Radar toppled backwards with a grunt of pain as two rounds slammed into his left shoulder, spinning him as he fell.

Jackal brought his left arm up and let loose with a barrage of grenades from his launcher. Fragmentation rounds pounded a balcony located just above and to the right of the room the squad was in. Even after the heavy weapon stopped shooting, Jackal slammed an extra three rounds of high-explosive, anti-personnel grenades into that area. When a limb went cartwheeling away from the enemy’s position, Jackal stopped firing but kept his weapons trained on that area.

“Two? Three?” Risky yelled into the comms. “Talk to me!”

[[Two reporting, just shaken.]] Radar replied. [[No breach, just tossed around.]]

“Three?” Risky repeated as she helped Radar to his feet then started to where Twitch went down. The battle armor trooper was on her hands and knees, a small pool of blood beneath her. 
[[Three reporting. I have a breach in my chest armor and got some fragments in me, but I’ll be fine.]] Twitch groaned and tried to stand, only to collapse against a small iron and glass table that had somehow managed to not get destroyed in the firefight. Her mini-gun punched through the glass top, but the frame of the table held her weight long enough for her to go to one knee.

“You okay?” Risky asked, wanting to do nothing but pop her helmet and open Twitch’s suit to check her injuries. However, that was not just risky, but suicidal. The battle armor suit was the only thing that kept Twitch from becoming a red stain on the wall.

[[No, but I’ll live.]] Twitch replied and got to her feet with Risky’s help. [[Would it be okay if I wimped out and let someone else take point?]]

“I suppose if you feel that strongly about it.” Risky replied and waved Jackal forward. “Rada-… Two, help Three out and keep an ear out for comms from above. Also, ping this place if you can and see if we can get an idea of where the big fish are hiding.”

[[Copy, One.]] Radar replied and moved to help support Twitch, letting Risky move forward with Jackal. 

“Crab One to Skyfish One… I have walking wounded.”

[[Copy Crab One.]] Yao’s voice paused. [[ You know we have to net the big fish.]]

Risky gritted her teeth at the statement… it was Yao’s way of apologizing for them to keep moving and fighting until they got the big bosses that had attended the meeting. “Copy that, Skyfish.”

[[I’m good, dammit, let go!]] Twitch’s voice growled over the comms.

Risky looked back and saw Radar backing off of the other trooper and letting her come forward on her own. She spotted Risky looking at her and kept moving forward.

[[I’m fine, One. Ever forward.]]

“Ever forward.” Risky agreed and turned back so she could continue on. Twitch was a big girl and a professional… if she said she was fine, then she was fine. Still… she turned back to Twitch and poked her in the left shoulder, where the armor wasn’t damaged. “Just don’t slow me down with your whining about bleeding. I have my shows to catch.”

[[Season finales are tonight too.]] Twitch replied with a small, strained laugh.

“Damned straight. Make me miss that and your ass will be hurting from the amount of butt chewing I do on you.”

[[Ma’am, yes, ma’am.]] Twitch continued forward, passing Risky and taking her spot behind Jackal and to his right. 

The squad moved forward as one, covering their assigned zones with their weapons panning back and forth as they moved. They cleared the rest of the first floor and stopped at the base of an ornate marble staircase. Jackal stopped and turned to Risky.
“Up and over.” Risky said.

Without another word, Jackal lit up his jump pack and leapt to the next floor’s landing, bounding over the stairs. After a moment, his voice came over the commline. [[ Clear.]]

“Two… then Three. I have the rear.” 

Radar leapt up to the next floor, not with as much grace as Jackal displayed but he made it in one piece. A moment later, Twitch jumped up to the top then pointed her weapon down to the first floor, watching the area the squad was leaving as Risky rode her jump jets up to the second floor then motioned the squad forward. 

Anarchy Squad had gone forward another ten meters when a number of doors flew open, each disgorging a number of DiLeo’s goons. They were wearing body armor and armed with a number of automatic weapons, shotguns, and other weapons. There was a moment where no one moved or said anything before everyone opened fire.

The goons opened up first, shotgun slugs and automatic weapons firing at the armored battle suits almost as one. Two grenade launchers opened up, spewing 20mm grenades at Anarchy Squad, spreading shrapnel all across the room. Three of them went down to bullets that ricocheted from the Fa Shih suits or from the fragmentation rounds of the grenade launchers.

For their part, Anarchy Squad returned fire with mini-guns, shotguns, and their own grenade launchers; spraying death and destruction all across the area. The difference was that despite being staggered by the concussion of grenades and reeling backwards from the weight of the incoming fire; Anarchy Squad was near impervious from much of the hazardous air particles flying around. 

Forty seconds after the first rounds were fired, the fight was over. Over a dozen bodies littered all across the floor or against the walls; their bodies shredded by not only the weapons of Anarchy Squad but also the fire of their comrades. The room was a shambles with not a piece of furniture or a single wall fixture not scarred by weapons fire. The walls were perforated with bullet holes, making them more screens than actual walls.

[[That was fun.]] Jackal said with more than a bit of amusement in his voice.

As if his voice was the final straw, the chandler that was attached to the ceiling in the middle of the room suddenly dropped to the ground, shattering the glass ornaments that made up the better part of the fixture. Radar flinched back from the explosion of glass and brass. As if making up for the reaction, he stepped forward and crushed several more of the ornaments under his armored boot.

[[Boy… you showed that chandler.]] Twitch said in a dry voice.

[[That will teach them.]] Radar confirmed.

“Let’s keep…” Risky started to say then turned at the sound of several large engines firing up, followed by a crashing sound. She rushed to a window, pulling down the remains of the curtains to better see outside. Four armored vehicles were roaring out of the house and heading towards the gate at the south end of the compound.
“Crab One to Skyfish One… four vehicles are heading south at high speed. Probably the big fishes leaving the pond.” She motioned her left arm forward and leapt out the window, igniting her jump jets as she did. The rest of her squad followed her out the shattered window. “Crab One in pursuit.”

[[Copy that Crab One. All units, converge on those vehicles… they don’t leave this place in one piece.]]

“You got it, Skyfish One.” Risky growled over the commline. “Let’s go people… let’s get these bastards.”

Posted by,
LT Tiana Anders-Hsien
Callsign: Risky
Fa Shih Battle Armor
Battle Armor Commander
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 2136
Contract Count: 26,040

2249
August 23, 3093
DiLeo Estate aka “Il Fortezza Grande”
114 km East of Galaport
Galatea, Lyran Alliance

[[Copy that Crab One. All units, converge on those vehicles… they don’t leave this place in one piece.]]

[[You got it, Skyfish One.]]

“Grinder copies.” SRLT Jackson “Madman” Tallman said into his comm and began moving his Centurion towards the gates of the estate. “All Grinders and Briars, form on me. We have unknown number of vehicles trying to leave the compound with our big fish. They don’t get past us.”

Jackson paid little attention to the chorus of acknowledgements that came over the channel. Everyone knew what to do: stop those vehicles. He dialed up his magnification and focused on the gate of the estate; there was only one way out and he was going to make sure he covered it.

The voice of LTJG Kylie “Red” Fong over the commline broke his thought process. [[Incoming! VTOLS!]]

“You mean lunchmeat.” Jackson replied and flicked his LB10X autocannon over to cluster rounds while searching the sky for targets. He spotted a pair of red flashes zooming towards him and the rest of Tempest Lance at just over treetop level. “Got em… I’ve got four targets on screen. Bearing 49… range at 597 meters and closing. Warbook says… “his eyes flicked from the telemetry coming up on his HUD to a secondary monitor before they widened slightly “Yellowjackets… I repeat those are Yellowjackets. Hit them fast and hard!”

VTOLS were nasty opponents because they were hard to hit at the speeds that most of them could reach. However, if you hit them, they shattered. The nearly unarmored rotors of the aircraft made them glass cannons. The problem was that Yellowjackets mounted a Gauss rifle on them, giving the VTOLS better hitting power than some light BattleMechs on the field and the ability to cripple or outright kill anything on the field short of a DropShip.

Jackson upped the throttle on his Centurion, wanting to meet the damned VTOLs and not give them a chance to become standoff platforms that could severely damage his command. The right arm of the Centurion went up and the LB10X autocannon started barking, sending cluster munitions downrange towards the VTOLs. The cluster rounds allowed the autocannon to work like a giant shotgun, spreading submunitions across a cone shaped area, and were favored for shooting at aircraft of any sort.

The first rounds scattered across the path of the Yellowjackets, causing the enemy pilots to swerve their VTOLs left and right, trying to get out of the way of the “pellets” from the cluster rounds. Gritting his teeth, Jackson tried to follow the aircraft as they moved and continued to fire. If nothing else, he might be able to keep them moving enough to spoil their aim.

Jackson felt the impact of something on the left torso of his Centurion, twisting the Mech’s torso to the right and shattering a ton of armor with the impact. He rode the damage out and did his best to compensate for the damage not to mention the change in the Mech’s balance due to the loss of the armor. He fired a snap shot with the LB10X, but didn’t even come close as the VTOL continued to drift to the left while its Gauss rifle recharged its capacitors. 

[[Got your back, Grinder One.]] LTJG Franklin “Right” Morgan said as his Apollo stepped closer. Both of the covers on his twin LRM launchers flipped open and the Mech vomited out thirty LRMs in one salvo. A different Yellowjacket then the one that had fired at Jackson tried to get out of the way of deluge of missiles but failed. The VTOL’s rotor shattered under the impact of the long range missiles and spun out of control before slamming into the ground.

“That’s one.” Jackson said and spun his Centurion to follow the Yellowjacket that had fired at him. His LB10X coughed again, sending more cluster rounds at the VTOL as it jinked back and forth. The LRM10 launcher on the Centurion’s chest sent out a swarm of missiles, forcing the aircraft to pull back out of range. Satisfied for the moment, Jackson checked out his radar.

The only Yellowjacket still in the sky and still a threat was the one that he’d made retreat. Two of the other three VTOLS were already flaming wreckage and the third was heading to the east at its best speed, trailing a stream of smoke behind it. LTJG Parker “Thorn” Rose’s CRD-5S Crusader was chasing it, spatting missiles and laser beams at the Yellowjacket.

“Grinder Three… let it go. We’ve got bigger fish to fly.” Jackson ordered.

[[Fish are netted.]] Sergeant Carl “Pinky” Pinkerton reported. [[We’ve got all three vehicles under control.]]

“Talk to me Briar!” Jackson demanded

[[We’ve stopped the three vehicles, but the biggest fish is not here.]] Pinky paused in his report. [[Um… unless he’s in the third vehicle… then he’s fish bits.]]
 
“Right.” Jackson closed his eyes and shook his head slightly. He turned the Centurion towards the location that Pinky and his squad showed on the radar. “Can you – “

[[Briar… confirm the fish.]] Captain Alexander Yau’s voice came over the commline, trampling over anything else that Jackson had to say.

[[Will do.]] There was a break in the report for several long moments.

The last Yellowjacket took that moment to reappear, firing another Gauss slug that was close enough to the Centurion’s cockpit that Jackson would later claim that he could see the scars on the slug from the rifling of the weapon’s barrel.

Jackson stopped the Centurion mid-stride and pivoted on its left foot, bringing the Mech around almost 180 degrees and fired the LB10X again. Submunitions from the cluster rounds slammed into the Yellowjacket at the same time as another wave of LRMs from Right’s Apollo impacted all across the aircraft. Several of the cluster round’s submunitions slammed into the Gauss rifle that ran underneath the Yellowjacket’s center. The VTOL exploded in midair as the Gauss rifle’s capacitor ruptured. 

“Thanks for the assist, Grinder Four.”

[[Assist? Assist, hell! That was my kill, One.]] 

 “Whatever, Four.” Jackson replied, but his heart wasn’t into it. All he really cared about was making sure they got the “big fish”: Anthony DiLeo. He turned the Centurion back towards where the Fa Shih squads had stopped the enemy vehicles. Four black SUVs were left on the road with one of the others left as either flaming wreckage and a second one on its side. 

Bodies in black suits were scattered across the ground around the vehicles, their weapons left on the rocky ground where they fell. A few were on their knees, hands behind their heads and under the guard of the bulky forms of six Fa Shih battle armor units standing nearby. Two other Fa Shih troopers were off to one side, one holding a squirming man in his battle gauntlet while the other displayed how slowly he could make the flame of his flamer expand. 

Jackson’s face went blank and his licked at his lips. There were certain things that you had to do during times of war… sometimes even things that you wouldn’t want to do. He brought his Centurion to a stop twenty meters from the vehicles and turned away from the scene at the SUVs. 

“Grinders… form a perimeter on me. Let’s make sure that no one else comes to join the party.” Jackson ordered. “Skyfish One… do we have a confirmation on big fish?”

Posted by,
SRLT Jackson “Jack” Tallman
Callsign: Madman
CN9-D Centurion
Executive Officer and Chief Window Washer
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 1278
Contract Count: 27,318

2257
August 23, 3093
DiLeo Estate aka “Il Fortezza Grande”
114 km East of Galaport
Galatea, Lyran Alliance

[[Skyfish One… do we have a confirmation on big fish?]]

“Don’t get your knickers in a knot, Grinder One.” Captain Alexander Yau replied, his voice steadier than the thoughts in his head. “We’ve got him.”

Alex raised the right arm of his CTF-4L Cataphract and let loose with the ER PPC mounted there. Man-made lightning spat out from the barrel of the weapon and shattered the paved drive just in front of a small red hovercar. The car swerved left then right before the driver lost control and spun the vehicle in a complete circle, bringing it to rest just to the left of the drive. The fan skirt crumpled as it rammed against the remains of a fountain, which turned out to be a deceivingly solid piece of stonework despite having caught a stray missile or three. 

Alex stomped his 70 ton Mech to the side of the hovercar and brought the magnification for his HUD up to four times magnification. His efforts were rewarded by a close up view of pale skinned cleavage caught up in a V-cut blouse of red silk below a tangle of raven-black curls, pouty lips, and dazzling grey eyes.

“Oh wow.” Alex said, not caring if that went over the comms or not. Not taking his eyes off his HUD, Alex poked various controls and took several pictures of the beautiful woman that was slowly coming out of the car. 

[[You okay, One?]] Asked LTJG Anthony "Bear" Greenwoode.

“Ah… yeah. Great. Continue your sweep.” Alex swallowed and turned on his exterior speakers and microphone. “Are you alright, miss?”

>>Fucking great. << She replied and flipped him the bird. >>I just fucked up a 150,000 C-bill… not House bill, but 150,000 C-bill hovercar… dodging a shot from a BattleMech while trying to keep my ass from getting killed in this damned… whatever it is. <<

“It could be worse.” Alex said calmly.

>>Yeah? How’s that? <<

“I could have shot you instead of the road.” He pointed out.

The woman seemed to ponder that for a moment then shrugged and took a deep breath, which did interesting things to everything that Alex could see, then looked back up at the head of the Cataphract. >>You got me there, cowboy. So you going to shoot me or step on me or something? <<

“Not if you surrender.” 

Another shrug from the woman, which Alex watched with glee. >>I suppose I surrender then. << She reached into the hovercar and pulled out a pair of duffle bags. >>I’m ready. Where do I go? << 

“Just stay there. One of my people will be by to get you.” Alex said and started to turn the Cataphract away.

>>What if I run for it? <<

He brought the Cataphract back around and then down to one knee, looming over the woman in a 70-ton war machine to make his point clear. He could see the fear flash across the woman’s face and the way she seemed to swallow hard, but she stood her ground despite that. Impressed, Alex smiled at her and asked. “Where would you go?”

She smiled slightly at that and set the bags on the ground, then leaned against the wreck of the hovercar. >>You got me again, cowboy. I’ll just wait here for your… people? <<

“Good call.” Alex stood the Cataphract back up and moved away from the woman, heading back into the compound. He tapped his radar, making a mark on the screen, then opened up his commline. “Skyfish One to Crab… I have a prisoner at nav-point Zulu One. Please pick her up and put her with the rest.”

[[ Her?]] Alex could hear the sigh in Lieutenant Tiana “Risky” Anders-Hsien’s voice. [[Copy that, Skyfish. Any sign of the big fish?]]

“I’ve got nothing so far, but we’re still looking.” Alex replied and headed towards the remains of the main house. “Skyfish One to all elements… we have one-five minutes to complete this sweep then we are out. Finish leveling this place and watch for anyone trying to escape or hide. Watch your fire to make sure we have no friendly fire incidents or drop a building on a friend or something like that.”

Alex was satisfied with the chorus of affirmatives that came over the line then swapped channels. “Skyfish One to King Cheese.”

[[King Cheese here. What can I do for you?]] asked Captain Dillan Fowler of the MARIANNE asked. His Union class DropShip was parked less than a kilometer away from the northern edge of the estate, its engines idling on a low power setting.

“We’ve cleared most of this place. Anything incoming or outgoing?”

[[No sounds from the militia or anyone else in the area.]] Dillan reported. [[There’s the one Yellowjacket that got away from… er… Grinder element, but that’s it.]] 

Alex licked his lips and nodded. “Right. Nothing to be done about that right now. Keep your sensors peeled and let me know if anything comes out. Skyfish One out.”

Satisfied that there was no rescue force or reinforcements coming their way for the moment, Alex went back to sweeping the compound both visually and with his sensors wide open. If there was something standing more than three meters in height, he blew it to hell with his autocannon or melted it to nothingness with his lasers. 

He listened to all of the radio chatter that was going on as others in the unit followed his example, leveling everything in the estate or setting fire to it if it wouldn’t fall down on its own. Alex gave a grim smile of satisfaction. Even if DiLeo somehow had survived this, he would not forget it any time soon.

A small chime chirped at Alex from his command console and Alex tapped the control to turn it off. It was his ten-minute alarm. “Skyfish One to all elements. We are out of here in five minutes. Finish your work and head towards extraction point seven-kilo. We lift in one-zero minutes… say again, lift in one-zero minutes.”

Again, affirmatives came over the commline just as Alex came to a garage. He reached the Cataphract’s open hand down and ripped the roof off of the garage. Half a dozen hovercars of different makes and manufacturers were stored there; each one well-polished and gleaming in the flickering light of the flames that were all around the ruined estate. Among the cars were nearly a dozen men, all armed and gaping up at the BattleMech that had found them.

Alex flicked on his speakers. “Drop your weapons and raise your hands. If you don’t… “

His speech was cut off by one of the men yelling and pointing, then all of them opening fire. The small arms rounds pinged off the Cataphract’s armor, doing nothing to the Mech but marring the paint. Alex frowned down at the group and tossed the roof to one side as he straightened the Mech up to its full height. This is why he was almost sorry that this whole thing with DiLeo had come to this assault… the bad guys just really had no chance.

He raised the Cataphract’s left hand and opened fire with one of the ER medium lasers mounted there. The crimson beam seared its way across the garage, slicing through one of the cars before impacting with the group of men there. 

One of the men ceased to exist as anything but a red mist as his body superheated then exploded. Another seemed to melt like a living candle as the beam swept over him. Two others ran off, screaming as their bodies burned. The rest scattered, throwing their weapons away and raising their hands into the air.

One man didn’t run. He stood his ground, screaming up at the Cataphract and firing his pistol at the cockpit, ignoring the facts that the revolver was long empty and that he only had one arm. The other arm was gone, likely burned away by the awful heat of the medium laser. 

Alex zoomed into the man and recognized Anthony DiLeo as the man in question. He smiled grimly and leaned the Cataphract down to pick the man up with its left hand. DiLeo started to slam the handle of the revolver against the metal hand that held him, still screaming with incoherent rage. Alex realized that the man’s mind was gone… probably overloaded by the pain of losing his arm and whatever other damage was done by the near miss by the energy beam.

He brought DiLeo up to the level of his cockpit, watching the man for another moment and wondered just why the hell he’d been so scared of this man. Alex glanced away from DiLeo and regarded the men that were standing there with their hands above their heads. To his amazement, he recognized several of them from the day that all of this started in front of Chaos Incorporated’s billet… including Frank Rossi. 

Rossi looked much less spit and polish than he had when he’d threatened Alex and the unit as a whole. Without a second thought, the right arm of the Cataphract swung in line with the group of men and the ER PPC mounted there fired. The men didn’t even have time to scatter before the energy blast hit the ground, scattering their parts all across the area.

Alex’s gaze went back to DiLeo, who had stopped screaming when the Cataphract had fired and was just kneeling inside the palm of the Mech’s left hand. Alex cocked his head and closed the Cataphract’s left hand into a fist. A moment later the fist opened up to a hand then the hand shook back and forth, depositing a red mush across the ground.

Alex then turned the Cataphract back to the garage and opened fire, leveling most of the building and setting the rest on fire. The cars inside were destroyed outright or started burning as the building collapsed around them. He turned the Cataphract to where the MARIANNE loomed outside the ruins of the DiLeo Estate and opened a commchannel. “Skyfish One to all elements. Big fish are fried. We are out.”

Posted by,
Captain Alexander Yao
Callsign: Random
CTF-4L Cataphract
Head Cat Herder
Chaos Incorporated

Word count: 1731
Contract count: 2,049

0307 Local Time
October 24, 3093
Mech Bay Two
MARIANNE, Union Class DropShip
Attached to GOLDEN CRANE Invader Class JumpShip
Irece System Zenith Recharge Station
Irece, Draconis Combine

Captain Alexander Yao scratched at his forehead and flicked another card towards the open toolbox that was sitting, magnetized, to the deck of Mech Bay Two. He sat in a canvas deck chair with his feet propped up on a second chair. Towering above him stood his 70 ton CTF-4L Cataphract with several of the access panels standing open all across the Mech. 

Like many of its comrades, the access panel on the right shin was open but this panel also came with a pair of legs sticking out of it. A clatter of metal on metal and a muttered curse in Japanese echoed out of the access area. Japanese was a favorite and one of the best languages to curse in, according to the owner of the legs.

“Is everything okay in there?” Alex asked in a bored voice as he flicked the three of diamonds towards the toolbox. The deck around the toolbox was littered with over two dozen cards, six of them were in the toolbox with a seventh hung up on the lip of it. In Alex’s opinion that card counted as additional points as it had achieved a difficult landing.

“You could come in here and look yourself.” An older man’s voice came back to him from inside the Mech’s leg. “It would do you good to know more about how your Mech works.”

Alex sighed a loud dramatic sigh and tossed another card towards the tool box. “I know how it works. I walk it somewhere and I shoot things until they stop moving.” The ten of hearts arced to the left, missing the toolbox by a solid meter when it landed. Alex signed again but softly this time, the card was not worth the additional effort. “It’s pretty simple really.”

The older man came out of the access panel and frowned at Alex, pushing his goggles up towards the top of his balding head to better look at the younger man. “You know nothing.”

“Tynon, I was joking.” Alex said with a slight smile and sat up, still flipping through the remains of the deck of cards in his hands.  “Besides, you know that’s not entirely accurate. I could rebuild that actuator you were in there looking at… hell, I think I was the one that actually did rebuild it last time.”

“And yet you feel the need to complain that the foot hitches when you walk the Mech around to go shoot at things until they stop moving.” Tynon turned away from Alex and started packing up his tools.

“It’s fixed?” Alex asked.

“Almost.” He paused in his tool gathering to look at Alex for a moment before pulling the goggles off of his head and placing them in the open toolbox. He picked up the seven of clubs from where it teetered on the lip of the toolbox and flicked it in Alex’s direction before plucking the other cards out of the box.

Knowing that if he stayed sat down without picking up the cards, he would get a lecture on the multitudes of sins he was committing; Alex stood up and began retrieving his cards from where they were scattered across the deck of the Mech Bay. “What’s left?”

“To teach the young monkey that pilots this beast some sense.” Tynon muttered and sent the queen of spades in the opposite direction of where Alex was. “That and twisting that last myomer bundle about so it aligns properly with the rest of the musculature. Both are difficult chores, but the second is at least possible to complete.”

“We can do that now, if you like.” Alex offered and made a mental note of where the queen of spades had gone. “I recall that being much easier to do with a second pair of hands helping to get it all in place.”

Tynon nodded his agreement and stood up with his hands on his lower back and a groan sliding from between his lips. “Yes, but this set of hands is old and tired.”

“You’ll outlive me by a century if not more.” Alex replied, as he always did. 

“Agreed, but that is because you are full of piss and coolant, which has still somehow not tempered your hot head despite its presence.” Tynon admonished him in a tired voice then sat down in the chair Alex had vacated and looked at him. “And that will likely be the cause of the death you find before I find mine, young Alex.”

“You’re still upset about the DiLeo thing.” Alex said quietly and placed the assembled cards into a pocket on his jumpsuit. “You still believe it was the wrong thing to do.”

“We could have quietly left then taught them the lesson that they learned that night later, but only if they had pursued us.” Tynon said, swapping to Cantonese with his reply. Normally when he did this, Alex knew that Tynon felt he had a serious point to make. If he had swapped to Mandarin, then Alex would have known the discussion was going to be much more serious, bordering on a sermon.

Alex squatted down and looked at his mentor, the man who raised him for the most part, and his oldest friend. “We did what we had to do, Tynon.” Alex said in Cantonese, staying with his mentor’s choice of languages. “I would not have us looking over our shoulders every day, just because some people made a few minor mistakes. They could have let us buy our way out of the insult in some fashion that would not have crippled the unit entirely.”

“The mistakes that were made were not minor and their actions are not the ones that we are accountable for.”

“No, but they are the ones that we had to deal with.” Alex replied, his anger rising. The two had been having this “lack of agreement,” as Tynon put it, in private almost since the moment they had lifted off of Galatea. Neither man had budged from their position and the continuing discussion had caused some discomfort between them as it went on. 

Tynon looked at Alex, no trace of anger on his face or in his eyes. “There were other paths we could have chosen.”

“Agreed, but none of them good for us individually or as a whole.” Alex said. “What would you of had me do? Ignore the killing of one of our own? Or turn Sara over to them?”

“DiLeo could have died without the wholesale destruction of everything and everyone else.” Tynon closed his toolbox without looking down at the container. “He could have borne the weight of our sins alone.”

“Not just our sins.” Alex pointed out.

“And his… to an extent.” Tynon said in partial agreement as he stood.

“How was this conflict not at least partly if not entirely DiLeo’s fault? Or the fault of his agents, at the least?”

Tynon met Alex’s eyes steadily and said in quiet Mandarin that seemed to boom in Alex’s ears despite the low volume. “If someone had killed you, my son, then I would have moved every heaven and every earth on all the planets in the galaxy to bring them grief and pain that would still not equal half of mine at the loss of you.” He turned and started towards the door of the Mech Bay. “I will not argue with you about this any further. You have seen my point and I have seen yours. We will agree to disagree on this matter.”

Alex dropped his head and let Tynon leave the Mech Bay without offering another word of disagreement. He owed the older man that much and more. Part of him wanted to agree with Tynon just to erase some of the disapproval in the older man’s eyes and voice. The other part knew that to do so would be a betrayal of what he saw as his duty and would only put some of that disapproval into his own eyes whenever he looked into the mirror. Besides, he didn’t really believe that his actions or the actions of the unit as a whole were wrong or incorrect.

Alex stood and walked the three or so meters away to where the queen of spades had landed. He picked up the card and went through the process of putting it away in with the deck of cards he’d put in his jumpsuit. Alex looked up at his BattleMech as he did so, happy to see it back in his colors instead of the primer grey they’d used on the assault on the DiLeo Estate.

The Mechs of Chaos Incorporated did not follow a standard unit paint scheme so each Mech was painted in the manner that the MechWarrior piloting it felt was appropriate. Of course, for operational purposes, they would use environment appropriate camouflage, but for non-combat or for those “I don’t give a fuck is going on, this is what I am fighting in” instances, each MechWarrior went their own way as far as paint schemes were concerned.

There were only a few things that were standardized on the equipment that Chaos Incorporated. The first was the unit insignia: a black square with a white, eight-pointed chaos star in the middle of it. Inside the unit, it was referred to as the “Union Black” which played on the name of a flag from an ancient Terran country. The other standard was a horned and fanged smiley face with its tongue sticking out to one side of the mouth. This originated from a doodle that Alex had done much earlier in life and had appealed to a number of the unit’s members. He had named it “The Heathen Child.”

The Union Black was on the upper left torso and right shin of each BattleMech. Aerospace Fighters displayed it on the top and bottom of each wing as well as on the tail of the fighter. The battle armor suits had it displayed on the upper part of each arm as well as the right shin. If the unit was going in camouflaged, then the colors would be changed to something more appropriate to the rest of the scheme, as needed.

The Heathen Child image was an entirely different matter. It was only painted using a special paint that showed on thermal imaging or on lowlight visual imaging and was also radar reflective. It served as a visual identify friend-foe to help make sure that no one could insert themselves in to the middle of the unit and cause trouble. BattleMechs had it on their rear and forward upper right torso. Aerospace Fighters put it on the underside and the top of their fuselage. Battle armor troopers painted it on the back of their helmets and the upper left torso of their suits.

Going with his callsign of “Random”, Alex usually liked to use a splinter pattern of triangles in various shapes and sizes with a varying number of colors filling each shape. Sometimes he used as few as two colors or as many as ten colors in the scheme. He even tried to stick with that same pattern when he went camouflaged, just using the appropriate colors for the environment they were fighting in. There had even been one instance where he used only one color, a deep yellow with heavy black lines splintering the color every which direction but that was an exception instead of the norm.

Right now, his Cataphract was painted in a variety of reds and greens of varying shades with an eye-searing orange being used as a trim color and as the border of the triangles. With a small smile on his face, Alex walked around the Mech and started closing the various access panels that were open, making sure that each clicked into their locking mechanism. He left the panel that Tynon was working in before leaving open… just in case.

With the few panels closed that he could reach, Alex went up the gantry the Mech was parked against and began working his way down by hand to close the rest. Tynon had a weird thing about opening damned near every panel on a Mech he was working on. “Letting the Mech’s spirit breath” is what he called it. Alex had always thought it was just so Tynon could amuse himself by making any Astech working with him have to look everywhere for the tool or set of glasses that Tynon always seemed to misplace but could never quite remember where.

With the last of the panels closed, Alex went back up the chest of the Cataphract and over to the shoulder so he could clamber into the cockpit. He left the hatch open behind him and slid into the command couch with movements that were familiar from repetition. With the Mech powered down, he felt safe playing with the controls for a moment, visualizing tearing up the Grasshopper at the DiLeo Estate. 

That, of course, brought his conversation with Tynon back to the forefront of his mind. With a sigh, Alex let go of the controls and leaned back in the command couch as much as he could. It was comfortable, but it wasn’t the recliner that he had in his quarters. He stared up at the image of the movie poster of “Immortal Warrior XXIV: Return of Black Ivan” that was painted on the interior of the Cataphract’s head, just above the command couch. It had been Tynon’s suggestion to have it painted there instead of trying to replace the poster every time it got charred when the Cataphract overheated.

Alex looked back down from the poster to the command console in front of him. A holopic of Tynon and him in fishing gear, down to the floppy hats, displaying a fish that Alex had caught when he was ten. It was the first time he’d ever been fishing and despite Tynon’s protests that continued to this day, Alex was certain that the old man had somehow arranged for him to catch the damned fish.

“Dammit.” Alex muttered and climbed out of the Cataphract, dogging the hatch closed on the cockpit. He climbed down the Mech without slipping, a testament to the soles of his footwear as much as to his own nimbleness. He closed and locked the access panel on the Mech’s right shin then stuck his hands into the pockets of his jumpsuit and headed to the door. 

They were scheduled to jump into Meinacos space in a few hours, right after they finished recharging the jump drives on the GOLDEN CRANE. Apparently the MARIANNE was going to be detached the moment they materialized in the Meinacos system and the GOLDEN CRANE would be jumping as soon as the DropShip made it to a safe distance. Seven days after that, they would be onplanet and then he could focus on things that were much simpler to deal with… like killing pirates.

Posted by,
Captain Alexander Yao
Callsign: Random
CTF-4L Cataphract
Head Cat Herder
Chaos Incorporated

Word count: 2541
Contract count: 31,590 

0341 Local Time
October 24, 3093
Corridor 2N, Outside of Captain Yau’s Quarters
MARIANNE, Union Class DropShip
Attached to GOLDEN CRANE Invader Class JumpShip
Irece System Zenith Recharge Station
Irece, Draconis Combine

Captain Alexander Yau headed towards his quarters from the Mech Bay, hands in the front pockets of his jumpsuit and thoughts about Tynon on his mind. He opened the door to his quarters and then stopped and did a double take. After a moment, he stepped just deep enough into his quarters to allow the door to shut behind him and stopped. He blinked twice and looked at the woman lying in his bunk. “Well… hi there.”

“Hey, cowboy.” 

“Hey. Good to see you again.” Alex stepped further in the room and sat down in the recliner opposite the bunk. “I didn’t realize you were in here.”

“That was part of the surprise.” She replied and slid deeper under the sheets. “These are nice. Silk? What’s a nice mercenary boy like you doing with silk sheets?”

“They help me slide out of bed in the morning.” He replied and leaned forward, putting his elbows on his knees and his head on his hands. “What are you doing in here?”

She shrugged, which made the sheets do all sorts of interesting things. “Girl has to find someplace to be, right? This place looked much quieter than the mess hall… then there were these sheets. How could I resist?”

“How did you get in?” Alex asked.

The woman sat up, letting the sheet slide down to reveal she was naked at least to the belly button. “Do you really care?”

Alex blinked at her for a moment then nodded. “Yes. Yes, I do.”

She slid her hand down her ribs and over her hips, slowly moving the sheet down her as she did, revealing that she was not wearing anything but a smile and a pair of ruby earrings. “Are you sure you care?”

He rubbed at his chin and looked away for a moment before returning his gaze to the woman in his bed. “I still care, but less than I did a moment ago.” He clucked his tongue on his teeth. The curse of all men, enough blood to operate only one head at a time, was trying to take over but he fought it with another question. “I have another question.”

“Just one?” She asked, a smile playing on her lips.

“At least one.” Alex replied, realizing just how dry this throat was at that moment. 

“We might have time for a question.” She purred and slid out of the bed, walking towards him. He looked her down then back up, locking eyes with her. She reached Alex and placed a hand on his chest, pushing him back so the recliner actually reclined then straddled his legs. “What’s the question, cowboy?”

“What’s your name?” Alex asked. 

She leaned in and brushed her lips across his then nipped his earlobe before whispering into it. “Do you really care?”

“I do… but you can tell me later.” Alex replied, giving up his battle with the nip on his earlobe. She smiled again, but he couldn’t see it and really didn’t care about that right now since her mouth was busy against the skin of his neck. There was no more talking for a long time after that.

0917
Captain Yau’s Quarters

Alex started awake when the door chime dinged and started to get up. His progress was delayed by the slim arm of the naked woman beside him. She tried to pull him back into the bed, but Alex twisted just so and got free. He pulled a robe from the small closet set in the wall and headed to the door, which was buzzing again. 

Alex grumbled something unpleasant in the general direction of the door and pulled it open. “I hope to whatever god you pray to, for your sake, whoever you may be, that this is an emergency.”

“It is.” Said the black clad figure in front of him. Alex could see his reflection in the dull red, wrap around visor that the figure wore.

Alex blinked and started to say something before a black glove covered his mouth and its match was planted in his chest before shoved him back. He stumbled backwards and the figure followed him, letting the door shut behind him… her? The build was wrong for a he… Alex decided as he scrambled to his feet, eyes on the… ninja? There was an honest to Buddha fricking ninja in his quarters? 

The ninja bowed low to Alex, who returned it with a much shallower bow of his own and kept his eyes on the black figure in front of him the entire time. When the ninja straightened back up, he froze and slowly put his hands up. Alex looked behind him and the still naked woman was holding his prized 14mm autopistol pointed at the ninja in a classic two-hand grip. 

“Hang on a second… uh… “

“Nikki.” She supplied, not letting the pistol waver.

“Right… Nikki... oh, I’m Alex.”

“Good to meet you, Alex. Can we do this part later?” She nodded towards the ninja with her chin and did not let her gaze waver from her target.

“Of course… right.” Alex tore his gaze away from her and back to the ninja. “She’s not going to shoot… at least not until you present a threat.”

“He’s within a three-meter distance, Alex. He’s able to present a threat before either you or I would be likely to stop him.” Nikki growled and shifted how she held the gun slightly. Alex could tell she was struggling with the weight of the heavy pistol and didn’t blame her; he struggled with it too if he held it in a firing stance for too long.

Alex looked at the ninja, who shrugged and nodded, agreeing with Nikki, then took two slow steps backwards to show that he meant no threat to anyone. Alex took a step back as well because it seemed like a really good idea to have more space between him and the fricking ninja in front of him. When he got close enough to it, Alex turned and shoved his hand into a drawer pulling out a 10mm automatic pistol that he aimed at the ninja’s chest.

“Now, tell me why you are here.” Alex said, feeling much more confident about the situation until he remembered the man in front of him looked like a ninja, moved like a ninja, and was probably part of the Internal Security Force for the Draconic Combine. Suddenly, he wanted this meeting to be happening with him in his Cataphract, the ninja in an open field in front of him with no cover, and a good 100 meters’ distance between them.

“I am here to deliver a message, Captain.” Came the electronically distorted voice from the ninja. “May I reach into a pouch on the left side of my belt?”

“You may.” Alex allowed with a nod. “Slowly.”

Slowly, the ninja took his left hand and opened the pouch then fished inside the pouch for a moment before bringing his hand back out with a datacube held between his forefinger and thumb. “Your mission orders, Captain.”

“I thought those were coming when we got to Meinacos.” Alex stated, his eyes narrowing.

“A change in plans because of unforeseen circumstances.” The ninja explained with a slight shrug, as if those eight words just made everything crystal clear to all parties involved.

“Set it on the desk.” Alex waved the pistol at the small desk that was covered with datacubes and noteputers, most of which were open to games or eBooks. The desk also held a number of crumpled napkins, a half-eaten sandwich from late the day before, and several half-drunk cups of coffee. Alex actually felt slightly embarrassed at the condition of the desk in front of company, which was silly considering his “company” was a ninja and a former girlfriend for a gangster. “Yeah… I know. Just put it down there.” 

The ninja started to comply then hesitated before looking back at Alex. “How do you find anything?”

“I know where everything is at, okay?” He waved the pistol towards the desk again. “So just put it down and stop making non-verbal or round about comments about my organizational methods.”

The ninja nodded and turned slightly to set the datacube down away from the edge of the desk. After a moment, he completed the spin as a black blur. There was a bright flash and Alex stumbled backwards, blinded from the sudden eruption of light. He heard a scream from Nikki and hoped that she was just reacting to the flash instead of reacting to something more sinister… like a ninja sword in the kidney or something bad like that.

After a few moments, Alex was able to see more of the world than just spots and stumbled towards the bed. “Nikki?” 

“Yeah, right here, cowboy.”

“You okay?” He moved his arms blindly across the bed and found warm flesh.

“I’m in one piece…” She paused and let out a small sigh at where Alex’s hands landed in their blind flailing. “Yes, those are too.”

“Sorry… I’m still having problems seeing.” He sat down on the bed beside her. “You’re not hurt?”

“No, he didn’t hurt me. The light didn’t do anything good for me but I’m okay.” Nikki paused for a moment. “Alex… was that a fucking ninja?”

“Yeah, I’d say it was.” Alex agreed. His eyesight was much clearer now and he could see that there was no one else. Sighing, Alex set the 10mm pistol on the small table beside the bed then took the pistol from Nikki. “Thanks for the backup. Where’d you learn to handle a gun?”

“Have you seen the people I used to hang out with?” She asked and pulled his arm up and around her shoulders. “Or that I am hanging out with right now, for that matter? A girl has to know how to handle herself.” 

“Valid point.” He leaned over and kissed her on the top of the head. “I’m glad you are okay.”

“Getting all attached already, cowboy?” 

“Nope. If he stuck you with his ninja sword or something, then you’d bleed all over my silk sheets.”

She slapped him hard across the stomach. “Bastard.”

“And don’t you forget it.” Alex replied and slid out of the bed, still carrying both pistols. He slid the 10mm automatic back in the drawer he’d pulled it from and set the 14mm on the desk, shoving it into the pile of things already there.

He glanced down at the datacube and put it into a drawer in the desk. “You know what?”

“What, cowboy?” Nikki asked. She had drawn the sheets back up and around her and was watching Alex as he stood at the desk.

Alex let his hand settle on the handle of the 14mm pistol, but didn’t pick it up. “You never did tell me why you were here.”

Nikki smiled and let the sheet slide down to expose her naked breasts. “I thought that was pretty obvious at this point.”

“Maybe.” He replied and picked the automatic up, looking at her as he did. “Maybe not.”

“I had nothing to do with ninja-boy, Alex.” Nikki replied, her voice steady and her gaze not wavering from his. “I came up here to do what I do best… get in good with the man in charge. That and you didn’t kill me at the estate, so I thought I should say thanks.” She shrugged slightly. “And I like Asian guys, so you got three pluses right there, above and beyond your physical attributes.”

Alex nodded and walked back to the bed, setting the pistol down on the table beside him but not sitting back down. “I believe you.” 

“Well good.” She stuck her tongue out at him. “Because it’s the truth.”

He nodded again. “I need to look at that datacube.”

“I am not stopping you.” She pointed out. He said nothing, just stood there looking at her. Nikki sighed and flung the sheet off of her. “Fine, I get it. I’ll leave.”

“Operational security and all that.”

“Well, I don’t have to go look at it or anything.” Nikki said and gestured towards the bed. “I could just be right over there and keeping the bed warm.”

Alex smiled slightly and shook his head. “When a ninja delivers things to me, I tend to take my operational security up a couple of notches.”

“I suppose I can see that.” Nikki pulled on her clothes, including the jumpsuit she’d been given, letting Alex watch her the entire time. “You might want to do something about the lock on your door. It’s really not very good. Didn’t take me more than like thirty seconds to get through it.”

“I’ll get that on my to-do list.” He assured her and rubbed at his temple with one hand. “When you come back later…”

She looked at him with an arched eyebrow and zipped the jumpsuit most of the way closed, leaving a fair amount of cleavage showing. “‘When’?”

“Fair enough.” Alex replied with a slight smile. “If you decide to grace me with your presence later…”

“Better.” She purred. 

“… please be so kind as to not break into my quarters.”

“Of course not.” Nikki blinked at him innocently. “You’d be expecting that.”

Alex sighed. “Go away.”

She stepped up to him. “Can I come back later?”

“Maybe.”

Nikki kissed him, long and lingering. Alex responded as appropriate, letting his hands settle on her hips, the data cube palmed in his left hand. “Please?”

“Maybe.” Alex whispered against her lips then gasped softly.

Her hands had found their way inside his robe and were exploring him slowly. “Pretty please?”

“Probably.” Alex replied, his eyes closed and his voice unsteady.

“Good.” Nikki gave Alex a slight smile, a light kiss, and a gently squeeze before sliding her hands back out of his robe. “I’ll call ahead.”

“Thanks, I appreciate that.” Alex replied and watched Nikki as she left his quarters without a backwards glance.  

When Nikki was out the door, Alex went and locked it… both the handle and the security bolt that didn’t even have any controls on the other side of the door. With his quarters as secured as they could be, Alex slapped the call button on the communit built into the wall in front of the desk.

[[Room service.]] Captain Dillan Fowler said, his voice much too cheerful for Alex at that moment.

“Hi. This is Alex… I need a ham, cheese, and mushroom omelet with a side of bacon and some grapefruit juice. And, I almost forgot, I need to let you know that I had a ninja just visit me.”

Dillan paused for a long moment before speaking. [[ Did you just say that a ninja just visited you?]]

“Yes. Guy in a black sneak suit with a red wrap around visor just came by and gave me a present then vanished by using a flash grenade of some kind.”

[[Uh…. You ok?]]

“Outside of wondering how the hell a ninja got onboard the ship without one of your people knowing about it? Yeah, I am fucking great.”

[[Let me get back to you on that. You want some of your guards there?]]

“It wouldn’t be a terrible idea.” Alex snarled. “Call me once you find something out.” 

Alex flicked off the communit and turned on one of the noteputers on the desk before sliding the data cube into it to be read. The noteputer took several moments to warm up and come to the sign in screen; time that Alex used to shove a better portion of the clutter on his desk into a trashcan beside the desk. 

He logged in and gave his thumbprint on the noteputer to verify his identity then did it again when the data cube prompted him to do so. Text and images started appearing on the screen, each giving information and details on their mission and the targets involved. He started reading.

Almost an hour later, Alex sat back and rubbed at his eyes with one hand then ran that hand through his hair. Things had changed a bit with the contract since he’d last looked at it. Maybe that was part of the “unforeseen circumstances” that the ninja mentioned. With a sigh, he flicked on the communit attached to the wall in front of him.

[[Bridge.]] Dillan said, his voice noticeably less cheerful than it had been previously.

“Hi… where’s my fucking omelet?”

[[Still no word on what the hell happened with your ninja friend.]] Dillan replied, ignoring the issue with the omelet for the moment. [[ We found security footage of him arriving at your quarters, but nothing outside of that… no traveling to them and no getting onboard the MARIANNE. It’s like the fucker just appeared out of thin air.]]

“Well, he is a ninja after all.” Alex grumbled. “Did anyone come on board recently?”

[[Not a soul.]] Dillan said. [[We’re still looking though and I sealed the docking doors with the GOLDEN CRANE, but who knows if that would stop him.]]

“Did you contact the GOLDEN CRANE’s captain by any chance?” Alex asked, but he knew what the answer would be.

[[Hell no. What would I say? One of your ISF guys just stole onto my DropShip and could you please have him not do that again?]]

“Yeah, I didn’t really expect you to do that.” 

[[Good thing.]] Dillan agreed. There was a several moment pause before the MARIANNE’s captain spoke again. [[Did you need something or are you just harassing me for fun?]]

“Oh… sorry. Would you contact Tia, Jackson, Sarah, and Tynon and have them come here please?”

[[Sure, that I can do. Anything else?]]

“Only if you have a miracle machine somewhere around here.”

[[I’ll call the others.]] Dillan said and the line went dead.

Alex sighed. “Yeah, that’s kinda what I figured.”

Posted by,
Captain Alexander Yao
Callsign: Random
CTF-4L Cataphract
Head Cat Herder
Chaos Incorporated

Word count: 3,034
Contract count: 34,624 

0823 Local Time
October 24, 3093
Mess Hall, Deck Three 
MARIANNE, Union Class DropShip
Attached to GOLDEN CRANE Invader Class JumpShip
Irece System Zenith Recharge Station
Irece, Draconis Combine

“I still can’t believe it. A ninja? An honest-to-God fucking ninja?” MechWarrior Isaac “Arcade” Beck said with a good measure of awe in his voice, his New Avalon accent showing through his words, like it did when he was excited. 

“Yes.” Captain Alexander Yau replied… again. “A real ninja. Now that I have established this fact a total of five times…”

“Six.” Muttered SRLT Jackson “Madman” Tallman, the executive officer for Chaos Incorporated.

“What?” Alex asked, startled at the interruption then wondering why, especially considering who he was talking with.

“Six times. You have now established the fact that there was a ‘ninja’ or a ‘fucking ninja’ in your quarters a total of six times.” Jackson leaned back and started ticking off times on his hand. “Once from me. Once from Sara. Once from Adrian. And that instance was the third time for Isaac.”

Alex shot a withering look at Jackson.” Thank you for correcting me.”

“It’s what I do.” Jackson replied with a shrug.

“So… yes… for a total of six…” Alex began again and looked to Isaac, who was trying to not laugh but was not totally succeeding. Alex gave him a hard eyed gaze and Isaac smothered the laugh to a chuckle. Mostly. Alex continued in a controlled voice. “Yes, for the sixth fucking time, there was a ninja in my quarters.”

“And a woman.” LT Sara “Bandit” Hammond said flatly, the displeasure in the Aerospace pilot’s voice was obvious.

“All things considered, I do not want to hear it from you.” Alex said without turning to look at Sara.

Sara said nothing but flushed slightly. She knew that Alex was referring to the large amount of time that she’d been spending with the MARIANNE’s captain, Dillan Fowler… especially when they were both off duty and in his quarters.

“I do.” LTJG Anthony “Bear” Greenwood grumbled. “I want to hear about the woman and what she was doing there.”
 
“Me too… but with graphic details.” LTJG Franklin “Right” Morgan said

“And illustrations.” LTJG Adrian “Left” Morgan supplied then looked at his twin. “Maybe instructional videos?”

“’Tab A’ into ‘Slot B’.” LTJG Kylie “Red” Fung said, demonstrating her point by making a hole with one hand and inserting a finger from the other hand into the hole. “Why do you need instructional videos for that?”

“I don’t ‘need’ the videos per se…” Franklin said with a grin.

“… he just wants to see what Slot B look like.” Adrian finished with a matching grin.

“I think you just want to see what Tab B looks like.” Kylie said back with her own grin. 

Alex leaned forward, placing both hands on the tabletop and hung his head. After the initial meeting with his officers, it really seemed like a good idea to tell the rest of the combat staff or at least the rest of the officers of the combat soldiers, what was going on. At this point, Alex debated not only the wisdom of having the meeting but also the wisdom of getting out of bed this morning. “I swear to all the hells that I am going to shoot all of you if you don’t shut up. Twice.”

“What about Slot C? I hear that’s a good time too…”

Alex slapped his hand on the table loudly. “That’s enough!” He growled. “I am trying to tell you… you… humans… something important and you are not letting me.”

“Sorry, chief.” Kylie said, her voice soft.

“Sorry.” Franklin and Adrian chorused, almost sounding like they kinda meant it. Maybe.

Anthony crossed his arms and settled back into his chair more. “I ain’t sorry.”

“It takes more than a black sneak suit and a wrap-around visor to make a ninja.” Lt. Tia Anders-Hsien said in a loud voice, bringing the conversation away from the woman. The battle armor commander did not look like she was in the least bit amused by the conversation.

“I didn’t check his ninja credentials, I just assumed that since he had those things on, moved like a greased marak on speed, and vanished into thin air that he was one.” Alex said, anger creeping into his voice. “May I continue?”

Tia shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

“Too kind.” Alex slid the data cube the ninja had given him into the noteputer on the table in front of him. After a moment, the projector built into the noteputer displayed the information on the data cube, bringing up a number of pictures, maps, and scans of documents. “This is what was on the data cube.”

“What is it?” LTJG Isabella “Cutter” Frank asked. As Tia’s executive officer, she was the only other battle armor trooper there.

“Details on the contract.” Nathan “Player” Hooker said as he leaned in to get a better look at the information. “And these are different from the details that we were given on Galatea.”

“Yes, they are.” LT Felix “Ghost” Cornelius said as he studied them for a moment then sat back in his chair. The intelligence officer tapped on his noteputer a few times, capturing the information from the data cube and studied it from the smaller screen with LT Janis “Amber” Rider, his fellow intelligence officer, leaning over his shoulder.

“Alex.” Nathan said quietly. “They want us to assassinate this man.”

Alex shrugged and didn’t met the eyes of his mentor, Tynon Lu, where the older man sat at the table. “Kill him in a Mech to Mech brawl and it’s all good. Shoot him with a hundred rounds from your machine gun on the battlefield and its’ all good. Stab him in the dark when he’s not looking and you are a bad guy.” The mercenary commander shrugged. “However you do it, the man’s dead.”

“You know there’s a difference.” Nathan said. “If nothing else, assassination is illegal and could get the unit banned from by the Department of Mercenary Management.”

“That’s why we don’t tell them.” LT Vincent “Crow” Hobbs replied flatly. Except for the color from a tattoo that crawled up his neck, Vincent looked like a shadow, dressed all in black with shoulder length black hair spilling down over his face. He was still leaning in a corner of the room where he could be close to Alex while getting a clear shot at the door with the pistol that his hand hovered near. The man took his self-appointed role as Alex’s bodyguard very seriously.

“There’s always a chance they could find out.” Nathan pointed out. 

Alex nodded, not for the first time happy to have Vincent nearby. “There’s a chance, but Crow is right. We just do the job and get out.” He shrugged again. “Besides, if we get this Zink Finley dead in his Mech, then it’s just like a normal operation, right?”

“I’m not so sure about that.” Jackson said, hesitation in his voice. “If we are there gunning for him specifically, then it sounds more like a hit to me rather than going in for a fight.”

“But we’re not going for him specifically.” Tia pointed out and stabbed at the data floating above the table with a single finger. “See? They want his officer corps too. The more the better.”

“So? A headhunter op is better than a single target hit?” Jackson frowned. “I don’t think there’s much difference in that either. They both sound less than honorable to me.”

Alex closed his eyes and slowly counted backwards from ten in his head. As much as he liked Jackson, the man took the damnedest times to pretend he was a knight in shining armor. Alex started to say something but stopped when Sara spoke up.

“Were you not the one roaring about killing DiLeo and all of his people not too long ago?” Sara asked, an edge of harshness in her tone. “You sounded just fine with going in and killing all of them, if I recall correctly. And in Mechs no less. Not even storming the place on foot, but stomping everything flat with weapons that they had little to no chance to beat. Yeah, that sounds really honorable.”

Jackson’s face went blank except his eyes, which were sending fiery daggers at Sara. “That was different.”

“And, oh so, ‘honorable.’” Sara said, making air quotes with her fingers as she rolled her eyes.

Jackson stood suddenly and put his fists on the table. “You are not one to start with anyone here. If not for you, then we wouldn’t have been in that fucking mess to begin with.”

Sara shot out of her chair fast enough to topple it to the deck of the Mess Hall. “I’ll start with anyone that I feel like starting with!”

“No, it was not.” A soft voice cut through the argument, cutting through the words and wave of anger that was coming over the room. Everyone, especially Alex, looked to Tynon Lu. Jackson shot a hard look at Sara but sat back down in his chair. Sara ignored him and his look, picking up her own chair and sitting down before giving Tynon her attention.

“Our actions at DiLeo’s estate was not honorable actions, but it was, perhaps, necessary given the way our life is.” Tynon stated and nodded slightly in Alex’s direction. “And it is a different situation than what we face here. And what we face here is not an entirely honorable action, on its face, but I believe it to be an honorable action despite that appearance.”

“In what way, Tynon?” Alex asked, matching the older man’s soft tone.

“We fight to free these people from the tyranny and depravations of these pirates, who’s own actions are much less than honorable. I would say their actions have even greater dishonor than any we would perform.” Tynon lifted his chin slightly. “My thoughts say that their own actions and dishonor erase any possible dishonor in trying to kill these particular men who have not given us any harm.”

Alex let go a mental sigh of relief that cleared the tension in his own mind. He wasn’t sure where Tynon had been going with his speech, but was glad the man had taken the road he had. If Tynon, which nearly everyone in Chaos Incorporated considered the unit’s moral rudder, if it had one, had come out entirely against the operation then it would have been Hell trying to get some of the others to go with it. “I am glad that we’ve gotten that settled.” He looked at his executive officer. “Right, Jackson?”

Jackson was chewing at his lip, like he did when he was thinking hard about something, and looking at Tynon. The older man held his gaze but said nothing. After a moment, Jackson nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, we’re good, Alex.”

Alex turned to look at his Aerospace commander. “Sara?”

“I’m fine. I was fine to begin with.” She said with a shrug. “Just point me in the direction of who I am supposed to carpet bomb and we can get this shit done.”

“So how are we going to do this?” Tia asked, as always getting to the heart of the matter as quickly as possible.

 “The GOLDEN CRANE will get us there, let the MARIANNE release, and then jump the hell out once we are clear. The story will be that we hitched a ride on her, against their captain’s objections and with a gun to someone’s head, and got here because of what we’d heard about the place… a budding pirate haven straddling a shipping lane. So, we came to take a look.”

“And then?” LTJG Parker “Thorn” Rose, always one to deliver a straight line when needed, asked.

“I am glad you asked that, Parker.” Alex grinned at the other man then turned to address the room as a whole. “Then we get on the planet, maybe tussle with some militia or something to make us look legit and get settled in. After that, it’s a matter of hunting down these guys and killing them off. It will look like a second pirate band that’s decided to cut in on the action instead of being hired by the Combine to take care of a problem.”

“Which is also a part of our objective. Right?” Parker asked as he pointed at the data. “Don’t reveal our employers?”

“Right you are.” Alex replied. “And as long as we do this right, then no one will ever know.”

“We were not entirely quiet about hiring on with the Combine.” Nathan pointed out. “I mean, we didn’t put it up in neon lights or anything, but I didn’t take extra precautions about keeping it quiet either. What if someone pulls all of that together?”

“I don’t think that’s going to be a problem.” LT Nigel “Radar” Atwood said and tapped on a couple of buttons on his noteputer then set it down a meter or so away from where Alex’s noteputer was sitting. 

Several of the mercenaries came closer to the table to look at the news article that the noteputer displayed while others just leaned in and started reading. No matter how far away they might be though, everyone in the room could see that the headline at the top of the story screamed: “MERCENARIES ON A RAMPAGE!”

“Oh no…” Sara sat back down in her chair with a plop.

“’Despite attempts to disguise their identity, the mercenary unit Chaos Incorporated, has been identified by experts as being behind the destruction of the estate of Anthony DiLeo, a respected business man on Galatea.’” Alex read from the news story and closed his eyes, slowly sitting down as he did. “Well, fuck.”

“It could just be a cover story.” Tia offered. “Something to assist us in our insert of the local area… back up our story and all that.”

“Yeah, maybe, but that’s not all it is.” Felix said grimly. He looked at Janis and then Nathan who both nodded their agreement since their mental assessment pf the situation came up with the same scenario that Felix had come up with. “It’s also a good double blind for the Combine.”

“So if we fuck up or it looks like we are going to blow the whistle on them…” Jackson started.

“Then they can just ‘happen’ to find us and blow us the hell up, closing up a loose end and making sure that nothing can be traced back to them.” Tia finished and sank back into her chair. “That’s not good.”

“Do you think it’s the beginning of a good old fashioned Drac double cross?” Anthony asked in his deep bass voice. 

Alex shook his head. “No, not really.”

“It could be though.” Nathan said.

Alex could only nod his agreement with that. “Yeah, it could be, but I don’t think it is.”

“You think it’s a cover up option that’s being put in place in case its needed.” Felix stated. “Just in case.”

“Hopefully just in case.” Alex replied. “I mean, yeah, it could be that we’re going to get double crossed no matter what, but I am betting that it is just a back-up for them. So the ISF can cover their ninja asses in case something goes south.” 

“Maybe we should just call this and get the hell out before it goes south.” Kylie said softly. “Sure, we can use the money but I don’t want to get dead just so the ISF saves face.”

“We can’t do that.” Jackson sighed.

“Why the hell not?” Franklin asked before anyone else could. “Being rich is good, but being dead and rich is just pointless.”

“For one, we’re closer to Luthien than we are to any border the Combine has with anyone.” Jackson pointed out. “Then there’s the little problem of not having a JumpShip to get to either Luthien, if we were feeling suicidal, or to the border.”

“For another, it will kill our rep.” Tia said. “It will look like we took exception to the assignment and turned tail on our employers.”

“And last, but not least…” Alex spoke in a louder voice than the rest. “… if we turn tail with this information in our hands, we have given up the ISF when they didn’t want to be given up. With that being the case, they will not let us leave Combine space alive.”

“Damned if we do, damned if we don’t.” LTJG Mitchell “Rooster” Pine stated from the back of the room. 

“Pretty much the case.” Alex agreed then straightened up and clapped his hands together. “So, let’s get it done.”

“What?” Sara exclaimed. “We’re going to go ahead with the op?”

“Do you see a better choice?” Alex asked her.

“I…” Sara started then stopped and slumped back into her chair. “No. No, I don’t.”

“Exactly.” Alex smiled broadly. It wasn’t so much that he was amused or even wanted to smile, he was just to the point of not really knowing what else the hell to do right then. He glanced at the chronometer on the wall of the mess hall. “We have about seven hours before we jump. At about eight hours, we are on our own. So, let’s make sure we are as ready as we can be for this.”

A Joint Post by,
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 2905
Contract Count: 37, 529

1852
October 24, 3093
Bridge, Deck One
MARIANNE, Union Class DropShip
5 days, 17 Hours from Meinacos Prime
Meinacos system, 
Draconis Combine

“Look, Sho-sa, I have no intention on ruining your day, I am just trying to make all of these things happen.” Captain Alexander Yau said calmly. “I am trying to make sure that my unit can complete its operation… the one that we were hired to complete by your people.”

After hitting the send button, Alexander thought about the awkwardness if not absurdity of having an argument with someone when it took at least fourteen minutes for the response to come back to you. While they were getting closer to the main planet, it still took seven minutes to get a transmission there and another seven minutes for a response to come back to you, above and beyond however long it took for the sender to reply.   

[[I have no indication from DCMS command that your unit has authorization to land, Captain, and you have given no authorization code showing you have received authorization to land on Meinacos.]] came the sharp reply from Sho-Sa Akiro Oishi. [[Without authorization, we will bring your vessel down if it attempts to enter Meinacos space.]]

LT Janis "Amber" Rider stabbed the “mute” button with her red-polished fingernail. “Use the information on that data cube. Maybe the authorization code is in there.” 

Alex nodded, found the data cube she mentioned, and fumbled it into the noteputer that he had in front of him. A moment later, information on the contract came up and Alex scanned through that information for a long moment before finding what he needed. “My apologies, Sho-sa. I have found the key code that you wished. Are you ready?”

[[Yes, Captain.]] 

Alex could hear the “I am SO tired of you, gaiijin” tone in the Sho-Sa’s voice and hoped that the information he was giving would help the situation. “Whiskey-Tango-Three-Seven-Zulu-Zulu-Nine-Zulu- …”

A second voice, Alex was not sure who’s but he was obviously someone used to being in charge and obviously not Sho-Sa Oishi’s, cut through what Alex started to say immediately. [[Captain… return your vessel to the recharge station at the zenith NAV point. Flight Red Bird will be escorting you to your destination. You will dock at the recharge station and wait further instructions. This transmission is at an end.]]

Alex’s eyebrows rose at the response and then rose further when the line went dead, suddenly cut off on Oishi’s side of the transmission. He looked at Janis. “So… I guess I said something right then?”

“That or they are going to shoot us with the Aerospace fighters that they have incoming.” Janis replied with a slight sigh. “Dracs are not as bad as they used to be with mercenaries though, so I give us a solid 60% chance of surviving this part of the operation.”

“Well, that’s not too bad.” Alex said with a grin and swiveled around in his chair to face the other person actively in the conversation. “Captain? What are your thoughts?”

Captain Dillan Fowler, commander of the MARIANNE, frowned. “That the person who responded to us is a lot closer than that Sho-sa.”

“Agreed.” Alex said with a nod and looked at Janis, who also nodded her agreement. “So, any thoughts on our chances of getting out of this with our asses intact?”

“Oh… not very good chances of it.” The DropShip captain licked at his lips as he stared vacantly in the general direction of the main viewer.

Alex followed Dillan’s gaze but did not see anything of value so settled back into his chair as best he could. “Any other thoughts beyond that?” 

Dillan shrugged. “The others follow along those same lines.”

“Not an optimist then?” Alex asked.

“You have no idea.” LTJG Sara “Bandit” Hammond replied. The Aerospace pilot was standing behind Dillan, not really taking part in the conversation, but hovering close to the DropShip Captain’s presence. The two had been almost inseparable during their off duty hours since the MARIANNE had lifted off of Galatea. 

“I just don’t like having some twitchy Aerospace jock floating around in a multi-ton armed Aerospace fighter looking like he might want to shoot at me.” Dillan growled. “Makes me nervous and pessimistic.”

“So does warm milk.” Sara replied with a frown, obviously less than happy about the comment concerning “twitchy Aerospace jock”.

Dillon patted her hand where it rested on his shoulder. “I did not mean you or anyone like you, dear. Just ones that are from the Combine or anywhere else that might be shooting at me.”

“I can join those ranks.” Sara scowled at him and slid her hand out from under his.

Dillon remembered why he and Sara hadn’t really worked out to begin with and sighed slightly before forcing a smile to his face. “Alex, just get us past this and do so in one piece, okay?”

Alex shrugged. “I’ll see what I can do, but no promises.”

Suddenly, a high-pitched voice called out: “Sir!”

“What is wrong, Zip?” Dillon asked and stood up to walk to Crewman Mitchell Saperstein’s station, which was to man MARIANNE’s radar systems. Alex hid his smile, knowing that Dillon was certainly relived to have an excuse to step away from Sara.  

“We’ve got two Shilones coming in…” Zip reported, his voice going up an octave as he spoke. “They are coming up high and on our six.”

Dillan looked down at the scope and nodded then looked over at a different station. “Mandy, dear, raise those two boyos and make sure they are ‘Red Bird’ flight, would you?”

“Roger, roger.” Amanda Zipperstein replied.

“Zip… see if you can find where they came from.” Dillan commanded.

“Yes sir.” Zip replied absently as he was staring into the screen, trying to find where the fighters had come from. “They have to be close.”

“Very close.” Dillan agreed. “Amanda? Anything?”

“Getting their frequency now.” Amanda twisted towards Dillan as she replied. 

Alex turned slightly and placed one elbow on the console beside him so he could rest his head on his hand and, somewhat, unobtrusively observe Mrs. Zipperstein. How the hell Mitchell… Zip… had ever gotten a hold of someone that looked like Amanda was entirely out of Alex’s ability to comprehend. The woman was caramel-skinned, with red highlights in her hair, and a body that just wouldn’t quit. Plus, she had a 100-kiloiwatt smile, was very intelligent, educated in multiple fields of study, and was at least seven points more attractive than Zip would ever be.

The urgency in Amanda’s voice cut through Alex’s thoughts, bringing him back to the here and now. “This is MARIANNE to incoming fighters… state your intention.”

[[MARIANNE, this is Red Bird Leader. We are here to escort you to the recharge station at the zenith NAV point. Do not attempt to deviate from your course or we will engage with lethal force. Do you understand?]]

Amanda looked at Dillan with big eyes and waited. After a moment, Dillan nodded and turned away to give orders to the pilot and navigation. Amanda went back to her communication console and replied in a steady voice. “MARIANNE understands and will comply.”

[[Copy that, MARIANNE. Red Bird Leader out.]]

“Well… to the zenith NAV point we go.” Dillan stated with a sigh and plopped down in his chair. “I guess we have a couple of hours to spare, right?”

“Sure.” Alex slid his hand into a pocket and came out with a set of playing cards. “Anyone want to lose some money?”


1709
Bridge
MARIANNE, Union Class DropShip
Attached to Recharge Station, GENTLE RAIN

“Still nothing from our hosts?” Alex asked and flicked a card into the upturned hat that he’d retrieved from the floor after Sara stomped out in a huff about ten minutes ago.

“Nothing.” Amanda confirmed.

“You’d think they’d have told us something by now.” Dillan muttered. 

At that moment, the door to the bridge opened and Sara stumbled in, her eyes wide. She caught herself before she fell to the floor but before anyone could get out of their seats to assist her, four black-clothed figures stepped inside the bridge and fanned out with weapons ready. Each held a sonic stunner, a non-lethal weapon that would incapacitated anyone that was hit by the blast. To make them worse, sonic stunners had a wide beam on them, like the blast from a shotgun, and with four of them covering the bridge everyone there was certain to be affected.

Everyone in the bridge froze, even Dillan who had started to get up to assist Sara but now slowly sat back down in his chair. A fifth black-clad figure stepped inside the door to the bridge and looked around. After a moment of surveying everything, he nodded and barked out a single command. The four others stood down from their assault positions and dispersed. Two stepped outside the bridge doors while the other two flanked the interior of the door, hands never far from the triggers of their weapons.

“You will note, captains, that none of your people are injured. We did have to incapacitate several of your troopers that became… hostile… when we boarded the vessel, but they were only knocked unconscious by the stunners and will recover quickly.”

“ISF?” Alex guessed.

The man made no notice that he had heard Alex’s question but approached the table Alex was sitting at and placed a small recording device on the tabletop. “I, Tai-Sa Yamada Taro, identification number Tango-Nine-Hotel-Juliet-Nine, the representative for the Draconis Combine, do request, for the record, that you, Captain Alexander Yau, commanding officer for Chaos Incorporated, identify yourself and do acknowledge that you and your unit will comply with the terms and conditions for contract DC-SC-04-01.”

Alex looked at the Tai-Sa then leaned down towards the recorder. “I am Captain Alexander Yao, commanding officer of Chaos Incorporated. I do acknowledge that Chaos Incorporated will abide by all terms and conditions for contract DC-SC-04-01, per agreement with the Draconis Combine and their representatives. I ask that Tai-Sa Taro, as representative for the Draconis Combine, will also acknowledge, for the record, that the Draconis Combine will comply with the terms and conditions for contract DC-SC-04-01.”

If Alex could have seen the man’s face, he would have sworn that the Tai-Sa smirked as he said. “As representative for the Draconis Combine, I agree that we shall comply with the terms and conditions for contract DC-SC-04-01.”

“Thank you, Tai-Sa.” Alex replied. “What can we do for you?”

The Tai-Sa reached down and stopped the recording device the placed it in a pouch on his belt. “I am here to give you final instructions on your assignment.”

“Then why stop the recording?”

“As you have guessed, the original contract is a cover for a less overt action that you have agreed to undertake for my commanders.” He nodded towards Alex. “You received the data cube from our agent? And have reviewed it?”

“Yes.” Alex nodded. “To both of those questions.”

“You will take the contract then?”

“Well, we’re here, so why not?” Alex replied and another shrug. “Be a shame to come all the way out here and not do something after doing so.”

“Good.” The Tai-Sa leaned over the table. “To cover your actions here, your vessel was escorted to this station by local authorities in conjunction with the story that came over the news. Reports will have you blasting free of the recharge station after ambushing the boarding party that came to take you into custody. Your surprise will be such that we will not be able to respond to your actions with Aerospace fighters and your vessel will be able to enter Meinacos Prime’s atmosphere.”

“Oh, great. That should make us some friends.” Sara growled, staring daggers at the Tai-Sa. 

The Tai-Sa gave no sign that he heard Sara speak. “Once you reach the surface, a small engagement will happen with the militia where all parties will come away with little in the way of damages. This should establish your credentials as ruthless criminals and allow you an opening into the local underground. What you do from there, is up to you and your people.”

“Do we have an established landing zone?” Dillan asked. 

The Tai-Sa shook his head. “No. That could compromise your mission and show that you are under employment with the Combine. You are entirely on your own from this point forward, until your mission is completed.”

“Understood, Tai-Sa.” Alex stood, ignoring the shifting in stance by one of the guards to cover him. “When do we begin this deception?”

The Tai-Sa said something loudly in Japanese, the words so quick that Alex couldn’t understand them, but did not turn around. The two guards outside the bridge stepped in to join the two that were inside the bridge. Then all four of them stood at attention in a line. He barked something else and all that Alex caught were references to the “dragon”, which meant House Kurita or the Combine as a whole, normally. All four men barked a quick response and bowed low to the Tai-Sa. The Tai-Sa turned and bowed back, his bow slightly lower than the four men’s bows and held for a moment longer.

“Now.” The Tai-Sa replied to Alex and drew his pistol. He fired four times, shooting each of the guards in the head then fired into their bodies randomly until his clip was empty before reloading his pistol. After bringing a round into the chamber, the Tai-Sa holstered his weapon and turned back to the mercenaries. “There. The boarding party has been eliminated. I will have barely escaped with my life and that only due to the quick actions of a second boarding party that is arriving on your ship now.”

Stunned, Alex could only stand there before he blurted out. “Why… why did you do that?”

“Nothing will jeopardize this mission. Nothing.” The Tai-Sa pulled his pistol out again and fired twice more, once in his shoulder and another in the leg. Despite the obvious pain, the Tai-Sa said nothing, only drug himself out of the bridge and presumably heading towards the second boarding party.

“Fuck!” Dillan scrambled out of his chair and slapped the talk button on the intercom. “All personnel! Do not engage the Dracs! Let them go and we are the hell out of here! As soon as they are clear of the airlock, we are gone!”

“Why the hell did he do that?” Sara asked, eyes wide and staring at the four bodies sprawled across the bridge floor.

“I don’t know.” Alex replied as he also stared at the bodies and the widening pools of blood. “But we can find out later. Right now… right now we just get rid of them and get the hell out.”

“Stick to the plan?” Dillan asked without turning from the monitor that showed the ISF boarding team as they drug their Tai-Sa off the MARIANNE.

“Stick to the plan? We’re fucked by the plan.” Alex snarled and looked at the DropShip captain. “Are they clear?” 

“Just got that way.” Dillan replied and stabbed the emergency disengage button with his forefinger. The MARIANNE came free from the recharge station and drifted for about ten meters before the engines ignited. “Rene!! Get us out of here!”

“Oui!” Came the reply from the pilot’s chair. Rene Fonck, formerly of Chirikof in the Federated Suns, shoved the throttle as far forward as possible, shoving the MARIANNE further away from the recharge station. “Where am I going?” 

“The only place we can go at this point.” Alex replied. “Meinacos.”  

A Joint Post by,
Lieutenant Sara Hammond
Callsign: Bandit
SL-17R Slayer
Air Boss
Chaos Incorporated

And

Captain Alexander Yao
Callsign: Random
CTF-4L Cataphract
Head Cat Herder
Chaos Incorporated

Word count: 2,639 
Contract count: 40,168

1852
November 1, 3093
23 km South-South East of Tierra del Noche
Meinacos, Draconis Combine

“Keep the contact light, people. I don’t want this to get into too much more of a cluster fuck then we already have on our hands.” Captain Alexander “Random” Yau ordered over the general commchannel for Lawless Lance. “Watch the left flank, Dice… two Panthers are trying to get in with us over there.”

[[Copy that, Random.]] replied LTJG Felix "Dice" King from the cockpit of his OSR-4L Ostroc. The electric discharge of a near miss from a PPC bolt made the commline jump with static but the commline stayed open, so Alex decided that a near miss was just as good as a far miss and continued on with trying to keep track of what had been some play acting in giant war machines but had turned into a running engagement with the militia.

“Dammit… the militia was not supposed to continue engaging.” Alex growled to himself. He leveled the ER PPC in his CTF-4L Cataphract’s right arm at an approaching Sentinel and let fly. The cyan-colored lightning arched from the weapons barrel and carved or melted away nearly a ton of armor from the approaching medium BattleMech’s right shoulder.  

The Sentinel staggered under the hit and returned fire with the autocannon that made up its left arm. The stream of shells missed Alex’s Mech as the Kuritan MechWarrior was thrown off by Alex’s shot, but it blew the hell out of a series of rocks and scattered debris across the area. The medium Mech followed up its shot with its SRM2 Streak launcher, slamming both missiles into the Cataphract’s left torso. 

A snarl came over the commline as LT Vincent "Crow" Hobbs stepped his GAL-2GLS Gallowglas between Alex and the Sentinel. The 70-ton heavy BattleMech opened fire almost immediately, letting fly with both large lasers and its Gauss rifle. The large lasers burned into the Sentinel’s leg, burning away a ton of armor from the limb and leaving a trail of molten metal composite to run down the leg. The Gauss slug missed the Kuritan Mech entirely, slamming into the ground ten meters to the enemy Mech’s left and skittering across the badlands.

[[Keep going, Random.]] Vincent growled. [[I’ll keep this one occupied.]]

“Right. Remember the ROE.” Alex ordered, his voice tight. Vincent was an excellent MechWarrior but he got a little carried away when it came to Alex’s safety. The mercenary commander had yet to figure out what he did to merit a bodyguard, but whatever it was, Vincent took his self-appointed position seriously. Still, Alex felt that it was best to remind Vincent to keep with the rules of engagement. 

At this point, Chaos Incorporated was doing its best to not damage the militia too much. The unit had landed at the Meinacos Space Port and immediately deployed Lawless Lance as well as the two SL-15K Slayer Aerospace Fighters of Havok Lance. With the Mechs of Lawless Lance forming a perimeter, the crewmen of the MARIANNE had begun refueling operations on the DropShip while Havok Lance kept an eye on the sky. The militia forces responded with nearly a company of armored vehicles along with mechanized infantry.

The problem started when the Slayers made an attack run on the enemy column. Rather than just pepper the enemy armor with flights of LRMs that would, hopefully, just disable the enemy vehicles; Sara had destroyed one of the bridges ahead of the column. While this did indeed slow the enemy column without damaging the militia forces, it almost caused the death of several civilians that were near or under the bridge when it collapsed. 

This led to a bit more hard-charging attitude from the militia forces and a continued push by the armored combat vehicles in the column while much of the infantry and their carriers stopped to assist the civilians. As this happened, VTOL support moved forward with the armored vehicles to engage the mercenary forces at the Space Port. In addition to this, two lances of Shilones also took to the air, finally giving Havok Lance targets as they moved to intercept.

The Aerospace fighters from both sides made a hell of a show of it. They dived back and forth, maneuvered for shots that missed but only by a hair’s breadth, keeping the show as real as possible. That went well until someone zigged when they should have zagged and LTJG Mitchell "Rooster" Pine caught part of a spread of missiles in his left wing. Why the hell the militia Shilone had fired missiles no one would know for sure, but it turned what had been an aerial display into a true to life furball.

Sara returned fire with the ER medium lasers on her Slayer, scoring twin lines across the offending Shilone’s fuselage but making sure to stay far from the militia pilot in the forward cockpit. This did nothing to help the situation and a more concentrated fight began where the two sides were trading damage for damage while trying to keep from making a kill of any sorts. That restraint went away when Mitchell punched a hole in one of the Shilone’s wing and sent it skittering across the sky. Despite the fact that the pilot was able to eject before the Aerospace Fighter impacted with the ground, the fight was on for real now and both sides reacted accordingly.

The aerial battle was reflected by the incoming militia ground forces and the armored vehicles opened up on the Mechs of Lawless Lance as soon as they had a clear shot. The VTOLs, a mixed bag of Balac Strike VTOLs and Yellow Jacket Gunships, also opened fire on the Mechs, sending a spread of tactical missiles and Gauss rifle rounds at Lawless Lance and the MARIANNE.

Lawless Lance responded with their own weapons, making the VTOLs skitter this way and that as they tried to avoid the incoming autocannon shells and energy beams. Determined to not let this screw up any farther than it already had, Alex made sure to remind his people to watch their shots and stay with the ROE. None of the Mechs’ fire hit the VTOLs, which was good since the damned things were so fragile. However, when one of the Yellowjackets spun off and slammed into a building trying to avoid a stream of autocannon fire, it looked like Lawless Lance had actually shot it down.

To make matters worse, the armored vehicles that had also engaged Lawless Lance were scoring hits on the Mechs and attracting fire in response. Twin ER PPC blasts from LTJG Anthony “Bear” Greenwoode’s WHM-8D Warhammer shattered a Kuritan Goblin, leaving it a smoking wreck and the squad of troopers inside kindling. This made the militia back off, their vehicles moving back into cover and their VTOLs leave the immediate area.

Alex made a hurried transmission over a secured channel to the militia’s commander, Tai-Sa Howard Blane, but the high tensions made negotiations a quick thing full of harsh tones and pointed fingers as to who was to blame for the continued escalation in the conflict. It was decided that Chaos Incorporated would be allowed to finish their refueling and get the MARIANNE clear of the area while the militia would regroup and pull back their forces. Given the state of everything at that moment, both actions would be entirely plausible by any observers, which was the point of the engagement to begin with.

As the militia pulled back their forces, Chaos Incorporated did the same and created a perimeter with the Mechs from Lawless Lance plus brought out the twin Apollos in Tempest Lance to act as fire support, just in case. As the two sides were settling down and the mercenaries’ perimeter was established, the rest of the armored column with their infantry and APCs arrived at the Star Port. For reasons still unknown to Alex, this force was not aware of the cease fire that had been agreed to. 

They spotted LTJG Fiona “Ice” de Wynter in her TDR-9SE Thunderbolt with no visible support in the area. As Fiona thought these forces were part of the current cease fire and were only deploying, she did not immediately open fire on them. Because of this, she took a severe battering across the broad center torso of her Thunderbolt as a wave of shoulder-fired SRMs plowed into her Mech. 

Immediately, Fiona returned fire with the arm-mounted large pulse laser and all three medium lasers built into the Thunderbolt’s chest. The energy beams carved through one APC entirely, killed or severely wounded several soldiers, and scattered the rest into more secure cover. The APCs opened fire again with a mix of missiles, machine guns, and energy weapons. Fiona leapt her Thunderbolt backwards, deeper into the Space Port, but fired again with her large pulse laser at her targets while calling for support.

Support arrived in the form of sixty LRMs shattering the general area where the infantry and APCs. As the explosives rained down on them, the infantry and APCs retreated, calling for support as they did. The militia VTOLs arrived first and, believing that Chaos Incorporated had broken the cease fire, opened up on Ice and her Thunderbolt. As the VTOLs arrived, so did Bear in his Warhammer which further escalated the firefight. 

Finding what had been going on for the past several minutes, Alex pulled his the mercenary Mechs back so they were deeper into the Space Port and under the guns of the MARIANNE. The VTOLS pulled back as several waves of LRMs were launched by LTJG Adrian "Left" Morgan and his twin brother LTJG Franklin "Right" Morgan in their Apollos. Unwilling to come under fire from the MARIANNE, the militia units did not venture further into the Space Port. 

As the crew of the MARIANNE finished the refueling process, Alex tried to contact Tai-Sa Blaine but his attempts at communication remained unanswered. He had both of the Apollos board the MARIANNE along with Fiona’s battered Thunderbolt, which had severe damage to its left leg, while the rest of Lawless Lance kept watch. Just as Fiona was able to get her Mech onboard, the militia attacked in force.

The armored vehicles and VTOLs swarmed into the Star Port, attracting Chaos Incorporated’s fire all long the mercenaries’ left flank. When the mercenary Mechs were fully engaged, two companies of militia BattleMechs, all heavy Mechs that were pulled from across the battalion of Mechs the militia had available, charged into the right flank. The only thing that kept Lawless Lance from collapsing under the dual assault was the fire support from the MARIANNE. 

Rather than meet the militia head on by redeploying the rest of the unit, Alex pulled Lawless Lance away from the MARIANNE and to the southern end of the Star Port while the DropShip lifted off. The MARIANNE’s firepower swatted down a number of VTOLs as it left and provided aerial cover for five minutes, giving Lawless Lance time to pull out of the area.

The five Mechs pushed out from the Space Port, heading into the badlands south of there. Alex cursed for several long minutes in various languages and continued to push his forces away from the Space Port. Things were not going well for the mercenaries, especially as the militia had apparently decided that the gloves were off and play time was over. The only chance the mercenaries had at the moment was to escape into the badlands, take out the pirates, and then sound the recall to get things cleared up. Hopefully.

Alex licked at his dry lips. “Yeah. That’s just going to be a hell of a trick, oh mighty captain. How you going to do it?” 

For nearly ten minutes, Alex just drove his Mech and consulted the tactical map on one of his secondary monitors, looking for inspiration on how to make sure his people survived the current cluster fuck that had exploded around them. The rest of the Lawless Lance continued to fall back with him, sniping at the militia Mechs if they came too close. Finally, a plan started to form in his head and he flicked on the company level channel then brought the MARIANNE into the conversation as well. 

“Okay, people. Here’s the plan.” Alex swallowed hard, not sure if this was going to work or not. “We are going to have to assume that the militia will follow and follow hard. I want the MARIANNE to go to NAV hotel seven on the tactical map and wait there. That’s about forty klicks from where we are plus relatively shielded from immediate ground attack. When you get there, make sure the other Mechs and battle armor are functional and be ready if we call for you.”

[[Call for us? What the hell do you mean?]] Captain Dillan Fowler demanded. [[Won’t your lance be onboard?]]

“Negative. Lawless Lance and I will continue on to draw the militia off and hopefully break contact with them.”

[[Boss, let me get back out there with you.]] Fiona said.

“Again, negative. Your Thunderbolt needs to get repaired and is slow to begin with. Plus, it will be hell to get the MARIANNE back on the ground long enough to get you deployed and then get back into the sky before the militia get here. Stay onboard and help guard the MARIANNE. We’ll be fine, especially with Havok Lance coming in to give us an assist every now and again.”

[[You got that, Random. We’ll be there.]] LT Sara "Bandit" Hammond replied with a growl. She was ready for more action against the militia’s Aerospace force or whatever else fell in front of her crosshairs.

[[What happens after you break contact with the militia?]] LT Tiana "Risky" Anders-Hsien asked. 

“Then we make contact with the MARIANNE and get picked up. Easy as pie.” Alex assured her.

[[Good. Then you won’t mind us coming along.]]

“Wait… “Alex began as he saw the door for Mech Bay One on the now hovering MARIANNE come open and a dozen armored forms leapt from the door, riding their jump jets down to the ground. “Dammit, Risky!”

[[I’m sorry, sir. Did you want us to stay on the DropShip?]] Tiana asked in a sickeningly sweet voice as she leapt her Fah Shih battle armor towards Alex’s Cataphract.  Behind her, eleven other troopers, the remaining balance of three squads’ worth of battle armor, leapt forward to join Lawless Lance. [[If I had realized that, we would have stayed aboard. Too bad the MARIANNE won’t have time to land or we could get back on her. I guess we’ll just have to stay with you.]] 

“Sure. Right. Whatever.” Alex grumbled into the commline. “Get you and yours onboard. Deploy the other squads out to the rest of my lance and we’re out of here.”

[[As you command.]] Risky replied, twisting the knife a bit. The phrase “as you command” had long been a joke between the members of Chaos Incorporated… it was a good way to tell a commanding officer, especially one paying your bills, to fuck off while complying with a given order. It was normally reserved for commanders being dumb asses in one form or another.

Alex grumbled to himself as Anarchy Lance latched onto his Cataphract. With the magnetic connecters built into the Fah Shih, the battle armor could travel on any BattleMech, not just OmniMechs like most other units. Despite his grumbling, Alex knew that the Fa Shih could definitely come in handy, especially if they needed to set up ambushes or the like for their pursuers. 

[[You kids have fun and don’t get into too much trouble.]] Dillan said over the commline, interrupting Alex’s thoughts. A rumble filled the sky as the MARIANNE started to leave the area. [[We’ll stay as low as possible to keep under their radar. Call if you run into something too big for you to handle.]]

“Thanks.” Alex replied to the MARIANNE’s captain then swapped over to Lawless Lance’s commchannel. “Alright troops, let’s get this done. Those militia bastards aren’t far behind us.”

Alex flicked his headset off and let out a deep breath. “Damn I hope this works.”

Posted by,
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 2714
Contract Count: 42,882

1924
November 1, 3093
37 km South-South East of Tierra del Noche
Meinacos, Draconis Combine

Lt. Sara “Bandit” Hammond made a last check on her diagnostic board, making sure that everything came up green. Satisfied, she gave the tech, Khalid el Meziane, a thumbs-up. He replied with the same then waved her forward. It wasn’t like she was really moving her SL-15K Slayer forward under its own power though… the catapult system was actually moving the 80-ton Aerospace Fighter backwards into the launcher.

She let out a deep breath and settled herself into the command couch of her fighter a little more. It promised to be a long day of flight and fighting, neither of which were necessarily bad things to do, but a girl certainly didn’t want to do it all the time. After all, there were other things to do too. Unconsciously, her eyes flicked up to where the holo of Captain Dillan Fowler was attached to the top of her cockpit under a visor that would flip down.  

Flipping the visor down would reveal a set of instructions for her ejection system and a whole lot more of Captain Fowler than anyone else besides her really needed to see. She flipped the visor down and grinned at the holo for a moment then noted the flashing green light on her control console and flipped the visor back up. It was time to get to work.

The voice of her wingman, LtJG. Mitchell "Rooster" Pine, interrupted her. [[You done being all moon-eyed over your beau yet, Bandit?]]

“Bite me, Rooster.” She replied and slid the reflective visor on her helmet down then shoved the throttle on her fighter forward to 100%. When the control console showed both engines in the green and coming to full power, she opened her commline. “Bandit is green.”

[[Rooster is green.]]

“Havok Flight is green.” Sara said.

[[AirBoss shows green for Havok Flight.]] SRLt Aaron "Wings" Scarfiotti-Dunn said over the commline. 

Aaron was an Aerospace Fighter pilot in the service to the Free Worlds League before he’d lost his left leg after a particularly explosive crash. He was honorably discharged from the Aerospace service and given a healthy pension for the loss of his limb and his years of service to the League. After a year or so of rehabilitation and trying to find out what to do next, Aaron had signed on with a string of other DropShips and their captains before settling in with the MARIANNE and Dillan. Some say he lost a bet, others that he actually won the bet. Neither he nor Dillan ever expanded on the story beyond a smile though.

[[Good hunting, Havok Flight.]] 

That was the last thing that Sara heard before she felt her Slayer jump forward on the catapult as it was hurled out of the MARIANNE and into the atmosphere of Meinacos. The Slayer bucked slightly as it caught the atmosphere and the wash from Rooster’s Slayer. She glanced over at the other fighter for a moment then swapped her attention back to her control console.

Everything looked good at the moment, no severe crosswinds and no incoming weather plus no one was shooting at them. Yet. Sara consulted the radar on her HUD for a moment to make sure that no one was incoming then opened her commline. “Keep it low and level. We’ll do a circle back towards the space port and then come back around to make sure no one is following Ale-… er… Random’s trail.”
[[Roger that. I’ll keep on your high eight.]] Mitchell replied as he slid his fighter back into the position, relative to Sara’s fighter, that he’d indicated. 

“Copy.” Sara replied and banked her Slayer to the right. Following the “standard” paint protocol for Chaos Incorporated, Sara’s Slayer was painted a deep purple with glitter mixed in the paint, which she claimed had “dazzling” properties that would throw off the aim of her opponents. The Slayer was trimmed out in a deep red that happened to match Sara’s favorite color of lipstick. A single eye was centered on the fuselage just in front of the cockpit, which was the source of the Slayer’s name: One-Eyed Flying Purple Plane Eater.

In stark contrast to her colorful paint scheme, her wingman’s Slayer was a flat black color with a bone-ivory color highlighting it. Unlike Sara’s Slayer, Mitchell also decorated his with his call sign by putting the image of a large skeletal rooster on the right wing, the only colors being the bone-ivory and a bright red for the rooster’s comb and single eye. On the left wing, again using the bone-ivory color again to make sure the meter-tall letters stood out on the flat black wing, he’d inscribed his Slayer’s name: Deathcock.

The two Aerospace fighters continued their course until they sped over the top of the Mechs of Chaos Incorporated. The four Mechs were moving at a good pace but had to stop and fire every so often to keep the light Mechs or armored vehicles that were pursuing them from getting too close. 

Luckily for Chaos Incorporated, many of the light Mechs were Panthers, still a favorite light Mech for the Combine even after centuries and also one of the slowest light Mechs to ever exist. Chaos Incorporated’s 70-ton WHM-8D Warhammer could actually stay ahead of the 35-ton light Mech with ease. The problem came when the Panthers opened fire because they packed ER PPCs, which could definitely reach out and touch someone but hard.

“Let’s see if we can cut in on the party before we get enemy birds in the air.” Sara ordered as she brought her Slayer around to line up with a string of the enemy forces. “You follow about twenty second behind me so you get a mostly clear run. Copy, Rooster?”

[[Copy, Bandit.]]

“Then let’s do this.” Sara said, more to herself than anyone else, as she lined up the nose of the One-Eyed Flying Purple Plane Eater with one of the enemy Mechs, a Panther, and began opening fire. 

The Kuritan Mechs started to scatter almost as soon as the Slayers began their run and turned their weapons to the sky. While this might turn the Slayers away, it also gave the mercenary Mechs they were chasing a chance to open fire unmolested. As some of the Kuritan Mechs turned their attention away from the incoming fighters to the Mechs, confusion reigned which then left gaping holes in their defensive fire.

Sara flicked her nose-mounted LB10X autocannon’s ammunition selector to scatter-shot and began firing. Submunitions from the scatter shot began exploding along her firing path, stripping armor from both Mechs and vehicles. She followed up with streams of scarlet energy from the six ER medium lasers mounted on either wing. Armor melted and flowed under the intense heat of the weapons, leaving one Panther a smoking and limping wreck and a pair of Pegasus hovercraft disabled… one flipped over and the other with a hole in its lift skirt.

Mitchell’s follow up attack was less devastating to the militia’s forces as they had already scattered from Sara’s attack run, but he still left his mark on the militia. Leaving his LB10X autocannon on solid shot, the 100mm high explosive, armor piercing or HEAP rounds shattered armor plating and punched into the more fragile inner workings of the war machines. His lasers followed up on that, crippling a Daimyo and finishing off the Panther that Sara had lit up. Mitchell rolled the Slayer through a tight barrel roll, giving the Kuritans the finger for the five seconds he was inverted.

Return fire from the ground forces was poorly coordinated and resulted in only a single scar across Sara’s fuselage from an ER large laser. The rest of the fire was aimed poorly enough that the two Aerospace fighters were able to dodge out of the way or the pilots inside merely watch as the beam or missile flew past their aircraft. 

Captain Alexander Yau’s voice came over the commline. [[Havok Lance… Random requesting Lucifer’s Fall.]]

Sara smiled at that. “On the way, Random. Don’t slow down. You ready, Rooster?”

[[Oh copy that all to hell, Bandit.]]

She nodded, hearing the eagerness in Mitchell’s voice, and lined them up for a run across a line some 50 meters behind from where the quickly retreating mercenary BattleMechs were at that moment. The militia forces seemed to pause, perhaps stunned by the strafing run from the Aerospace fighters or the sudden retreat by the BattleMechs, but quickly recovered and looked to be attempting to close the distance on the mercenary force.

However, Lucifer’s Fall was designed to make that action very difficult if not openly impossible for the militia, at least in the short term. The Slayers began their run as the Chaos Incorporated Mechs got nearly 100 meters of clearance from their line of attack, then Mitchell brought his Slayer parallel with Sara’s. The two Aerospace fighters blazed away with all of their firepower, draining ammunition bins while heating up their aircraft as they fired, and pushing the enemy forces back on their heels.

At the proper moment, both Aerospace fighters dropped their payload of two each of 500-kilogram thermobaric or fuel air explosive bombs. The bombs dropped then exploded at only about five meters above the ground, creating a massive wave of explosive overpressure with a wave of flame quickly following. A couple of the enemy’s hovercraft lost control when the wave of overpressure hit them, spinning the air-cushioned vehicles around in a tight spin. Other vehicles and Mechs were stopped in their tracks or staggered when the wave hit them. A spindly-legged Jenner was knocked over by the blast as it had been almost in the middle of the blast when the FAE bombs exploded. 

As most of the enemy forces were armored units and BattleMechs, they were not badly hurt by the explosions, but they were startled by the violence of them and stopped in reaction to them. This gave the two fighters of Havok Flight time to loop back around and release the last of their bomb payload, an even half-dozen Inferno bombs from each fighter. With the evocation of “Lucifer’s Fall”, the bombs were dropped slightly ahead of the enemy’s forward position, creating a wall of fire that stuck to everything it touched and burned hot. 

The militia’s forces stopped entirely before they reached the wall of flame and brightly burning inferno fluid. The fire would damage the armored vehicles some, but it would stop the Mechs entirely if they overheated in the intense flames and then be helpless until their Mechs cooled enough to restart. 

Mitchell hooted in triumph over the commline and again brought his Deathcock through a victory roll, as Havok Flight turned again, bringing their collective noses back around towards the militia forces. Sara ignored Mitchell’s celebration and concentrated on what the militia was doing and how they reacted to the strikes.  She cursed harshly when she saw some of them begin to move around the fire wall the infernos created. 

“Bandit to Random… they are moving around the Fall.” She checked her command console. “We are at about 10% fuel before bingo fuel. Do you want another pass?”

[[Negative, Bandit. Refuel, rearm, and give me a call. We can see what’s what from there.]]

“Copy that.” Sara replied and let go of a breath that she didn’t know she was holding. The idea of being too low on fuel just terrified her beyond reason, even beyond the actual fighting of an enemy… she could figure out why, but she knew it did. “Rooster, head home. We’ll come back later.”

[[Copy, Bandit.]] Mitchell replied with an odd tone in his voice. 

From long experience of flying with him, Sara knew from the tone in Mitchell’s voice that he wasn’t ready to leave. He wanted to mix it up some more with the bad guys, preferably other fighters but he would make due with shooting more ground pounders too. “We’ll be back after refuel.”

[[Excellent.]]

Sara could almost hear the grin in his voice at that and shook her head slightly. How in the name of anything remotely holy someone could sound quite that happy to get back into combat she had no clue. She was okay with getting into a furball, but she was also just as happy to be leaving one and be in one piece when she did. 

“Bandit to Wings, we are incoming to home. Request refuel and refit so we can get back out here. Copy?’

[[Wings copies you, Bandit. Come on home, we’ll have you back out there in no time.]]

“Joy.” She muttered and headed back towards the MARIANNE.

Posted by,
Lieutenant Sara Hammond
Callsign: Bandit
SL-17R Slayer
Air Boss
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 2141
Contract Count: 45,023

1104
November 2, 3093
Corner of 3rd Street and Dragon’s Tears Avenue
Remika’s Falls
Meinacos, Draconis Combine

“Remember, we play this to the hilt, but try not to get anyone that doesn’t deserve it killed in the process, please.” Captain Alexander “Random” Yau said into the commline. He listened with half an ear to the quips and acknowledgements that came back over the line from the rest of the task force and concentrated more on just keeping his CTF-4F Cataphract moving forward through the street with as little property damage as possible. After all, pretending to be a bad guy did not mean you had to really be one. 
 
A souped-up sports car of some model went whipping up the street, weaving through the legs of the four BattleMechs of Chaos Incorporated as they made their way through the small town of Remika’s Falls. The three passengers jeered at the Mechs, throwing empty bottles out the windows as they sped by and giving the Mechs the finger for good measure. 
 
Alex frowned and targeted a section of road well in front of the car then let loose with his arm-mounted ER PPC. The man-made lightning struck the asphalt and created a good four-meter-wide crater as well as melting some of the surrounding pavement with the intense heat. The sports car swerved and tried to avoid the crater but was going too fast to do so and went nose first into it. Alex could hear the crash even through his cockpit, despite the external microphones being off. The three dazed passengers and one driver stumbled out of the wreck, yelling something in Japanese that it was probably best that Alex couldn’t translate.
 
With a smile, Alex had the Cataphract use its single human-looking hand give the driver and passengers the bird as it stalked closer. The four humans scattered just as the Cataphract stomped on the damaged vehicle, smashing it into a three-ton paperweight. The driver and at least one of the passengers started yelling obscenities that he could translate at the Cataphract, along with shaking their fists. The heated maw of the ER PPC swept over the group and they scattered again, running into a convenience store located in a strip mall to Alex’s right. He laughed and kept going.
 
“Alright, maybe you have to be a little bit of a bad guy to pull it off.” Alex said with a smirk.
 
Chaos Incorporated had finally made the militia break contact with them about ten hours previously, allowing the Mechs to finally board MARIANNE and get some real distance between them and the militia’s pursuit. The militia commander had played it smart during the pursuit and continued to harass the fleeing mercenaries with hovercraft and light BattleMechs. This allowed him to keep tabs on the mercenaries and keep them moving or get overwhelmed by whatever heavier forces the militia could drop on them. 
 
They had finally broken contact with the militia by suckering them into a pocket canyon where they thought they had Lawless Lance trapped. However, when they got to the end of the canyon, Lawless Lance turned and closed on them while the newly deployed Tempest Lance dropped several hundred missiles on top of their heads. 

The militia forces broke and the surviving units dashed through the gaps that the mercenaries had intentionally left in their lines. With their pursuers gone, Chaos Incorporated had loaded back onto the MARIANNE and sped far away onboard the Union class DropShip. The militia made no further attempt to pursue, even with Aerospace fighters, as the DropShip headed deeper into the badlands.
 
After landing several hundred kilometers deep into the badlands, Chaos Incorporated began repairs to the battered Mechs of Lawless Lance from their running fight with the militia. While they put on new sheets of armor, replaced a bad left knee actuator on LTJG Anthony “Bear” Greenwoode’s Warhammer, and topped off the expendables on the Mechs; Tempest Lance set up a perimeter to watch the area. After the repairs were started and the perimeter was set, the officers of the unit met to decide a course of action.

With hard intelligence on the pirates being at a premium, Alex wasn’t certain what the next course of action really should be. All they had from the ISF was the names of the officers of the pirates, the names of a few of the more notorious members of the group, that they were raiding all across the region for damned near anything that could be tossed in a cargo net and hauled off, and that they were often seen in the town of Remika’s Falls.

Remika’s Falls had been a relatively calm town prior to Finley’s Crew showing up. They were the last stop of civilization before going deep into the badlands and were a favorite of prospectors looking for their lucky strike, hunters of lost Star League era treasure troves, miners, and the nomads that herded the giant reptiles that were often the best source of meat in the badlands. There were a few bad elements in town, but they normally kept things at a low intensity so as to not attract too much bad karma or the attention of local authorities.

After Finley’s Crew made their way to the town, things were different. It was now avoided by corporate interests and anyone else that didn’t want to get shook down in the process of finding a good cup of sake before hitting the badlands. Now, those elements that may have wanted to avoid the authorities thrived there and did what they wanted… as long as Finley and his Crew were okay with it, of course.

A lively discussion ensued which was crowned by Tynon spouting the wisdom of the ages, which no one really understood so he said it again plainly and using small words: “Go to the town and stir things up. They will come to see what is going on.”

Everyone agreed and things were decided. The MARIANNE would land about 10 klicks away from the town then stay on standby after that. Lawless Lance accompanied by SRLT Jackson "Madman" Tallman in his CN9-D Centurion would head to the town. Tempest Lance would deploy after Lawless Lance and stay about three klicks away from the town, ready to supply fire support as needed. The rest of the battle armor would stay with the MARIANNE, just in case someone tried to get inside the DropShip. The two SL-15K Slayer Aerospace Fighters of Havok Lance would be on ready five alert, to either cover the MARIANNE or to come support the task force.

When they got closer to town, Alex had Jackson in his Centurion and LTJG Anthony "Bear" Greenwoode in his WHM-8D Warhammer stay at the outskirts of town as backup, in case things went sideways. He would have liked to of left more Mechs at the outskirts, but was told in no uncertain terms that four Mechs were going in there one way or another. 

So, surrendering to his ever unruly mob, Alex had led the task force of four Mechs and twelve Fa Shih battle armor troopers into the town. Since then, there had been no contact from any hostile forces or even friendly ones. Both of which were good things since it meant that nothing had gone pear-shaped. Yet.

The mercenaries stopped outside of a bar with a number of battered vehicles in front of it and a giant neon sign that had seen almost as many better days as the building itself. The building was a battered concrete block affair, scarred by wind and sun, that looked more like a bunker than a place of business. What paint was left on the building was peeling off and definitely could have used either a couple of fresh coats or a blindfold to cover up the eyesore the building made. The sign read “The Last Stop” in less than glamorous kanji characters, which made it sound both appealing and accurate. 

The vehicles parked out front included everything from dune buggies to hovercraft to motorcycles of various makes, models, and conditions. Alex’s favorites were the group of half a dozen bright orange motorcycles with dusty tails from some off-world mammals hanging from two-meter-tall antennas. Why they appealed to him, Alex wasn’t entirely sure but they did. Maybe it had something to do with something so obviously off-world being displayed so casually. Maybe it was just the pretty colors. 

“Alright, kids. Here we are.” Alex said into the commline. “I’ll park here and take in a squad of battle armor with me to stir things up. Everyone else, keep an eye on things.”

[[I’m going too.]] rumbled LT Vincent "Crow" Hobbs from the cockpit of his GAL-2GLS Gallowglas. 

Alex closed his eyes. Vincent had long ago made himself Alex’s bodyguard and took the self-appointed position very, very seriously. “Crow, I’ll be okay with Anarchy Squad with me. It’s not like they can’t keep an eye on me.”

[[Agreed, they can do the job well.]] Vincent replied and, for a brief moment, Alex thought he’d seen a miracle and would have won the argument. Then Vincent continued. [[ I’ll see you out of the Mechs in a moment. Don’t go inside without me. Crow is clear.]]

Alex opened his mouth to continue the discussion but realized that it would be a waste of time for two reasons… one, Crow wouldn’t listen to him, and two, Crow had signed off the commline and was climbing down the front of his Gallowglas right now. “Right. I’ll see you down there.” Alex replied, remembering the old adage about how leadership was in part just getting in front of the charge. “Everyone else… make sure we don’t get killed by a bunch of bad guys. Random is clear,”

Alex disconnected the sensor pads from his body, the coolant lines from his cooling visit, then placed his neurohelmet on the shelf to the side of his command couch. With only a few curses, Alex made it off of the command couch through the tight confines of the cockpit and out the hatch, dragging a small bag with him. He climbed down the back of his Cataphract with practiced ease then opened the bag to pull out some clothing. 

The mesh shirt he wore in the cockpit was tossed in the bag and a newish T-shirt with a Battle Master’s head backed by crossed bones emblazoned across the front. He pulled on the jeans from the bag and stomped back into the black leather boots he wore in the cockpit. A moment later had his gun belt with a 12mm automatic and a fuck-off sized knife on. After making sure everything was in the right place, Alex did a quick commcheck and headed towards the bar.
“You all prettied up now?” Lieutenant Tiana "Risky" Anders-Hsien asked from inside her Fa Shih battle armor. 

“How could I get any prettier?” Alex asked with a smirk.

“Let me count the ways.” She replied with a wicked smile that Alex couldn’t see but knew was there.

“Yeah, yeah… let’s just go do this already.” Alex grumbled. 

Like a living shadow, Crow slipped into position slightly behind Alex and to his left. The four Fa Shih battle armor suits also took up positions around him in a square formation. This left Alex a bit more vulnerable from incoming fire from the front, but it also made the impression that he was in charge and everything and everyone else was just window dressing.

When they got to the door, Alex shoved it open with a heave and headed inside. Specialist Jay "Radar" Carter and Specialist Laura "Twitch" Pandini stationed themselves on either side of the entrance, mini-guns leveled towards the street. Crow, Tiana, and Corporal Fraser “Jackal” Kearns coming in behind him. The bar went silent as the four mercenaries stepped inside. Fraser stepped to the right as he entered, keeping himself on the inside of the door with his weapons casually covering the three dozen or so people inside.

The jukebox in the corner was playing something loud and twangy… an off-world country music that somehow penetrated this deep into the Combine. While Alex was all for expanding the Combine into different cultural directions, widening their view of the universe as a whole, there were limits. 

“By the Dragon’s third ball, I hate that song.” He said loudly.

With a sigh, Alex made a casual gesture at the jukebox. The mini-gun of Fraser’s right arm spun and moved in the direction of the offending machine. Four patrons of the bar scattered away from the jukebox as the mini-gun spat out half a dozen rounds into it killing the music immediately.

“That’s so much better.” Alex gave his best feral grin and headed straight towards the bar. “Hey, barkeep. What do you recommend for a thirsty MechWarrior that has just acquired a new bar?”

“New bar?” The barkeep’s brow furrowed. “There’s only this one and one other in town. So what do you… wait… this bar?”

“Well, since you suggested it.” Alex plopped down on a bar stool and grinned. “Sure. For starters anyway.”

“But…” The bartender started to protest then stopped suddenly, his eyes widening at the sound of Tiana’s mini-gun spinning up. As it wound back down, his eyes snapped back to Alex.

“See, here’s how this goes.” Alex said as he leaned in closer to the barkeep, keeping his voice so it carried across the mostly silent room. “I have decided that this place is mine. The lady in the armor here and the gentleman in the armor there both agree with me. This fellow right behind me doesn’t care one way or another, but he goes with it because I want it to be like this.”

“But… “

Alex continued, as if the bartender hadn’t started to say anything. “Now, if keeping them happy isn’t enough for you, then I am sure that keeping the lance of BattleMechs standing outside this little shithole of a bar happy should be.”

“But…” 

“Of course, if that’s not enough…” Alex shrugged. “Then I guess we just get unhappy and this place burns down around your ears.”

“But…” The bartender continued to protest then stopped and backed away from the bar with eyes wide.

“What he means to say, friend, is that the bar’s not his to give up.” Came a growl from behind Alex.

Alex sighed and looked at the bartender. “Is this human a friend of yours?”

“Well…” 

“Shut up, Frank.” The voice said.

“Excuse me, Frank. I’ll be right back.” Alex turned around casually and looked at the eight scraggly looking men and women that had arrayed themselves about four meters away from the bar. Many of them glanced nervously towards Fraser and or Tia, a couple watched Alex. Only one looked at Vincent at all… Alex took that one to be the most intelligent of the group. The obvious leader was standing there in a too-tight short sleeved shirt with the light gleaming from his bald head. Alex smiled at the man who’d spoken. “I’m sorry… I didn’t catch your name.”

“I didn’t throw it.” The man stated and hooked his thumbs into his gun belt. This action also took his hand very close to the handle of the heavy revolver set up on a cross draw. He gave Alex a slight condescending smirk.

“How witty. Damn, I hate witty people.” Alex replied. “Crow.”

Vincent stepped forward, his face set in its normal almost but not quite frown. He wore black on black on black… the only hint of color was the silver on his overcoat, gun belt, and the polished wood of his custom pistol. He looked at the gathered people then nodded towards the door. “You should go.”

“You think we’re scared of you?” the man scoffed. “Your battle armor might kill us, but we’ll get you first.”

Vincent gave a casual shrug. “I doubt that very much.”

“Is that so?” the man laughed outright now and Alex noticed a slight twitch in Vincent’s eye.

“Yes.” Vincent agreed. “Because I am just going to kill you now and see if the rest of your people want to do something about it. Then if they do, I am going to kill them too.” 

“I don’t think you understand the situation you’re in, friend.” The man said.

“Explain it to me.” Vincent requested.

“See, you just don’t know who you are dealing with is the biggest problem.” The man spread his arms out wide. “We’re part of … “

“I’m bored.” Vincent said suddenly and his hand blurred.

A single shot rang out and the man fell to the ground, a hole in his forehead. The other members of the group froze, mouths open at perhaps the sudden violence or the speed that the violence had occurred or both. Vincent stood there with his pistol in his hand, like it had appeared there by magic, but with the barrel pointed to the floor and a small swirl of smoke coming from the barrel. His pale eyes regarded the dead man without any trace of emotion then flicked up to the rest of the group, which stepped back slightly.

“As I was saying…” Alex began and stepped around Vincent, while keeping clear of the other man’s field of fire. He stepped closer to the group, kicked the downed man in the leg to clear his path, and poked the next closest man in the chest. “… this is our bar. You are no longer welcome here so I suggest you and all your friends get the fuck out of it.”

The man’s eyes snapped to Alex’s face. “You’re going to regret this when Finley hears about it.”

“Maybe. But you won’t live to tell him about it unless you leave.” Alex grinned slightly and clapped the man on the shoulder. “Now.”

The man nodded and motioned towards the body of their dead comrade. The rest of the group scooped him up and they all left the bar post haste. Fraser followed them outside and, after a moment, several powerful motors could be heard coming to life then roaring away. Fraser stepped back inside and gave an all clear hand sign. 

Alex smiled pleasantly and went back to the bar, sitting down and motioning the bartender closer. “Frank… thanks for your patience while I dealt with that whole unpleasant situation. We just can’t have riff-raff like that in a fine establishment like this.” He made a vague gesture to the bar as a whole then pulled a couple of hundred in C-bills from his pocket and slapped them onto the bar. “First things first… drinks for everyone. Second, we’ll get that jukebox replaced as soon as we can find one.”

Alex turned and looked at the other mercenaries. “For now though, I have to say the pot is sufficiently stirred. Let’s see who comes calling.” 

Posted by,
Captain Alexander Yao
Callsign: Random
CTF-4L Cataphract
Head Cat Herder
Chaos Incorporated

Word count: 3,174
Contract count: 48,197


1409
November 5, 3093
The Last Stop Bar and Sushi, Remika’s Falls
Meinacos, Draconis Combine

Captain Alexander Yau quirked an eyebrow at his vodka tonic. The drink was shaking slightly, spreading small rings across the liquid in sympathy with the vibrations of giant footfalls that were moving up through the bar.  He sighed slightly and took another sip before getting up from his bar stool and heading out the door of The Last Stop at a trot. The fact that this event was not only anticipated but also desired did not make it less annoying when he was in the middle of his drink.

His CTF-4L Cataphract stood waiting for him in the parking lot of the bar. Five other Mechs also stood in the general areas, but they were already being manned by their respective MechWarriors, the rest of his Lawless Lance. Alex threw himself at the waiting ladder that trailed down the torso of his Mech and scrambled up the length of the chain ladder like a crack-addled monkey looking for its next fix. This speed was achieved out of both practice and a sincere desire to be wrapped up in 70-tons of armor, weapons, and engine when the bad guys arrived.

Sirens wailed all across the town, a recent addition to the town after Chaos Incorporated had painted a giant bullseye on the place by making it their residence. The sirens were appreciated by the townspeople that resided in Remika’s Falls but the presence of the mercenary band wasn’t. It didn’t matter that they had all but driven out Finley’s Crew, a pirate band that had done what they wanted to whomever they wanted whenever they wanted and often did it just to amuse themselves. It didn’t matter that the mercenaries were paying for things and bringing in a decent amount of hard currency in the form of C-bills. 

What mattered was that because Chaos Incorporated as there, sirens were wailing all across the town, warning of incoming BattleMechs.

As Alex slid into his command couch and placed his neurohelmet on, he decided that he really couldn’t blame the town so much for that particular attitude. His mind wandered across that subject even as he hands went through the routine process of connecting his body to his BattleMech and then starting the war machine up. 

The townsfolk couldn’t be entirely left to blame for that desire after all… wanting to live a relatively simple life without having giant tanks on legs come stomping through their town. All in all, there were worse reasons to be upset with someone for moving in. With a lurch, Alex had the Cataphract moving and all thoughts about the plight of the townsfolk and even the town itself went away… it was time to fight.

“Random online… SITREP.” He ordered, cutting through the chatter that was coming over the commline. 

[[Bandit here, Random.]] Lt. Sara “Bandit” Hammond replied almost immediately. Alex could hear the thud of the fuselage mounted autocannon of the 80-ton Aerospace Fighter as it fired and knew that Bandit and her wingman, Ltjg Mitchell "Rooster" Pine were already engaged. [[Havok Lance is delaying them at the moment… making them fear the skies and all that.]]

Alex grimaced at that. A pair of SL-15K Slayers, even if they were weighing in at 80 tons each, were not going to slow down what a couple of retired soldiers that lived in the town had estimated to be close to a battalion’s worth of pirate Mechs. Not for long anyway. He adjusted the microphone in his helmet. “I need range and ETA to the town.”

[[Enemy forces at two klicks, south by south-west of Remika’s Falls, Random.]] LT Tiana "Risky" Anders-Hsien answered. The battle armor officer sounded a little out of breath as she reported the situation. [[We are shifting assets to cover and begin Plan Zulu Nine.]]

“Copy that.” Alex acknowledged Tia’s report and went through the plan very quickly on his own. Two battle armor squads had been dispersed south of the town at about three kilometers out with additional sensors being set at five kilometers from town. These would give Chaos Incorporated at least a little bit of warning before the pirates hit. 

When it was confirmed that the pirates were on their way into town, instead of just doing some recon or the like, the battle armor squads at their listening posts would hunker down and send information to the rest of the unit. Then they would be in position to either hit the enemy in the rear when called, ambush any of the pirates that would retreat across their path, or just stay hunkered down if not needed. 

Havok Lance would engage as soon as possible, slowing the pirates and giving both the town and Chaos Incorporated time to get ready for them. They would disengage when either they were close to bingo fuel, which was measured as the amount of fuel they would need to get back to the MARIANNE, or were chased from the skies by enemy fire.

At first, only Lawless Lance and the battle armor would engage the pirates, leaving Tempest Lance as a reserve to spring on the bad guys at the last moment or not at all, depending on the situation. If they were needed, Tempest Lance would be able to engage the enemy force at about 1000 meters out, which helped mitigate where they were currently positioned in relation to where the battle was thought to be taking place. 

In an attempt at secrecy, Tempest Lance was stationed at the northern end of the town, farthest away from the town’s border with the badlands. While this positioning alone would not insure that the Mechs were not seen, hiding them inside several warehouses would definitely help that out. Plus, with the extra time before they would be needed, Tempest Lance was entirely shut down which also helped to conceal their position.

The plan had the pirates coming in, guns blazing from whatever direction they came from the badlands. Lawless Lance would engage them at about a kilometer or so outside of Remika’s Falls, giving them some room to fight and maneuver before getting to the border of the town itself. The idea was to push whatever pirate forces would be coming back into the badlands and not continue the engagement into Remika’s Falls itself. 

If the battle did spill back into the town, Remika’s Falls would be devastated by it. In his more honest moments, Alex knew that he didn’t give less than a fuck about the town, the people in it, and if it was destroyed by an engagement with the pirates. While it wasn’t the town’s fault that things had happened the way they did, these sorts of things happened in the modern universe. Still, it didn’t mean that he wanted to fight in the middle of the town so he planned to avoid it. Especially since the buildings in town weren’t really that tall so wouldn’t make very good cover for the heavy Mechs in his unit. 

As the Mechs engaged, the two squads of battle armor that would be riding Lawless Lance would move to assault the pirate Mechs, armored vehicles, and whatever infantry the pirates would muster. Battle armor was not expected from the pirates’ forces, so hopefully whatever infantry they sent out would be chewed to little bits quickly by Tia’s squads and then they could concentrate on the armored vehicles and BattleMechs.

Assuming that the pirates didn’t oblige and just crumble under the combined assault, Tempest Lance would engage selected targets and bring them down in a rain of missiles. When they got close enough and had line of sight on their targets, then Tempest Lance would be able to also engage using their energy weapons and whatever else was available to them. Alex knew that his XO, SRLT Jackson "Madman" Tallman was eager for that.

Reports showed that the pirates were using primarily medium BattleMechs with some heavier Mechs as support. Many of these units were in need of some repair when last seen by militia and regular DCMS units. This was due to the lack of supplies coming in for their BattleMechs. With Finley’s Crew unable to get out of the system or get supplies in from other systems, they had to rely on raiding the local militia’s supplies for more expendables for their Mechs. 

Knowing this, the militia had removed all of their outlying supply depots and kept their supplies centralized in heavily armed and armored supply centers. To also keep battlefield salvage to a minimum, the militia had withdrawn most of their BattleMechs from patrolling leaving such duties to hovercraft, VTOLs, and other armored vehicles. These actions had, hopefully, cut the pirates off from much of their needed supplies and made any fight to get more supplies more difficult to win and costlier even if they did win. 
 
Given all of that, Alex seriously hoped that the pirates would come in with under-maintained Mechs that were low on munitions and maybe even not be full up on their armor. He also hoped that by understating his forces and having kept Tempest Lance hidden even with their initial entry into town, the pirates would not send a huge force of Mechs and armor at them in the beginning. If both of these things held up, then Chaos Incorporated would be able to crush the incoming force with ease.

However, if the combined strength of Lawless Lance, the battle armor, Havok Lance, and Tempest Lance were not enough to either stop or at least turn the pirates away; Alex knew that he could call in the MARIANNE. The Union class DropShip was sitting about twenty kilometers away from Remika’s Falls and was patched into the satellite systems of Meinacos, with the covert blessings of the ISF no less. So, they could monitor the fight provide coordination for Chaos Incorporated and would be available to either lend fire support or provide extraction for the unit, if needed.

Alex hoped that he wouldn’t have to rely on the MARIANNE for either action, but knew it never hurt to have contingency plans set up for your contingency plans. He firmly believed in the old adage of a plan never surviving contact with the enemy and did his best to keep every angle covered.

He arrived at the edge of town just as the first shots were being fired by his reinforced lance. Both LTJG Anthony “Bear” Greenwoode in his WHM-8D Warhammer and LT Vincent “Crow” Hobbs in his GAL-2GS Gallowglas were opening fire on the incoming pirate Mechs. An already ancient looking Assassin stumbled then toppled face first into the ground as twin ER PPCs from Bear quickly followed by a Gauss rifle slug from Crow smashed the lighter Mech down. The Assassin skidded on its face for an impressive five or six meters before coming to rest and didn’t look to be getting up any time soon.

 A spread of ten LRMs leapt from the launcher on LTJG Fiona "Ice" de Wynter’s TDR-9SE Thunderbolt and scattered all across an incoming Wasp. The light Mech was hit by only a couple of the long range missiles, but still seemed to have trouble dealing with the light damage it had taken. LTJG Felix "Dice" King added to the Wasp’s suffering with both of his ER large lasers, creating a furrow in the Wasp’s center torso armor that caused the Mech to fall backwards and lay there like a drunk that had lost his balance.

Jeers and cheers were made across the commline for a moment but were silenced as the rest of the light lance crested the rise, quickly followed by eight more BattleMechs… two of which were heavies: a Rifleman and a Marauder. The Rifleman was firing into the sky, keeping Havok Lance busy and off the advancing force.

“Alright Lawless… keep your fire concentrated on single targets and don’t get split up.” Alex ordered. “We move as a unit and work together until support gets here.”

[[Bandit to Random… we are at bingo fuel and are banged up…]] Alex could hear the rattle of autocannon rounds from the Rifleman as they banged against Sara’s Slayer. [[We’re heading back to base and will be back soonest. Copy?]]

“I copy, Bandit. Any info for me?” Alex asked as the two Slayers streaked over his position. Sara’s Slayer, identifiable by its purple paint scheme, left a trail of smoke behind it as it flew by.

[[What you see is what you get on your front. That Rifleman and Marauder are the end of their formation so…]] Sara paused. [[Oh shit.]]

Alex closed his eyes. He hated hearing that when there was combat going on. “What? What do you see?”

[[I have eight more Mechs coming in from the east. Mix of mediums and heavies. Looks like these pirates are…]]

Sara’s transmission garbled into static which let Alex know that the bad guys had some ECM running around on the east side of the town as well, scrambling communications. That explained why the MARIANNE didn’t warn them of the second group of Mechs coming in and he had assumed that everything was well since the MARIANNE hadn’t called in. Cursing himself, Alex brought his crosshairs down on an approaching Griffin and waited for the flash of a target lock. 

Things had just gone to hell.

Posted by,
Chaos Incorporated

WORD COUNT: 2243
Contract Count: 50,440

1421
November 5, 3093
1.73 KM South / Southwest of Remika’s Falls
Meinacos, Draconis Combine

Captain Alexander Yau lit up the incoming Griffin with both the ER PPC and the Gauss rifle mounted on his CTF-4L Cataphract. The Griffin did a little hop-skip maneuver that allowed it to slide out of the way of the charged particles of the PPC blast but the dance seemed to put it directly in the path of the Gauss rifle slug. The nickel-plated slug slapped the Griffin around in almost a full circle, but the enemy MechWarrior was on the ball and somehow kept his Mech upright. 

The Griffin seemed a bit unsteady, but was steady enough to return fire with its own PPC. The man-made lightning came close enough to the Cataphract’s cockpit to make static fuzz in Alex’s ears but didn’t actually hit. He swore he could see sympathetic sparks from the blast play over the seams of his cockpit’s frame.

Thanking several of his ancestors, Buddha, and anyone else that was listening; Alex made a mental promise to burn a small village’s worth of incense when he got out of this in one piece and flipped the switch to turn on his stealth armor. He could hear the slight hum that happened when the Guardian ECM and the electronic field of the stealth armor engaged together but did his best to ignore it. Truth be told the sound drove him crazy and made it difficult to concentrate if it was on for too long.

Again the crosshairs on Alex’s HUD flashed gold and he stabbed the Cataphract’s left arm forward as he tripped the TIC for the twin ER medium lasers mounted there. Both cyan beams cut into the Griffin’s right torso, blazing parallel tracks across the armor there and creating twin molten scars in the process of burning away more than half a ton of armor with the hit.

The Griffin didn’t quite recover from this shot as well and smashed into the rough terrain of the badlands face first, which made Alex wish nothing but badness for the MechWarrior inside. If he was extremely lucky, the damned pirate would have cracked his head open on something solid and not get the Mech back up.

Alex cursed his luck as the damned Griffin started to struggle back to its feet almost immediately after falling. It flattened back to the ground when LT Vincent "Crow" Hobbs stepped up in his GAL-2GLS Gallowglas and carved more damaged into the Griffin’s exposed rear armor. The mercenary fired both of his large lasers and his Gauss rifle into the back of the Griffin, cutting through the much thinner armor there and shredding the XL engine of the lighter Mech. The Griffin twitched and went still, a column of smoke coming out of its back.

“Thanks, Crow.” Alex gasped out. “That son of a bitch was not wanting to stay down.”

[[Don’t worry Random. I’ve got your back.]] Vincent replied. [[We just need to get moving.]] 

“Right… moving…” Alex consulted his secondary screen where the tactical map was being displayed at that moment.  The five Mechs of his Lawless Lance along with four of the unit’s squads of Fa Shih battle armor were deployed south by southwest of Remika’s Falls… two of those squads were dismounted in listening posts another solid half klick or further south of Lawless Lance. Tempest Lance was still at the north end of Remika’s Falls, hunkered down in warehouses but looked to have their own incoming at that moment. 

Alex chewed at his lip then flipped open his commline. “Beetle One and Two… recover to Lima Three Seven. Do not engage enemy forces and do not stop for anything until you get to the recovery zone. Copy?”

[[Beetle One copies, Random.]] Sergeant Dalton “Spiral” Ye replied. 

[[Beetle Two copies, boss.]] Sergeant Carl “Pinky” Pinkard also replied. 

With his two listening posts taken care of, Alex continued on with his orders. [[Lawless Lance, withdraw to the north… keep west of the town. Line abreast, walking speed in reverse. We are not going to outrun these fuckers, but we can keep them hurting.” He tapped several commands on his tactical computer, highlighting enemy Mechs with alpha designations. “ABCs are up. Sound off and begin reverse march at new NAV… Tango.”

[[Crow with you, Random.]] Vincent said unnecessarily; his Gallowglas was less than 100 meters away from Alex’s Cataphract. 

[[Copy you, Random.]] LTJG Fiona “Ice” de Wynter all but purred. Her TDR-9SE Thunderbolt let loose another spread of LRMs at some target that Alex didn’t have a visual on and began pulling back to the NAV point he’d programmed into the tactical computer.

[[Bear moving your way, Random.]] LTJG Anthony “Bear” Greenwoode growled out in his deep voice. His WHM-8D Warhammer was out of Alex’s immediate line of sight, but he was able to pick up the Mech on his radar. 

[[Be there in a minute, Random.]] LTJG Felix “Dice” King replied. Alex was able to get a visual on him and started to move towards Dice in his OSR-4L Ostroc, which was backing away from an enemy Quickdraw that seemed to have decided that the Ostroc needed to die and was charging in with his weapons blazing. Felix was returning fire, but had never been the best shot in the unit and what shots that did hit were ignored by the pirate Mech.

“We’re here, Dice.” Alex said and dropped his crosshairs onto the Quickdraw. When the targeting system on his Mech finally got a good solution, Alex pulled two triggers on his joystick. First, the Gauss rifle spat out a basketball sized slug towards the enemy Mech at a hypersonic speed not quite reaching Mach 5. The nickel plated ball smashed into the Quickdraw’s right torso, sending sheets of armor spinning away from the struck Mech. The second weapon, the ER PPC mounted in the Cataphract’s right arm, missed the Cataphract and left a line of fused sand just behind the Mech’s charge.

Behind him, Alex saw Vincent level his Gallowglas’ right arm mounted Gauss rifle as well and send another slug into the Quickdraw. The slug smashed into the Quickdraw’s right arm, shattering the armor plates mounted there and exposing the interior bones of the limb to the world. This second impact was too much for the heavy Mech and it stumbled in its charge. Somehow, despite the loss of two tons of armor, the pirate Mech stayed on its feet, but it was definitely off balance. 

[[Thanks, so much, Random... Crow.]] Felix replied and reversed the course of his Mech, charging forward with his Ostroc to meet the Quickdraw. [[I’ve got this son of a bitch now.]]

While no one had ever said that Felix King was the best shot in the Inner Sphere or even in Chaos Incorporated, it was often said that he was a bad person to meet in close quarters. This was also true when the man got in tight with an enemy Mech and put his fighting skills to use while piloting his Ostroc. He’d selected this Mech from several others specifically because it retained both hand actuators and it mounted all of its weapons in its left and right torsos.

The Ostroc came forward to the Quickdraw and stepped to the pirate’s left while lashing out with its own right foot into the pirate’s left leg. The kick landed just below the Quickdraw’s left knee, which did nothing to help the pirate regain his balance and caused the pirate to spin to his left as he tried to compensate for the damage. 

Felix turned the Ostroc to face the pirate’s Mech and grabbed the Quickdraw’s flailing left arm with both of the Ostroc’s hands. He pulled the arm hard, entirely overbalancing the heavy Mech and bringing it to the ground. Felix released the Quickdraw and let it fall then planted his Ostroc’s right foot into the Quickdraw’s left torso before firing all four chest mounted lasers into the pirate Mech. 

The left ER medium laser burned a line across the Quickdraw’s already damaged left torso, more by luck than design, and burned away almost half a ton of armor as it did. The left ER large laser missed the Quickdraw, but did leave a brilliant, glassy scar in the badland’s surface.  The right ER medium laser also dug into the left torso, adding to the Quickdraw’s damage and leaving a lopsided “X” scarred across the Quickdraw’s armor. The right-side ER large laser did better and almost amputated the Quickdraw’s right arm.

The Quickdraw didn’t try and stand, it just opened fire with all of the weapons it had available. Four SRMs corkscrewed their way towards the Ostroc as it loomed over the downed Mech. One of the missiles slammed into the Ostroc’s right shoulder and another into the rounded head of the mercenary Mech. The other two continued their way into the sky where it really didn’t matter what they did after that. 

The two medium lasers in the Quickdraw’s left torso lashed out, sending scarlet beams into the Ostroc and burning away armor from both sides of the mercenary Mech. The right arm mounted laser also fired as the Quickdraw thrust it towards the Ostroc. The crimson beam washed over the Ostroc’s head and caused the Mech to stumble back as Felix reacted to first the explosion of the SRM and then the energy beam damaging the head of his Mech.

“Dice!” Alex yelled into the commline and fired another Gauss slug as well as the ER PPC, which had just cycled back up, at the Quickdraw.  The Gauss slug slammed into the already damaged left torso of the Quickdraw and bounced around inside the enemy Mech, damaging internal components and destroying something that caused a deep blue smoke to come out of the Quickdraw. The ER PPC’s beam finished the job started by Crow and Dice by blowing through the upraised right arm and sending it cartwheeling across the badlands.

Crow added the weight of his Gauss rifle to the contest, quickly followed by both of the large lasers mounted in his Mech’s right torso. The Gauss rifle slug smashed into the prone Quickdraw hard, smashing away a ton of armor from the Mech’s center torso. The twin large lasers benefited from the last minute aiming adjustment that Vincent made by carving into the spherical head of the Quickdraw. The heavy pirate Mech jerked once, like its nervous system had one last impulse to give before expiring. 

[[I…]] Felix started then stopped for a moment before continuing with what turned out to be a protest. [[I had him.]] 

“Yeah, I know, Dice.” Alex gasped as he fought to take a breath in the now overly heated cockpit of his Mech. “We were just making his end quick so you wouldn’t make him suffer. Ares Convention and all that. You good, Dice?”

[[Yeah… yeah, I’m fine. I just don’t want to get a suntan like that again.]]

“So noted. Let’s get the hell out of here.”

[[Now would be good.]] Vincent interjected as the enemy Marauder started firing its torso mounted autocannon towards the trio of mercenaries. 

Alex felt his Cataphract react to the impact of first the Marauder’s autocannon then the follow up fire from the Rifleman and began withdrawing. He throttled the Cataphract backwards, trying to get out of the range of the enemy Mechs and snap firing his Gauss rifle in response. He turned the Cataphract around and began moving forward towards the rest of Lawless Lance. “Let’s get out of here.”

[[You got it, Random.]] Vincent replied as Felix moved ahead, outpacing the other two heavier and slower Mechs.

The sniping fire from the two enemy heavies subsided as the mercenaries withdrew to rejoin the rest of Lawless Lance. The two enemy medium Mechs that were exchanging poor sniping fire with Fiona and Anthony withdrew from their cover positions as the three heavies joined their companions. Apparently dueling with two heavy Mechs was okay, but five was a bit outside their comfort zone.

“Okay…” Alex took a deep breath and wished he was somewhere else, preferably somewhere that included a bottle of warm Saki and two willing women. “Everyone here and in one piece.”

The chorus of acknowledgements was comforting and Alex nodded. “Right then… backwards march, keep your good armor forward and target on my alpha calls. Got it?” 

The rest of his people knew the drill from there, so Alex only kept half an ear on their responses as he tried to raise SRLT Jackson "Madman" Tallman on a separate commline while backing his Cataphract with the rest of the lance. When that met a wall of static, Alex cursed under his breath and tried the other members of Tempest Lance then the MARIANNE with no luck on any of them. The enemy’s jamming system was just not letting him communicate with the other half of his unit. 

“We’ll just have to wing it.” Alex growled out then paused for a moment and swapped to a secondary channel. “Random to Risky.”

[[Copy you, Random.]] LT Tiana “Risky” Anders-Hsien replied. The battle armor commander in her Fa Shih battle armor was riding on Bear’s Warhammer with the rest of her squad. 

“I can’t get through the enemy’s jamming. Dismount and see if you can get to the warehouse where Tempest Lance is or otherwise contact them and let Madman know what’s going on and where we are off to.”

[[Got it, Random. I’ll bring Bedlam Squad with me, unless you just want them to hang on out Ice.]] 

“No, go ahead and take them with you. The extra firepower will do you more good than me at this point.” Alex licked his lips. “Luck, Risky.”

[[No need. I’ve got skills to spare. Risky clear.]] 

Alex let out a heavy breath and set his communit to scanning the channels that Chaos Incorporated used for their standard communications. Hopefully someone from Tempest Lance would get back with him soon. Right now though he had to concentrate on piloting his Cataphract and killing any damned pirate that got too close.

“Alright… let’s keep this tight and see if we can kill someone really, really badly.”

Posted by,
Captain Alexander Yao
Callsign: Random
CTF-4L Cataphract
Head Cat Herder
Chaos Incorporated

Word count: 2,394
Contract count: 52,834

1427
November 5, 3093
3.21 KM South / Southwest of Remika’s Falls
Listening Post One
Meinacos, Draconis Combine

Sergeant Dalton “Spiral” Ye increased the magnification on his helmet’s viewer and tried to penetrate the cloud of dust that the enemy Mechs left behind. That’s what most of the past couple of days had been for him and the rest of Disorder Squad: trying to see through clouds of dust. He and the other three members of his squad had been dispatched to this particular bunch of rocks to keep an eye out for incoming bad guys. 

The only other signs of life they’d seen over the past two days were a couple of damned persistent lizards and the odd squawk over the hardline cable that ran over to Entropy Squad a klick or so away. They’d had to run the cable just to be sure that no one would be able to pick up on their transmissions if they used regular comms. Laser communications was also discussed right up to the point of hearing about the massive sand storms that frequented that area. All the particles in the air wouldn’t allow for sure comms with the laser, so they were down to stringing the cabling and hoping that nothing cut it or ate it or something.

They were there to make sure that the rest of the unit was not caught with their pants down so they kept a look out. For the first few hours, it was almost fun to communicate back and forth with Entropy Squad about every second lizard or other reptilian thing that happened across their paths, but that brand of fun went away pretty damned quickly.

Then, about 45 minutes ago, the first of the pirate Mechs were picked up by the remote sensors laid out about five klicks south of the listening post and all the fun and games went out the window. Everyone went into cover and began capturing the information that could be discovered from the incoming pirate Mechs then relaying it back to Remika’s Falls.

Which, of course, was when that mother fucker Murphy came dropping down into the whole situation. A small pack of local wildlife came thundering through the area, fleeing the incoming BattleMechs most likely. In any normal time, the long-legged raptor looking things would have been the predators chasing something down, but it seemed that 30-meter-tall walking tanks made that whole situation flip-flop for them.

The pack numbered only about a dozen of the critters… some of them obviously kids… but they made up for their small numbers by having a lot of teeth in their heads and some serious looking claws on their short-armed hands and feet. The majority of them were just barreling straight out at close to 40 kilometers per hour… fast, but not fast enough to gain much in the way of ground on the approaching Mechs. Either because the Mechs were gaining or maybe just because the beasties thought it was a good idea, about five of them would stop either in as a group or individually to turn and roar a challenge of some sort back at the pirate Mechs.

It was at that point that Sergeant Ye found out that Trooper Stephen “Wager” Wagner was a budding ethologist, having started doing courses through a university with a branch on Galatea. He stood up and was recording the entire thing, totally ignoring the rest of the squad’s yelling to get the fuck down. Wagner continued to stand there, watching the raptors, and explaining how the rest of the squad didn’t understand what an opportunity this was and that the bad guys couldn’t see him anyway.
Unfortunately, his actions did capture the attention of the raptor-things and the entire pack charged towards the movement. As they charged towards the rocks, the raptor-things roared challenges and were coming straight at Wagner with mouths wide open and claws clacking. 

While this did not seem to alarm Wagner, Trooper Anthony “Reaper” Beal who stood up at that moment had a serious case of freaked the fuck out by this turn of events and opened fire on the charging beasts at the range of three meters. Just before the pack hit, Wagner pulled Beal down behind the rocks and into cover. This turned out to be a very good thing as one of the raptor-things put a claw through the air that Beal had been inhabiting a moment before, leaving a gouge in the rock just in front of Beal’s former position.

Beal killed two of the raptor-things outright and wounded a third with his mini-gun as the rest of the pack swarmed around and over the rocks that the squad was sheltering in. Totally spooked by the gunfire, the raptors did not stop to chew on anyone but kept running at their best speed, apparently feeling that barreling straight through was a better course of action instead of scattering to the winds in the face of the loud noises and death of a couple of their packmates. 

While they did not stop, the course of the raptors did have several of them go into where the squad was sheltering, even if only for a stride or two. Of course, one of the damned things got a claw or big toe or something caught in the hard line that Disorder Squad was using to communicate with Entropy Squad and pull the communication equipment from where it was sitting on the rocks.

The last that Ye saw of the communication unit that was attached to the hardline was when it bounced around behind the raptor for about four meters before smashing against a rock formation. The hardened steel case did not break, but the cable did get severed from the unit and a large dent was created in the side of the case. 

This dent apparently opened up whatever internal component that held all the magic smoke that made the unit work because that smoke escaped out of the unit and into the sky. And, as Ye recalled from a conversation with a tech, once you let the magic smoke out, then things stop working. He cursed long and loudly in his helmet as he rushed over to the unit. 

The case was well and truly fucked up from bashing across so many rocks plus the hardline cable was now shorter by several meters. He flicked the power switch off and then back on with the unit not responding to anything. Ye then tried the reset button and again flicked the switch back on. He continued trying to resurrect the unit and paid no attention to what else was going on for several minutes then began a long and creative script of curse words.

What all of this meant was that Disorder Squad now had no secure way to contact either Entropy Squad or the rest of Chaos Incorporated to advise of enemy numbers or makes or anything. Ye looked up and noted that the lead enemy Mechs, a Wasp and an ancient Assassin that was quickly outpacing the Wasp, were now much closer. He dropped to the ground and muttered more curses at the Sphere in general while hoping that the Mechs wouldn’t see him.

When those two Mechs had made it some distance past the squad’s position, Ye jumped up and ran into the cover of the rocks. He continued to curse the world mentally while also longing for the communications gear that had been ruined. As it was, if they called to the rest of the unit and warned them about the incoming Mechs, then those same Mechs would be all over them in a minute. By that point, they could hear the exchange of weapons’ fire and see the next wave of Mechs, including a Marauder and a Rifleman heading towards the town. Ye was debating hard enough on just calling to Captain Yau on the unsecured main frequency that he jumped slightly when the Captain’s voice came over the commline.

[[Beetle One and Two… recover to Lima Three Seven. Do not engage enemy forces and do not stop for anything until you get to the recovery zone. Copy?]]

“Oh thank you great Buddha.” Ye said breathlessly before replying back to Captain Yau. “Beetle One copies, Random.”

[[Beetle Two copies, boss.]] Sergeant Carl “Pinky” Pinkard’s, the squad leader for Entropy Squad, reply came close on the heels of his own.

“You heard the man… we’re gone.” Ye stated to the rest of his squad. “Leave the gear and recover to Lima Three Seven. Do not engage.”

The acknowledgements from the rest of the squad were almost as quick as Ye expected and the squad started moving as one, heading towards Entropy Squad’s position. The other squad met them very nearly at the half way point then both squads headed to the north, where they would rendezvous with the MARIANNE and the rest of the unit. 

Hopefully. 

Posted by,
Sergeant Dalton "Spiral" Ye
Fa Shih Battle Armor, Laser
Squad Leader, Entropy Squad
Chaos Incorporated

Word count: 1511
Contract count: 54,345

1429
November 5, 3093
1.73 KM South / Southwest of Remika’s Falls
Meinacos, Draconis Combine

“Dammit… I wish we were closer.” LT Tiana "Risky" Anders-Hsien muttered. She and the rest of her squad had been riding on a 70-ton Warhammer for much too long with the damned Mech not getting any closer to the enemy Mechs than possible.

[[You looking to get mixed in, boss?]] asked Corporal Fraser "Jackal" Kearns from the back of the Warhammer’s left torso. 

“Am I that obvious?” Tiana barked out a laugh as she continued. “At this point, I’d rather be shot at than just ride here. Hell, anything would be better than just riding on this giant tin can”

[[Hey now… this is not a tin can.]] LTJG Anthony "Bear" Greenwoode commented from the cockpit of his WHM-8D Warhammer. [[This is my baby.]]

Before Tiana could respond to that, Captain Alexander Yau’s voice came over the commline: [[Random to Risky.]]

“Copy you, Random.” Tiana said then muted her microphone. “Please give me something real to do, dammit.”
 
[[I can’t get through the enemy’s jamming. Dismount and see if you can get to the warehouse where Tempest Lance is or otherwise contact them and let Madman know what’s going on and where we are off to.]]

“Got it, Random.” Tiana grinned to herself as she continued. “I’ll bring Bedlam Squad with me, unless you just want them to hang on out Ice.”

[[No, go ahead and take them with you. The extra firepower will do you more good than me at this point. Luck, Risky.]]

“No need. I’ve got skills to spare. Risky clear.” Tiana replied and brought up a channel to her squad and to Bedlam Squad. “Anarchy… Bedlam… dismount and fall in with me.” She glanced at her HUD and created a new navigation point with a flick of her eyes to the proper visual controls on the HUD. “New NAV is Romeo Two.”

The seven troopers responded across the comm and Tiana nodded to herself, mentally checking off each trooper as they called in. “We’re out of here, Bear.”

[[Copy that, Risky. Good hunting.]]

“You too.” She replied to the MechWarrior and released the magnetic clamps holding her Fa Shih battle armor to the Mech and jumped from the Warhammer’s torso. She ignited her suit’s jump jets with only a few meters above the ground and landed on flexed knees then began running. The rest of her squad formed up with her in a diamond formation with her at the point. When they had gotten a solid five meters from the Warhammer, the entire squad leapt nearly 90 meters in a single leap. Once they landed, they again began running, going another five meters before leaping back into the air.

The process was repeated until they got to the NAV point that Risky had made and they were met by Bedlam Squad. Together, the eight battle armor suits leapt deeper into Remika’s Falls. With most of the buildings in the town being short and squat, the troopers took to the rooftops quickly. The leap was nothing like you would call long and there was no traffic to worry about beyond the odd groups of people watching the fireworks happening to the west of the town.

[[Stupid humans are going to get themselves killed.]] Corporal Donna Jean "DJ" Kern muttered just loud enough for her communit to pick up.

[[Probably hoping for it.]] Trooper Monty "Flush" O'Neill commented. [[Hell I would before the first month of living in this fucking dust bowl was up.]]

“People gotta live somewhere, Flush.” Tiana said and adjusted her course slightly in midair in response to a sudden blip on her radar. A wash of static flowed over her radar and ran through the commline for a split second. Tiana’s eyes narrowed as she tracked the intermittent blip on her radar. “Follow my lead people… close in and watch for hand commands. Expect jamming. Pinky…”

[[On it, Risky.]] Specialist Jay “Radar” Carter said before she could even get the order out completely. She watched her radar visibility become slightly clearer as well as the reception of her communit. Her communications specialist was already on the job and trying to burn through the enemy’s jamming at least at the short range the two squads were to each other. 

She flicked her eyes over her radar, noting the other seven blips from the two squads with her as the closed the gap between each other and her. Running tight like this could be a problem if they got hit with missiles or LBX munitions or something, but it was worth the risk to keep everyone in communications with each other through the jamming. 

Tiana winced as the jamming from the enemy Mech hit again and sent a squeal of feedback through her helmet. Another eye flick and the volume went down, enough that the squeal wasn’t a complete distraction more just a buzz in the background, but she would be able to hear the rest of her unit. 

A flashing blue light came up on her HUD, alerting her to a private channel being opened on the commline. She brought the volume back up, noted who it was, and answered the call. “What’s up, Cutter?”

LTJG Isabella "Cutter" Fisk’s voice cut in and out with the static for a moment before coming in with clarity. [[… orders were to get to Tempest Lance…]]

Tiana sighed quietly and nodded to herself, as she had been half expecting this call. “I know the orders, but if we can get to the enemy Mech that’s causing the jamming and take it out then we reestablish comms for everyone in the unit.”

[[Whatever you say, Risky… just want to know what’s up.]] 

“No worries, Cutter. Keep on doing your job.” Tiana replied; she knew that her XO was only making sure that her “cowboy” nature wouldn’t get the unit too far off track and she also knew that Cutter wouldn’t do it in front of the rest of the unit, hence the private channel. 

Tiana went back to trying to get to the center of the static. That’s where the enemy Mech would be… hopefully a light that they would be able to kill quick and then slide back into the shadows before his buddies got there.

[[Got it. Bearing 37… range at 117 meters.]] Radar called out, his voice cutting through the static like a knife through a sentry’s windpipe. 

Without a word, both squads of battle troopers headed in that direction. Tiana could feel her heart as it started to race in anticipation of the upcoming engagement. At the range that Radar had the mark at, it would only be a moment or two before they made contact.

Suddenly the head and upper torsos of a Battlemaster stepped into view and Tiana cursed roundly. It had to be a BLR-4L if it was the source of the jamming. If it wasn’t… well… she looked past the assault Mech and noted another seven shapes moving in behind it… there were more targets to choose from after him. Tiana smirked inside her helmet and painted the Battlemaster with a targeting lock then gave it a tag name before opening her commline.

“Engage target as Alpha. Bring it down quick and we can make things all better, kids.”

As one, the two squads leapt into the air, heading directly towards the massive assault Mech. Their leap either registered on the Mech’s radar or the movement captured the MechWarrior’s eyes because the Mech turned towards them. ER medium lasers mounted on the Mech’s two torsos opened up, burning crimson beams towards the scattering Fa Shih suits. 

For a moment, Tiana wished for a SRM pack mounted on the back of her armor then returned fire with her small laser. The rest of her group also fired, so eight beams burned towards the assault Mech simultaneously. Four of them found their marks, burning into the torso and cockpit of the Battlemaster. In her comm, Tiana could hear the scream of pain from one of her troopers as the MechWarrior’s shot also found a target. 

For a moment, she wondered who it was but then decided that figuring out who it was would have to wait; right now was the time to avenge them. She landed just shy of the Mech and made a high leap into the air, coming almost straight back down. As she landed, Tiana reached out with her battle claw and caught the armor plating nearest her then turned to bring her small laser to bear. 

At the other side of the Mech, Tiana could see the rest of the Fa Shih troopers as they also closed on the Battlemaster. Three of the suits broke left and right, continuing to fire their small lasers at the Mech as three others attempted to get into close combat with the Battlemaster. The Mech’s massive left arm lashed out in a wide arc, clipping one of the Fa Shih suits and sending it into a building where it punched a hole through the wall, leaving a cloud of dust and crumbling masonry in its wake.

As one of the other suits latched onto the front torso of the Battlemaster, Tiana opened fire into the head of the Mech, hoping to either burn through and get to the MechWarrior inside or at least distract them for a moment and give the others a chance to fight. Neither happened, instead she felt herself being pressed down and realized that the son of a bitch had leapt his Mech into the air in an attempt to lose his passengers and escape the battle armor.

She gritted her teeth and hung on for her life as the 85-ton Mech went up and above the town on twin pillars of plasma. Again, Tiana fired her small laser into the Mech’s head, creating a second molten line in the armor plating mounted there, but still not being able to get deep enough to get past the armor and into the soft human inside. 

The Battlemaster landed on both feet, knees flexed, and then twisted hard to the right; obviously hoping to shake Tiana and whoever else was, hopefully, latched onto the Mech off. Tiana felt herself lose her grip and she went flying, crashing into the Battlemaster’s right arm and twisting as she slid down the Mech’s forearm. Planting her feet on the blocky arm, Tiana shoved off and ignited her jump jets again, rocketing towards the Mech’s head again. The Battlemaster twisted again, its left arm coming straight at her. 

“Oh shi- “was all that she was able to get out before the blocky forearm impacted with her and sent Tiana towards the building to the Mech’s right. Tiana tumbled and ignited her jump jets again, trying to cushion the impact. The impact came anyway, slamming Tiana hard through the exterior wall and into an interior wall inside the apartment.

She tasted blood and could hear screaming from somewhere around her then she fell forward and landed on something squishy. After a moment, she realized the blood was from where she bit her tongue and the screaming was from the two panicked women escaping out the door of the apartment she had landed in. Fearing the worse, she looked down and found that the squishy thing was a now demolished couch. 

Tiana pulled off her helmet and rolled over on her back, landing on the floor of the apartment, and tried to catch her breath. Her head buzzed like a chainsaw and her ears were ringing from the impact with the walls of the building. A moment later, Tiana rolled to her side and messily threw up what had passed for breakfast at the Last Stop. She spat then swallowed hard and came up to her feet, bracing herself on the corner of a table. The table collapsed under the weight of the battle suit, but not before she got to one knee and was able to steady herself.

A moment later the building shuddered and then the back of the Battlemaster’s head and shoulders came through the wall and continued down deeper into the building. Tiana cursed and shoved her helmet back onto her head before leaping forward and above the Battlemaster as the floor below her was drug down under the Mech. The assault Mech went through the last two stories before coming to a rest three stories below the apartment that Tiana had landed in.

As she continued her leap, Tiana looked down and noted that the front cockpit of the Mech had been burned and smashed through leaving a wide hole in the middle of it. She could make out some of the body of the MechWarrior still in his command couch, but most of the cockpit’s interior was painted a messy red.

[[We’re clear, Risky.]] The voice of Corporal Fraser "Jackal" Kearns came over the line.

“Copy that, Jackal. Good work.” Tiana complimented the man as she landed on the building across from where the Battlemaster had come to rest. There was no doubt that he was the one responsible for the death of the MechWarrior and downing of the Battlemaster… the man was somewhere beyond being labeled as just “lethal” and wandered into the territory of “magical” when it came to killing. “Radar… “

[[Jamming is gone, Risky. I’ve called out to Tempest Lance with a SITREP. They are going to cover our withdrawal and we’ll go meet up with the rest of them.]] Jay reported. 

“Alright then… is everyone accounted for?” Tiana asked, knowing part of the answer in her mind.

[[Monk’s gone.]] Isabella said in a tight voice. [[ Rebound is living up to his callsign… his armor is busted up, but he seems to be fine.]]

[[Right as rain.]] Corporal Mark "Rebound" Brownstein reported, backing up Isabella’s report.

“Collect remains, if possible, and let’s get out of here.” Tiana ordered, her voice cold even to her but she knew that the time for mourning was not now. Above her, she could see dozens of contrails flying over the top of their position, coming from the north, and nodded. LRMs… lots of them. “Tempest is letting loose the rain. Let’s get while the getting is good people.”

Posted by,
LT Tiana Anders-Hsien
Callsign: Risky
Fa Shih Battle Armor
Battle Armor Commander
Chaos Incorporated

Word count: 2404
Contract count: 56,749

1437
November 5, 3093
Aerospace Bay One
MARIANNE, Union Class DropShip
21.7 km South of Remika’s Falls
Meinacos, Draconis Combine

Lt. Sara “Bandit” Hammond pushed open the cockpit of her SL-15K Slayer, shoving against the power of the hydraulics that were opening the canopy much slower than she wanted. The Aerospace Fighter had just made its landing aboard MARIANNE and was just beginning to rotate on the platform so the nose would be pointing towards the still open bay doors. She pulled her helmet off with her free hand and hung it from the small hook set off to her right then stood as soon as she could without cracking her head on the canopy. 

“These birds need to be refueled and rearmed now!” She yelled at the techs as they started to scramble towards the arrowhead-shaped fighter. “I need to be back in the air yesterday!”

Tech Bella Chan looked at Sara for a moment, her face screwed up in an angry snarl as she wrestled with the refueling hose, trying to wrangle it into position to refuel the Slayer. “Cool your jets, Sara! We’re on it.”

“Get on it faster!” Sara yelled. “I’ve got MechJocks down there that need a friendly hand especially with all sorts of baddies crawling up their asses!”

Bella just ignored her and went through the process of attaching the refueling hose to the Slayer and opening the safety valve to get the Aerospace Fighter back to a full tank of fuel. For a reason that even Sara would be unable to later identify, this infuriated the Aerospace pilot and she savagely pulled the cords connecting her flight suit to the fighter’s command couch. Sara then leapt from where she was stand on the cockpit to the wing where Bella was working, grabbed the tech by the shoulder, and spun her.

“Hey! What the – “Bella started but stopped when Sara leaned down into her face, a snarl of her own painted there.

“Get moving, tech! Or are you enough of a fuck up that I need to do this for you?”

Bella’s face went an angry red at that and she stood in a fluid motion, slapping Sara’s hand off her shoulder then twisting the pilot’s arm around, spinning Sara into an arm lock that rotated the pilot’s shoulder enough to pull a gasp of pain from her lips.

Slowly, Bella leaned over Sara’s back and spoke in a quiet snarl. “I am going as fast as I can. This is dangerous, flammable stuff I am working with. A spark of static electricity could very well ignite any stray vapors around, incinerating both of us and then your fighter and then the entire bay. Static electricity that could be generated by things like your little stunt just a moment ago.” 

Sara could feel Bella pause for a moment, but she didn’t know why. When that moment was over, Bella pulled Sara’s arm up a little more and twisted it slightly, making Sara gasp in pain again. “So next time, sit down, shut up, keep your hands the fuck off of me, and let me do my job. Got me, bitch?”

With the last word, Bella let go of Sara’s arm, letting the pilot fall to the wing’s surface, and went back to refueling the Slayer. Sara levered herself back up, rubbing at her shoulder, and slid down the wing to the deck of the bay. She started to stagger but was caught by a pair of strong arms which then guided her to the side of the Slayer, out of the way of the techs reloading the Aerospace fighter’s centerline mounted autocannon. 

Sara turned to see Tynon Lu, the head mechanic for Chaos Incorporated, guiding her to a bench and sitting her down. When she was seated, he pulled a bottle of Melee Melon flavored COMBAT! sports drink from the cooler sitting there, opened the lid of the bottle, and handed it to her. Patiently, the older man waited as she took several long swallows of the drink then stopped and looked at him breathlessly.

“It has often been said that a wise person does many things, but none of them in haste.” Tynon said with a smile. “The techs will have your Purple Eater back in the sky as quickly as possible. It must be refueled, rearmed, checked over to make certain that no flight surfaces or important components were damaged, and have at least minimal amounts of the armor replaced.”

“I don’t have time for all that… the others need…” She started to reply but stopped when Tynon raised his left hand.

When he was sure Sara had stopped and was listening to him, Tynon dropped his upraised hand. “What the others truly need is you functional and your fighter not falling out of the sky when you come charging to save them. If you go into combat without your fighter being properly prepared and repaired, then you will get shot down and only make things worse because now Alexander will have to go recover you. He has enough to worry about without your haste making things more difficult.”

“Dammit, Tynon…”

Again, he raised a hand to stop her reply. “Think of what I am saying, Sara.” He said as he continued in a gentle voice. “If you explore the situation with your mind and be rational instead of being hasty, you will see that I am correct.”

Sara took a deep breath, let it out, then nodded her agreement. “You’re right. I overreacted and was being an idiot. I know that your people will get this done as quickly as possible, I am just concerned for Alex and the others on the ground and its making me more than a little crazy.” She took another drink, trying to hydrate herself as much as possible. Like BattleMechs, Aerospace fighters got very hot while in combat and Sarah was certain that the heat and her obvious exhaustion contributed greatly to the scene she’d made. “I will have to apologize to Bella.”

Tynon bowed his head slightly at her obvious wisdom. “That would be most appreciated, I am certain. Are you well enough now to allow the repairs and rearming to continue?”

“Yes.” Sara let go of another deep breath and the tension that had been in her shoulders for the past thirty minutes of flying CAP, making strafing and bombing runs on the enemy, and otherwise doing her best to make their life difficult. “Thank you for speaking with me, Tynon. And for getting me this drink and for shoving some sense into my head.” Sara smiled slightly, her cheeks reddening with slight embarrassment as she pushed back a lock of hair that hung across her face. “Oh… and for not letting me fall on my ass.”

“You are most welcome. I am pleased to be of service.” Tynon smiled and again bowed his head slightly before turning away. The tech started to walk away, but then suddenly turned back around to Sara and leaned in, gesturing Sara closer. The pilot leaned in to hear him and Tynon whispered: “But if you touch one of my techs again while they are merely trying to do their job, I will allow Bella to rip your arm off and beat the fuck out of you with it.” He laid a gentle hand on her shoulder, squeezed slightly, and smiled a soft smile. “Understood?”

This time, Sara flushed a bright red with her embarrassment and nodded, this time letting the locks of her hair fall down to cover her face. “I understand, Tynon.”

“Excellent. Wisdom comes quickly to those that have an open mind, an open heart, and a closed mouth.” He squeezed again and released Sara’s shoulder as he stood with a wince. “A poor old man’s back never ceases to be a trouble. Be safe in the sky and let nothing happen to my son.”

“I won’t.” Sara replied and watched the older tech walk away, surprisingly spry for one with a bad back and the age of years resting on his shoulders. With a sigh, Sara combed her hair back so it wasn’t in her face and opened her flight suit half way to allow herself to cool off more. As Sara refused to look at either the chronometer on her wrist or the one on the wall of the bay, she had no idea how long it had been before she heard Bella approaching her, pulling heavy rubberized gloves off of her hands as she did.

“Purple Eater is refueled and rearmed… you still had about a quarter of your ammo bin full so it sped things up on that end. The bomb racks are empty because the left one has a glitch in the release mechanism. We left both empty because we don’t want you flying around lopsided. Right now, we’re getting a few plates of armor put back on, but outside of that fuselage hit you took towards the tail of the craft, she looks okay.” 

Bella met Sara’s eyes with embers of her earlier anger still there. “She might not even fall out of the sky as a fiery ball of wreckage from a freak accident with a fuel line.”

 “I would appreciate that.” Sara said softly and slowly stood up. Bella took half a step back and look both wary and ready to fight but said nothing. “I apologize for my grabbing you and yelling at you earlier. I was totally out of line and I know that you are definitely not a fuck up… I was the fuck up in all that.”

Bella’s face softened a little and she nodded wordlessly then licked her lips and looked away for a moment before meeting Sara’s gaze. “I understand… heat of combat and all of that. Uh… I’m sorry I torqued your shoulder.” The tech looked a little sheepish as she continued. “I… ah… really shouldn’t have done that. It was uncalled for and unprofessional.”

“It’s okay… I started it with grabbing you like that.” Sara replied then gave a slight smile. “Hell, if I’d known you were going to Kung Fu my ass, I wouldn’t have even thought about laying hand one on you.”

“Well, now you know.” Bella replied with her own small smile. “Did I hurt you? I mean like permanently or anything like that.”

Sara shook her head and rubbed at her shoulder. “Nothing that won’t be fixed with some myomer replacement surgery, several months of physical therapy, and then some counseling for the trauma from the event.”

“See, that’s what Tynon has been telling me. I need to really work on my follow through or it just doesn’t leave a lasting impression.” Bella sighed in mock exasperation. “I’ll just have to learn to do better next time.”

“Well, next time, you can do it on my wingman. I really don’t want to be anyone’s Kung Fu test dummy.”

As if summoned, Ltjg. Mitchell "Rooster" Pine ambled up to the two women, his helmet dangling from his right hand. “Hey Bella… Bandit. They’ve got the Slayers almost ready to go again. Plus it sounds like someone put the kibosh on whoever was jamming things out there so we’ve got full comms back online. That’s great, eh?”

“That is great. Not having comms was a real pain in the ass.” Sara replied. Both women stood there looking at Mitchell as the silence after her comment stretched.

Not taking the hint, which Sara was certain was due to him being a thick-headed male, Mitchell stood there for a moment then nodded and jerked a thumb over his shoulder towards the waiting Aerospace fighters. “So… you two done doing girl talk over here?”

Bella arched an eyebrow at that. “I can see why you volunteered him.”

“What?” Mitchell asked, looking back and forth between the two women.

“You have only had a taste of what I have to go through.” She assured the tech then turned to her wingman. “Alright, Rooster, let’s get going.”

Mitchell looked at Sara for a moment with narrowed eyes, then nodded and turned back around to head for his Slayer. Sara took a moment and extended a hand to Bella, who took it without hesitation and the two women shook. Without another word, the Aerospace pilot turned away and headed back to her purple Slayer at a trot. There were bad guys to shoot.

Posted by,
Lieutenant Sara Hammond
Callsign: Bandit
SL-17R Slayer
Air Boss
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 2090
Contract Count: 58,839

1436
November 5, 3093
Warehouse Seven
North Edge of Remika’s Falls
Meinacos, Draconis Combine

SRLT Jackson "Madman" Tallman kicked a tin can into the wall of the warehouse he stood in with a growl of anger and frustration. It had to of been at least fifteen minutes or better that Alex and Lawless Lance had begun engaging the bad guys but there’d been no word from him since. With Tempest Lance on a communications blackout until Alex called out to them, there was no way for him to know what the hell was going on at this point.

“You really need to park it, Madman.” LTJG Franklin "Right" Morgan said from where he lounged on the foot of his APL-2S Apollo, his back against the Mech’s shin. “You are just going to get all worked up over nothing and be all pissy about things until you get to shoot someone in the throat.”

“Bite me, Right.” Jackson replied. 

“You are so not my type.” Franklin quipped. 

When Jackson turned and glared at the other MechWarrior, Franklin gave him the bird, which did nothing for the situation. Jackson, never the least on edge member of the unit, was ready to blow as it was and Franklin just made himself a ready target. He began stalking towards Franklin, his fists already bunching as he did. Alarmed, Franklin slid down from his perch and got ready to throw down.

“What Frank means, Jack…” began LTJG Adrian "Left" Morgan as he got between his twin brother and Jackson. “… is that everything’s going to be fine. We’re all just as anxious about what’s going on out there as you are, but everything’s going to work out.” The younger MechWarrior gave his normal lopsided smile. “It always does, right?”

Jackson glared daggers at Franklin then broke eye contact with him to look at Adrian then nod slightly. “Yeah.” He turned away and continued his pacing. “You’re right, Adrian. It does always work out. Somehow.”

“Exactly.” Adrian said to Jackson’s back then turned to glare at his twin, who just shrugged and tried to get settled back in on his Mech’s foot. “Cap’n will get back with us here pretty quick and we’ll make it rain but good.”

“Right.” Jackson said with little certainty in his voice. He glanced towards the ARC-4M Archer that was off to his right and called out in a raised voice. “Kylie… what’s on the comm?”

[[You do have a communit on, you know.]] the voice of LTJG Kylie “Red” Fong said in his ear. A stream of static drowned her out before her voice came back online crystal clear again. [[ -eed to yell.]]

“Comms blackout, right?” Jackson yelled out as he pulled the still crackling communit out of his ear.

A moment later, Kylie appeared on the shoulder of her Archer. “Comms blackout, right.” She cleared her throat. “Nothing at the moment… like nothing at all.”

Jackson stopped his pacing and looked up at her sharply. “Are we getting jammed?”

Kylie shrugged. “Do I look like a comms-geek to you?”

He muttered something unpleasant under his breath and rubbed at his temple before responding. “Do you only get static on the comms channel?”

“Yes?” Kylie answered uncertainly. 

“Then we’re probably getting jammed.” Jackson responded and turned towards the rest of his small command. “Everyone mount up and fire up your rides. I think we’re in for a world of hurt here.”

“Bad guys will see our reactors come online.” Franklin said as he slid off of his Apollo’s foot and scrambled to get ahold of the chain ladder going down the length of the Mech.

“They’ll also see us dying in their gunsights if we are not up and going, so get moving. Alex can yell at me later if he wants.” Jackson called up as he ran towards his CN9-D Centurion. He climbed up the Mech using a combination of the chain ladder that dangled down the Centurion’s broad torso and the Mech itself; using crevasses in the Mech’s armor plating to hurry his ascent. After crawling through the hatch in the back of the Mech’s head and dogging it closed then locking it; Jackson slid into his command couch and started buckling in then starting the Mech up.

After clearing the security sequences, Jackson could feel the Centurion rumbling to life under him and smiled. This is what he really lived for… the fighting and the destroying of his or at least the unit’s enemies. Flexing his fingers then cracking his knuckles for good measure, Jackson opened his comms and could only hear static. 

Cursing, Jackson turned the Centurion towards the exit door on the west wall and started forward. He pulled the rectangular door opener from where he’d stashed it and pushed the button down. Nothing happened. He did it twice more with the same results. Tired of waiting, angry at the way nothing seemed to be working right, and just feeling shitty about everything going on at that point; Jackson swung the LB10X autocannon that made up the Centurion’s left arm and blew the door open. 

The thin metal shredded under the blast, giving the Mechs the opening they needed to get out of the warehouse and giving the rest of Tempest Lance direction on where to go. The Centurion stepped out of the warehouse first, shoving some of the remains of the door out of the way as it did so. Kylie came out behind him in her Archer with LTJG Parker "Thorn" Rose in his CRD-5S Crusader coming out behind her. The twins in their paired Apollos followed behind the Crusader and all five Mechs stopped in the open area outside the warehouse.

“Alright, Jack… everyone’s outside. Now what?” He consulted his tactical screen, but it was being affected by the jamming as well… the ECM was probably breaking up the signal that the MARIANNE was bouncing off of a satellite parked overhead. “Fuck. No targets… no comms… no spotters. What you going to do now, smart ass?”

A crackle of static came over the commline again before becoming a voice that became clearer and clearer as the moments past. Jack fiddled with the commchannel until he got a solid lock on the voice just as all the static went away.

[[… again…. This is Anarchy Two… we have cleared comms. You read me Tempest?]]

Jackson smiled at being able to hear the voice of Specialist Carl "Pinky" Pinkard on the commline. “Tempest One hears you, Anarchy Two. You have something for us?”

[[I have seven Bravo-Mikes heading your way from near our location. Requesting fire mission and cover to fall back.]]

“You got it. Send the feed over the normal channel.” He paused. “Risky okay?”

[[She’s offline at the moment, but we’re pretty sure she’s okay. Sending data now.]]

“Copy that.” Jackson replied. He wondered about the part of them being “pretty sure” that Risky was okay but set that to the side for now. Despite his concern, right now it was time to give some support to the people that he knew were okay… that and kill some bad guys. He flicked his communit to the lance’s channel. “Madman to all Tempest… fire support to coordinates on TAC map. Blanket fire and correct as needed.”

Kylie’s voice came over the comm. [[Say again, Madman… blanket fire?]]

“Blanket fire.” He confirmed with a nod that no one was around to see, but made him feel better to do. Blanket fire was the LRM equivalent of carpet bombing… you lob tons of explosives into a zone with no clear target and hope to hit something important. The only plus they had was the spotting done by the Fa Shih battle armor that had the enemy force under observation, but even that only went so far against moving targets. The minus was that collateral damage was a certainty, which was very bad considering the enemy was closing on the edge of the town. 

Jackson licked his lips and modified the order. “Blanket fire then move in to get visual and solid target locks.”

Acknowledgements came over the commline before all of the Mechs paused to fire their LRMs, letting 120 long range missiles loose to fall where they would downrange of their location. The LRM launchers had not yet cycled a new load of missiles before Tempest Lance was on the move. Up ahead, Tempest Lance could see where their missiles had impacted by the rolling wave of explosions and smoke that was rising from the target area.

Jackson magnified his view and winced at what he saw… a couple of buildings there were on fire with columns of black smoke coming up from them. Though one was way out of the target zone so he was pretty sure that wasn’t their fault; still it made him feel a little queasy that it was almost certain that one or more civilians had been injured or even killed in that. Even as his mind warred with that thought, Jackson caught sight of an incoming Mech.

“Incoming… target designate Alpha… range 750 meters and closing.” He dropped his crosshairs on an approaching Wolverine and smiled slightly when they flashed gold. “Fire at will.”

The whoosh of his LRM10 spitting out its load of missiles was quickly followed up by the rest of the lance. The Wolverine staggered when seven of Jackson’s missiles hit him, then disappeared under a rain of high explosive, armor piercing missiles as they enveloped the Mech. Jackson delayed firing again only long enough for his launcher to cycle then added his LB10X to the mix. 

The Wolverine stepped out of the first cloud of LRMs with its armor in tatters before being enveloped by the second wave and the solid round from Jackson’s autocannon. When the smoke cleared, the Wolverine was standing in place. The Mech’s left arm dangled by a thread of myomer then fell off a moment later. This seemed to be a signal of some sort as the Wolverine toppled over, the MechWarrior inside dead or batter to unconsciousness.  

Satisfied for the moment, Jackson opened up a commchannel to Risky and her crew.  “Madman to Risky, copy?”

[[I’m here.]] LT Tiana "Risky" Anders-Hsien replied.

Jackson frowned to himself, he could hear the strain in the woman’s voice. “We’re on our way to you for pick up. What’s the word?”

[[Get the fuck out.]] She said simply. [[Extract to NAV Tango on the tactical. With the jamming gone, MARIANNE should be able to update your system now through her network.]]

Jackson expanded his tactical screen and spotted the new NAV point as he did. They would be going back nearly three clicks to give the MARIANNE some space to land where she wouldn’t be an instant target. “Copy that, Risky. Where are you guys at?”

[[About two klicks south of you. You guys just hang out there and we’ll get to you.]]

“It’d be faster if we moved towards you.”

[[Negative. Bad guys are on the way… stay back and you have that much more time to shoot LRMs at them.]]

He paused and pondered that for a moment then shrugged. “Okay, Risky. We’ll do it that way and get the hell out as soon as you get here.” Jackson’s eyes went wide for a moment as he realized the situation. “Did anyone get in touch with MARIANNE?”

[[Random has that covered, so no worries.]]

“Oh good. That means I can just…” Jackson dropped the crosshairs of his targeting system across the torso of a Wasp in pirate colors as it stepped out from behind a building. The crosshairs flashed gold and he caressed the trigger for the LB10X in a loving fashion. One of the submunitions shattered the ferrocrete of the building while the other nearly tore the Wasp’s right arm off. The light Mech dodged back behind cover.

Jackson smiled and finished his sentence. “… shoot things.”

Posted by,
SRLT Jackson “Jack” Tallman
Callsign: Madman
CN9-D Centurion
Executive Officer and Chief Window Washer
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 2013
Contract Count: 60,851

1503
November 5, 3093
3.04 KM north of Remika’s Falls
Meinacos, Draconis Combine

Captain Alexander “Random” Yau could feel it as the ground around him shuddered as the 3600 tons of the MARIANNE landed some 300 meters behind his CTF-4L Cataphract and he smiled slightly because of it because if nothing else it was beyond time for him and his to get the hell out of there. Unlike the shuddering of the ground, the sound of a new Gauss rifle slug sliding into the chamber of his Gauss rifle was both good and bad… it was good because he had another round to shoot at someone with and it was bad because it meant that he was down to about three rounds, if his count was correct.

He glanced down at the ammo counter on his system screen and cursed. “Fuck… only two left.”

The pirate Mechs had dogged him and the rest of Lawless Lance since they first made contact nearly forty minutes ago. The exchange of fire had been fierce at first, at least until the mercenary Mechs of Chaos Incorporated explained in no uncertain terms what happened to any of the pirate Mechs that got too close; they turned into the prime target for all of the mercenary Mechs.  It took a Vulcan and a Crab becoming smoking hulls before they learned it, but the pirates did learn that lesson.

After the loss of both of those Mechs, the pirates had hung back a bit more and their opening strategy of free for all firing turned into a sniping match between the two sides. Energy beams, autocannon rounds, missiles, and Gauss rifle slugs sped back and forth between the two groups as the pirates advanced towards the retreating mercenaries. Everyone had gotten damaged in the process of all of this, but so far none of the mercenary Mechs were down for the count.

A couple of passes by the twin SL-15K Slayers of Havoc Lance helped delay the pursuit some, but their last pass had been almost fifteen minutes ago with both of them leaving the field with smoke trails behind them. Alex had ordered they make no additional passes until they were fully repaired. He knew that the order was one that would definitely make things easier for the pirates, but Alex had no desire to lose either the fighters or their pilots in a “strategic retrograde action” … the politically proper term for a retreat.

While the pirates had pressed hard against them for the first ten or fifteen minutes of the engagement, but the tactic of concentrating fire had definitely dampened their enthusiasm for a hard fight. Add in the odd air strike and the spectacular entrance of SRLT Jackson "Madman" Tallman and his CN9-D Centurion on their right flank; Alex could understand their reluctance to get in too tight. It also helped him in confirming that the pirates had to be low on expendables and didn’t want to damage themselves too much before they caught up to Alex and his merry crew.

Jackson’s arrival came just in time to blunt a two Mech push on Alex’s left flank. A pirate Griffin and Daimyo, both most likely captured from the Kuritan’s militia forces, had begun a run on that flank while the two pirate heavies, a Rifleman and Marauder, had pushed against Alex’s right with all guns blazing. So while Alex and the rest of his battered lance were responding to that fire, the Griffin and Daimyo used the buildings on the edge of Remika’s Falls to cover their much less spectacular approach.

They had just broken out of the line of the buildings and opened fire on LTJG Felix "Dice" King’s OSR-4L Ostroc when Jackson appeared. His LB10-X autocannon and medium lasers had burned into the back of the Griffin while a spread of LRMs slammed into the Crab from behind. 

Alex wasn’t sure what had gone through the minds of the two pirates when they were suddenly attacked from behind, but he was pretty sure it amounted to something like “oh shit!” because they broke off their attack and headed back towards their own lines very quickly. Jackson chased their retreat with both his autocannon and LRMs as he slid into the line with the rest of Chaos Incorporated and made his report. 

With the enemy’s jamming gone, Tempest Lance had been able to link up with the two squads of battle armor that had been sent to alert them as to the situation then start moving towards the extraction point where MARIANNE would be arriving. With the rest of his lance loaded up with Fa Shih battle armor troopers and now clear of the urban environments of Remika’s Falls; Jackson cut back into the town to link up with Lawless Lance. He also reported the destruction of a Battlemaster, the source of the jamming, by LT Tiana "Risky" Anders-Hsien’s battle armor troopers as well as the destruction or at least disabling of a Wolverine, a Wasp, and a Panther by Tempest Lance.

Alex did some mental mathematics: A Battlemaster, Wolverine, Wasp, and Panther was a lance of enemy Mechs down. Add in the Quickdraw, Assassin, a Wasp, and Griffin plus the Crab and Vulcan that Lawless Lance had downed since the engagement had started… plus only the loss of a single battle armor trooper on their side. Alex gave a slight smile; Chaos Incorporated had given a good accounting of itself. Mathematically speaking anyway.

The real problem would come when his already tattered and battered lance hit CLG… Combat Loss Grouping. It was a combat term where a military unit would seem to be coming through a fight without a single loss and then, as the collective punishment given by the enemy and environment suddenly caught up to them, men and machines would start dropping like flies. 

As if he had summoned them with that thought, a lance of pirate Mechs pushed up from his right with the enemy Marauder in the lead. PPC fire came from the Marauder and punched into Felix’s Ostroc hard, burning deep into the already damaged Mech’s left leg and right torso. Follow up fire from the rest of the lance with the Marauder, a Shadow Hawk, a Griffin, and a Panther; sheared the Ostroc’s left leg from the rest of the Mech at the knee. 

Alex turned towards the enemy Mechs and opened fire with his Gauss rifle, sending a silvery blur towards them. The enemy Panther ducked, allowing him to keep his head instead of losing it to the slug that Alex had fired. As other Chaos Incorporated Mechs returned fire, the pirates fell back and away from the mercenaries. The Ostroc spun and fell to the ground, face first, with a crash, tossing up dust and rock particles created in the process of the impact. 

“Dammit… “Alex cursed and flicked on his communit. “Talk to me Dice!”

[[I’m here, Random.]] Felix groaned his response out. [[My ride’s not going anywhere though.]]

“Yeah… I can see that.” Alex replied and mentally cursed more. They had been so close to getting the hell out of here too. “Okay, get out of the Mech and head towards Ice. She can get you out of here.”

[[What about Yolanda?]] Felix asked, anguish in his question.

“The Mech has to stay. Nothing we can do about it at this point, Dice. So just get out of there and get with Ice… no sense in losing a MechWarrior along with his Mech. Not if we can help it anyway.”

[[Copy that.]] Felix said with a glum voice.

[[I’ll be right there, Dice. Don’t do anything stupid and get dead, okay?” LTJG Fiona "Ice" de Wynter’s voice came over the comm.

[[Yeah, I’ll do my best.]] 

“Thanks, Ice.” Alex said then began issuing orders. “Madman, Crow, and Bear… form on me. We’ll get between Dice and the bad guys to make sure they don’t get in the way of our buddies. As always, concentrate your fire and don’t let the bastards get you down.”

Confirmations came from the other three MechWarriors as Alex led the way on forming a wall of war machines between their downed comrade and the pirates. Fiona recovered Felix, cupping the MechWarrior inside her TDR-9SE Thunderbolt’s hand before she lumbered the heavy Mech towards the MARIANNE. Alex paused, warring with the decision in his mind before deciding that the unit didn’t have enough Mechs to do without one.

“Crow… help me with grabbing Yolanda here by the arms and dragging her onboard. Bear and Madman… you have cover duty. Yell out if you get any contacts.” 

Decision made, Alex reached down with the Cataphract’s right hand and grabbed the downed Ostroc’s right arm. On the other side of the Mech, LT Vincent "Crow" Hobbs used his GAL-2GLS Gallowglas’ hand to grab the Ostroc’s left arm. Together, both Mechs pulled and started the Ostroc towards the MARIANNE as their best pace. 

Behind them, Bear and Madman walked their Mechs backwards, so they could keep their weapons and best armor towards the enemy. After seeing some of the damage done to them by the nearly forty-minute running battle with the pirates, Alex wasn’t sure if the rear of the Mechs wouldn’t have had more armor than the front. 

He wasn’t too worried at this point though. With Lawless Lance now being under the umbrella of the MARIANNE’s weapons and with both the LTJG Kylie "Red" Fong in her ARC-4M Archer and LTJG Parker "Thorn" Rose in his CRD-5S Crusader still outside the DropShip; Alex was certain that the fight was over unless something very bad happened. 

Still, Alex held his breath as he and Vincent drug the Ostroc inside the MARIANNE then the rest of the Mechs covering them got inside. For once, the tiny Angel of Hell that seemed to follow him around and come calling specifically whenever Alex most hoped that he wouldn’t actually didn’t show. As the door to Mech Bay Two slowly closed and the last Mechs stepped into their gantries, the MARIANNE rumbled and began to lift off. 

Alex dropped the Ostroc’s arm to the ground and backed his Cataphract into an open cubicle on instinct more than actual true thought than began the shutdown process for his Mech. As the engine inside finally shut down, Alex pulled off his neurohelmet and set it on the shelf for that purpose then took a long drink from the once cold but now more tepid bottle of sports drink next to the command couch and closed his eyes for a moment.

Had the last forty minutes been as bad as some of the fighting he’d been in over the years? No… it had actually been much less so. Had it been fun? Not in any way, shape, or form had it been fun. Plus, it had seemed to go on for forever and a day. Having caught his breath slightly, Alex stripped the sensor pads off of his body and let them hang over the arm of the command couch before peeling himself off of the seat and heading towards the hatch in the back of his Mech.

It seemed that the first part of his plan had worked like a charm… they’d gotten the pirates’ attention. Now, all they had to do was survive it.

Posted by,
Captain Alexander Yao
Callsign: Random
CTF-4L Cataphract
Head Cat Herder
Chaos Incorporated

Word count: 1910
Contract count: 62,761 

1842
December 17, 3093
Finley’s Crew Hideout
Meinacos, Draconis Combine

Zink Finley looked over at the man across the table from him with his chin resting on both fists and a deep frown on his face. He let both hands fall to the table with a solid thud, making the liquid in the various glasses resting on the table jump with the impact. The man across from Finley jumped too. Finley took a moment to bring out a cigarette from the front pocket of his fatigue jacket and held it up over his left shoulder. A large bald man stepped from Finley’s right to light the cigarette with a stainless steel Zippo lighter that shot a near 8-centimeter-long flame.

The tip of Finley’s tongue escaped his lips for a moment, sliding across them before disappearing back in his mouth. “So… Martin…” He paused to take a long drag of his cigarette then blew the smoke towards the fan above the table. “Tell me again what happened with the fuel convoy.”

“It’s like this…” Marvin started, his hands moving as he spoke but his eyes on the table in front of him. “We were doing the normal run from the fuel tanks that Singahama Transport has out west of Dune Flats, right? Normal run, no problems with it ever. We had almost two companies of armor with us because… “his eyes flicked up for a moment but then went back down almost immediately. “Because of the problems we’ve been having lately.”

Finley’s flat stare didn’t twitch at the reminder of the troubles that Finley’s Crew had been having in the past several months. He just stared at Martin through the smoke of his cigarette. “Go on.”

“So, we got the armor and like five trucks of guys with us plus the normal tanker trucks, right? We got there fine… filled up the tankers and topped off all our vehicles in the process… then we was out but quick… just like you said to.” He looked at Finley for a brief moment before his eyes flicked over to the large man to Finley’s right then back to the table. “There were no problems to be had, right? Then we get about seven klicks out when the lead vehicle hit a mine of some kind.”

“Who was that?” Finley asked and took another drag off his cigarette, again letting the smoke up towards the ceiling fan.

“Uh… Tresson in his Galleon. Flipped the damned thing end over end.” Martin explained, showing the flip the vehicle experienced with his restless hands.” After that, all hell broke loose. One of the other Galleons flipped… that was McInnis’ ride… and a hover truck got hit by a couple of those damned Fa Shih battle armor suits them damned yohei use.”

“The sons of bitches were all over us in a minute flat, I swear it. They wrecked another couple of the Galleons, a truck of the troopers got flamed, and a Harasser went down too. Lasers and flamers and machine guns popping all over the place…” Martin took a minute and drank some of the whiskey in front of him and set the nearly empty glass back down on the table. “We tried to line up on them, but they were like fucking ghosts or something.”

He glanced back up and noting the flat look in Finley’s eyes immediately went back to looking at the table. “I think we got one or two of them pretty good though because they just got the hell out of there all of a sudden. We started to pursue but then this rain of LRMs came out of nowhere. Lost another truck of guys to that and the beat up Patton…”

“You lost the Patton?” Finley asked, his voice dangerously calm. 

“It wasn’t my fault, Colonel Finley… I swear it.” Martin stammered as he continued. “I was trying to get a pursuit organized and kill some of those damned yohei then the LRMs hit and Hanson lost a track on the Patton then it was like he was just a target. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that many missiles come down on someone.”

“What about the Mechs? Where were our Mechs?” Finley stood and leaned over the table. “What happened to the Mechs that you were supposed to have made sure were shadowing your convoy?”

“I… I… “Martin stammered more. “Nothing happened on the run in, so I had them head back towards the fuel depot and… “

Martin tumbled out of the chair from the force of the blow that Finley landed across his face. Finley came around the table and landed two solid kicks into Martin’s torso before stepping away, his face a mask of fury. He gestured to the man still standing near the table and the man hauled Martin up from the ground and shoved him back into a chair then held the cringing pirate in place with his massive hands over the smaller man’s shoulders.

Finley sat back down and took another drag from his cigarette then a drink from the whiskey in his own glass. Rather than set the glass back down he tossed the remaining contents at Martin, splashing the man’s face with the cheap but potent liquor. “The next fucking time you are told to do something, just fucking do it.” Finley growled. “Your little decision cost us a good number of troops and vehicles because there was no one there to fucking support you because you ordered that support away!” 

Visibly calming himself, Finley leaned back in his chair and stubbed the cigarette out into the table’s top. He just watched for a moment as Martin tried to wipe the liquor from his face with a shirt sleeve before entirely losing his patience. “Well? Keep going, Martin. Tell me about the rest of this cluster fuck that you were in charge of.”

“See… it was like this… we got clear of the LRMs and headed back to our fuel depot. We must have lost like eight or so of the vehicles between the mines and the battle armor and that LRM shower… “Martin flicked his eyes up to Finley’s and flinched at what he saw there so looked back down. “… we just needed to get the hell back to friendly territory was all, see?”

“Anvil…” Finley looked up at the large man standing with his hands on Martin’s shoulders. “If he says ‘see’ or ‘it was like this’ or anything of that nature again, I want you to pull that fucking cannon you call a pistol out and shoot him in his leg.”

Anvil drew out the massive revolver he kept on a left-handed cross draw, leaned over Martin’s shoulder, and aimed at the smaller man’s left leg. Martin started to move but felt Anvil’s free hand tighten on his shoulder and stopped.

“Now, Martin…” Finley said very calmly. “I need to know the rest of this story sometime before Amaris rises from the grave and I need to know everything that happened. So, stop fucking around and tell me.”

“Ah… ah… sure thing, Colonel. It was like… “Martin stopped talking then looked at Finley before quickly continuing. “We got to the depot and one of the gate guards noticed something stuck on the side of one of the fuel trucks… the last one. He started to remove it before anyone could stop his stupid ass and the bomb detonated. Three other tankers blew at the same time, which caused a couple of others to blow too.”

Finley grabbed his glass and tried to take a drink before realizing that it was empty and sat the glass back down. “So everything started going up. Most of the combat vehicles stayed outside the depot, forming a perimeter, right? So we only lost the truck that went in to help get the fuel loaded in the pipes and shit. Well… that and the guys that were in the truck that were doing the loading and the guards in there and… and… “

“And?” Finley prompted.

“And a Panther that was doing sentry go on the east fence line where the explosion happened.” Martin finished quietly. “Just burned the damned thing down and the stupid MechJock inside panicked and got himself burned up.”

“And?” Finley asked.

“And nothing else, Colonel.” Martin finally looked at Finley. “We got beat the fuck up, then the fuel went off when we got to the depot, and then nothing. We did our best to put out the flames and salvage, but the depot is a total loss from what I saw of it.” He shoved a sleeve up showing a burn covered in gel on his right arm. “I was trying, I swear it, Colonel.”

Finley nodded and looked towards the door. “Marcus! Get in here!”

Marcus Callahan stepped into the room at Finley’s barked order. The slender man acted as what was as close to an executive officer position that Finley would allow, mostly because the man was efficient, deadly, followed orders, and didn’t have an imaginative bone in his body so posed no threat to Finley’s command of the pirates.

“Marcus… “Finley scratched at the days’ old stubble on his chin. “Tell me what Martin’s little jaunt today cost us.”

“One Panther BattleMech. Six Galleon light tanks. One Harasser hover tank. Three hover trucks. Ten tanker trucks. The fuel depot. Over 30,000 liters of fuel for the vehicles. And an estimated 180 troopers between the fight and the fuel explosion.” Marcus recited in his gravelly voice. “And an unknown number of… workers.”

“Any salvage?” Finley asked, disregarding the number of deaths among the population of Meinacos that were slaving for his band of cutthroats.

“None, sir. I sent out a team to both the battle site and the fuel depot. Nothing of value was left.”

“Any good news at all for me out of this whole fuck up?”

Marcus shook his head. “None, sir.”

Finley nodded his understanding and snatched the bottle of whiskey near him then began filling up his glass. “So, since that first fight in Remika’s Falls with those damned mercs, what has all this cost us? An estimate in machines is what I am really looking for here.”

“After today’s…” Marcus regarded Martin with a flat cold stare that a snake would have envied before continuing with his report.” …events. The total is seven Mechs and nearly two companies of armor, including the hover trucks in that number, of course.”
 
“Of course.” Finley nodded and took a drink of the whiskey, enjoying the burn of the liquid as it went down his throat. “Anvil… let Martin go and get back over here. Martin’s done his best for us and we shouldn’t have treated him like that. Right, Martin? You did your best for me, right?”

Martin frantically nodded his agreement even as he watched Anvil walk over to where Marcus was standing. “I did, Colonel. I swear it.”

“Well, nothing else to be said for that then.” Finley shrugged and took a second drink then set the now empty glass on the table. “Except that, frankly Martin, your best just sucks.”

Finley stood in a single swift movement, pulling his pistol as he did, then shot Martin in the left shoulder. The pirate screamed in pain as he toppled backwards and fell to the ground. Calmly, Finley marched around the table with his pistol still pointed at the wounded man and continued to fire. Each round hit Martin, but only in places where the shot was sure to not kill him. Not immediately anyway.

Martin had stopped trying to scramble out of the way after the fourth round hit him. After the seventh, he stopped reacting to the shots beyond twitches. Finley stopped after shooting Martin nine times then crouched down beside the dying man as blood leaked out of the many wounds that had been inflicted on him. He watched as the last light left Martin’s eyes then stood up.

“Alright… I think we can all agree that while Martin may have not been a stellar asset to our organization, that was a bit wasteful. Fun and enjoyable, but wasteful none the less.” Finley slipped the partial clip out of his automatic pistol and replaced it with a full clip before holstering the weapon then turned to the two men standing in the room with him. “Now, I have to figure out a plan on how to get these fucking mercenaries. Marcus, what do we know about them?”

Marcus shook his head. “Not much. They showed up on the news after stomping the hell out of some estate on Galatea but that was after they were hired by some border lord that was pissing about Clan raids. When the news got out, they killed the liaison troopers that came to arrest them and disconnected from the JumpShip they were on. Then they tangled with the militia pretty hard before breaking contact and showing up in Remika’s Falls.”

Finley nodded his understanding and started pacing back and forth. He stepped over Martin’s body the first time but paused when he came back to it and looked at Anvil. “Get someone in here to clean this mess up.” Anvil left the room while Finley continued his pacing, not stopping as he addressed Marcus. “Do we know how badly they’ve been hurt in all this?” 

“No, sir. They’ve been using hit and run tactics and taking away their dead or wounded before we could get any kind of good count. I know they lost an Ostroc at Remika’s Falls and one hasn’t been seen since, but we only know they have enough troops to fill a Union class DropShip. They’ve also not left any salvage on the field… they either take it or render anything they have to leave behind mostly if not entirely useless.”

Finley’s eyes narrowed. “What about the militia? They tangled with the mercs since that initial contact?”

“Not that we know of, but intel is hard to get sometimes.” Marcus shrugged. “The militia are still not going out on general patrol unless they are in company or better strength. Even then, they don’t engage us unless they have some support coming from somewhere. VTOLs or Mechs normally, but they did hit Vanity on her last raid with some Aerospace fighters.”

“These sons of bitches came down outta nowhere and start in on us hard. They’ve hit us… what? Seven? Eight? times since we pushed them out of Remika’s Falls. And every damned time they do it, we lose men and materials that we can’t replace entirely but they don’t seem to be losing anything in the process of all this.” Finley growled out each word with rising heat. “I can’t believe that they just happened to get to here and then their shit went south. They have to be working for someone.”

Marcus nodded his agreement. “Yeah, but who? If it was coming through normal DCMS channels then they wouldn’t have killed those liaison guys in space or tangled with the militia after getting down here. Hell, even before they hit the ground they were coming in hot with their Aerospace fighters shooting at the militia’s fighters. There’s no way to really fake that without lots of practice on both sides.”

“Fuck.” Finley threw himself into the chair that Martin had been using and stared at the floor for a minute before reaching into his pocket for another cigarette. He quietly lit it and took a long drag before pulling his gaze up to Marcus. “Well, while it would be nice to know who the fuck sent them, I guess that doesn’t really matter. What matters is that we need to kill those mother fuckers dead and then get back to our normal business around here.”

Marcus nodded but said nothing as Finley scuffed at the floor with hit booted foot. The Colonel hated to be interrupted when he was thinking and doing things that the Colonel hated got someone in serious trouble… normally the kind that required medical attention or the incinerator. Finley took another deep drag from his cigarette then got back up and resumed his pacing.

“What we’re going to do is lay an ambush for them.” Finley said slowly. “Send out a force that they’ll hit and then slap them with a bigger follow-up force that will crush them. Maybe we can get the BLACK FLAG up and use her to stop them in their tracks by inserting a force behind them or something.”

The BLACK FLAG, an Overlord Class DropShip, had started life as a military vessel that had been slightly converted to mercantile use by creating more cargo space through the removal of some of the BattleMech cubicles. It had been captured by Finley’s Crew up near Echo when they hijacked the JumpShip that had brought them from the Combine’s border with the Periphery to here. 

While they’d lost both the JumpShip and the EDGY LADY, a Union Class DropShip, when the DCMS had intercepted their space transport; the BLACK FLAG and two Union Class DropShips: DIRE WARNINGS, and ANNIE’S DARLING were all the transport left to them. The problem Finley’s Crew had now was getting enough fuel to actually be able to use the vessels as anything but firebases. Not that it mattered much since without a JumpShip, they still wouldn’t be able to get the hell out off of Meinacos.


“I’ll check and see if she has the fuel for it.” Marcus said with a frown as he tried to remember how much fuel they actually did have left for any of their DropShips. “But… after the fuel depot being destroyed, she may not have more than whatever is in her tanks right now.”

“Can we transfer fuel between the DropShips?”

Marcus kinda shrugged. “Yeah, but its damned dangerous to do.”

Finley waved Marcus’ concern away with one hand. “Use the people we picked up at Remika’s Falls. If they get dead, it’s no skin off me.”

“I’ll talk to Ursa.” Marcus replied, meaning the head tech for all of Finley’s Crew. The stocky woman was a marvel to watch when it came to using the various tools of the trade, no matter if she was using her favorite meter long wrench to tighten up a loose actuator or crush someone’s skull, it was indeed a show.

“Yeah. Do that.” Finley stopped in his tracks with a sudden thought. “The mercs don’t know where we are, do they?”

“I guess not. We haven’t been hit here and none of our patrols have seen any one.” Marcus paused when Anvil stepped back into the room with a pair of locals that were swept up during the operation in Remika’s Falls. The man and the woman started to drag the body out when Anvil stopped them at Finley’s upraised hand.

“He can take care of getting Martin to the incinerator on his own.” Finley had stopped pacing and was eyeing the woman up and down a couple of times. The smile on his face said he liked what he saw. “She can stay here with me.”

The woman looked at him with wide, frightened eyes and stepped closer to the man… probably a husband or someone else that was close… like she was going to be able to suddenly hide behind her. The man also looked scared but spoke up anyway. “You don’ want her, sir… she’s nothing special…”

“I would have to disagree.” Finley’s hand came to rest on the pistol at his waist. “Now get Martin to the incinerator or join him in it, I don’t care which. Either way, the girl’s staying here.”

“It’s okay, Mark.” The girl said, fear still in her voice despite her trying to be brave. “Go take care of things and I’ll… I’ll be back later.”

“Well, that just depends on how good you are.” Finley chuckled with a smirk on his face. “Anvil.”

With a nod, Anvil pulled the girl away from Mark’s side and shoved Mark in the shoulder with his left hand. The girl squeaked in pain from the rough handling, but waved Mark out the door and sat down in a chair in the corner without any additional protest. Mark looked like he was going to say something else, but Anvil stepped closer, menacing the smaller man with just his sheer bulk. Reluctantly, Mark grabbed Martin’s booted foot and started dragging the corpse out of the room. Anvil closed the door behind him as he followed Mark’s trail.

“Going to have to get someone to clean this floor up.” Finley muttered but waved Marcus’s movement to get someone away. “It’ll keep. Right now, I think this lovely young lady and I are going to need to have us a little talk. Right?” 

The woman nodded mutely, hands in her lap as she stared at the floor. Her eyes were locked on the trail of blood left behind when Martin’s body was drug out of the room. She was obviously terrified of what was going to happen next and if she was going to be drug out to the incinerators afterwards. 

Finley smiled. They were normally much more docile when they were terrified plus their terror at what might or might not happen next always gave a little bit of a welcome edge to the sex. He walked to her and tilted the woman’s head up with his hand under her chin. She met his gaze with the fear still in her eyes and a single tear rolling down one cheek.

“We’ll finish our discussion later, Marcus.” Finley said without breaking eye contact with the woman.

“Yes, Colonel.” 

Finley knew that Marcus left only because he heard the tread of the man’s footsteps as he walked out of the door and then the closing of the door behind him. Finley deliberately turned away from her and locked the door, the click of the deadbolt being thrown sounding like a very final thing. He turned back to find the woman staring at the floor again, shaking slightly as she cried.

The pirate leader walked back over to her and tilted her head up again, his eyes blazing with pleasure at her fear and anticipation at what would happen next. Tears were streaming from her eyes as she met Finley’s gaze. She was attractive, in a plain kind of way… not someone that would ever walk a stage at a fashion show but she might turn a couple of heads when she walked down the street. He placed his thumb on her chin, catching her chin between his thumb and the rest of his hand, and squeezed slightly.

This drug out a small gasp of pain and more tears as she whispered: “Please… please don’t hurt me…”

“I’m not going to hurt you.” Finley lied and eased up on the pressure. This one was going to be so much fun to break... not much of a challenge, but fun. “We’re just going to have a good time. Right?”

“Yes… yes, Colonel.” She stammered out.

“Good.” Finley’s smile was a nice one but it wasn’t joy or happiness in his eyes, but lust and the knowledge of how much power he had over the woman. “What’s your name?”

“Janice.” Lieutenant Janis "Amber" Rider, intelligence officer for Chaos Incorporated whispered. “My name is Janice.”

“We’re going to have a good time.” Finley said. “Aren’t we Janis?”

“Yes. Yes, we are.” Janis replied with a slight smile of her own and a predatory glint in her eye.

Posted by,
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 3940
Contract Count:  66,701

0032
December 18, 3093
Finley’s Crew Hideout
Meinacos, Draconis Combine

Captain Alexander “Random” Yau sat back in the only chair left intact in the small room where the body of Zink Finley laid in a pool of very cold blood. He’d been killed by LT Janis "Amber" Rider when she’d been pulled out of the job of carrying a different body out of the room by Finley. Janis and her fellow intelligence officer, LT Felix "Ghost" Cornelius had inserted themselves in with the civilians that Finley’s Crew had rounded up from Remika’s Falls then were able to finally get in reach of Finley himself. Through sheer luck, the two were the “workers” that one of Finley’s lieutenants had grabbed to go into the office and clean up the dead body.

When Finley decided that Janis looked like a tasty treat and kept her with him while sending Felix and all of the other pirates away, Janis struck. She beat the hell out of Finley before stabbing him twice in the chest with his own knife. After that, she was able to send a zipped up message to the MARIANNE and Chaos Incorporated was on the way in to extract both her and Felix. 

When the time came and the LRMs started to fall on the pirate’s base, Janis and Felix were both inside the cave complex with a number of civilians, barely holding off the pirates in a firefight with stolen weapons. That helped in not only saving lots of civilians from getting caught in the crossfire of the incoming mercenaries, but also delayed the pirates in getting to their Mechs and vehicles and making a true defense of their hideout. 

The BattleMechs of Chaos Incorporated came down like a hammer on the hideout, scattering the few defenders that were in place and creating a general ruckus with concentrated and sustained firepower. The Mechs of Lawless Lance plus SRLT Jackson “Madman” Tallman in his Centurion punched through the outer perimeter easily, as the pirates weren’t expecting an assault and had gotten complacent. 

The two Mechs that were standing perimeter watch were engaged first by Lawless Lance then swarmed with LRMs as Tempest Lance got into the fight. The infantry and lance of light tanks supporting the pirate Mechs were outclassed by just the mercenary Mechs, so broke when they found themselves facing not only the Mechs but seventeen Fa Shih battle armor troopers, who were looking for payback after their own losses during the campaign against the pirates.

The combination of surprise and the strength of the attack had smashed through the pirates’ defenses easily and scattered those pirates that were not killed. The ones that didn’t die either ran deeper into the base or fled. Unfortunately, several of the pirates that escaped were able to do so with their Mechs or vehicles plus they took a number of civilians with them. Still, Alex considered the operation a resounding success, if for no other reason than the corpse in front of him. Killing Finley had been a major objective in this contract.

For no reason he could comprehend, Yau nudged the corpse with his foot. Of course, it didn’t do anything in reaction to that… it was several hours into death at that point… but there was something in the back of Yau’s head that told him to do it. Just because. So, he did. After all, Alex had earned his callsign by doing just that sort of thing many years ago.

“Hey Alex.” Jackson said as he stepped into the room. He scratched at the stubble on his cheek and looked down at Finley’s corpse. “Wow… that’s one dead dude.”

“Yep.” Alex replied and nudged the body with his foot again before looking up at his executive officer. “What’s up, Jackson?”

“Tiana and her crew were able to get those last pirate hold-outs from the caves. A couple of the civilians that were being used as hostages got caught in the crossfire, but only one dead right now with another one in critical condition.”

Alex nodded. LT Tiana "Risky" Anders-Hsien lead the battle armor troops and had been at the head of the effort to secure the hideout from pirates that had hidden themselves in the nooks and crannies of the place. “How many got caught up?”

“I think like eight hostages were left in there, including a couple of kids. The pirates killed one of the hostages to show Tiana he meant business so she marched her people in and they killed the pirates.” Jackson shrugged. “One of the hostages was killed in the firefight and four others wounded, including the critically injured one. The medics are taking care of the wounded.”

“Were any of the kids hurt?” Alex asked. When Jackson didn’t say anything for several moments, he muttered. “Shit. Dead or wounded?”

“The critical one is a ten-year-old girl. Pirates were using her as a human shield and she caught a round from one of our guns.”

“Fuck.” Alex said and stared at Finley’s corpse very intently. “Did any of the pirates survive that fight?”

“Two, I think. They dropped their weapons when the rest of their buddies went down.”

“Hang them.”

Jackson blinked. “What?”

“You heard me.” Alex replied as he looked up at Jackson. “Hang them.”

“I heard you, but I didn’t believe it. They surrendered.” 

“They surrendered after their human shields were dead or rescued and the rest of their murdering pirate buddies were dead. They are not enemy combatants protected under the Ares Convention… they are pirate scum.” Alex explained in a tight voice. “Hang them.”

“It might cause some of the other pirate prisoners to get rowdy.” Jackson warned.

“You can hang them too. I really don’t give a fuck about bringing in prisoners for the ISF, Jackson. Besides, given what the ISF would put them through, hanging might be considered a mercy by some people.” He regarded his XO for a long, silent moment. “Do I need to get it done myself or you got this?”

Jackson held up his hands in surrender. “I got it, Alex. Just wanted to make sure we were on the same page.”

“Okay, good.” Alex put his face into the palms of his hands for a moment, rubbed at his face then looked back up at Jackson. “Did we get a message off to the ISF?”

“Yeah. Dillan had sent off the burst packet to the channel we were given. We’re still waiting on a reply at this point, but that was only like an hour ago that we sent the message and we have no idea how long it will take to get a reply.”

“Good.” Alex ran a hand through his short black hair and stood. “Good. Okay… get the pirates hung from something high and let the other prisoners watch it. I’ll be there for the event so don’t start without me. I am going to have one of the medics get this…” he nudged the corpse again “… somewhere cold so it doesn’t stink to high heaven while we wait for our paymasters to get back with us. Do we have other bodies to deal with?”

“Yeah. Pirates mostly, but some civilians.”

“Okay. We’ll let the prisoners deal with them after the hanging.”

Jackson raised an eyebrow at that. “Little harsh, Alex.”

“So is life as a pirate, Jackson. These sons of bitches called the tune when they decided to take up this life, now they get to pay the piper.”

Jackson nodded. “Works for me. I’ll get things going.”

“Thanks. I’ll be there in about 20 minutes.”

Jackson nodded again and left Alex to ponder his own imponderables.

0123
Finley’s Crew Hideout

Alex watched as the second pirate finally stopped kicking and turned to the assembled pirates, the mercenaries guarding them or just watching, and the few civilians that had wanted to have a little satisfaction for what they were put through. The only mercenary standing near his perch on a stack of crates was LT Vincent "Crow" Hobbs, who had appointed himself as Alex’s bodyguard. Alex’s gaze was cold when he looked at the pirates, standing in a group and surrounded by their mercenary battle armored guards. 

“I am only going to tell you this one time.” Alex said in a loud voice. “Fuck with me and you will meet the same fate. I have no tolerance for any of you mother fuckers and am just looking for an excuse to kill more of you. Do as your told, don’t cause any trouble, and you might get out of this with only a prison sentence.”

“Why should we listen to you, kid? Looks like the only way out of here is being dead.”

“Who said that?” Alex asked. 

One of the pirates shoved his way through. The man was of medium height but well-muscled with a swirl of tattoos peeking out from his clothes. He wore an aura of meanness around him like a cloak and looked Alex straight in the eye as he spat on the ground. “I did.”

“Thank you for expressing your opinion.” Alex replied and said: “Crow.”

Vincent’s arm blurred as he drew his pistol and shot the pirate in the forehead. The pistol was back in its holster before the pirate hit the ground. Vincent’s face was stone-cold with no remorse for the shooting showing on his face or in his eyes. The other pirates stepped back, letting the body fall, and said nothing for several long moments.

“Make no mistake.” Alex said, his voice cutting through the silence and his eyes sweeping across the pirates. “You are all going to pay for the things you have done. I don’t know if that means death or just imprisonment for a very, very long time but it is going to happen. Do what you are told, cooperate, and you’ll get to live long enough to see which of the two happens.”

Alex’s eyes went hard as he continued. “Fuck with me and I will happily use that as an excuse to kill you and leave your body to rot in this place.” Alex paused to look at the dead pirate in front of him before letting his gaze sweep over the pirates again. “Anyone else have a question or comment they want to share?” 

When no one spoke, Alex smiled slightly. “Good. You are all on burial detail. You will be collecting the bodies of your buddies and laying them out over on the far side of the motor pool for identification. There will be tarps over there to cover the bodies with. Any civilian bodies will be placed in body bags and then in the garage so they can be identified and taken back to their families. You will be watched and if you try something stupid, then you will be shot dead.”

He looked around the mercenaries until he spotted Tiana. “Risky. Get these bastards to work.”

Alex stepped down from the crates and placed a hand on Vincent’s shoulder. “Thank you. It made a good show for them.”

“My pleasure, sir.” Vincent replied.

“I am sorry that I had to use you like that but I might have missed, which would just not have been good.”

Vincent looked at Alex for a moment. “I don’t mind killing, Alex. Especially when they deserve it.”

Alex returned the look silently then nodded. “Right. I’m going to see how the salvage is going and all that.” 

“Right behind you.” 

“Yeah, I know.” Alex said. “Thanks for that.”

Vincent just nodded and followed the mercenary commander as he headed towards what passed for the Mech Bays in this place.

0744
Bridge
MARIANNE, Union Class DropShip
Outside of Finley’s Crew Hideout

Alex stepped into the bridge yawning and trying to fuss his hair into something besides what looked like a jet black hedgehog. “Dillan… what’s going on?”

Captain Dillan Fowler turned away from the communications console he was leaning over and looked at the mercenary. “Major.” He said formally, letting Alex know that there was someone on the commline to be formal sounding with. “We have that call you’ve been waiting for.”

That woke Alex up entirely and he hurried to the communications console and looked at the screen, seeing a familiar face. “This is Captain Alexander Yau. I hope you have recovered well, Tai-Sa Taro.”

Tai-Sa Yamada Taro, the man who’d started the unit on their path to Meinacos’ surface back in October, looked back at him. The Tai-Sa had killed all four of the men who’d boarded the MARIANNE with him then shot himself twice to help make sure that the story covering Chaos Incorporated’s insertion into Meinacos was covered. “I am well enough, Captain. Your mission was a success?”

“We have the body of Zeke Finley along with a number of his people here along with prisoners to turn over.”

“That is satisfactory. Your coordinates have been established and we will be onsite at approximately 1000 hours’ local time.”

“I look forward to it, Tai-Sa.” Alex replied with a small smile. When the screen went black, the smile went away. “Bastard.”

“What now, Alex?” Dillan asked.

“Nothing.” Alex shrugged. “We wait for the Tai-Sa and his people to take these sons of bitches into custody then we’re done.”

“You sure about that?” Dillan asked quietly.

“Sure as I can be about anything.” Alex replied with a slight smile. “I am going to let the others know what’s going on and then see if there is something to eat in the mess hall. Let me know if anything exciting goes down.”

“You got it.” Dillan sat back down in his chair at the center of the bridge.

Alex left the bridge quietly and hoped in the back of his mind that he hadn’t lied to Dillan and that everything on this was indeed well and truly done.

Posted by,
Chaos Incorporated

Word Count: 2319
Contract Count: 69,020