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*Appears out of thin air.* Did I hear "fighters"?


”On him, someone take over this One Victor.” Karel acknowledged Ulrik’s order before addressing Remy, not at all thrilled by the thought of letting any of these goons escape. ”Let’s squeeze that missile raft, old timer. Go from his left, I’ll take the right.” Calling something this small a missile ‘boat’ never felt right. Noting the explosion that signaled the Jenner’s end, he swerved to avoid what looked like a flying piece of a leg the ammo detonation launched his way. He briefly considered taking a shot at the downed 1E with his small laser, but he had to watch his heat by now lest the myomer start protesting too much. Making sure he didn’t overextend himself by outrunning Overkill or lag behind and leave him far too forward, he could almost imagine what the Javelin guy’s underwear would look like when the duo crested the rise he was hiding behind.

As soon as his cockpit popped up over the terrain, Karel immediately locked onto the goofy-looking machine, its appearance not helped by either the wannabe badass paint job nor what Jaromir’s PPC did to it. Noting the extent of the damage to its right torso, his ‘Mech confirming the innards were exposed, Karel snapped the crosshair onto the damaged section and fired all three medium lasers. An ammo or launcher hit would take care of that 30 ton problem nicely.

At the same time, the Javelin pilot noticed him and threw him a curveball, throwing the light ‘Mech to one side so hard it looked like it was going to topple over while accelerating before catching the fall with a turn, all three of Karel’s lasers scything through the snow behind where the rapidly accelerating Javelin was standing just a second earlier. It would seem like the biggest weapon in the pirates’ arsenal was making Karel look stupid. ”Very well, squirelly bastard, be that way…” Karel muttered under his breath as he continued closing the distance, adjusting his approach to better herd the pirate toward Overkill. He briefly considered ramming, but there was no point damaging his own machine, particularly since spare parts would be hard to come by. He wasn’t that mad. Yet.

”The droids were outside as sentries for our protection. Worlds that support life - any life - are rare in the universe. We saw trees outside, we assumed wildlife and prepared in case the wildlife was aggressive. And wouldn’t you know it, something even rarer than life - intelligent life - came. Hope for the best, plan for the worst.”

”And per most human laws I know of, drawing a weapon is considered its use. How’s that for taking things seriously?” She finished her explanation, blaming cultural differences for the misunderstanding. Though to be fair, Ezra did seem to have a habit of waving his talking stick around and she had no idea what the fresh Hell Darnell was doing half the time.

The promise of multiple lightning mages was music to her ears. Getting rid of that sword hanging over their heads would make life so much easier and safer with the morale boost alone, nevermind practically unlimited time, proper lighting, unlimited tool use and actually hot water.

But with talk of being granted land getting thrown around, Vigdis waited for a break in the conversation before addressing the Captain, making a point of switching off her translator and speaking quietly enough that someone else’s wouldn't pick her words up. ”Ma’am, when, if at all, are we telling them that we don’t intend to stay? I was worried about it earlier, since Silbermine was convinced we’re his gift from the gods, though I’m not entirely convinced he’s come to think otherwise. Do we tell now that the other side is here too to potentially back us up? Or do we wait until the ship’s up and running again because we might piss them both off, because our departure deprives everyone of our knowledge? I’d really hate for them to go ‘We’re not giving you lightning mages because we want you here, you’re ours now.’ on us.” Paranoid? Maybe. But if the Yenge wanted to leave before the Humans could learn from them and she’d been there, she’d likely have taken a wrench to their engines herself.
What Belial said, no rush.
Marit just barely managed to suppress a happy giggle when she caught Ziska’s wink. Some might consider approval from Ziska a step in the wrong direction. Naysayers, the lot of them! And then she opened her mouth. Maybe the naysayers were onto something after all...

”Just because they paint us as deranged maniacs doesn’t mean we have a pass to become that. Isn’t it the average joe that’s gonna be scared shitless of us now, and running to report the ‘green baby killers’ to the nearest patrol as soon as possible? Last thing I want is to give them more reasons to believe the lie.”

”I’m going to act like I didn’t hear the part about nuking a city, let’s pretend that didn’t happen, but I get where you’re coming from. The people that hired us to be here have abandoned this place, the last ones upholding their rule are dead and the locals have hated us from the start, justified or not.“ She counted on her fingers, ”Besides needing FPA cannon fodder to pull the jailbreak off, nothing’s really keeping us here, is it?” Family Man would probably take objection to that, but she had a defense ready. But otherwise, grabbing von Kemp, staging a jailbreak, liberating any ship they could get their hands on that could get them away and leaving sounded good.

Truth be told, Marit was confused. By all rights she should’ve been a nervous mess lamenting the disintegration of her future, and while she understood this would have nasty repercussions on Espia and had the potential to become catastrophic in greater scope, it hadn’t yet and right now she was mad as Hell that they’d have the gall to try. Maybe she just didn’t fully grasp the depth of the swamp they’d just been thrown into. Still, being stuck in the mud was only really bad if one didn’t have anyone to lend a hand and pull you out. She should know. And they had a fairly loaded and connected helping hand, at least for now.

The Colonel thought along the same lines, and had a plan on top. Finally, nothing to protect, but a simple ambush. Perhaps not so simple given what the target was. Assuming the most common models, that was two PPCs, an AC20, two LRM 15s and a bunch of lasers, and given the nature of their target they probably had ammo left for the weapons that required it. ”Once they’re dead, do you think we’ll have time to salvage? I don’t expect we’ll leave much in working order, but you never know what you’ll find until you look. Maybe even some hints to the Fist mystery.”
“Nope. Not English. And not a rescue party either.” She shook her head, switching to Russian to answer the Russian man before going back to English, “We’re a hit team. You guys are on your own, good luck.” She was ready to keep them at bay with force if they got agitated, but most seemed too confused and exhausted to do much besides stand there and try to make sense of a nonsensical situation. Poor fucking bastards.

With enemy reinforcements, likely closer to their level of competence, approaching, she didn’t need to be told to leave. “Never a fucking trip mine to leave behind when you need one.” She grumbled as they left the courtyard to the sound of Viktor’s voice. Not their mission. As far as they knew, Viktor thought the four died carrying out Melani’s orders. As long as the westerners don’t get captured and squeal, Viktor might never be aware of their involvement.

…Therefore he’d know in roughly 12 hours, because the westerners would get captured and they would squeal quickly.

Not ideal, but in order for it to matter they first had to make their way out. Following Hayden away from the front of the compound, they ran into the first hurdle about two corners in - a skinny on his way to the main yard from a side room. Yekaterina didn’t know if they were the most unpleasant surprise of his life, but they were definitely the last. Two rounds to the chest and one to the head - always deadcheck - made sure of that. “I’m gonna assume they heard that!” She yelled at her teammates, yelling to hear herself over the ringing in her ears. Catching up, she tapped the Canuck on the shoulder. “Hayden, hang back. I’ll take the front.” She moved ahead of him, his weapon not ideal to be in a building, nevermind at the front of the stack on a stairwell.

The careful ascent slowed them down somewhat, but roof access was now in sight. Locked, obviously. “Go as soon as it’s open.” She struck the door with the halligan high, mid and low on the handle side to check for drop bars before pushing against it with her boot and driving the duckbill in the resulting gap. A few seconds of labor later the door jamb failed and she flattened up against the wall after pushing the door open to give the others more room to pass. “Move!” She used the time to stow her tool and grab her rifle again, taking up the rear.
The Locust guy’s transmission tugged at his ears. Clearly not a military guy, talked way too much on air. The Capellan guy, Jaromir, sounded much better. Crisp, to the point, keeping the air clear. Same with the other two former soldiers, Zohra and Fuka, as expected, the latter already tanking damage with her face like a good heavy. Firestarter guy sounded exactly the way he looked, but seemed professional enough. Live this long in this line of work, you get a pass to limit the amount of fucks at your disposal. This might not be a shitshow. Pleasant surprises.

On the note of surprises, a medium laser across his cockpit went straight into the ‘Not pleasant’ category, but tolerable. Not ‘My armor is evaporating.’ unpleasant. ”Pirate ‘Mechs ahoy!” He grinned over the radio. While he’d love to think the other guy was a good sport and was giving him a warning shot, the chances of that were pretty low and thinking that either Karel was hard to hit or the other guy was inept was just as good. Still, shooting at him was a sin that couldn’t be forgiven, and Karel turned to engage the closest Locust, the 1V, assuming that was the culprit. He briefly considered slowing to a walk, which would allow him to be heat-neutral even while firing all three medium lasers, but not getting hit was even better. He lined up the crosshairs and pulled the trigger of his medium lasers.

The first shot went wide.

The second went low.

The third hit… a rock Karel that didn’t notice before as the Locust passed behind it.

”Jebat křečka!” He roared at the top of his lungs, leaning against a pedal with all his weight and hauling the Mongoose around in anticipation of returning fire, kicking up a cloud of snow and ice as the feet tore into it to redirect the momentum of 25 tons of war machine moving at highway speeds. He didn’t need be that rought with the controls of course, but every MechWarrior knew that the harder you pulled a trigger or pushed the controls, the more damage the guns did and the harder the ‘Mech turned. Fact. Out of pure, pig-headed spite, heat be damned, Karel turned the torso back toward the 1V and fired his small laser.

By now the swearing must’ve been heard outside of the ‘Mech as the small laser’s beam viciously assaulted empty space near the enemy ‘Mech, the thought of the 1V missing him as well being only a small comfort given the vast gap in volume of fire between the two machines. Maybe he should’ve hit up the sims and learned how the new ‘Mech handled instead of bumming around the ship, but everyone’s a General after the battle is fought and hindsight is always 20/20.

Vigdis looked up at the civvie from her seat. ”You don’t know who’s on the bridge. I do. He’s not gonna help.” In the unexpected festive mood, she let slip an opinion she probably shouldn’t have in front of a civvie. Keep up the Potemkin Village facade of a well-oiled crew, Vigdis... ”Let’s see if we can find something you can use.” Excusing herself from the table and leading the metalhead back into the ship, she let him go through the list of equipment on board that could possibly work for him, audio engineering being a complete enigma to her. In an unguarded moment, she also grabbed a pair of noise-canceling headphones. Just in case. Coming back outside, she nudged the musician with her elbow. ”Looks like the party’s breaking up a bit. Giddy up before you lose all of your audience.”

Curiosity getting the best of her, she started making her way to where everyone else was scurrying off to. Maybe some of the soldiers were handing out some food or booze from their private supply and didn’t want their commanders to see. Well, that was a nice thought, anyway. Catching the tail end of Kolvar’s explanation and seeing a… thing…? About to unalive itself, Vigdis turned right back around. She didn’t have to be everywhere and see everything. But something Nellara said made her stop, like a weak reading on a bullshit detector.

”You mean like you didn’t point a row of metal balls at me with magic when we first met? It’s natural to point weapons at that which you fear, and it’s natural to fear that which you don’t understand. That,“ She pointed at the Kriliteran, ”whatever that is, fits that description.” If she had a Krone for every time something that vaguely resembled Kolvar brutally murdered a person on the silver screen, she wouldn’t have had to take the Stavenger job. Humans being uneasy about something that looked this weird might as well have been a Pavlovian reflex by now.

”Besides, if he wants to off himself, having weapons that can do that faster and painlessly pointed at him is the least of his problems.” The engineer grumbled to herself.
“You think this gets broadcast out beyond the system? What if your old company sees this?” Lovett turned to Marit.
”For Fedorov’s sake I hope they don’t, else a company of angry Vikingrs will show up to smack him so hard his mom won’t recognize him for being a lying little shit.” She said with conviction, but doubts and nightmare scenarios were swirling around her mind. ”No fucking way this lie can work, right? One, show me a merc who does something they don’t profit from, this is just a waste of ammo and two, we don’t even have any of those ‘Mechs.” Though she’d be lying if she said she would mind. A Warhammer and a Crusader, like second Christmas.
“And anywhere else you’d be right, but we‘re in Capellan territory. Critical thinking has been thoroughly bred out of them.” Lister countered, so mad about the false flag massacre he scrunched up his beer can and now even madder because of the spilled lager.
“You may have grown up around BattleMechs, but the average person can’t tell an Archer from a Crusader anymore than they can tell Ricotta from Mascarpone.” Kochanski shared a more realistic opinion.
”How? They’re nothing alike.”
“She’s right. Two arms, two legs, more missiles than the pilot has teeth and it’s big and scary. That’s all they see.” Lister said glumly, having skipped the third stage of grief straight to the fourth.
“SLDF will have their work cut out for them to re educate these-”
“Not this crap again, dinosaur breath. They’re not coming back. They’re dead!” Rimmer made Lister roll back to stage two.
The Colonel’s roll call provided a good excuse for Marit to extract herself from the conversation before the two Astechs could start arguing again, shooting Lovett a sympathetic look before making tracks.



”No, they’re already dead.” She replied to Family man flatly with a defeated sigh, ”It’s, what, four hexes on the map? 200 klicks, that’s around… three hours with our slowest ‘Mech at full tilt. Even longer if we bring the tank along. And besides, any survivors just got their lives destroyed by BattleMechs flying our colors. I doubt we’d be welcome.”

She looked around the assembly. Ziska was probably going to look bored or beaming. This sort of chaos seemed either like something she’d thrive in, or like a Tuesday to her. Instead, she lingered on Ingrid, expecting either the same dignified mask as always or an overheated boiler minutes from exploding. She just didn’t know what would be the last straw: the fallout of the false accusation or the insult?

”So, what now? I don’t suppose seizing a radio tower and saying our two cents about it would achieve much, would it?” Then, an idea. ”Hang on, when did this happen? If that’s this morning, then our ‘Mechs were inactive, some down for maintenance, so BattleROMs aren't much of a direct option, but logs from other missions could prove we don't have that equipment, else we'd have fielded it before.” It wasn't as good as a simultaneous mission and wouldn't help them in the short term, but being able to take a JumpShip ride without being arrested or shot sounded good.
”DON’T. Drink. The local brew. It‘s hard to describe the taste, but the word ‘despair’ comes to mind.” She quickly warned him.

”Oh, fuck, you had to remind me.” Vigdis sighed when Varen mentioned the working parties. ”Don’t really care what they like or don’t like. I don’t mind yelling at them if that’s what gets into their heads that we’re marooned and we can’t afford to coddle people. Right, you got the solar farm salesman in your party, you poor soul!” She was suddenly struck with realization, genuinely sympathetic to his plight. ”They gave me the mining equipment mechanic and one of the cargo haulers, so I might be good. I’ll let you know how it goes and if they’re decent, I’ll trade you one good one for one bad one. If not, we’ll have to get that still running fast. Good boss points for Zhao though, she could’ve taken the good ones and left us with the idiots. Still, were it not for them being pissy enough as is, I’d recommend cutting down their liberty time for more training. I’m gonna go ballistic if we start losing resources to dumb mistakes and god save us from the plebs if one of them gets hit by an ND.” It was times like these that made mandatory military service sound like a really good idea.

Bidding farewell to Varen for now and returning back to her seat beside Kareet, she waited for a break to rejoin the conversation. ”So, feasts, get togethers with music… Is this a common thing to do in the Ascendancy and Mythandia when two groups of people meet?” Vigdis continued to quiz the scholar, oblivious to or uncaring of any social awkwardness. ”What else do you do, at least when war doesn’t loom on the horizon? Board games, sports…? Any that require magic to be played?”
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