Chapter 3- Family Pt. 1


Rashid slowly walked out of his MS, fists clenched in anger. All over, his uncle's men slowly exited their machines, faces filled with shock over what they had done. The mercenaries were different, however. Some cheered with joy, other prayed. Abdul was high-fiving some of the cheering mercenaries, Auda simply congratulating them. Afmad was talking with the MS crew, informing them on the performance. Rashid didn't care. "They disobeyed orders," he thought. "They violated my command!" Quickly, he stormed over.

Abdul was singing loudly when he felt a blow to the side of his head. Falling, he saw lights in front of his eyes, dancing fancifully to mock his paralysis. "Get up!" he heard. "If you think you're strong enough to disobey my orders then you should fight me!" In seconds, the other mercenaries descended on Rashid, while Auda dragged Abdul away. Then, the factory workers started to help Rashid, and the whole thing turned into a donnybrook. One worker sung a wrench at a tattooed man with a handlestash, only to hit empty air, then get picked up and thrown. A scrawny mercenary was knocked out when he was hit on the back of the neck. Three factory workers were all backing away from an Asian man, who swung at them with martial arts. This carried on for some time until a gunshot rang through the hangar. When the combatants turned towards the sound, what they saw was Rashid's uncle, and a few other men, each holding a gun, the uncle holding his at the ceiling. "Rashid, come with me."

Silently, Rashid closed the door to his uncle's office and sat down in the nearest chair. He and his uncle sat in silence for minutes, the tension building steadily in Rashid. "Well," his uncle said, finally switching off the pressure. "You struck at the convoy." Rashid nodded. "You defeated at least a dozen enemy mobile suits." Rashid nodded again, not so much apprehensive as confused. "Then where are my supplies?" Rashid was off guard for that question. "I'm…sorry?"

"You forgot your objective!" he yelled. "I specifically ordered you to capture the convoy, not waste resources!" The old man was working up a storm now, his fists slamming up and down onto his desk. "We needed those supplies to feed the families! You were responsible for feeding us! And you failed!" Rashid slowly wheeled the chair away from his uncle, but didn't dare bolt for the door. Whoever those men were would throw him back inside. "B…b…but uncle! It wasn't my fault! Those…mercenaries-"

"Don't you think I'd have a radio!" he bellowed. "They made the right decisions! Not you!" He sat down now, breathing deeply for a minute before continuing. "Those men out there are other so-called 'mercenaries'. They will train my workers until they deem them fit for battle. Until then, I will leave command to Afmad. You," he said harshly, "Are confined to your quarters until I deem fit. Now, get out of my sight!"

Barely noticing the yelling of the new men at the workers turned pilots, he stumbled all the way to his room, mercenaries staring him down, turning it into a walk of shame.


Dr J was busy putting the finishing touches on his masterpiece when his comm. lit up. "Yes?"

"Dr J, its Howard. I've got some news from the surface."

Dr J rubbed his temples. "Howard, if its troop movements again, I'd rather not hear it."

"How about a new force against OZ?" This got J's attention. "Tell me everything."

"Well, I don't know much, but it seems an ES convoy came under attack earlier in the week. Only enemy MS were destroyed, though, not the rebels."

Dr J was confused. "Strange, I haven't heard anything about bases being raided."

"That's just it!" Howard exclaimed. "They were using completely new MS! And even better, they didn't even take the convoy!"

"What?" Dr J cried. "Where did this happen?"

"That's even crazier! It happened out in the middle of a desert! Exactly the place they'd need the supplies!"

J puzzled over what he had just heard.


The remains of the convoy screeched to a halt once it was inside the base they came from, the drivers shaking or standing around nervously. The MPs were shocked, seeing how none of the trucks had been touched, yet the tanks and MS that were sent with them were nowhere to be found. "What happened?" asked the first one who got to the drivers.

"They…came from nowhere…" said the man, his eyes in the thousand yard stare. "They came…right from the sand…the radio…it was like demons screaming!" The driver started shivering even worse. "The escorts…they were just…wiped away! The suits…vanished! We barely escaped!"


Eventually, the base was calmed, and its CO, Col. Ian Young-Timar was in the infirmary, "evaluating" the survivors. "Dammit, tell me! How many were there!"

The man in the bed below him was quaking seriously, everyone present afraid the man would have seizure. Finally, one of the doctors worked enough courage to say "That's enough, sir!" rushing to the man's bedside to stabilize him. Young-Timar, meanwhile, stormed to his office, cursing the whole way. As he arrived, however, he found a man already there, in the dreaded dark blue uniform. In his hands were the preliminary reports on what had happened. "Hm. Twenty brand new MS destroyed in the span of a half-hour. This must be a new rebel record."

Young-Timar growled at the intruder. "Major Reanou. To what do I owe the pleasure of your…arrival."

"This attack," he said, placing the files on the desk and removing one of the last fine Cuban cigars in Young-Timar's drawer. "We of course have the good sense and decency to keep such an incident away from the public eye, though we must investigate with all due haste." Picking up the colonel's lighter, he puffed away at the cigar, the room filling with blue smoke.

"We can handle this," Young-Timar growled, teeth bared. "If we need OZ assistance, we will call for it. Until such time, however, I ask you to vacate the base, post haste!"

"But of course, general," Reanou said, his Bordeaux accent highlighting itself in his small chuckles. "I will leave the matter entirely in your capable hands." Cigar still in hand, he walked out to the helicopter that brought him.

Young-Timar swore, picking up the cigars and throwing them across the room. "Damn special bastards!" he bellowed, throwing himself into his chair. "If it wasn't for them looking over our shoulders, we wouldn't have to worry so much about performance!" Grabbing at his most treasured possession, a ten-year old Scotch, he poured himself a glass and threw it down, mind working as hard as it ever had as an officer to figure out a way to deal with these so-called "demons".