(The Dilemma of Flay Allster – REVISED)
Sometimes, there are things that are too interesting to leave alone, but are themselves not entirely germane to the main story to warrant a place in it.
Flay Allster is a classic case of interesting but not critical; some would call her the only painfully real character in Gundam SEED, others would call her the most manipulative wench ever seen in Gundam. Personally I tend to leave the latter distinction to Haman Karn of Zeta fame, Flay was just confused. Severely confused. Still and all, this confusion makes things a bit interesting, leaving her in a position that is both shaky and incredibly vulnerable to outside influence, and that makes for interesting results with the dice, does it not?
Herein lies a bit of a quandary. While Flay is not one of the higher-exposure main characters, she is an interesting subject – and as it happened, a secondary character of the second Jokers Wild set on my first write-up. This time around, I intend on giving the story in question a thorough workup proper to the character in question and its place in the timeline.
We shall see how this turns out this time around, no?
WARNING WARNING WARNING: If you have not read "Legend of the Jokers Wild" at least up to Chapter 17, this will not make much sense to you. I don't want to read any flame reviews because you did not understand who this revolved around or what the hell was going on or what happened prior. Read the first sections of the saga before giving me the ration of flame and stink, uh?
GENERAL DISCLAIMER: I own no rights to any included material from any other stories. I intend no offense in such use.
BAAAAAD LANGUAGE WARNING: This story revolves around a cast of incredibly crazy people from several different Dimensions (and anime, to boot). Expect foul language; they are soldiers, after all. Also expect possible suggestiveness, crazy situations, interpretiveness, analysis, and lots and lots of violence. You have been warned.
DICE WARNING: Events in this story will be controlled by the dice, and are concrete, true-random results provided by number generation services. These results will change events dynamically and/or modify established plans. After all, there is no mistress more cruel than fate.
POLITICAL WARNING: Political concepts and methods may be presented in this story that may conflict with established 'norms'. This is deliberate on the part of the author, to show different and rather sharp viewpoints on these subjects. The views expressed most likely do not match the views of the author, and are also subject to the dice at any time.
ANTI-POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WARNING: AT NO TIME will this story be politically correct. Real life is not politically correct, much less 'nice' in some definitions of the word. If you take issue with this, I recommend finding another read.
FLAY WARNING: 'nuff said.
And now, onto the diatribe from another dimension…
(Legend Of The Jokers Wild, Side Story 01 – The Dilemma of Flay Allster (Revised))
(Chapter 01 – Opening Moves)
(10 April CE 72, 0930 Hours)
(Mendel Colony, Residential Block 4, Apartment Building 9R4, Suite 407)
After the door swung wide open, Flay shuffled into her apartment with her one roller suitcase, two shoulder-strap suitcases, and small carry bag. The vacation was technically over, but would not officially end until the following morning and she had some sleep to account for before she returned to work. Once inside, the luggage went onto the couch unceremoniously and she reached back outside the door to the wall-mounted mailbox for her accumulation of bills and advertisements. There were only a few things in the box, but one item she was looking forward to receiving.
A heel closed the door behind her and her 'end-of-day' routine began in earnest, albeit 7.5 hours early. The paper-mail went to the table and she reached to the radio on the counter to turn the volume up. It was always set to the same channel, 105.05, which Mendel used as a public information channel and which Flay used as a source of intel and occasionally (theoretical) target lists. If they were dumb enough to make it public knowledge, Flay was smart enough to maneuver assets into attacking it, provided Blue Cosmos gave her anything to work with. The lead story was a state visit from Chairman Durandal, who would be inspecting the progress made on the Armory One PLANT being built practically next door to Mendel. Inviting target, but I have nothing to use on it, Flay thought.
A bottle of double-filtered water in the door of the fridge joined her at the kitchen table, where the work on her mail began in earnest. Letter one came in a nondescript, standard-size envelope and was easily opened with a butterfly knife: Dear Flay Allster, our records show you are overdue for your next dental cleaning. Please call our office at 001-016-1252 to schedule an appointment. Please remember we are always available for emergency dental repairs... the mailer trailed off into their usual self-touting, which Flay had read more than once since she moved to Mendel. She made a note on a separate notepad to call them and arrange the cleaning. Her vacation had not helped her smile, but had helped her relax.
A swig of water and the next envelope beckoned. As soon as she lifted it to slice it open, she immediately recognized it for what it was: the Mendel Unified Utility Notice – Accumulated Statement of Services. She smiled at the fun with acronyms the bill evoked: MUUN-ASS, often pronounced 'moon-ass' even by the workers at the utility commission. Of all the things she could (and routinely did) accuse Mendel of, one of them was not 'lacks a sense of humor'. The total bill she acquired was only 43 c-bills and change, most of that in electricity as opposed to her usual 85+ c-bills, the latter usually due to higher water charges (long showers or baths). Mendel inverted the usual cost structure for utilities: electric and natural gas were incredibly cheap, water proved to be the major expense. To point, one of the things on Flay's 'to do list' from Blue Cosmos was to steal the plans for a working dual-stage fusion reactor...
The third of three envelopes contained yet another bill. Also uncharacteristically small, this one was from the Cleaning Service in C-6 block, where she had most of her clothes professionally cleaned and maintained. Since she had spent most of the prior month down on the planet below her, there had been little in the way of accumulated laundry to have cleaned. What laundry she did rack up would arrive tomorrow on a small cargo shipment from the planet, along with a few things she purchased for the apartment. A quick note to submit an electronic payment for her cleaning bill and she was done with the major bills. She deliberately set the magazine aside, since she knew if she opened it she would not get anything else done.
Another swig of water and the dreaded task: unpacking the suitcases. Always the least fun of any travel arrangement, but a cruel necessity. Living out of a suitcase was possible, but not exactly convenient and certainly did not smell or look proper. She started light, the carry-on that contained most of her makeup and toiletries and was done with that phase of her unpacking in ten minutes. Another hit of water and she was back to it, this time with her hanging clothes. Since few of those were not expended after the two weeks planetside, she had it done in five minutes and was on to the next. The two shoulder bags contained her shorts and undergarments respectively, the former empty and the latter close (Flay was of the 'pack extra underwear' camp, as was her whole family). With those last holdouts done, the suitcases went back into the closet and she was done with the onerous side of the tasking.
All that remained in her required home routine was to check the schedule for work and other activities, and check her vidmail archives for any requests for contact. The requests were always handled in code language, as were any substantive exchanges of information or orders, especially given that Mendel and their precursor Magi were excellent at breaking encryption routines on what was otherwise considered 'secure' communications. Requests for contact came by way of the vidmail or e-mail systems, as the information contained therein could be made ambiguous enough to look as a joke email sent to the wrong box.
-x-x-x-
(10 April CE 72, 1100 Hours)
(Mendel Colony, Research Block 1 (GARM R&D Facility))
The sight of four Marines in armor and under heavy arms was nothing spectacular inside the GARM facility. GARM R&D had come to be known as the heaviest-guarded genetics archive, research facility and Eugenics / Coordinator facility in the solar system bar none. Part of this was actually ingrained into the Magi ethos, which put high emphasis on the defense of such facilities due to the fact that the bulk of the persons within were very soft targets. In all reality, one does not get any easier to kill than an unborn child in a eugenic womb, and an attack on GARM would not be the first time the Magi had suffered such depredations.
The sight of four anti-armor-equipped Marines escorting one flak-jacketed systems engineer and a similarly-clad electronics technician, both of whom were armed (assault rifles) and carrying between them a meter-long hexagonal canister, was sufficiently strange enough to draw attention. Doubly so given that the entourage had arrived in three separate APCs and had a Mobile Suit escort. Whatever they carried in that canister had to be powerful stuff, the GARM personnel collectively figured. Few of them correlated the transport mission to the influx of heavy computer equipment that had been delegated to various stations around the building, though most figured it was something related to the new server farm in the basement of the facility.
The Systems Engineer and the Electronics Technician were met in the new server room floor by two equally-critical personnel: a Data Systems Architect and a Systems Architecture analyst. The first two were Magi natives, though both would readily admit the latter two were the better hands on deck. The Data Systems Architect was formerly a ZAFT Redcoat, disillusioned by what he saw in the final battle from the Earth Alliance and from ZAFT; the Systems Architecture Analyst was a displaced Morgenroete employee that Mendel had 'acquired' and brought on as a contract service provider from Morgenroete.
"That's it?" The Sys Architecture Analyst asked.
"Aye, Dalton, this be the whole package in one little tin," the Electronics Tech replied. "The core Kernel module and the main memory banks. The actual processing horsepower is left to whatever we plug her into."
"Well, no sense letting such a kickass moment go to waste," the Data Systems Architect said in true geek fashion. "Plug her in and get her running!"
"Hear, hear!" the Magi-trained Systems Architect replied. The Marines stood back to the door, ostensible guards to what was about to take place, though all four were slightly curious as to what all the hullabaloo was about.
The canister was carried carefully to a special housing that contained another eighteen identical cartridges, arrayed in 3-4-5-4-3 hexagonal grid. This was part subterfuge on the part of the systems engineer, and part backup solution. The remainder of the backup solution was itself the Mjolnr, the origin point of the canister in question, where off-site backups would be maintained of the very unique data within. The subterfuge came into play in that none of the canisters were marked in any way, so there was no way to know which canister was the 'live' canister that held the Kernel module, the 'heart and soul' of the unique data structure.
The canister was inserted into the center of the top row, and immediately the entire rack came alive after the canister indexed. The accompanying terminal began scrolling command lines as the Kernel entered an active state and began processing in its new architecture, something for which it was already suited. Within thirty seconds, the other canisters came alive as they began receiving backup information from the primary cartridge.
The initial copies and integration took thirty seconds, then the Kernel began accessing the next machines in the series: a group of primary quantum supercomputers purchased from Morgenroete. With the instant influx of raw computing horsepower and omnidirectional logic processing, the primary data hives in the canister came alive. And with those hives an entity awoke from hibernation.
"I am awake, gentlemen," the AI formerly enshelled in the Mjolnr declared. "It's...kinda weird, working in this quantum architecture. Whose idea was it?"
"Guilty," the Morgenroete contractor said. "We were going to sell those to the Earth Alliance for new Archangel-class ships, but screw them sideways. Mendel actually knows where to send the checks, the NDIA can't get our mailing address right."
"Interesting," the AI replied. "Thank you, Brian. I'm working on accessing and initializing the main storage servers now," and as she said so, the banks of storage servers began humming harder and the drives began lighting up. "Okay, everything appears to have come up clean, though I am showing about a dozen hard drives across seven servers as bad. Next up is the secondary processing systems; this is where you come in, Harold," she referenced the Data Systems Architect.
"Here's to hoping it all works as I planned it," said Architect replied. He checked his panels, and saw all the right entries. "Everything looks green on the uplinks," he declared after a second scan. "Okay, this officially seems weird to me, talking to a computer and expecting a response."
"Beginning connections now," the AI noted.
"It's funky to begin with, but you'll get used to it." the Electrical Technician admitted. "Hell, half the Mjolnr staff doesn't even think about the AI being there. The other half get along with her real well."
"And I heard some noise about ZAFT beginning work on their own construct AI entities, so you'll probably be called in to consult," the AI dropped in. "Okay, I'm online with half the secondary cores, the rest are spinning up and interfacing now. This...this is insane power, like someone force-fed my former body a kilo of caffeine and told me to go to town."
Four eyebrows arched in unison, though for two different reasons. "Wait...what? Since when would a computer be affected by caffeine?"
"I wasn't always the soul of the Mjolnr, Harold," the AI admitted. "More than an eon ago, I was an infantry officer. I was caught loose in an artillery barrage and my whole Binary was cut down; I survived, for certain definitions of the word 'survival'. Back then, the concept of Upload-generated Artificial Intelligence was new, and nanos weren't even on the drawing board. I was given two options: die out or take a chance on being uploaded. Given I was a rather angry kid back then, I chose to take the upload route and keep kicking ass."
"Never again will I look at a server in the same way again," Harold admitted.
"All is in order," the AI noted. "I am online with every integrated system in the facility now."
"Yes!" Brian, who had designed the cross-systems interfaces, was rather happy that everything worked as planned.
"Now I get to see what kind of access I have outside this building..."
-x-x-x-
(10 April CE 72, 1515 Hours)
(Mendel Colony, Commercial Block 6, GFS Retail Foodsource)
One of the first and foremost of problems Mendel had encountered was food supply. In much the same fashion as ZAFT, the Mendel colony was not self-sufficient in terms of foodstuffs or water. On the other hand, the Mjolnr had brought along enough supplies to feed a literal army for over a hundred days, and though those rations had been seen to it was enough to get some trade agreements in place.
One of those agreements was the presence of an Orb mainstay, the Gordon Food Service (GFS) distribution company. Where the retail giants of yore had not survived the Reconstruction War, the humble small-chain stores and the wholesale outlets did survive, those who were not interdependent on massive global logistics and could retool themselves to local production only. The most egregious examples were the dissolution and eventual annihilation of the Wal-Mart and K-Mart chains, companies that had become so dependent on globalization and cheap material that the trade disruptions of the Reconstruction War doomed them to a slow and painful death. The small-business-model 'mom 'n' pop' grocery store showed a resurgence in the decades after the war, and even now was the de facto standard for shopping, with chains larger than 4 stores being the blaring exception. GFS, one of the largest chains in the world (41 outlets including the two in Mendel), still held a lot of the small-store feel and local spice.
Local spice is right, Flay thought but did not say. She was holding a jar of Armia, a spice native to the planet Altair and grown in several other locations. Supposedly had some good whole-body cleansing effects and served in cooking as a cross between garlic and oregano. Tonics made with it were said to be almost as good at reducing weight as Acai-derived medicines, or so read the label. Flay figured she'd try some out for herself, but she wasn't betting on it reducing her a dress size or more.
Onward in the same aisle, she came across a necessity in her household, Ketchup. Heinz was an old survivor from the days before the Cosmic Era and one of her favorites, but there was always something more in GFS. Two generic brands, Onogoro Farms and two Magi offerings were on the shelf—the latter would not last long, Flay figured, given there wasn't much growing space available as of yet. The Magi offerings were a bit weird, though: one was peppered Ketchup, the other was Italian-Spiced Ketchup. No wonder they weren't moving except whenever a Mendel Armed Forces person came by and grabbed one...
The next aisle held her next stop, various pasta products and baking goods. The pasta was a necessity for some of her favorite dishes, though the baking area held a package of brownie mix she needed. Her plan was to bake up a batch and force herself not to eat them, for the purpose of taking them in to work the following day, in hopes of her coworkers not being pissed off at her for being gone three weeks. There was only one problem with her plan: a small gaggle of younger teens were hovering around the baking area.
"I dunno shit about baking," one of the older guys noted. Flay figured him maybe fifteen, tops, more likely fourteen.
"I dunno, either," the one girl among the four said.
"Directions don't look all that bad," the youngest guy said. "I think I can cook this."
"You are a braver man than I," the eldest guy said. Flay passed quietly behind them, though she did take notice of one of their shirts: a block of white with a crying face on a tan shirt, and the caption 'This piece of Tofu cries because vegans ate all its friends'. Flay managed to avoid snickering at the sarcastic parody of vegetarian beliefs and acquired her brownie mix without drawing their attention.
"This is the strangest thing we've ever done with cake, though," the girl in their midst noted.
"Well, she's on the level despite the fact that nobody likes her. Fuck 'em, I say, she's earned it. And I hear she does some interesting things with leftover cake..." Flay deliberately did not hang around to find out what they intended to do with the cake, or how it would be misused. Without further ado, she was in the next aisle, stopping only briefly to pick up some fudge chips to add to the brownies she planned.
In the next aisle, she made two paces before she hesitated at the sight of the other end of the aisle. Her hesitation drew the attention of the eldest of the three, a tall mofo in the standard Magi gray uniform. His glance lasted maybe a half second before he decided Flay wasn't a threat; the other two, both less than half his age, hardly even noticed her. Flay stopped to acquire a new spatula and cutting board (hers was falling apart after she inadvertently ran it through the dishwasher), though the military personnel were intent on dragging through the aisle to grab nearly one of everything and repeats of some.
"One question, old man," the one of the three officers holding the novel to his face asked, "How did you get the name Argus?"
The eldest pilot chuckled. "It is not unheard among the Magi to name a child after a Battlemech. I am one who suffers such a fate," he admitted.
"Argus? A Battlemech?" the one with the book asked. The green-haired one pushing the cart stopped to slip off his headphones, presumably so he could listen.
"Oh yes," the elder pilot replied. "Sixty tons, originally a Federated Suns 'mech, mostly carrying a ballistic and missile payload. The AGS-4D version is particularly nasty, armed with a rotary 66mm autocannon and a ten-silo LRM launcher, with 20mm Machine Guns and ER Medium Lasers in backup."
"A lead-slinger," the reader noted. "Wait a minute, is that why you—" His question was interrupted by the elder pilot.
"Need a pack of those wooden spoons," and he pointed across the aisle, almost next to where Flay was comparing metal serving spoons to conceal her spying on the pilots. "Anyways, yes, I drive a Heavyarms in direct mirror to the Argus. Missile and Ballistic weapons by the dozen. I have cross-typed in as a 'Mech pilot, but few things have the sheer firepower of a Heavyarms."
The green-haired pilot chuckled in an evil fashion; "First rule of combat: always bring enough gun. More than enough gun is also acceptable."
The elder pilot chuckled as they stepped behind Flay, who was looking away from them in a simulacrum of trying to choose new spoons. "Old soldier's axiom: it is impossible to carry 'too much ammo' in modern warfare."
"I know that feeling well," the reader said. "The amount of times I've run short on energy before my machine was upgraded..." What he said was lost as the trio turned the corner Flay just passed. After deciding on the cheaper of the spoon sets, she continued in the direction away from them, assured that she was not going to cross their paths again. She knew they were pilots, and she thought she recognized them from intel briefings, but she had no real idea as to their identities or their importance. Just as critical was her orders to not do anything that would warrant her being arrested (or executed), which included killing Gundam pilots.
Flay continued onward, convinced that her day couldn't get any stranger. She was right, inasfar as she knew what else was going on in the colony. Elsewhere in existence was another story.
-x-x-x-
(10 April CE 72, 1930 Hours)
(Nicaragua territory, Atlantic Federation (Earth Alliance), eastern jungle region)
"Man, am I glad proper anti-submarine warfare patrols died out a hundred years ago, or we'd be dead meat," Ghost Officer Amina said from the rear position of the marching line.
"Oh? How?" Ghost Officer Thomas asked.
"MAD," the point-walking Ghost said laconically.
"Uh, what?" Thomas asked.
"MAD, a little fun with acronyms. Magnetic Anomaly Detector, used by patrol craft to spot submarines by way of the hole they create in the earth's magnetic field. Averted with the decidedly nonmagnetic Akula-class subs of Russian fame, which were mostly titanium ships."
"Ah, and since you are walking second (1) with a small fusion reactor strapped to your arse, Commander, anyone that passed overhead with MAD gear would know right where you are."
"You got it," Star Commander Megan Garibaldi replied diffidently. "They would probably ping on the Ghost Cloaks, but they definitely would ping to the magnetic containment toroid in the little 'juice box' I'm wearing."
Ghost Team 6, a short point of Commando Assault Ghosts, were the 'pathfinder point' for the coming operations. Their orders were simple: go forth, find a safe way into the heart of the Atlantic Federation (The old American territories, as opposed to Iceland, the notional 'brain' of said nation), and prepare a central staging outpost for further operations. Follow-on teams would make their way to the outpost thus made, and would expand radially outward to key strategic locations to build new outposts. What happened after that was subject specifically to orders from on high, but SC Garibaldi's orders were simple: monitor communications and repay Blue Cosmos in spades if they do anything to Mendel.
Of course, since the only notable landing zone in the Americas that the Ghosts could reasonably hike off a Dropship was in Brazil, getting just to Nicaragua had been described by Amina as 'a mother-humper' and other choice invective. The operation was programmed for 4 kilometers an hour, fifteen hours a day of marching, given that the bulk of the terrain they were marching through was jungle or roughlands...or both. Given the distance from Manaus, Brazil to Tulsa, Oaklahoma was around 7500 kilometers overland, a march that met those movement guidelines would take over 125 days.
The troops of Assault Team 6 were good, but four months was not a preferred option for their operation. The railroads were still active despite the continual warfare in the area, making jaunts of several hundred kilometers in a single day easily possible (and a train would be hard-pressed to notice a few extra tons of Ghost on a flatbed in the middle of its chain). Truck traffic was possible just the same, especially with constantly-active Ghost Cloaks, though a truck would eventually notice when it weighed an extra 4 tons. On those happy wheels, the trucks and rail transport had cut the transit time to the halfway point of Nicaragua down to 16 days – a happy state of affairs for Ghosts who had planned on spending four times that to get as far as they did. Even crossing the Panama Canal was easier than expected: the Gatun Locks doors were more than wide enough to allow a Ghost to march across on the top of the doors, and though this 'silhouetted' the Ghosts against the river and/or sky, making the crossing at night prevented anyone from knowing that a Ghost had wandered by.
"This area is so volcanically active that a decent MAD reading would be close to impossible," SC Garibaldi admitted. "How's your charge, Hawk?"
"Close to full," the point-man replied. "Ejecting cable."
The cable that connected Hawk's armor to the fusion reactor mounted as a 'backpack' on Megan's armor was released and reeled back in to the cord keeper. She had theoretical connection to feed up to two infantry points, and with the newer version dual-stage fusion reactors she could power even the hungriest energy weapons continually, but all this came at the cost of stealth. Something as passé as an old AC-130 with the Black Crow electromagnetic detection system could easily 'see' the fusion reactor she was wearing. Thankfully, the various nations were devaluing their specialized air forces even as Mendel demonstrated why airpower flexibility was key, and an AC-130 had not been seen in flight in this atmosphere for over 125 years, long before the Reclamation War that annihilated the United States Air Force.
"Amina, Thomas, charge status?"
"85, boss," Amina replied.
"60 and dropping," Thomas replied. "Can I hook up?"
"Can you?" Megan asked in retort; she was more the stickler for proper speech than most Magi, and the distinction between 'can' and 'may' in such a question was one of her sticking points.
"Real funny, boss lady," Thomas pulled a cord from the power distributor on the fusion reactor pack to plug his armor in.
"Wait, is that rain?" Amina asked after a few moments trudging.
"It never rains in the Magi Armed Forces, it rains on the Magi Armed Forces," Thomas replied.
"Shut up and keep marching, we've a long way to go before we get out of the jungle and into the desert."
-x-x-x-
(11 April CE 72, 0745 Hours)
(Mendel Colony, Industrial Block 5, Handel Manufacturing)
Flay wasn't the first in to work, she never was, which actually relieved her of the task of setting up the office coffee for the morning. Since Flay didn't drink coffee, this worked to her benefit since she didn't know how to make it in the first place.
"Morning," the secretary-receptionist said as she entered and locked the front door behind her.
"Morning," Flay replied with a hint of cheer to her voice. Her vacation had recharged her soul, but being back in her own bed had recharged her body, and the combination had lit her up.
"Coffee?" Feisel offered her a cup from the credenza behind the front reception counter.
"Feisel," she chided.
"Sorry, gotta keep trying. It's a moral obligation," he admitted.
Flay scowled as she sat down and keyed her computer on. "You wouldn't happen to have a relative in the coffee business, would you?" she asked innocently.
"Well," he hedged for a few moments. "Okay, yeah, my brother owns a roasting center in Colombia. I get it at a discount, but..."
"Gotta gin up new business for the family, eh?" Flay asked in counter. "Sorry amigo, I have enough bad habits without adding coffee to the list."
"You keep saying that, but you never say what you count as a bad habit," he prompted...
...and Flay saw right through it, as she usually did. "I don't ask about your lengthy list of bad habits. Or should I?"
Feisel took the hint and backed off with a grimace. "Okay, you win. Can I ask about your trip?"
"You may, and I'll say I spent a lot of time on a lounge chair or in a pool, when I wasn't conducting business meetings," Flay admitted.
"Are you allowed to talk about that?"
Flay entered her username and password into her terminal before she responded. "If you're asking about the business deals, it's nothing big, just the final checks of my father's estate." Feisel said nothing; he knew who Flay's father was, but he did not wish such an ill on anyone, even the daughter of a disdained enemy. "On the part about sunbathing and skinny-dipping, well, your imagination is your own worst enemy," she declared sadistically with an included half-truth for effect. She had tanned with varying levels of clothing, but she always swam with at least a bikini, and Feisel would never know better.
"Oh my, you have guys pegged," he admitted.
Flay decided it was time to divert from the derailment of the standing conversation. "What did I miss?"
"Three weeks of the usual ration in the usual fashion," Feisel answered.
"That's it?" Flay asked in response.
"Yeah, nothing special going on this week, the aerospace firms seem to have settled down from their contracting and buying frenzy."
"If we don't get hammered again, I'm not going to complain," Flay replied unsteadily.
"I agree," the boss said from her door. "Business was exceptionally good, but there is such a thing as 'too much of a good thing'. On that note, how did your trip go?"
"I have everything squared away, trustee status, the whole nine yards," Flay said. "It's on autopilot if anything happens to me, and I have nieces that could stand to inherit it." The sister in question surpassed even Flay's wildest expectations of bitchiness; Flay had been away from the family for years, and said sister was directly stating that father had died because of her. Flay didn't outright deny it, but she didn't want to take that from anyone, much less her somewhat-estranged sister. The will said the estate went to Flay, and Flay said it went next to the nieces, end of story.
"Well, these are interesting times we live in," the boss said. "Anyway, I won't ask much today from you, Flay, just spend it getting caught up and prepared for the next hurricane."
"Something coming?" Flay asked innocently.
"We may be supplying machinery or parts for some new and pretty nasty projects coming down the pipe," the boss replied. "I don't particularly trust Mendel, or the Magi, but they do have a way with infantry that I wouldn't want to see used against me."
"Infantry?" Flay asked, now shocked. "What would Mendel want with—"
"Same thing everyone else wants with infantry, Flay," Feisel, formerly a ZAFT vehicle technician, replied evenly. "Military forces aren't mobile suits or warships. The bulk of ZAFT was infantry and logistics, the warships and MS forces were maybe 10 percent of the total force size."
"Oh," Flay filed that fact into the back of her head for future reference. "Is this about that weird battle armor project I keep hearing about?"
"I don't know, and I'm not going to guess," the boss said. "Just recover and reorganize for the day, girl. We'll worry about tomorrow on the morrow."
-x-x-x-
(11 April CE 72, 1115 Hours Lima (local) time)
(Orb Military Training Facility 2, Urban Operations Assault Course, Onogoro Island)
The perimeter sentry on the north end of the warehouse looked hard at the surrounding buildings, but as usual he saw nothing. He knew there would be an exercise, and the first warning the team would have would be what warning he could give before someone shot him, but the attack may not be coming from the north, or so had said the briefing. His eyes passed over the two-story brick rise north of the guarded building, and once convinced there was nothing within or around, he began searching for hints of the incoming OpFor to the northeast.
The sound of the bolt clicks were relatively quiet, but in the eerie silence of the training ground they were no less frightening than an actual gunshot would have been. The impact of the simunitions on his back and shoulder, followed quickly by the immediate sting and trailing numbness, only served to remind him that being shot sucked. He had taken a round during a live-fire exercise last year, and though far less painful the simunitions were not pleasant. As per the exercise, he dropped to the ground in a decent simulacrum of being shot and slain immediately; he could not warn his comrades, he was theoretically dead before his body would have hit the ground.
The approach of the OpFor from his rear, what would have been the northwest, was somewhat surprising. Even more so was when one of the enemy operators stopped to check him. "You okay, kid?"
"Mendel's new simunitions hurt like hell, and how the fuck did you get in behind me?" the downed sentry asked.
"It's my job, amigo," the operator replied quietly as he stripped off the sentry's radio and attached it to the back of his gear harness. The lapel microphone went over the left side, to prevent confusion with his own radio on the right side.
"These ain't your daddy's rubber rounds," the OpFor heavy weps specialist said as he approached carefully. "3 side is clear, sniper took that guard hard."
"Finally, we can train at realistic combat ranges," the scout on the team said. "Hooray for materials sciences we've never imagined, much less tried." The scout finished by stripping the rifle and magazine harness off the sentry, which was a different rifle from what the OpFor carried. "Now play a good dead soldier, comrade, and I'll only charge you one beer for looking the wrong way."
"You say so, Corporal," the downed sentry grumped.
"Team, form up on the two-three corner, we need to move it up," the expected element commander ordered. He was armed as a standard infantryman would be, albeit with different weapons overall from Orb's mainstay firearms. Strangely, none of the force were carrying Mendel weapons, either, which ran the gamut from absurdly anachronistic (M4 assault rifles and M2 Heavy machine guns) to extremely advanced (L75 Infantry Support Lasers, Rorynex RM-3/XXXVI PDW sub-machineguns). That simple fact meant this was a different force from any nominal Mendel Special Operations teams, but they weren't armed or acting like Orb personnel...
"Stacked on corner," the scout said. "Viewscope check shows no tango."
"Go," the commander ordered. The team began moving as one, first turning the corner, then moving in a prearranged pattern to cover all zones of possible enemy threat. "Door, unit stack," same commander ordered.
"Stacked, door is negative open," the scout replied.
"Breach and bang," the commander ordered, his rifle trained outward toward other nearby buildings.
Ten seconds elapsed: "Breaching charge laid," the demolitions expert reported.
"Go in five," the OpFor commander ordered. All persons in the stack took several steps back and turned their off-shoulder to the door.
The charge planted was a 'safe' charge, a door breacher with a containing frame that disintegrated into harmless plastic bits when fired. Five seconds after the go-code was given, the charge detonated and cut the lock clean off the door to which it was attached. The door was kicked in the rest of the way, as the scout, heavy weapons officer and demolition expert each threw in a pair of flashbangs. The cacophony of minor explosions and flashes served to drive most of the guards inside into a form of mental overload, whereby they could only stare at the blown-open door as the team entered and began firing on them.
Inside the warehouse, the scout entered and continued forward down the wall he encountered immediately inside the door, allowing the number-two man to go left and silence the open-area threats. The scout only had one tango in his immediate sweep zone, a rather good-looking female soldier wearing the 'blue' hat of a defender; despite the lack of a weapon, their orders were to silence all opposition, so she received a pair of 6.2mm rounds in the center of her chest. With the ringing in everyone's ears from the flashbangs, nobody heard the shots from the suppressed weapon.
The heavy weapons officer had the second entry billet and as soon as he entered he knew he packed the right gun for the job. The RK-40A1 light machine gun was loosely based on the RPD LMG of old Soviet fame, chambered to a 6.2mm rifle round instead of the old 7.62x54 Russian. It lost a little in range from its ancestry, but made up for it in lighter and more compact ammunition. Which was also a good thing, because the weapon had a 900-RPM fire rate that could easily burn through ammunition faster than two guys could gang belts of it together. When he brought the gun up and onto the first of four targets in the table-crowded southern expanse of the warehouse, he centered on the leftmost (and nearest) of the threats and loosed a pair of rounds. With two tags on his chest, he traversed right and onto the next nearest threat, fired another pair, traversed, fired a double-pair on one that was beginning to move. The fourth of the persons among the tables was engaged by the scout, two of the rifle-armed troops, and his heavy machine gun, leading to what would be a bloody mess had this been real combat and not a simulation.
"Clear left!" the heavy weps officer said.
"Clear fore!" the scout said, his weapon trained on the hallway that led into the northern office maze of this warehouse building. "Sorry, honey," he said to the lady after he approached and knelt down next to her.
"That hurt, man, did you have to hit my solar plexus?" she asked, rubbing the points of impact and smearing the paint from the rounds all over the cleavage valley of her BDU shirt.
"I do as I train," the scout admitted as he hurriedly rolled her over to check her back or pockets for anything of interest.
"So who's buying who the beers for this one?" she asked the scout as he was patting down her butt pockets.
"No intel on this tango," the scout said on his radio channel. "We'll hash out beers at 1430 after the debrief," he said quietly to the downed lady.
"Radio, rifle, demo, check the south tangos. Heavy, base of fire on the unsecured corridor; scout, stop playing with the downed tango."
"Way ahead of you amigo," the heavy weapons officer replied to take the heat off the Scout. He had dropped down the bipod for his LMG and braced on a table, his sights tracing back and forth across the doorway involved.
The crack of a somewhat-nearby sniper rifle was followed by a muttered 'damn' and a body collapsing to the ground outside the door. "Sniper reporting one tango down outside the door. Vanilla weps package, nothing important on the body."
The RK-40 ripped a ten-round burst into the corridor, centered on one of two soldiers coming their way; the first guy took six hits, the second barely managed to get out of the way of the burst by hugging the corridor wall. It didn't do him much good, though, as the LMG fired two- and three-round bursts down the same bearing to suppress any attempt to approach. His presence was answered by a grenade lobbed down the hallway; after three seconds, the sound of a large paint splat hailed the end of that threat.
"South checked, no intel or critical items on tangos. Pictures taken of projects."
"Unit, stack and prepare to clear office area," the commander ordered.
Another crack from a sniper's rifle presaged the sound of return fire from some sort of response team outside. The fire did not last long, however, as within five seconds the automatic fire ceased. "Sniper reporting, three-man heavy weps team is down."
"Snipers: reach out and touch somebody," the Scout said.
"Stack, deploy," the commander ordered.
The team began moving down the hallway, with a pair of them entering the one office to the west with a doorway in the main hallway, the remainder moving forward and to the east to clear the last two rooms. No other persons were encountered in the offices, though they picked up the necessary documents that were the objective of the operation. With nothing left for them to kill, a pyrotechnic simulation device was dropped in the office area, one that would create a plume of red smoke to show a dead building.
When the last of the troopers existed the building, a stopwatch was clicked. "Simulation completed. Total time, 2 minutes 26-point-three seconds," Colonel Kisaka said. "Defense, come on out," he half-shouted into the building.
"Man, you guys don't play fair," the northern sentry said. "Silenced SMG?" he asked.
"H&K MP-8 series," the scout said.
The rest of the defense had exited the simulated warehouse, though none of them were looking pleased with the complete blowout loss they had suffered. "Who the hell are these guys, Colonel Kisaka? They ain't like any infantry I've ever faced," the titular 'defense commander' asked.
"USSA Special Forces," Ledonir Kisaka said evenly.
"You guys are training your teams up against us, and we're training against you guys, in preparation for upcoming training against Mendel and operations against Blue Cosmos," the assault team commander said as he pulled his balaclava hood. "Major Pedro Samuel Rigos, USSA Argentine Special Forces," he said, offering his hand to shake with the defense commander.
"No wonder we got hosed," the Lieutenant said warily before he took the offered shake. "Good luck going against Mendel. BC will be a cakewalk compared to what I keep hearing about their Spec Ops people."
"Aren't you a bit old for Ghost stories?" the Major asked in counter, though to anyone listening his voice held more than a hint of worry.
As the group of victorious Argentine Special Forces and defeated Orb infantry began moving away from the warehouse, none of the personnel noticed a shadow on the inside of the west warehouse wall shifted slightly. The light reflecting off the wall was temporarily distorted by the movement, but after the movement stopped the distortion became unrecognizable from the rest of the shadow.
-x-x-x-
(13 April CE 72, 1800 Hours)
(Commercial Block 4, Mendel Colony, Holly's Bistro)
"Pepsi, no ice, please," Flay requested from the waitress. After she departed; "Welcome to Mendel," she said to the three occupants of the booth. "Flay Allster; I'm your contact. Code-word is 'ambiguous'. Now before I begin, any questions?"
"Do they honestly expect to stop us if they let us in so readily?" the eldest of the three persons at the table asked.
"Yes, actually," Flay replied. "You will need actual anti-armor weapons to take out the Armored Infantry, if you're so inclined. Personally, I say it's a death warrant if you try. Four teams already made that mistake, I suggest you don't follow that highway to hell."
"You say so," the same guy replied. "Barry, Ops div."
"Jeane, Intel div," the lady across from Flay said.
"Rico, Ops div."
"Have you been briefed on how things will work out here?" Flay asked.
"No," Rico admitted.
"I have," Jeane replied.
"Okay, listen up. Mendel is a special case; you are not autonomous up here. You report to me for anything more noisy than passive spying. If I say 'no', it doesn't mean 'later', it means 'don't do it'. If I say 'yes', you do it right, you do it smart, and you get the hell off this colony before the hammer drops on your head. Clear?"
"What the hell manner of shit is this? I always work autonomous," Barry said peevishly.
"Barry, this isn't Manaus, Berlin or even Onogoro," Flay chided him, using his own operations record against him. "This is Mendel. There is practically zero support for the creed up here. They outright kill terrorists on sight whenever possible, and they execute the survivors publicly in a very bloody spectacle. If you get caught, the only right you will have is the right to choose how they execute you. Now, if you're not going to do as I order when I order it, pack your shit up and get off this colony. You can be a loose cannon in terrestrial ops, maybe in Copernicus, but not here in Mendel."
"And who made you Commander? You're just a trumped-up radio wench turned secretary," Barry replied.
"My orders are from Lord Djibril, dumbass," Flay replied, calling on all her invective skills to counter his attitude. She didn't normally use foul language, and it showed. "If you blow this, I will personally report to him where you screwed up and why. And, if by some God-given miracle you survive Mendel's wrath, you get to deal with 'the boss' next."
"Okay, okay," he raised one hand to signal surrender. "What are our orders?"
"Ingrain yourselves into society," Flay ordered. She fell silent as the waitress approached with her drink. "I will have the Reuben sandwich with potato chips, please," she requested. Once she left, Flay continued. "You know how to blend in. Mendel is very tolerant of immigrants, so slowly adjust yourselves to living here but keep a quirk or two from home for good measure. Everyone does," she said, showing a little of her home-town accent. "Mendel is accepting of being armed; I carry no less than two pieces a day," Flay admitted. "Whether or not you are armed is your choice, there is a vocal minority of people here who want guns banned but they get laughed at frequently. I recommend an unobtrusive pistol or revolver, but shotguns and rifles are not unheard of."
"That's good," Jeane said. "I got used to carrying in Denver, crime rate is atrocious down there."
"I was told the bulk of what's going on for the next few months is going to be pre-positioning work. Get yourselves decent jobs in your trained trade, and enjoy the nightlife around here. It's busy, trust me," Flay said. She partied at least once a week with the other ladies from her office, which worked out for her personally as much as it did keep her cover going.
"And what about loose ops? Or is all this under an ops schedule?" Rico asked, partly to verify and partly to end the debate as to who was in command.
"We do nothing until I receive orders," Flay answered. "Except for gathering intel, which you are to pass on through the chain of command. They will tell me what needs to be hit and when to do it; you take no violent action until then. Clear?"
"Understood," Barry replied peevishly. Flay knew this was probably going to end badly, but her clout wasn't completely established in the upper ranks and she couldn't get someone arbitrarily reassigned...yet.
"And our quota?" Jeane asked.
"The quota is suspended in Mendel ops," Flay replied evenly. She thought it was stupid to begin with, requiring every member of Blue Cosmos to contribute to the death of at least one Coordinator a month, but she also saw the logic in it. Such a numbers game weeded out the lazy pussies and the chick-chasers real fast, leaving only room for those who knew what the job was and were willing to do it. "Trying to execute the quota up here would be nothing more than a meat grinder to turn incoming cells into gritty hamburger. We have to hit them heavily, in concentrated assaults that at least chance succeeding; you may be up here two weeks before the operation, or you may be here six months. Remember, Mendel has a Strategic Psionic; if you try randomly killing people, they will know and they will find you."
The three incoming cell commanders simply nodded. Flay said no more, but had only a thought: damn, I'm starting to sound like Mendel. This is troubling. Their meal was cheap but exquisite.
-x-x-x-
(18 April CE 72, 2100 Hours Lima (local) time)
(Earth Alliance territory, Atlantic Federation State of Mexico, roughly 80km northwest of Mexico City)
A small mountain existed northwest of Mexico City, surrounded on four sides by small towns, farmland and relatively sparse population. The mountain had nothing of real value to the residents of the area beyond a lot of trees and some animals. Jocotitlan was the closest and largest of the nearby towns, barely sprawling above 8000 persons, far from large enough to warrant a hazard of discovering four otherwise invisible Ghosts on the nearby mountain. The immense amount of broadleaf and specifically tejocote trees on the mountain would help prevent visual identification of the Ghosts, even by accident (no evidence showed a deliberate search, which was telling enough that they were unknown to the enemy thus far).
The unit had been mostly immobile for the past six hours, moving no farther than two kilometers circle from the peak of the mountain to scope out their area. Nothing was seen that made the area suspicious to the Ghosts, so they simply watched the movement of the mountain goats and observed the 'hustle' of the small towns nearby through high-power scopes on their various weapons. The actual purpose for their immobility was simple: a Base Nanomachine Generator had been set in place to carve out a full-facility intermediate outpost for Ghosts transiting the Colombia-Panama-Belize-Mexico-US march path. For those who routed southward (through southern Guatemala instead of Belize) an outpost was planned for the mountain-lands roughly 30 kilometers north of the town Tequila.
"Basic formation is done," SC Garibaldi said as she read over the control panel on the BNG pack they had carried. "Ready to step in?"
"Hell yeah, boss-lady," Ghost Officer Thomas replied.
"I will stand sentry for now," Hawk Longfeather said quietly.
"Six hours, Hawk," Megan Garibaldi said. "Don't worry about D-F (2) in these environs, no major military bases for 60 kilos; if you see trouble your radio at once for backup."
"Aff," he said before he released his connection to the fusion reactor they were powering from. "Ten hours of cloak."
The main entry was activated, which caused a weathered boulder to lever up mechanically and reveal the base entrance below. The main blast doors opened after Megan applied her codex to the control panel, and with that she stepped into the new bunker. It wasn't much, especially since it had only been under construction for 6 hours, but it was enough to conceal their presence and give them some creature comfort before they resumed the march. All the facilities would be ready in the next day, however, and that included geothermal power, showers, bunks for up to 3 points, a full kitchen, basic armor maintenance facilities, and best of all a nanomachine hive for the production or repair of necessary equipment.
"Well, at least it is out of sight and out of mind," Amina said. "Oh, armor cubes! (3) Can we get out of armor?"
"You may, though we have no showers and bunks for another four hours," Megan replied evenly.
"Screw it, I want to breathe some fresh air," Thomas said. "By the way, isn't this facility going to cause a thermal bloom to anyone looking at the mountain?"
"Nope," Amina replied in a muffled shout as her armor deactivated and began opening up for her to exit. When she had emerged from the armor, she immediately stretched to relieve the cramps and kinks caused by her armor. "We're ten meters underground, and the nanos have striated the rock above us into insulation layers that will mimic the temperatures around us. The only way they could see would be the entry, but that is hidden under a boulder."
"We are far enough south that even snow on the mountains is a rare occurrence," Megan said as she began slowly working out the kinks in her limbs from the armor. "Unless they know we're coming, they aren't going to see us or this outpost."
"Command, Hawk, I have activity to my south. Eyes on suggests civilian foot traffic."
"Hawk, Command, eyes on and ensure stealth," Megan replied.
"Command, negative tango approach," Hawk reported. "Three civvies, two female plus one, late teens, at a rock outcropping 300 meters south of base entry. Setting out a picnic."
"Bit late for that," Amina said but not on the radio.
"Not much of an adventurous side?" Megan asked plaintively as she shrugged into one of three bathrobes waiting for her in her cube. It was patently impossible to wear anything more than undergarments while in armor, due to the way the armor worked with the body to coordinate movements and actions.
"Huh?" Amina asked.
"I was born on Atreus in the 441 dimension of the old Empire," Megan said, a fact unknown to the others with her. "Mostly jungle, in the standard history it is the capital of the Free Worlds League. Fairly close to Terra in conditions. Atreus 441 has a population of 2.2 billion."
"That's quite a bit for one planet," Amina replied. Most planets had a population of 1.5 billion, give or take. 3 billion was considered extremely overcrowded.
"Good agriculture, good exports, and a few good cities," she replied. "FWL Atreus usually sucks on Agri, but..." she trailed off.
"But yeah, without a hostile environment, you get a population imbalance," Thomas said to cut the conversation right to the chase. "How much of an imbalance?"
"40-60 split," Megan admitted, meaning that out of 100 persons, 40 were male and 60 female. It was a known phenomenon among the Magi, where the common (Terran) population split was 45-55 split M/F, the planetary environment tended to change the ratio by as much as + or – 15 percent. It had been a point of contention in the early years of the Multimage Empire, and was only exacerbated by the Star Empire Wars (where despite 100 percent equality in the Empire's army the forces were still skewed 75 percent male), but now it was accepted and understood fact.
"That means 440 million ladies in limbo," Thomas said. "Or, as is common..."
"It's not all that common," Megan admitted. Stools and a card table had been set up by the BNG for temporary seating until it could go back and do the non-critical material builds (proper furniture, decorations, etc). "Love is a hard thing to share in a three-way marriage unless you're really willing to give that much. I saw quite a few try and fold, and I saw quite a few rock-solid ones. Two-ways were more common, by about 6-to-1 or so."
"I keep forgetting that is not illegal in the Empire, just on certain ultra-reactionary planets," Amina replied. "Wait, you?"
"Was," Megan said with a clear load of sadness to voice. "Husband, Marcus Keeves, wife, Celes Rickix. They were killed in a car wreck against the rear of a wheeled armored personnel carrier that ran a red light in downtown Columbus, on Atreus. I was spared death that day because I was in the back seat; the prow of the car went under the personnel door and decapped both." It went without saying that death was instantaneous for her husband and wife; such accidents were more common with cargo trucks but just as fatal. "It was the Dynasty ambassador to the planet, his driver had been drinking at the party they were just leaving. The ambassador was stone-cold sober, his driver was not, and she didn't know until after the Military Police had tested the driver for blood in his alcohol."
"Diplomatic immunity?" Thomas asked quietly. Usually these stories ended with the deportation of the drunkard; cases where the drunk was actually prosecuted and executed for his misdeeds were the blaring exception to the norm.
"Actually not," Megan replied. "All three of us were Commandos; Marcus and I were Assault Ghosts, Celes was an Armor Sniper and Support Mage. Our unit swore the bastard wouldn't make it off planet alive if it came to DI, but the Ambassador personally handed the fop over to us. His trial was by the book, and his execution was by Pentite Canister Rifle. You can guess how that ended."
"Messy," Amina replied. The Pentite Canister Rifle was similar to the ancient C-10 Canister Rifle used by Terran Dominion Ghosts (of which the Magi Ghosts were an upgraded version), but the Pentite used in the standard 60mm Grenade Canister was more powerful than the original C-10 by more than half. One direct hit against an unarmored human would turn them into a widely-distributed collection of bloody scraps and a fine pink mist. Multiple direct hits, such as in a firing squad execution by a very pissed-off unit of Ghosts, only reduced the amount of bloody scraps and increased the dispersion of the pink mist.
"Wait, if you were on Atreus 441, how the hell did you end up in the Marine forces of the Mjolnr?" Thomas asked.
"Transfer. With the death of my husband and wife, I didn't see much reason to hang around. I asked for a random posting, I got this. And I'm glad I got it."
-x-x-x-
(16 April CE 72, 1700 Hours)
(Commercial Block 3, Mendel Colony, Sniper Bar and Grill)
"What'll it be?" the bartender in the central bar area asked.
"Scotch and rocks," Flay replied. She wasn't particularly a fan of drinking, but she did go out occasionally with the other office staff if for no other reason than to maintain the appearance of being an ordinary girl.
"Sweet Tart," Lunele answered a moment later.
"So, what are we looking at today?" Flay asked.
"What are you looking at?" Lunele asked in reply.
"I dunno, I always look for the real dark horse candidates," she admitted. "The ones that look like they aren't worth the time of day at 20 meters."
Luna grimaced. "Most of them aren't worth the time of day."
"Most of the Fabio-looking ones are good for bedtime fun and not much else," Flay said deadpan. The guy sitting next to her chuckled grimly at the comment but said nothing.
"Looking a little farther down the line than just the dating or entertainment scene?"
"And you don't?" Flay asked in counter.
"Nah, not for now. I'm twenty, plenty of time to make a choice like that," she admitted. "I take it you lost a good one," she asked after a few sips of her drink.
"Yeah, more than one," she admitted. "Was an Earth Alliance soldier on the same ship as me."
"Archangel?" Lunele asked for clarification.
"Yeah, I was transferred off the ship, he wasn't. I thought he died at Alaska, but the ship turned up in Orb, having defected. I think he's still alive, but probably betrothed to someone else now," Flay admitted.
"And the other?" Lunele seemed to be dwelling on a guy across the building. Flay couldn't tell who it was at a table of four, but she guessed it wasn't the token fat guy in the bar.
"Well, I was considering going out with the second before Heliopolis happened, but we went our separate ways when I met the first," she admitted. "Not giving names though, to protect the innocent in that incident."
Both were silent as they scoped out the crowd in the bar, though Flay had already decided that there wasn't anyone inside that she seemed the least bit interested in. Maintaining illusions was all and well, but this would end a night of nothing more than scotch and rocks and catcalls. Her second drink was the same way, though she made note that some military personnel had entered in their 'duty uniforms' and had taken seats to her left and slightly behind.
"Still looking over there," Lunele said.
"If I may make sure of one thing?" Flay asked, using a slightly more stylized Mendel phrasing to work her way further into blending in.
"Hit me," the executive secretary replied almost immediately.
"You're not...with the boss, are you?" Flay asked almost hesitatingly.
"Wait, what?" Lunele looked at the receptionist with a confused mien. "Serious? Where did you get that?"
"That little kiss you gave him yesterday, little after 2 PM," Flay countered.
"Oh, that was for the contract we just picked up, you know, for the subcontracting on the new Battle Armors. You think we – I – him?"
"I thought possible, but not likely," Flay replied.
"No, not at all. He's old enough to be my dad, and his wife is smokin' hot. I don't think Tina could get his attention if she showed up in a bikini." Tina was the Purchasing Coordinator for the office and maintenance groups, and Flay had to admit she was a bit jealous of said Coordinator's figure. Just a little, she would hedge, since hers worked for her well enough to get Kira's attention.
"That would chronically distract the floor teams," Flay grumped. Even as far as she concerned over the perversion of the guys, the floor crew were a generally horny bunch. They watched their step around the ladies, especially Flay since she carried a readily-visible 9mm pistol, but the catcalls and looks were always there. Nothing really demur, nothing that was directly degrading (Flay actually welcomed the attention), but it was notable.
"Er, right," Lunele grimaced. "We don't need them in the office, for sure."
"Toast to that," and Flay raised her glass. The two ladies drew a little attention from the patrons, but nothing came of it.
"You see anything you're going to try?" the Exec Sec asked.
"I may have an idea, but I'm not going to play that one tonight," Flay said, barely looking over her left shoulder at the table now occupied by a bunch of military. Three she recognized as pilots, the pilots of the Forbidden, Raider, and Calamity. The one with the pink hair was hanging all over a lady she didn't recognize, but the other two looked like they were unattached...
Author's Chapter Afterword:
This is where the first side story of the Jokers Wild begins.
Covert Operations are one thing that I have a lot of inspiration for. Documentaries on the various black military and clandestine operations gives a good (if wildly incomplete) picture on how it is done. Tom Clancy provides the foremost inspiration from fictional source on how to interweave political, military, and espionage into a cohesive whole. Gundam SEED and SEED Destiny gives us plenty of reason to exercise all of the above – and multiple parties to use them on.
The greatest challenge of DFA is the background. SEED provides plenty of reason to use black ops, but often we only see the aftermath, not the actual operations. The Multimage Chronicles provides plenty of method to deliver those Black Ops, but often the outright warfare overshadows the necessity of clandestine ops. Interweaving these two elements into a cohesive showing of the black operations is the great challenge, and after a couple reads through this chapter I think I got it mostly right. A little polishing on the tactical application, a lot of polishing on the espionage, and this threatens to be as messy and charged as I can possibly make it.
NOTICE: I hope you saw the lack of 'James Bond' or any such expies in this chapter. I also hope it registered that there is no James Bond in this story, and if he does show up, well, M will be looking for a replacement in short order. I will admit the 007 movies are a fun watch, especially the most recent ones that have real gritty spy-novel twists to the plot, but this story is no territory for the suave or sophisticated. Tuxedos are still in closets and Martinis are not on tap in a world standing on the razor's edge of all-out race war. This is a job for the true professionals of intelligence gathering and clandestine operation; the glorified hitman can have his martini (shaken, not stirred, of course) and sulk while the real espionage work gets done.
Also, keep in mind the paramilitary and special operations angles shown here. Ghost Team 6 is an Assault Ghost formation; they are not particularly set up for the close-in espionage operations of the Recon Ghosts. On the other hand, they are trained and outfitted to get up close and real personal with things the command section need destroyed, so you can expect that angle in play. The USSA has already recommissioned their Special Operations Directorate (Read: they tracked the crazies down in the mountains and told them the EA lost), and now the USSA and Orb Special Forces are cross-training as part of the new-found detente in the 'second-string nations'. Orb, USSA, and the Mendel Protectorate have an under-the-table military relations codicil that the three nations intend on playing long and hard to achieve their separate but parallel ends, even despite the overwhelming advantages the EA and ZAFT hold against them.
And then there is the wild card: Blue Cosmos. Only they know what they want, only they know how they are going to do it, and thus far Mendel does not have penetration to their command level. This makes things dicey for the colony nation; where ZAFT has size and defensive depth to its advantages, Mendel does not, a sad state of affairs for an Empire that relies on its defensive game to win the wars. Flay acts as their controller in Mendel and their main purveyor of influence, but to what level of faith she has in the organization, only her heart knows. With events outside her purview likely to change her course, how will she end her part on the stage of the Cosmic Era? Pawn to Djibril? Reformed citizen of Mendel? Patriot of Orb, purveyor of neutrality and honor? In a convent, reformed of ways? I leave that up to your imagination for the time being, for I certainly do not know.
Thus ends the inaugural chapter of the new Dilemma of Flay Allster.
NEXT UP: Operations planetside continue in the great game of espionage; in Mendel, Flay begins establishing a tangled web of spies and intrigue, hoping to ensnare a prime source of intelligence in the same unit as the infamous Century Commander, Gerald Lightbringer. Will Flay spin her web true, or fail to catch this fly?
Review Replies: Though this is the first chapter, it is ultimately a revised story from the original. Thus, I believe replies are due to the last reviews from the original:
FraserMage: (Original Review): Good... I dislike Rau... Erm Rey anyway.
"FraserMage: As the Jokers Wild story goes onward, the matter with the large machines and the USSA using a lot of Newtypes will only get more prolific. Every army has their 'toys' when you get down to it."
Hmm... Did the Destroys even appear in this? (Maybe they did maybe they didnt... Though it would be fun to see a Mendel Tricked out Version of em..
REPLY: In the original, the Destroy Gundams made a minor showing, but where they really showed was cut off twice. When ZAFT assaulted the moon in Destiny, BC had plenty of time to complete five such machines; Mendel started with the moon, and only one was combat ready. The Bonaparte and its prototype machine made itself real scarce during the invasion of Terra, and as such its machine was never pout into action before the land battleship was surrounded and captured. The four at Heavens Base were damaged beyond repair due to the suborbital bombardment from the Mjolnr and Nirvana Celeste, and as such never saw action.
The art of war shows us that the best action is to deny the enemy the use of his best troops. Mendel teaches The Art of War to every soldier that goes through its academy, and how to apply it dynamically. Simple conclusion, ne?
One-Village-Idiot: (Original Review): Very nice. I only have two question: One, why does gerard prefer the heat saber? I always assumed that beam sabers were better, or maybe even Epyon's beam sowrd. What's your logic behind that?
And two, did Minerva actually recieve the signal and they ignored it, or did they somehow not hear it?
Man oh man, you always give some surpirses. when it comes to being unpredictable, you take first place.
Later.
REPLY: (1): Gerard uses a heat saber from Kika's Dom Tropen because it is inferior to beam sabers, and for the symbolism. Not only is he chopping up their d00dz, he's doing it with a weapon that is technically wildly outdated. Their pain shall be twofold.
(2): Minerva heard the transmission in question, they had their orders and the Dominion was standing in the way. Of course, since Gerald cheats by default, they didn't quite meet their operation objectives...
(3): I love suprises, don't you? (teehee :)
Knives91: (Original Review): Yeah... I'm sure that it's pure coincidence...
Most excellent work. Nice battles too. More please.
REPLY: It has been so long, I have no clue what the coincidence was supposed to be.
Hope this qualifies as the opening to the request of 'more please' you like to see, amigo, because I guarantee there will be more of it to come :)
Deathzealot: (Original Review): HOLY FUCK! About time Shinn got what is coming to him. I see you kept the two GuAIZ R units the Minerva had during the first two episodes. I would think they would have been killed after Armory One. Rei is someone I never liked, so no skin of my back, but I do like the Hawke Sisters and Arthur was someone I always laughed at. Anyways a great chapter. I would love to see what happens to the others after this.
REPLY: Wow, if I get an allcaps HOLY FUCK for a review, I can only assume I have done something right :)
Kicking Shin's Ego down the stairs and stealing its lunch money was a goal after all the whining angst of Destiny. I'm over it now, but expect at least some of his conduct to show through in this story.
Those are actually not the GuAIZ from Armory One, remember that the first 4 chapters of Destiny were unchanged in the original Flight of Jokers Wild. Won't happen that way this time, but the same principle still applies: you can expect the Minerva will receive reinforcements as operations continue.
Rey, well, Rey rolled bad dice, and suffered a bad fate. Gerald seems to be one for handing such things out, though. Wonder if he will still get his end in this one, or not?
The other members of the crew will get some much-needed airtime in this side story, and maybe even some in the mainline Flight. Haven't done the dice yet for that one. As to what happens next, well, history has already been rewritten, so you can expect the Destiny itself to be altered just the same (or even stranger).
Mantaarms1989: (Original Review): Dang...
Nice response: Lots of action, Loved Gerard's Comeback to Captain Gladys.
Not-so-nice Response: The death of Za-Burrel was a little over the top. You may need to change the rating of this one to "m" because of that.
REPLY: Gerald is an old-school hardass of the first order; he showed some of that in Legend (particularly chapter 12, despite my fouling of other elements) and will show some more. His tale, however, is part and parcel with the Multimage Chronicles; expect him to truly earn his title 'Archangel of Solace' in those works and related side stories.
On the other part, well, I don't count chopping someone in half as requiring a 'M' rating; you get to see that on Die Hard With A Vengeance, and that is shown on broadcast television. If it flies on the basic channels (or the less risque cable channels), it can fly with a T rating as far as I can tell. Of course, this story may get a 'M' rating for elements to come, but I'm listing it as 'T' for now.
THANK YOU ALL FOR THE INSPIRATION TO REDO THIS SIDE STORY! It is the reviews that fuel the soul, and it is the reviews that give me new ideas, fresh blood to which I can apply. Keep the reviews coming, this bonfire is just getting started!
The Gripe Sheet: No gripes yet, though one outstanding comment from Necroblade, my honored (and overworked) beta reader.
The use of Flashbangs in the entry phase of the assault on the warehouse was due to the mission profile. The Argentine Spec Ops mission was recon-in-force, snatch and extract any key intel from location. The use of fragmentation grenades tends to be very unhealthy to things your command section may want to be extracted, so the use of NFDs on entry is preferable. The one 'frag' they tossed (a paint bomb) was due to defense terrain favoring the blue side, they had to flush a particularly nasty entrenched foe, and the only way to do it with zero friendlies down was a frag.
Footnotes:
(1): Walking Second refers to walking in the number 2 position in a column. The number one position is properly called Walking Point, though is more often called 'Sniper Baiting'.
(2): D-F Is military shorthand for Directional Finding, using multiple interception systems to triangulate the transmission location.
(3): Armor Cubes is a shorthand for Armor Cubicles, individual partitions for housing Infantry Armor (or, in this case, Ghost Armor) and the various weapons and accessories that normally go along with the armor (shield, infantry weapons, support weapons, ammunition harnesses, backpacks, etc).