(Sigma Mercenaries, Story 0002, Chapter 4: Unstated Rivalry)
(28 March, Magi Year 14408 / Year SL 8838, 0605 Hours Local Time)
(Hess' Quarters, Administration Building 4th Floor, Base Boarhound, Terra 232)
(Day 11 of Campaign)
"Not doing morning workout today?" Sidonia asked after she entered the boss' apartment.
"Nope, we have a project," Hess said. "You can pull your armor and set it on the table, but keep your pistol belt, harness, and drop legs. We'll be doing plenty of lifting here shortly."
"Why not all of the gear?" Toni asked after she was part way into her body armor.
"Work your way slowly into doing tasks in a full gearset," Hess cautioned the three SSO troops in front of him. "It took me years to get properly used to doing common tasks with full vest and arms. And I did injure myself once or twice building up that tolerance."
"Oh," SSO Rasine T. said from behind Sidonia. Hess hadn't worked with her much yet, she had a habit of working the night shift thus far, guarding the halls and rooms during the dark for everyone else to sleep peaceably. This was, technically, the end of her day, and for that Hess felt a little guilty having her on this task, but not enough to call her off.
"So, what's the beef?" SSO Asuka L. asked.
"An armory and proper barracks for the SSO group," Sigma One flicked a diagram from his tablet to the main monitor in his room, which displayed it at maximum scale for the four SSO operators to see.
"That?" Sidonia said. "I think I can like that."
"We're going to do this in several phases. First round is the actual armory racks, storage, and bunks." Virtue highlighted those fixtures. "Second round, we expand the physical dimensions of the room by merging it with an unused neighboring apartment," Again, Virtue illustrated the changes by highlighting. "This will increase floor space by 120 percent. Third phase, we upgrade bathrooms in both sections, merging them into one communal bath, shower, water closet, and a sauna at the end." Virtue highlighted each section in turn. "When I developed this plan, I intended new fixtures and equipment, but we can use salvage from the Trains if you want it and redirect the budget into something else."
"The showers in the Trains were decent, the bedrooms acceptable but we can do better," Sidonia grumped.
"My back says we do better," Asuka replied tartly. "I say we pull salvage from the Trains for use in the bathroom, but get some real beds."
"Works for me. It'll be a week or two before we do the bathroom work, so the Scrap Team can get us the goods," Hess finalized that part of the plan. "We'll determine exact placement and requirements at that time based on the salvage on hand. Fourth Phase, in the second half of the apartment we will clear out this executive area and replace with a proper kitchen and dining area suitable for the crew."
"Hope you're going to let us do some cooking for the command level, sir," Rasine said with a smile.
"Well, that, or we let Clint loose in the galley, the scrawny one can cook almost at the professional level, and Clarence, Victoria or myself are not slouches behind the counter either. Virtue, include an interdimensional food dispenser in the plans as well."
"Already included, as is another ScrapNet Interface in the armory section," Virtue highlighted the former in red and the latter in green.
"Phase five is lighting, electrical, monitors, furnishings, glory cases, and miscellaneous odds and ends. Expectation is that we will work on this in groups in sections, rotating schedule every three or four days depending on operations load to allow for directed workouts or training in the mornings. Any questions?"
"No sir!" Toni responded for the other SSO troops.
"Prepare to flex your backs, people," Erich said heartily as he stood up from the head of the table. "Everything in the starter room comes out in the next hour, to be stored for sale in ScrapNet."
-x-
(30 Mins Later)
(SSO Barracks Western Half)
"Last item. Last stinking item," Rasine grumped. "And it had to be the big one."
"Of course," Hess said with a smile. "Misery spreads itself out across a length of time. True pain always waits until the end of the task."
"This thing isn't going to fit on the smaller ScrapNet Pad we have up here," Sidonia pointed out the obvious mahogany elephant in the room.
"It isn't going to fit out the door without disassembly," Toni guessed.
"We will disassemble and stack the components on the smaller pad for storage purpose," Hess said. "Asuka, the screwgun please?"
"How do we do this?" Rasine asked as Hess looked up under the table.
"Roll it to one side, unscrew the table columns in the center, separate the top surface from the columns, and disassemble for shipment. I'll roll it toward your side, set it down easy as it comes your way."
"Got it," Sidonia said. The balance of the table's weight would still be on the legs, but as the heavy top surface rolled in their direction it would be noticeably heavy.
"On three. One, two, three," Hess exhaled significantly as he pulled the table up and began rolling it sideways in their direction.
The table and chair sets used by the Star League for their Executive Officers Quarters were both very utilitarian and rather well designed, a combination that was contrary to what Hess expected from the normally dumbass Star League. The tables were built in a 'monopod' configuration, a single series of columns in the center of the table supported the surface and branched down to some rather heavy feet. With no legs at the corners or in the center, and with the feet positioned at 45 degree angles to the flat edges, maneuvering up and down the tables in roller chairs (office chairs) was relatively easy. The tables were made of a rather heavy hardwood, Hess figured Mahogany or Ironwood offhand, meaning that a table suited to seat roughly 24 persons weighed in at almost a ton. The fasteners in use on the tables were not light-duty screws, he figured the lag bolts in use as hardened steel, possibly tool-grade steel, with hardened and anodized washers to ensure a good solid bond. If nothing else, he figured it entirely possible to run a dance party on top of the table with little or no risk of the table collapsing under the dancers.
Of course, at nearly a ton weight overall, it took all five of the persons involved to lower the table to its long edge and expose all the bolts for disassembly. "Oh wow!" Asuka grumped. "They built this thing HEAVY!"
"Can't accuse them of screwing everything up," Toni said.
"This may be one of their few legacies worth talking about," Hess acknowledged the point. "Virtue, do you have schematics on this mighty piece of furniture? I could see these being an interesting skilled craft export once we get a proper logging and foresting industry up and running."
"Confirmed, the designs are part of an old military database, they are not copyrighted or patented."
Sigma One started with the lower bolts on the center column, the bolts facing the ground, and removed those six fairly easily. The two end bolts on the pedestal were also easily removed, but after the second of the middle bolts came out the remaining lag bolts groaned in protest. "Change of plans. Toni, Sidonia, on this side and support the ends of the center column. Asuka, Rasine, keep the surface braced and perpendicular to the ground. If we do this wrong, it will destroy itself under its own mass."
"Right," Asuka answered as she took more of the surface load while Toni and Sidonia shifted around to the back of the table.
"Ready, sir," Sidonia said after she took a grip.
Hess worked his way out from the center, two, then two, then the last two one by one. After he loosed the fifth bolt, it took both Sidonia and Toni to keep that end propped up, while the big guy used his thigh to brace the other end of the pedestal and used his arms to alternately lift it into alignment and unscrew the last lag bolt. When the last bolt cleared the frame under the table surface and released the pedestal to gravity, it took effort from all three on the bottom to prevent the pedestal from dropping.
"OKAY!" Toni shouted. "This is way the hell heavier than I thought it would be!"
"Probably about 750 pounds or so, 3/8s of a short ton," Hess gauged as they rotated the pedestal up to standing on its legs without the table surface on top of it. "The table in the annex section remains, so once we're done with this mother we are done with the superheavy objects," he consoled the help.
"And now for the surface," Sidonia said, projecting some air of resistance to the abuse.
"Now that I look at it without the pedestal in the way, this is a compression fitting object with eight fasteners," Hess said. "This will be very fast to disassemble. Remove the eight lag bolts and the table top falls apart into the frame and twelve slabs of surface material. Efficiency and sturdiness, I think I misgauged the craftsmanship on this one by quite a bit. Now, let's get this set up right: Sidonia, Asuka, Rasine, Toni," Sigma One indicated where he wanted each to stand. "Grab the two panels in front of you and get ready for this thing to disassemble itself in sections."
"Ready," Rasine said with a bit more gusto than she actually felt. She had volunteered for the task even against her inner dread of being one of the physically weaker of the SSO troops, but figured the effort was a given if she wanted to remain faithful to the group's' initial intention…
The first two lag bolts on the outside corners caused the entire table top to groan as tensions was released. The third lag bolt was partway up the frame toward the head of the table, and with it the end cap and the first two panels were loosed. Sidonia took quick control of these three easily enough, relieving pressure on the other three. The second central lag bolt loosed another three panels, two of which Asuka continued to prop up by hand and the third which fell back against her chest. Before he tackled the remaining central bolts, Hess removed the two end bolts at the head of the table, which loosed the rest of the compression against the central slabs, and the last two bolts were easy enough to remove and loose the panels.
"That's that, peeps." Sigma One used some box tape to tape the lag bolts for the tabletop frame to the inside of one of the frame rails. "Let's get the surface into the ScrapNet System, then we worry about the pedestal." Hess lifted the frame up onto his shoulder and started walking with it independent of any assistance.
"That frame has to be over 200 pounds, how the hell does he do it?" Sidonia asked nobody in particular after the boss was out of the room.
"Are we sure he's human?" Asuka asked.
"And I thought he was supposed to be out of shape," Rasine groused.
"He is out of shape," Toni confirmed. "Notice how you never see him run?"
"He can bench-press the back end of a compact car, but he can't run," Sidonia grumped. "Something is a bit wrong with him."
"Come on, these things aren't going to carry themselves down to the ScrapNet pad," Toni chided the SSO helpers. She walked hers over to the wall nearby the door, then lifted one and started walking with it.
Rasine sighed after Toni was out of the room. "You know she's not going to say it," Rasine said to Asuka.
"It's obvious," Sidonia interjected. "Personally, I'm a bit ambivalent on your conspiracy to keep them happy, but I'm also not one to be defeated so easily."
"A challenge, is it?" Asuka replied. "I accept."
"If you're going to challenge each other, don't injure yourselves in the process," Sigma One said as he entered the room, completely misreading where the conversation had gone (mainly because he heard only Asuka's reply). He grabbed one panel from Rasine, one from Asuka, tucked them under his arms, and headed back out the door.
Toni came in, grabbed her second panel, lifted it and was out the door without a word.
"We're not going to challenge ourselves, we need to work on challenging them," Sidonia said. "We're going to need a good, solid challenge for them, follow?"
"Make 'em or break 'em," Asuka agreed to the terms.
-x-
(10 minutes later)
(SSO Barracks (under construction) northern wall)
"Okay, disassembly and cleanup are done," Sidonia said after the last of the dust and debris was swept up into a dustpan.
"Yes!" Toni half-squealed with her arms in the air.
"Now the fun begins: stocking furniture and beds for you guys," Hess said.
"And No!" Toni continued even with her arms up.
"May I call a vote for a break?" Rasine asked.
"Eh, take a union five," Hess said, something of a wan joke amongst the other Claiborne County Militiamen (none of which had any love for unions). "I'll get the first load of gear in place. Virtue, deploy a pallet jack and pallet to the pad," he said the latter sentence toward one of the wall-mount speakers, which doubled as a microphone.
"Preparing now." the artificial intelligence entity answered.
Sigma One stepped out into the hallway and went five paces before he stopped in one of the hallway intersections to stretch. "The analyst in me knows there's some shit getting ready to go down, but given this crew I'm not sure if this is going to be a bad thing or just crazy," he quietly vocalized his thoughts on the conduct vis-a-vis the three non-Phoenix SSO troops. He had not yet caught anything truly pointing toward something, but small hints of their conduct were starting to suggest some manner of conspiracy.
"Should I warn them off?" Toni asked from behind Hess as he began moving again toward the pad.
"Nah," Sigma One snap-decided on the matter. "Let's hold close, see where this one leads. I'd say don't even pick at their thoughts, unless you really want to spoil the surprise," he said at the edge of the pad before he pulled the pallet and jack off the pad. "I don't think where this is going is malicious, not yet at least, so we'll hold on it."
"I figured you'd say that. You have a lot more of an adventurous streak than you give yourself credit for, big guy." Toni dialed in the delivery for the first load of gear headed into the room, a series of eight bunk beds and associated foot lockers for the SSO personnel.
"And that is a helluva thing to say to a guy whose professional life has been an exercise in eliminating variables and random chance," Erich said as he moved the first bunk-bed-in-a-box from the transported stack to the waiting pallet.
"You're at war with how much adventure you want versus what you do to solve problems," she pointed out the obvious conflict in conduct. "I can give you some direction on what I think it may be?" Toni said before she moved the second bed-in-a-box over.
"Okay, hit me," Sigma One said.
"After 10 days, everyone's convinced you'll do the right thing, they're not convinced you'll do the right thing when the shit hits the fan," Toni explained her thinking on the matter of the others' thinking.
"Cut and run? Not hardly," Hess said after he slid the next bed set onto the pallet."At this level, the only options are to die on one's feet, die on one's knees, or die tired as you try and fail to run away. Only one of those options appeals to an American Militiaman, and maybe there is a shred of hope for not dying in that kind of failure drill."
"I know that," Toni pointed out. "I'm not the one that needs convincing, though. That's where the other SSO troops fall in."
For Toni, it was an interesting process watching Sigma One chew through the half-information she gave him to come to the necessary conclusion. Even without using her telepathy, she could tell when he reached the expected conclusion before he said a word.
His answer was a sigh, before he finished moving over the last of the bed-in-a-box units. "I really should say something against that, but survival is never a pretty business. The methods of survival in situations like this, also not at all pretty. I cannot fault them the motive."
Toni stacked the first footlocker-in-a-box on the pallet. "Would — " she cut off her question, not entirely sure if she wanted to know the answer. After two more footlockers were loaded on the pallet, she steeled herself. "Would you do it?"
"I don't know," Hess answered fairly. "Not an easy question to answer. I've always been willing to give my life to save my nation, it's a job hazard to a proper Militiaman. Give my heart for such a scenario? That's not exactly something I've considered over the haul."
"Oh, you're not thinking of it in the way they are," Toni realized, and considered that a possible opening for her.
"Pfft, hell no. I've known guys that have a clear divorce between their dick and their heart. A few of them are dead, some are in jail, roughly a third are up to their asses in alimony and child support payments, and a goodly portion I go out of my way to avoid dealing with. I just can't force myself to think in those kinds of detached terms, it's not in my mindset."
"That's either a good thing or a bad thing," Toni said. "I'd like to think it's a good thing."
"If what the SSO troops are thinking is an on-the-ground reality, it can and will be a complication, unless there comes some other way to prove to the citizenry I'm not here to pander human or cut and run when shitnado hits," Hess declared staunchly as he crab-walked the last footlocker case onto the pallet.
-x-
(60 minutes later)
(SSO Barracks Room)
Paired 15mm box end wrenches, one in each hand, was all that Toni needed to tighten down the bolt / washer / lock-washer / nut assembly on the lower legs of the last bed. "That's the last. Mattresses?" she asked nobody in particular.
"Didn't Rasine and Asuka go for the mattresses?" Sidonia asked.
"They did, some minutes ago," Hess said before he drove another screw into the baseplate of a locker box. "Wonder what's taking them?"
"Bed mattresses might be heavier than we anticipated," Toni said. "I'll check."
Sidonia crab-walked the completed bed frame to its position and dropped it in place. "Now we wait for the mattresses. How many lockerboxes are waiting?"
"Four," Hess answered.
"Where do you want me?" Sidonia asked in response.
"Need to spread the beds wider, give more room for walk paths and, well, space for you."
Sidonia took to spacing the beds out on the eastern wall a bit more to allow the team more room, but left them an extra two bunks worth of room for expansion at a later time. Sidonia figured the team was running short right now and could always use more personnel.
From her vantage, Sidonia was able to keep an eye on Sigma One, which turned out to be a bit of an exercise in dodging him checking on her, or her actions. They dodged each other's checks for several minutes, until the trainer was inevitably caught looking in the wrong direction. "You're looking in this direction for a reason. Care to pass it on?" Sigma One prompted her.
"You're a nice guy, but this is a bit much," Sidonia prompted the protectee.
"I am a nice guy, but I am not convinced this is enough," Hess retorted. "You do remember that your official position is Secret Service Security / Protection Officer? That means, leaving aside the necessities of mercenary warfare, that you will likely be shot at quite a bit over the course of your career?"
SSO Trainer Sidonia cringed at herself for having allowed herself to forget that not-so-minor detail. "Good point, sir, but — "
" — but there is always more that can be done in appreciation of those who would risk it all for this misbegotten cause," Hess cut her rebuke short. "I will always work to defend those who would defend me, or in this case ensure you all sleep comfortably."
"You know, some of us are willing to do more than just defend you," Rasine said from just inside the door.
"Yeah, I know," the big guy declared. "To which I say it is not necessary at any level. It is I who owe you for attempting to keep me alive in coming weeks and months, You don't have to worry about thanking me in any fashion. Nor do you need to concern about survival in that regard; the more I consider it, the more I'm convinced that something shall happen, and I will probably be obligated to side against the humans. And I'm not saying that to curry favor, I am saying that because it is a principle worth fighting for."
"The hell is wrong with this?" Asuka asked nobody in particular. "You have a security detail, all ladies, and half of them are wagging their butts in your general direction. Your response? Act like a Paladin," she said tartly.
That is not necessarily a bad thing, Asuka, High Executor Nereus rebuked her telepathically, which reply was audible to everyone in the room.
"The High Executor is right," Sidonia picked up where Nereus left off. "How many different ways must it be said? We go there, we reduce our efforts at bettering ourselves and the world to who we sleep with."
"And you profane your efforts to build a world upon which you can live in the manner of your choosing." Hess pinned Asuka with a stare. "Life;" his gauze shifted to Rasine, "Liberty;" again his gauze shifted, this time to Sidonia. "Pursuit of happiness. If you force yourself into believing that your only way to secure those blessings is to prostitute yourselves for survival, then you have already forfeited those blessings for a pale illusion of safety and survival."
"Illusion of safety? What — " Rasine started to ask, but cut herself short. "Oh."
"Oh, yeah," Hess acknowledged her sudden understanding. "I am one man, nothing more and nothing less. I will fight long and hard for you all, but at the end of the day I can guarantee nothing. Freedom is never free. Freedom is never safe. Survival is not free, safe, nor pleasant. Never accept the promises of safety and security, always defend your life and freedoms, at the end of the day that's the only guarantee you have. Even under the most locked-down autocracy there is no assurance of safety. If you want your freedom, not just a shadow of survival, you need to plan on fighting for it. So far as I have found, there is no way to bed-hop to freedom."
Sigma One stood up and made for the door.
"Uh, sir?" Sidonia asked after he walked five paces. "Are we done here?"
"Assembly is done," Hess pointed out. "All that remains is flopping down mattresses and arranging lockerboxes." Hess stopped in the doorway, deliberately facing away from the room. "You have a choice to make. I cannot give you what you are unwilling to fight for, what you are unwilling to secure for yourselves. That choice belongs to you all, both in here and in the barracks outside."
Toni departed the room after a few moments, an action which could be either personal or professional, or both.
"He's right," Sidonia said.
"Declaring defeat, are we?" Asuka asked.
"Oh HELL no," Sidonia answered coldly. "I said I won't accept defeat, especially on this."
"He's right, but he's also half bullshitting himself. He wants something, but he believes himself honor-bound to not ask or not take advantage of his position," Sigma Two said from the door. "What's your present planning?" Clint asked after a moment.
Author's Chapter Afterword:
This is where things start looking and sounding conspiratorial, and for good reason. This is, by all accounts, a conspiracy either for or against Sigma One and Toni, depending on how things work out.
A critical distinction now comes into play, and a pitfall that all too many fall into in real life or in fiction. A war exists between two diametric principles that most persons cannot grasp, and erringly believe they can have both at the same time. Freedom and Protection are oddly believed to coexist, but by their nature they cannot coexist in the proper forms.
Protection, ergo, the premise that 'someone else' (usually some manner of government entity) will protect you from any listed boogeyman assumes a critical detail that most persons overlook. A government that is powerful enough to protect its citizens from any and all threats would be so massive and invasive that the ready expectation of freedom or privacy is near zero. Large governments demand total or near-total subservience, and usually use low-level hazing and intimidation to force it. Large governments also demand increasing amounts of sustenance from the 'protected' persons, which can reach a point of critical mass whereby the government demands more from the people than can be reasonably provided.
More to the point, security provided by such a massive entity is not complete, and is invariably focused on defense of the State before defense of the people. As such, the 'defense' provided to the protected masses will be haphazard or incomplete, allowing hostile entities easy access to soft targets. Another critical lapse is the common requirement of disarmament of the 'protected' mass 'for their own good' in the parlance of the protecting entity. In more common parlance, the disarmament makes it impossible for the protectees to defend themselves in scenarios where there is inadequate protection from above. The actual motive of the disarmament is much more blatant, if unstated: by having a disarmed populace, it becomes difficult to have the positions of the large entity to be challenged.
Freedom, ergo, the premise that each individual is primarily responsible for their own safety and sustenance and shall not be hindered by collective interference in exercising those duties, is the opposite side of the coin from the protectionist mindset. The ready assumption is that the involved governing entity shall attempt to provide high-level defense and low-level policing, but every individual is responsible for both their own conduct and their own safety. This also includes the ready assumption that in most such societies, the first line of defense and deterrence against foreign harassment or invasion is a populous that is capable of providing severe threat to interlopers, both foreign and domestic. This arrangement of mutual defense also has the effect of subduing attempts by the 'protecting' entity from unduly curtailing the rights and freedoms of the populous.
A position of freedom, however, does not exist without issues of its own. The first and most dissuading lapse of a position of societal freedom is that freedom cannot nor shall it attempt to guarantee anything. As such, a person born into such a society has no assuredness of place, no ready expectation of results, and no guidance as to how to proceed on his or her life path. Whereby all persons are equal in rights, not all persons are equal in outcomes, and such variance in result has a very disheartening effect on those who are either unable to elevate themselves or unmotivated to elevate themselves. When taken to the extreme, such as in the Multimage Empire or (to a lesser degree) America, the government has a modicum of power but dares not turn its hand harshly against the citizenry lest they quickly find themselves in a guerilla war for which they have no expectation of winning.
The crux of this conflict of purposes rests in the obliquely-stated position of the Secret Service Operators, whereby they espouse a desire for freedom, but their driving goal is an assuredness of position — ergo, protection from anticipated racial conflicts that may or may not come. Whether or not Toni realizes it, she has become the de facto vehicle for such desires of the Secret Service team, in that they believe the bond between SSO and Sigma One would persuade Hess to side with the nonhumans in such a conflict. In real-world practice, they are playing matchmaker to a pair that is already leaning toward each other, and who have already decided that they would stand against a race riot or race war with severe lethal force as needed. Hess, in particular, has zero love for a person who judges and acts upon the race or ethnicity of a person as opposed to their actions or speeches, though of the four Sigma Leads, it would be Victoria who is the most fervently anti-racist of the old Militiamen and will demonstrate it in coming chapters of the mainline story.
And thus the build-up to the conspiracy, as the SSO officers under Toni have convinced themselves they need to 'make or break' the posturing for her relationship to the boss, with the perilous circumstance that now Sigma Two is involved. Clint, naturally, will provide both high-level horsepower and further planning on ways to try to make or break the two, given that he has a fairly decent knowledge of Hess at the psychological and physical level and can use that information to help design methods of trial and tribulation.
NEXT UP: A new and very abrupt arrival into the Secret Service ranks changes the tempo and planning for the coming 'make or break' trial when she reveals some critical facts and insight about the parties involved...
Review Replies: One review from Dark Phoenix Jake for this chapter, which is honestly more than I expect for most of my writing and am very thankful for!
You are right, in that a lot of humanity has not and likely will not get past the fear of the unknown, but also keep in mind that the humanity shown throughout the story is not in any way homogenous future humans. Sigma has a slice of everything from Ancient Egypt and Ancient China all the way up to the Star Empires, and many groups imaginable between those benchmarks. This will be a particularly rough issue going forward for Sigma, and one that will result in violence from time to time.
Jeff Evans' design work will begin probably in the next couple of game months, after the initial settle-in is completed. The event work involved will be rather interesting for the unit classes, and the individual designs will be entertaining to see them take shape from concept to engineering to prototype. And, Jeff Evans will be the progenitor of a whole new class of unit to the MMC, a weapon of land warfare dominance to an absolutely unholy degree, with Sigma making very bloody use of it in stories to come. Yeah, I am repeating that wheeze about stories to come, but in realistic terms these things take time, and the chapters here are very narrow-focused.
Thank you for the review! Keep 'em coming!
The Gripe Sheet:
No gripes from the last chapter. Thanks to Takeshi Yamato, Sieben Nightwing, and Necroblade for keeping my prose straight.
Footnotes:
No footnotes for this chapter.
Included Works:
Included works are the same as prior chapters.