Chapter 26

May 16th, 3025

Jeano's Sports Den

Downtown Mach 'Beh

Suk II

"We interrupt this broadcast to bring you a special news update."

The bar erupted into groans and boos almost instantly. There was a semi-final football match between the biggest rivals on Alshayra, and the score was tied one-to-one. The small bar's patrons simultaneously found a reason to get up and go to the tiny bathroom, built for one person at a time.

The screen changed from its usual introductory screen and cut to Wes Johnson, looking a little more serious than usual. His hair even looked more serious, somehow. A random peanut bounced off the screen, followed by a "hey!"From the bartender.

"Good evening. Approximately thirty minutes ago, several riots began throughout the capitol. Approximately thirty-seven people have been injured, and there are reports of many store fronts that have been broken into and looted. We take you now to Mohammed Hajar, reporting live. Mohammed?"

The screen changed to show the street signs of Carson street and Steiner Drive, then the camera panned out to show the intersection covered in trash and debris and multiple stores were broken into. One had smoke coming out of the front window, but despite that, people went in anyway to take what they could. In front of that window stood Mohammad with the traditional hand-held microphone that has become almost purely aesthetic. Many professional journalists had their own custom microphones mounted around their ear.

"Thanks Wes. This is the scene of where everything began. A large group of anti-Lyran protestors were lined up and down the street corners of this intersection just moments ago. This area was the hub of a four-block pro-Lyran rally where a small festival was supposed to be held all day." The camera panned around the street, where small tents, tables and bleachers were in various states of torn, broken, and bent. Or burned down entirely.

Another peanut bounced off the screen. "Nobody cares! Go back to the game!" The bartender walked to the table of the legume thrower and mouthed a last warning.

"Hey, that riot's in the middle of my drive home. Give it a sec." Another voice, from somewhere along the back wall.

The holovid screen had a blurring transition, then began a slideshow of numerous video clips of people fighting in the streets, setting fire to tents, or coming in and out of stores that had been broken into. A small fire was shown on one of the shops directly next to the intersection.

"Both groups had been feuding in the last couple of weeks since The Langley Affair, but the arrival of over a regiment of a Draconis Combine troops, likely in battlemechs, that allegedly mean to occupy the planet had brought things to a head. Both sides blamed the other for The Langley Affair, and gun cam photos from one of the battles showed a commando team with known Combine equipment and weaponry was spotted leaving the building that exploded shortly thereafter."

The screen then transitioned to various photos from the fight between the Coyotes and the RoughRiders, showing the commandos crossing the street and their equipment. Then it went back to showing more riot photos and fighting. One video showed one man performing a perfectly-executed body slam of another man onto the ferrocrete. The entire bar groaned as the man's head bounced off.

"I felt that from here!"

"Welp, I doubt he's feeling anything at this point."

"Damn, that's a red card."

"I mean if you're going to use your hands, you might as well go all-out like that guy." Laughing and more groans broke out.

Through the stain-glass doorway, multiple people ran along the street, with more following them. And then a Molotov cocktail sailed after them with a crash of glass barely audible. Screams were heard as more and more people ran past the door, silhouetted for a brief moment.

The bartender ran to the door and put his hand on the reader, then pushed another button and the door clicked shut. Most people suddenly realized what was going on, and a panicked murmur rippled through the bar.

"Closin' up early, guys. You can go out the back way or you can ride this out with me until it's gone. Drinks are free until this whole thing blows over." That got a pretty good roar from the room, for the time being. Hunkering down with friends and fellow sports fans over some free booze was one of the best ways to ride out a good old-fashioned city riot.

Firebase Yankee

Suk II

"Didn't think I'd be back here so soon," Emily thought aloud. Pearl and Martin, with their liaison Daniels were strolling along the various 'mech gantries laid out along the dirt path. There was an impressive number of 'mechs currently being worked on, most of them being the ones reclaimed from their battle over on New Syria just four days ago. Her head still hurt, but she could handle walking and talking on her own just fine now.

Emily was still on a light duty chit for the twenty more hours, and the RoughRider doctor was strict as hell about it. He didn't care that any of them weren't even a RoughRider.

Nobody in the group had anything particularly better to do for the afternoon, for once. Now that most of the briefings were over they decided to get a closer look at some of the remains of "The Battle of Selidran." Pearl had arranged for transport back to Alshayra for the company now that the main threat on New Syria had been neutralized, but they hadn't arrived yet. So, for probably the only time they could remember that didn't involve getting piss drunk, they had some actual downtime.

This was Martin's ritual, which the rest of them had adopted. Daniels tagged along out of idleness more than anything.

And just five days till the Dracs arrive…

Up close, two Warhammers stood in gantries side by side with the same cammo job. Both had belonged to the people they had just fought. One was missing and arm and a lower leg, and was supported by hoists from the gantry.

The other must have been Jawbone's 'mech, because it was missing a lot of everything. It was mostly intact, and stood on its own, but the holes that had been punched in it from every direction would give even some of the sternest stomachs a case of trypophobia.

This time her ride was far more trashed. Pearl's hadn't fared much better. It wouldn't see combat in the coming days while it got its chest and both its arms repaired. Once the RoughRiders had landed behind them with the 3rd Cavalry closing in rapidly, their targets went for a brief last-ditch defense and knocked her engine and gyro out in a single shot from that Hunchback's AC-20. Emily's own Hawk had been reported as a total loss, but there was about 60% of the 'mech remaining, which counted for something.

We didn't even know they had a Hunchie until he blew my shoulder out. Guy's a crack shot with that thing. It could have been an error from the person giving LaPointe the battle report, because what was left of the fifty-tonner that took down both of them was blown to so many bits that nobody recognized it at first. It littered a twenty-meter radius like it was taken apart in a chop-shop, except with various forms of ammo and lasers instead of tools.

It had belonged to one of the best gunners in the medium 'mech circuit on Solaris. A well-deserved top-ten ranking for three years running in the circuit, Chris Johannsen had earned a good living, until a few days ago. His unit, which Emily finally found out was an entire stable that had left the scene to go mercenary, were known as the Seventh Solaris Sandmen. Possibly named after their house, because I sure as hell don't recall there being a First, Second, up through Sixth Solaris Sandmen. Oh well. Points for alliteration on a clever name.

She had found their shooting to be quite exceptional, but their overall tactics and strategy were a little primitive. Most of their pilots were used to the specialized brawling of the arena circuit, and their TO&E was a bit strange to her.

Well ok…not strange, just plain dumb.

Scouting with a support medium, using lights for perimeter security while taking a loot-and-pillage kind of contract. Apparently, Jawbone was their company commander, and formerly the stablemaster. Their actions were a lot less aggressive once Jawbone had been…neutralized.

The guy doing this salvage report didn't seem to know much about how savvy a team of 'mech techs can be when the shit really goes down. That, or he was trying to write off more equipment that he could smuggle into the black market. Either way, it didn't work. I'm sure LaPointe knows by now that something's amiss, but I could bring it up too for some extra points with him.

She thought she had seen it all, back with Bart's Broncos. They had a Jagermech with parts from a Rifleman that made it look like the two had somehow combined into one ugly monstrosity. Because they had. Literally. It had yellow and black arms with a red and white body. It had been rechristened as "Patch, the traveling zombie." The sight of it was horrifyingly awesome in Emily's memory.

A handful of men were handling a very large flatbed and a crane, pulling out pieces of 'mech parts slowly and carefully, like the planet's most expensive claw machine that may-or-may-not hold onto that stuffed animal a child really wants. One had a data pad and was reciting the names of things that were being removed. This truck had mostly intact parts, so the "things" were more recognizable.

"Fire in the hole!" Yelled a man on their team. A second later, the horizontal "ribcage" on either side of the flatbed that held all those parts together opened slowly, and they all came to a new resting place on the truck with a group of screeches that sounded paranormal. Everyone had electronic earmuffs with various choices of white or brown noise available, but the sound still penetrated. Pearl felt a few lightning bolts go between her ears for a moment.

The man mouthed a sorry, but he seemed about as sincere as the wad of tobacco in his mouth. He spit a little bit off to the side and smiled, turning to face the mass of parts on the truck.

This bundle of parts was a large one. Mostly limbs and weapon barrels on this truck. There was a small hopper in the back that had several smaller parts sticking out. Random pieces of armor and parts of interior skeletal structure poked out like the tools of a professional torturer who always seemed to go above and beyond the duties of his job.

The bundle itself was a pile of ugly and even more ugly. The parts were various forms of drab green and brown cammo, mixed with mud, dirt, shrapnel shavings and gunmetal gray where paint had been chipped off. The whole truck smelled of various kinds of explosive residue mixed with biodiesel exhaust. They belonged to either the Coyotes or the Sandmen. Both units had similar cammo patterns. Both looked like a child went crazy with a digitized cammo spraypainter.

With a loud mechanical whir, the crane carefully dipped in and picked up a long, familiar-looking barrel. The man with the datapad shouted "AC-5, long-barrel, approximately 55mm."

Another man shouted back simply, "Shadow Hawk. No sign of the rest of the weapon. Scrap."

That got their attention for a moment. They stood in solemn silence as the crane lifted, pivoted, and gently placed the barrel on an oversized plasteel palette. Watching pieces of the war machine she was piloting just a few days ago be picked up and moved around like junk felt otherworldly to all of them. Martin always joked that the souls of the 'mechs were broken into smaller souls when they had armor melt off, or lost an arm, or in this case a weapon.

If that's the case, this is probably a very angry little soul. It made her think about the fight again, when she got knocked down and out. Memories of giant feet crashing down in front of her viewscreen again and again. Leaving her sight almost as soon as they arrived. The occasional view of an arm-mounted gun pointed directly at her cockpit. If they had known I was the one that called for Jawbone's execution, I wouldn't have seen the light of the next morning.

His call to bring in two Unions to help trick them into surrendering was the right move. We were losing that fight, but then I suppose that was the plan all along. LaPointe had mentioned this to her while they were negotiating for the battlefield salvage this afternoon. Given their situation, her superior portion of the salvage and the next mission at hand, she had opted for her fifty percent to go towards the captured 'mechs themselves and some of the semi-precious stones, which were easier to transport.

Bulk quantities of pyrite and quartz made up the vast majority, with some silver and a touch of geranium mixed in. They were in-demand for tank production and various electronics, and the geranium was part of a harder-to-find component for the Kearny-Fuchida drive that allows for interstellar jumps in the blink of an eye. She'd get more solid numbers later, but the rough estimate was a cool million C-bills for all the minerals and stones put together.

Unfortunately for the Coyotes, almost zero of the 'mechs salvaged from Selidran really worked into their TO&E. They were mostly too slow and lacked jump jets for mobility in a pinch. Given their next mission, they would likely get run down and caught or killed by the 2nd Legion. That also included their own Urbanmech. Emily had considered sacrificing it to buy more time, but she wasn't decided exactly how just yet.

She desperately wanted to make a trade for some of the RoughRider mediums or a trio of lights. She half-heartedly hinted at it, but she knew asking LaPointe to table flip his own TO&E and unit cohesion just to appease a separate company of mercenaries just wasn't going to happen. Impressed though he was with Emily and her unit, he had to take care of his own first.

Ironic how the unit essentially going in first and outgunned beyond all recognition is also the lowest on the totem pole when it came to getting ready for this fight. But that's mercenary life for you. I'd do the same thing in LaPointe's position.

For now, until they came up with a better plan, the three remaining Coyotes in command had settled on a thirteen million C-bill credit from the RoughRiders to be cashed in later when the campaign was over. This allowed the much larger regiment to take the four heavies and remains of everything else.

LaPointe had promised them just about whatever they wanted in terms of 'mechs to replenish their own company. Dusselhoff had promised them access to the logistical assets at Firebase Yankee to keep repairs and refits up to snuff, in the meantime. But it would mean they were second in line.

The defenders of Suk II were on a limited timetable before the carnage happened, and both the planetary government and the Militia wanted their A team as ready as possible. And everyone knew that means the RoughRiders.

The prisoners and vehicles were also taken by the RoughRiders as they were more logistically capable of bringing any defectors into their own regiment much more smoothly. It was uncertain how many of them were still loyal to their former stable, but given the situation, something would create a rift between them that the RoughRiders could capitalize on.

As it was, she had to find out who would be the most comfortable with the new Catapult. It might have to be her. In what would be considered a one-in-a-million stroke of luck for Pearl, her gutted Trebuchet was replaced almost the same day. The Treb they ordered as part of the trade for the Warhammer had arrived about the same time as she lost first one.

The Coyotes had been tasked with hit and run actions against the 2nd Legion for the better portion of a full day. Anything they could do within the Ares Conventions to slow down the 2nd Legion without being decisively committed to a fight would be within the bounds of their new contract. Emily was no fool. Salvage rights in a delaying action would mean nothing to the Coyotes.

She went exclusively for the money on this operation. Six million C-bills for a single day of fighting, with 95% of repairs and refurbishing being handled by the RoughRiders. All paid for by the Planetary government.

Nineteen million C-bills, plus the stones and germinate, plus their remaining 'mechs and equipment. A huge net gain if they managed to survive without losing all of their rides simultaneously.

The Coyotes had gone from sixteen 'mechs, four of them mediums, to twelve mechs in decent working order. One lance of them were mediums, and now the Cat christened their heavy column. One Treb, previously acquired as part of the trade for the Warhammer. To round it out, one Wolverine, one Griffin, and one Dervish made up the bulk of their firepower. Two of the three Fire Javelins, two Firebees, a Mongoose, a Spider, and an Urbanmech made up the rest of them.

Within five days, Emily had to come up with a plan for these 'mechs to stall the advance of about six dozen light-through-assault 'mechs for the better part of an entire day. Worse than six-to-one odds for a two and a half-to-one payout.

Sounded right up their alley, now that she considered what the Coyotes were good at. All they had to do was survive.