Sigma Mercenaries 0001R: Initial Public Offering REVISED

by CSS Stravag

Sigma Mercenaries Mainline story beginning, REVISED EDITION. When an unknown train lands on the vegetable garden of an American Militiaman, and the happenings in the train are revealed to be wildly messed up, four Americans swing into action to save lives and bring order to chaos. Along the way, they will meet a very odd and diverse cast of peeps from all over Existence.. (Rated M)

13. Immigration And Customs

q(Sigma Mercenaries, Story 0001: Initial Public Offering)
(Chapter 13: Immigration and Customs)

(29 March, Magi Year 14408 / Year SL 8838, 0330 Hours Local Time)
(Mess Hall, Base Boarhound Admin Building, Terra 232)
(Day 12 of Campaign)

The normal duty mess hall staff was off-duty and likely asleep or just now waking up, which did not surprise Quina in the least. So far as he could tell, every animal in Existence needed sleep, and even he was no different (though the Qu only commonly slept a few hours a night, and traditionally woke up before sunrise to prepare first meal).

The kitchen area came alive with some kind of technological light when he entered, which made things easier. "This better kitchen than Trains, more space, bigger grills! Can make everyone breakfast easily."

The presence of the transdimensional food storage unit was easy for Quina to recognize, so he moved for it immediately, given that would be where he had to start with drawing materials. As he passed the range and grill section, he saw several sheets of paper dangling from the range hood, and immediately recognized the (fairly universal) format of a recipe.

"Ah, Continental Breakfast, Breakfast Burrito, Classic Burrito, Hash-brown Sandwich, Hashbrown Pile? Must be breakfast menu." He thought about it, weighing the consideration of doing his own breakfast plan against what the command chef intended. After a minute to contemplate, he decided that, being in foreign lands, the rest of the base may not take too well to traditional Qu Gourmand cooking, so he decided sticking to the plans was the proper option. He could always do some Frog Omelette at a later time, he figured.

The item on the list that would take the longest to prepare would be the breakfast rolls for the Continental Breakfast, so he started there. The recipes they had listed for the rolls were twofold, one for cinnamon buns, and another for maple pecan bacon sticky buns. Both recipes used the same base bread mixture for the starting point, so he turned to the food system and dialed in the ingredients for the recipe — he selected the fourth option on the recipe card, enough to produce the bread component for some 600 rolls.

The dispenser took three loads to completely dispense the necessary milk, yeast, salt, sugar, flour, and butter. The necessary water and milk mix that had to be preheated — some 50 cups of half-milk and half-water — went on the range with four electric burners underneath the pan running to get it up to temperature. While that was going on, Quina moved the dry components (half of the flour, the yeast and sugar) over to an industrial-size motorized mixer and loaded them in to begin auto-mixing. A flick of the switch and the machine took over blending the components.

While the mixing and heating was going on, Quina started pulling down baking pans for the cinnamon rolls and muffin pans for the maple and bacon sticky buns. These he arranged on the central island and sprayed with a butter-based nonstick spray (he had learned quickly on the 523 Train that modern cookware tended to burn foods to the cookware faster than traditional cookware, and the fix was to use oil-base or butter-base nonstick sprays. Or lard, where appropriate.) A couple mixing bowls made their way onto the counter, in one he whipped together a frosting glaze for the cinnamon rolls (confectioner's sugar and vanilla powder) which would have to wait until he was ready to glaze the rolls. The other one he mixed the topping group for the maple, pecan, and bacon sticky buns, sans the bacon which he would have to fry up toward the end of the prep for the rolls. Brown sugar and maple syrup went into the mixing pan, though he took a couple minutes to finely chop the pecans up rather than dump them in as halves and pieces, and took about five minutes to mix it.

The next step in bread prep was to add the milk and water mixture to the mixer with the bread components, not an easy task for one guy handling almost two gallons of heated liquid in a large stock pan. Still, a roller cart and a steady hand made it work, and once he dumped in the liquid content the mixer finished blending it in, then he shut off the mixer and set a 15-minute timer.

Now in a brief dead zone for the breakfast recipes, Quina pulled a package of frog legs from the storage system and set them to frying on a separate burner. While his personal breakfast was cooking, he took a few moments to page through one of the recipe binders in the galley, this one on a separate grill and bar section away from the major appliances. "These recipes basic. Need more variety, better use of ingredients," he complained to nobody in particular (given he expected he was alone in the galley).

"The military way is to do basic meals, high-energy, easily prepared for large groups."

Quina looked up from the binder to the speaker, sitting across the bar from where he was standing at the grilling station. "You Executor?" Quina asked, remembering that much from what he had heard around the base.

"Yes. Did not know you were a cook?" Nereus prompted him.

"All Qu study way of Gourmand. It is highest calling."

"If you intend to try, you have a very large group to cook for, here on the base," Nereus pointed out the obvious possibility.

"Gourmand on large scale?" Quina asked for clarification, to which Nereus nodded. "This may be greater challenge than simply way of Gourmand."

"Even when you master one thing, if you look past it, you will find a bigger challenge," Nereus said philosophically.

"Will think. Must cook now, breakfast must be readied for base," Quina said.

His timer went off for the bread mix. "Good luck," Nereus said.

As Quina returned to the industrial mixer to add the other half of the flour, the salt, and mix it up again, the other cooking staff entered the galley to find a lot of their early-morning prep-work underway. Rather than work at cross purposes, Quina volunteered to handle the breakfast prep while the cook staff began preparing ration packs for lunches for the basic training recruits (who often ate out in the field for lunch and sometimes dinner).

By the time the first Basic Instruction recruits filtered into the galley around 0545, Quina had already prepared some 5000 servings of the various breakfast menu items. And he didn't stop until the menu switched over to lunch at 0830. The MP units dispensed with the overflow to the collection of residents around the perimeter of Boarhound, which helped start the processes of building goodwill to the persons around the base. A contingent of Engineers took some of the hash-brown recipe out to the main soup kitchen in Mayville, which helped supplement the food stocks from last year's harvest and what the pump technicians had brought with them the day prior.

At the end of the day, Quina would be reassigned to the larger Galley in the main mess hall, so that he could use the larger equipment to do even better.

-x-x-x-

(29 March, Magi Year 14408 / Year SL 8838, 0900 Hours ComStar Standard Time)
(ComStar Main Administration Building, Brasilia, Brazil, Terra 02 (Multimage Star Empire homeworld))

Demi-Precentor (Junior) Lunete Ueda stepped up to the desk of the executive secretary and came to attention smartly. "Demi-Precentor Lunete Ueda, reporting as requested."

"Primus Hallestrom is waiting for you in her office, Ueda. Good luck."

"Aye, thanks," the field reporter nodded, turned smartly, and took the five paces to the door of the Primus. She gave two knocks, then entered after five seconds of silence.

"Lunete Ueda? Come in, please," Primus Elaine Hallestrom waved her to one of the office chairs. "Please, be seated. Coffee?"

"Always, milady," Lunete said cheerfully.

"Good, you're going to need a lot of coffee in coming weeks, you and the crew I am assembling. How much have you been briefed in on your assignment?"

"Not much, ma'am, Precentor-Broadcasting Higginson said that it would be a duty station, it would be very lively, it would be dangerous, and I would be the sole reporter in a hot zone."

"All true, very much true actually," Elaine said tactfully.

"Reading between the lines of some of the sauce I was hearing around the other field reporters, the expectation was that it would be a one-way assignment, but the only guess anyone had for 'where' was Dustball 383 in the Star League territories." Much like the natural-history Inner Sphere planet Dustball, the Star League planets by the name Dustball were also havens of organized crime and general thuggery. That made ComStar News Network personnel sorely needed to help the various law enforcement agencies out, but also made it a very hazardous posting.

"Not a bad guess, but all our Dustball dockets are filled right now," Primus Hallestrom said with a smile. Being assigned to Dustball wasn't considered a death sentence, per se (in fact, the kill rate was less than 20 percent for COMNN employees), but it was considered a very severe punishment and usually dead-ended the career of the assigned personnel.

"So, where to, then? Protectorate of Sigma?" Lunete guessed offhand.

"Actually, yes," Elaine dropped a folder in her lap. "We are reactivating the HPG at Base Boarhound on Terra 232, full staff, once the Precentor is in place we will be negotiating staffing a ComGuard training unit on planet as well as the usual facilities guards and such. The second HPG facility, at Base Erlanger on the western continent of 232, will be reactivated at a later time."

"Oh, wow," Lunete considered that genuinely shocking. So far what she had heard about the new resident of Terra 232 was not all that good, and yesterday's censure of the Protectorate was a big red flag that something was wrong in this whole scenario, but the Primus was sending in a full HPG group, a ComGuard training Regiment, and a press contingent? Something was not adding up in the slightest…

"Oh yes, I can hear the gears crunching inside your head, Demi-Precentor. That Censure from the Star League rings loudly against them, but I've got a pair of names to check against you."

"Listening," Lunete Ueda acknowledged the coming quiz.

"Century Commander Jeffrey Vickers," Elaine dropped the first name.

"Up-and-coming Multimage Century Commander. A lot of people consider him a good candidate for a Legion posting, but there are better candidates if needed for the Division Commander Bladesmen." DC Joan D'Arc still held that post and had been at station since she trained in and rose up through the ranks under the Old Emperor, Eric Atrebas, during the bad old days of the Star Empire Wars. She also had never once made noise about retiring, and showed no sign of being forced out of the position, so…

"Good. Jeffrey Vickers has command of the combined garrison, support, and training forces at Base Boarhound. There are some think tank power-players that think his posting to 232 is some manner of stain on his honor, but the reverse is quite accurate: already involvement with Sigma is gaining a no-shit reputation, since there are a lot of very important eyes on that planet. Ready for round two?"

"Hit me, ma'am," Lunete said immediately.

"Nereus."

The field reporter thought hard about the name for five seconds, but came up blank. "No clue, ma'am." Demi-Precentor Ueda admitted honestly.

"No worries, he's not a household name like some of the other Executors," Elaine Hallestrom said offhand. "Nereus, also known as the Paladin of the Deep Blue, is a High Executor from the Dynasty. Former Senior Warlord under Lord Cale, he was talent-scouted by Executor-Lord Tenchi and trained in under him. He's a straight-shooter, old-world Paladin, water specialist, and one hell of a savvy political operator. He makes his noise by way of settling problems without making noise, and does it in full view of God and Star Empires but somehow manages to avoid any press time in the process. The Executors assigned him to the 232 detail because they wanted someone low-key but capable of defending the Protectorate against unjust assault."

"Who from?" Lunete asked.

Elaine flexed her jaw momentarily, sizing up the Demi-Precentor across the desk from her. What she thought she caught a hint of was what she was looking for on this assignment, but she figured a question was in order. "How dirty do you write your copy at the end of the day?"

Lunete immediately understood the bent of the question. Every reporter had their own unique way of writing copy for the electronic broadsheets or for airing on video segments, but most of those were edited to a clean and presentable copy before publishing. The artificial intelligence entities in the employ of ComStar were some of the best, not to mention the ComNN editing panels and producers in the employ. Though a Multimage-based company, ComStar had respect in all the major and minor Star Empires throughout Existence, and for good reason. That respect was built on a clean presentation of some otherwise dedicated and salty reporters who were not afraid to get in and get dirty in pursuit of stories and truth.

The Demi-Precentor figured an indirect answer would be the best. "My first posting out of Journalism Academy was the Dark Moon Battleship Helena Du Lac. I've heard every combination of sailor's invective possible, and I've written about most of it."

"Good, because what you're about to report on is a very bad case of Star League dicks trying to piss in a soup kettle being guarded by a hardass American chef. What have you heard so far about 232?"

"Planet in anarchy, and now a madman has somehow convinced the Multimages to sponsor his dominion over the planet," she cut her analysis short once she realized the Primus was expecting that answer — and it was the wrong one, gauging by her body language. "Which I guess is wrong analysis?"

"Very much so," Elaine said. "The Protectorate boss is an old-school American, freedom-loving, patriotic, crazy enough to piss on parties bigger than himself, but he's also savvy. The Empress of the Magi put some serious horsepower into his Protectorate, and one of the signatories of the declaration was also the Will Transcendent. This would not have gone forward with a madman at the helm if the Executors are involved arse-deep in this arrangement. More to the point, the Protectorate is under contract to the Executors to do two things: capture, clear, and scrap the Interdimensional Jumper Trains, and eliminate the Star League Slavers' Guild."

"Oh Gods, no wonder the Star League is spitting fury at them," Lunete said. "That means all this bullshit they are running about abuses and depredations on planet — "

"Bullshit, plain and simple," Elaine confirmed. "Sigma One is supposedly running a tight ship, tighter than reasonably expected for what kind of refugee nightmare he's pulling off those Trains. I want to see some solid reporting on how he is doing it. I want to see the good and the bad of the Protectorate, in full color and maximum 3D resolution. Get in the mindset of the refugees, the people who are serving under Sigma One, and most of all, try to figure out why an American with a decent home life dropped everything and started kicking Slaver ass on the Trains."

"Will do, ma'am," Lunete said with a smile. If she came up with even a quarter of what the Primus wanted to see, she figured it would catapult her career to the top in less than a year.

"One last question, just to make sure you're the right operator for this post. What's your take on the Star League's middle and lower bureaucracy?" Elaine asked.

The bent of this question was almost as subtle as an assault 'mech stomping through the downtown business sector in Sao Paulo. "I once had a Star League Magistrate try to have his way with me after I told him four times to back off."

"Try?" Elaine prompted her to continue, since this incident wasn't part of her personnel jacket.

"Try, yes, at least until I kicked him in the nugs hard enough to put him in surgery. And even after I care-flighted one of the bastards, three more tried and failed. Institutionally, the Star League is comprised of wanton jackasses commanding the most misbegotten assembly of rejects and perverts ever given official cover. I enjoy outing them for corruption. I keep a running tally of how many careers I nuke, and how high on the fuck-stick those careers were halted. You give me free reign, Primus, and I'll make sausage out of their genitals on live broadcast with a smile on my face."

Primus Hallestrom chuckled at the euphemism from the Demi-Precentor. "I hope you have a big grinder on order, because what you are going to report on can be laid squarely at the feet of the Senate. You'll have plenty of meat to chop into this recipe, just make sure you stay alive long enough to upload your copy. The Senate has a hard-on for the Protectorate, and ComNN reporting on the Senate's failures will not be a move calculated to make them happy."

"Oh, they'll hate me within the month, Primus," Lunete assured her.

"Well, then, if you have no objection to the posting, your next stop is Precenter-Transport Mohan's office."

-x-x-x-

(29 March, Magi Year 14408 / Year SL 8838, 0800 Hours Local)
(Rescue Rangers Office, 2rd Floor, Base Boarhound Administration Building, Terra 232)

Sergeant Foley knocked and pushed open the not-completely closed door to what was supposed to be the Rescue Rangers' office. "Ma'am, is this the Rescue Rangers outfit?" he asked of the lady at the desk.

"Yes, it is. Have you come to sign up?" She asked as she stood up. Three others were in the room, a guy with a tail, a lady (?) that looked like a bit of a mouse or chipmunk (?) and a large guy with a classic knight's broadsword at his hip.

"Yes ma'am," Sergeant Foley said as he pushed into the room properly. "Sergeant Foley, Corporal Dunn, Private Ramirez, 75th United States Ranger Battalion."

"United States, as in, the same lands as Sigma One?" the guy with the knight's sword asked.

"We're full-time military from the States, Sigma One was Unorganized Militia, a reserve soldier," Corporal Dunn explained in what he hoped was a more relative and understandable fashion.

It took only about three seconds for the correlation to register behind her eyes, and for that Sergeant Foley was thankful that Dunn had his head in the right place. "Oh, excellent," she said with some cheer to voice, despite the frightening correlation she probably just drew. "We're looking for people that can both do Rescue missions and training, but I welcome any assistance."

"We can do both, ma'am," Sergeant Foley said. It was part of the Spec Ops training that the Ranger units were capable field instructors for indigenous forces. The best of the best in that regard were the Green Beret troops, but pretty much any of the SOF could do a passable training regimen so long as the local stock to be trained was up to the task.

"Excellent. You are apprised of the mission for the Rescue Rangers?" she asked.

"Yes, ma'am, we go out on short-duration contracts mainly revolving around finding and extracting persons," the Sergeant answered. "Our intention is to help the Rescue Rangers get started, and work with this outfit until a Train is available to clear."

"Understood, thank you. I am Dagger, this is Zidane, Freya, and Steiner. Welcome to the team."

Dagger? Must be a cover name, Foley thought but did not say aloud. There might be a story there. Still, best not to pry.

"Not to sound like we're being impatient, but how soon can you be ready for a couple sorties?" Dagger asked.

"Within the hour, ma'am," Foley answered. "Do you have some business lined up?"

"Something to start off, light-duty contracts," Freya said. "Search-and-rescue, personal accident recovery, and a rescue from hostile capture," the not-at-all-human but rather well spoken staffer / soldier (?) said. "We are thinking, in similar fashion to Sigma One's recent exploits, we will do a light-duty regimen while preparing the forces for more involved work."

"And once those forces are up to speed, rotate them out to full operations," Ramirez answered. "It gets the unit moving, and makes for training time when not out doing light duty. Not bad," the private allowed, though Foley could easily recognize a hint of worry in his voice.

"That is the plan," Zidane said as he leaned back against the desk. To Foley's eyes, Freya and Steiner were the closest to military from their group, but Zidane clearly was not and Dagger struck him as something else…

"Where do you want us to begin, ma'am?" Foley asked.

"We intended to do the paired non-combat contracts first, then attack the hostile rescue last. We will need the use of the helicopter teams for all three," Dagger came around her desk with three folders and handed them to Sergeant Foley. In close, he figured her about five foot two inch, neighborhood of 100 pounds total (gear, clothes, and all), and not all that energetic or at least suppressing it very well. Her movements were graceful, not what one would expect from a late-teen lady.

"Thanks," Foley said as he did a quick read-over the supplied information for each contract. In each case, ComStar had provided detailed maps of the areas of operation and in the case of the hostile extract they had been provided intel on the on-site guard force and the local garrison.

"Okay, these look pretty solid. We'll take the personal accident extraction, we're pretty used to rough terrain and unusual mission requirements," Foley said.

"Hooah," Corporal Dunn acknowledged the point.

"We'll do the shoreline search and rescue, then, and once our tasks are completed we will plan out the method for the hostile extract," Dagger confirmed the rest of the plan going forward.

"How soon do we leave?" Ramirez asked.

"30 minutes," Steiner said after he set a phone down in the cradle. "The aviation unit is preparing our helicopters as we speak."

"Virtue, Dagger, please assign Sergeant Foley and his men to the Rescue Rangers unit and assign them a vehicle," Dagger requested of the artificial intelligence entity.

"Done. Sergeant, you have HMMVW 6 until further notice, it is waiting in the Admin Building motor pool," Virtue announced by the room's loudspeaker.

"Copy, we're ready to go," the Sergeant said. All three of the Rangers came to attention and saluted, given Foley was starting to suspect that Dagger was a bit higher ranked than a section commander…

"See you on the field, Sergeant," Dagger returned the salute, sloppily given a lack of training, but returned it nonetheless.

Outside the door, Ramirez sighed. "Won't need anything special for the first run, but the second will," he said while paging through the intelligence papers. "Got a lot of sword-swingers to cut through for that one."

"Hooah," Foley said. "This job is getting stranger by the day, but they have their heart in the right place."

"What I would like to know, why didn't our world get any of the interesting nonhumans?" Dunn asked. "I mean — "

"When they say different worlds, different rules, they're not joking," Sergeant Foley guessed. He was only partially correct on the principle of the matter (The Executors' preferred descriptor was 'different worlds, same rules' in most cases).

"Hooah," Ramirez acknowledged the point at face value.

-x-x-x-

(29 March, Magi Year 14408 / Year SL 8838, 0830 Hours Local)
(Apartments area west of Base Boarhound, Terra 232)

"This is where the tracks hit the terra firma, gentlemen," the Star Captain of the engineering group began his briefing. "Our surveys over the past couple days have identified some 84 structures that are too far gone to properly repair, so we need to begin the demolition and reevaluation of those sites. We start on the west side, since that faces the nearest active organized city, and we want to reestablish road networks as quickly as possible to begin moving outward from Boarhound. Joining us on the Pipelayer is going to be Sigma One, who will be using the pipelayer to support structures and remove debris."

"Welcome to the party, sir," one of the junior Combat Engineers said, to which Hess nodded.

"Our intention today is sites A1 and A2, we bring these burned out wrecks down, clear the debris, and level the ground in preparation for rebuilding at a later time. One thing, be damned careful about the underground utilities, both buildings have natural gas and fusion power service. If we disrupt those conduits, someone's day is going to end very abruptly," several of the engineers chuckled at the wan joke. "Our best bet is we go in, disconnect and render safe the utility conduits, then begin the demolition process. Wallace, Lasky, Keaton, I want you three to handle the utilities in A1, Burns, Lopez, and McCandle, you have the utilities in A2. Any questions?"

"Radio channels?" Toni asked.

"4A1 and 4A2 for the two sites. Since you'll be starting at A1, I want the pipelayer on 4A1."

"Will do," Toni said.

"Any further questions?" No voices were raised; Sigma One figured (not incorrectly) that this was a veteran civil and military engineer group, and they didn't require much in the way of cheerleading. "All right, let's move out!"

Hess turned to the pipelayer and mounted the command deck at a fairly fast pace; after the nearly two weeks in position, the prospect of a fear of heights was the least of his concerns. Especially with the political trajectory of the Star League angling toward casus belli for the mere sin of daring to correct their problems.

Toni was quick to join him on the topdeck for the control cab, though she had to take a position on the outside of the cab, on the command deck at the top of the ladder, and hold on tight. Once situated and strapped in, Hess turned over the engine and let it idle down to proper running speed before he put the throttle down.

"Engineers are rolling out," the Star Captain reported on 4A1 before the lead utility truck drove past the pipelayer and into the western drive lane headed outbound from the base proper.

"Copy engineers are on move," Hess answered by rote. The trucks moved forward and were out of sight in a few seconds.

Hess ran the throttle down to the maximum, which was not all that impressive by the absolute numbers — he could outrun the pipelayer in short bursts, inasfar as he ran anywhere. "This is gonna take a few minutes," Toni half-grumped.

"Not a very patient one, I daresay?" Hess asked.

"I can force myself to be patient, but I'm a Phoenix. It's in my nature to be mobile and stay mobile. And active." She turned around and leaned back against the front rail, so she could see inside the crew cab and speak directly in the window. "What I don't quite get is how you have so much patience, even when it is expected that you should go off the cliff."

"In the same fashion that I've seen men with a divorce between their dick and their heart, I've seen a lot of guys who have a clear divorce between their emotions and their common sense. Leaving aside the influence of alcohol, that's a bad combination, allowing one's emotion to take control when logic and patience are a necessity. Decisions are broken and lives are destroyed by such failures. I've watched more than a few guys cast their lives asunder by not showing patience, and long ago I swore I would not add my name to that list."

"You do realize there are circumstances where you have to act before you think things through?"

"Oh yes," Hess said before he made an adjustment of travel direction. "There is a definite difference between acting decisively and acting without proper forethought. I know when to act and when to think, and that is why I have the patience to deal with just about anything thrown in my direction."

"Okay, this doesn't look right," Toni said as the pipelayer rounded the corner toward their first location.

"10-4 to that," Hess said as he caught proper sight of the new happening. "Virtue, Sigma One, possible situation at site alpha one. Are the turrets in the area active?"

"Affirmative, but be advised that the threat party is below the maximum gun depression for the two nearest turrets. I will have to call in the fire from a greater than intended distance."

"Have the Armored Infantry take up position on the wall for plunging fire as needed. This looks like it could be bad, but I don't think it is completely off the rail yet." Hess continued the slow drive pace without changing a thing on his panels. "Situation looks like a pogrom of about sixty against twenty moderately-armed combat engineers. They know they can take 'em, they don't want to pay the blood to take 'em."

"That's the overarching thought I am getting from them as well," Toni said.

"Virtue, Sigma One, activate the aviation unit, emergency deploy for air support, have Two, Three, and Four report for fast deploy with the SSO group. I suspect this is about to get nasty."

"Acknowledged," Virtue answered.

"One, two, what's the word?" Clint asked.

"High Noon standoff at a demolition site. Not sure what the casus belli is, but this is looking nasty from the onset."

"Roger that, keep your eyes up and your ass down, boss-man. We're mobile in five."

Hess figured he had another three minutes to get to the destination point, so five minutes was not a huge deal.

"Augh! The waiting is so killer!" Toni grumped.

"Toni, did we not just discuss this?" Sigma One asked.

"Yes, sir," she said drolly.

The crowd spooked a bit when Hess approached close to the line of Engineers and their own pogrom, but they stopped stirring readily when he stopped the pipelayer and shut it down. On the way out of the crew cab, he made sure to cinch in his M14 rifle sling, given that he wanted to make it very difficult for someone to grab it if things got out of hand.

"What gives here?" Hess asked the lead of the pogrom when he approached behind the Engineers.

"You in command of these Engineers?" some twenty-something guy asked. Hess gave him a quick once-over, and figured him for the rough equivalent of a local druggie in downtown Louisville.

"I have some influence," Hess half-lied. "What is your concern?"

"Our still is in that building! You can't destroy it!"

"Still? Alcohol brewing?" Hess asked.

"No! Crystals!" another guy said.

"Crystals? Methamphetamine?" Hess asked to drill down to the heart of the matter.

"Yes!" The same twenty-something said. "We can't live without it!"

"You can't live without it, or you do not want to live without it?" Hess asked, working on the psychologic angle of the matter.

"Don't try that shit on me — I know chicken psychology!" he half-shouted in response.

"The phrase you're looking for is 'chicken-shit psychological ploy'," Hess countered. "Point Officer, if you would step aside?" Once the Engineer was out of the way, Hess moved forward into the front line. "I am going to ask you again, can you not live without it, or do you not want to live without it?"

"I said don't —"

"There are two ways Meth addiction ends, amigo. You get treatment, or you get dead. Meth, like so many other illicit drugs, it doesn't take prisoners. You either go clean, or you are slain by it either directly or indirectly. How do you want this to end?" Hess asked as he could hear the sound of approaching chopper rotors. "How do you want this to end, mister?"

"I —"

Sigma One figured he had them broke, as nobody was showing the overt hostility they had been showing earlier. "Answer the damn question! Do you want to face your death at the hands of crystallized poison, or do you want to right your lives?"

"There is nothing left in our lives any more," an older (middle age) lady said. "When the government collapsed, it took out everything."

"If your choice past that destruction is to fill the void with crystal meth, then you have already consigned yourselves to death. I can't stop you from self-destructing, nor would I try if I had the authority. But this building is going to come down today, and with it this production lab. If you want to clean yourselves up, there are options. If you don't want to clean up, that's your call."

"But — but why?" the twenty-something asked.

"Earlier you said not to try any psychological ploys on you. I don't have to. All I have to do is my job, which is begin rebuilding these houses and start cleaning up this world. In so doing, I force you to make the choice." Hess sighed. "Star Captain, do you have demolition charges in your unit?"

"Yes, sir," the Star Captain said, staring at the twenty-something as he said it. "First squad, fall out with demo and rig the building! I want it ready to drop in 90 seconds or I want to know why!"

"Aff, SIR!" Five of the engineer troops broke rank and entered the structure to rig it.

"Damnit! We can take 'em!" a big guy shouted.

"Yes, you can take us down by the numbers, but you won't survive the battle," Hess waved a finger toward a Calliope Turret that was facing the crowd. "The operator on that turret has orders. You'll want to think real hard about how much of a gamble you want to take today, because the only three turrets around the base that are not working are on the north wall." Sigma One studiously did not mention what those orders would be, of course. Their imaginations would fill in the blank to the proper effect.

As a result of his psychologic combat, the crowd did nothing even as the Engineers rigged what remained of the building and returned to the line. "Building rigged for straight drop, sir. Utilities are disconnected, we're ready to go on your orders."

"Gas masks, meth labs are a breathing hazard. Doubly so when destroyed violently," the Star Captain offered two such masks to Sigma One and his SPO.

"Been a while since I drilled on using these," Hess loose-fitted the mask, pulled both sides of the fitting bands tight at the top, then did the bottom bands. His check for proper seal was to fit a chemical filter to the mask, then cover the filter inlets while trying to draw air through it. When his mask vacuum-sealed around his face, he knew it was set properly. "Good to go, Star Captain."

"Same," Toni said, as Magi citizens all received training in school on how to use gas masks as part of their disaster survival training.

"On your go, sir," the Star Captain said.

"Fire," Hess ordered. The Star Captain squeezed the radio detonator, which caused four sets of Pentite demolition charges to fire. What was left of the burnt-out building collapsed into its own basement in a matter of moments.

"Look at that shit," one of the Engineers said as pink-green fumes began rising from the rubble. There were some rumblings from the crowd, some sobbing, but nothing drastic.

Hess figured it was time for the obligatory ration of tough love. "This is your decision point, people. If you want to start the process of cleaning up, inside that base is a facility of people willing to help you get back on your feet. It starts with you, however, I can't make that decision for you. Otherwise, I suggest you start walking, we have a job to do and you're not going to be able to recover anything from these ruins."

Some would walk, but most, now forcibly denied their addiction of choice, would take the offer to clean up. Most would even succeed.

-x-x-x-

(29 March, Magi Year 14408 / Year SL 8838, 1100 Hours Local)
(Dimension CS-30215510-4646, Rescue Contract 00004)
(Rescue Rangers Unit 1 — Sergeant Foley)

The Roadrunner General Aviation Helo had been outfitted with winch outriggers on both sides, along with other sundry rescue gear, given this wasn't a combat mission the door-mount gatling guns would not be needed. If any manner of firepower was needed, the Rangers still had their M4s and the Roadrunner itself had two (admittedly weak) lasers under the chin in a turret assembly.

By way of the Gate Engines back at Base Boarhound, the helo arrived on the landing pad for the family helicopter, though the helo was missing — it was the lost craft, all things considered, and the pilot was who they were going in to find. After a few moment's pause, a late-twenties lady approached the helo. "You're the rescue flight?"

"Yes ma'am, Sigma Mercenaries Rescue Rangers," Sergeant Foley said. "You have any updates for us?"

"I do! Permission to board?" she asked. She was dressed appropriately for a cold journey, which was a good thing — the autumn air at ground level was a bit chilly.

"Get in and strap in," Curt pulled her up into the cab and sat her down in the jumpseat. She didn't take long to strap in and secure. "You're family?" Foley asked in a more civil volume after she had a headset on.

"My mother is the person we're going in to rescue. I'm a trained paramedic."

"Welcome aboard," Katherine said from the pilot's seat. "Turning rotors now." She flipped on her radio systems and transponder. "Seattle Center, this is Rescue Ranger, on site at private helipad per flightplan 8870-Romeo. Requesting takeoff and search clearance, over."

"Rescue Ranger, set squawk to 1105, cleared takeoff 1105L, rescue search cordon authorized per contract. Contact Helena departure once airborne."

"Set squawk 1105, cleared takeoff 1105L, rescue search cordon authorized by contract. Contact Helena departure once airborne, Rescue Ranger copies all." Katherine dialed in the transponder number herself and synchronized the local time to her instruments. 1105 local time was only a minute away, which gave her plenty of time to allow the blades to spool up to takeoff velocity, and at the appointed minute she was airborne.

"Helena departure, Rescue Ranger, have departed the McGentson private helipad and am northbound per flightplan. Any updates?"

"Rescue Ranger, Helena, be advised that Coast Guard rescue helos have checked adjacent search cordons 1-Alpha, 1-Bravo, 1-Charlie, and found no trace of November-Foxtrot-62505. State endurance for search and intended pattern, over."

"Helena, endurance is maximum 16 hours flight time, intended search is 3-Charlie, 3-Bravo, 3-Alpha," which was a south-to-north search pattern across roughly 50 square miles of territory, "then southbound from 2-Alpha to 2-Charlie," which was another chunk of real-estate along the size of 50 square miles. "Will advise when we have entered the first search grid, how copy?"

"Rescue Ranger, Helena, good copy and good hunting, pilot. Helena is out."

"All right, ma'am, what can you tell us?" Corporal Dunn asked of their passenger.

"It wasn't in the initial contract, but my mother reported some manner of explosion in her engine compartment before she went down. We don't know if it was sabotage or just a mechanical failure, but the maintenance on the Bell JetRanger was completely by the book."

"We lose a helo every other year in SOF training, even with the maintenance by the military book, so that's no guarantee against it," Sergeant Foley acknowledged the point.

"If we can find the crash site, do we want to try to recover the wreckage?" Curt asked. He normally flew craft, but in this case was acting as the loadmaster for this mission.

"Judgment call, especially in the case of sabotage," Sergeant Foley said. "Might be best if we just mark the position and turn it over to the investigators."

"Standby, guys," Kathrine switched her radio main frequency back on. "Helena, Rescue Ranger, have entered search grid 3-Charlie, commencing low-altitude sweep. Standby for updates."

"Rescue Ranger, Helena, copy all. You've got some damn good radios in your bird, what type are you flying?" the Helena Air Traffic Controller assigned to the rescue mission said.

"Vandren Aviation Roadrunner Multipurpose Utility VTOL, it's a bare-bones transport chopper made by a company that practically nobody has heard of, over."

"Fusion engine bird, over?" the controller asked.

"Affirmative, Helena. This thing is about as bare-bones as a minibus, but the price is right and Sigma loves 'em."

"Awesome, Rescue Ranger, thanks for the update. Continue as planned. Helena, out."

Katherine started her first looping turn around the southern half of 3-Charlie grid. The area they were searching was predominantly forest area, with some sparse clearings here and there, but nothing major in the way of open territory. Finding where a helo went in under this canopy was going to be a hellish challenge.

"Do we have our sensors on?" Curt asked.

"Uh, no, I don't have the mast-mount on, think it will help?"

"At this point, can't hurt, I'd say," the loadmaster / pilot answered.

"Got it," Katherine flipped up the safety covers for her sensor power panel, and clicked them active until all the sensor and targeting systems were active. "System is powering up, I'll have detailed information in about ten seconds."

"Whoa, hold the phone, I think I have some smoke up here," Ramirez said, looking out the port-side door. "Nine o'clock low, six kilos off," he guessed.

"I have a sensor return from that area," Katherine reported. "Helena, Rescue Ranger, possible sighting of smoke and hard radar return from sector 2-Charlie, I am moving in to investigate now. Standby for further," she reported by radio.

"Rescue Ranger, Helena, copy all. Good luck, pilot," the ATC operator said reverently.

Katherine made sure her radio was off and the intercom only was active. "Foley, I have a feeling about this one," Katherine said.

"So do I," Captain Foley said. "Dunn, Ramirez, brass check," he ordered. The Corporal and Private both pulled the charging handles on their weapons and verified safeties were on.

"Is that necessary, Sergeant?" the passenger asked.

"I hope it is not, ma'am, but I'm not in the business of gambling. This is prime area for narcotraffickers, not a major city or residence for twenty kilometers. It is possible your mother may have flown over an operation and been shot down with a SAM."

"Damn, didn't think about that," Curt grunted.

"Some of those narco groups have the arsenal of a third-world jerkwad military, and a lot less restraint in using it," Corporal Dunn pointed out. "Eyes up and out, if you see something, say something."

"Got something!" Ramirez said. "Red flare, ten o'clock! Came from that clearing!"

The passenger grabbed a pair of binoculars from her vest and looked down through them. "Oh, God, it's her! It's mother!"

"Eyes on one in the clearing," Katherine said from the pilot seat. "That area should be big enough, I'm going to set her down toward the south edge. Helena, Rescue Ranger, be advised I have eyes on possible missing person, relaying coordinates now. Intend to set down in nearby clearing for contact and extract, how copy?"

"Good copy, damn good show! Any sign of the downed helo?"

"Possible fire at the crash site, will investigate after rescue, over." Katherine slewed her craft parallel to the person that discharged the flare, then began bringing it down. Smartly, the lady in question turned away from the rotor downblast and took a knee to reduce her profile to any debris kicked up by the rotors. Once she landed, the lady stood up into a crouch and made for the helo almost without reserve, then jumped in.

"Mother!" the passenger shouted, embracing her just after she entered the crew cab.

"Katherine! Thank you for finding me so quickly!"

"C'mon ladies, we can do the hallmark moment after we're clear of the AO," Curt said as he closed up the side door. "Need you to be seated, ma'am."

"I know the routine, son, this isn't my first helo extraction," the lady said. "I'm Lane McGentson, what do you need to know for identification?"

"Date of birth and town of birth, ma'am," Sergeant Foley had those as bona fide for her.

"4-8-1950, Houston, Texas," she answered.

"Confirm. Anything we need to know about the wreck, ma'am?" Foley asked.

"I didn't report it over the radio, didn't have time, but what downed me was a missile fired from the forest," Lane reported. "I was doing a sweep for ATF, they said there was a minimal risk for SAMs in the area, but I guess I found one."

"And here comes another!" Corporal Dunn shouted after he caught sight of someone near the edge of the clearing aiming a SAM tube in their direction. He was fast enough to get his M4 up on target, but not fast enough to stop the shot.

"Not again!" Lane grumped a moment before the SAM struck the craft. The whole Roadrunner rattled, but most surprisingly none of the systems went red and nothing major fell off the craft, so...

"Everyone hold on, damage is minimal!" Katherine jammed the collective down quickly, forcing her rotors to take significant bites out of the air and climb upward rapidly. "I'm airborne, all flight-critical systems are green,"

"Guns!" Ramirez shouted as gunfire began striking the lightly-armored hull of the Roadrunner. He began firing back along with Corporal Dunn as Katherine rotated away from the threat axis and started southbound.

"Helena, Rescue Ranger, priority traffic, rescue and extract complete but AO is hot, repeat, 2-Charlie AO is hot! Rescue Ranger took minimum one MANPADS (1) missile and numerous automatic small arms fire before departing, how copy?"

"Rescue Ranger, Helena, copy all, can you evacuate area?" the ATC operator asked.

"Rescue Ranger inbound Helena station direct route at this time, full-throttle and all. So much for this being a noncombat operation."

"Acknowledge all, you will be met by rescue and investigation personnel at the airport. I have the skies clear along your route. Safe trip, pilot," the air traffic controller said.

-x-x-x-

(29 March, Magi Year 14408 / Year SL 8838, 1230 Hours Boarhound Time)
(Demolition Site 1A, outside Base Boarhound)

"Check this shit out," a Junior Engineer (Engineer Point Officer) said as he held up a tablet for his Engineer Team Leader (Point Commander) to see.

"Yeah, that's a troop that knows his stuff. Flying away from the fire lane and he still gets four kills," the Team Leader said reverently. All the ops personnel were outfitted with cameras for their rifles now, and Dunn had been quick to upload his footage — both as evidence for the change in contract status and for the investigation personnel to cross-take the footage for the FAA reporting. In the grand scheme of things, the investigation for the contract had become a classic bureaucratic clusterfuck, because mercenaries (Department of State) had been working a downed aircraft SAR (FAA), found the person (Coast Guard), been fired at by a SAM (ATF) and multiple automatic weapons (ATF again) in the possession of narcoterrorists (DEA or FBI, take your pick), using protected wildlife refuge areas (Department of Interior, Montana Department of Fish and Wildlife) as sanctuary and routing for their drugs (DEA again). In short, Foley's involvement threatened to take several hours, so Ramirez and Dunn had made sure their footage went up onto MercNet's records system fast to ensure that the team knew they had pulled it off. The contract itself was classified, so the shoot footage wasn't publicly available, but naturally it would circulate within Sigma to a degree.

"Ramirez?" Hess asked as he approached the huddle. One of the Star Commanders for the Engineers team had taken over the Pipelayer detail for lifting out debris, leaving Hess and Toni pretty much circulating and keeping a close eye on the people in the area.

"Corporal Dunn, video from their close encounter, sir," the Team Lead said. "Got a damn good shooter here, sir."

"I suspected as much, Rangers don't turn out slouches behind the trigger," Hess said mildly. "Huh, wind that footage back a moment." The engineer did as requested. "There, pause it," Hess requested when he caught sight of something. "Gun truck, or more proper term in this case is a Technical," he pointed out a vehicle-mobile machine gun that was tucked far enough into the forest to not be obvious but close enough to have a good shot at the LZ. "This was a spontaneous encounter, otherwise that Technical would have ripped into the chopper pretty hard."

"Think the contracting party knew?"

"No, she would not have known, otherwise she should have mentioned it," Hess gauged. He was right, technically, but only because the daughter did not know the mother was hunting drug traffickers that the ATF expected were armed but not extremely heavily armed. Hence, the daughter filed the contract as a personal accident recovery and not as a rescue from hostile forces. "I'll give her a pass on this one, it sounds like everything is legit on her end, but I'll warn her in person about that."

"That's mighty level of you, sir," the Team Lead half-challenged Hess on the call.

"I won't fault a person for an honest mistake, but I will fault someone when it is obvious they are engaging in willful ignorance. Given the circumstances and evidence, this one is riding the border but I would be hard-pressed to make it stick in arbitration, so…"

"I hear ya, sir," one of the Junior Engineers said with a smile.

"Ride's here, big guy," Toni said just before Barrett Goodwin stopped behind him.

"We've got this, sir," the Star Captain said as he approached. "Pass on my congrats to Team 1 for their rescue job, sir."

"Will do," Hess said as he hopped in behind the driver's seat of the HMMVW.

"What's the word, sir?" Barrett asked.

"Some reason, command level has been requested to where Rescue Rangers Team 1 is marooned, I'd guess pertaining to the investigation for being shot at?" Hess guessed. "We'll just port in with HMMVW and all, and once we have everything straightened out, we'll just bring it home."

"Aye aye, sir," Barrett and Cyrus said in unison, which caused Toni to giggle at their obvious exasperation. "And you're it because Dagger is out on her own contract?"

"Aye, she's still doing a shoreline search for a missing person," Hess said. "That means Sigma Command is next in line."

"Fun times, sir. Cyrus, make sure you've got one in the Ma Deuce," Barrett said.

"Already got it cocked and locked, brother!" Cyrus replied testily.

"Keep it skyward when we're on site unless you have to use it," Hess ordered as the HMMVW turned into the base proper with a wave onward from the MPs guarding the southwest gate.

"Aye, sir," Cyrus acknowledged.

The ride to the Gate Pad and the subsequent short wait for clearance to gate over were silent.

-x-

(Dimension CS-30215510-4646, Rescue Contract 00004)
(Local time 1200)

The time shift between Boarhound and Helena was negligible, thirty minutes give or take on-the-ground time difference, so it was not all that disorienting a change to the occupants of the vehicle. The air pressure change was a bit more unsettling, but easily manageable.

The environment was rather busy, all else being equal. The landing spot for the helo had been a light craft ramp space adjacent to the field control tower, and Virtue had used telemetry from a Pylon to put the HMMVW immediately adjacent to the Helo's tail rotor (powered down).

Immediately after the HMMVW landed, Corporal Dunn opened the door for Hess. "Sir, glad you're here, these newsies are vicious!"

"Of course, the press doesn't like anyone that gets results," Hess said on his way out of the HMMVW. Toni was quick to form up on him and Dunn took a secondary escort position as they moved to where Sergeant Foley was speaking to some 'suit' types.

"Sigma One on Deck!" Private Ramirez announced when Hess approached. The Helo crew and the Rangers came to attention immediately and saluted.

"As you were," Hess said immediately. "Sergeant Foley, damn good job getting the protectee out of an ambush. Did we take any casualties?"

"Hole in the bird, sir, but otherwise intact and mission capable," Sergeant Foley answered immediately.

"All right, where do we stand?" Hess asked diffidently.

"Deputy Consul Kinder, sir. Welcome to America," he said, misgauging where Hess was from.

"Thanks, Deputy Consul. I am told you need a command person for something pertaining to this?" Hess asked.

"Yes sir, we need the reports from your men signed off, unless you are allowing your personnel to speak on the unit's behalf?" the Deputy Consul asked.

"Sergeant?" Hess asked.

"Incident reports and video filings, nothing special. We went through the fine print, it's clean," Foley explained.

"Would not have signed it otherwise, sir," Corporal Dunn said.

"Same here, sir," Katherine said.

"Very well, I shall consider my personnel's word sufficient and proper to the matter," Hess said succinctly, which answer would echo long and loud throughout the unit for the implied and expected trust the command section put in the personnel. "What can you tell me, Deputy Consul?"

"The Department of State intends to give Sigma an official award for their involvement. I know it breaks the classification of the contract, but you've earned it. DEA search teams have found about 300 acres of Marijuana grow and several cocaine processing stations already, and we're not finished sweeping the entire area."

"The drug runners themselves?" Hess prompted.

"We've caught several groups with Stinger MANPADS, serial numbers trace to several National Guard armories in California. Assorted small arms and a couple heavy machine guns, manufactured from Chile to Siberia and a dozen stops in between. Do you wish to deal with the team that shot at your troops?"

Hess weighed possibilities for a few moments, but came to the conclusion that warehousing, prosecuting, and eventually executing the narcos in question would be more of a distraction at this time than anything useful. "I think I will pass on trying them under Sigma law. If the US Government tries them under death penalty statutes and gets a solid conviction, I would like to volunteer for the firing squad," Hess said.

"As do I, sir," Curt said.

"I would, but I think I'm exempt under Habeas Corpus regulations," Sergeant Foley explained his position.

"I'll pass that on to the Department of Justice," the Deputy Consul said. "I think we have all the information necessary for our side of the filings," he continued. "I think the ATF guys had a couple questions for you."

"Not any more, the crew chief on your bird answered them, but the press wants a word with someone in command," he said. He had already taken a catalog of arms used in the incident as per regulations, and the FBI had extracted shrapnel and residue from the impact point on the helo, meaning that the remaining issues were odds and ends questions.

"Might as well give them something to talk about," Hess said drolly. "We could always use the press, especially since the contract is no longer classified. Speaking thereof, has all that been signed off, Sergeant?"

"Yes sir," Foley answered immediately. "Payment is in mixed civilian weapons, rifles, antique and curio pieces, similar."

"Not bad. The deployment team may keep their cut in the direct proceeds or may sell them back to the unit at going price, your option."

The Press didn't wait for any manner of introduction or prompting, as soon as they realized there was someone in a command role in the mercenaries' unit within striking distance, they flooded toward. They did keep a respectful distance, though, given that Hess was still outfitted in his combat gear and had his M14 rifle at combat sling (made even more 'sinister' to the newsies by the large optic and suppressor on it).

Hess raised his hands for a moment of silence from the shouted array of questions. "Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. I am Command Administrator Erich Hess, callsign Sigma One. I'll preface this by saying that I do not have a prepared statement, but I would like to thank the DEA and ATF for their stellar work in mopping up the narcoterrorist cells that shot at my rescue team. Other than that, I'll field questions in an organized manner, starting over here," Hess pointed to his left at an AP reporter.

"Sir, I read the contract as initially accepted by your unit. The contract has been violated due to breach of classification and due to the presence of hostile parties involved. Will Sigma attempt to modify the contract or bring proceedings against the contracting party?" the reporter asked.

"The contract was filed in good faith that the rescue operation was a noncombat personal accident rescue. Unless I receive evidence that suggests otherwise, I have no cause to assume that the contract was filed under false pretense nor shall I make such an accusation. As to the classification of the contract, I have no objection to breaking stealth given the very noisy nature of the rescue and the events surrounding the necessity thereof. This wasn't a quiet accident the family wanted to hush-hush. The protectee was shot down by ruthless narcos trying to cover their tracks and bury a potential witness. They also tried shooting down the rescue team, and paid in blood for it. I daresay that serves as its own loud and nasty warning to two-bit narcos to not take potshots at interdimensional mercenaries, such actions might not end well for the offending party. Next question."

The next person to drop a question was a ComStar News Network reporter. "Sir, this makes your fourth completed contract in a week. Why is your unit moving so fast on short-term contracts, when most mercenary commands prefer long-term operations?"

"The first three contracts were done by the command team of Sigma to prove it could be done, complete short-duration contracts at cost or at a profit. Sigma actually has three contracts laid in for today, to be executed by the newly-formed Rescue Rangers subdivision of Sigma, with the goal being to prove that it is possible to complete an enhanced operations schedule in a single day with minimal overhead and little to no hazard to the teams."

"You call being shot at by a SAM as 'little to no hazard'?" a CNN reporter asked snidely.

"I can speak for that, my helo," Katherine stepped forward. "When the boss said little to no hazard, he wasn't joking. A single man-portable SAM is not a major threat to a Star Empire-manufactured aircraft or VTOL. In fact, the damage to my bird is going to be in the neighborhood of 500 C-bills after armor is replaced and painted to specification. No rotor damage, no frame damage, no engine or hydraulics hits. My craft is flight-capable right now, and I'll take any of you up in it as demonstration."

"Interdimensional Mercenaries play by a different ruleset as a matter of course," Hess picked up where Katherine challenged them. "Years upon years of technological advancement have increased the survivability of personal defense equipment, light and heavy armor applications, and is compounded by an ethos that values the troops as individuals and as part of a greater whole. The Roadrunner is not our heaviest bird, but it has enough armor to withstand anything short of medium-range SAM systems. Trust me on this, if we had suspected armed threats in the rescue zone, I would have sent in attack helos to sanitize the area before the rescue team went in. I reiterate, we did not expect any manner of threat in this rescue mission, but our rescue effort bird-dogged an actual threat for the federal government to see to during the course of our contracted duties. Next question."

The local FOX affiliate reporter stepped up to the plate. "Sir, will you pursue the narcoterrorists with your own assets for firing on your rescue team?"

"If the United States government requests our support by way of contract or treaty, I will make my services available as needed. That said, the ATF and DEA appear to have this matter in hand, bringing Sigma's aviation units into play is not likely to provide any measurable benefit at this time."

-x-x-x-

(29 March, Magi Year 14408 / Year SL 8838, 1330 Hours Boarhound Time)
(Sigma Support Services Building, Base Boarhound, Terra 232)

"This is a first," Jeff Evans said nonchalantly. "This is the first day since we started this misadventure where I don't have any planned operations."

"Our prior engineering tasking has been taken over by the combat engineers group, so better we get to our actual business," Chief Engineer Subaru Annoe said heartily. "Question becomes, where do we begin?"

"When we started this hot mess, the boss gave me one good tasking. Existing Successor State, Star Empire, and similar machines are geared for more armor-centric combat, would you agree with that assessment?"

"With a few noteworthy exceptions, yes," Subaru admitted. Most equipment manufactured throughout the Star Empires or in historical terms was supremely engineered for the purpose of combatting other units of the same classification, or occasionally that family of units (armor threats, be it ground armor, standing armor, or similar, or aerospace threats, or naval threats as examples).

"Same premise applies to designs from my home world. Tanks are doctrinally designated to support the Infantry, but are designed primarily to bust other tanks. Battlefield necessity drives that requirement."

"Makes sense, I'd say," Subaru acknowledged the point.

"Here's the thing with Sigma. We don't intend to face the same family of forces, at least not in large quantity. By that metric, us having a main battle tank that is supremely engineered to bust other main battle tanks is good on paper, but not very useful to the unit when all you are facing is infantry and horsemen. Follow?"

"Not really, sir," Subaru admitted. "Why would we be in a position where we — oh," she cut her own sentence short after she realized what Evans meant. "Contracts against pre-Industrial-Age opposition," she said.

"In that kind of scenario, something like an M1A1 Abrams would be overkill of a massive order. The best scenario for that kind of action, we load the tank out with grapeshot shells and use it as an overlarge shotgun, but it is still an insane waste of resources and a perfectly good tank crew."

"Okay, I see where this is going," Subaru nodded twice. "We need units geared to fighting infantry."

"Close. We need units designed specifically for supporting our own infantry, or for supporting the infantry of contracting force structures," Jeff drew the proper bounds for the challenge as Hess had instructed him on the requirement. "Those support requirements are basically to provide heavy punch against opposing infantry and fortifications, with a secondary purpose of suppressing armor. We will be deploying units for dealing with armor, but our first challenge is saving our own troops. I don't care if the designs get low marks from the armchair generals because we built a tank that can't really fight other tanks, what I want to see is something our troops can rely on to help us win contracts, typically against foes that have never seen firearms before in their lives."

"So, in essence, we maximize the anti-light target capabilities of a machine, including dual-use capabilities, with the inclusion of heavier weapons as design ethic permits?" Subaru pinned down her thoughts on the challenge to come.

"That is the plan. I may be an engineering major, but engineering platforms at this scale and technology level never was in my engineering texts. Is it doable?" Jeff asked plaintively.

"Doable? Oh hell yes, definitely doable. Most Mobile Army weapons can be used on infantry just as easily as they can be used on other Mobile Army forces, but some weapons will be better than others for the job. Some platforms will be better for the job than others," she admitted. "Mobile Suits are probably going to be the least favorable for the task, as Mobile Suits and Gundams are pretty much engineered to take on other standing armor and outfitting them for anti-infantry combat is going to be the same as with your Abrams analogy: yes, it can be done at the technical level, but it won't be very smart or efficient."

"Okay, what's the technical aspect involved?" Jeff asked.

"Mobile Suits change roles by way of the weapons they carry. Give a Mobile Suit a machine gun and you have a general purpose unit. Give it a beam rifle and you have a primarily anti-MS weapon. Give it a rocket or missile launcher and you have something best suited to attacking ships. Use a big-bore cannon and you have a mobile artillery or anti-fortification unit. If you use a low-caliber high-fire-rate machine gun, say, you could do a number on enemy infantry, but then you would need to carry other weapons for other threats. Virtue, could you gin up a quick sim of a RX-78-G mass pro with, say, a 75mm rotary gun, opposition would be sword infantry?"

"On monitor 2, I am demonstrating using the same gattling as used on the Zeon Gouf B-3 model."

After a few seconds, the monitor faded into a scene of an infantry formation on the march toward another infantry force in defensive positions with their backs to a forest. After a few moments, the forest came alive with a pair of the mass-production ground combat Gundams moving forward, then both raised their shields and attached 75mm Gatling Guns. The pilots weren't stupid about their application of firepower, they swept the enemy ranks progressively with bursts of fire until the enemy formation had been reduced to less than half numbers.

"This example, using standard 75mm high-explosive dual purpose munitions, has a munitions expenditure cost of roughly 130,000 c-bills at going rate and nets an expectation of circa 3000 casualties across 2 machines."

"Not bad," Jeff Evans said.

"Better example," Subaru held up a finger. "Virtue, please redo the same battle conditions using two SRM Carrier IIM machines."

The scenario reset, but this time the machines that came out of the forest were two squat, boxy missile packs on tracks. For the next two minutes, these missile tracks hocked salvo after salvo of missiles in the general direction of the oncoming enemy formation, as well as a pair of lasers fired roughly every ten seconds, and continued to fire the lasers after the cessation of missiles. The battle concluded as a blowout victory for the defending forces (Sigma's side).

"Battle scenario completed. Assuming less-than-ideal gunnery, the expectation is roughly 2800 enemy casualties per missile track across their ammunition load plus five minutes of laser fire, assuming enemy marching across an open field without terrain to screen them. Expenditure per missile track is six tons of SRM-6 missiles at 27,000 per ton, or 162,000 per sortie per vehicle assuming all missiles are fired."

"That's a chunk of cheddar," Jeff pointed out.

"We save money on the per-unit cost," Subaru pointed out. "Virtue, what is the off-the-shelf cost of a RX-78-G Mass production unit?"

"Anaheim Electronics is offering the ground-combat mass production Gundam at 24 million C-bills per unit with a purchase contract of ten or more units. This does not include the cost of armaments, munitions, or repairs if they get banged up during an operation."

"And what is the street cost of the Multimage-rebuild SRM Carrier?" Subaru asked to finalize her argument.

"Full-up packages for the SRM Carrier IIM, model designation SRC-02A, are 3 million, 984 thousand, including a full load of munitions and first engine overhaul after 5000 operating hours provided by General Dynamics Mobile Warfare Systems."

"So, in essence, assuming we bought ten of the SRM carriers, and four full loads of missiles for the units, is still less than the cost of two ground combat Gundams, their weapons, and munitions?" Jeff asked.

"This is correct. Additionally, the per-cycle maintenance costs, typically calculated on a monthly basis, assumes that Gundam-class Mobile Suits cost roughly 2 percent of their purchase value per month in maintenance and support staff, assuming one sortie a week. Maintenance costs for ground armor is calculated as one percent per month, assuming two sorties a week. Another thing to keep in mind, traditionally ballistic munitions have always costed less per salvo than equivalent rockets or missiles. A more comparable munition cost to the demonstration would be the use of a Rotary AC/5 on most Battlemechs, or in the case of the Gundams, comparable munitions would be their use of the Hyper Bazooka or Raketen Bazooka, with appreciably less results across a similar munition expenditure."

"That's a lesson worth remembering," Jeff reminded himself that without mechanics, the best-engineered machines eventually broke down. "So, what about, say, a battlemech geared toward dual-use or close support?" Jeff asked.

"Let's start with, say, the Bushwacker IIM, the XC1 variant," Subaru said. "This is a classic Magi refit machine, built during the Quarter War, cost is midrange for its weight bracket but lethality is very high — and it has a solid dual-use arsenal. The only weapon that really counts as single-shot overkill for Infantry is the main ER Large Laser in the nose. Virtue, rerun same scenario with three decent pilots in the BSW-XC1."

The sim took a little longer to run through this time, roughly seven minutes, but the results were rather clear. By the time the enemy formation reached allied lines, it was a shadow of its beginning strength, and was easily thrashed into bloody chunks by the still-fresh defending infantry.

"Expectation of casualties per machine, assuming average gunnery skills, is roughly 1450 per machine across a five minute span to completely expend onboard munitions and continue firing laser only. Therefore, three machines would expect 4350 casualties in five minutes of continued fire with no resupply. Total expenditure on munitions per machine, assuming nothing comes home, 84,500 C-bills."

"If I'm doing the math right, that's roughly in line with the expenditures of the SRM carriers or the Gundams, though it requires double the machines to get the same casualties," he pointed out.

"Dual use machines," Subaru pointed out. "The Bushwacker is an ambush and hunter-killer medium 'mech. It's primary prey is other 'mechs, light and medium machines, and ground armor, but as we just demonstrated, definitely usable to support infantry."

"Okay, message received," Jeff pointed out. "So, we'll want to aim for dual-use, but lean more toward infantry lethality than mobile forces lethality. Where do we begin?"

"Here," Subaru handed him a notepad, which to Jeff's way of thinking was an unusual starting point. "Every good engineering project starts by listing the objectives. Once we have that, then we begin tailoring the solution."

Jeff nodded twice. It was a lesson he would use time and time again in the future, and one that would save him thousands of hours of effort.

-x-x-x-

(29 March, Magi Year 14408 / Year SL 8838, 1500 Hours Boarhound Time)
(HPG Facility, Base Boarhound, Terra 232)

Sylvianne Zeelen, Precentor-1 (the lowest rank of Precentor) stepped first through the Gate provided by the Transportation Gate Mage and into the semi-darkness of the Boarhound HPG command center. Given that three more persons were planning on coming through the gate, she was quick to step forward and simply hope that she didn't run into anything injurious along the way. Three steps in, no impact.

Herbert Sosigenes, the new facility commander for HPG Maintenance, stepped through behind Sylvianne. "Damn, coulda left a light on," he growled as he stepped forward and aside to clear for the remaining two.

"Bit dark in here," Demi-Precentor Pavel Sarka grumped as he moved forward and rammed into Sylvianne.

"Oi! Watch it!" the new Precentor-HPG barked at her effective second-in-command.

"I can't see shit," Demi-Precentor Lunete Ueda complained as she stepped in, then promptly tripped over something. "OW!"

"Great start to this tour," Pavel said grumpily. "Ai, this is Demi-Precentor Pavel Sarka, ComStar HPG Services. Where do we authenticate and can we get some light in the command pit?" He asked the room, using the common Magi addressing to an artificial intelligence entities (Ai — technically it meant 'love' in Japanese, but also referenced the acronym AI for Artificial Intelligence).

"Lighting facility now," Virtue began powering up the light systems in the HPG complex. "You may authenticate at any terminal that is active."

Ten of the terminals in the command pit were active, so finding seats for the four personnel was a simple task. Each plugged in their personal codex and gave a hand-scan to confirm biometrics.

"All personnel verified. I am the Artificial Intelligence entity for Base Boarhound and surrounding area, callsign Virtue. Sigma One is apprised of your presence and welcomes you to the Protectorate, but cannot greet you in person at this time due to outstanding obligations."

"I expected he would be busy," Sylvianne said. "Startup Protectorate, startup mercenary unit, startup refugee resettlement and rescue group, he's got a lot going on."

"Quite true," Virtue said. "Right now, he is operating with the mercenary unit to complete a brace of contracts as proof-of-concept for the Rescue Rangers outfit."

Lunete decided a gamble was in order. "Would he object if I did some observation and initial reporting?" she asked.

"Standby," Virtue answered. "He is in the second-floor briefing room in the main admin building. I have uploaded a map to your tablet."

"Go, kid, but be careful," Sylvianne said to the younger field reporter, who was quick to grab up her camera from her personal effects bag and headed out toward the indicated conference room. "So, Virtue, the Primus intends to completely reactivate this facility. Do you have diagnostics on it ready, or do we need to start there?"

"For having been abandoned during the general evacuation of Terra 232, this HPG is in very good condition, owing mostly to its relative youth. The only major system that requires overhaul is the HPG Core Secondary Cooling System 4, all other cooling systems are intact and running at 66 percent load."

"Number four secondary cooling system? Bah, better than I expected," Herbert said with some cheer to voice. "I'll begin triage within the hour, Precentor."

"Well, time to settle into quarters, draw basic supplies, and get acquainted with the base," Pavel hoisted his luggage and started for the crew quarters.

-x-

Lunete had no real trouble finding the briefing room in question. She knocked twice and cracked the door. "Field Reporter Lunete Ueda, may I enter?" she asked meekly.

"Come in, come in, standing room only at this point," the lady at the front of the room said. Lunete guessed her age at or around seventeen, which seemed strange for someone delivering a briefing to quite a few persons double her age or more.

Lunete wormed her way around the periphery of the room and took station next to a bunch of guys wearing the jumpsuits of flight personnel. Sitting in the chairs in the row immediately in front of her were several guys wearing body armor and carrying firearms, as well as several ladies.

"ComStar Intel on the rescue is pretty good, as we have locations and estimates of personnel guarding the rescue," the lady in front continued. "Marina Kokinos is being held on the third floor of the governor's palace, in an isolated and secured room adjacent to the Governor's master bedroom. Mansion garrison is 80 troops, a Roman Century, and the remainder of the local garrison formation is within five minutes marching distance of the Governor's Mansion. Combined with domestic staff, we expect a maximum enemy ground force of 120 troops, 80 trained, 40 untrained, assuming we are in and out fast enough to avoid the 800 troops for the local garrison."

"Shotguns will do better in these confines than rifles, but sub-guns, assault rifles, and light machine guns would be optimal," one of the infantry troops said. Curiously, the trooper had an american flag on his shirt-sleeve, not the Protectorate's symbol.

"We'll want at least one good rifle," another of the American troops looked down the row toward another trooper. "Can you do overwatch, sir?"

"Should be able to, Toni can cover me while I cover the open AO," the biggest of the troopers said.

"That puts four, three, and four on the ground, so grand total of eleven to do the rescue, with two up top proving cover and suppression."

"Sounds like a solid count to me," another one of the infantry said. "Zidane's team has main entry, Foley's Team and my team provide ingress and egress cover?"

"If we do it fast enough, we should minimize enemy encounters," the lead American trooper said. "The Apaches will be needed on the road approaching the manor in case the garrison responds quickly, so we can't call on them in close."

"We can get creative with our positioning," the boss flyboy said. "If we have to support the entry teams, that's not a big deal. The minimum response time from the garrison is five minutes, that gives us plenty to work with."

"What about a preemptive strike on the on-site garrison barracks?" one of the Americans asked.

"Sir?" the lady up front asked.

"Our approach is southwest," the big guy almost directly in front of Lunete said. "The barracks are northwest corner of the property. Beck, think you can down the Barracks or at least put a hurt on them in one pass?"

"Easily, that's stone and wood construction, our AP Gauss Rifles and HE-DP rockets will tear right through it," the boss flight operator said.

"There you go, even if we don't kill 'em all in one pass, if we knock out half the on-site garrison we pretty much ensure little to no organized resistance at the mansion," the guy sitting next to the big guy said.

"That's what we'll plan on, then," the lady giving the presentation said. "Apaches will hit the barracks just ahead of our landing team. We land the main personnel helicopter adjacent to the rear entrance, teams enter and push forward to the central stairwell, third floor, push to and breach the prisoner's chambers, rescue and extract. Any questions?" the lady asked. "Let's complete the trifecta, people!"

As the troops began mobilizing, the big guy in front of her stood up and stretched. "Lunete Ueda?" he asked.

"I am, sir," the field reporter acknowledged.

"Erich Hess, Sigma One. This is Clint Jamieson, Sigm Two, and Clarence Williams, Sigma Three. You ride with me for this deploy, hope you're ready for some action."

Lunete gulped against the sinking feeling in her stomach. Truth be told, she was not ready for action, but now was not a time to quibble on the matter.

-x-

(20 minutes later)
(Base Boarhound Gate Flats)

The infantry for this operation, Lunete had figured out, was divided into three groups plus an overwatch element. The first group, which comprised the command section of the Rescue Rangers, was headed up by Dagger (she refused to give her real name), with Zidane, Steiner, and Freya rounding out her unit. Steiner struck her as an anachronism, an old-school knight dropped in a modern world, but more interesting to her were Freya (clearly a nonhuman of a type not before known to any of the major players) and Zidane, who also appeared to be nonhuman but far more humanocentric than most. And, to make things even more interesting, he clearly had his sights set on Dagger, which would make for an interesting romance novel plot, not a news story, the CSNN reporter reminded herself mentally.

Second of the groups was a trio of Americans, hence their use of the American Flag on their BDUs rather than the Greek letter Sigma in a circle as worn by the others. Sergeant Foley, Corporal Dunn, and Private Ramirez, she had quickly learned, were United States Rangers that had chased some Russian invaders onto a Train and now were working on a way to finance a path home. Hands down, the three of them probably had the best training and combat experience, and was likely enough to skew the odds in their favor, so…

The third group, most unexpectedly of all, was the command section — Clarence and Clint, along with their prospective Secret Service Officers, Leonora guarding Clarence, Moira guarding Clint. They fell under the bracket semi-trained, inasfar as military training went, decent with arms but not really trained as were the Rangers. That said, their primary jobs were not infantry duties — being the Business Administrator and TRADOC Administrator respectively, their ability to support operations was secondary but critical in this case.

Inasfar as it was possible to confound Lunete, the overwatch element was equal parts creepy and stunning to her. Hess was totally not what she was expecting from the Command Administrator, given that she was expecting someone with monomaniacal confidence and the ego to match. What she found was an engineer, an arms dealer, a fixer of problems, and a guy that she strongly suspected could out-think 95 percent of the Star League bureaucracy and yet was completely humble about it. His prowess with a rifle was already something of a legend in the Protectorate, as she had heard from more than a few of the ground crew. Someone even uploaded video of a 'strip marksman's match' to her tablet, where supposedly Hess had won without losing a single piece of clothing. As to his SSO, Toni, she suspected something was a bit off about her, but in what fashion or what end-game was intended, Lunete figured she would have to find out.

"One minute to jump!" The Loadmaster shouted.

"Anyone on this wagon speak Ancient Greek?" Hess asked.

"You have one now," High Executor Nereus said as he entered the load bay of the Chinook II-F transport helo.

"Welcome to the party, High Executor," Hess said. "Contact team is going to be Dagger's Element, so you'll want to run with them."

"Will do," Nereus took a seat next to Zidane and braced for the flight. "Just received a ruling from the Will Transcendent, we Executors are authorized to support your mercenary operations so long as they are otherwise moral operations."

"Well, this one is on the green side of the break-even line," Clint said. "We'll have to chop up some Roman Legionnaires, which is arguably moral given their street reputation, in pursuit of rescuing a kidnapped lady under threat of forced marriage by the provincial governor, which is on the level."

"Works for me," Nereus acknowledged.

"Jump in three, two, one, now," the loadmaster said. Immediately thereafter, the light level in the cabin of the helo and the air pressure changed noticeably. "We're on site at the jumpoff point."

"Let's get moving," Dagger said.

Lunete held her peace, on the hopes that things didn't result in her being in combat, or slain in combat, but she reminded herself that this was a detail she volunteered for and she promised results to the Primus. What better way to get prime footage than to follow along with the mercenaries as they boldly go forth to rescue a damsel in distress?

-x-

Beck Ellsworthy was first off the deck of the three helos, and set the pace northbound at about 120 kilometers per hour. The Apache could do better by a good degree, but the Chinook II-F wasn't all that fast a bird and 120 was pushing the top-end of its envelope.

"Eagle 1, Eagle 2, I'm airborne and on your four o'clock. Boxcar is 300 meters behind me."

"Keep it loose, Zoe," Beck cautioned the novice helo pilot. "This isn't a long flight, only ten minutes at our pace, and we don't have any ADA threats to deal with for this one."

"That's what the morning team thought," Zoe said.

"Well, another point in our favor, we've got the arsenal to flatten them, the morning run was supposed to be noncombat." In point of fact, Beck had made sure that both helos were armed with LWP-44 rocket pods loaded with HE rockets, miniguns loaded with a combination of AP and HE rounds in a 2:3 ratio, and a pair of Hellfire ATGMs just in case heavy hits were needed. It was technically a light load, less than 3000 pounds of gun and munitions overall, which further improved the performance envelope of his helos.

"We'll make it work, sir," Katherine C. said from the gunnery seat of Eagle 2. She was three years younger than the non-combat pilot Katherine who had been shot at this morning, was a Sylph as opposed to a Nymph, and her love was being in the air and in command of firepower.

"Ten minutes," he said mostly to himself.

"This is nice, quiet territory," Curt noted as he used the optics in the nose of the helo to look around.

"We are almost 1700 years before the industrial age, kid," Beck said. "You get a complete lack of technology in exchange for all the downsides of that, a lack of modern medicine, and forms of warfare that require you to get up in someone's face and stab them to death. It's a helluva tradeoff."

"You've thought about this?" Curt asked.

"A little, after it became clear the boss intends to do a lot of work before the advent of firearms," Ellsworthy admitted. "If I had to choose, I probably wouldn't do it. I mean, it would be nice to never hear the sound of a diesel engine again, but one thing the Boss hasn't articulated about these time periods, nations and their armies have a lot in common with coyotes. They move in packs, they kill smaller prey with wanton abandon, they strip the flesh with no remorse, and they don't willingly go away when they find themselves some prize territory. By the time you realize you're in the way of that kind of monster, it's too late to do anything about it."

"Oh," Curt groused.

"Oh, yeah, just because this society hasn't been corrupted by modern methods doesn't make them saintly or pure. Thus the necessity of this contract."

-x-

(10 minutes later)

"Approaching target zone now," the loadmaster for the troop helo reported.

"Arm up!" Clint ordered, then suited actions to his words by way of drawing the bolt back on his ACR.

Hess drew the bolt back on his M-14 EBR, then took a moment to activate the holographic sight that was 45 degrees offset from the scope.

"If I may ask, why do you have two sights on your rifle?" Lunete asked as Sigma One pulled his UMP40 and chambered a round in it.

"Scope for long range, holographic sight for close range," Hess explained. "General principle, your primary weapon is almost always a better option than a secondary, so having the ability to use it at either max range or close is advisable."

"Oh," Lunete said with some reservation. She hadn't really considered the possibility of a sniper having to engage enemies in close, but…

Given that everyone else was arming up, Lunete took a moment to switch on her dual camera system, which ran from a backpack over both her shoulders, and pulled the microphones out, one on each camera, to collect audio. CSNN war correspondents commonly preferred the backpack and microphone arrays because it gave them the best recording time and required hand-carrying the least amount of gear.

"Compound in sight! Apaches are moving to shred the guard barracks!" Hess had his tablet out to watch the gun camera from Eagle 2. It was also playing on the main monitor in the helo, so everyone else could see the outcome.

Ahead of Boxcar, Eagle 1 lined up on the barracks just as the front door came open with a couple men looking out and about for the unusual sound. It was too little too late, though, as Eagle 1 fired a salvo of six rockets into the long side of the building, and followed up with both ER Medium Lasers and both barrels of AP Gauss Rifle. Eagle 2 went heavier on the rockets, ten total, but eschewed the AP Gauss. Not that they failed their intention to begin with, because as the Helos banked overhead the barracks collapsed in on itself, evidence enough that the troops inside were either dead or incapacitated.

"Eagle Lead, Boxcar, not seeing any roving enemy infantry on the premises, now rotating to set down and unload my chalk, how copy?" Peggy declared by radio, which was audible to both the troops and the cameras.

"Boxcar, Eagle Lead, I copy all. Eagle 2 moving to blocking position, I am doing a visual inspection of the building. Standby," Hess caught sight briefly of Eagle 1 as he sideslipped around the building, nose inward, to use his onboard cameras and electronics to view the building in detail. "Boxcar, Eagle Lead, confirm Hotel is in expected room, repeat, confirm Hotel is in expected room. Threat scope is minor, blade infantry scattered throughout. Execute at discretion."

"Hess, where do you want me to drop you?" Peggy asked by radio.

"Flat-top roof, drop me on top, then drop the teams at ground level for entry," Hess said.

The loadmaster dropped the rear ramp, then waved Hess forward. Toni and Lunete followed close, though it was the big guy who set foot first on the building, followed quickly by the reporter and the SSO. "Hess is on ground, no contact. Once you've offloaded, hold on the ground for pickup, then jump up and grab us."

"10-4, sir," Peggy acknowledged as she began setting down with the rear hatch facing the building.

"Now what, sir?" Lunete asked.

"Now we patrol, and we wait, and mostly we make sure that nobody crawls up the asses of our entry teams." Sigma One snorted. "It's the waiting part that kills."

-x-

Zidane and Steiner led the way into the building, with Freya, Nereus, and Dagger close in behind them. The immediate resistance at the service entrance was light — a chef that thought he was a hero with a knife turned out to be a non-threat to Steiner's broadsword — and the team blew through to the central corridor.

"Central corridor is empty!" Nereus shouted after it was obvious there was no resistance on the ground floor.

"Push for the central stairs!" Dagger instructed as Clint closed up behind her.

"Rangers on station at the lower stairwell," Sergeant Foley announced as his trio took position to guard access to the stairs.

Zidane continued the charge up the stairs, and at the second-floor landing he encountered his first real resistance of the contract: two soldiers in red vestments and steel banded armor. The first stab of their swords gave them the height advantage, stabbing down a stairwell, but Zidane was ready for them and expertly parried both blades with his Rune Tooth double-blade sword. Given they held the high ground and were preventing movement forward, Zidane had to clear them out of the way so they could continue. A good check by the intrepid trooper shoved them out into the hallway and bowled one of them over.

"Go! Push for the Hotel!" Clint ordered as Steiner took the second-floor landing and Nereus came up behind him.

"Keep moving up!" Dagger reinforced the order.

Freya was the first person in proper jeopardy since Zidane cleared them away from the stairs, but given she had room to work with, she took proper advantage of it. A chest stab with her Partisan lance put the standing Roman down on top of the one that Zidane knocked down, rendering him combat ineffective momentarily.

"Go, keep going!" Clint ordered as he closed up behind Freya.

"Good luck," Freya said quickly as she brought her spear in close and began up the stairs.

Clint stepped out into the second floor corridor and immediately went right. His sights passed over two ladies that were both wearing only necklaces above the waist, but neither was armed so he held his fire. Clarence was second in and went left, as was customary, though he didn't get the eye candy that Clint did. Four Roman troops were approaching from the left, so he simply raised his M249 to level and dumped a burst into the head of the lead trooper, then a longer burst into the chests and arms of the three following troops. This caused a brief spate of panicked musical rooms for some of the domestic staff, but otherwise ended the threat for the second floor. Clint put four rounds into the chest of the downed Roman trooper, and with the two SSOs for himself and Clarence, held station on the floor.

Steiner ended up taking the lead up onto the third floor and into the third floor hallway. Only one person was moving in the upper halls, a man wearing a set of silvered band armor and wolf-fur epaulets over his shoulders. The sword he carried was longer than the common Roman sword, and structured a bit different — a cutting blade rather than a dedicated stabbing sword. The enemy offered no challenge or order, he simply started the battle with two quick slashes at eye level against Steiner, both of which the Knight had no trouble terminating with his mythril broadsword.

Steiner took a step back instinctively in reaction to the offensive from the Roman, but in his stead Freya and Nereus both moved forward, each leading the way with their polearms (partisan and trident respectively) and both chose to strike within moments of each other. With two threats, the Roman officer seized up, failed to block either, and suffered four punctures in his chest courtesy of his non-reaction, as all three blades of the relic-enchanted trident and the single wide blade of the mildly-magicked partisan had no trouble punching through his banded armor.

"He's down," Nereus declared after he hefted the body off his trident by way of shoving him toward the far-side corridor.

"That was fast," Freya commented.

"I think that may have been the governor," Nereus guessed as he continued down the hall.

Zidane stepped past Nereus to a door nearby the main double-doors on the floor. "This should be it."

-x-

To Lunete's way of thinking, it was a bit unnerving to watch Sigma One lord over the area around the main mansion, his eyes always outward, scanning back and forth over the surrounding countryside for threats. Toni was a bit less unnerving to her, but only because the SSO was constantly looking around, both in toward the structure and outward as well.

"Team, Dagger, we have the hostage," the Rescue Rangers CO declared.

"Damn good," Toni said.

"Does that mean we're done here?" Demi-Precentor Ueda asked.

"Not necessarily," Hess answered.

"Sigma One, Dagger, two matters at hand. First matter, there is another hostage in the building, indeterminate location, Marina Kokinos is requesting we extract her brother as well. What's the policy here?"

Hess thumbed his talk switch on the front of his vest for his radio microphone. "If it is feasible, whenever possible we do the secondary extraction. In this case, since we've eliminated most of the resistance, there is nothing stopping us from getting the second Hotel out. Do you have any location information?"

"Yes sir, Marina thinks her brother is being held in a basement on the property."

"Dagger, Foley, we are next to a cellar entrance, I'm sending Ramirez downstairs to check it out."

"Ramirez, Nereus, I will be down shortly to provide translation, I have the team up here under Translation spell so we're good to go on this end."

"Ramirez copies all, I'll hold for you at the first floor landing," the Ranger Private acknowledged.

"Sigma One, Dagger, second issue, what is the policy on collecting material from around the mansion?" Dagger asked. "Marina wants to take some of the valuables from the Governor's collection with us as compensation for his violations."

"Salvaging a hostile party's goods is permissible so long as it does not compromise the primary contract tasks. Be smart about it, but if you can round up any major valuables or coin, we can definitely turn it around. Our contract says we get preferential choice on 60 percent of the salvage, how copy?"

"Understood, we're on it," Dagger acknowledged.

"Is that wise?" Lunete asked.

"Conditionally," Hess answered. "Two things in this case. One, this is a hostile extract contract, two, the Romans weren't exactly famous for humanitarian pursuits. I have no problem ripping off an abusive nation's government when I have reason to suspect the methods they acquired those gains may not be entirely legitimate by common definition."

"Slave labor?" Lunete asked.

"Slaves are not unheard of in this era," Hess acknowledged the point. "One could also easily make a case for the oldest rule in the book: to the victor goes the spoils." He stopped and dwelled in on something to the north of the mansion, nearby a treeline. "Huh. I believe we have incoming."

"Where?" Toni asked.

"There, the treeline about 900 yards north-northeast," Hess pointed. Lunete made sure her cameras were facing in that direction. "Yep, I count the rough shape of a Roman Century, ten cohorts of 8, analogous to squads in modern parlance." Hess again depressed his radio switch. "Team, Sniper, we have incoming. I have eyes on 80 foot-mobiles coming in from the north, estimate arrival in five minutes, six minutes on the outside."

"Sniper, Dagger, understood. Eliminate at range as best as possible, we are mostly wrapped up here."

"Dagger, Ramirez, second hostage has been recovered, we're coming upstairs now," the Ranger Private said.

Hess dropped down to the roof of the mansion and dropped the bipod on his rifle to brace for long-range shots. "Toni, spot me," Hess ordered immediately after he began lining up his first shot.

"Watching," Toni said. She had anticipated the request, so she already had a spotter scope out. She really didn't know what she was looking to do, but she zoomed in and focused on the lead of the Roman column coming their way. Hess loosed his first shot, and Toni watched the vapor trail as it went downrange until it terminated in the dusts east of the Romans. "Ten meters due east of the lead, looks like you got the round right there."

"That's all wind, elevation is on," Hess made a quick adjustment to his scope and fired again. This time, he did not miss; the front trooper dropped, screeching, as the round had caught him in the guts rather painfully.

"Dead on, sir, caught him in the stomach," Toni gave him the instant analysis.

"Going for a formation stopper," Hess said. With his scope dialed in to range and windage, he began firing one round every three seconds, aiming into the mass of Romans to scatter the casualties around their formation and cause the most confusion possible.

The effect was surreal to Lunete, who hadn't really considered the mechanics of a battle like this. The Romans were fiercely disciplined troops, but having their ranks picked apart from over 800 yards, they had no clue what was happening to them. All they knew was that something was killing them, wounding them, one at a time, every few seconds. By the time Hess cleared his first magazine and had to reload, the formation had stopped and hunkered down behind shields to defend against what they (correctly) assumed had to be some kind of projectile attack. Against that, Hess held his fire; the shields ran a real risk of stopping his rounds at that range, so no need to waste ammo.

"Team, sniper, enemy troops have turtled down, they are advancing but now at a walking pace. We should be safe for a few minutes."

"Sigma One, Dagger, we're almost done salvaging the Governor's room. Just a little bit longer…"

-x-

Steiner and Freya both held their tongue on the way this contract had turned, but even their silence did not deceive Nereus.

"You concern about the ethical bound of this action?" Nereus asked Steiner as he wrapped up a stack of gold wall decorations in a bedsheet.

Steiner didn't answer vocally, he simply nodded.

Nereus pointed to a door that led to a bathroom off the Governor's bedchamber. "On the other side of that door are two slaves. Before we depart, I will be explaining to them what has transpired. Chances are very high, they will take their leave of this mansion and never return. You can look at this as low-level theft, and technically you would be right, but a more accurate description would be depleting the resources of a hostile state."

"That seems to be stretching it," Freya pointed out.

"Another thing to consider is that, by the laws that govern mercenaries, we are not denied reasonable salvage in accordance with our contract. This is Executor case law, actually, that the personal estate of a governing entity is valid salvage, and the facilities of a governing entity are valid salvage if they are within an area of operation for a contract and are not critical to the survival of the populace. It is a universal law, it even applies to we Executors and the Big Six Star Empires, so there are no circumstances where it is variably applicable."

"I will accept this, but I still object under ethical premise," Freya declared.

"There are some mercenary units that do not operate wider salvage practices, but even the big ones — Wolf's Dragoons, Northwind Highlanders, Kell Hounds, Harridon's Harassers — they all conduct major salvage operations concurrent with their major contracts," Nereus said.

"Another thing to consider, we get 25 percent of the contract's cut," Zidane said as he approached Nereus with two bundles over his left shoulder. "That includes salvage, I asked Clarence about that yesterday," the rogue said. "Everything we salvage contributes to our bottom line."

"We will guard the team on the way out," Steiner said adroitly. He wasn't convinced it was proper, but the cash flow would help hire a Temporal Psionic for them to return home… eventually. Or maybe contribute to a proper house in the Protectorate? Steiner silently admitted to himself that barracks life was growing a bit old on him, maybe having a proper house was not an untoward goal for the here and now?

"We're done here," Dagger reported after Marina hefted her bundle. "Time to leave."

"I have one thing to do, go ahead without me." Nereus blinked from where he was standing to the door that led into the bathroom, and opened it. He entered and stopped just inside the door.

"We will not resist," the head lady amongst the four persons within said. "We will serve you as master."

"Hold," Nereus said. All four of the ladies were scantily dressed, which reminded Nereus that Rome was rather famous for corruption and debauchery toward the end of its existence as a viable Empire. "I shall not impress you into further slavery, as it is not the way of the Star Empires to enslave. Your master is dead, I am here to tell you that if you seek to escape, now would be a good time to do so."

"Can we go with you?" One of the ladies asked.

"Uh," Nereus wasn't expecting that specific question. "Sniper, Executor, request for opinion," he requested into a radio.

"Go," Hess answered between shots. Even with the suppressor, his DMR work was very much audible in the governor's rooms.

"Slaves in the employ of the hostile party of a contract, are they allowed to extract with us?" Nereus asked.

"Affirmative," Hess answered, which was audible and understood by the ladies because Nereus' translation spell also encompassed his radio. "Slaves found in the pursuit of a hostile party may come home with us or may head out on their own. In the former case, they will be treated as normal refugees."

"Come on," Nereus waved the four to follow him.

-x-

"Sniper, Boxcar, we are almost finished loading, what is your status?" Peggy requested as she began preparing for takeoff.

"Boxcar, Sniper, we have incoming cavalry from the south, the sooner you can get us off this roof, the better," Hess declared. "Toni, need a hand over here."

"I see them," Toni moved forward to the edge of the roof and brought her rifle up onto target. While Hess was still firing aimed single shots, Toni started in using three-round bursts from her ACR.

"Helo is spooling up," Hess noted after the electric motors on the Chinook II-F began turning. "This one's gonna be close!"

To point, the cavalry had crossed into the area of the mansion's immediate yard, meaning that they were within seconds of the walls at a full gallop. Lunete was angled right to catch Hess switch from the scope to the holographic sight, and at this much closer range he was far more forthcoming with rounds. In seconds, he had emptied another magazine, kicked it loose, and reloaded with a fresh magazine — his fourth of the day.

Toni fired through two magazines before the cavalry arrived at the perimeter of the mansion, nearby some ladders that would give them access to the roof. The SSO pulled a grenade, stripped the safety clip, pulled the pin, and lobbed it down to the base of the ladder. "Frag out!" She ducked down to where the roof edge blocked her exposure from the grenade, Hess simply took two paces back.

"Helo is coming up!" Peggy announced as the rotor blades changed audible sound drastically — as they began biting into the air to achieve lift. "Sir! Come to the west!"

"Fall back! Come on!" Hess ordered as he stepped forward and started hammering the remaining standing cavalry troopers. After he unloaded a fifth magazine, Sigma One turned toward the Helo and started for it at a jog. Toni and Lunete made the short step across the air gap into the cargo bay of the helo, though by the time Hess arrived at the western edge she had drifted away enough that he could not jump it.

"Problem, Peggy, you're drifting away!" the loadmaster announced.

"Hess! Coming up the ladder!" Foley warned Sigma One.

"Shit!" Erich brought his rifle up to the holographic sight and drilled the man on the ladder in the face with two rounds. To help discourage further attempts to climb, Sigma One armed and threw a grenade just over the edge nearby the ladder, though he would never know that the grenade bounced off the second-floor roof into a well at ground level and detonated only to render the well unusable.

"Coming back your way, boss!" Peggy said by radio, which was only barely audible to Sigma One. She did slip the helo back toward the roof, close enough that he could reach out and grab a frame bar to hoist himself up into the cabin.

"I am onboard, let's get to the dropoff point," Sigma One said after he took a seat and put on a crew headset.

"That was a bit exciting toward the end," Toni said. "I think we need to avoid that going forward."

"More snipers," Foley suggested to the Phoenix. She would take the lesson to heart.

-x-x-x-

(29 March, Magi Year 14408 / Year SL 8838, 1730 Hours Boarhound Time)
(Northern Wall Turret Platform 6, Base Boarhound)

Rail Guard Team 2 had carpooled up to the site of one of the nonfunctional Calliope IIM turrets on the northern wall in two HMMVW vehicles, though Sir Launcelot wasn't entirely sure what the intention was for this endeavor.

Thankfully, Launcelot had to admit to himself, this was an operation planned out by someone else.

"Base Boarhound is surrounded by 44 static defense emplacements. Most people call them turrets, but in reality the entire structure below the turret is just as much the defensive emplacement as is the weapons assembly turret at the top," Grace Q. said, looking toward the subject of today's plan. "In a prior life, before I was kidnapped into the Trains, I was trained on how to maintain structure defense emplacements, the high-voltage power systems needed to power defense emplacements, and as a cross-craft I learned how to maintain Mobile Suits and Gundam structural components."

"So, you know how to fix this thing?" Leander asked, waving a finger at the turret.

"Maybe. I never was a professional in the matter, but we shall certainly give it a try," Grace admitted. "We will do what we can. Come," the oldest person on the team waved her comrades toward the maintenance hatch at the base of the defensive emplacement. "The turret at the top is an ironic piece of hardware for the Star League. Calliope Turrets are nothing special, their design has been seen in the possession of all the old Great Houses. These turrets, however, are substantially upgraded, and are designated Calliope-Two-Mike, meaning they are the second recognized design, engineered by the Multimages. That is truly a sticking point amongst the Star League."

"The Star League traditionally and venomously hates the Magi," Irina said with a chuckle.

"Why so much hatred?" Sir Launcelot asked.

"The Magi are the most influential of the Big Six Star Empires. The Magi routinely disregard Star League edict, and then dare the Star League to enforce it. The bulk of the Executors hail from Magi territories, and many have adroitly stated they would side with Empress Atrebas long before they would enforce Star League dominion." She paused to step through the maintenance hatch and into the superstructure of the Defense Emplacement. "Chief among the Star Empires, the Magi are perfectly capable of wiping out the Star League in a week or less; it is estimated that the other Star Empires would take a month to do so, if possible at all."

"Too large to control?" Lotta asked as she stepped into the facility.

"They are become the child that has dishonored the parent's attempt at glory," Irina said with a clear hint of pride. "The Star League fancied itself the entity that would forever put to rest the Star Empire Wars that ravaged known Existence for 3500 years. Instead, the Multimages used the resurrection of the Star League — after it was destroyed by the Negaverse, no less — as a bludgeon with which it subdued the wars that were rightfully egged on and intensified by the Star League. In the millennia after the end of the conflict, the Star League has only become more bitter, more unhinged, more antithetical to the Star Empires. Now, they even threaten a Protectorate nation that seeks only to help people unjustly harmed by Star League policy."

The group had fanned out amongst the lower level of the Defense Emplacement, inspecting the facilities and fighting positions therein. "You're right, this isn't just a turret," Irina said. "How many troops can fight from here?"

"It is designed that the Turret Towers can support a platoon of leg infantry on each level, with accommodation for heavy field guns on the bottom floor."

"And with the amount of turrets, combined with the amount of troops, you have an immense interlocking field of fire," Melva gaped.

"And capped off by a turret assembly capable of putting a serious hurt on any Mobile Army forces that wander into its gunsights," Grace finished the thought. "The system report from Virtue declares only the turret as offline, so we need to understand what is wrong there and try to repair it, but we also need to deal with the other facilities and material deficiencies in this defensive emplacement."

"I gander, like a fortress, these ramparts are designed to provide shelter and supply for troops for a protracted siege?" Launcelot Du Lac asked.

"Correct," Irina said. "There is supposed to be rations, water, and munitions for each platoon to fight it out against an attacker," she indicated the large cargo palette staging area. The palettes were still in place, but the munitions and supplies were not.

"Well, then, let us begin," Launcelot said. "Where do you need us most, milady of the mechanical restoration?"

-x-x-x-

(29 March, Magi Year 14408 / Year SL 8838, 1945 Hours Boarhound Time)
(Hess' Quarters, Base Boarhound Administration Building)

Clint was the first to enter the quarters of The Boss, followed quickly by Moira. "We owned the other team," Clint said as he took a seat to the right of The Boss.

"Not much of a challenge," Hess pointed out. "Blade infantry is at a critical disadvantage of range."

"And that's how I want it," Clint said. "I distinctly remember you saying that if we are fighting fair, we're fighting wrong?"

"Very much true," Erich admitted, then hoisted his mixed drink in salute to Clint. "Now, what brings you over tonight?"

"Doctrine and Organization. We need to hammer this out, and soon, before we get balls deep into disorganization."

Sigma One sighed. "At more than one level, this was a fight I never desired, but the necessity of it is obvious given our circumstances."

"Yeah, big guy, time to either ante up or bail out. Do we do this right, or not at all?" Clint asked.

"There is no walking away, at least for me. We will do this right." Sigma One hit another slug of his mixed drink — he was doing a Steiner PPC drink right now, as something of a celebration for the day's endeavors.

"Okay, we're in," Clint acknowledged the point. "So, the big question, do we do this NATO style or Magi style?"

"Any particular benefit to one or the other?" Hess asked.

"Not really," Clint said. "Both are flexible enough, the Magi style has less graduations along the same manpower buildup, the NATO style will require more stepping in the units to get to the same size. When you get up to the largest designations, Army Group on the NATO side and Legion on the Magi side, you're talking roughly the same amount of personnel, combat weighting is going to be the same for actual battle and support personnel."

"So, essentially, the choice is what we know and what is a little more graduated versus the de facto local standard of asskicking with less graduations," Hess boiled down what Clint had just said.

"Hai, sensei," Clint said in a horridly false Japanese accent.

"This is actually not the simplest decision set," Hess admitted. "The weight of the Magi's victory is not trivial, especially considering their opposition used a modified NATO structure."

"That's a bit of a complicated story, boss," Clint said. "Moira, I'll let you explain this one, you're way better at it," he said.

"Sure," Moira acknowledged the point. "You are aware of the great surprise at the end of the Star Empire Wars?" she asked Hess.

"No, I haven't gone that far into the history yet," Hess admitted. He read, voraciously read whenever possible, but so far his actual reading time when not doing other critical tasks was marginal.

"The Star Empire Wars was pretty much billeted as brother and sister scrapping it over the perception of who had the right path to surviving Ragnarok. This is false on two levels. First, the actual motivation behind the OpFor was vengeance, not duty to the end of Existence, and therein the Magi's involvement was defensive."

"Vengeance for what?" Hess asked. So far as he had read, the first encounter between Negaverse and Magi was hostile on the Negaverse part, an unprovoked attempted invasion of the Magi capital world. There was no prior contact in recorded history.

"That is easiest answered by explaining the second falsehood of the popular perception of the Star Empire Wars. It was not brother and sister in battle, it was brother against dethroned divinity who was using the sister as a proxy."

"Hera," Hess groused out the name, given that he had read about the end of the Star Empire Wars by chance — and that included the name of the goddess that Atrebas annihilated, but not the prior details mentioned by Moira.

"Correct," Moira acknowledged the point. "Hera had controlled Queen Beryl by Magic Jar and used her as a mindslave to fight a war against her hated enemy, Eric Atrebas and the Multimage Empire. To that end, Hera made damn sure she structured the armies of the Negaverse completely different from the Magi's emergent system, the Clan Star system, that way there would be no ready apparent commonality between the groups. She propagandized the Negaverse for centuries before the war, making any manner of reconciliation effectively impossible. Their defeat at the hands of the Magi is both valid and red herring in this case, because the contest never was truly level, they were always hampered by Hera's vanity and unwillingness to allow any person in Beryl's ranks grow to challenge her."

"Ah," Hess groused. "So I should not weight the Magi victory terribly higher than other systems?" Sigma One asked the SSO.

"I would not, given the necessity of the comparison," Moira said, and in so doing forever positioned the Secret Service group into an advisory role with the Sigma Command Section. "What matters more than the unit structures is the troops, the commanders, and most of all the fact that you actually give a flying fuck about the people below you. The troops will assemble themselves however you want, so long as you give them reason to assemble."

"That's the simple part," Hess deflated. "They have plenty of reason, I worry that my leadership is inadequate to the challenge."

"So far, no problems I know of," Moira said. "Sooner rather than later, you're going to need to start backing away and let the people take over their own affairs completely, but for now you're doing what is needed."

Hess nodded to the point. "Back to task, if you both expect that there is no quantitative gain in using the Magi model, then the overriding factor is flexibility. Flexibility is a factor of choice, and in this case, the expanded graduation of the NATO structure gives us the best options for choice. Clint, you will begin drawing up a full listing of formations, unit sizes and strengths, commanding ranks, and similar. Also, most of NATO has eliminated the Regiment as a unit size, I want Regiments and RCTs in our organization chart to allow for an extra layer of flexibility and harder-hitting forces than just battalions without going up to Brigade, follow?"

"Will do, sir," Clint said.

"Make it happen," Hess ordered as something of a dismissal.

"I'll have it worked out before the end of the night," Clint said as he stood.

"Thank you for the explanation, Moira. Good evening to both of you," Hess saluted them with his Steiner PPC drink, then slugged it again.

-x-

(10 mins later)

"Think tomorrow I'll see if he can do a bench press with me as the weight," Toni said mostly to herself as she snugged in her bathrobe.

Once she was sure she was being revealing to a degree but not overly so, she headed out into the room proper. Unsurprisingly, Hess was at the head of the table, both elbows planted on the surface forming a bipod, his fists holding his head up to stare at the monitor on the wall directly opposite (south) of the table. On it were some very unusual symbols assembled in a heirarchy, which Toni vaguely recognized as some kind of military symbology but she didn't know what any of it meant.

So far as she could tell, Erich didn't flinch when she emerged from the bathroom, and may not have even realized she was there, so hard was he staring into the screen. When she sat down, he again didn't flinch, just continued to stare into the screen, so Toni decided a test was in order. She reached out toward him to poke him, but her finger never approached more than a dozen centimeters from his right arm before he did respond with a loud snort, followed by a sigh.

"So you are still alive, I was starting to worry," Toni said with a bit of humor.

"Death is a permanent solution to temporary problems. Excepting for a Phoenix, of course," Erich said. "As these things happen, the pile of problems is significant but not that crushing."

Toni internally sighed in relief as Hess leaned back and stretched. "So, what's the ailment for the day?"

"All of my life, day in, day out, find problems, solve problems," Hess said. "I've been doing it so long, my mind processes are geared to see just about everything around me as a problem and to find a solution for it."

"That's not bad?" Toni asked. She wasn't seeing the nature of such a problem, nor where this was headed.

"It is a nasty problem when you're talking about people's lives, not a computer with a fried hard drive," the former-technician said. "Fixing problems is a factor of isolating the problem, understanding the problem, tailoring the necessary solution, then applying it. That rule doesn't apply to people because people are not replaceable pieces of hardware, Socialist doctrine notwithstanding."

"So don't treat them as hardware," Toni poked his arm. "There are a lot of people around here that say they owe you their lives, but you're not obligated to collect. You'll have to make some tough calls in the future, but you don't have to just waste lives. So, that said, what's the problem here?"

"Hunh," Hess grunted. "Well, if any problem still stands, it's my mindset. Intellectually I know what you are saying, it is just a matter of forcing my subconscious to accept that answer and act accordingly."

Toni leaned into the table and reached for Sigma One's hand. In so doing, she didn't realize that she was being quite a bit more revealing than she intended. "Don't think of us as numbers, or hardware, or little solutions, or tools, or pawns. Think of us, and only of us, and you'll come to the right conclusions."

"I think I shall, but I will need help on making sure I do it right," Hess said evenly. True to his nature, he didn't miss much, but he wasn't going to comment.

Without any conscious effort on either of their part, Toni had begun realigning Sigma's command policy toward a policy geared to do the damndest for the troops, even more so than was already in place.

---

Author's Chapter Afterword:

First day on the job for the Rescue Rangers, and things are already heating up.

This chapter is really an intersectional chapter, more than a few things happen here that appear to spider in several directions but in reality are colluding to haunt everyone involved. The first and loudest one is ComStar, and now the presence of a reporter in the area will make things a little bit dicey for Sigma — but the publicity of it will blossom far and wide for both ComStar and Sigma. That said, the footage that Lunete pulled from her tag-along with Sigma One will show a very harsh reality of the mercenary warfare Sigma is headed for, and that will raise eyebrows in the next chapter or two. (After all, despite the entirety of practitioners of the Art of War seeking to skew the odds in their favor by any means possible, the armchair quarterbacks and generals shall always make noise about 'fair fights'. As if there was ever supposed to be anything 'fair' in the art of war.)

The second major noisemaker is the Rescue Rangers missions. All three missions were successes, but two of the three missions ran into snagging points. The first snag point is the whole combat / noncombat debate pertaining to the downed helo rescue. As Hess pointed out, this contract is the gray area of the legal world: when the contract was written up, it was listed as a noncombat contract, but the environment turned out to be a shade more hostile than simply 'noncombat'. That said, with no positive evidence that the contracting party had deliberately misfiled the contract, Hess has little to go on in terms of legal recourse for jeopardizing his troops. Only the mother (and the ATF) were truly aware what was going on, despite possible appearances otherwise, and as such Sigma would be effectively unable to prove in MercNet Arbitration Review that the misfiling was deliberate, which arbitration assumes 'innocent until proven guilty' as the default legal presumption. Of course, the fact that the contract was completed despite hostile action and the contract turned out a very good narotrafficking bust are certainly not bad reflections on Sigma for the day.

The hostile extract mission has two loud and nasty sticking points all of its own. First, the use of modern weapons in service to ancient battlefields will raise hackles in more than a few spots in coming chapters. Again, as I stated earlier, there will be much butthurt ensuing in pertaining to the illusion of fighting fair, nevermind that no real army anywhere in Existence fights fair, and only a select few in fiction fight anywhere near fair (and more often than not such fictional entities fudge their rules when convenient or necessary). Of course, regardless of historical and fictional precedent, there always shall be operational butthurt about the 'necessity' of fighting 'fair'. That said, when someone tries to grill Hess on it, someone is going to get hammered flat for it.

Second, the salvaging of hostile entities is going to be an issue for the internal politics and policies for the units, but I already have a workaround for it. The main riding factors here are Steiner and Freya standing against on honor grounds (nevermind that chivalry doesn't really have a rule against taking spoils from conquest). In terms of the rest of the FF9 team, Dagger and Vivi are more or less ambivalent on this point, and Zidane, being a diehard adventurer and rogue of his own credit, fully supports the salvaging of enemy hardware when appropriate. That said, even Steiner is seeing some practical application of ripping off a hostile party in this case, as Sigma gets a cut of the salvage as is listed in these contracts. (Naturally, if the salvage is not worth the effort or if Sigma doesn't have salvage rights in a contract, no effort will be expended in such cases. No need to waste effort when there is no profit to be made.)

The third major noisemaker is doctrinal and has begun in the engineering group. This is a sticking point that a lot of people don't quite understand properly about the military: the infantry is the main force on a battlefield, fullstop. The purpose of tanks, IFVs, APCs, artillery, airpower, transport, is all to help reinforce and expand the capabilities — ergo, support — the infantry. All too often, and ESPECIALLY in cases of giant mecha shows, the infantry is overlooked or nerfed because the armor or the air force is where the sex appeal is at and it doesn't sell model kits to have the infantry routinely beat the hell out of the giant mecha of the day. Unfortunately for series that rely on the smexy standing armor (here's looking at you, Gundam and Battletech), the rules I operate under will be quite a bit closer to reality than the ruleset of the shows. You can expect some arrogant mecha pilots to find out the hard way that the Infantry are not so easily defeated as they think it should be.

This leads into the third point: the engineering group's purpose is to enhance the capabilities of the Infantry and enhance the ability of the other force structures to support the infantry. Jeff Evans doesn't quite yet understand the proper purpose of the command to focus on supporting the infantry or dual-use forces, but he will learn that purpose soon enough. The entirety of the Engineering group will learn the lesson soon enough. More to the point, by creating forces specifically geared to supporting the Infantry, or dual-use forces, Sigma will be creating another branch of mercenary work for themselves that is as-yet untapped: supporting a host force's infantry. You saw, briefly, how even one mildly competent modern infantryman could put some serious hurt on ancient infantry, now imagine several mildly competent 'mechwarriors piloting dedicated anti-infantry 'mechs in support of a friendly contracting unit. Imagine, even nastier still, the use of those same support machines in support of Sigma infantry against just about anyone else's infantry prior to the 21st Century. The force multiplication effects could be absolutely massive, and for good reason.

And that's the shape of the chapter for today. Note that I also have new chapters for Sigma 0002 and Sigma 0003 in the works, but they are for today mostly divorced from the mainline chapter, but that will change next chapter — the effects of those two side-stories will haunt a goodly portion of Sigma 0001-14.

NEXT UP: the Multimages move out the first group of captured Slavers and Sigma moves in more refugees from the Train. With the revival of the local water treatment facility and local fusion power plant, things are beginning to improve for Sigma, especially when a major business concern decides to make a new residence on a certain scorned planet...

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Review Replies: Had three reviews for the last chapter, which is AWESOME! Still glad this story has so much traction, even if it is a completely nonstandard crossover.

Klever Kilva: The Long Tom Artillery Tank is definitely possible, as well as variations thereof that are engineered by Sigma. Remember, Sigma One has made noise that he favors artillery over expending personnel, so anything is entirely possible until further notice.

As to the Omega, well, that's a bit of a more complicated issue. Granted that with the latest BT rule book there are now rules for creating Superheavy 'mechs, but in the Multimage timeline Superheavies were abandoned as wastrel fantasies without practical application. Now, after playing with the technologies of the Clans and Successor States for some 14,000 years, and with some very wild advances of material sciences, an inventive engineer could revive the Superheavies under Sigma engineering and production policies. The Omega itself may not be in the TO&E to come, but I can assure you that Sigma will be playing with some very wild superheavy machines of their own design in the future.

Knives 91:

The philosophical bent of the story is one of the main driving factors for the main characters, and it will continue to be. Hess is a believer in life and honor, and is willing to work to save lives (hence the driving motivation for the ongoing story). It will translate to varying degrees as this moves forward.

Holy Dragoon:

Hard to say. Remember the story initial was 2015, Trump wasn't even on the radar. Still, remember that the bigger the government, the less it is trusted by the involved Sigma troops and that distrust will help keep the coming bureaucracy in check.

THANK YOU FOR THE REVIEWS! I am liking the quality of the points being raised, it is always good to know that my writing is making people think. Hope this chapter gets people to thinking as well!

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The Gripe Sheet:

No gripes for the prior chapter. Much thanks to Necroblade, Takeshi Yamato, and Sieben Nightwing for helping keep my prose straight!

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Footnotes:

(1): MAN-Portable Air Defense System. Technical term for any shoulder-carried air-defense missile or similar weapon.

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Included Works:

—Real Life Armaments — too many to name, that is most of the arsenal shown.
—Real Life Combat Gear — the vests and gear carried by the Militia troops are easily constructible from stuff you can buy on Amazon or Cheaper Than Dirt. No, Seriously, Look it up. Do a search for "UTG Modular 10-Piece Complete Kit", and you have a good look at a starter kit for any serious gearhound.
—Real Life Concepts
—Real Life Time Period: 1930s New York City (Shown in Chapter 2, referenced in chapter 3)
—Real Life Time Period: Rome after AD. Contract SR003 is expected to be happening in an interior province of Rome.
—Real Life Equipment: The Caterpillar equipment showcased in the chapters is based on real life designs or equipment from said manufacturer.

—Real Life Mythology: The Phoenix race of beings are derived from the mythological Phoenix (Egyptian) and Thunder Bird (Native American). That said, I have made some serious modifications to the whole principle that will be revealed in coming chapters.
—Real Life Mythology: The first of many Valkyrie have joined the blossoming Protectorate. That said, do not confuse the Valkyrie with the term Valkyria — separate work, separate purpose. (Shown in chapter 7)
—Real Life Mythology: The Dryad featured in this chapter (and in a helluva lot more chapters to come) is a derivation of the ancient Greek mythos around Trees and Tree Spirits. Specifically, the Dryads used in this story are akin mostly to the Hamadryad of older mythos.

—Personal Works: The Star Empires are mentioned briefly here. Additionally, the Magi Empire is named specifically.
—Personal Works: The nations of the Jokers Wild are mentioned in Chapter 6. There is a very good reason for that.
—Personal Works: The Star League is a derivation of the Star League from Battletech, but founded by Queen Sora Serenity (Executor-Queen Sora Takenouchi).
—Personal Works: The Executors are specialized Mages who have transcended a minimum of twice (Gods and Goddesses are a minimum Transcendance of once) and are specially commissioned to defend life and honor amongst the Star League territories or member states.
—Personal Works: The 10mm Kurz cartridge is a shortened / lower velocity / lower weight version of the 10mm BG round, developed by the Magi for 'crowd pleasing' against large masses of Negaverse troops, most of which were unarmored during the Star Empire Wars. It quickly became a favored heavy machine gun round for multiple purposes after the fact. (Shown in Chapter 1)
—Personal Works: Gerald Lightbringer is most famous for his participation in my Jokers Wild series, but his history is far stranger than either story properly shows. (Last seen in chapter 5)
—Personal Works: The last section of Chapter 6 makes it clear that the Jokers Wild, Sigma, and Multimage Chronicles are interconnected at multiple levels. This WILL come back to haunt everyone involved, in multiple ways.

—Anime General: the oddball hair colors, especially endemic to nonhumans.
—Anime General and D&D: the nonspecific concept of Elves, Nymphs, and Sylphs.
—Anime Trigun: Vash The Stampede, Millie Thompson, and Meryl Strife took the wrong train, ended up hanging out, and now are tagging along with the Militiamen.

—Cartoon Publishing Group: Disney Works in general are mentioned here, but have not made an official showing yet.

—Cartoon: Chip 'n' Dale's Rescue Rangers is mentioned in this chapter as well, and due to the show mechanics may not actually make a showing except as a show within a story, but you can rest assured that it will influence things going forward.

—Game: Battletech: You are starting to see some serious discussion of Battletech units and force concepts in this chapter. They will become more prevalent as the story marches on. (Happens off and on.)
—Game: Dungeons and Dragons (First Edition): A lot of the spellcraft will be drawn from D&D as well as other sources to be named.
—Game: Dungeons and Dragons (First Edition): The concept of the Dragons of many colors is drawn from the D&D First Edition
Monster Manual. Some mods were made (the Platinum dragon is not unique, and the Eternal Dragon is a wholly new class).
—Game: Final Fantasy IX: The player cast of the game (Zidane, Dagger, Steiner, Freya, Vivi, Eiko, Red, and Quina) were residing in one of the dining cars, but are now members of Sigma's personnel as of Chapter 13, with the exception of Red who is still in Basic Training and intends to go full mercenary.
—Game: Infantry Online (Sony Online Entertainment): The CAW from the early section, and named in the stinger, is a different-manufacturer version of the Kuchler A6 CAW. (Shown in Chapter 1)
—Game: Call Of Duty MW2: The Remington ACR in use in this story is based on the Magpul Masada / Bushmaster ACR / Remington ACR in use in said game. Hey, even if it was pooh-pooed in real life, someone in an alternate dimension would do it right, ne?
—Game: Command And Conquer Renegade: The Infantry Ion Cannon (Portable Ion Cannon) is a personnel weapon from Renegade, and is considered a mainstay amongst the Star Empires. (Seen in Chapter 8, to be seen frequently in the future))

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POSSIBLE CONTRACTS:

R000001: Offer from a Middle Age Female (50) Single Person Businessman from Early Modern Era (1900 to 1950) for Non-Hostile Rescue mission Missing Persons Search
Sorties: 1
Contract Special Requirements:
Classified: Classified (No MrcLvl Bonus on completion}
Unit Type: Naval-Capable Infantry
Ammo Expenditures: Full Ammo Expenditures
Minimum Requested Units: 1

Pay is 4590 in Finished Goods
Salvage is 40 percent Salvage Rights, Preferential Choice
Kill Bounty is None

R000002: Offer from a Adult Female (27) Single Person Businessman from ancient times (early AD) for Hostile Extract against Contract to Kill / Capture
Sorties: 2
Contract Special Requirements:
Classified: MercNet Only
Unit Type: Air
Ammo Expenditures: 1/2 Ammo Expenditures

Pay is 9180 in Foods
Salvage is 60 percent Salvage Rights, Preferential Choice
Kill Bounty is None

R000003: Offer from a Elderly Female (67) Single Person from New Millennium Age (2000 to 2025) for Non-Hostile Rescue mission Personal Accident Rescue
Sorties: 1
Contract Special Requirements:
Classified: Classified SAR (No MrcLvl Bonus on completion)
Unit Type: Any as seen necessary
Ammo Expenditures: Full Ammo Expenditures
Minimum Requested Units: 4

Pay is 2203.2 in Weapons
Salvage is 60 percent Salvage Rights
Kill Bounty is None