Fury of the Jokers Wild

by CSS Stravag

Jokers Wild Set 3. After 400 years, the exiled Blue Cosmos gets their chance to come back to finish the purification of the Earth Sphere. Their mad quest to cleanse the human race will not go unchallenged by the worlds of the new Star Empires, and on one of those worlds, a runaway lady will take up the challenge... (Rated T: V, L, SC)

3. In The Shadows

(Joker's Wild, Set 3: Fury Of The Jokers Wild)
(Chapter 02: In The Shadows)

(8 February, CE 476, 2200 Hours Local (Dendez East) Time)
(North Shore Motel, Kalweyn outskirts area, Planet Carver V, Protectorate of Mendel)

The choice had been painfully simple for this layover: a bench at the bus stop, a brothel, or this motel. The other hotels in the area were not accepting reservations this late at night.

Sionet had been tempted to bunk in at the brothel given she could probably get a very good rate, but remembered that the Mafiosi that 'controlled' this area had a proclivity for being arrested in the brothels for 'conduct inappropriate to a whorehouse'. Sionet had not dug into what that criminal charge actually represented and left it at that, but never forgot that the Nayemeyer Family loved their horseplay in the whorehouses of Kalweyn. Not that the Brelle Family had any manner of good relations with the Nayemeyer, but Sionet figured it in her best interest to simply avoid them and thus not risk being identified or involved in an altercation.

Of motels, this one looked the best of the two in the area that were still open, and at 10 c-bills for a night, Sionet figured she could live with the sub-standard sound environment of the area for a night. On her trek up to room 212, she had passed at least one and maybe as many as three rooms with persons getting laid inside, and the adjacent room to hers (210) sounded like a group orgy. Inside her room, the sound was not improved, mainly due to the walls being somewhat insulated and soundproofed, but definitely not enough to properly suppress the wailing banshee in 210.

The room itself was not hugely stellar, certainly not up to the usual hotel standards that Sionet kept to when out with her mother or father, but at the least it was clean and well-stocked. More surprising to Sionet, the room had a tea kettle, a hot plate, and a traditional traveler's charm that was common in Magi society in hotels and motels. More to the point, it had a fairly typical monitor that Sionet turned on and tuned to the continental news station — if she had been reported missing, the story would certainly be on the continental news.

After a minute and the lead headlines of the hourly news cycle, Sionet broke out her tablet and fingerprinted her way in with her password, then activated the text client that allowed her to text with PALADIN. All traffic in and out of the tablet was heavily encrypted, so she was not concerned about a sniffer picking up the traffic.

HAVE I BEEN REPORTED MISSING AT ANY LEVEL YET? Sionet asked by way of the chat system.

NO REPORTS THROUGH OFFICIAL CHANNELS, the AI entity responded. KENNY AND DESTINY HAVE COME OVER FROM KILESKA TO ASSIST YOUR MOTHER IN LOOKING FOR YOU.

GOOD. THEY WILL PURSUE THE BUG IN MY TOILETRIES KIT WHILE I GO IN A DIFFERENT DIRECTION. ANY UPDATES ON DESTINATION POSSIBILITIES? Sionet asked.

CRITERIA REDUCTION HAS RESULTED IN FOUR POSSIBILITIES IN WESTPORT. INFORMATION AND ADDRESSES BOOKMARKED ON YOUR MAP PROGRAM.

Sionet forced herself not to look, as she would have the bus drive from Kaelwyn to Westport to review possibilities and further narrow down where she intended to go to check out possible crash locations.

THANK YOU FOR THE ASSISTANCE, Sionet answered the report. GOING TO SIGN OFF FOR THE NIGHT AND TRY TO SLEEP, IF I CAN OVERCOME THE ADRENALINE.

PALADIN was silent for a few seconds, until: THE FIRST FEW NIGHTS WILL BE RESTLESS, AN UNDERTAKING LIKE THIS WILL MAKE YOU JITTERY. SOON YOU WILL OVERCOME IT, I BELIEVE YOU HAVE THE DISCIPLINE TO DO SO, AND TO MAKE YOUR PERSONAL GOAL A REALITY.

That thought brought to Sionet a question that she typed out to the AI entity: ANY RECOMMENDATIONS FOR THAT GOAL?

ALWAYS TRAIN HARDER. THE BEST OF THE BEST AMONG THE ACES OF ERAS PAST NEVER STOPPED TRAINING, LEARNING, OBSERVING. EVEN YOUR NAMESAKE ANCESTOR CONTINUED TRAINING UNTIL THE FINAL WEEK OF HIS COMMISSION. I HAVE UPLOADED A FLASHCARD PROGRAM TO YOUR TABLET FOR STUDYING MOBILE ARMY SILHOUETTES UNTIL YOU CAN START LEARNING TO RECOGNIZE THEM AS PART OF A SIMULATION.

AGAIN, THANK YOU, Sionet typed out before she locked her tablet. She definitely did not want to dig into the silhouette flashcard program before trying to get some sleep, or she would keep herself awake for several hours more.

Contrary to her thoughts on the matter, as soon as Sionet crawled in under the covers on her bed, she was unconscious in five minutes and snoring in twenty. Even despite the startup of another orgy session in the next room over.

-x-x-x-

(9 February CE 74, 0935 Hours Onogoro (UTC+10) time)
(Office of the Chief Representative, Government House, Onogoro City, Emirate of Orb)

"And one thing we can always count on, any meeting time Anantha is called to will be five minutes late at a minimum," the younger sister of said brother commented to their father. "If he was a little more consistent about the +5, you could set a watch to it."

"Thank you, dear sister," Anantha pulled her head close and gave her a quick kiss on the top of her head, an easy task since he was head and shoulders taller than his sister.

"Enjoy the witty banter while it lasts," Ophir Seiran said. "Your sister is headed up to Mendel to serve an internship under the Division Commander. From there, after a four-year stint with Mendel, she will be rotating down here to do Naval Academy and take a position in the fleet."

"That's the goal, now to see if the sands of time shake out in that direction," Morrigan Seiran admitted the one thing that no person in the room preferred to admit, but to which they were all beholden.

"The vagaries of fate," the silent man in the room said. Akachi Seiran, the older brother of the three siblings, stood up from the chair by the coffee table in the office. "The new Division Commander is supposed to be a fairly reasonable lady, so I don't expect much in the way of trouble or challenge."

"She is accommodating, yes, but hardly reasonable in the sense of politics here in Orb or Equatorial or Scandinavia or, dare I say, even the USSA or ZAFT." Ophir came around the desk and leaned up against the front edge of it. "Never forget the origin of Mendel, they are ingrained in the political scene but never forget that they came here by accident and simply refused to leave. If we are to take the chief position among the Star Empires, we must always tread carefully with them until Orb is finally strong enough to suborn them."

Morrigan showed no face at that comment from her father, but internally she scoffed at the thought of it. Mendel may have been the 'wild child' of modern politics (according to career politicians), but in military circles the mere mention of going against the Mendel Touman (Armed Forces) caused knees to weaken and bladders to spontaneously empty, and for good reason. The forces of Mendel were veteran, battle-hardened troops from a truly old Star Empire well before they landed in the L4 area of Cosmic Era earth. As proved repeatedly in battle in the years following their arrival, throwing nuclear arms in their general direction only pissed them off, such was not a crippling blow to they. And no nation of this era intended to start that kind of scrap with a nation that saw the 8.5 million ton Mendel-class ultra-carrier as a reasonable military expenditure.

In the here and now, Mendel was no less formidable and even to a degree more frightening a prospect to 'suborn' than they would have been in centuries past. The first modern JumpShip Pirates of the Cosmic Era had run roughshod over the USSA and Orb for five years, until they made the mistake of trying to raid a Mendel world, when their collection of Mobile Suits and support vehicles had run afoul of the local militia and were pinned in place long enough for Commandos to respond to the assault. The Militiamen sold their lives dearly to enable the killing blow, and the Commandos did not disappoint: those few who bailed out or punched out were summarily executed, and their Jumpship was caught at the Nadir point by a strike team of Mobile Armors. Technically what happened to the Black Ring was a gross violation of the Asgard Accords that protected Jumpships from hostile action, but no nation made noise about the sinking of a pirate ship flying a black flag and firing on civilian traffic.

"I'll learn what I can, but the present DC came up in the ground forces, she's not Naval," Morrigan pointed out.

"Learn what you can, dear," Ophir nodded to his daughter. "We will make sure the ground is fertile for you to find your place in the stars after all is said and done," he proclaimed boldly.

"Thank you, father. I hope my merits are a match to the political capital necessary for it," she said formally. "If you will excuse me, brothers, father, I need to finish preparations for my departure."

After Morrigan departed the room and the heavy door latched, Akachi snorted loud enough to be heard by the others. "I love my sister dearly, but her heart is conflicted on this matter. Mendel is a nation to be exploited, stifled, and eventually surpassed. They may have scraped by for 15 millennia, but they are not the future of the Cosmic Era," he proclaimed staunchly.

"Be cautious, brother," Anantha said. "The Magi have left many a world, many a Star Empire in ruins, and Mendel does not forget its history or ancestry. If you intend to kick this tiger in the arse, you had better have a damn good plan for dealing with the teeth of said tiger."

"You side with Morrigan?" Akachi asked.

"I side with Orb, and only with Orb, brother, but I try to be practical about these things. I'm not saying it is impossible, I am saying if we are going to do this we need to make sure we have a solid plan with contingencies in place before we put the first piece on the board," Anantha pointed out.

"We will indeed plan for this, sons, and we will plan very thoroughly for it," Ophir Seiran pulled both of his sons into a hasty group hug. "We have years to work on this, but when the opportunity is there, we must act with decisiveness." He released his sons from the embrace. "Now, be smart about your tasks for the day, and be here for dinner, I will introduce you to the Minister of Intelligence so you can begin working on the plan."

Ophir would never know that he would indeed provide fertile grounds for his daughter's ascension to a command position in the stars, but not by the fashion he thought he would.

-x-x-x-

(9 February, CE 476, 0930 Hours Local (Dendez East) Time)
(Waffle House, Kalweyn outskirts area, Planet Carver V, Protectorate of Mendel)

Sionet had made sure to reserve her tickets to Westport while waiting for her breakfast, and after that relaxed to read some inane news articles on her tablet. On the far side of the diner was two obvious Mafiosi types of the local outfit, but Sionet wasn't worried because she was looking disheveled enough that she would not be readily recognizable even if she had crossed them in the past (and, as far as she ever remembered traveling, she had never crossed this outfit in the past).

"Your platter, miss," the waitress set Sionet's breakfast of eggs, breakfast sausage, and hash browns on the table in front of her.

"Arigatou," Sionet said. Without anything more said, the waitress topped off her coffee and set a creamer cup on the table next to it. The runaway decided right then and there that she would leave a two C-bill tip for the waitress, which was not common conduct in Magi society but reserved for exemplary service. It was also not Mafiosi practice to leave a tip, which would further distance herself from any such identification.

For her breakfast, Sionet switched over to the history of mobile warfare in the old history of the Magi — more than just good scores and good presence, Sionet knew she would need to understand the concept of Mobile Warfare and how it had been used in the past. Even still, she was surprised that one of the old academy lectures on the subject demonstrated that the Magi implementation of Mobile Warfare did not fit the true definition thereof — the Magi did not devalue Mobile Warfare, but they did not rely on it as a be-all-end-all of warfare at the Star Empire level.

As was demonstrated by the complete lack of Earth Federal Space Forces or the Romefeller Foundation in the lists of known Star Empires, national policy dictated the fate of the nation. Hence, a nation that married a desire for extreme control with a piss-poor defense policy that had severe gaps in inventories and capabilities would eventually collapse, if not under its own failings than under external pressure or invasion. The Magi did not 'skate' in this regard, as some in the defense complex wanted to believe, in that the Mobile Army was one facet of a larger and coordinated whole but not the backbone of the Magi Touman. The Infantryman, lowly and devalued in the face of Mobile Suits and Gundams, was still the chief asset of the Multimage armed forces, and still the frightening capability of Mendel to resist foes twice their number or more.

So, not only must I be cautious of Infantry when piloting, I need to learn to leverage them when I have their assistance on the ground, Sionet thought. More inline with her expectation, the other 'lesser' forms of armor and support were also on the lists of hazards and helpers. Sionet knew intellectually that the humble Tank was still a fearsome foe in modern battlescapes, but the frightening speed by which an Alacorn IIM could disassemble a GuAIZ mobile suit was a reminder that ground armor was not out of the game, again completely in defiance of present pundit thinking on the subject.

The next segment of the lecture series dealt with artillery, always a traditional strength of the Magi and Mendel. Sionet was a bit mystified by it, as it always struck her as an imprecise and random business, but that random effect was where it truly excelled, according to the professor giving the lecture. Directly targeting a foe was one thing, but when you chance hitting a whole enemy formation it tends to cause the entire formation to freak out rather than just the prospect of losing one or two units.

"Everything good, miss?" The waitress asked, which snapped Sionet out of her study and back to reality.

"Very good, thank you," Sionet answered after she took one of her earbuds out briefly. She moved to put it back in, but stopped when the waitress said something that she didn't expect, but very much welcomed:

"Found your reason for running yet?"

Sionet bristled at the question, briefly, though she mastered the reaction fast enough. It went without saying that she was trying to run, and a thinking person would have little trouble seeing that.

"Already have the reason, now I need the destination."

"Doing better than I did, then," the waitress said quietly. "Took me four years to settle down where I am, find a new life. Good luck."

Sionet nodded in acceptance of the waitress's story, but silently hoped it would not be 4 years to achieve such a goal. That frame of time would certainly be enough to put her out of the Mafiosi but it would also put her out of the running for piloting qualification under normal circumstances, she figured. Time would prove her right, but not for the reason she thought.

Sionet had her coffee topped off twice more before she left.

-x-

(Same time as above)
(Southbound on Highway 33, Dendez Continent)

"Where's our runaway?" Destiny asked.

"Narwhal for sure, looks like she's downtown right now, within 30 meters of two hotels," Kenny answered. "Probably deciding which one to do tonight."

"Which hotels are we talking about here? I can probably predict which one she takes."

"Hotel Carver is one of them, the other… Vester," Kenny said after he correlated the geolocation to actual addresses.

"Vester it is," Jasmine declared with certainty.

"How do you come to — oh, yeah, she'd know not to camp in a hotel chain that you frequent," Destiny said.

"Exactly. She's a bit green in the ways of concealing, but she does know not to follow patterns," Jasmine pointed out, knowing full well that they were chasing a phantom contact.

"Anything else we need to know going into this?" Destiny asked.

"I don't know what exact mental state she is in, but for sure she is in a bit of a mood to think this a rational action. We should be cautious and not too aggressive in confronting her. She is still armed, I can confirm that, and I don't think she'd be willing to shoot us right off the bat but pushing her may get her to that point."

"So take it easy, can do," Destiny said. Jasmine had picked her of the crew's ladies because she was the easiest-going of the female crew. She was also the largest of the ladies on the crew, which would make her very valuable in the case of needing to strong-arm Sionet… or brawl with a hostile Mafiosi.

"We'll make it happen," Kenny said. "I figure we've got about four hours to arrival in Narwhal."

-x-x-x-

(9 February, CE 476, 1330 Hours Local (Dendez West) Time)
(Mackie's Club, City of Westport, Dendez Continent, Planet Carver V, Protectorate of Mendel)

The full-time DJ didn't fail to notice when someone entered the booth, and Kyle was no exception to that rule. "How goes?" Kyle asked.

"Not bad today. Crowd today is kinda on the mellow side, so I'm mixing mostly lighter music. You want to take a spin?"

"Sure, I'll give it a shot for a few, and before you ask, I am already done with my lessons for the day," Kyle made sure to defuse that complaint before it was raised.

"Yeah, hard to bus tables when you also have to have your nose in a workbook," the DJ admitted. "What's your thought on a series?"

"I'm a big fan of the deep past trance and dance, so I was thinking about spinning a few of the pre-Cosmic-Era discs," Kyle said.

The DJ thought about it for a few moments, and had a look over the crowd to gauge where they were musically. "Okay, I think that'll fly for a few, at least until the dinner and clubbing crowds come in. Table's yours after this track is out."

The track that the DJ had last spun was only about halfway through the 6 minutes, so Kyle had a few minutes to get his media drive in place and queue up his first couple songs, then assemble a crossfade for them. The last step he did was a crossfade from the present track into his first track.

Cascade — Transcend (Moonman's Transcentral Remix)

Once the first track laid in, Kyle made sure to set the display over the DJ booth to list the track name and show a spin of the original turntable record for the track. After that was done, he sat back and took his own gauge of the crowd.

The results a minute into his first choice were not too bad, nobody had rushed the DJ booth with a bladed or impact weapon and nobody had spontaneously left the club, and most of all there were no boos or catcalls, so all and all a decent start he figured.

"Pretty good result so far," the DJ said. "I've spun some of the older ones in the past, and occasionally I'll sneak a track or two in from the golden age of Dance and Trance, but most of the time it's a more recent vintage."

"Nobody's tried shooting us yet, I'd call that a vote of confidence," Kyle joked.

"Gunfire would be quick and merciful, the one you have to worry about is a flying whiskey bottle, or Gods forbid, a flying wine decanter. Those can lay you out in a severely injured state if you're not careful," DJ Klein noted to the greenhorn.

"Aye, be on the lookout for flying booze bottles, duly noted," Kyle acknowledged the point.

Tilt — I Dream (Tilt's Resurrection Mix)

"Man, you're spinning some of the classics," DJ Klein acknowledged the next track with a raised water bottle in salute.

"Have to pay homage to the masters, and Tilt is one of the unsung ones," Kyle said. "I'll warn you, the list ramps up as we go along."

"Oh, I'd expect that, Trance can go both directions, either mellow out or get right up to the edge of outright Dance music. To be seen how well the crowd takes it."

"That's the big question here," Kyle mused. "I guess we'll just see what we'll see," he concluded after a moment before he broke open a workbook for a subject he didn't have due for a full week.

Ozone - Rock

A minute into the song, Kyle flipped pages on his workbook and began penciling in the answers for the problems, though a couple of them he made margin notes to review them later — he thought he had the right answers, he wasn't sure of his work.

"Still no departures that can't be attributed to finishing their meal and going on about their business," DJ Klein said. "I'd say your first 30 is a solid success, kid. Ever consider making a career out of this?"

"Not really, no," Kyle said. "Still have no idea what I want to do when I grow up."

"Pfft, kid, growing old is the mandatory component of aging. Growing up is entirely optional, and I'll admit I never escaped my twenties."

Kyle eyed the DJ carefully. "34?"

"38, thank you very much," the professional DJ said with a raised eyebrow.

Kyle nodded acknowledgement of his missed guess and bent back to his workbook.

Absolute Project — Life Search (Trance Mix)

"You really did ramp it up on this one," DJ Klein noted.

"Yeah, and a little bit of mind screw in there for good measure. It wouldn't be a classic trance party if there are not any funny or trippy lyric catches to your set," Kyle pointed out.

"Ever thought about your DJ name?"

"I was thinking about just going with my last name, not even DJ in front of it," Kyle said.

"Trado? Definitely a throwback to the old masters. Now we just got to get you producing your own material," the much older and more experienced DJ pointed out.

"I've tried once or twice, I don't think it was any good," Kyle downplayed that angle.

"Well, if you still have it, bring it by the booth some time and we can spin it on a quality sound system, see if it is any good," DJ Klein recommended.

"Maybe, I'll have to see if I still have the source files," Kyle hedged his position and bent back to his workbook.

Li Kwan — Point Zero

"Last song talks about space, this one gives you that instant 'flying in space' trance rush, and then throw in the hard edge techno feel that brings to mind the days in space on a Jumpship or Dropship," DJ Klein nodded. "Excellent follow-through, kid."

"You do any time out in space?" Kyle asked.

"Did two hitches as an aerofighter pilot," DJ Klein admitted. "Before you ask, I knew I was good but not good enough to make a career out of it. There were peeps in my squadron that were twice as good as I was, and I was no slouch in scores or duty profiles."

"Still pilot?" Kyle asked after a minute of listening to the chorus of the song.

"Don't tell Mackie this, but I make use of one of the other working pods downstairs from time to time to keep my stick skills somewhat sharp. Good enough for combat? Probably not. Good enough to get the fuck out of dodge if something goes sideways? Oh Hell yes. Shit to shove, I'll happily commandeer an orbital shuttle or small Dropship to get out of the way of impending doom and extract anyone else I can."

"Every now and then I think it would have been cool to work toward being a pilot, but I don't know any more," Kyle said.

"It's an ingrained desire in our society," DJ Klein pointed out. "Mendel, and our ancestry in the Magi, were heavy into the warrior ethos and still are. It's what has kept us alive and functioning as a society when the rest of Existence wants to flay our dicks into skin-hats."

Kyle had to work hard to suppress a giggle at the phrasing from the senior DJ.

Subtle By Design — Sirius (DJ Tiesto Remix)

"Y'know, going purely as a matter of aiming for a piloting qualification, you're probably already out of the running unless you get a damn good teacher in here to whoop your arse into battery."

"I figured as much," Kyle acknowledged the point.

"As a way to blow off steam, or as a way to keep yourself mentally sharp, spending some time in the pods is pretty good. It won't relax you, combat adrenaline is a thing and even happens in the pods, but just to keep yourself sharp? Hard to beat," DJ Klein said. "And, if you're in need of some death from above, I'd happily fly a round of support while you're in a sim."

"And of course crunching some of the baddies of wars past is just visceral fun," Mack said from the back rail of the DJ booth. He wasn't up in the booth, which precluded either older or newer DJ from noticing his approach.

"Yeah, doing an Aerofighter Combat Air Patrol over Nazi Germany is about as fair as putting a Clan Ghost Bear Elemental Linebacker against a toddler in a football helmet, but hot damn is it fun turning a reviled foe into a flaming wreck. And there were some merc units that made a good living off doing just that, interdimensional mercenary work against all manner of foes from bronze age to Inner Sphere and everything in between."

"Yeah, I remember reading about some of them, Sigma was one of the big names back in the day," Kyle said. "Maybe I'll give that a try, I could always stand to vent some steam."

Salt Tank — Eugina (Michael Woods Remix)

"Last song I queued up for this set," Kyle said.

"Not a bad first round," Mack said. "Think he's got it?" the proprietor asked the professional DJ.

"I think he's got the stuff," DJ Klein admitted. "Might let him spin a couple more sets."

"Can you spell me in the kitchen for a few, Kyle? Need to head downtown and sort out some financial stuff," Mack asked.

"Can do," Kyle said before he passed the headphones back to the professional.

DJ Klein stepped back up to the turntables and plugged in. "Ladies and gentlemen, give it up for our guest DJ of the hour: Trado!"

Surprising Kyle more than anything else, the round of applause and cheers from the audience was a shot of confidence he didn't realize he needed… or even knew he wanted.

-x-x-x-

(9 February, CE 476, 1815 Hours Local (Dendez West) Time)
(Westbound on Highway 12, Dendez Continent, Planet Carver V, Protectorate of Mendel)

Sionet had settled herself in against the window on the port-side of the bus and wrapped herself loosely with her windbreaker, so she could easily get to her pistol if needed. Unlike the bus drive from Hagerstown to Kalweyn, there were a few characters on this wagon that she was suspicious of, and at least one that creeped her out by eyeing her.

Apparently, one of the other passengers of the bus ride had seen the same creepy look as had Sionet. "Is this seat taken, miss?" A slightly older lady asked.

Sionet eyed the lady in question and was surprised at two levels — first, that the speaker was a Mendel Commando officer, second, she was a pilot. "Not at all, please," Sionet nodded to the bench area next to her. On the other side of the aisle, a larger guy also in a Commando uniform took a seat.

"You can relax your death-grip on your sidearm, kid," the pilot said in a directed mumble so as to not be audible to others in the area. "Creepy boi just moved six seats forward and is staring out the front window like a good little punk."

"Good, really didn't want to file paperwork on a creeper," Sionet visibly relaxed under her windbreaker cover.

"And wanted less to be violated on the trip to Westport," the pilot finished the thought for Sionet. "Margaret Lockett, Commandos. Used to live on Home Terra until I transferred out here. You?" She prompted Sionet.

"Sionet Neider, formerly from rural Kileska, now looking for a new home and a new start," Sionet popped her hand out from under her windbreaker for a shake.

"New start? Anything come to mind?" the pilot asked.

Sionet noticed the pilot's arm patch below the typical sigil of Mendel, she was a pilot of the Tallgeese III Gundam, a frighteningly powerful derivative of the Tallgeese Mobile Suit, the first prototype Mobile Suit of the After Colony timeline.

"Actually, yes, though I don't know if I'm out of line in thinking it possible. Since I was a little girl, always wanted to be a pilot, but my father kept me out of the sim pods because he believed my future lies elsewhere," Sionet said as something of an explanation.

"And thus you are looking for a new life and a new start," Margaret brought the thought full circle. "How much time do you have in the pods?"

"80, 85 hours total?" Sionet guessed. She couldn't clearly remember her last accumulated time or score.

The pilot nodded after thinking about it. "You are in for an uphill battle, Sionet. Not impossible by any means, but you will need to leverage every advantage you can take and post some excellent scores to be noticed."

"I'm already willing to give it all, but if you have any advice, I'm listening," Sionet said.

"First, find your strength and play it to the hilt," Lockett recommended. "Second, since you're so far behind the national training average for early-starters, you should request a training dispensation so you can do more than one ranked match every twenty-four hours. Third, if you crew in with a team, any scores you post reflect on the whole team as well as yourself, so making sure your whole team does well is just as important as how you do from match to match. And fourth, ranked matches are applicable only to the continental, planetary, or national leaderboards; what matches you run between those ranked matches will also reflect on your standing and count toward hours in type, and those numbers are often more important for recruit selection than your place on the ladder."

That fourth revelation caused Sionet to frown. "The top of the ladder isn't necessarily the top of the heap?"

"More often than not, no," Margaret said with a smile. "When I was coming up through standard schooling, I was number twelve on the leaderboard for the continent and number 85 for the planet. I knew the number four guy from Asia and I slept with the number 2 guy from the planet, but the interesting part is, the number four guy for the continent is now a lawyer and the number two guy for the planet was killed in a barfight he started. After spending six years flipping burgers, mind you."

"Doing better as a team operator will get you farther than being a solo ace, but both will weigh on the decision processes?" Sionet distilled the lesson down.

"Warfare is a team operation, an ace pilot can sway a battle but damn near never wins it on their own," Pilot Lockett pointed out. "You mostly see an ace do it all in horrible science fiction where their enemies suffer from crippling stupidity or some other major game-breaking flaw that would not be present in real life. Out on the line, you rely on the person to your right and the person to your left, and hope that your equipment, made by the lowest bidder nevertheless, holds up to the abuse it is about to take."

"I see," Sionet said. "Support the team, and the team moves forward," she distilled that lesson down. "Thank you."

"Rest easy, kid," Margaret said with a nod. "We are eight hours to Westport, so you should get a nap or two in. Never run when you can walk, never walk when you can sit, never sit if you can lay down, and never stay awake if you can get away with a power nap."

Sionet's trip, sitting next to the Commando Gundam Pilot, would cover many topics about the art of piloting and the duties of the Commandos. The pointed questions and eagerness to learn would endear Sionet to Margaret Lockett, who would watch her rise to piloting qualification eagerly in months, years to come. Sionet would never forget the Tallgeese III pilot, even into the uncertain future to come.

-x-

(Same time as above)
(Downtown Narwhal, Dendez Continent (south), Planet Carver V, Protectorate of Mendel)

"So, looks like her tracking beacon is coming from about two blocks forward of us and one block right," Kenny told Jasmine.

"Yeah, two blocks up and one right, will do," Jasmine said a moment before the stoplight turned green and she headed forward toward their rendezvous.

The effort to track Sionet down had gone in circles yesterday after the signal went off the air, and the hotels in the area had not reported seeing or admitting her, so they had to pick up the search today after the bug went live again. It had shown up across town an hour ago, so Jasmine had done her best 'respectful-fast' driving to get to intercept. (What they did not know is the signal disappeared because the Commando who was doing the deception work for this operation had locked the toiletries kit in a signal-isolating hard case overnight and into the morning, and only took it out to be exposed to tracking again before dumping it.)

One block south, two blocks south, and a right turn. "Okay, geeky guy, what are we looking for?"

"Target is… one block and change dead ahead of us," Kenny said without looking out the front window.

"Are you sure? The only vehicle ahead of us for three blocks is a trash truck," Jasmine said.

"Fuck," Destiny said. "We'd better stop him and explain what's going on."

"Loop around — wait, he's stopping to get out and dump a can," Jasmine said. "Destiny, you're on."

"Got it, boss," Destiny rolled her window down as Jasmine pulled up to the back end of the truck. "Hey, mister!"

"Ho, miss! What can I do for ya?" the trash collector asked before he activated the automatic lifter to dump the dumpster in the back of his truck.

"Hey, we're trying to track down a runaway and her tracker is pointing to your truck," Destiny said. "Have you picked up any loads that looked or smelled suspicious?"

"Like dead body suspicious? No," the driver said. "You think maybe some foul play?"

"We hope not, but the tracker being in your truck makes it look that way," Destiny said.

"Okay," the Driver said before the dumpster dropped back to the ground and he wheeled it back to the curb. "We have a protocol for this. Follow me to the processing site, we'll check the contents for anything suspicious."

"Thank you," Destiny nodded to the guy.

-x-

(30 minutes later)
(Waste Processing Site Delta-Three, Dendez Continent, Planet Carver V, Protectorate of Mendel)

Jasmine followed the truck to the foreman's office and parked in front of it after the driver got out and waved her forward. The three Brelle Mafiosi jumped out of their SUV as soon as the engine was off, and were greeted by the foreman — a stocky woman of at least 40 years age and an obvious tobacco chewing habit. "My driver radioed forward about what you told him," she said. "You're sure the tracker you have is in his truck?"

"Definitely, it's in there," Kenny held up his tablet with the tracking locator on it, and turning the antennas toward the truck caused it to ping loudly.

"That blows," the forewoman said before she hocked a loogie of tobacco juice. "Benny, get your truck on the inspection pad and empty it, but use the slow speed for ramming it. If there's evidence of a crime, we want to preserve it."

"Can do, boss," the driver said before he turned back to the truck and climbed in.

"Here," she picked up a couple grabber-rods and heavy gloves, and handed one pair each to Jasmine and Destiny. "Trash digging probably ain't what you expected out of today, but if you want answers, your eyes'll be the best for looking for clues."

"I hear you," Jasmine said stoically.

"Your son?" the Forewoman asked.

"Daughter, seventeen," Jasmine said.

"The Mendel regulars and the USSA Spec Ops just put a violent end to a sex trafficking ring running out of Caracas on Home Terra and leading all the way here, but that doesn't mean they got them all. I hope that's not what we have here," the forewoman waved the three undercover mafiosi toward the inspection pad after the driver finished emptying the truck's haulage.

Kenny took the lead, using his tracker unit to quarter the pile of trash to reduce the amount they had to dig through, and with some creative scanning was able to reduce the requirement of searching to a dozen bags. Once those bags were isolated, he went over them with an electronic sensor turned to the tracker, and found the specific bag quickly. "Here it is."

"Way too small for a body," the Forewoman said of the bag in question.

"This is one of the bags from the downtown strip, the cans along the road," the driver said. "Definitely not heavy enough to have a body in it, I remember pulling it."

"I've got it," Jasmine gave it a good tear with her gloved hands, and with it the disgorged bag revealed the toiletries bag easily enough. "Here it is."

"No evidence of a body," the forewoman said after she picked through the remainder of the bag.

"Unzipping now," Jasmine unzipped the bag and found it empty. "Empty?"

"She may have realized it was bugged — yeah, the stitching over the bug has been tampered with," Kenny said after inspecting it. "It either came loose and she found it, or she went looking."

"She went looking, these were deliberately ripped out, the same as the other corners," Jasmine picked out a seam ripper from the bag. "That tells me she's still on the run."

"Want me to call the Regulars?" the Forewoman asked.

"No, we'll just have to keep tracking her the hard way," Jasmine said. Mafia pride-of-place in this case would prove to be one of her best forms of camouflage in this deception, as the Mendel troops would have no trouble tracking her down in a hurry but the Mafiosi would not want to involve the military for fear of the story leaking.

"Good luck, then. You think we don't need to check the rest?" the Forewoman asked. It was a pro forma required question, as she would not disturb evidence of a crime if asked but if they declined to call it a crime she needed to get her people back to work.

"No, I don't think she's a victim of a crime yet," Jasmine said officially, which cleared them to dispose of the rest.

"All right, mama, good luck in finding your wayward daughter," the forewoman said.

"You have any?" Jasmine asked as the group headed back to the foreman's office.

"Three, two daughters and a son, youngest just enlisted," she said.

Behind them, a large trash pusher used a fifteen-meter-wide push blade to clear the inspection pad and push the trash into one of the processing piles. None of the involved persons would ever know that one of the bags that Kenny had individually swept held the contents of the emptied toiletries kit, which the Commando had emptied into a separate dumpster for plausible deniability before he ripped the stitches out on the bug to reveal it.

-x-x-x-

(10 February, CE 476, 1000 Hours Local (BC Standard) Time)
(Blue Cosmos Pilot Academy Newground, North American continent, Blue Terra)

"Ladies and gentlemen, it's the grudge match we've all been waiting for!" Cadet Tania declared on the radio.

"Oh please," Sylvie rolled her eyes at the cheap wrestling intro to the coming bout.

"Oh YES!" Cadet Trimes half-shouted.

"Yes! More! MORE!" Cadet Hana Editto said in her best pervert voice.

Sylvie sighed. "If I didn't know the 356 class was even more perverted than you wankers, I would have requested a transfer months ago."

"And ruin your chance at making Class Top? I'm doubting that," Tania answered with a flip of her hair.

"Big frigging doubt on that one," Emilea said.

"Okay, Sylvie, I've got him. He'll be coming around the hillock at your eleven o'clock here in 30 seconds," Cadet Moira Wilbanks instructed Sylvie from the command truck. She had been a Gundam Pilot Cadet in the 355 class, but washed out due to a low G-threshold for blacking out, and quickly segued into Operator Training where her experience in the cockpit served her well on moving around Gundams.

"They're getting close!" Tania said in a raising voice.

"And I'm getting wet from it!" Hanna said a moment thereafter.

"Why, God, why?" Sylvie asked the space above her top monitors, and by extension the Holy Spirit well above her Gundam.

"Rather than ask 'why', you need to ask 'why not' more often," Emilea needled her friend and favorite tease.

"Op! Op! Eyes on Kevin's machine!" Hanna commented. On at least one of the open microphones on the ladies' open radio net, someone's pilot suit unzipped rather audibly.

"And here it comes," Tania said. "Who's gonna play it?"

"I've got it," Emilea said.

Sylvie did an oblique-angle jet forward to close some of the gap with Kevin, but halfway through her jump the radio band was assailed with an ancient Terran song: Yakety Sax by Boots Randolph.

-x-

Kevin saw the approaching Sylvie readily enough, and moved to orbit around her by jetting in an arc behind her line of advance. The addition of Yakety Sax as the soundtrack for their battle caused him to smile readily, but as much as he wanted to break down laughing from the comedic element of it, this was a scored match — and there were instructors listening and watching by way of the cameras in everyone's machines, so for every shenanigan to be had in this battle, there would be an equal and vociferous criticism.

Sylvie was not caught unawares by his maneuver. She immediately jetted behind his line of advance and snapped off two training-strength beam rifle shots at him, both of which he tanked by shield. "Nice try, Sylvie!" Kevin said.

"Just getting started, Top," Sylvie said in one of those rare renditions where she acknowledged that she was only number two in the class.

Kevin was smart enough in this case not to try to return fire with his beam rifle — he knew Sylvie was fast enough to block it by shield, even at their short range. Instead, he racked the beam rifle and pulled one of his Stiletto anti-armor rockets and quickly loosed it at Sylvie.

In this case, shielding herself saved her from a one-strike kill, as the new Mk. 405 Anti-Armor Penetrator Rocket 'Stiletto' was plenty powerful enough to punch through even Variable Phase Shift armor — the penetrator was Phase Shift itself — and had an internal explosive charge designed to core out critical components in a MS or Gundam. When it struck Sylvie's shield, the Phase Shift Penetrator punched through the magnetized metal face of the shield and detonated partway through, which caused most of the shield to shear off above and to the left of the handguard. The training result of such a strike was the top half and left-side strip of the shield fell off.

She'll get aggressive to cover for the destroyed shield, Kevin realized quickly. Instinctively he jetted back and left to clear the line of advance, and true to his intuition Sylvie quickly closed with one beam rifle shot, then two more as she finished closing the gap and dropped aside the beam rifle for her beam saber. Kevin already had his in hand but did not eject the blade immediately, he took the first two swings in his shield surface and baited her in with the appearance of being caught defensive.

It only took her four seconds for her hyper-aggressive streak to create an opening, and Kevin quickly capitalized.

-x-

Sylvie didn't clearly see the strike that got her, but her peripheral vision easily caught sight of her right leg going red, then black to signify complete loss of the limb and thereafter her machine went face-first into the dusts of the training field. A second later, her main reactor warning lit off, signaling that her engine had been breached, probably by a beam saber to the back of the machine.

As she settled against the harness and gravity tried to draw her down toward the front monitor, Sylvie groaned after she felt her chest wrap give out and she started free-dangling. She had gone up two sizes in the past three months, much to Hanna's chagrin now that she was the largest lady in the class, but the downside was that she hadn't yet purchased any new bindings for herself in a year — and this one just ripped.

"Man, that was too fast!" Emilea said.

"Kevin is way too fast for normal women," Hanna said. "How'd you like it, Sylvie?"

"Quick and dirty, just the way I earned it," Sylvie commented. "Not going to bullshit on talk radio, I got hyper-aggressive, made a stupid mistake in there somewhere, and paid for it pretty badly."

"Did you at least get wet off it?" Tania asked.

"I should slap you for a question like that," Sylvie said offhand. "Should, but won't."

"She did get wet from it," Hanna drew the conclusion.

Sylvie would not admit that Hanna was right, but not for the reason Hanna thought.

-x-x-x-

(11 February, CE 476, 1230 Hours Local (Dendez West) Time)
(Hotel Bix, Westport, Dendez Continent, Planet Carver V, Protectorate of Mendel)

Sionet had forced herself to normalize her sleep schedule over the course of two nights in Westport, and had woke up the morning of the 11th refreshed and energetic, ready to take on the coming challenge of finding some permanent digs in town that she could use as a launching pad for her personal career choice.

PALADIN had narrowed the list to four good recommendations, all four owned by former Commandos and two were 383-BLUE Alumni. Sionet had tried those four in the morning, and all four were unable to accept new tenants — they were already full up as is. So, stepping over that setback, Sionet revised the search parameters to include facilities that would meet the other criteria but were not owned or operated by Commandos. The first such expanded criteria facility flatly rejected her as too old to join their cadre. The second Sionet decided a phone call was in order rather than hot-foot it across town.

"Hello?" the proprietess answered.

"Hello, is this Arwood Facility?" Sionet asked.

"This is," the voice on the far end of the line said.

"I would like to inquire about taking up residence at your place for a couple years. I'm seventeen, emancipated, and looking to start a fresh life. I can do work around the facility as well as find a job."

"We may be able to accommodate, but I have a couple questions. First, special needs, accommodations or disabilities?"

"None," Sionet said.

"Second, civilian or military goal?" the proprietress asked.

"Is military a disqualifier?" Sionet asked.

"Not at all. Third, what changed your circumstance that you need to start fresh?" she asked.

"I would prefer not to discuss that," Sionet said automatically.

"I cannot trust a resident who is unwilling to divulge their past," the proprietress answered.

Sionet sighed. "Then I believe my inquiry is over. Have a good afternoon," she said before she hung up. "And I thought Mafiosi could be paranoid." Sionet took the time to cross that number off her list.

The phone for the room rang, and Sionet answered before the second ring. "Room 404."

"Your pizza has arrived, miss Neider," the concierge said.

"Arigatou, be down shortly," Sionet said quickly. She had skipped breakfast and was looking forward to the pizza while making a few more calls. She cleared and locked her tablet, grabbed up her room key, and dropped a piece of paper in the middle of the room walkway as a telltale in case someone tried to sneak into her room. Outside, she took the fifteen meters to the elevator in stride and down to the ground floor, where she met the pizza delivery girl (younger than she was).

"Neider? Large two topping?"

"That's me," Sionet said. She purchased a large pizza so that she would deliberately have leftovers for two or three more meals.

"Tab's 3 C-bills and 85 pence," the driver said.

"Five, and keep the change as your tip," Sionet said.

"Thank you!" the delivery kid was all too happy to walk away with a better-than-one-C-bill tip.

"And thank you sir!" Sionet said to the concierge at the front desk.

"No problem miss," the college student said to her retreating form.

Back upstairs, Sionet was quick to dig into her Pizza and start checking up the online presence and information for the other number she still had to call. After digging into the third number she was going to call, she quickly crossed that off her list: several reviews of the facility stated that it had problems, and a little digging in public records determined that it had both health code violations and several law enforcement calls against the facility. Such was not an environment she wanted to take a gamble on, the last thing she wanted was some kind of major medical issue from her environment.

The number four number that she intended to call and facility she intended to check up on, also removed itself from her list fairly quickly: the website and information page for the facility clearly identified that it only accepted practicing christians. Nominally, the Brelle family was supposed to be Lutheran, but in practice there wasn't much in the way of church activity or religious leanings from pretty much any member of the family, and Sionet was one of the worst offenders of the group. Sionet figured that trying to spoof her way into such an institution was also not a good idea, as any lapse in cover could get her thrown out on her arse.

Number five on her list of revised numbers to check turned out to be a decent possible, no major outstanding flags on her check, so she decided to give it a call.

"Hello?" the proprietor answered as soon as the call connected.

"Hello, sir, are you presently accepting new residents?" Sionet asked.

"Oh, you're calling for New Skies Boarding House and Orphanage? They folded two months ago," the person on the line answered.

"Ah, thank you," Sionet acknowledged. "Have a good day, sir," she said before she hung up. "That's a pain in the ass," she grumped after she was sure the call was disconnected.

With the last number on her second list exhausted, she sat her phone down and sighed. She could not eliminate any further criteria from her search, which meant that her next option was to look into conventional apartments and a day job of some kind, which meant she was either unlikely to make pilot, or the process would be drawn out even longer than she expected.

-x-x-x-

(12 February, CE 476, 0645 Hours Zulu Time)
(Allster Enterprises Orbital Station Freya, L4 Colony Cluster, Protectorate of Mendel)

"So, I believe the technical term is 'broke as hell'."

"No joke, sensei," the foreman on duty said in response to Cordelia's quip. "What happened is a chain reaction failure, one break leads to another break, which leads to another, and so on."

"Where did it start?" Cordelia asked.

"The frame strut immediately ahead of the top engine nacelles. Frame member Yankee-234, my boys were able to recover part of it and are working on getting the rest out."

"Any preliminary findings?" The Foreman expected that question, it was literally her ass on the line and she would have a vested interest in keeping it intact without an engine nacelle rammed up her butt while doing hard maneuvering.

"So far as we can tell, material failure. Your math on the assembly and structure requirements is right on, so we're looking at material fatigue — unlikely after 1 flight and 2 hours — or outright failure."

"Try sabotage," Engineer Lindsey Wright said as she approached the two. "This frame was cut, it did not fail of its own accord." She was holding the second part of the frame assembly that had sheared, and why she had mentioned sabotage was now very clear.

"Son of a space bitch!" The foreman gaped as soon as he could clearly see what the engineer meant.

"Pretty clean cut, maybe a hydraulic cutter?" Cordelia asked.

"Yeah, that was my guess, and it was done under the anti-fragmentation cover, so this has to be deliberate during the fabrication or at worst during assembly."

"Any chance this was an accident?" Cordelia asked, hoping against hope that it could be a misunderstanding.

"Too clean a cut to be stress shearing. As much as I hate to admit it, we have a saboteur."

"Well, that's going to be a big screaming bitch to narrow down, unless we get lucky and the sabotage happened in the presence of a camera," the foreman said.

"Maybe, maybe not," Cordelia said. "Sabotage like this has a purpose, nobody on this project has a tie to a competing company worth talking about, so that tells me that someone wants this project to fail. Motive for something like this would go in one direction, and I'll spare you two the details of that direction. We don't necessarily have to find the saboteur, we just have to narrow it down to a subset we can isolate."

"Move them somewhere else, they become a non-issue?" Lindsey asked.

"Exactly so," Cordelia said. "We'll start here. Aston, compile a list of who in the fabrication group worked on this beam or any adjacent beams. Once you have the list, archive it and resume normal operations."

"On it, milady," the Foreman said quickly and turned to head into the office area for the hangar bay.

"Lindsey, compile a list of engineers and QC inspectors that worked on the area. Same thing, once you have the list, archive it and get back to your usual routine."

"Can do!" Lindsey left the cut beam floating next to Cordelia and headed into the office area as well.

Cordelia broke out her tablet computer. "I am going to do some camera footage inspection going backwards in the fabrication bay, see if this wanker did something obviously identifiable."

In the span of an hour, her search of footage found nothing, so she went back through the assembly bay footage and came to the same conclusion — the cameras were sited incorrectly to see if anyone actually had done something as malicious as cut a structural member. All else being equal, she expected this result; anyone smart enough to sabotage a prototype in such a fashion that failure would be crippling but not instantly fatal would also be smart enough to not do so in full view of the cameras around the facility. To her mind, that meant an engineer: someone who would know the ins and outs of the design and generally be smart enough to do so at a time and place where they would not be caught for it. Most of the mechanics and fabricators were easily clever enough to be on the list as well, but to Cordelia's mind this was engineering artwork in the art of controlled destruction, and that had a very specific connotation.

"List compiled, milady," Aston said 90 minutes after he had initially departed. Cordelia looked up to the foreman and found Lindsey had come out of the office area with him. "What's the next steps?"

"We sit on the lists," Cordelia said. "If they try once and fail, they will try again. Whoever is backing this comedy is not going to give up on a one-and-done. When the next one happens, we compare the lists and narrow down the field. If we can narrow it to five or six, good, otherwise we use the revised list on round three to further shrink the pool. We keep reducing with each iteration until we have a reasonable subset to reassign to cargo dropship detail flying rubber dogshit out of Hong Kong." (1)

Lindsey could not help but giggle at the plan, though the foreman simply smiled. "I like this plan," he said simply.

"For now, rotate personnel around but don't make it look obvious, we don't want to spook our friend," Cordelia said. "Make sure the replacement components are to specification, we'll see if this foe tries again on round two or if they are going to bide time for a bit before trying again. Other than that, keep it situation normal."

"Will do, boss," the Foreman said.

"What do you want done with this?" Lindsey asked.

"How heavy is this beam?" Cordelia asked. Since it was in a no-grav zone, Cordelia wasn't sure about its weight when under gravity.

"Not heavy, sixty kilos after it was sabotaged?" Lindsey guessed.

"Help me carry it to my quarters. I'm going to have my assistants help me mount it on a blank wall in there," Cordelia said with a savage smile. The wall in question would be plainly visible to her communication terminal, meaning that when she received calls from her sisters, they would see that their machinations had flatly failed to kill her.

Now all she had to do was determine which of her two airhead sisters had actually come up with this comedy, and how to prove it…

-x-x-x-

(12 February, CE 476, 1045 Hours Local (Dendez West) Time)
(Apartment Quarter, Westport, Dendez Continent, Planet Carver V, Protectorate of Mendel)

Sionet's search for apartments turned up seven buildings with vacancies that also matched her criteria for (reasonable) proximity to a pod center, reasonable rent that she could marginally swing with a menial job, and weren't too close to known strongholds of the local mafiosi. The Rigos loved to frequent nightclubs and bars, they were not so much into the other businesses around town, though they were more than willing to shake down those other businesses for 'protection' money.

Apartment buildings one and two on her list were complete no-go facilities, and in the case of the second, Sionet had run back to her hotel room to take a shower, it was that grody. The level of dinginess in the halls was matched only by the state of the apartment she had been shown — this was not even shabby, it was just downright unkempt and unlivable, even despite the obvious signs of having been 'cleaned'. Sionet suspected that Napalm would have been the ground-floor minimum to properly clean and disinfect such a mess.

Apartment Buildings three and five on her list were good possible options, well managed and well kept both in grounds and facility. The only concerning things about them were proximity to a factory in the case of building three and proximity to the red light district in the case of building 5. The latter was the more concerning, as while the Rigos did not have the reputation for carousing and wenching that the Nayemeyer Family had, there was still the occasional news report popup for the Rigos in the brothels in Westport. As avoiding exposure to Mafiosi was high on her list of priorities, Sionet really had to weigh the options carefully.

Buildings four and six were both very good candidates, as there was no exposure that she could recognize and the facilities were very decent. The downside in this case was the lack of sim center in proximity to either: building 4 gave her a drive of 3.3 kilometers one-way to get to a sim center, and building 6 gave her a whopping 5.1 kilometers. Counting having to route around known Mafiosi strongholds, those distances increased significantly: 4.2 kilometers and 6.7 kilometers once detours were factored in. While those distances were doable with a decent bicycle, it was overall impractical from a training time - transit time calculation standpoint, unless one considered sleep deprivation a lofty method to gain hours (Sionet did not). (On the flipside, Sionet considered that all the bicycling she would be doing would give her excellently-toned legs and glutes, one of the things she always wanted to work on for her body).

Only one building remained on her list, and on the way up the front walkway to the building she immediately noticed the presence of a nightclub at the corner of the block it was on — and a man standing outside wearing a Rigos-colored windbreaker.

"Sionet?" the facility manager asked.

"I am," Sionet said as she arrived at the door. She gave him a quick handshake.

"Carl Kolte, I am manager for the building. Before we begin, any questions?" he asked.

"Hai, the nightclub at the corner, how loud does it get usually?" Sionet asked, pointing in that direction.

"They're fairly decent, actually, and it is a new building with heavy sound insulation built in. We asked the same question when they began the construction," he said. "Your apartment is on the back side, northwest corner, so you will not have direct line of sight to it."

"Good to hear," Sionet said. "Lead on, sir," she said, hoping her voice did not betray any worries about it.

"Follow me, miss," he waved her into the building behind himself. Access to the building was keycard-based, so Sionet figured she could have her keycard duped if needed. Sionet was quick to follow and quicker to observe; the facilities looked decently kept and the walls were freshly painted, so she figured this one would be a good room as well. "Here we are, ground floor, this is one of two units that match your price range," he said before he keyed into the door and held it open for Sionet.

"Not bad," Sionet said at first glance. Main living room, small kitchen (galley style), small dining area, two bedrooms and a full bath. "Utilities?" Sionet asked.

"All included in monthly rent. Internet access is included as well."

"Pest control and bug spraying?" Sionet asked, as it was a fairly standard question she had learned when doing research on apartment hunting.

"Every 60 days."

"Trash disposal?" She asked next. Sionet wasn't against taking her trash to a dumpster if needed, but…

"Trash chutes and roller bins at the ends of the hallways."

"Armaments policy?" That one was a big one for her, as she would not forfeit her sidearm or a chance to acquire more, paycheck permitting.

"National law is upheld, but be courteous about it. And, we do request that you don't do any destructive devices or explosives in the building for safety purposes," the Manager said.

"Definitely not, I don't do anything more dangerous than a shotgun," Sionet lied. She loved submachine guns and light machine guns, but those were well out of her budget for the time being.

"Other questions?" The Manager asked.

Sionet took another look around the main living room of the apartment. "No, I think I've covered it all. It is a very good facility, sir, and I've got a couple other options, so give me a day or two so I can sort out where I want to kick back."

"No problem, miss," he passed her a business card. "Give me a call either way, that way I know I can free the listing up if you rest elsewhere."

"Shall do, thank you sir," Sionet said with a slight bow. The Manager saw her out of the facility and shook hands with her again before she headed back towards downtown.

At the end of the block, a twenty-something Mafiosi of the Rigos Family thought he saw someone in Brelle Mafiosi colors, but the backpack, duffel bag, and cargo pants made him think twice about it. The falling out with the Brelle was still fresh on their minds, so eyes were always on the lookout for the black base / blue chevron of a Brelle Windbreaker or Trenchcoat.

-x-x-x-

(12 February, CE 476, 2000 Hours Local Time)
(Sakato Homestead, Rural Kileska Continent, Planet Carver V, Protectorate of Mendel)

"Rotating for landing," Tsukiko said since she was doing the flying tonight.

"Gear check, gear down," Shinta said. "Cameras on center monitors," the copilot changed over two of the monitors to the downward-facing cameras.

"Coming down now," Tsukiko reduced the collective on the rotor blades until her altitude began dropping slowly, and with a minute of drop the helicopter landed and rattled a bit on the landing pad. "Home sweet home," Tsukiko said.

"Call it in?" Shinta asked.

"I have it," Tsukiko said, then keyed up the radio channel. "Hudson Center, Zero-Seven-Five-One-Romeo, successful landing per flightplan at KSAK (2), no follow-up flightplan at this time."

"Zero-Seven-Five-One-Romeo, Hudson Center, copy all traffic. Flightplan is completed, awaiting final paperwork before closeout. Have a good evening, pilot."

"That's that, you've got 72 hours of testing and examination, then we're on vacation for a few days more," Shinta stretched out, something of a challenge in the cockpit area of the Chinook II-S Helicopter but still doable with some creative angling of arms and back.

"What do you intend to do while I'm over the grill?" Tsukiko asked while she finished up the flight paperwork for upload to Huson Center.

"Oh, I'm pretty sure I can get the Corvette running, we've got enough of the hardware in for the engine that I'm going to try to rebuild. If we get it running, want to do a quick run down to Port Lackland after your tests?" Her brother asked.

"Tell you what, if I pass my tests, let's head over to East Inlet for a celebration," Tsukiko finished the paperwork and uploaded it. "We're done."

Before either of the two had stood up from their flight seats, the cargo compartment side door opened up and their younger sister bolted inside and up to the flight deck. "Welcome home!" Yuuki gave first her older brother a hug, then her sister. "Dinner's already been put away, sorry."

"Not hungry tonight, need to spend time getting ready for the tests tomorrow," Tsukiko said immediately. "These are my finals, once I'm done with these tests, I'm done with schooling."

"You're never going to get bigger boobs if you keep starving yourself," Yuuki blurted out.

"Damn, mother wasn't joking, you really do have no filter," Shinta ruffled his little sister's hair.

"And that, sister, is way down my list of priorities," Tsukiko took a moment to ruffle Yuuki's hair. "Thanks for looking out for me, though. C'mon, let's check over your homework before I get started on my last-minute studying."

"Thanks!" Yuuki departed the chopper with the same speed that she had entered it, though Tsukiko and Shinta were not as fast to exit and had to take time to close it up.

Outside the chopper and halfway between the landing pad and main house, they were met by their mother. "I keep telling her not to rush out to the chopper until you open it up," Yuna Sakato complained.

"As long as she isn't running up to it while the rotors are turning, it's all good," Shinta gave his mother a good hug.

"Got a full blast from her with no filter on," Tsukiko said. "Was I that incorrigible when I was eight?"

"Yes, when you weren't buried in electronics, as was I when I was not carving dolls and matryoshka, and the same when my mother was not learning how to cook." Yuna said. "She comes by it honestly, the male half of the family is at least slightly more tactful in that regard."

"That's good, somewhat," Shinta admitted. "Anyway, need me to do anything before I crash for the night?"

"No, father has something planned for tomorrow and wants your assistance on it. And the examiner will be ready for Tsukiko's tests tomorrow at 8 sharp, she's in the guest room right now preparing for bed." Given the distance between the main rural school administration building and some of the more remote homesteads, it was not unheard of for an examiner to overnight for several nights at the homestead while doing exam sets.

"Does she have neural implants?" Tsukiko asked.

"Of course, and has already said she is looking forward to seeing the inside of your simulation system," Yuna noted as she held the back door to the main house open for her son and eldest daughter.

"Any other news or major happenings?" Tsukiko asked while stretching and yawning.

"Hai, I am pregnant again," Yuna said a moment after she closed the door.

"Wa — oh, wow," Tsukiko gaped. "Fourth in our generation!"

"A late bun in the family, but hardly impossible," Yuna pointed out.

"And father's opinion?" Tsukiko asked.

"Some grumbling that he is a bit old to be chasing around a toddler, but I think he welcomes it more than else," their mother said.

"I do welcome it, I don't think my knees will welcome it after the fourth or fifth sprint to chase down the tyke," Jubei Sakato said from the living room.

"There is always a sacrifice to be made," Shinta said from the door to the kitchen. He had a beer for himself (Legal under Mendel law) and a bottle of whiskey for his father. "So, what's on the menu for tomorrow?"

"Big one is to get the 730 running," by which their father meant the Hareg 730 Tractor. "After that, I take it you want to hammer on the Corvette?"

"That's my plan, unless we have anything bigger to tackle?" Shinta offered the field back to father as Tsukiko and Yuna headed upstairs to the bedroom level. What else was said was lost in the distance to the mother and daughter.

"And your plan when not under the grilling of the examiner?" Yuna asked her daughter.

"No idea at this time, I don't know how much time I will have so it is more of a case of planning as I go," Tsukiko pointed out.

"Well, rest easy and sleep well, daughter of mine. Tomorrow promises to be a busy day."

"You as well," Tsukiko gave her mother another hug. "Congratulations."

Much as with Yuuki's late arrival to the family, Tsukiko knew this would be a happy occasion for the family. She did not know it would be one of the few such happy occasions in years to come.

-x-x-x-

(14 February, CE 476, 1435 Hours Local (Dendez West) Time)
(Sniper Bar and Grill, City of Westport, Dendez Continent, Planet Carver V, Protectorate of Mendel)

Saiga Rigos, 3rd son of the present patriarch of the Rigos family, figured he had to be seeing things. First, a couple days ago, he thought he had seen a teenager wearing the blue chevron of the Brelle Mafia, but the presence of a backpack and duffel bag probably meant that the vagrant wearing it had picked up a jacket at a secondhand store. No skin off his bozack, he figured. Some Mafiosi were strict about attire in their territory, but the Rigos didn't get their jollies off on harassing vagrants or wanderers.

He'd done some looking around the next day (13 February), but came up with bupkis trying to find the vagrant or anything about her. This morning, the manager of the apartment building had been hesitant to give up any information, but a rather persuasive pair of 20s had loosened his tongue to a name: Sionet Neider. A quick background check of her had listed her as born in rural Kileska on the north shore, with decent or better schooling scores and no criminal record. No ties to any of the Mafiosi families on Carver V for at least three generations. She had no present permanent address since her emancipation a few months ago, which explained why she was now wandering Westport. The fact that she also lived on Kileska until recently meant that she probably came across the windbreaker she was wearing through a thrift store, all the Mafiosi families that weren't strict about clothing choices tended to donate older but still usable articles.

So, with that mystery solved, after a lunch meet with his elder brother to discuss management choices for the new nightclub over by Apartment Row, the two had decided to go make the rounds in the Red Light District and collect their rent as was appropriate. Like a lot of Mafiosi families, they did shakedowns and 'protection' racket, but unlike some of the other families, the Rigos Family also did a lot of legitimate real estate business. One of those major investment properties was the Red Light District, and while officially frowned upon by the powers that govern, the patronage of sailors from the ports and aerodrome presented significant tax revenue and kept the disturbances down to a minimum in the rest of town.

"Decent weather today, brother, you want to do this run on foot?" Samuel Rigos asked his younger brother.

"Might as well, need to burn off some calories from lunch," Saiga said. Both turned to the south to head for the next block that went west, since the Red Light District sat in the area between the factory district and the commercial district, and abutted some of the Apartment Row area (which made it geographically advantageous for the prostitutes, since it was not far from the harbor).

"Did Old Man Wheezer ever get caught up?" Samuel asked.

"Yeah, he's paid up to this month," Saiga said, since he handled the investment property work for this sector of town he would know who was in arrears.

"Well, let's see what his excuse is this month." Samuel's comment drew a coarse laugh from Saiga.

Saiga caught sight of the vagrant he had researched — Sionet Neider — as she exited a sandwich diner two buildings in front of him and hefted her duffel bag to where she could get the shoulder strap over her head and settled. He wasn't too shocked by what he saw as the sandy-blonde-and-light-blue lady walked past him; he was pretty sure she looked him up and down as well as Samuel, but the complete lack of further interest from a teenage girl slightly miffed him a bit. Still, he had his rounds to make and he already had a side piece; worrying about a wanderer served him no purpose, so he continued about his business.

-x-

Sionet had given the two obvious Rigos Mafiosi a very cursory look-down, but since neither of them appeared to properly recognize her, she continued on her way toward the next four apartment buildings she had researched as possible crash pads.

Of course, while they did not recognize her immediately, there was another possibility that she had discounted and which ran her blood cold ex post facto.

"Hey, brother, didja see her?" Sionet heard from behind her. She continued walking, feigning oblivion to the conversation even though she could easily hear it.

"Yeah, I did, so?"

"I know her," Sionet took a moment to look in a window to her right, though what she was doing was looking in the reflection of the window at the two brothers of the Rigos family. The elder of the two was looking her way, the other one was looking at the elder brother.

"Dunno where from, brother. I looked her up, she's a vagrant from Kileska," the younger brother said. Sionet made sure to keep her walking pace even, if she bolted that would magnify the suspicion factor by an order of magnitude.

"You sure? I remember seeing her from somewhere, I think over on Kileska," the elder brother said. It was only then that Sionet realized that she had crossed paths with the elder brother, at a high-level meeting between the Brelle, Yuuko, and Rigos families. They had not been introduced, but Sionet had learned his name to be Samuel Rigos.

"Meh, I'm not worried about it, C'mon," the younger brother turned away and the elder brother followed suit quickly enough.

Sionet continued her even walk toward the north, making sure to only slightly increase her pace so as to not look suspicious on further glance, and continue the search northbound for the next of her afternoon's apartment hunting. A half block north, she sighed some relief and continued at her slightly-faster-than-normal pace. She figured if they could recognize her after the fact, they could recognize where they recognized her from, and then it was game on.

Two blocks north, Sionet did a window look deliberately, which also meant that she was physically positioned to use her peripheral vision to identify if she was being followed. It was less than surprising to her that they had decided to pursue her, though it was equally unwelcome to the runaway just the same. Still, they had probably hemmed and hawed about whether to pursue or not pursue, because their distance of pursuit was about a block and a half behind her, which gave her options.

With a shrug and a sigh, Sionet continued north to the corner of the next block and crossed at the intersection immediately. The timing of the light at the intersection worked in her favor, the stoplight trapped the pursuers in place for over a minute, which Sionet used to widen the gap to roughly two blocks her advantage. Another two blocks north and two blocks west put her on the edge of downtown, still being pursued but now at a distance of almost three blocks between them and herself.

With the gap now in her favor, Sionet took a turn down an alleyway in the middle of a block, and now that visual contact was broken, she cut loose — her personal favorite physical exercise was running around the primeval forests of rural Kileska, and running down an alley would be even simpler for her. No randomized terrain obstacles, just the odd dumpster.

One block north, two blocks north, and at the central alley intersection of the second block, she turned right again, now headed east toward downtown. Still at a run, Sionet went three blocks east at a good clip, then turned left again — North — for her next leg.

She only made it ten yards before a suddenly-opened door forced her to come to a skidding halt, though even that wasn't enough to prevent her from banging into the back door of Mackie's Club. "Whoa shit!" someone on the far side of the door half-stuttered as Sionet barely caught it before it slammed into the hapless worker.

"Gomenasai!" Sionet said hurriedly after she pulled the door open to where she could see the man she almost bowled over.

"You all right, kid?" The guy in the chef's apron asked. His military dog tag, Enhanced Imaging facial tattoos and control nodes on his hands (3) told Sionet that he used to be a pilot for Mendel, as most private pilots would not take the risk of EI Implants or the possible neurological damage that could result from catastrophic damage to their machine while using them. Military pilots for Battlemechs, Infantry Armor, and some other applications loved them — the utility in military operations outweighed the risks.

"Actually, no," Sionet said in a rush. "I'm being chased, can I hide in your place for a few?"

"Sure, kid, c'mon," the worker waved her into the door of the kitchen. "Sit down behind the island, I'll give you an all-clear when they go by. Who was chasing you?"

"Two guys wearing trenchcoats. Maybe mafiosi?" Sionet said after she sat down on the far side of the chef's island. She didn't miss the instant tense up from the busboy that was dropping a load of dishes in the sink, which told her she needed to be cautious around him if he was sketched out by mafiosi.

"I'll try to shake 'em, kid, if they come this way."

-x-

(10 minutes later)

Saiga had caught a lucky break on pursuing the Neider (Possible Brelle?) girl, in that she had left a footprint in some muck down an alley that seemed logical, a pair of hiking boots by their tread pattern, but that luck ran out two alleyways past it.

"Son of a bitch, she is fast!" Samuel cursed their inability to keep pace with her. "Oh well, we know her face and her identity, if we cross her again we'll know."

"Well, we tried," Saiga said before he was startled by someone opening a service door three meters from him. It was the owner of Mackie's Club, which he visited for the rather unique Pub Burger he served. The music selection wasn't all that impressive, the DJ he used was more of the techno type as opposed to the Nightclub Crooner vibe that the Rigos preferred, but there wasn't a perfect joint in town, Saiga reminded himself. "Hey, Mack, quick question?" Saiga prompted him.

"Hit me, kid,'' the old Mechwarrior said before he heaved a trashbag into the dumpster for his facility.

"Looking for a girl that may have run past here? You seen anyone running by?"

"Heard someone hauling ass at a dead sprint in that direction," and he pointed eastbound toward downtown. "Never got a look at the tango, though, couldn't tell you if it was a man, woman, Crocale, or an alien. Sorry."

Samuel barked a laugh at the explanation from the proprietor. "Thanks for the tip, mister!" he said, which was rather uncharacteristic for Mafiosi but Saiga figured a good dose of humor could loosen up even hardened mafiosi from time to time.

"Good luck," Mackie said before he closed the back door to his club. There was a small window over the dishwasher's sink, which is where Saiga saw Mackie go to next to start processing another load of dishes. The two Mafiosi shook it off and went in the offered direction, though when they emerged onto the surface street there was nobody in the area they could inquire about a running girl.

"Man, Hell with this," Saiga grumped.

"The way she runs, she could be halfway to Joton by now," Samuel continued the complaint.

"But man, running like that, just think about the legs in those pants. Hot damn," Saiga said.

"Well, if you do get a crack at her, good luck," Samuel said. "Let's grab a cab over to the Red Light District, I've had my fill of hoofing it," and the elder brother waved them over to a cab parked by a hot dog vendor with the cabbie sitting on the hood chowing down on a weiner.

They would never know they were both within five meters of their quarry.

-x-

"They just turned the corner down the east lane, kid. Two early-twenties in trenchcoats, just as you pegged them."

"Rigos Mafiosi," the busboy said with clear contempt to voice and demeanor. "Two points for hoodwinking them, girl."

"Thanks. I take it you're not a fan?" Sionet asked.

"They can go straight to hell, do not pass go, do not collect 200 c-bills. You?"

Sionet figured she'd play an angle on her present story as a way to ingratiate herself with the crew here. "I fled Kileska to get away from the Mafiosi there. Now I'm here on Dendez looking for somewhere to crash. You wouldn't happen to know anywhere I could rent a place?" She asked both the busboy and the proprietor.

"Actually, yeah," Mackie said. "I run an off-the-books work-housing program here, if you're not object to washing dishes or other tasks?"

Work-residence programs were not unheard of throughout the Empire, and Sionet had heard from some of the Mafiosi that off-the-books programs were not uncommon, either. And such a program ran by a former Mechwarrior would likely be on the up-and-up, she figured. "I'm willing to learn," Sionet said. "How much for how much?"

Mackie offered her a hand to help pull her to standing, which Sionet readily took. "Rent is 20 hours a week, anything beyond that is going wage. Fair enough?"

That was a helluva better deal than she figured she would get on apartment rent. "Perfectly fine with that," Sionet said. "Sionet Neider."

"Mackie Inargos. This gent is Kyle Trado," and the Proprietor pointed to the busboy.

"Welcome," the busboy said before he gave Sionet a shake as well.

"I'll introduce you to the rest of the crew at closing time. For now, Kyle can show you up to the girl's loft so you can offload your gear and get cleaned up. I'll ping my wife to come up and help you get situated."

"I heard," a voice said from the doorway headed into the back of the facility. The lady in question did not have the control nodes on the backs of her hands, but she did have at least a partial of the Enhanced Imaging Neural Interface tattoos beloved by Mendel mechwarriors. "Kristi. I try to keep this club floating, good and bad as it is. Welcome to the outfit."

"Thanks. Sionet Neider," she gave a short bow.

"Don't worry about it, kid. C'mon," and Kristi waved her toward the stairs up to the top floor. "Second floor is some storage and the boy's bunks, we try not to go in there too often. It smells like a locker room more often than not."

"Thanks for the forewarning," Sionet said. She knew the ambiance of a locker room well, the Brelle Mansion had a gym with adjacent locker room, and Sionet took the occasional turn on the weights and aerobics gear just the same as everyone else in the family.

"Third floor, left is Mack's and my room, right is the girl's bunks. Room for seven, but you'll be number five right now."

Sionet stepped in behind Kristi and sighed in relief. It wasn't too drab, but it wasn't a complete pink-and-frills washout, either. Something in between, she figured, and more in the way of hanging plants and greenery than any other form of decoration.

"Nice to not have to be on the go," Sionet said to the questioning look from Kristi.

"This place is definitely stable, I'll give you that. Unfortunately, this isn't a long-term career, though. After a while, you're going to want to move on. Everyone does." Kristi admitted. "We keep in touch with those who moved out, they're generally doing well."

"It's a start," Sionet said. "I've been wandering a while since I was emancipated, so anything is better than bouncing from crash pad to crash pad."

"Agreed. You'll take that bunk over in the corner. We just had the roof repaired, so it should not be leaking any more." Kristi followed Sionet over to the bunk in question, where she dropped her backpack and duffel bag, then took off her old windbreaker. "Huh. What kind of piece is that?"

"Oh, this? Browning Hi-Power," Sionet slipped her holster out of her belt and held it up. "This isn't going to be a problem?" she asked.

"Hell no, girl. Everyone in this club carries, and most of the staff carry a primary and a backup. And we have some hidden heavy arms, Mack will introduce you to those after a while."

"Wow, was not expecting that," Sionet said truthfully. Mendel's personal armaments rate (the percentage of population who possessed at least one firearm) was over 90 percent, and the concealed carry or open carry rate (legal throughout the Empire) was on the order of 65 percent. A club where the entire staff was well-armed was not impossible, but not expected, either.

"In case you didn't notice, this isn't the best part of town, and we do get the occasional bout of trouble here." Kristi said in a soured tone, which told Sionet enough about what to expect.

"Hrm, have to keep an ear out for that," Sionet judged.

"And this armoire will be yours," Kristi knocked on the door of the edifice in question; "so you can hang up your clothes. You do have some spares, right?"

"A couple sets, enough for about a week," Sionet admitted. "I've got some spare cash, so I can pick some stuff up — but I want to wait a bit to avoid that trenchcoat trash that just chased me."

"We'll hit the supermarket on the north side, they have a good selection and the Rigos avoid the place — turn their noses up at it, a place like GFS or Zabby's is below their salt, so we can go in and out with no hazard," Kristi said.

Sionet nodded with a slight smile — she knew the attitude that Kristi was describing, even the Brelle Family had a list of places they would not be caught in. And for her, freed of the fetters and the policies of the Family forevermore, the world was now wide open, even 'low-brow' stores such as gas station convenience stores, supermarkets, and common shops in 'the bad part of town'.

The runaway moved her right foot a bit to shift her weight, and her foot caught on something she wasn't expecting. A quick look down at the object gave her a bit of a surprise. "Floor safe?" she asked.

"Yeah, each bunk has one. We need to reset the combination for you so you can secure your valuables."

"Fire rated?" Sionet asked.

"Oh yes, and since it is the third floor, impact-rated as well." Kristi went into her bedroom and came back a moment later with two socket keys. "This key is yours, most everyone wears theirs on their bead chain with their codex." Sionet did just exactly that, she put her key on her codex chain. "And this is the reset key." Kristi opened up the safe, inserted the reset key into the back of the safe lid, and ratcheted it. "Now, while I have this locked open, please set your number combination. I'll not look," and she deliberately looked toward the armoire and away from what Sionet did.

Sionet set herself a number that was random but somewhat easy for her to remember — 63 36 84 48 — and went hands-off the dials. "Done," Sionet said.

"All right," Kristi released the reset key, which locked in the combination. "If you forget the number, Mack has a Master Key that can open it along with this reset key, but you'll know because it will zero the combination. Otherwise, nobody should be able to get in without your key and number — make sure you change your number when you're not getting into it."

"Yes ma'am," Sionet nodded her head. "While it's open," Sionet dug her 'clean' codex copy out of her bra band and dropped it in the safe.

"Pistol?"

"I keep that on me, or under my pillow," Sionet admitted before she closed it and dialed the numbers at random.

Kristi opened her mouth to say something, then closed it after a few seconds and thought about her next words carefully. "If you ever need to talk about it, I'm always available."

"Arigatou," Sionet said with a slight bow. "Not today, though. Someday, not today."

"Do what you have to. Bathroom is open for now, would be a good time to get cleaned up and get your stuff organized. Also, general recommendation, you may want to label your stuff with your name, whoever has laundry duty for the day may not recognize personal effects, doubly so for the guys and our underclothes, so there will be laundry collection confusion. And, if I don't miss my guess, you are very close in size and stature to Nike, the resident of the bed next to you, so that will add an extra layer of confusion."

Sionet nodded. "Got a sharpie handy? Might as well get started when I strip down."

"You're in luck," Kristi pulled a sharpie out of her hair bun and handed it to Sionet. "Keep it, you'll find plenty of use for it."

"Thank you," Sionet nodded and silently kept the hair bun idea in mind — she had not seen anyone store a common object in one before, but it made sense. Almost as much sense as the habit she picked up from her mom about storing things in her bra band or bra straps.

"When you're done, come on down and I'll introduce you to the kitchen staff and get you a quick meal."

Sionet nodded acceptance of that plan and turned to her duffel bag. With a quick zip, she had her toiletries kit, her next set of clothes (light gray cargo pants, black shirt, minimizer bra and panties, socks and tennis shoes), and most critically of all, her tablet. The quick sandwich she had was forcing a need to go to the bathroom, so she had some can time in the future and the tablet would be perfect for it.

Inside the bathroom and settled on the toilet, she unlocked the secret side of her tablet by way of fingerprint and 8-digit code, then immediately opened up the text chat utility.

Before she could even say anything, PALADIN had some noise to make: TRACKED YOUR RUN THROUGH DOWNTOWN WESTPORT AND SCRUBBED WHAT RECORDS I COULD. MAFIOSI PURSUERS IDENTIFIED AS SAMUEL AND SAIGA RIGOS. DID THEY IDENTIFY YOU?

POTENTIALLY, AT LEAST PARTIALLY, Sionet responded. THEY THINK THEY RECOGNIZED ME FROM A MEET YEARS AGO, I DID SEE SAMUEL AT A DISTANCE BUT WAS NOT INTRODUCED.

GOOD EVADE AND ESCAPE, NONETHELESS. INTENTIONS?

HAVE BEEN OFFERED A BUNK AT PRESENT LOCATION FOR 20 HOURS KITCHEN WORK PER WEEK. GEOLOCATE ME, PLEASE, I DO NOT KNOW MUCH ABOUT THIS PLACE YET EXCEPT THAT OWNER IS FORMER MILITARY.

An answer only took five seconds to come back. CONFIRMED, BOTH OWNER AND HIS WIFE ARE RESERVE MECHWARRIORS. MARRIED 8 YEARS, NO CHILDREN. YOUR LOCATION IS LISTED AS A CLUB AND PUB, NO MENTION OF A WORK-HOUSING PROGRAM AT THAT LOCATION?

OWNER SAID IT IS OFF THE BOOKS, WHICH I CAN LIVE WITH IF IT IS LEGIT. HE HAS A CREW HERE IN DECENT ACCOMMODATIONS.

AFF, A RECORDS SEARCH OF THE ADDRESS SHOWS MULTIPLE PERSONS WITH THIS FACILITY AS PERMANENT ADDRESS. THIS SHOULD HAVE THROWN UP A FLAG SOME TIME AGO, BUT I SHALL KEEP IT ON THE DOWN LOW UNLESS AN INQUIRY COMES UP THROUGH OTHER CHANNELS. NO OTHER MAJOR INFORMATION AVAILABLE ABOUT THE FACILITY AT THIS TIME. BE CAUTIOUS, BUT IF IT IS OTHERWISE ON THE LEVEL, YOU ARE WELL SITED AWAY FROM OTHER RIGOS ESTABLISHMENTS AND COMMON TRAVEL ROUTES.

Sionet breathed a sigh of relief on that note. PROXIMITY TO A SIM POD CLUSTER?

NEAREST CLUSTER IS 2.2 KILOMETERS DOWNTOWN, AND NOT AN OPTIMAL ONE AT THAT. RIGOS NIGHTCLUB ACROSS THE STREET, AND THE POD CLUSTER SEES HEAVY TRAFFIC DAILY. NEAREST OPTIMAL POD CLUSTER WOULD BE A FURTHER KILOMETER INLAND.

Sionet grunted at that revelation. 3.2 kilometers travel one-way to do sims? That was a haul, but not impossible. A bike would definitely help keep her fit just running back and forth for it. Still, she figured she'd take a week to settle in and get her personal affairs in order before she worked out the travel route to the pod center.

THANK YOU FOR THE ANALYSIS. GOING TO GO DARK FOR A LITTLE, WILL CHECK IN TOMORROW EVENING EARLIEST. WILL HAVE BETTER IDEA ON ENVIRONS AT THAT TIME. THANK YOU.

KEEP YOUR EYES UP AND YOUR ASS DOWN, PILOT CANDIDATE. IF IT FEELS WRONG, BAIL OUT. GOOD EVENING TO YOU NONETHELESS. PALADIN IS OUT.

Sionet set her tablet into standard mode (accessed with only a six-digit code, no fingerprint) and from there turned on some light music to finish her business on the toilet and take her shower with. She did take the time to mark her name on her clothes articles before she dropped them down the laundry chute and hopped in the shower. True to the recommendation from PALADIN, she did keep her eyes up and toward the door for any change there, as well as kept her Browning Hi-Power in easy reach of the shower just in case. Mafiosi paranoia was well ingrained into her, and even though this outfit looked legit, she was not yet ready to completely trust them.

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Author's Chapter Afterword:

Second full chapter, and the trajectory takes another strange turn.

When I was doing the dice for this story, I had generated Sionet first as the main character, and only afterwards from prepping the first six main characters did I start working out the shape of the crew she ran with. The results were, well, rather disparate to say the least, and you'll really see how disparate in the next couple chapters. Not going to spoil anything, but suffice it to say that when Sionet said she thinks she had found a decent crew, she would be proved correct beyond her wildest dreams. Except for one bad apple, but any crowd runs the risk of having a shithead.

The thing with the Rigos Mafiosi chasing her is a bit of an echo of her past, for obvious reasons, but because of the fallout with the Brelle, the Rigos are not going to tell Jacob Brelle that they may have stumbled across their wayward daughter. More to the point, the Rigos just know they saw someone that may or may not be her, they are as of right now not aware that she is considered missing / runaway. All that being equal, though, it will come back to haunt her at more than one level in coming chapters.

The other major point for this chapter is the evolving sabotage situation with Cordelia's prototype Mobile Interceptor. I won't go into details on this one yet, as the true depth of depravity of that story is a major arc point for her, but suffice it to say that this is a conspiracy that runs deep and dirty for multiple parties. It will echo loud and hard into the future for everyone involved, but as I am wont to learn repeatedly, the dice have no memory and no angle — it may bounce off rock bottom a few times, but the end result is always strange and rather unexpected.

And then there is a sleeper: Tsukiko and her love of Artificial Intelligence projects. I'm really not going to go into any kind of details on that one, but I can guarantee you that it will be a major plot point in this story. And then, even stranger still, that plot point that is a big deal in JW3 will become a huge hinge-point in JW4, like make-or-break-an-empire big hinge-point. Once you see it unfold in this story, you may scratch your head, but when I get into JW4, it will all make a creepy and very poignant sense.

The writing continues unabated! I had this chapter largely written around August of '22, when I was still pushing myself to write anything and working on rebuilding my writing gumption. Plenty has changed since these heady days, which is why when you read the coming chapters you will notice quite a shift toward some more personable and a bit perverse plotlines, culminating in the first of what threatens to be at least three good side stories for this series. Might take me a while to solidify the detail work for that first and most certainly NSFW side-story, but when it drops, a few disparate threads in the mainline JW3 will make more sense — and I can only hope that the side story gives you an appreciation for the tribulations of people with psionic and Newtype talents.

That's it for this second full chapter of JW3.

NEXT UP: Sionet has her first days at the Club, learns the value of Ibuprofen, and quickly ingrains herself into the crew as the crew accepts their newfound and rather unusual surprise resident. And, as she begins planning her first forays to a Pod Center for her attempt at making Gundam Pilot, a new and very unexpected path comes to light…

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Review Replies: As this chapter is part of my New Years '23 Document Dump, there will not be review replies here. I will reply to all reviews as appropriate by IM or in the Review Reply section for the next published full chapter after the New Years Dump.

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The Gripe Sheet:

No Gripes yet. If you have any gripes or corrections, go ahead and drop them in a review or IM and I will address as quickly as possible. Thanks to Takeshi Yamato for keeping my prose straight and throwing random piles of IDEAS at the wall to see what sticks. (And yes, some of his IDEAS have been added to the story, as well as become one of the major side-stories to come!)

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Footnotes:

(1): In honor of the original Top Gun, this is a retooling of a rather humorous threat from the Admiral in the early part of the movie for the slightly different cargo shipping process in Cosmic Era 471.

(2): KSAK is the code on Carver V for the landing pad on Kileska at the Sakato residence. The Kileska continent is sparsely populated and private landing strips are registered as valid landing locations with callsigns if they see enough traffic, and also for use as emergency landing locations if needed.

(3): Control Nodes are the circular devices sometimes seen on the backs of the hands of Clan pilots who use the Enhanced Imaging Neural Interface system (as seen in Battletech). Not all Magi and Mendel troops that use EI also make use of these control nodes, specifically for controlling the hands of their units with a much finer degree than the haptic waldo gloves used by pilots without EI implants.