Embers After Flames, Chapter 9.1

9.1

+++

“That voice...”

“I’m the one that Carla calls ‘the annoyance’, yes.” She had called me that to my face and I was oddly proud of the title. “I trust I don’t need any more an introduction that that?”

Walter made a noise, half a grunt and half a hum. “Carla has told me enough.” He says. “‘Drich’, isn’t it?”

“Correct.” I agreed. “Something to say?”

“... No matter how hard I try, I can’t think of anyone who fits the claims you’ve made.” He spoke. “It’s an extraordinary claim-”

“And that requires extraordinary evidence?” I finished the proverb, shifting the generated voice to echo the tone that Nagai had used to speak with. “I remember you well, boy. As much as you’ve grown, I won’t be forgetting that devilishly smart child, sitting at the third floor of the observatory window, watching the city run by underneath him. You were ahead of the curve, not even ten years old yet already going through the crises of someone in their thirties.”

“... Hmm.”

I laughed, allowing my voice to echo across the line. “Oh, don’t feel too bad. Carla’s been chewing on this for three years, and she still hasn’t figured it out. You’ve been busy with other things. Speaking of, shall we get to business?”

“You want to hire 621?” He switched tracks so seamlessly. Good. That kind of focus was what was expected from an Operator, and Walter did fit the bill.

“There are a series of events coming up, and I would prefer that 621 provide assistance for us rather than our enemies.” I explained. “I won’t force the matter, of course, but I am prepared to pay particularly well for several missions. You may not be here for purely mercenary reasons, but you’re also not the type to deny it, either.”

“You have vastly more resources available to you than most people on this planet do.” Walter pointed out. “Yet you’re still choosing to hire a mercenary?”

“Call it a hunch.” I tell him. “But I think your hound will do a better job than anybody realizes.”

“... Hmph. The jobs?”

“Arquebus and Balam have designs upon the RLF.” I explained. “They plan to assault our major positions in an attempt to steal our knowledge of the Coral. We originally had another plan for dealing with them in mind, but then your hound showed up.” And, really, wasn’t that saying enough on its own? “They have a four-part plan. I would hire your Hound for the purposes of thwarting each part.”

“You know that I have been advertising to the corporations, right?” He asked. “Taking four jobs against them will build a reputation.”

“You already have a reputation.” I pointed out. “And you’re far too intelligent to think that skillfully overcoming their own forces won’t be another ‘advertisement’ all of its own.”

“... Fine. Send the briefings over, and we’ll see if 621 feels up for taking them.”

Would that I could smile.... “Of course. Goodbye, Walter.”

+++

Walter handed the briefing over the next day, and I was eager to listen in when he did.

“Got a job for you, 621. A request that comes from an RLF affiliate by the name of ‘Drich’. Check the briefing.” He said the thing!

I heard my briefing play next. “Greetings, 621. You pulled a rather sneaky trick on us, taking the license that you did. Don’t worry, I’m not mad. As a matter of fact, I’ve got tasks for you. The megacorporations invading Rubicon have finally decided that they covet our knowledge more than they worry about their ability to acquire that knowledge. I would like you to introduce them the error of their ways, 621.” A brief pause, where all my neat little visuals were now showing up. “Arquebus is up first. They plan to attack the Outer Perimeter and disable our monitoring systems. It’s the first in a series of actions that they believe will leave our positions open to harm. Frankly, they’re wrong about the actual capabilities of our sensor network, but I want you to punish them nonetheless. You’re going in alone for this mission against V.VIII Schweitzer and a small army of MTs.”

Another brief pause. More images showing up, schematic data for Schweitzer and the MTs.

“The MTs are nothing special. Typical Arquebus engineering, focusing on high-output energy weapons. They’re only dangerous if you get caught, and they’ve got a real problem with heat. Either bait the shots and then destroy them while they’re cooling, or blow them up before they can shoot you. Schweitzer is about the same; he’s the lowest ranked surviving Vesper, and he’s so far down the list he doesn’t even rank in the top thirty. His job is mostly morale maintenance. You shouldn’t have any trouble with him.”

The images flicked away, replaced with a slightly modified form of the RLF’s logo.

“That is all for now. I look forward to see you in action, 621.”

Confirmation pulsed through the network, and I wish I could smile right now.

“It seems they know about your ID, now. So long as they’re still willing to hire you, it’s not much of a problem, I suppose.”

+++

621 arrived only a few hours afterwards, disembarking from the transport helicopter to make the last of the distance by AC.

621 landed on a raised outcropping, only a few kilometers away from the targets. No time was wasted, of course; the moment LOADER 4 went into Combat Mode and 621 was afforded full control, the AC was blasting forwards at a speed of holy fuck.

The MTs were first up on the list.

It was not a battle.

Once 621 was done with them, LOADER 4 simply moved right onwards, heading to the next group of MTs. Again, 621 was faced with no problems, nor were there any problems at the third, fourth, and fifth group. Number six at least brought a change of pace in that 621 was up against a pair of Heavy MTs that were worth a damn rather than a bunch of normal MTs, but this didn’t actually change the outcome of the matter, just the methods used to reach the outcome.

Where normal MTs had no capacity to resist the powerful shots of an AC-scale Assault Rifle, the Heavy MTs could handle quite a few shots. The laser blade, on the other hand... Less so, especially when it was aimed at joints and unarmoured parts of the machine.

But hey, they survived a whole four seconds, each!

With the chaff out the way, the final target showed up next, Schweitzer boosting into the area and immediately attacking 621.

He made the critical mistake, however, of getting close, trying to use raw aggression and close-range firepower against 621.

Against 621.

The battle was over almost as soon as it had begun, the laser blade flaring at exactly the right moment and taking the head of Schweitzer’s AC clean off.

The only thing the poor guy managed to say was a single, very confused “What?”, right before the fuel cell cooked off and the pilot’s cradle rang like a bell full of shrapnel.

621 probably spent more time travelling to the enemy than in actual combat, to be honest, but the mission was over and done with regardless.

Once 621 had safely returned to the transport helicopter and sent the confirmation through, I sent another message in turn.

“For the past five years, the megacorporations have been fighting each other over scraps. It was inevitable that they would turn their attention to us, but it’s unfortunate that they couldn’t weaken themselves even more before they did. Thanks for the assistance, 621. Hopefully, you’ll decide to keep working with us for a bit.”

The next job I had for him came only a few days later. Arquebus’ failure to disable any of the Outer Perimeter’s sensors had made them delay things for a bit while they checked the plan and made some adjustments, but the bean counters ultimately decided to continue forwards regardless, since obviously there was no way that the RLF would be able to directly oppose both megacorporations at the same time, right?

Hah.

“Greetings, 621. I’ve got the next part of this sequence for you. The Megacorporations are still under the mistaken impression that they have enough force to get what they want, and just like last time, I want you to disabuse them of this notion.” The pretty little visuals showed up again, this time showing the form of the RLF’s wandering fortress. “This is the Strider, a mining strip that the RLF recovered and militarized a long time ago. These days, it’s a moving fortress, protecting a wide area through its sheer threat. Balam wants to blow it up, and I would like you to join the team that’s going to make sure their efforts don’t come to fruition.”

The Strider’s schematics vanished, replaced by two groups of dossiers, one on the left side of the screen, outlined in blue, and one on the middle and right portions of the screen, outlined in red. “The RLF AC Pilots Messem and Sahad will be joining you on the battlefield, with the Strider providing additional long-ranged firepower support. Balam is sending G8 Mono and G10 Kasai as AC Pilots, as well as an army of MTs of various different classes. Most of them aren’t any more dangerous than BAWS’ typical designs, but Balam focuses much more on physical weapons rather than energy, so keep in mind that the pressure is going to be constant rather than restrained by heat concerns, even if the actual power of these weapons is a little lower for each individual shot. Aside from the MTs, there’s also some specialist equipment; large scale weapons intended to break open the Strider.”

Just like last time, the images flicked away, and the RLF’s logo came up prominently.

“That’s all. It’s a bit of an escalation in the amount of forces you’ll be fighting, but you’ll also have allies this time around. Of course, that’s no reason to slack off; you’re getting paid more for every machine you destroy, so consider that encouragement to do your best. Good luck out there, 621.”

The briefing ended.

“Hmph. Their rates are generous, 621. Make sure you lighten their wallet as much as you can.”

Heh. Silly little Walter.

+++

621 arrived just in time, barely a minute before the battle as a whole commenced. Messem and Sahad were there to greet them, both pilots already waiting.

The battle started a fair distance away from the Strider, and I’ll give Balam one thing; they were actually reasonably prepared to take it on.

The MTs were, ultimately, just a screening force for the larger machines carrying high-grade weaponry for taking down the Strider at a distance. It was mostly heavy missiles and mass drivers, but there was also a long-ranged Pulse projector.

Mono and Kasai were there to handle any threats that the MTs couldn’t. To be fair, they’d do perfectly well against Messem and Sahad.

621 killed Kasai in the first ten seconds of engaging with the pair, and then promptly left Mono to Messem and Kasai in order to hit the strategic weaponry.

The Pulse projector was destroyed first; the screening MTs simply not capable of meaningfully blocking 621’s ability to access it at all. A decent chunk of them perished when 621 blew up the gun but left the generator intact, which meant nowhere for all the Pulse energy to go. Once the capacitors overloaded, it was like a superscale version of Assault Armour going off.

By the time Messem and Sahad had killed Mono, more than half of the strategic weapons were offline. Between the three of them, the rest didn’t last very long.

621 only switched efforts away from destroying the strategic weapons when the only ones left were the missiles. Given that the missiles had a rather long launch time, that wasn’t too surprising. They were dangerous, yes, but until they were ready to fire, they were less of an immediate threat than the MTs.

Balam’s forces only began to retreat when it was obvious that there was nothing they could do to stop the three ACs. I’ll give them that, they’re very determined. Still, simple determination alone couldn’t bridge the gap in skill and power, and what managed to get away was little more than a few squads out of the entire army.

A devastating loss for Balam, but it was still only the second mission.

There was still more to come.