Chapter 11:
New Kyoto, 13 January 3005, Nine Lives, Catbox, L1 Pirate Point.
Major Kira "Firebird" Nox
"Alright, folks, button it up and prepare for a tough fight. We have moved to Foxtrot Tango Whiskey Protocols, and that means expect the enemy to be able to reach out and touch you at similar ranges. First thing I want from everyone is to shut down their ASF. Remove that fighter screen, and we can leisurely take the droppers apart." I call over the comms as my bird is rearmed and refuelled as we wait for the LF battery to recharge for our second jump.
"We are moving for a slingshot intercept followed by a high G burn for a least time intercept. Call out to your squadron leads if you are struggling. You all know the Colonel's stance on trying to tough it out and then dying because you're exhausted. We work this based on the slowest flight," I continue, and notice several jeers and ribbings go out over the subchannels for each squadron and flight.
"Get some water and eat some rations on the quick in your cockpits, we have ten minutes before we are in the black for another six long boring hours. I don't want to hear you all complaining while we fly; there will be more than enough excitement on the other end." I finish as I tear into a ration pack that was stashed away just for this.
The Colonel had really splurged; our birds all had the types of rations that had you questioning if MREs had ever truly existed. At least until you checked the emergency kits. For these long-distance flights, we had ration packs that were almost as if someone had frozen a premade luxury health meal, calorie-dense and perfectly balanced. With a taste that was almost as good as the officers' mess.
Biting into the rice and beef ragu that was in my pouch, I had to give it to the Colonel. Flying was not so bad when you had good food to ensure you didn't go hungry. I was done two minutes before the jump alarm sounded, and so I started running a preflight. May as well have that squared away ahead of time.
New Kyoto, 13 January 3005, Nine Lives, Catbox, L1 Pirate Point.
Major James "007" Bond
I was very, very unhappy. One of the lead birds had managed to ping both Nuclear and Chemical weapons aboard their intended Jumpship. That was going to be a problem, and as the comms panel lit up with more reports, I could only sigh. "Send the word, the Colonel needs to know," I say as I stare at the approaching docking collar of the Leviathan-class Jumpship.
"Sir!" replies the comms officer before informing the Colonel. Her response does not take long. Soon, an all-spectrum open channel broadcast goes out, "To everyone hearing my voice, this is Colonel Samantha Wylde of the Black Cats PMC, at 13:42 local time, as my marines approached the jumpships, NBC weapons were detected. I repeat, NBC weapons have been located aboard the Jumpships belonging to the pirates, and I must assume the same is true of the approaching dropships. As such, I am authorising the complete destruction of these vessels with extreme prejudice." She said, causing gasps to ring out. One did not destroy Jumpships, ever; they were too expensive, and important to the continued well-being of human space and economy for that to be allowed.
"Should the pirates aboard these vessels surrender without a fight, then I shall ensure they are allowed a full trial in accordance with the Ares Conventions; however, should even a single pirate vessel activate the onboard NBC weapons, these terms are forfeit. You have five minutes to comply." She continued, leaving a way out for the pirates as well as a chance to recover the ships.
I lean back in my acceleration seat and stare at the ceiling for a moment, knowing that it won't be the end of it. I already know what is coming, already have all my troops prepared. I am proven right a moment later as the Colonel's voice comes through the command channel directly to me.
Vanta Black protocol. Such a strange phrasing, until one realises that when it goes into effect, there may as well no longer be light among the black of space, just the deep unrelenting void of a black hole. Sitting forward in my chair, I give the order, and across all the shuttles, acknowledgements flow in, before they all go dark.
They do not just stop responding; their section of space is now a void of signals. All you can tell is that in that general area, something is eating all signals, electromagnetic, radar, sonar, LIDAR; it doesn't matter the sensor, all it shows is a rapidly growing sphere of nothingness. These were bits of tech that the Colonel had personally made for exactly this situation. A signal disruptor that would disrupt an area of space 5 clicks in diameter. Nothing in, nothing out, and it doesn't matter if you are in another vessel with shielding; it all gets eaten. Hell's even power gets slightly disrupted unless you have the exact shielding needed to prevent it.
The Colonel had spent two months on the first shuttle, teaching the techs exactly how everything had to be done and how to maintain it. Before handing over finished units for installation that she had made. Not found, made. Tech that makes the Star League look like they were still fumbling in the dark was made during the course of her regular day of training, paperwork and admin.
Now they would be putting that capability on display, in an effort to ensure that her people would live. I had to chuckle; not a single other power or leader in the IS or Periphery would give up the knowledge that this sort of technological advantage existed so easily or for what they considered so little. Yet here she is doing it for the Marines I lead.
I shake my head as the bubble of nothingness around us envelopes the Leviathan. My platoon and I are ready for action immediately, stacked up and waiting. Ready for the double cross, ready for ComStars agents aboard to try and kill us all with some form of contingency. I have everyone check seals and ensure that they have what is needed. When I get back a green status from them all, we make the breach.
It is a good day to be a Marine when you get to put boots on an enemy vessel and you get to put the hurt on. I have to smile as the teams break off as needed and move to secure their objectives, external speakers blaring the entire time for people to get down and surrender.
New Kyoto, 13 January 3005, Black Cat PMC Main Base.
The Colonel, Samantha "Titania" Wylde
I watched the tactical plots as my ASF and dropships moved onto intercept. There were two minutes on the ASF and five on the droppers. Just two minutes before the first shots were fired in anger that I can see the results of.
The Marine and boarding contingents out at the Jumpships were still under Vanta Black Protocols, meaning that I would not hear back from them until they were safe and they had complete and unrestricted control of the vessels, which would only happen once they had taken stock of every single person, machine and square inch of them.
I had not left the CIC since the raid had started, and we were about to hit the five-hour mark, just two left before the Dropships made planetfall. Looking over the sensor readouts and the feeds from our intercept force, these pirates had far more cover than I was comfortable with.
"Sensors, are my readouts correct? Enemy force composition is currently 58 ASF, as well as their Dropships?" I ask as the tactical display slowly zooms in on the coming area of conflict. I notice that the Pirate ASF have pulled well ahead of the dropships, leaving a good fifteen to twenty minutes between them which confuses me for a minute, until I notice that my ASF pilots have been flying in a phalanx formation, meaning that unless the Pirates adjust either way on the z-axis, they are only seeing half our number, while the Lee is hanging back behind my Titan carrier, making it look like their is only it flying in for the attack.
I would smile as I saw the plan that Major Nox had; she was baiting them in, making them think that there was only one carrier here and that the other was swinging around the other way and would be late. And they bought it. The light element of the pirates is slowly pulling ahead; the Sabres outnumber my own birds on their radar, but in actuality, they are about to fly into the teeth of a numerically comparable force.
I watched as the pirates reached extreme range, crossing the bracket and then having half of them vanish from the plot. They were just reacting as the next salvo from my pilots came in. They had waited until they were right about to move into the long-range bracket before laying into them. Multiple hits from ERPPCs and Gauss Rifles tore the entire group of Sabres from the black.
Twenty vanishing in explosions, while the remaining dozen all were mission killed for one reason or another. The Zero's and Rogues coming in behind were then met by numerical advantage on our side, with better range, targeting, and skilled pilots. The results were almost entirely poredictable.
I would have bet money that we would loose more birds but in the end, we had only lost three Stingrays, one Stuka, and a Rapier to the enemy ASF. A half dozen had managed to break through the furball and had swung wide around the dropships, making for the planet but I was not worried; the Daimyos' new ASF contingent outnumbered them three to one, and had decent birds to boot with the support of the Titan.
I continued watching, quieting my crew in the CIC even as they celebrated the absolute spanking we had handed the pirates in the opening salvo. This was the result of the seven P's, and now my boys and girls could see why I constantly pushed them, why I laid into slackers and drove them all to drink with my training bouts against them.
Here was the proof that they had become a force to be reckoned with. Pirates these individuals may be, but they had been in combat up and down the Lyrian Combine border for the last four years. And we had so thoroughly trounced them that it was almost as if they had flown into our guns.
By the time I had everyone back on task, the ASFs had made it into range of the pirate dropships and were standing off to plink at them with their far superior weapons, just picking at the droppers until they had to heave to and surrender, or in the case of the two Union CVs at the front, went up to golden BBs that punched through armour just right.
By the time my droppers had made contact and started joining in, there were only four pirate droppers still on course for the planet, and they seemed to have decided to redline their engines to break away. They managed, if barely, to break contact and make a direct beeline, least timing it, straight to the ground.
Unfortunately for them, they came down near my main base. Even more so, when they touched down, the whole CIC fell silent. Everyone just stared at their touchdown location, eyes flitting between the tactical map and each other, before one of them burst into a giggling fit, followed soon after by most of the rest of the command. I could only shake my head at the poor MFs and the luck they had today. No one deserved what was about to happen. Then again, I heard we were scheduled for some heavy iron rain today.
New Kyoto, 13 January 3005, Pirate Overlord
'Black' Jack McGirk, Pirate King.
This was not supposed to happen. The whole op had gone to shit, and now he was on world, and his entire crew now knew that they had been travelling with WMDs. WMDs that they did not control, and that were potentially going to go off without their knowledge.
I had managed to talk folks round, get them to understand that I was unaware of this as well and that the techies were to blame; they had not found them. That had resulted in a few of the slave techs receiving brutal beatings and, in one case, dying. But for now, they were on planet and had a job.
The crew was all mounted up and waiting for the doors to drop. We had been strapped in and looking at potentially having to hotdrop with the booster packs that our 'generous' sponsors had provided. Thankfully, we had made it down safely, and now we could put this sweet, sweet metal to work. Didn't matter what the so-called PMC had on hand, my crew was better than them and now was the time to show them they just got lucky in the black.
The doors dropped, and the first off was the recon lance of two mongoose and two sentinels. They had just cleared the bottom of the ramp, matched by a scout lance of combat vehicles and the first of the infantry guys, when suddenly there was a massive rolling explosion that enveloped all of them. Throwing the balance of the boys and me off. Some actually fell over, others managed to stay upright. Of the disembarked lances, nothing remained except multiple craters.
I was just about to start asking what in the ever-loving fuck was going on when an all channels broadcast cut through on my comms, "I have to say, I figured you lot were here for some specific people, and you definitely got the shortened up in the black. But heaven and Hell must hate you to have made you set down in the middle of my artillery's live fire range." The voice sounded bored, almost like this was just a casual performance review or something.
"Now you are currently under enough guns that I can and will drop five tons of steel rain on your head every five seconds until there is nothing left of you but scrap metal and glass craters. Power down and surrender, and you will receive a fair trial and should explanations be available, lenient sentences. You have fifteen seconds, or my guns start shelling directly through your bay doors." The voice finished, and the statement was punctuated with another round of shells landing just far enough from the ships and bay doors to prevent exit and prove the point.
I could only look around as my crew started raving at one another on the comms before a single voice spoke up and told them all that I was the one to push for this job, and I was also the one hesitating. Suddenly, there was a large number of weapons trained on me, and my next words might very well determine if I lived or died.
New Kyoto, 13 January 3005, Black Cat PMC Main Base.
The Colonel, Samantha "Titania" Wylde
I had to shake my head at the landing site the pirates had chosen. Yes, being within twenty clicks of my base was good for them as it was close enough to raid easily. It was also one of the few locations flat enough and without too many obstructions that would allow them to touch down anywhere nearby.
Honestly, my artillery crews had seen them land on the plots, and their grins had been so evil that I was sure I was not going to be getting any salvage out of the droppers that had touched down. Thankfully, all they had done was drop shells on the first things to step out of the droppers and then keep the shelling going on the area to put the pressure on the pirates, slowly inching closer to the doors.
It was just as I was about to give the order to start putting shells and missiles into the bays that the surrender came, along with the dropships powering down and essentially striking colours. Things moved quickly from there, and soon my infantry contingent and supporting mechs and Combat Vehicles were en route to take possession of the metal and put the pirates in cuffs.
I was not relaxing just yet and was coordinating the cleanup and capture in the black, ensuring that we had everything taken care of and that we had the ships locked down. My troops were all rocking NBC gear, self-contained air, and scanners for finding even the best shielded fission or fusion devices. I was taking no chances, and my men and women were the same.
All the pirates were going to be quarantined and decontaminated before being allowed anywhere else on the planet, and we had to run SR for our lost pilots and birds in the black. Same for the pirate pilots and the surviving birds. Katrina and her two boys were still here with me in the CIC, staring wide-eyed at the results of the raid, probably wondering which deities I was giving favours to under the table, because this was as close to a bloodless perfect win as had probably ever been done in the history of humanity, when this much metal was involved.
It took a further six hours to get everything in line and sorted out, including getting all of the pirate dropships crewed by my own guys and gals and the pirate crews and slaves taken off by shuttle to the quarantine zone we had set up. By now, we were into the early hours of the morning of the 14th, and I was ready to call it a night, when the base alarm sounded and gunshots rang out.
The adrenaline dump was immediate and the barked orders were just another time where situation and old habits briefly overrode the curses that left me looking like an unfeeling robot, "Sit rep now!" my barked order had the entire room switching to base defence and bringing up sensors and cameras.
Several screens around the room immediately showed and ongoing firefight, just inside the perimeter and near to the fuel bunkers. Thankfully I had redesigned those myself and as such you would have to have bunkerbusting munitions to set of a chain reaction from them. But it had not stopped somebody from trying, and from the fact that all that could be seen originally was muzzle flashes, before heavily armoured troops faded into view, I knew exactly who was here, and what they were equipped with.
"Base Alert, Tango, Sierra, Papa, Alpha, all units are to immediately switch to heavy weapons and apply heavy marking thermal smoke to all access corridors." My order was met with the perimeter suddenly exploding with sensor bloating, smoke, that seemed to coat and highlight a platoon's worth of previously invisible contacts that had been pushing in from where the firefight was.
"Captain, you have command. I have some hunting to do, and I don't plan to be slowed down. Guide me to them, but otherwise, ensure the rest of our people stay alive and lock them down." I say as I head for the CIC's door.
Even as I am walking, I am dropping my duster and checking my gear. I had been in my full battlerattle this entire time, and it looked like now was the time to put it to work. My cooling suit was modified, a fusion between the SLDF cooling suit and the Hei Gui stealth suit that I had been given by the gacha. Pulling the hood from the collar, I pulled it up over my hair and settled it into place before activating the suit and shimmering out of existence.
The Toaster fuckers were not the only people who could play with invisible enemies, and this particular suit was far more advanced than theirs. I moved at a run, drawing the Maloriuan overture that the Gacha had gifted me. Flicking open the cylinder, I dumped the standard rounds that I normally ran before jamming in the old school, brass-cased, custom rounds that matched with the ETE upgrade I had made to the revolver. This was now the equivalent of a tech weapon from the 2077 games. And with the copper-jacketed tungsten penetrators, I was more than set to start punching holes in a group of Blakist zealot assholes who had decided to attack my people.
It did not take me long to make it to where my people said the now-moving group were. They had yet to realise that the smoke they had walked through had made them trackable by certain sensors, as well as painting them in certain UV bands for detection. Now, looking through my suit's HUD, they were spotlights in the dark.
I moved silently, drawing my vibroknife with my other hand, getting as close as I could without alerting them. Apparently, when a gacha ability says it could stalk an owl through a forest in high vis, it was not lying, as I managed to get within two meters of the rear-most PA trooper before I made my move.
I went from a stalking, silent walk to a very silent sprint, closing the distance between me and the last of the Blakists in line, and then proceeded to ram the vibro knife straight between the seam of the neck, severing the spine and pushing it out through the windpipe. This would have been loud by itself, but was followed by me putting two rounds into the head of the next Tornado in line, before grabbing the Laser rifle my first foe had been using and mag dumping into the rest of them, causing them to scatter in their panic.
One of them had tried to turn and attack me but my enhanced strength meant that one handing the SAW laser weapon and still having my revolver out I could put two into him as well before fading back into the darkness. That did not stop the remaining six from opening up a crossfire over where I had just been. Though they still all missed. As I had dropped and rolled into cover.
They eventually stopped firing, and I could see them checking on the downed individuals. I was meanwhile reloading, putting four more rounds into my revolver and drawing my second vibro knife, the first having fused into the neck of the first individual's suit from heat. As I saw the group prepare to continue moving, with two individuals moving to place scuttling devices, I popped back out of cover, this time with clear shots on four of the fuckers.
My first round managed to find the power pack for one of the agents facing out and on overwatch, causing a cascade failure that had him briefly screaming in agony as the electrical charge of his suit dumped into not only the myomers, but also his own muscles, before it cut of with a sickening crunch, as limbs snapped and his heart and lungs apparently spasmed to hard.
The second round found another neck, punching through the relatively lighter armour and tearing the agent's throat and neck apart. They went down gurgling, and the rest were already turning towards me. My next two shots took the first of the individuals, placing scuttling charges blowing through his visor and painting the one behind him in brain matter and blood.
Before they could react, they were treated to the same, leaving me with two opponents and just my knife and an empty revolver. Now that would have been a problem if I did not have speed loaders and also a very useful piece of cover that I could make it to and let my cloak come back up.
I dove, rolled around another corner, pulling my last reload for this particular type of round from my bandolier and slamming it home as the old casings dropped from the cylinder. My cover was getting shredded by automatic fire, and it was looking like I may have to take a few rounds if I wanted to finish this when the night was suddenly lit up by the flashes of a mech-scale laser and the sound of a VTOL gunship.
The two Power armour troopers immediately turned to run for cover themselves giving me a chance to lean out and kneecap them both, before making a sprint to the downed agents. I knew that they might have already bitten their suicide pills, but I wanted to see if I could potentially get to them before they finished. I also hit the signal scrambler on my belt after signalling to the gunship to hold station and let me secure the prisoners.
Unfortunately, I did not make it in time to take them alive. I did, however, get my scrambler up in time to prevent the armour from being remotely scuttled. Base security has also managed to grab several teams of normally equipped, read not in power armour, troopers and agents that had been preparing to assault the base. All but two of whom had also managed to take suicide pills. So I figured that I might just be able to secure some information from them.
With the excitement of the night and the prior day finally calming down, I had the base remain on ready 2 and to ensure that patrols now ran with counter stealth in effect, before heading back to my room and crashing out for several hours. I knew that I would have to debrief with the Damyio and the liaison later but for now I needed sleep.