The first "normal" contract after you'd been hunted always felt like a trick.
The escrow cleared too quickly. The employer's paperwork looked too clean. The nav route was too reasonable. The pay was just high enough to make you wonder what wasn't being said.
Dack Jarn didn't trust any of it.
But he took it anyway, because mercenary work didn't wait for you to heal, and because money was how you kept the Dire Wolf fed—reactor maintenance, myomer bundles, replacement armor plates, coolant, parts that only existed if you knew the right people. And because running forever made you predictable.
He wanted to be working again.
Working meant choice.
Choice meant control.
The convoy rendezvous point was a dull speck of industrial light near an asteroid belt—a minor trade lane where civilian traffic still dared to move if it had escorts and luck. Three haulers floated in a staggered line, their hulls marked with municipal seals and hazard striping: water tanks, medical modules, reactor components packed in shock crates.
No glamour.
Just survival.
A small corvette-class gunship idled nearby, its weapons outward and its engines twitchy, like a dog that wanted to look brave while remembering it had been kicked before. Dack's dropship slid into formation without hailing until the last possible second—habit now.
When he finally opened a channel, a tired voice answered.
"Unidentified DropShip, this is Escort Command. State your ID."
Dack typed in the new transponder set ComStar had given him—fresh callsign, fresh hash, clean enough to pass casual scrutiny.
A beat.
"Confirmed," the voice replied. Relief bled into the syllables. "You're the heavy asset."
Dack didn't like being called an asset. It made him feel like the case again. "Name the route," he said.
"Cinder Corridor," the escort commander answered. "Two hours transit. Pirates have been hitting this lane hard."
Dack's eyes narrowed. "What kind of pirates?"
A pause. "Light 'Mechs. Mostly. Aerospace harassment sometimes."
"Sometimes," Dack repeated. He hated that word. It meant *you'll find out when it's too late.*
He cut the channel. He didn't argue.
Arguing didn't stop bullets.
Behind him in the dropship cockpit, Talia sat strapped in, watching the convoy on the forward screen. Her bruises looked darker in the cold shiplight. Her hair was still rough-cut, floating slightly when the ship's inertial dampers shifted. She looked like someone who'd been turned into a package and then forgotten on a shelf.
Except her eye wasn't forgotten.
Her one good eye tracked the escort ships like she was counting angles and imagining where the first shot would come from.
"You're quiet," Dack said.
"I'm thinking," Talia replied.
Dack glanced at her. "About what?"
Talia's mouth tightened. "About how civilian ships die."
Dack didn't correct her.
He stood and walked back toward the bay where the Dire Wolf waited. The Daishi sat in its cradle like a black mountain chained to the deck—broad shoulders, missile racks silent, armor patched and scarred. It was too big for civilian work. It looked like an executioner hired to escort ambulances.
Dack preferred it that way.
He climbed up into the cockpit and sank into the harness with a familiar click of restraints, neural link biting into the base of his skull. The world sharpened. Heat sinks whispered. Reactor hum rose like a second heartbeat.
He powered to standby, then opened an internal comm.
"Talia."
"Yeah?"
"I'm going to run drills," he said. "If you want to learn the basics, now is the safest time."
Silence.
Then Talia's voice, too controlled: "I'm not a MechWarrior."
Dack paused. "You could be."
A small, bitter laugh. "No. I can't."
Dack didn't push. He didn't say *try anyway* yet. He knew that tone. It wasn't modesty. It was a wound.
So he changed the question.
"What are you, then?" he asked quietly.
Talia's breathing hitched. For a moment he thought she wouldn't answer.
Then she spoke in a flat voice that sounded like something memorized.
"Bondsman. Handler. Translator. Protocol." She swallowed. "A piece of equipment that can read the right words and press the right keys."
Dack's jaw tightened. "You opened that vault."
"Because they built it for people like me," Talia said, sharper now. "Not for warriors. Warriors break things. People like me… make sure the right things *move*."
Dack didn't like hearing her call herself equipment. He didn't know what to do with that kind of self-hate.
He tried the one thing he understood.
Honesty.
"You're useful," he said.
Talia's voice went cold. "That's the nicest thing anyone ever says to a bondsman."
Dack closed his eyes briefly in the cockpit. He could feel the Dire Wolf's systems like a living animal around him, patient and lethal. It was hard to remember what it felt like to be powerless when you sat inside a monster.
He opened his eyes.
"Do you want to learn?" he asked.
A long pause.
Then, quietly: "Yes."
Her voice tightened as if she hated the word.
Dack nodded to himself. "Then we start small."
---
The dropship had a compact simulator pod—old, battered, the kind used by merc crews to keep reflexes sharp during long transits. It wasn't a full 'Mech cockpit. It was a stripped-down neural interface chair with projection screens and feedback bands. Enough to teach fundamentals.
Enough to remind you what you weren't.
When Dack climbed out of the Dire Wolf and guided Talia into the sim bay, she moved like someone walking into a courtroom. Her shoulders were stiff. Her hands were tight fists at her sides.
She sat in the chair without being told.
Dack noticed that.
He strapped the feedback bands around her arms and torso, clipped the neuro-pad behind her head. The system hummed to life.
Talia's one good eye flicked to him. "Don't make it easy."
Dack hesitated. "We're starting with movement."
"I said don't make it easy," she repeated.
Dack nodded once. "Fine."
He loaded a basic training scenario: medium OmniMech chassis, simplified weapons, open terrain, no enemy fire. Just walking, turning, heat awareness.
He activated the sim.
Talia's body jerked slightly as the neural feedback connected.
For a second, she looked almost peaceful—like she'd been waiting for this feeling.
Then the simulated 'Mech moved.
And Talia flinched like she'd been punched.
Her hands spasmed on the control grips. The 'Mech in the sim lurched forward, then sideways, then almost tripped.
Talia's face tightened. "It's—" she swallowed, fighting her own nerves. "It's heavier than I thought."
"It's supposed to be," Dack said. "Don't fight it. Guide it."
Talia tried.
The 'Mech stumbled again.
Her breathing went fast.
The sim chair vibrated as the system translated her strain into feedback. It wasn't pain yet, but it was discomfort—the neuro-link punishing her for bad posture, bad timing, wrong tension.
Talia's lips pulled back. "Stop shaking."
Dack frowned. "I'm not doing anything."
Talia's eye flashed. "Not you. Me."
The simulated horizon tilted. The 'Mech drifted, then corrected too late.
Talia's stomach lurched visibly.
She gagged once.
Dack's hand hovered over the emergency stop. "Cut it?"
"No," Talia snapped. "Don't—"
The 'Mech in the sim took another step and her body betrayed her: her shoulders locked, her hands jerked, and the simulated machine slammed its foot down wrong, twisting an ankle actuator.
The sim flashed a warning.
**ACTUATOR STRAIN. PILOT INPUT ERROR.**
Talia's face went white.
She tore the neuro-pad off her head with a sharp motion and ripped one strap free. She didn't unbuckle gracefully. She *escaped* the chair like it was trying to eat her.
Dack caught her before she fell.
She shoved him away immediately, not wanting help.
"Don't touch me," she hissed, voice shaking.
Dack stepped back, hands open. "Okay."
Talia stood there breathing hard, eyes wet with rage she didn't want to show.
"It hurts," she said, almost accusing. "The link. It hurts. It feels like—" She swallowed. "Like my body is wrong."
Dack held still, letting her say it.
Talia's voice cracked slightly. "Warriors don't… flinch like that. They don't get sick. They don't freeze."
Dack's chest tightened. He could picture Clan training pits, harsh instructors, people laughing at a bondsman daring to sit in a cockpit. He could picture her failing in front of them.
And he could picture the bitterness that would grow from that failure like a thorn.
"You're not a warrior," Dack said quietly, and saw her jaw tighten as if he'd stabbed her.
Then he continued, carefully: "Yet."
Talia's eye narrowed. "You think it's that easy?"
"No," Dack said. "I think it's hard. That's why we do it slow. And we do it private."
Talia stared at him, hatred and hope tangled together.
Then she laughed once—sharp and ugly. "Private. Like I'm shame."
Dack didn't deny it. "You're not shame. But your enemies would use your failure against you. And you would use it against yourself."
Talia went still.
Dack added, softer: "I'm not going to let you do that."
Talia looked away, swallowing hard. "You don't even trust me."
"I trust you to be angry," Dack said. "Anger keeps you alive. Just don't let it drive."
Talia's mouth tightened.
Then she nodded once, reluctant.
"Fine," she said. "Slow."
Dack exhaled. "Good."
The ship's proximity alarm chirped.
Not loud—just enough to prick the edge of his awareness.
He snapped his head up.
Another chirp.
Then the escort channel came alive, strained.
"Contacts—multiple—off our port vector—"
Dack didn't waste time.
He ran.
---
He was back in the Dire Wolf's cockpit in seconds, neural link connecting, systems rising from standby to active like a beast waking with teeth already bared.
External cameras showed the convoy formation tightening instinctively—haulers drawing closer, the corvette sliding outward to present its guns.
And then the pirates appeared.
Three 'Mechs—light and medium—emerged from behind an asteroid cluster like insects crawling out from under a rock. Their paint was mismatched, armor plates scavenged, silhouettes ugly but familiar: a fast scout, a jump-capable skirmisher, and a medium gun platform with too much autocannon for its frame.
Above them, two aerospace fighters swooped in low, skimming the convoy's plane and dumping flares to confuse sensors.
The escort commander's voice was tight. "They're going for the haulers—"
"Of course they are," Dack muttered.
He didn't chase the fighters. He didn't even look at them longer than needed. Fighters were noise unless they carried bombs.
The 'Mechs were the real threat—because they could cripple a hauler, board it, strip it, and vanish before anyone could respond.
Dack pushed the Dire Wolf forward.
The Daishi drifted out of the dropship bay into open space, maneuvering jets pulsing. The 'Mechs saw it and hesitated.
Every pirate knew the silhouette of a Dire Wolf.
Even if they'd never seen one in person, they knew the stories.
Dack didn't let hesitation become strategy.
He fired a tight beam from an ER Large Laser—warning shot—cutting across the space in front of the scout 'Mech, forcing it to juke.
Then he fired again, this time at the medium gun platform's shoulder mount.
The beam carved armor. Sparks and fragments blossomed. The medium 'Mech's torso twisted to compensate, and its autocannon stuttered as it lost stabilization.
The pirates reacted fast. They weren't amateurs.
The jump skirmisher boosted—jets flaring—trying to arc behind the convoy where the Dire Wolf would have to turn.
Dack anticipated it.
He rotated the Daishi's torso smoothly, compensating for the tiny gyro drift he'd learned like a second reflex. He didn't chase the jumper's landing point.
He predicted it.
He timed the shot to the moment the skirmisher's jump jets cut and it became a falling object.
UAC/5 burst.
The shells hit the skirmisher midair.
The 'Mech's leg actuator snapped. The machine landed wrong and spun, tumbling in the void.
It didn't explode.
But it was done.
The scout 'Mech panicked and sprinted for the nearest hauler, trying to reach it before the Dire Wolf could reposition. It fired small-caliber rounds—harassment, not killing. The hauler's hull sparked.
The escort corvette tried to track the scout, but its guns were busy fending off aerospace harassment.
Dack understood the pirate plan immediately:
Keep the escorts distracted.
Hit the soft targets.
Run.
Dack didn't allow "run."
He pulsed thrusters hard and cut across the convoy's plane, placing the Dire Wolf between the scout and the hauler like a wall.
Then he did something ugly.
He fired missiles—not at the scout.
At the space around it.
LRMs blossomed into a tight net, detonating in controlled proximity bursts. Shrapnel and pressure waves battered the scout, forcing it to slow, forcing it to flinch.
A flinch in a 'Mech fight was death.
Dack followed with an ER Large Laser cut across the scout's cockpit.
The canopy didn't shatter—space 'Mech canopies were reinforced. But the armor around the head peeled. The scout staggered.
Dack fired a final UAC burst into the scout's hip joint.
The joint failed.
The light 'Mech folded, leg collapsing, drifting helplessly.
The medium gun platform—wounded but still dangerous—fired its autocannon at the Dire Wolf, rounds sparking off the Daishi's armor. The impacts were angry and loud through the frame.
Dack didn't care. He wasn't afraid of medium guns.
He was afraid of losing civilians.
He turned his lasers on the medium 'Mech's weapon mounts and began stripping them apart like a butcher.
One mount exploded.
Then another.
The pirate pilot tried to backpedal, thrusters sputtering. Dack kept pressure steady, heat managed, violence controlled.
Finally the medium 'Mech went dark—reactor scrammed, systems shut down.
Disabled, not dead.
Dack let it drift.
The aerospace fighters saw their ground support neutralized and peeled away, dumping flares and vanishing into the asteroid belt.
The convoy was alive.
Damaged.
Shaken.
Alive.
Dack exhaled slowly and let the Dire Wolf drift in front of the haulers like a guardian statue.
The escort commander's voice came through, breathless. "You— you just—"
"Get them moving," Dack said. "Before the pirates have friends."
"Acknowledged," the commander replied immediately.
Dack's cockpit alarms quieted. Heat dropped. The Daishi cooled.
He keyed an internal comm. "Talia."
Her voice came back fast. "I saw it."
"Then you saw the rule," Dack said.
"What rule?"
"The one you're angry about," Dack replied. "Skill is unfair. Some people get born with it. Some people have to bleed for it."
A pause.
Then her voice, raw: "You didn't even hesitate."
Dack stared at the drifting disabled pirate 'Mechs on his screen, thought about pilots inside them—young, desperate, stupid. Thought about the frozen bodies he'd seen in the derelict.
"I hesitated plenty," he said quietly. "Just not where you could see it."
Talia didn't answer.
The convoy reached its destination hours later—a small orbital depot with battered docking arms and grateful traffic controllers. The haulers offloaded water and medicine like it was treasure. People in orange suits moved like ants, efficient and tired.
Dack docked his dropship and kept the Daishi in the bay, powered down but ready.
He didn't trust docks.
He never would again.
When the escort commander came aboard to pay him, the man looked like he hadn't slept in a week. He stared at Dack like Dack was a monster that had chosen to be useful.
"You saved us," the commander said, voice rough.
Dack nodded once. "You paid."
The commander swallowed. "We did. And… there's another job. Bigger. If you're interested. Word travels."
Dack's eyes narrowed. Word traveling was money.
Word traveling was also danger.
He didn't answer immediately.
He took the payment file, verified escrow, then said only: "Send details."
The commander left, almost stumbling with relief.
Dack turned to leave the airlock—and found Talia standing there, watching the bustling dock through a small viewport. Her face looked softer in the dim light, but her posture stayed tight.
"I didn't help," she said quietly.
Dack stopped. "You stayed alive."
"That's not helping," she snapped, then caught herself, anger flickering. "You did everything. I was… weight."
Dack studied her.
She wanted a cockpit. She wanted the identity of a warrior. She wanted to be something other than property with a good memory.
And she hated that her body had betrayed her in the sim chair.
Dack understood one piece of it.
He'd had a machine that made him powerful. She'd had nothing but her own hands.
"Talia," he said.
She looked at him, eye sharp, defensive.
"You think being a pilot is the only way to matter," Dack said.
Talia's jaw clenched. "In my world, it is."
Dack stepped closer, not looming, just present. "In mine, it depends on whether you keep people alive."
Talia scoffed. "And what did I keep alive?"
Dack didn't answer right away.
He walked to a panel and pulled up the convoy's telemetry logs—the pirate approach vectors, the fighter harassment pattern, the disabled medium 'Mech's drift.
He pointed.
"You saw the fighters first," he said. "You called them before the escort commander did. You noticed how the lights changed when we were being hunted. You read the case like it was language." He looked at her. "You are already useful in ways most pilots aren't."
Talia's expression wavered.
Then she snapped, bitter: "Useful. Again."
Dack held her gaze. "Yes. Useful. And if you want to be more than useful—if you want a cockpit—then you earn it slow. You train. You fail. You try again. You stop calling failure proof that you're nothing."
Talia's throat worked.
She looked away, voice small. "It hurts."
"I know," Dack said.
Talia's eye flicked back. "How?"
Dack hesitated. Then: "Because the first time I linked to a real machine, I thought my spine would snap. I threw up after. My father laughed at me." His mouth tightened. "Then he made me do it again."
Talia stared at him, surprised. "You?"
Dack shrugged. "I don't like telling that story."
Talia's lips parted slightly, as if she didn't know what to do with the information. The myth of Dack as "perfect pilot" cracked, just a hair.
Then she did something Dack didn't expect.
She nodded.
Once.
Slow.
"Again," she said quietly.
Dack's eyes narrowed. "What?"
"The sim," Talia said, jaw tight. "I want… again."
Dack felt a flicker of something in his chest—not warmth, not romance. Respect. The kind you gave someone who chose pain on purpose.
"Alright," he said. "Again. But we do it smart."
Talia's eye hardened. "No easy."
Dack almost smiled. Almost.
"No easy," he agreed.
Outside the viewport, the dock kept moving. People kept living. The convoy they'd protected kept unloading medicine and water into hungry hands.
Dack looked at the stars beyond the station's rim and remembered ComStar's packet, the favor token sitting in his files like a loaded gun, the encrypted shard of proof hidden in his suit.
The shadow war wasn't gone.
It was waiting.
But for tonight, he had a contract completed, a payment earned, and a passenger who had finally asked to stop being weight.
And that, for a mercenary, was almost peace.