74 replies to this topic

[Janitor101]

Kurt sat, head pressed on the cool metal table as the other pilots argued.
"Personally I've heard frogs that are scarier then Barrett trying to scare us into not thinking he's a psychopath." Kurt interrupted loudly.

"Now shut up or I'll nail all of you to the roof of the mech bay! All this stupid crap is killing my head!" Kurt continued, forehead still on the metal table.

After a moment of silence Kurt speaks again.
"Now, about the pirates Commander?"

[Highlighter]

Sometimes, Felix longed to be a company commander back in the Davion Guards. At least then, there'd be some resemblance of sanity within the unit. But, then again, it was the flexibility of a mercenary unit that had attracted him to contract work in the first place. Plus, he'd never have met as unusual people as his crew.

"All doom and gloom and joking aside, Barrett is right. We do need to exercise caution. Intel states that Linda's Raiders aren't your typical, motley pirate crew. They've got some experience and their tech is far above average for Periphery gains. It's going to be a challenge, but they're certainly no House unit." Felix nodded towards Xin. "We've got full salvage rights for this operation. So, whatever you don't completely total, you get to keep. What you take down is yours. Now, we don't have to babysit their pilots, but the local magistrate would like us to take any alive and hand them over. As such, don't go out trying to crush their pilots by foot, but don't worry about keeping them alive. If we do, we get a bonus, if not, it's no big deal. Certainly don't jeopardize your safety."

The briefing room door hissed open one more time, and an attractive woman with sandy-blond hair stepped in. She was dressed in a aerojock's jumpsuit and took a position at the far end of the room. Isis Sinclair was the unit's only female and one of the two pilots. She had served with Felix previously for several years. Felix acknowledged her with a nod. "As for air support, Lieutenant Sinclair will be providing us with cover and recon as needed."

The Blue Suns commander punched a few buttons on the display, and the image flashed to a map of the northern continent. "We'll be landing at two locations. Alpha Lance will take the first drop zone, and Bravo and Command Lance the second. We expect the Raiders to be in this wooded area here between the two LZs, so we'll easily surround them. Once we're grounded, we'll move in and take them out."

Felix Maan looked at his crew and gave them a confident smile. "This should be an easy one. Finish this, we get paid, and we'll have enough for some time off. We're about two days out from Main Street, so use that time to make last minute checks on your machines. Lance leaders will coordinate individual battle formations. Any last questions?"

[Hanyit Greyhame]

I hate to say it, but Barret does have a point. These aren’t the scrubs that we have been used to fighting. They actually have mechs that our intelligence says are in some semblance of working order. And in order to keep mechs up in the type of hostile environment, you have to have d@mn good pilots and even better techs. We’ll have a fight on our hands for this one,” Hanyit stated calmly, backing up Barret. As much as he didn’t like the man’s sadistic manner, Barret was one of his lance-mates and a man under his command. In the interest of unity, he had Barret’s back.

“Alright, onto some more tactical questions. Boss, you said that we will be facing what amounts to a merc corp. What does our recon say about their strengths and weaknesses? We know the have operational mechs, but I haven’t heard how many. What is their fighting tendency? Ya’ know, brawling, long ranged combat, or something of that sort. Also, what terrain will be fighting in and how can my support lance be of best service?” Hanyit asked, sitting back and stretching. He was still feeling kind of groggy from getting up late, but was almost feeling mentally capable. Those stym packs were better than coffee some mornings.

[Charles Martel]

Cornelius gave Barrett's little attempt at intimidation all of the gravitas it merited, by several well-placed eyerolls. It helped to overcome the urge to give the man an account of things he and Cornelius would be better off to not have him know. There were things much worse than a band of pirates, no matter how hardened.

He bowed his head in deference to Kurt, a courtesy expected for one's lance leader and thus commanding officer. And listened, idly twirling a simple disposable pen between the fingers of his right hand.

[Joe Davion 86]

While Joe didn't much care for Barrett he did have a point. Joe had been on a enough drops with the group here to never underestimate a Pirate...after all that lucky SOB that shot up his old Blackjack had been a Pirate.
"What time do we drop sir?" was the only thing Joe could think to ask.

[DocBach]

Nelson Tibbitz was easy to miss, especially in a room full of alpha males with type-one personalities. He prefered to be in the background, part of the scenery. He was an average person by most standards -- he was barely 5'9", average in height, and most wouldn't particularly considered him to be attractive. His unkempt shaggy hair and ungroomed stubble gave him an uneven, if disheveled appearance. He nervously stepped forward before clearing his throat.

"Sir, I've been looking over the intel on this group of pirates, these 'Linda's Raiders' and we're going to have one hell of a time trying to move on them."

Nelson pointed to the holographic projector then tapped on few keys which changed the image to satellite overlays of the pirate's suspected area of operations.

"Any way I look at it there's too much risk. Reports show they've got us outnumbered. Outgunned. Their forces beat us straight up, the terrain suits them if we try to flank and manuever around. A hot drop leaves a good portion of our forces either disabled by malfunctions on the landing or hit by enemy AA on the way down."

Nelson scratched the back of his neck and averted his eyes from his commanding officer.

"Sir, I'm going to have to... I'm going to request that I sit this one out in the command center. My Jagermech is.... it's having problems with the, uhm feeding systems for its autocannons. I'd be more of a liability down there then an asset."

[Dreadstar]

Mac turned a whispered to Felix. "I got dis Boss." and then turned to Nelson, his big crooked smile appearing on his face.

"Naw Nelson, I got ya back on dis' one." He clapped a meaty hand on Nelson's back. "Ma' techies just got thru lookin' at ya Jag, and they said they got ya AC working just fine."

"Yer gonna be workin' wit me in tha Command Group on dis here run. Ya gonna be coverin' my sweet Auntie's a$$ and stickin' close ta me." He put Nelson in a brotherly-like headlock and started walking towards the door.

Mac had seen Nelson's docs, and read the psych reports on him. He had told Felix that he would watch over Nelson, and get him back into the game. Hence the reason Mac was 'mothering' Nelson, and trying to get him over his PTS. Which means he would perhaps be a liability, but with Mac watching over him, and hopefully making Nelson feel more comfortable with a Atlas as his wingmate.

"Doan ya worry about dis here raiders Nelson, we'll teach 'em how real Mechdriver's operate. Numbers ain't got nuthin' ta do wit it."

[DocBach]

Nelson subconsciously flinched then readjusted his glasses as Mac pulled him away. For a brief moment, he remembered how his older brother Nicolas would hold him down the same way when they were growing up, right before he'd give him noogies or push him down into the dirt. He filled with a brief moment of rage, then sadness, remembering Nicolas was never found at the Victory Industries complex Nelson along with the rest of the 10th Deneb Light Cav razed to the ground.

Struggling to keep his balance as the much larger man handled him, Nelson stuttered, "Well... welll, well what about the gyroscope? Last drop it sounded abnormal and I'm pretty sure I was getting negative neurofeedback out of it."

[Xinaoen]

Xin shot Barret a condescending smirk as Mac dragged the still-protesting Nelson from the briefing room.

"Congratulations, lancemate," Xin purred, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "It looks as if you managed to scare somebody after all."

He turned his attention back to Maan, not waiting for a reply.

"Though it probably goes without saying, should we assume that Mister Tibbitz' estimation of the enemy's strength was - as usual - wildly exaggerated?"

[guardian wolf]

Chris studied the room, and had heard Barrett's description of the enemy quite clearly. It struck home, and he respected the enemy, not hated them, nor was afraid of them. Barrett was a damn good mech warrior, and Chris couldn't count the times he had heard that Barrett pulled someone's *** from the fire. Chris watched the shaky puke go on how his Jaggermech was having difficulties, and immediately realized what was going on, he was having what Chris's unit called the shakes. He must have had his world rocked recently, and his unit, formerly attached to Dylan's Hell Jumper Company, had seen many like that. Jumpers would come in cocky, and bull headed, only to see the actual horrors of combat, and then, afterwards end up like this kid. Chris had watched men get blown out of the sky in their battlemechs, before even touching the ground, watched formations break as recruits withered under fire. Chris looked up as the kid was basically dragged out of the briefing room. Chris nudged Barrett, and said quietly.
"Seems like the kid needs a little help, hold the fort while I'm gone will ya?"
He then said loudly.
"That information wasn't exaggerated, in fact if anything, we should be assuming we are going against elite mechwarriors. Never take your enemy's for granted, and always overestimate what they are bringing to the field, so you are prepared for what happens,"
Chris got up and followed the kid out of the room. He tapped him on the shoulder, and then spoke quietly.
"So, what happened kid? You lose someone?"
Chris's arms naturally crossed.

[DocBach]

Nelson suppressed a scowl, but his fists subconsciously balled. Lose someone? How about my home and entire family?

He took a deep breath and cleared his expression, loosening up his knuckles which turned from white back to their usual red after the capillaries relaxed. He adjusted his glasses on the rim of his nose.

"Let's just say I'm not a fan of suicidal tactics. Back in 3039 the Dracs tried it against us...."

Nelson paused, the memory of the 6th Benjamin Regulars trying to break out of the position he and the 10th Deneb Cavalry had them locked into with suicidal charges flashed through his mind. His face bunched into a scowl, this time one he couldn't suppress.

"Let's just say I'm not a fan -- there's always a better strategy then storming straight on like some of these meatheads like to do."

Edited by DocBach, 25 April 2012 - 02:55 PM.

[Xinaoen]

Xin scoffed quietly as Chris swept from the room, and then leaned conspiratorially towards Haynit.

"Honestly, Lance Leader, I think it's about time that you had a talk with Bravo Two and Three," Xin stage-whispered loudly.

Xin raised a hand in a "hear me out" gesture.

"Don't misunderstand. I adore the fact that everyone's taking this so seriously," Xin drawled. "Really, I do. But if I hear one more unsolicited lecture from either of those two..."

Xin leaned back, grinning broadly.

"...I might start to think that they're trying to steal my gimmick," he concluded grandly.

[Charles Martel]

Smiled as Mac and Chris obviously went to shore up Nelson. Make no mistake, we all were going to need that kid's genius if this was going to be anything other than a waste of time and equipment. And, at least one of the cubs was actually doing something useful. So he turned to Barrett to give him his 0.02 C-Bills, with a golf clap.

"So, what's the plan? I think I agree with Nelson that a hotdrop wouldn't be the smartest option unless we can suppress their aerospace defenses. Otherwise we might as well toss our mechs into a recycling grinder."

[Highlighter]

"Like I said," Felix continued as Mac, Nelson, and Chris left the briefing room, "they're composed of a single 'Mech company, mediums and heavies. Because they're raiders, we're expecting to see heavily energy-dependent designs." Felix glanced at the briefing report he held. "Looks like they've got one lance of heavies. The only confirmed 'Mechs are two Warhammers, a Marauder, and a Flashman. The other two lances are going to be a mix. Panthers and Centurions is what I have in my report, with some unknowns as well.

"The issue is that Linda's Raiders are trained, so they know how to use their 'Mechs. They prefer to brawl, but aren't afraid to mix it up a bit. That being said, I don't believe this is going to be too difficult." He glanced at where Nelson had sat. "It'll be a slight challenge, but we're much better pilots. We'll get this done quickly.

"To answer Greyhame's question, the Raiders are sitting in a wooded lot. We're going to try to draw them out of the trees so Bravo Lance will get a clearer shot at them. If we can't draw them out, we'll torch the forest.

"We'll be timing our drop to coincide with sunset. Alpha Lance will have the sun behind them, providing them some cover as they drop. The Raiders don't have any air cover, so the drops should go well."

Felix paused and smirked. "Not that anything ever goes well. No plan survives contact with the enemy." He looked around the room. "Anything else?"

[MacabreDerek]

Barret silently nodded to Chris, and observed him leaving the room. He didn't know what he heard of Barret, but for some reason the man treated him with a truly undo respect, and that didn't sit well with Barret. It was like ants crawling along the back of his eyes. Barret can only imagine the hand full of stories where it could have been twisted into him doing something good for someone, though he couldn't imagine what that was. The fact he had been assigned into a Lance with Chris was going to prove aggravating.

It was Nelson who caught Barret's interest. He couldn't help himself as he wondered just which side of 'broke' this kid was going to fall on, but it would be entertaining to find out. There is only so much pent-up emotions that a person can keep, and it works like a coiled spring waiting for a chance to release. Some people, like Barret, find a comfort in that. He wasn't sure what had the boy so wound up, but it was clear it was something he brought to the table.

He continued to listen, letting the commander take the floor, but losing himself in thought to Kurt's earlier comments. Kurt was one of those guys who had about as much sense as Barret had in dealing with the negative element, and usually that ended in explosive circumstances. Though this was often entertaining, it was financially a dead-end, for both participants. Though that didn't stop Barret from following the rabbit-hole of his own imagination.

He thought on how he would set fire to his door and dorm while Kurt slept, and wondered if the tough-guy was going to try and not give Barret the satisfaction of his screaming. He tried to imagine if it would be the heat or the smoke that would get him first. He drifted into detail on how the burns would take layer after layer of skin, peeling as slowly as a cheese grater. If there was any sense in Barret in how he could possibly get away with it, that voice was reduced to a whisper.

A moment of disappointment followed simply on him thinking on how he wasn't going to be paid for it, and then how he would not receive pay on this job after any half-brained freebirth figured out how obvious it would be. And that was the final nail in the coffin. Still, something bad could happen to him on the job... There was always hope, Barret thought.

[guardian wolf]

Chris figured he hit a nerve, the way the kid was talking. Dracs, he said the dracs tried suicidal tactics against him. It suddenly dawned on Chris that this kid had probably been forced from his home, lost everything due to the Draconis Combine's tactics. Chris figured that he oughta give the kid the speech, the one that their commander Dylan always used to give before hot drops. Chris looked up at the kid, and took his dog tags off with a sharp yank.

"Kid I'm gonna tell you something that my CO used to tell me. We, we are warriors, we fight so that others may live. Things go wrong, the ball gets dropped and people die, but we can't dwell on that. There are people counting on us down there, and we have to be fighting our ***** off to save who we can. Kid, I've seen war at its worst, I've seen Lyrans chase someone down a street, just to step on some poor ******* trying to get out of the way. I've watched my closest friends get blown out of the sky, in the middle of a drop, before even touching the ground. We must stand strong, as we are the people in the trenches, holding back the darkness that is anarchy. Normally this is reserved for Hell Jumpers only, but, I feel like I can trust you,"
Chris held out his dog tags for him to grab.
"Kid, this is a sign that I trust that you will not only perform your combat duties, but also, that I trust you will be able to file the report if I die. This is something that each Dragoon in our unit took as an honor, and I'd be proud for you to have my dog tags."
Chris waited for the kid to take them.

[Dreadstar]

"Listen Kid.." Mac said as the door closed behind them, his facial features softened slightly, which actually did nothing to dissuade from his normally gruff face, but his grey eyes suddenly took an almost compassionate look. "We've all had our ..losses. Ya can't live in tha past, ya gots ta look forward. Ya gotta look at life like a never endin' book.."

"What ah mean ta say is. Iff'in ya turn da pages back, it's just sh!t that ya already read before, an nuttins changed. But ya never know what tha next page is goin' ta be cuz ya ain't read it yet. Lifes kinda like dat."

He puffs out a thick plume of cigar smoke into the air as almost an afterthought, and then the edges of his thin lips curls slightly into a sharklike grin. "Doan ya mind that peckerneck Barret, he's so wound up he'd reach escape velocity if a mouse farted behind him.". He chuckled slightly as his own wit and then clapped Nelson hard on the back. "Ya just stick close ta me, and my Annie's a$$, an we'll get ya through dis one, like sh!t through the proverbal, now extinct, goose."

Edited by Dreadstar, 26 April 2012 - 12:20 PM.

[DocBach]

Nelson looked at the dog tags hanging from Chris Wolf's hand, then looked up to his eyes. He shifted his focus to Mac, then back to the dog tags.

"You can keep your dog tags and death letters - I'm sick of you all treating me like I'm some kind of green cherry. I was on the front with the Dracs during the Fourth and was part of the spearhead during '39." Nelson wiped his nose with the back of his knuckle. "I know the score -- this isn't my first rodeo."

He paused, making eye contact between both of them before starting again.

"And, I also know how hotheads like you guys think you can just stomp your way into a fight and walk out of it without taking a scratch. I've seen too many units fight wars that way, and I've seen way too many guys not some home because someone in charge didn't think things all the way through."

Nelson reached in to a zippered pocket on the shoulder of his jumpsuit, revealing a small notebook. He flipped through it to a page that was folded on itself. On it contained notes Nelson had scribbled from the intelligence reports he had read, along with hand drawn maps of the area of operations.

"When the rest of you guys were drinking or looking at girlie magazines or whatever, I was going over all the intel I could get on this op. We can do it the way most MechWarriors would, by relying on superior violence because 80 tons of 'Mech makes us think we're invincible, or we could try something out a little -- less direct."

Nelson pushed his glasses back up the bridge of his nose, as they had slid down a bit while he was talking.

"I know there's a chance that some of us won't make it back from this one. That's the reality of the job. But if we play the game smarter, more of us should be able to make it back. Just because we're dropping in on their home turf doesn't mean we have to play by their rules..."

Edited by DocBach, 26 April 2012 - 03:44 PM.

[Janitor101]

Kurt watched while Tibbitz had a breakdown or something and was led from the room, Kurt closed his eyes and rested his chin on his crossed arms that sat on the table, tuning out the useless chatter, and listening to what actually sounded important in the free for all that the briefing had become.

Kurt raised a hand.
"If things should go FUBAR, where are our evac or rally points?" He asked, hopefully the answer should keep the pilots who were worried reined in and calm.

[Dreadstar]

"Weellll." Mac stated as he stood up to his full height, the top of his tight crewcut rubbing against the upper bulkhead. "Lookit what finally showed up. A 'real' mechdriver, who suddenly thinks he knows more than anyone else."

"Listen...pup." He spoke the last word pointedly. "Your tha one that was in the room actin' like yer panties were all in a twist over the op. All we're tryin' ta do is give ya some courage ta overcome yer obvious issues."

"You tink yer the only one that lost family and friends or somethin'?" He crosses his arms, causing his jumpsuit's material to creak to the point of tearing. "We 'all' know the score each and everytime we get in those hunks of metal and firepower. No one is takin' anything fer granted on a battlefield. Doan mistake everyones witty lil' repartees, or in the case of Barret, a$$holishness, with overconfidence."

"But...." he suddenly stabbed a thick finger in Nelson's shoulder. "Doan ..ever..question tha Commander. There's a reason he's tha Commander, and yer just another Jag Jockey lookin' fer a paycheck. Ya gots no balls ta question tha Commander behind his back. Ya got a problem with him, then ya need to take it up with him. Doan be questionin' his orders 'after' ya left the room."

"I bin with tha Commander since the 4th, ya snotnosed little a$$hat. He knows his stuff, an we've survived some serious hairballs together." He bulls by Nelson and then pauses, turning his head back towards him. "So, iffin' ya need my techies to fix your 'supposed' problems wit yer Mech, then git your a$$ to the bay and git 'em fixed. Otherwise, git back ta yer crib, stick your thumb in yer mouth and suck on it."

"I ain't gonna have some candyass in ma group, that I'm goin' ta need ta be worryin' about iffin' his diaper is too loose."

Mac stalks down the gangway towards the Mech bays, a thick trail of smoke bellowing out behind him.