2
November 3rd, 3049, 17:30
New Hinton - Federated Suns/Confederation Border
Surface Gravity: 0.75
Ambient Temperature: -74 C
Times were tough in the Inner Sphere. Tinal Triskian knew this first hand as he sat freezing in the cockpit of his third-hand CPLT-C4. A year ago he had been a rising star star back in the Draconis Combine, competing for the top slots at the Academy. A lot can change in a year. His myopic eyes gazed out of his neurohelmet and cockpit for a moment, squeezing back bitter tears as the near-whiteout conditions filled his view. He could have been a leader once upon a time, but today Tinal found himself on New Hinton, a frozen ball of ice not worthy of note aside from the recent germanium find a few years back. Now rival mining concerns battled over the precious resource. It wasn't the most glamorous job, but he needed the money. His LRM launchers were feeling a little empty.
If it hadn't been for Gin Teriyaki, before frantically pushing the thought out of his mind. His eyes returned to the viewscreen, from which dull, tinny moaning emanated. Lyran [stuff] of an obscure genre played as Triskian's fat gloved fingers thrust themselves into a bag of processed cheese snacks, the dust of which coated his hand-me-down DropShip flightsuit. He had bundled up, for on this world not even the overtaxed fusion reactor of his aging Catapult could keep him warm. Winter came a little early this year, and so had repair bills.
Tinal threw the processed cheese snacks into his mouth, chasing them with cheap light beer he had loaded up on before beginning his expedition. He hadn't much left. Empty cans littered the floor of his cockpit like so many fallen leaves. At least the beer was cold. He hadn't seen much action out here aside from a pirate raid a few weeks back. He got lucky, the AC/20 round had only sheared off one of his missile batteries. He spent nearly everything he had repairing it, but he knew his fortunes would change soon. He just needed to get where he was going first. Some friends of his from the Academy had set out for Liao space, washouts like himself. They were the only people who had ever really been there for him. Still, they left him behind. He had heard from one, Sanders, a few weeks ago. Apparently they had struck the big time. And if there was one thing Tinal Triskian craved, it was the big time.
[Redacted]
And then in the moment, the peace was shattered like a mirror cast upon the metallic, can covered floor of the cockpit. For war never changes, and he had a job to do. The reminder came as a Gauss round caught him in the back. The screen shut off as the Catapult's klaxons rang. Tinal wheezed as his heart raced. There wasn't supposed to be any raiders in this system. His lancemates on this job were all untested.
"I'm under attack! [Damnit], help me!" Tinal screamed as the servos of his Catapult whirred to face the enemy. He switched to thermals, there was no way to see in these painfully white conditions, and it was only about to get darker as the sun set on the forsaken satellite of New Hinton. They were hours out of the settlement. Suddenly, the familiar green of medium lasers pierced the blinding whiteness, nearly missing one of his LRM batteries. He looked frantically around in a moment that seemed to last forever. Out of the blizzard ran a HBK-4SP. As Tinal tried to maneuver into cover, he breathed a small sigh of relief. The Hunchback was one of his lancemates, callsign Mikhailo. He didn't know much about the guy, but he knew he had the money to keep an HBK in mint condition. Mikhailo ran forward into the blizzard. Maybe his eyes caught something out there that Tinal's couldn't. Maybe he just paid for the best thermals he could find on the market. Either way, it didn't really matter right now.
"Thanks for that assist, buddy!" But Tinal received no reply from Mikhailo, who had already moved out of visual range. The only thing that emanated from his comms was a terrible squawking sound.
It was about to be a long day for Tinal Triskian.
THE SPHINX HAS SPOKEN.
Edited by Niko Snow, 16 May 2013 - 12:08 PM.
Mature Content Removed
