Embers After Flames, Chapter 8.1 (Patreon)

8.1

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The first corporate invasion of RLF territory came before the month was over.

It was not, as one might suspect, a particularly big invasion.. No, it had been a rather subtle affair, insofar as giant robots shooting the shit out of each other could in any manner be considered ‘subtle’.

An Arquebus MT Squad was sent to investigate an outlying region that the RLF kept as a listening post / communications center for the outer proportions of the continent. Its defences were relatively light, owing to the fact that it simply wasn’t very important, and consequently maintained very little actual personnel. It had been set up a decade ago when the RLF still lacked for more complete information dominance, and truth be told, it probably wouldn’t have lasted much longer regardless.

Twelve Arquebus MTs, equipped with weapons an appreciable amount better than the current BAWS standard, against eight RLF MTs, carrying nothing but relatively standard equipment selected for its lightweight logistical footprint. In numbers, they were beaten by fifty percent. In firepower, they were beaten by approximately fifteen percent, with ranges also about that much higher for Arquebus

Most would imagine that this would not end well for the RLF.

Most would be wrong, too.

It would not do to forget that the RLF had the advantage of a defensive position, yes, but there were also two other factors that by far weighed more on the scales of that particular conflict ending in the RLF’s favour than simple terrain and positioning did.

The first was experience. The RLF were long used to being outgunned, outnumbered, outranged, and underpowered. 1.5:1 odds? That was a good day. Tactically, strategically, they had developed the tactics to handle that particular problem a long time ago, and then refined those tactics even further as the years went by.

Now, the Arquebus MT pilots? They’re not bad. Megacorporations which bothered to build armies usually liked to have competent armies, assuming that wasn’t some degree of corporate fuck-fuck games going on in the upper crust. You can train MT pilots fairly easily, to be honest, so it’s also relatively cheap to do as well. There was, however, a big difference between corporate pilots who were probably not flush with actual battlefield experience and the RLF, who fought for their lives on the line on the regular.

In terms of experience, that twelve versus eight match was a lot more evenly matched than it could have been.

The second was much more tangible than that, however.

The Arquebus MT pilots? They were normal dudes. At the absolute most, they’d maybe have some gene therapy treatments from their home worlds and the company itself to enhance things a little. Usually, that was much more than just what was required to handle higher or lower levels of gravity.

For the RLF, almost everybody except the newest recruits were rocking third stage C6 Augmentations.

The ‘normal’ Humans of this day and age, versus people who had the reaction speed and mental acuity, if not the actual physical ability, to keep up with Armored Cores.

Yeah.

The little invasion ended exactly how one would expect. Arquebus got fucking totalled, and it was no real surprise. The qualitative difference between Arquebus’ MTs and the RLF’s MTs didn’t matter, because Arquebus’ pilots couldn’t bring out the full potential of their MTs. The RLF’s could, and half of the time, the MT was what was holding them back.

End result, twelve dead corporate MTs and nothing but armour damage to show for it.

I would pity the corps, but, well, corps. Fuck ‘em. The shit happening on Rubicon might be suppressed, but they’re Megacorps. They had the power to find out. The fact that they’re choosing to fuck around just means they’re going to get the more violent kind of finding out.

In any case, Flatwell ordered all the outlying dudes to pull back. If it couldn’t be automated, it was being scrubbed and abandoned. The corps would be very willing to trade away lives if they though they could cut away at the RLF slowly, so he didn’t feel like giving them that chance.

The rest of the year... Well, to be completely honest, it was basically the first month writ large. The vast majority of the PCA’s efforts continued to focus on Raven and Branch, all but ignoring the RLF and the corporations. Arquebus and Balam continued to expand, hitting the smaller corporations one after the next, plundering all the data that they could.

As for the mercs, well...

Watching the entire thing play out, I couldn’t help but be reminded of the way that an ecosystem collapses. Where, before, there had been dozens of competitors of roughly equal strength, now there were two apex predators whose only real competition was each other, and both of them were in the process of eating everything else. They were a bit too dangerous for most mercs to be willing to assault them directly, and that meant that most of the remaining smaller corps were only bleeding out even faster, lacking AC support against the significantly larger numbers that the megacorps had.

Most of the less capable mercs were now in the process of pulling out, leaving Rubicon behind after having acquired as much from it as they possibly could. Some of the mercs were jockeying for the megacorps’ favour, chasing payouts that would naturally be significantly larger than what most of the smaller corps would be willing to provide, but that came with the caveat that it would also require more dangerous jobs and employers who were much more prone to engaging in shenanigans.

It would stabilize, eventually, but the environment would never be the same after this. When this whole thing was done, there were going to be, at best, three to four groups that the mercs could conceivably sell their services to- and against megacorps... it was a dangerous proposition.

Danger alone wasn’t enough to scare away mercs, of course.

Since I was a little curious, and didn’t really have anything better to do at the moment, I elected to engage in some socialisation and called up ALLMIND to have a chat about it.

The only conclusive statement I was able to get out of her was how the situation, while it was a downward spiral for mercenary engagement, was hardly irrecoverable. She had, by now, ceased trying to push the narrative of inevitable conflict and failure upon our conversations though, so that was progress.

The next year didn’t bring much difference, to be honest. The number of corporations dropped slowly and steadily, mercs shifting in and out. The RLF continued to work towards the goal. Balam and Arquebus continued to fight each other, skirmishing as they slowly examined the continent in their attempt to locate the Coral supply that the leaked PCA reports spoke of.

About the most interesting thing that happened that year was the PCA formalizing their lowered state of readiness on Belius in June. Their constant chases of Raven and Branch had ultimately led the PCA to be significantly out of position, and the addition of megacorp forces into the mess that was Belius now created even more unacceptable risks than when it was just the RLF.

As such, the PCA claimed that they would no longer interfere with the corporate conflict while they handled ‘the matters of the still free planetary terrorists’, presuming that the corporations did not expand their territories beyond the conflict zone, which was basically the entire continent of Belius.

It was a lovely bit of political fiction, I’ll admit. Since the main Coral mass wasn’t on Belius, and every smaller deposit was monitored through PCA facilities, that left only the RLF as a source on the matters of Coral. No one was entirely sure how much Coral that the RLF had access too, but the logistics of the widespread Augmentations alone demanded that it be of significant size. That meant that the RLF had the attention, since it was much easier to get to them than it was to get to the PCA.

At least, in theory, anyway. In practice, that was bullshit, and everyone knew it. The RLF’s major positions were locked up tight, and after all these years, Flatwell had substituted as much usage of Coral as he could. The slow expansion and rolling out of hydroponic systems had alleviated the main consumption, the Mealworms, until they eventually reached critical saturation and non-Coral food production overtook consumption entirely. Once the RLF had built up a big enough technician corp, they’d switched over to aeroponic systems for even greater density and efficiency. When that happened...

Well, the RLF doesn’t transport Coral these days. Hell, the web of logistics cloaked in illusion and mirage that Flatwell had woven in order to keep the RLF supplied wasn’t necessary anymore. Now, nearly everything was internal, and almost every location was self-sufficient, save solely for C6 Augmentations.

That, Flatwell kept relatively close to his chest. There were only a handful of locations that had the full setup prepared for that, and the injectors were made to demand, not stocked up.

Nothing to steal, that was his thoughts on the matter.

All-in-all, that left the RLF really fucking fustrating for the Megacorps. Nothing to track, no small hits to be done, only a series of increasingly more dangerous locations that would require significant investment to break open- the kinds that would leave them open to their rival in an unacceptable risk.

That wasn’t saying that the Megacorps had no options, of course. They’re Megacorps, and while the RLF’s fortifications were thorough, a defensive stance fundamentally cedes initiative. In time, they would be able to pull something together... Just nothing right now.

Honestly, I was of half a mind to leak the knowledge that the PCA was sitting on top of several deposits near the Watchpoints, but I was fairly certain that wouldn’t end in the kind of fireworks that I enjoyed. The PCA would never allow the Megacorps to have them, and if hitting a Watchpoint could be decisively pinned on a Megacorp, the satellites would rain fire until everything involved was glass.

Greed and arrogance overpowered intelligence all the time for Megacorps, but only when they thought they could actually get away with it. No, the most that would happen is a bunch of patsies being sent off to probe, who would be subsequently discarded the instant it was necessary.

So, no. That one was off the table, unfortunately.

By the end of the year, there wasn’t that much left of the old, smaller corporations. Most of the new arrivals that had snuck in just before Balam’s and Arquebus’ arrival were gone, and so were most of the old guard that had stuck around from the very beginning. In terms of independents, there were now only a handful of groups too small to matter.

The list of forces that were left was missing only a single member from canon, though most of them were quite different from their counterparts.

We had Arquebus and Balam, the two driving forces of conflict for Rubicon. Aside from possessing a technological edge over their original counterparts, these were most similar. Schneider and Dafeng, in turn, existed under their umbrella.

The RLF, of course, existed as a major independent faction, in practice representing the remaining population of Rubicon.

BAWS, Furlong, and Elcano were theoretically three more independents, but in practice all three were supporting the RLF through various means and for various results.

The PCA was the PCA, and had advanced considerably over their counterparts, both in technology and industry.

ALLMIND was in the background, much like the new addition of myself, supporting and undermining however we pleased. Branch, too, was in the background, and currently making a mockery of the PCA. ALLMIND had her fill of mercenaries and corporate patsies, and I had my Firekeepers and C-Weapons.

The ones missing from the lineup were RaD and Overseer, neither of whom had arrived by the end of that year.

Of course, there was a saying about being fashionably late to the party.

It was in May of the year after that I received a certain piece of news that I was waiting for.

Ships, arriving at the planet. Source: the Jupiter colonies, more specifically from the Titan Line.

A place I paid attention to, because that was where Nagai had once kept some very important friends.

I was able to confirm things only a few weeks later.

Walter and Carla had arrived on Rubicon.