Collection 7 (Patreon)

Collection

Chapter 7

-VB-

Previously…

But Miguel wanted to ride out. To be a mechwarrior again. 

“... Alright,” I replied, making everyone else look at us in surprise. “But when I tell you to retreat, you retreat. Understood?”

“Of course, captain.”

I nodded. “Good. Then we go.” During our conversation, my ship’s battery had recharged just enough for me to do a intrasystem jump. “Miguel, we will do doing a hot drop. You will have to jump out of the dropship as we  come close to the ground. I will give you the go, so go and get ready. You have less than half an hour to be ready.”

Miguel took off from the bridge toward the drone bay. 

“Daniel, Riley, Sato. You’ve all been training with the turrets. I need you all to man them.”

“Got it, captain,” Sato, who’s been quiet so far, acknowledged and left with the other two.

“Amy and Armas. Both of you will assist me in the bridge. Amy, you take care of the sensors. Armas, you aim and fire the main cannon.”

“Got it, bro,” Armas grunted as he quickly went over to the new drone control console. Amy wordlessly nodded and followed her man over to where the main sensor console was, not the screen that was next to the captain’s seat that we have been watching from.

I turned to face the front again and looked at the screen showing me Gatchina. 

Pirates were everywhere we went. Was that truly what the situation was like along the League’s periphery border or was there something else that was causing this…? 

Then I jolted as the Inspired Inventor, after months, finally gave me another charge. 

Nice. Now, what was I going to invest that in …?

-VB-

Edward Arlaokas

Gatchina System, En Route to Orbit of Planet Gatchina

3001, June

As my ship flew toward Gatchina, I received more and more radio calls. I listened to them all so that I can get the best picture of what was happening on the ground. I even began to make a map of what might be happening where with one of the computer consoles.

And then I got a call that made me stop.

“{This is Captain Varnama to the approaching dropship. You can either fuck off or die.}”

My hands paused before I turned to the radio. I grabbed the radio transceiver and held the on button. “This is Captain Edward Arlaoskas of the Solo Killing. Am I talking to the pirates on Gatchina?”

“{What if you are?}”

“Oh good. Then I’ll give you this one chance to get off of the planet before I decide to kill you all.”

“{Ha! You and what army?}”

“I don’t need an army to kick a beggar’s ass.” I hung the transreceiver and changed the frequency so I wouldn’t have to hear him anymore. Then I turned to Amy. “Amy, I need the readings from IR, LIDAR, RADAR, and passives. I want to know if anything is moving between us and the planet and if anything out there is looking to target us.”

“I don’t see any-.” She paused. “Passive’s lighting up. IR is picking up … four targets. They’re locking on.”

“Active?”

“Our radar’s detected them. They are … 100 kilometers out.” Then she paused before I saw her panicking a little. “They’re accelerating!” I glanced at my screen and saw that the fighters that were going around 1,400 kph shot past 20,700 kph. 

I grunted. “Missiles?”

“None yet!” 

“Deploying drones,” I replied as I did just that. 

I watched as new drone console screens lit up. My Wasp Interceptors screeched through space as their own radars and LIDARs locked on the fighters. They sped much faster than their fighters could, and by the five minute mark, they crossed more distance than the fighters have by a factor of two. 

“Enemy fighters identified, captain,” Amy stuttered out. “All four fighters are Stingrays.”

Stingrays. Those were the League’s most prolific aerospace fighters. Did this mean that the pirates originated from within the League? Or supported by someone within the League? 

Ugh, did I just step in political shit? Corporate wars? 

… Whatever. They were still pirates. They were still hostis humanii generis. Scums who provided acceptable targets. 

Five more minutes after that, they engaged. 

“Deploy radar countermeasures.”

---

They detected the extra light fighters coming at them from afar. 

Jake was a little wary about this while the others in the wing hollered about how easy it was going to be. 

“They’re here!” someone cackled. 

Jake saw them on the radar, too, and -.

“What the…?” he muttered as they closed distance. “Why is their crosssection so small…?” 

And then the radar screamed. “Wait, what?!” he nearly shouted as he looked up. Those fighters just turned on a dime! Those pilots were dead!

But obviously that wasn’t the case because they fought, shooting small lasers while orbiting them. 

“They have turrets!” Jake shouted into the radio. 

“No shit!” the previously boisterous and arrogant voice shouted back. “Fan out! We have to take car-. Shit! My engine’s fried!” 

Jake snapped his face to the left to see Crow 3’s condition. His eyes widened when he saw one of the enemy fighters.

But those weren’t fighters. They were way too small to small to be a light ASF. 

A chill ran down his spine. 

“Drones…” he muttered in horror. They weren’t fighting a random dropship captain. No, this was something beyond a horror story. Something that had just come crawling out of myth. “DRONES!” he shouted into the comms. 

But all he got was crackles from it. 

He stared down at his radio. The radar crackled, too, showing false readings everywhere. 

In the next second, he grabbed his stick and turned the fuck around. 

Radio’s jammed. Radar’s jammed. He could only trust his eyes right now, but he couldn’t see his rear in full. Then he pushed his fighter to his and its limit, putting everything he could into its thrusters. 

Then he spotted a trio of the drones almost casually spinning in orbit around him, making turns that only machines could perform.

“This is bullshit…!” he laughed hollowly as he saw the three drones turn toward him and lock on. His ship screamed as it registered the attackers, but by then, it was too late. 

He screamed into the void as twelve small lasers bombarded his fighter until it burned and broke under him.

---

“All … All enemy fighters are down, captain,” Amy muttered. 

“Good,” I hummed as I recalled the drone to defend the mothership. I then turned on the intercom. “It’ll take us under an hour to reach the planet.” Then I had the drones recalled to do standby orbit of the ship.

Let’s see how they reacted to that.

-VB-

Miguel Nohara

The ship tumbled and shook as it began an atmospheric entry, and Miguel waited patiently within his - no, the boss’s - phoenix hawk. He jostled a little in the seat, but his eyes were laser-locked onto the small booklet that supposedly had a few upgrades that the boss made while the ship was at the drydocks. 

Specifically, the boss claimed in this booklet that this crab should have nearly double the amount of heatsinks without sacrificing armor or weapons. It was a ridiculous claim, but the boss made … quite a number of ridiculous things, so while Miguel wasn’t willing to risk his life on it, he might experiment with it. 

The onboard radio crackled. “Miguel.”

“What is it, captain?” he asked as he put the booklet down somewhere safe. 

“We are exactly eleven minutes out before your drop off. I am assigning three drones to act as your guard. You have just one mission: wipe out all pirate mechs and vehicles in the area you find yourself in. I will send data right now.”

There was a ping, and Miguel looked down at the computer in front of him. Just like Captain Ed said, data streamed into his computer and then showed a lagging map of where he will be dropped off. The lag slowly let up as they got closer.

“What if they get reinforcement?”

“Then I will send over more drones. Remember, you are worth more to me than the drones are. I can make more of those, I can’t randomly find someone to trust. Got it?”

Miguel nodded before realizing he wasn’t talking. “Got it, boss.”

“Good. T-Minus nine minutes. EdCom out.”

EdCom? Did he just add his name and command together? Not a bad name but unoriginal. 

Boom!

He stiffened in his seat when some kind of explosion struck the ship’s hull, making the entire thing wildly shake for a moment but it went back to only jostling minutely. 

Boom! BOOM! CRACK! Boom! 

Damn, they were getting shot at a lot. 

“This is a hot drop, Phoenix 1. Get your jump jets ready,” Ed called out calmly. 

“Wait, what?”

“Opening the bay doors in 5… 4… 3… 2… 1… Launch.”

The mech bay doors snapped open, sliding into the walls of the ship instead of going outwards, and Miguel hesitated only for a second.

Because that looked like a hundred meter drop! 

But he had jump jets. If he timed it right, then he could land the mech without damaging it… too much. 

He pushed the phoenix hawk forward, and almost lurched back at how responsive the mech was compared to what he was used to. The mech jumped out of the open bay door and down toward the ground. 

Miguel took a single moment to glance around and take a stock of the situation, and his eyes nearly bulged out. There were three mediums and two lights! This was a suicide mission! 

But before he could think anything else, he saw two things covering his flanks. He looked at them and his eyes widened when he saw that they were indeed the drones that Ed used in place of ASF.

He watched as the drones with their four wicked clawed wings fired lasers from the tip of each of the wings, and the light mechs, which looked like upjumped mining mechs, that were the first targets quickly bugged out, taking cover behind the medium mechs. 

Miguel remembered he was still falling and quickly activated the jump jets. He grunted against gravity’s pull but then noticed how much more slowly he was falling compared to what he was expecting. At this rate, he would hit the ground in three seconds. 

He glanced at the heat meter, and to his surprise, the heat sink was extremely slow to rise. He could tell that what he was looking at was true because he also didn’t feel heat creeping into the cockpit. 

Which … possibly meant this phoenix hawk had less armor if Edward’s note was nothing but lies. 

But if it was true, then this Phoenix Hawk was possibly a monster. 

He landed with a crash on the ground on his mech’s two feet, and immediately launched into an alpha volley at the weakest looking medium mech, another upjumped industrial mech  that had been getting pelted by the hovering drones dodging all of their fire. 

To his surprise, his volley immediately punched through the pirate medium mech’s right shoulder joint and right side of the waist. His eyes widened when he realized just how much damage those drones were doing to mechs. 

And then he felt like an idiot because he realized that those drones?

They were made to fight ASF and dropships. 

Mechs were far less durable, far slower, and overall weaker in firepower compared to dropships.

He glanced at the drones, which were still the main focus of the medium mechs - a very roughed up Hunchback closer to be being a frakenmech than being a Hunchback - and another Phoenix Hawk. 

The light mechs, however, turned to face him as they left the cover of the beefier medium mechs to hit him. His Phoenix Hawk immediately identified the light mechs: a Commando and a Stinger. 

He immediately aimed at the Commando and fired. 

One large laser and two medium lasers smashed into the ubiquitous Lyran mech (where did the pirates even get this one from?) and -.

Miguel’s eyes nearly bugged out when the large laser burned through the light mech’s torso in one hit. 

The Stinger backed off immediately before breaking out into a run. 

He snapped out of his shock and immediately fired upon the medium mechs that suddenly realized that they were now missing light mech escorts. Their attacks - autocannons, lasers, and rockets - all slammed into him with a surprising level of coordination. His UI flashed and his armor lit up yellow. 

Not red? 

… Whatever. He still had armor, and that was good enough for him to continue the offensive. 

He fired again, aiming at the still surviving and retreating light mech. His lasers tore into the light mech.

And that was finally enough for the pirate medium mechs to give him their attention. 

But the moment they focused on him, the drones came rushing in like wolves that finally got the flank on their prey. 

The first drone delayed its fire for just a second and then unleashed a quad large laser alpha strike on the back of the mech his computer identified as a Wolverine WVR-6M. The medium mech staggered, and Miguel used this as his chance to hit that mech.

So he fired his Phoenix Hawk’s own one large laser and two medium lasers in an alpha strike, and they burst through the mech’s torso with liquids of molten metal dribbling down. And then he must have struck something critical because the Wolverine exploded on the spot. 

One of the two pirate’s medium mechs that was too close to the Wolverine took a brunt of the explosion from how close it was. The mech - a Phoenix Hawk PHX-1 according to his computer - staggered back and with its left side charred from the explosion. The other pirate medium mech - a Cicada CDA-2A - stepped out of the way from the staggering medium mech.

But that Cicada pilot noticed something and aimed up and not at Miguel.

It fired double medium lasers and something exploded above him.

Miguel looked up and immediately made his mech move out of the way as one of the drones fell out of the air. 

But then the drone did something, stabilizing its fall, and bumrushed the Cicada. 

The Cicada tried to move out of the way but the much faster drone slammed into the medium bug mech’s legs. Even though the drone was much smaller than the medium mech, it had enough mass and speed to topple the medium mech. Miguel jumped on the opportunity and blasted away at the bug mech’s hips joints with his lasers. 

After ten seconds of sustained fire, one of the joints finally slagged off the red hot joints. 

The other mechwarrior finally got their wits together and fired their red and black Phoenix Hawk’s arsenal on his gunmetal grey Phoenix Hawk. The lasers struck his already abused armor but the armor held. 

And so he fired back.

The pirate Phoenix Hawk, already damaged, fell to the side as his lasers punched through its armor and cut something critical inside. 

And … just like that … Miguel survived his first battle of the day, taking down five other mechs - two light and three mediums - with the help of the drones. 

It was a phenomenal victory. It’s not something he could have achieved had he been in his old mech. He didn’t doubt for a second that he would have lasted as long as he did under the barrage of five mechs without help and without the admittedly specially modified Phoenix Hawk.

“[Damage report],” the captain demanded almost immediately. 

Miguel tempered down the euphoria of his achievement and pressed down on the comm button. “Operational. Armor’s all yellow, though.”

“[Good enough. I want you to head to your next destination. The drones will be with you throughout it all, and reinforcements will be sent soon.]”

And then his Phoenix Hawk’s UI lit up with data being sent to him, and the mech’s telemetry immediately translated it into a visible map of his surroundings and the direction he needed to head toward to his next fight. 

Miguel took a deep breath in and let it out slowly. “Just a few more mechs, huh?” he muttered. 

Because on his map, he saw two more lances around the city the pirates were besieging. 

It was time to get to work. 

-VB-

Edward Arlaoskas

“This is Captain Arlaoskas of Solo Killing to the Gatchina garrison. Do you read me?” I spoke into my mike on the same frequency that I first received the distress call while Amy continued to read me what my ship was seeing. 

And overall, the picture wasn’t great but it was also not bad. 

For one, my sensors only saw two Leopard dropships. Which was good. Leopard dropships could only four battlemechs each, assuming that it hadn’t been modified to change the aerospace fighter bay into more battlemech bays.

“This is … This is Duke Apparent Danylo Renomena of Gatchina. Who are you?”

“I’m the mercenary kicking pirate’s ass right now,” I hummed. “I need to know what your militia’s current status. We’ve already engaged one of the pirate lances and destroyed them.”

“You have?” the man sounded surprised. “That … you are a savior,” the guy replied. “Unfortunately, my militia will not be of much help. Both they and my personal guard have been decimated. We only have one infantry company, one Wasp, and one heavily damaged Thunerbolt.”

That was … not even worth a mech lance. 

“Do you know how many more mechs the pirates have?” I asked with a frown. 

“If you took out a lance, then they have one reinforced lance left. They have one Crusader, two Wolverines, one Orion, one Wasp, and one Locust.”

‘Three heavies in one reinforced lance?’ I thought to myself as I considered the composition of the reinforced lance still fielded by the pirates. ‘... Not an issue.’ It wasn’t an issue because I could have each of my drones kamikaze their mechs, one for one, for near fatal if not fatal effect. I had more than enough drones for that. I could even double the kamikaze drones per mech and I still had enough drones for it. 

But I didn’t want to. 

That was wasteful. 

… Well, Miguel wanted to be a mechwarrior. He got to kill those pirates.

“Thank you. I’ll do what I can.” 

-VB-

Situation on the ground:

Edward Arlaoskas’s Crew

-1x “heavy” assault dropship

-1x Phoenix Hawk PHX-1

-7x Wasp drones (3 with PHX-1, 4 with dropship)

Gatchina Militia + Duke’s Guards:

-1x Thunderbolt (heavily damaged)

-1x Wasp

-1x infantry company

Vs 

Varnama’s Pirates

-2x Leopard dropships

-1x Crusader

-2x Wolverines

-1x Orion

-1x Wasp

-1x Locust