"What the hell am I doing here?" I said mainly to myself and the mecha in the bay. And maybe the occasional grease monkey. But they rarely listen to us jockeys.
Looking at my battered and beaten Regis "Undertaker" standing in the pale light. She almost looks beautiful. And again I find myself wondering just what the hell they want a troop of BFM and heavies on this gawd forsaken rock. You can't go 10 metres here without stepping on a Snavrum, and the humidity wreaks havoc on the mecha joints.
Well might as well get this over with I thought climbing onto the gantry to climb into my mecha.
Once inside, I rig in, that old familiar euphoric buzz from jacking into the neural link coursing through me. The old girl starting up, every nerve tingling as the dark matter converters hum to life. I reach into the cooler for a cold beer while I wait for the rest of the troop. Our orders are to penetrate the jungle on a recon patrol, only an eight hour stint. Beter be I thought. Only brought 48 beer to last me.
Once the rest of the troop is jacked in and are ready, we walk out into the dim twilight of Rizpah. I slide the antique CD into the play as Guns N Roses' "Welcome to the jungle: blares out over the com.
The first 6 hours of the patrol are mind numbly uneventful save about 40 or 50 snavrum wound up in our mecha joints. The grease monkeys are going to love us. When all the sudden every warning goes off at once! Looks like we found Dorian Cogsworthy. I key the com, "Once more into the breech guys" as the first projectile slams my chest plate. Dammit, I just welded that back on!
I fire off a full volley of Blue Dragons at the point mecha, watching it explode in a dizzying array of colors, momentarily blinding my sensors. Once the fog lifts, we are surrounded. All we can do is blast our way out. The com is eerily quiet as the men and women do their job. Staggering the firing to keep up with the recharge cycles, we are successful after about an hour of intense fighting. Only had one jockey punch out. We salvage what we can, and looky here! The star charts! Guess I know why Daniel wanted my troop on patrol. Turning back towards base with our salvage and the precious star charts, my chest plate finally falls off. Yeah, the grease monkeys are going to really love us! Well time for another beer and head for home.
"Come to Rizpah" they said, "It'll be fun" the said.
BULLSH!T
Submitted by Stuart Myshrall# 422352