A continuation of the story started in "Prologue to RND and Dragons"3307-April-30-1240Z Society of Cogwerk Planets claimed, Jungle Moon Rizpah, transit route 56
Things had been going great for Captain Mora and his Phalanx of Hoplites a week ago. They had transited Yomi Reefs to a gateway out of the Shogunate with out incident and were now on the Jungle Moon of Rizpah. They had avoided the squabble between the two Cogwerk clans, the Legionnaires of Galactic Trade and the Trinitarian World Symposium, that dictated so much of the mercenary missions on the damp rock. Initially their biggest issue had been snavurm as always, but now something or someone was hunting his company and they didn't fight by the rules.
He knew they weren't mercenaries, nor one of the Cogwerk major clans, because they weren't following the Mercenary Commission and Galactic Senate rules of civilized warfare. They had made no official declaration of hostilities, they were not fighting in formation and they had taken several of his pilots and their mecha , as well as one of the technicians trucks with all its personnel and made no offers to return any of them for ransom. One of his mecha had been completely destroyed beyond repair which was hard to do and also unusual, so he knew he wasn't dealing with your average bandit or pirate clans. Several mecha had been cut open with surgical precision and the pilots captured.
He had a horrible feeling that it was the Himitsukei. The only thing he did know was that whoever it was had at least one very good stealth mecha . The several times it had attacked only one enemy mecha was ever noted, that didn't mean they only had one but for some reason weren't attacking en mass. It had no radar or infrared signature at all and had very good visible light cloaking or chameleon systems. No one had gotten good visual on it, survivors from its attacks video just showed a noiseless blur racing through the jungle, even when it had engaged mecha in close combat with some sort of bladed weapon it seemed impossible to see. Based on its foot prints and the damage it did in close combat they knew it was a light mecha but that was it.
After the first couple of attacks he had ordered them to move in formation with the trucks in the center but this slowed them down even on the clearer than normal paths of the transit routes between gateways. This had reduced attacks but the enemy still found ways to pick off any stragglers before help could arrive. He had the techs send up an emergency message broadcast rocket, but it had been destroyed just as it started broadcasting so he wasn't sure anyone had heard anything. No one was sleeping well if at all which was leading to mistakes which also slowed them down as the techs fixed things.
Then they had picked up a faint encrypted radio transmission on RND standard inter formation channels. Commander Wadey had sent two companies with modular drop-ships to meet up with them and get them off the jungle moon. Unfortunately, due to the fate of the rocket the drop-ships would not come to them they would have to go to a defended Landing Zone. Someone had been jamming their radio transmissions though so they had been unable to communicate clearly.
Now they had just crested a hill and Captain Mora could see the LZ in a clearing in the valley below. Several Modular Dropships were surrounded by the iMechs of the iBinary Company and the Zadoks and Holmes of the Company nick named the Craftsmen Chessmen. They were almost there.
"Good to hear from you," Captain Ive's voice came over crystal clear now, "We were beginning to think you were going to be late."
"Not in a mood for jokes right now." Captai Mora responded, "Have you received any of our transmission about what is after us?"
"Unfortunately none of that came through in the clear." Captain Ive's jovial tone was replaced with that of concern. "How bad is it?"
"I've lost pilots and mecha," Mora replied, "I have no idea who they are or what they want but I've got data that needs to get to Commander Wadey and RND Central Command."
Just as he said that one of the Hoplite pilots screamed into the unit push, "Sigma to Phalanx, contact rear! Contak…" and was abruptly cut short.
"Our fast response team is en-route," Captain Ive said.
Two Novums flew up from the valley and over the Phalanx formation. RND transponders indicated two Orcus and two Keradons running through the jungle towards the Phalanx. Mora watched a missile rise up from the jungle somewhere behind his formation and swat one of the Novums from the sky. His computer tracked the source of the missile.
"Are any of those Zadoks equipped for indirect fire?" Mora demanded of Ive.
"Yes, but that would be against the rules." Captain Katz of the Craftsmen Chessmen replied.
"Time to stop pretending to be mercenaries and act like Caissan military." Mora transmitted the location the missile had come from, "Hit this entire grid, now!" He continued on the company frequency, "Do not engage, get to the drop-ships, now!"
Several Zadoks began volley firing T9 Bersekers in indirect fire mode. As Mora ran his Neiro down the hill he locked a communications laser onto one of the RND Dropships. As the forest exploded behind them the rest of the Phalanx followed him.
Suddenly his radar and radio comms went to static, they were being actively jammed. Whatever was doing it was powerful enough that his Neiro's computers could not not find anything in the clear even by altering the sensor and comm frequencies. Using the comm laser he transmitted the encrypted data from Kawaguchi with an attached message to get it to RND command even if it meant leaving them behind. As he deleted the file from his computers he turned his Neiro around.
The enemy mecha was among his formation and for the first time it could be seen. Maybe the missile fire had damaged it's chameleon abilities or maybe it was using so much power on active sensors and jamming their sensors and communications that the pilot didn't care. It was humanoid but moved with a flowing almost dance like grace he had never seen in a mecha before. It's surface was the blackest black he had ever seen, it reflect no light at all even high intensity energy beams had no reflection in it surface as they missed it repeatedly. It was ignoring most of his troops firing or cutting only those that were in its way as Mora realized it was coming straight for him.
Mora began firing at the enemy mecha and he realized there was something familiar about the way it moved. As it's sword sliced through Hoplites he realized where he had seen such movements before… in the video of the fight in the ally, the cybernetic woman who had brought a sword to a gun fight, this mecha moved the same way. Then it was nearly on top of him, rather than try to shoot it directly he strafed the area in front of him with cannon fire and was pleased to see a couple of rounds tear away the black flesh of the enemy mecha.
Then all his sensor screens went blank and all the emergency indicators lit up red. He realized the head of his Neiro had been cut off. Mora was still trying to change over to secondary sensors when he felt his mecha falling. He tried to fight it but feedback from his neural induction connection to the mecha combined with his head slamming into the side of his cockpit knocked him out.
3307-May-07 Unclaimed Fringe Space, RND Modular Dropship 39VKJ18 "Valkyrja Hlökk", Medbay
Captain Mora was surprised to wake up, and more surprised to see a RND medical Technician standing by his bed checking a monitor.
"Ah, glad to see you awake. Welcome aboard the Valkyrja Hlökk, sir," she smiled as she spoke, "if you feel up to eating I can get you some breakfast?"
Mora's mouth was dry and felt like it would hurt to speak so he just nodded. The medical tech left the room and returned shortly with a tray off food and a large pouch of juice and another of water. After eating he was feeling much better and dozed off.
When next he woke up Lieutenant Ouragos was sitting in a chair with a patch over one eye. "What would you like to know first, sir?"
Mora sat up, paused for the dizziness to clear before speaking, "How many of the company made it off of Rizpah?"
"Everyone, except those we lost before we got to the hill overlooking the LZ." Ouragos gestured towards his eye patch, "Quite a few of us were injured but you were the worst off."
Mora nodded, "Speaking of which how did I survive?"
"Bit of a surprise to us sir, we initially thought you had been killed." Ouragos looked somewhat ashamed, "After the ninja mecha cut off your Neiro's head and kicked you to the ground it tried to pry your cockpit open. All of us still standing, plus the two Keradons and Orcus opened fire on it, and Captain Katz redirected his Zadoks firing indirectly to fire on your position. Broke all sort of Galactic Civilized Warfare Act and Mercenary Commission rules doing that but we weren't planning on letting that thing get away to report on us not after what it had done to the Phalanx. Anyway, it could dish out damage and it was still hard to hit but it can't take a hit once one actually hits it. Unfortunately we almost scrapped your Neiro in the process, and thought that if it hadn't we had killed you. The medbays and repair facilities on these old VKJ Drop-ships are some of the best though and so are the med techs we have staffing them. Got all of our company mecha and personnel as well as the two Novum and their pilots onto the Hlökk and we boosted for the nearest gateway to the fringe."
Mora was glad the Phalanx had survived despite what had happened, "Where are we going?"
"We're enroute to Corps Central Command through as much fringe space as possible." Ouragos explained, "Captains Ive and Katz thought that would be the best place for the encrypted data, you hadn't told me about, to go and we would be able to get there just as fast as linking up with the rest of the Battalion. Their companies are on the other two drop-ships."
"Sorry about keeping secrets from you, but only I and McEth knew about it, at the time I thought that was best for opsec." Captain Mora considered Lieutenant Ouragos a friend and felt bad about that decision now. "What happened to the… what did you call it… the ninja mecha and its pilot?"
"Don't worry, I understand the decision," the Lieutenant grinned, "when her mecha went down the pilot committed suicide and tried to turn her mecha into an implosion bomb. McEth and her team disabled the booby traps on it and shut down its singularity power plant before it went critical. What little is left of both the mecha and the pilot we're taking back to CCC with us for study."
The last bit seemed bit odd to Mora, "Why wasn't the pilot left behind or buried?"
"Because the cockpit had burned, any biological components of the cyborg that was piloting the mecha were destroyed by the time the techs got that under control." Ouragos shuddered slightly, "It looks like the incendiary charge that destroyed the computer and the pilot was detonated intentionally by the pilot. However a lot of the cyborgs cybernetics, at least their outer casings were intact and it looks like the Shogunate has made some material science advances that no one else has figured out yet so, figured it might be worth researching."
"You did make sure there were no functional transmitters on the mecha pieces or the cybernetics?" Mora was pretty sure of the answer but after everything else that had gone wrong wanted verbal confirmation.
"I didn't have a chance to make that mistake." Ouragos laughed, "McEth insisted on taking the time to scan every piece before it was loaded on the Drop-ship."
Submitted by Sean Wadey # 356597