Surveying my surrounding, there were not many wheeled vehicles in the hangar that I couldn't outpace on foot. No glory in crawling through the canyons in a MagGrappler Crane that would not produce enough speed to move a single hair on my head. Slowly, the MGC completed its task and move onto it next mission, revealing the beauty I had been searching for... A 16-wheeled, all-terrain cargo hauler freshly loaded with the most recent scrap from the battlefields. Now, as they say, "Beauty is in eye of the beholder", and this was quite simply the object of my current desires. I quickly commandeered the trash hauler and relieved the driver of his responsibilities.
Now 50 KPH isn’t exactly racing speeds, but it was enough to satisfy my urges. I am sure the chief mechanic is not going to be happy knowing that I red-lined the fully loaded hauler just about the entire journal to the scrap recycler yards, but that is something he’ll just need to worry about later. Clan Wars 3304 was on the horizon, and he’ll have his hands full with repairing mechs.
It’s been a long time since I was a rookie pilot relying on the scrap of battles to make ends meet. Oh the joy of fighting a few battles, win or lose, to be able to afford that new piece of kit or new weapon. Those were the days, I even recalled fighting a losing battle, just so I could get enough scrap ferrite to be able to enter the mid-day Pilot Development Lottery. Been a long time since those days, once my pilot license was sufficient enough to be able to buy the heavier weapons, most of my ferrite and bioptic supplies have come from buying huge quantities of Fury Lasers while on sale in the Core Planets and reselling them to the markets in the outer rim territories. Sure, I lost out on some Crystal, but I had generous friends tending to my crystal farms, and doing a much better job than myself. Never been able to find a Crystal Seed in my own farm, but friends seem to find them all the time.
Coming out of the last canyon before the flat plains to the salvage facility, I had to come to a sudden stop. There was a long line of haulers waiting to delivery their scrap to the facility. Getting onto the short-band communicator, I flip to an open channel and inquire as to “what’s the hold up?”
“Thieves are taking our money!”, “It’s a damned outrage…”, “I’m coming back with my mecha squadron to get what I am due…”, “They can’t do this…”, “…not going to be to compete this time around…”, “…barely covering the cost of repairs…”, “…at least it should deter mecha pirates…” and other voices speaking over each other in rage. What the heck was going on? I flip through a few other channels and more of the same.
Finally, I flip to the facility’s private channel and caught the middle of a looped automated message, “… to the surplus of scrap and the mecha industry’s new higher standards on recycled materials, scrap prices have been reduced by more than half. We understand that this decrease is unprecedented in the last decade; however, the market standards and demands for reprocessed materials completely out of our hands. We will continue to buy scrap from our loyal customers and hope that you understand the necessities of the scrap price drop.”
Damn, now I understand all the outrage. Most of the higher rated pilots and clans don’t even blink at the scrap they leave behind, but for the younger less established pilots on the rim, it is serious hit to their income. Some were saying that the decrease was 60% or more for scrap prices from just a month or two ago.
Well, one thing was for sure, I wasn’t going to wait in line for those types of prices. Spying a rather dejected looking young pilot heading to the bar across the street, I waved him over and offered a deal. He could wait in line, sell the scrap, refuel and bring the hauler back to my base and he could keep the difference between the scrap and the fuel. He eagerly accepted of course, after all, it was easy money and materials for a new pilot who to just got shafted.
Me on the other hand, now I was stuck on the out-skirts of town without a ride. I guess, I’ll go check out that new skimmer shop… now an open-topped skimmer would be a fine ride for this fine August morning out on the rim…
Submitted by FJ Bros#885020