Sorry for another late chapter, I've been aiming for Wednesday releases if you can believe it XD, but im still working on getting a consistent writing schedule down.No poll this chapter, as I want to take a quick refresher from BOAF to keep it fresh for me. Next chapter will be Hyena Werks (hopefully out Wednesday). Also, I've been thinking of more ways of rewarding and thanking you guys for all your generosity, and I realized that I haven't been leaving a way for patrons to sign. I'm going to leave a word doc on my front page, and if you want your name in the credits of chapters, sign there. as always, thank you all so much for your support!
Birds of a Feather, Hot Drop Together
Battletech x (modified) ToF Avali OC/insert
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Chapter Fourteen:Operation Mockingbird
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Lieutenant Seko Zakari
Zenith Point, Panzyr System
Deep Periphery
March 26th, 3025
The JumpShip Capricorn cruised into realspace over the Panzyr system, riding in on a wave of blue light and ionizing radiation. The Leopard DropShip clinging to her belly slipped free of her moorings and began a leisurely burn towards the frigid world of Panzyr II.
Even at this distance, the planet's orbital ring of wreckage could be seen by the naked eye, catching the system's sun in golden flashes. Ancient WarShips and shattered DropShips spiraled together in thick, suffocating bands–choking out the planet below with a ferro-aluminum grip.
It was Doctor Kessler’s nightmare made manifest: a runaway cascade of orbiting space debris that devoured anything it touched, adding its victims to its ever-growing arsenal. One of the last known mass WarShip graveyards in existence, it endured as a grim relic of the Amaris Coup. All of the valuable equipment had long since been taken by opportunistic scavengers. Only twisted wreckage and emaciated bodies had been left behind to menace travelers for centuries to come.It was four days into their journey, halfway to the planet, when they finally received a hail from Panzyr’s ground control.
Seko drew his pistol and stuck it firmly against the scalp of the Directorate fuck in charge of communications. The kid sucked in a gasp, his already pale spacer skin turning sallow as he tilted his head slightly to stare fearfully into the lieutenant's featureless visor.
“You will not stutter-” He growled, digging the gun in further to emphasize the point. “You will not stumble over your words. You will not try to pass any secret messages. And you will not attempt to warn them. If you do-” He lowered the gun downwards, dragging its muzzle along the fucking Satyr's spine before settling it right over his lower back. “I will paralyze you, and then space your twitching body and make your buddies watch. Nod slowly if you understand.”The kid released a stuttering breath and nodded shakily. He slowly turned back and leaned into the mic. “We read you, ground control. This is Aegipan’s Fury, verification code alpha-alpha-charlie-omega-zulu, returning from a supply run. We are requesting a flight path down to Sturmfeld Spaceport.”
There was a long, pregnant pause as the message took time to reach the planet, but everyone on the bridge let out a collective sigh when the man on the other end returned with a cool professionalism. “Copy, Aegipan. IFF confirmed, welcome to Panzyr. It seems like you’re in luck, as there’ll be a window opening up in the debris field right as you arrive. I’m sending you the flight path now, just follow that in, and you’ll be fine.”
The kid looked back at Seko, his eyes wide in hope that his job was over. Instead, he just ground the pistol deeper into his back and leaned in, whispering into his ear. “Thank the nice man for all his hard work.”
“T-thank you, sir. We appreciate the help.”
The radio operator gave a jovial laugh. “No problem at all. Keep in touch, and we’ll let you know if anything changes. Ground Control out.”
When the line went dead, Seko grabbed a fistful of the kid’s uniform and hauled the little shitheel to his feet–Shoving him roughly towards the wall where they had stuck the rest of his fellow crew. Holstering his pistol, he then made his way over to a man in spacer’s overalls, the starry emblem of XCOM proudly displayed on his shoulder. He was hunched over a terminal, scrolling through the data on it. One of Doctor Farah’s engineers, on loan to Max’s Marauders for the duration of this mission.
Seko dropped a hand on his shoulder and leaned in to read alongside him. “We get what we needed?”
There was a pause before the man turned his head, a decidedly unkind smirk on his lips. “Oh yeah, it's all here. The mission is a go.”
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Another two days passed in tense silence, Seko and his marines spent the waning hours checking and rechecking their equipment as they watched over their increasingly nervous prisoners. The monotony was suddenly broken when alarms blared out over the bridge; Their scanners had picked up on an emergence bloom coming in directly over the planet’s Pirate Point.
The prisoners looked on in confusion as the mercenaries rushed to the bridge, eager to watch the fireworks through the ferroglass viewports. Already, they were picking up a massive uptick in chatter from the ground–Calls-to-arms, warnings for civilians to evacuate to shelters, the usual white noise when a raid is known to be incoming. Hell, there were even calls directed their way. Ordering them to prepare to repel invaders, which they were more than happy to assure the Directorate soldier on the other end that they were absolutely preparing for combat.
An hour later, Escape Clause snapped into reality with The Bad Egg and the now-renamed… Fur Ball clinging to her hull. Seko shook his head in disbelief. Whoever was coming up with these names certainly had a bizarre sense of humor.
Either way, the Colossus and the Union broke free from their mothership and turned about, burning hard to intercept his vector. A truly breathtaking sight to behold, the massive and ancient war machine ripping through the void–her loyal escort sailing steadfast at her side. Seko gave the nod to Farah's man, and he nodded back with a grin. Without another word, he slammed down a key on the terminal before him–causing their IFF to flash from her old name of Aegipan’s Fury, to Descending Talon.
Yet again, another strange name, but at least this one has some bite to it. Seko honestly felt bad for whoever got stuck with ‘Crewman of the Fur Ball’ on their resume.
The moment the switch was made, all the desperate calls sent their way sputtered and died a miserable death. He could only imagine the dawning looks of horror spreading over those goddamn Satyrs’ faces right now as they watched the three DropShips join up and confidently plunge into the debris field, riding along the flight path they oh so generously provided.The three ships moved as one, skirting the floating wrecks and punching through the odd scrum of floating scrap where they had to. With every kilometer, the debris field thickened. Clumps of twisted girders and half-melted armor panels drifted by at deceptively slow speeds–but just one knick from one of those death traps would spell doom for the entire ship. Shattered engine bells and ASF wings stuck out of the mix at odd angles like Czech hedgehogs… or like some sick mockery of modern art.
A sudden jolt rocked the Fur Ball off to their stern, a chunk of frozen atmosphere the size of a small house bouncing off its nose. The DropShip yawed slightly, but quickly corrected its course with a burst of RCS thrusters.Without being ordered to, the Directorate pilot of the ‘Talon took the initiative and relaxed the throttle. Letting them drift up and behind The Bad Egg so the larger vessel could be their shield against the whirling storm of junk. The tension on the bridge climbed with every kilometer stolen as they followed the streaming plasma of her drive–The Colossus plowing through the last remaining clouds of alloys like a battering ram, scattering the shards of metal in a dazzling display of sparks and flashing metal. The moment they cleared the debris field, alarms wailed their siren songs as the ship’s scanners were finally able to get a good look at the planet below them. Through their electric eyes and ears, the drive plumes of a squadron of ASF could be seen rising up to meet them.
“Contact!” Farah’s man barked from his place at the sensor console. “A full flight, incoming on track–bearing oh-five-oh, mark two-fifteen, vectoring for an intercept! Tee-Tee is reporting an even mix of… Thrush and Sabre fighters, escorting a pair of Stukas!”
“New orders, sir!” Private Sandoval spun around in his seat at the comms station, a hand pressed to the side of his helmet as he listened to whoever was on the other end. “The boss man wants us line-abreast with the ‘Egg, five-click dispersion! We’re weapons free!"
Nodding to both of them, Seko withdrew his pistol once more and let it hang by his side. He didn’t raise it, didn’t flash it, he just let its mere presence do all the talking. The Directorate pilot they had press-ganged into service got the message all the same.
Descending Talon leapt forward like a hound let off the chain–overtaking the ponderous Fur Ball and sliding smoothly into formation alongside the pride of XCOM. The Union rolled out of The Bad Egg’s wake and rushed to take up her place on the other side of the ship. The three spacecraft flew together, presenting an unbreakable wall for their enemies to shatter themselves against.
And shatter they did.
Seko could only begrudgingly be impressed by their suicidal bravery as the ASF didn’t so much as waver from their doomed charge.
The Bad Egg spoke first, hammering their formation with bracketing fire from her Gauss Rifles–shepherding the enemy craft together like the galaxy's meanest herding dog. Using precise shots, she forced them to charge right up the line and directly into her comrades' overlapping lines of fire.
All three ships let loose with their complement of lasers. The void filled with a blinding kaleidoscope of electric blues and poisonous greens as the ASF’s leading elements simply vanished under the onslaught. The glowing, melted husks of the disc-winged Thrushes and sleek Sabres tumbled away into the black, trailing ribbons of rolling plasma and slagged armor like arterial spray. They drifted outwards, silently joining the graveyard without ever even having fired their weapons.
The last two remaining Stukas remained steadfast, however. They tore straight through the burning debris of their friends, using their sacrifice to claw out a few more desperate kilometers before they were blown to space dust. The two planes abandoned every attempt at evasion; instead, throwing their throttles wide-open, redlining their engines as they dove fearlessly into the storm of laser fire. Closing the gap as fast as possible. At just over a hundred kilometers out, the heavy fighters opened fire. HE bombs dropped free from their jury-rigged hardpoints and coasted onwards toward their formation, riding in on momentum alone.
It was their last act of defiance.One of Fur Ball’s Large Lasers finally connected. The sapphire beam caught the right-most Stuka on the wing, and they eagerly marched it across its bow. In an attempt to break the lock, the craft tries to juke, but instead spins out–cartwheeling wildly through the void at speeds that almost certainly reduced her pilot to a fine salsa.Their mission complete, the last Stuka tries to turn and burn for home. But the instant it rolled and exposed its belly to them, a trio of Gauss rounds slammed home. The fighter was disemboweled in a silent eruption of molten debris and venting atmosphere.
“Sir!” Sandoval yelled, eyes locked to the unfolding battle raging across the bridge’s viewscreen. “The Boss is telling us to drop the throttle to two Gees and let them take the brunt!”
The Directorate pilot doesn’t need to be told twice. Grabbing a lever by his station, he hauls back on it. Descending Talon and Fur Ball ease back, the two more maneuverable ships slipping back behind the safety of their flagship once more.
The Bad Egg’s weapons blaze in frantic desperation, urgently trying to hunt down the rogue ordnance. One bloom of fiery light lights up the void–and then another–and another!-
The bow of the Colossus suddenly ignites in a brilliant ball of light.Armor is shredded like paper; the explosion sends liquid shrapnel spraying out in a glowing halo, ringing the stricken ship. The Bad Egg lurches to starboard, spinning with the blow as they’re knocked off course–right into the path of a second bomb.
Another explosion catches them directly amidships. The ensuing white-hot flare scours the bizarre nose decal from existence. But beyond that, the gallant martyrdom of six ASF pilots seemingly achieves little more than lightly pitting their flagship’s armor.
The rest of the bombs soar by in a staggered parade that slipped past their column, missing their mark by a scant few hundred meters. Both the press-ganged crew and the mercenaries alike stared in frozen silence as the deadly swarm shot past, glinting malevolently in the light of the distant sun–no one dared breathe a word until-The pilot whimpered, his knuckles white against the controls. “I think my ass just took a bite out of my seat.”
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With their ASF forces destroyed, XCOM’s descent went uncontested as they broke atmosphere–Coming in hot over the frozen plains surrounding Sturmfeld City. The Directorate’s triple-A umbrella was far too thick to dare contest directly, so they had to settle on some empty fields several kilometers outside the city. While The Bad Egg and Fur Ball settled low and began disgorging all their troops into the snow-swept fields, ‘Talon had its own mission to complete.
Skimming across the plains, they swung in low and wide to stay under the Directorate’s radar. Their first objective came up on them fast–a massive, towering orbital cannon. Another relic of the SLDF’s, the thing was taller than some skyscrapers back on Canopus. Squat and brutalist, it perfectly reflected the Hegemony’s design philosophy–utilitarian to the extreme, over-engineered to all hell…and terribly effective.
As much as Seko was loath to admit, the pilot before him was damned good at his job, and it was a damned shame he worked for whom he did. The man performed a picture-perfect Jayhook, hammering the craft to a hovering halt just outside the wall circling the cannon. Bay doors lining their belly slid open, and out fell a lance of mechs. The two Catapults drifted down gracefully on jets of flame, while the two Atlases fell like hammers to the ground below, slamming down with twin sprays of snow and topsoil.
The ‘mechs form up and march on the facility, but unfortunately, Seko and his men have their own objective to reach, so they can’t stay and watch the fireworks.
The Leopard jets off, cruising towards the city itself.
It was time to pay ComStar a visit.
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The deckplating beneath Seko’s boots shudders ominously as autocannon fire rakes up and down the hull in a stuttering thunder. He was suddenly slammed back into his chair as the ‘Talon juked violently sideways, threading the needle between two towering skyscrapers. The pursuing LRM’s hot on her tail slammed into the buildings, both of them immediately erupting into pillars of roaring flame.
Without warning, the Leopard rolled fully horizontal, drifting sideways through the sky to unmask her dorsal turrets. Lances of electric-blue lasers stabbed downwards, laying waste to a lance of battlemechs below. Two Riflemen came apart in rivers of molten armor and sparking wreckage–reduced to smoking corpses sprawled across the ferrocrete by the full fury of the DropShip. A pair of Orions staggered backwards, seeking cover behind the relative safety of nearby buildings–only for a fresh salvo of LRM’s to rise up from the DropShip’s rear racks and rain down on their heads in a cataclysm of high-explosive warheads.
The pilot finishes the turn, spinning the craft about in another masterfully executed Jayhook. Their ventral drives cut out abruptly; the ship falling like a stone from the sky. A final burst of autocannon fire from somewhere in the city streaks overhead, missing them by bare meters as the ship belly-floped onto the street–crushing more than a few abandoned cars flat under her bulk.
Seko exhaled sharply, gripping the armrests as the aftershocks slowly petered out. Dust and debris swirled past the viewports, making it impossible to tell what was happening outside the ship.
He fumbled with the release catch of the crash-couch’s harness for a moment before finally snagging it and ripping it free. Staggering to his feet, he reached over and ripped his Falcon rifle from its cradle. Turning about, he found his men also struggling to their feet; All of them waiting on his orders.
Should he give them an inspiring speech to bolster their spirits? Hell no, he works for a living. He doesn’t have the time to be coming up with speeches.
“Alright, chucklefucks–let's go earn ourselves some hazard pay!”