WP3025 Chpt 19

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==Chapter 19 - Winged Praxis (Battletech 3015 CYOA)==
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===Sights of a City and the Stars===
Cylinder Two, Nadir Point
Mercantile Facilitators of Yanchep
Free Worlds League
28th February, 3015
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It took some getting used to, looking up and seeing a city above you. Or more accurately, a reflection of the protosystem flanked by a pair of cities. The Star League could create environments that would bend the mind of a 21st and 31st century mind alike. At this point, I was used to existing on multiple earth-like planets, inside spaceships, and even floating in empty space with little more than a pressure suit keeping me safe.
None of it had prepared me for the experience of an honest-to-God O'Neill cylinder. The Coriolis force was slight, but present enough to remind you as things didn't fall quite straight to the floor. In a room, you could almost convince yourself that you on a planet and slightly disoriented. That disappeared the moment you went outside, and the world curved up around you. There was no sky, but more land and giant windows that looked out onto the mirrors that brought Yanchep's light to the cities. 
 
It had been even more incredible to take a pedal powered ultralight up and fly near the cylinder core, where the G was a fraction of what it was at the surface, but the winds were intense. Swooping about the null G transit rail had been an experience like no other, flying without any motor power, feeling the flow of the wind almost directly, all at the center of this inside-out world in a system yet to be born.
 
The old creation of Clarke and Lee, Rama had come to mind. I had idly wondered if there were any Cosmos Christers in the Inner Sphere. Were it not for the mythologization of the Star League, it would have been all too easy for people to view this megastructure as the product of an alien civilization far beyond humanity. In fact, knowing that it was the product of humanity was awe-inspiring in its own right.
As was its fragility. You couldn't see if from where I stood on the hotel balcony, but I knew Cylinder One was still out there, locked in its gravitational dance with the man-made world I inhabited, a shell filled with howling nothingness.
"It makes me wonder how we ever went so wrong." said Terri, joining me out on the balcony.
 
I turned to take in her slender robe-clad form, wet hair drawn forward over one shoulder. "Oh?" I asked.
 
She gestured to the view. "People made this."
 
"And on a hundred worlds, the height of technology is ICE and radios, with oxen pulling plows," I said, picking up on her meaning.
 
"Right," she said. "And there's nowhere in the Sphere that could build this again. I remember being so impressed with my Stingray when father gave it to me. It was newly built, sleek and…it looked like the future, Gid."
 
I nodded. "It was your future," I pointed out.
 
She went on. "There's so much of that," she said, "worlds where we're still building incredible things. Amazing art and technology…but then I look at this, and I can see that for all that, we're just sifting through the ashes."
 
I couldn't disagree. "They threw so much on the pyre," I said. "And everyone figured they'd be able to rebuild once they won it all. Pendejos." My hands tightened on the balcony rail. "So much suffering for nothing."
"Do you ever think our children will be able to get back to this?" she asked, arms wrapped around herself.
I thought about everything I knew about the Terran Hegemony, Star League, Belters, the NAIS, Comstar, the Clans, and how things were supposed to go. Then I thought about science, and humans. "We figured out how to do this once," I said, turning to her and putting my arms around her. "We can figure out how to do it again." I squeezed her. "But I don't think we will if we keep going the way we're going. Something needs to change."
 
"I hope you're right," she said, squeezing me back.
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===Bar Fights===
Cylinder Two, Nadir Point
Mercantile Facilitators of Yanchep
Free Worlds League
3rd March, 3015
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I had just finished buying myself a Nakjima laser pistol that had made its way across the Inner Sphere in working order when my comm buzzed. Clipping in the power pack, and sliding the tight-beam pistol into my holster, I tapped my earbud. "Zalman."
 
"Colonel, Kumari. We have a situation."
 
"Tell me I don't need to shoot somebody. I haven't had a chance to zero my new sights."
 
She paused for a moment. "It shouldn't be necessary."
 
"Thank the lord for small favors," I said, moving away from the weapon stall in the bazaar towards a quieter alcove that was still fully visible to multiple stalls. "What's happened?"
 
"I've picked up some security chatter about a scuffle at a bar."
 
"Which one?"
 
"The Ice Belt," she said. "That's the…"
 
"The bar Socks and the other Regulans were visiting." I finished. "Weapons?"
 
"Nothing mentioned."
 
"More silver linings." I groaned. "Okay, I'm on my way. Anything else I need to know?"
 
"Station security seems to be waiting for things to cool down before they step in, but they are on alert."
 
"Do we have any ins with them? Bankhead comes through here all the time," I asked as I made my way through the crowd and towards the public transit station.
 
"I imagine that will get rather expensive. Bankhead and their passengers can afford to pay those sorts of bribes. We've already shaken up Captain Merlune's schedule and our contract multiple times. I think we might want to trade on Captain Thorklein's connections."
 
I smiled as I stepped onto the tram. "I suppose there isn't a cop in the sphere who wouldn't appreciate some high-quality Joe."
 
"My thoughts precisely."
 
"Right. Thanks Cliffhanger. Zalman out." I cut the channel and typed up a message to Terri that I wasn't going to be able to make our dinner date as planned. Then I sent a message to Marc asking if he'd be willing to help me defuse a possible situation. That done, I sat back to consider what might have happened.
Given it was the Regulans, it was probably something to do with the rumors that had filtered down to Yanchep that at least some of the Regulan units had indeed sided with Anton. Which meant nothing on what seemed to be word of mouth. After all, some of them had sided with him at the beginning of the rebellion. It was possible that the rumors were nothing more people talking about the 4th & 5th Hussars. But I couldn't help but worry that we were hearing about the beginnings of our worst-case scenario.
 
Not that it mattered now. With rumors of Regulans turning partisan to Anton flying about, either an Anton booster or a Janos loyalist could set off my crew with the wrong comment. I really hoped I wasn't going to have to put one of my pilots and a major fraction of my technical staff into hack.
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Marc was waiting for me outside the bar. "Got the secmen hanging back for now," he said. "How do you want to play this?"
 
"I want," I said, "to sweep the bar with a stunner, pile our idiots into a taxi, and drive them back to the Queen Anne."
 
He chuckled. "Sounds like a plan."
 
"It is," I said. "With two minor issues. One, I'm not carrying a stunner, and two, I didn't bring a taxi."
 
"That does put a kink in things," he said. "Annoyed at your boys?"
 
"I'm missing a date." I admitted.
 
"Well." he said. "I did bring my fists. Shall we take a more manual approach?"
 
"Suppose we'll have to."
 
I shoved open the door to be greeted with the sight of Jai Saidu tossing a load tech through a table. Considering the blood leaking from between Kalpit's fingers as he rolled on the floor, I found I couldn't exactly blame him the jump infantryman for defending his very close friend. Nor could I blame Ikshita for holding off a crowd of murderous looking patrons from her brother with a rapidly spinning pool cue.
 
There was some good news. None of the moaning bodies on the floor were my people, apart from Kalpit, and I was seeing mostly spacer garb on the combatants. The stationers seemed to be sitting this one out. My people had also made the bright decision to start a fighting retreat to the door, so I didn't figure I'd have to get my hands very dirty at all.
 
On the other hand, my leading tech was nursing a broken nose, and I didn't like the look of how Socks was nursing his left arm, even as he brandished a wine bottle in his right hand. And there was no doubt my mercenaries had inflicted injuries on their opponents. To say nothing of the property damage.
 
Seizing on the lull in the fight as the rival spacers stared at what Jai had done, I hooked a toe around the power cord of the sound system and yanked it out of the wall. The upbeat music cut out mid-riff. "Alright," I drawled in the sudden silence, playing up my accent. "Next idiot that swings a fist just volunteered to be test medium for my new pistol." Eyes swung to me as my threat percolated through alcohol-dulled minds. I was happy to see that neither Socks nor Ikshita looked my way, though they didn't make any moves to capitalize on their opponent's distraction. Jai and the Regulan Queen Anne crew did, however. Something to work on. "Right," I said in the silence, stepping forward.
 
"Screw you," snarled a drink-soaked engineer with an Atrean accent, cocking a fist back and lunging towards me. "I'm…"
 
Whatever he had been about to say caught in his throat as my Nakjima's muzzle appeared between his eyes. "Going to sit down and rethink your life choices," I said. "Marc, get them out of here."
 
"Oh, I never get to have any fun." he joked, supervising the retreat.
 
I gestured with the pistol, and the wide-eyed engineer sat down on the floor with a thump. "Right," I said, sliding the pistol back into the holster but keeping my hand close. "What did those idiots do?" I asked the bartender, jerking my head at the door to make sure he knew I was talking about my people.
 
"Looked to me like they were getting along fine for a while. Maybe a bit of friction over a girl or two they were looking to take home." She brought her hands out from under the bar and started washing a glass. "Then things got nasty. Heard a bunch about your lot being traitors, and some over being gay. Slurs and such, you understand. Couldn't say who threw the first punch, but things escalated pretty quick." She put down the glass. "If things went much further, I was going to have to do something."
 
"Glad it didn't," I said. She might have had a stunner behind the bar, but on the other hand, it might have been a needler. "Can I finish out their tab and damages?"
 
"I'd appreciate that," she said with a smile full of teeth. I was going to get soaked for it, of course. Something to keep in mind when I was handing out punishment duty.
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===Aftermath of a Fist Fight===
Dropship Queen Anne, Nadir Point
Mercantile Facilitators of Yanchep, Free Worlds League
4th March, 3015
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There were nice things about having a dropship. I had my own office, for one, instead of making do with a combination of my bungalow and the conference room on Siduri. It wasn't large by any means, and it doubled as my cabin, but it was my space. Crossbones was still technically an independent unit, but I had taken ownership of the Queen Anne. Phillipa had suggested it as extra incentive for Crossbones Squadron to stick around for the merger.
I just wished that I had been using it for something better than disciplinary meetings. Dealing with the crew and astechs that had joined us along with the Queen Anne had been simple enough. Vixen had standard procedures for crew that got caught brawling or needed to be bailed out. It was minor by FWLM standards, but to my Southwesterner lights, it sounded about right to be assigned punishment detail and be confined to the ship for a bit.
 
My TASS crew on the other hand were going to be trickier. We didn't have the same SOP as Crossbones set up, and while it was tempting to just make it policy across both units, most of the TASS offenders were officers, who were theoretically supposed to set a good example. Worse, interviewing the Crossbones crew had confirmed that Jai had swung the first punch.
But first…I clicked the intercom. "Kundaraju."
Socks entered with his arm in a sling, and a blank face. He stood at attention.
 
"What did the doctor say?" I asked.
"Broken wrist, Sir." said Socks, staring at the bulkhead.
"So, you're grounded." I said mildly.
 
Pain and shame chased each other across his face, flashing past. "Yes, sir."
 
"Do I need to tell you what this means?" I asked, nodding at the flight schedule.
"No, sir."
 
"Why don't you tell me?"
 
"We're down one pilot and don't have a reserve in case of a deckload launch. It puts us closer to defaulting on the contracts. You and the other pilots are going to have to pick up more flight shifts. The schedule will need to be rewritten…"
 
I waved. "Enough. At ease Socks. What the hell happened?"
 
He gave me a confused look. "Duster?"
 
"Don't get me wrong Socks, you're still in trouble, and I'm going to be dropping a bayload of admin work on you, but I do get it." I pointed to myself and quirked an eyebrow. "Me, remember?"
 
The shift from pissed off colonel to fellow pilot processed and he remembered how I was kicked out of LMS with a busted finger for punching Liszt. "Right. Well, I was competing for the attentions of a lady with a dropper helmsman…"
 
"Where'd she end up?"
 
"Scrammed when the fight started. Anyway, it wasn't anything serious between him and me, but some of their crew was hassling Jai and Kalpit something fierce. Don't know why. Things got nastier when a news report came in that the 9th Hussars came in out of Liao space."
 
I grimaced. "I take it they made for New Delos?"
 
He nodded. "Probably why someone started calling all Regulans dirty traitors. They didn't take kindly to us going mercenary either." He shrugged. "I'm not sure exactly how things ended up popping off. First I knew of it was blocking the stool the helmsman was swinging at me." He gestured to the broken wrist. "Docs say it should be better in a month under their care."
 
"Right. Well, punishment duty, and confinement to the ship. I also want you to write up how you could have better kept this from turning into a fight. I'll have your new workload for you soon. Brush up on your helm and aerospace control. You're going to be doing plenty of both." I grinned tightly at his disgusted look. I knew Socks hated driving DropShips. "Dismissed. Send in Ikshita."
 
He did. Ikshita was not happy to be standing there at attention, and it was obvious to see.
 
"I have statements," I said, "from the Crossbones crew that you didn't start the fight, and saved a few of them from worse than they got already. You didn't kill or maim anyone either. So tell me, Datta, what did you do wrong?"
 
She paused for a second. "That sounds like things I did right, sir."
 
I nodded. "But that's not what I asked."
 
"I'm not sure, sir," she admitted.
 
"I hired you, Datta, as an officer. I'm glad you're aggressive. It'll do you well on the battlefield. And you're plenty good in a scrap. You're a skilled warrior. But I need my officers to show initiative and leadership. You had good judgement once it dropped in the pot, but before that?" I spread my hands. "I'm confining you to the ship for the time being. You'll be getting a new list of duties as well. In addition, I want you to come up with a way to take some initiative and provide something of value to the unit beyond your assigned duties. Consider it a development exercise."
 
"Yes, sir."
 
"Send in Saidu."
 
Jai held himself at ramrod attention as soon as he came through the door. "Sir, the entire incident was my fault. Any punishment should fall on my shoulders," he said without preamble.
 
I raised an eyebrow. "You think that the entire responsibility falls on you?"
 
"Yes, sir."
 
"Did you organize the drinking outing?"
 
"No sir."
 
"Choose the bar?"
 
"No, sir."
 
"Accuse fellow Leaguers of treason?"
 
"No, sir."
 
"Snake a date?"
 
"No, sir."
 
"What did you do?"
 
"I threw the first punch, sir."
 
"Well," I said. "That certainly is a major error in judgement. And you will be seeing discipline for that. After all, I can hold you accountable for your own actions. But there was plenty else that went into that Charlie Foxtrot." I tapped a finger on my desk. "And I'm not letting you throw yourself onto the responsibility grenade for the others, though your nobility is noted. I'm not robbing your comrades of a learning experience so you can play martyr."
 
He deflated a bit. "Yes sir."
 
"At ease, Lieutenant," I said. "Tell me what happened."
 
"A few of the crewmen there were threatening Kalpit," he said, not expecting the switch in tone. "I didn't like that very much."
 
"Kalpit specifically?" I asked. "I was under the impression that your dance partners were calling all Regulans traitors."
 
"They were." he said. "This started earlier."
 
"This?" I said, "I hadn't heard."
 
"Part of the bay crew was getting pretty drunk at the table next to us. They convinced themselves that Kalpit was gay." Which was true, or at the very least bi, but not something I officially knew. "They started talking about things they had done to 'fix' fairies before. I'd rather not go into the details."
I nodded. "Feel free to skip it."
 
"Anyway, they were starting to talk about dragging Kalpit away. Then someone called us all traitors…" He paused. "And then I started it."
 
"That sounds like planning," I said. "Not threatening."
 
"It was the kind of planning you're supposed to hear, sir."
 
I nodded. "Understood." I tapped on my desk again. "So, what I'm hearing is that you heard your friend being threatened for an extended period of time, and when you were insulted, you turned to violence. Would you call that an accurate summary?"
"Yes, Sir."
 
"Right. Why didn't you leave?"
 
He looked uncomfortable. "I didn't know if I could convince the group to leave. People don't tend to take that sort of thing seriously. Or pretend they don't." He went on at my nod. "Besides sir, why should we leave the bar? We had a right to be there."
 
Two impulses warred in my mind. I sighed. "Right, Jai, I need to drop the crap for a moment."
 
"Sir?"
 
"I know," I said, "or am at least convinced that you and Kalpit are sleeping together."
 
A hunted, defensive look contorted Jai's face, and he twitched towards me. "I…"
 
"Questions of fraternization aside, I'm perfectly happy, so long as you two can keep up your responsibilities. It's no secret that T-bone and I share a bed on occasion." Lord only knew what sort of gossip I wasn't hearing about that.
 
He swallowed. "Yes sir. Do we have a policy on fraternization?"
 
"Nothing firm," I said. "And I realize that's on me. I'm not going to be slapping you with regs you didn't know you were under."
 
"So, why are you telling me you know?"
 
"Because I want to make sure that we aren't talking around the point. Did you think you wouldn't be able to get your shipmates to come with you, or were you worried that some of them might throw into the other side?"
 
He grimaced. "Worried, sir."
 
"Anything specific?" I asked sharply.
 
"No sir," he said, eyes downcast. "But you never quite know."
 
"Acknowledging that you're absolutely right, and you had the right to be there as much as anyone else, why didn't you and Kalpit get out of there?"
 
"They might have taken that as an opportunity to follow us." He gave me a bleak look. "I've seen that sort of thing happen before." His expression brightened a bit. "Besides, Kalpit was having fun getting to know the Queen Anne astechs."
"Right." I stroked my beard. "Well, I can't really fault your decisions on a personal level. As an officer, however…room for improvement."
 
"Yes sir."
 
"I'm assigning you snacko for the foreseeable future." I said.
 
"Snacko, sir?"
 
"Morale, welfare, and recreation officer," I said. "I want the crew associating you with good times. It's a shit job, but do it well, and people will love you for it."
 
"Yes sir." he nodded.
 
"And," I added, "if you can manage to subtly sneak a little queer culture into the vids, so much the better. Beyond that, we're accelerating marine training. I also want the crew following your lead in a scrap."
 
"Thank you, sir."
 
"I just dumped a bunch of extra work in your lap, Saidu, and you're thanking me?" I chuckled. "You are also being confined to the ship. Now go see Kalpit in medbay."
 
I sat back as Jai saluted and rushed out to check on his boyfriend, wondering what the hell I was going to do when my fellow Southwesterners showed up.
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*;Notes from the Author : Not too much to say about this chapter at the moment, other than the reminder that the characters are imperfect.
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