ANME-8

=Chapter 8 Ancient Memories=
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==Cheating Cheaters==
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===Act 1===
Solaris VIILyran Commonwealth2891
Gerald Rothstein brought his 'mech up to a trot as it left the hangars. Media drones circled like eager carrion birds. "Don't scratch the ride, Rothstein. The boss is giving you a chance, so don't ****** it up."
Gerald knew better. The mechwarrior who owns this 'mech, is too hung over and too old. He's filling in for the boss, using the boss's name, and the Boss's ride.
The arena wasn’t one of the big name ones for this fight. In reality it was a bombed out former ground car parking area that was close enough to an industrial area that stray shots devastated it. The Leaguer’s “The Factory” was practically next door, but they weren't allowed in there in no uncertain terms. There was practically no cover, and the ground was more gravel and rubble than ferrocrete.
It's late in the season, and they need at least a draw to keep the boss in the Semi-finals. To keep the sponsors, and the pay.
A few bribes still needed to be paid out to keep the Gaming Commission officials from crying foul for the substitution, and ruining the betting odds.
His first opponent showed up on the tracker. Jerry ambled left, feeling the response in Gungnir's bodgy hip. The old Black Knight was a pieced-together salvage job. It’d been in the old man's family since the Star League's fall, and had seen better days.
The other guys weren't in much better shape. Though their Warhammer was, at least, in better condition.
The counter on his display showed them reaching the arena floor right about the same time he would. Remember, you're being Juan Carlos today, he always salutes the crowd… Jerry did a pivot of his 'mech's upper body and raised the arms in the traditional salute before assuming his starting position.
Three…
Two…
One…
And the fight was on.
Particle beams lashed out from the Whammy, and Jerry did a pirouette and dodge maneuver he'd been practicing as a structures test when he worked on the 'mech's actuators.
Synthetic lightning carved into the packed gravel and sand, as he dashed laterally to bring his main weapon to bear on the Whammy.
The other guy rewarded him by stepping up to a jog, and revealing his leg. Gerald lashed it with his PPC, conserving his other heavy weapons until the Warhammer got closer.
Their shots went wide. His carved a furrow in the Warhammer's left leg, exploiting that design's weaker leg armor.
Heat levels bounced, as their return fire caught him across his right torso.
No critical system alarms sounded.
The Warhammer seemed to hesitate for a moment. As if the pilot was trying to decide to keep the range open where they had a slight advantage, or get in closer where the secondary weapons of the Warhammer could make themselves felt.
Gerald didn't hesitate, he stepped inward, bringing his large lasers into the fight, his shots slashed downward, crossing the knee actuator and foot actuator of the Warhammer, while his PPC added synthetic lightning, all to that left leg.
The Whammy went down, and Gerald felt relief-he'd managed one of Juan Carlos's special moves, crippling the other machine without risking the pilot.
And that's when something hit his rear armor, alarms blared, then silenced, as something else hit the same place.
He saw the chest of Gungnir bulge outward, as the fusion engine tore loose and released sublimating plasma as it tumbled free.
His ejection handle worked, and he was hurtling away from the 'mech, with machine-gun tracers passing by him as his ejection seat tumbled.
The bout was supposed to be one-on-one, but the heavy form of a tracked combat vehicle said it wasn't. Oh ******, I'm dead.
But then a small form of salvation. The media drones, broadcasting the fight were swirling around. Cheating was one thing but outright murder during a broadcast?
His seat's retros fired, and he found himself descending…
A tracer round hit the seat, and he tumbled out of control, as the drones…flew away?
The sensation of pavement striking the back of his ejection seat brought darkness.
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===Act 2===
"...waking up." Gerald opened his eyes. He was in a MASH Van.
"You… are not Juan Carlos," an asian man said. "Very disappointing, that."
"Nein…" Gerald reverted to the Deutsch accent. "Who're you?"
"Well, we're not the gaming commission, or their employees. Where is your boss? Who warned him?"
"Wha?"
"Who warned your boss? Simple enough question, answer it," the Asian man said.
Gerald didn't know the answer.
Four hours later, he still didn't know, but he knew what it felt like to be tortured for information he didn't have, and that wasn't current.
And he still didn't know who these men were, only that they really wanted Juan Carlos, and whoever warned the man about today.
"Chu-Sa, this boy knows nothing," the interrogator's torturer said.
"Well, dispose of him discreetly. He is neither the deserter, nor does he know where the deserter has gone."
By this point, Gerald was little more than a dishrag wrung out in a wood-chipper, as big men with grim faces wrapped his legs and arms with rigging tape and put him in the boot of a large sedan.
They drove for several hours, it felt like, until the car stopped and he was lifted out of it, dragged-carried across arid scrub desert dirt, to be dropped into…a septic tank.
The last thing he saw was the cover being closed. Entombed, with no understanding of how, or why he’d been left to die like this.
It wasn't fair. It wasn't right. He struggled against his bindings with all his remaining might.
The cover lifted. "Hey, You alive in there?" More strangers.
"Ja!! Yes!!" he shouted. Don't let me die in here!!
"I'll get you out of there in a jiffy pal." Pal? Who speaks like that?
The man who came down into the septic tank was almost so nondescript as to be forgettable even up close.
"They did a number on you man…hang on." The buzz of a vibroblade and the bindings were cut. 
"Thank you…I…I don't know-"
"Wait till we're upstairs. Hey, Nixon! Rope ladder and a tackle, I think they cut this guy's hamstrings!"
He was lifted out in a rope sling.
"You're soft, Mike. Why this guy?"
"Our targets thought he was worth burying in the desert," 'Mike' said. "Seems like a good idea not to let them have what they want."
"Fair."
"Targets?" Gerald asked.
"Yeah, a Drac Noble's family. They killed a few folks, the survivors hired us to even the pans… Oh, hi. I'm Mike, your name?"
“Gerald.”
"Tess, you got the medkit?" Mike asked.
"Right here, Mike." Their medic was beautiful, the most beautiful woman Gerald had ever seen.
"You're an angel…" he breathed.
"Sometimes," she said agreeably, as she went to work on his savaged limbs. "Yeah, we can fix this… Mike, could you be a dear and fetch me some extra light please?"
"He looks pretty bad…" Mike commented as he went to their ground car and brought back a construction light.
"Not that bad," she said. Gerald felt tingling in his savaged legs and arms. "Really, not that bad…"
"What can I do to thank you?" Gerald asked. "I don't have a lot, I was just an assistant to the senior tech on Gungnir..."
"Gungnir?"
"A classic Black Knight, owned by my… employer, Juan Carlos," he told them. "I don't have a lot-"
"What do you have?" Mike asked. "In your pocket, I mean? I'm gonna guess your account's probably frozen…"
Gerald reached into the pocket of his shorts, and found his wallet, there were a few loose M-Bills… and a ten C-bill voucher.
"That's enough," Mike said. "How would you like to get some payback on the bastards that did this?"
"I would!"
"This is enough for that, too," Mike said. "Isn't it, Tess?"
"Service is rendered, payment made," Tess said in a strange tone.
"They're out to kill your employer…"
"Wrong, they already did it," Nixon, the other man in the trio, said, holding up a portable comm device with Solaris News on the main window.
"I'm out of a job…" Gerald lamented.
"You're a Tech, you also a pilot?" Mike asked.
"Yes."
"I think we can hire you, if you're interested?"
“But I don't have a 'mech."
"THAT, can be dealt with," Mike said. "Here, stand up…"
"Have a drink," Tess said, offering a copper flask. 
Gerald accepted it, and the taste was powerful, sweet, and alcoholic. "Mead?"
"Yes," she smiled an adorable smile. He felt… different. She was still absolutely beautiful in his eyes, but she was no longer sexy, more like awe inspiring.
"You're fit, come on, we've got a long night ahead of us," she offered. "After all, Justice must be served."
Gerald followed the trio to their rental vehicle.
How did they find me? All this open expanse? It shouldn’t be possible.
But looking at her, like his eyes were open for the first time, at least for real. He knew.
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===Act 3===
"Hey, new guy, Gerald?" She was petite, sandy haired and looked for all the world like someone's bookish sister. But Gerald couldn't remember whose.
"Yes?"
"Steph," she said, extending her hand. "I'm told you're a warrior in need of a ride. Did Mike explain the deal?"
"Not really."
"Oh, this is going to be fun." She said, beckoning him into the Dropship. "You're still wearing a cooling vest. You a competitor?"
"I… I was substituting for one…" he felt an urge to tell her the truth. "My warrior was unfit, it was a bout for rankings…"
"Oh! Huh… well, we're going to need to kit you up. The boss found a bunch of jobs here on Solaris, so we're going to be here a bit. And it just happens that having a competitor will help us with the jobs…so, let's get you kitted first. You were driving that Black Knight that tore up Hokada's Warhammer, right?"
"Yes."
"So, you're okay in a heavy? Decent, anyway?"
"Um, I suppose… so? I've only had Juan Carlos's teachings… no formal training."
"Mike and Johnny will fix that one, let's see…" she led him between 'mech cubicles. "Here we go… now a Knight doesn't have jump-jets, and a Grasshopper does. But it's a tough ride. You okay with that? Not as much firepower but…"
"I couldn't afford this for a lifetime!"
"Yeah, well, the boss wants you kitted proper. Can you handle it?"
"I can try!"
"Good enough. Let's get you logged into it with your own personal codes, then we'll see about…upgrades."
“I hate to ask but… I doubt I can go back to my apartment.”
"Huh… talk to the Boss on that one. He might've sent Lara and Cham to pick up your stuff…if it's still there. But it's probably worth reminding him."
“For now, I’ll help you out.” A slightly taller, more athletic looking golden blonde woman walked up to them. “Hmmm. Yeah. You’re my new scratching post.”
"Deedee, I saw him fir-"
"Now, now, Steph. You know how it works. But I can share." 
Steph rolled her eyes. "Gerald, this is Styles, and she's senior. Deirdre, this is Gerald, he's the new guy."
"Replacing YOU as the new guy," Styles reminded her. "We'll begin the evening with drills, to get you familiar with your ride. If you do well enough, there will be a reward."
Gerald looked at the two women, and just nodded.
There was, in fact, something… shinier about Styles, some unearthly quality that the other woman also had, but to a far lesser degree.
"Stephanie, fetch Gerald a proper coolant suit. The booty-shorts and vest are fetching, but we really are going to be doing proper training, and I don’t want him to pass out from the heat too soon."
"Right…"
When she brought back the cooling suit, Gerald felt a stab of recognition. Star League… lostech?
"Yes," Steph said. "It is, and yes, it's expensive. And yes, it's yours… along with this delightful neurohelmet that isn't manufactured anywhere any more… and Styles isn't going to let me watch you put it on, because I'm still too new. I'll be in the office."
“Don’t worry. I’m feeling generous, so I might let you watch him take it off. I, however, am not too new." Styles said. "So strip. Let me see what I'm working with."
Strangely, it wasn't humiliating. Instead, it felt almost erotic.
"Yep, Tess does know how to pick 'em."
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===Act 4===
Mike had them assembled in the lounge area of the Dropship Summer’s Wrath.
It was an old Lion Class dropship that they saved from the scrapyards before Exodus, but it served their needs.
“Our target. Ryukan Kirishima. She’s the widow of the previous ruler of the planet Midway in the Draconis Combine, and uses the traditional naming structure of ancient Japan, where the family name comes before the given name. We have information she’s tied to the Yakuza, and has developed an interest in Solaris as a staging point where she can move illicit goods through Solaris to the Combine, and illicit goods from the Combine to Lyran and Marik space,” Mike briefed as a holoimage of a middle aged but still attractive asian woman projected on the wall.
“From what we can gather, her husband was a weak and ineffectual ruler and she was the real power behind the throne before his convenient death. In fact, her two brothers-in-law and every member of the Ryukan family that had a reasonable claim to become the new ruler with the death of her husband seemed to suffer quite convenient deaths as well,” Mike continued.
“So how does Juan Carlos fit into all of this?” Gerald asked.
“We believe he was supposed to take a dive, and refused. So one was arranged for him. The end goal seems to be to have their warrior also keep their standing. The idea being they could then use the cover of shipping in legitimate supplies for a competitor for their shipping of illicit goods. But without standing, such large shipments from the Combine or Free Worlds League would draw a lot more attention.”
"So…who hired you?" Gerald asked.
"Anne Weatherwax." 
"Who?"
"You don't know her. Her family isn't prominent. She paid us for this," Steph explained.
"This is an expensive operation, how rich is she?"
"She had about twenty thousand Comstar Notes, everything she had, really," Styles observed. "So we took the job. Kind of like how you had what was in your wallet, and not much else."
"That's insane. You can't even buy repair parts for-"
"No, not to Anne Weatherwax. They took her family away from her. The life she built, children, a husband, everything but twenty thousand C-bills… it was what she could pay, so we took the job. It's how our particular unit works, Gerald. Our clients pay us what they can pay, we do the job. It doesn't matter how big the job is, only that the client paid everything they could pay… kind of like you did."
"But… if that was everything…"
"She's getting Justice," Nixon said from his seat. "Or revenge. Depends how you look at things. She won't get it from Kuritan courts, or the government here on Solaris… but she can get it from us… but there's a price. Because there is always a price. We never charge more than a client can pay, but we also never ask for less."
"Besides, you may have noticed we're not exactly scrambling for materiel," Lara (he'd learned her name before the meeting) noted. "You might say we've got another sponsor, who handles our expenses in exchange for our activities."
Gerald nodded. His conscious mind was still rejecting it but even so, he knew. This ‘Tess’ or ‘Theresa’. She wasn’t human. She looked human. But that was clearly a facade. 
“Mein Gott,” Gerald said after a moment.
“It’s true I ask a lot, but I also give a lot in return. That is the core of what I am. I am certain of that.” Theresa walked gracefully into the lounge. “Indeed, once this mission is done, I’m thinking my Champions have earned a ritual of hedonism, revelry, and celebration of life, the likes of which will take some time to recover from. One could even call it a party.”
“The sample was fun, the main course should be delicious.” Styles licked her lips in anticipation, looking at Gerald.
“Mission first, Styles. Our target is the Golden Dragons Stables. Duchess Ryukan is meeting with her contacts there at zero seven hundred tomorrow morning, local time. They only have five operational mechs at the moment. One of which will be in transit to the Colosseum since they technically ‘won’ their last bout. We don’t have a solid number for how many of the local Yakuza will be at the meeting, but Duchess Ryukan we know will have six bodyguards.” Mike resumed the briefing.
“Should be simple enough to frame this as Juan Carlos having more friends than they anticipated and are looking for a little payback,” Nixon nodded.
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===Act 5===
The difference between a military operation and a police operation can be explained very simply: Police are trying to gather evidence and suspects, account for witnesses, or rescue hostages.
This was not that kind of operation. Intent, method, plan, the strike was to kill an enemy. There would be no effort to minimize casualties or damage beyond containing it to the grounds held by the Golden Dragon Stables-a thing made necessary more to assure the destruction of the enemy inside it.
"This… is going to be murder?" Gerald asked.
"Murder's a funny thing, Gerry… Jerry," Steph said. "See, they already set the terms when they rigged your death, thinking it was your boss-they're already murderers. They set what Mike would call 'The Rules of Engagement' at 'no rules'."
"So… not murder."
"No, not murder. Justice. And maybe a lesson to others about cheating, murder, and assassination and what it brings you… to encourage more thinking in others."
She finished making adjustments on his new ride, a Grasshopper. "You're not carrying that useless little light missile rack now. I changed the layout to a four-pack SRM system with some tweaks, they're more accurate and more will hit a target at the medium and long ranges, but you'll want to be conservative with it. Same with the lasers, but we've also tweaked with the heat curve-you can take more risks, but I'd really prefer it if you played like you couldn't."
"Why?"
"Because this kind of performance hasn't been 'normal' since the Star League's Royal Regiments, and that draws attention. The kind we don't want."
"From who?"
"Comstar, The Houses…" she shrugged. "Take your pick. Leverage your advantages, but don't let everyone see you doing it."
"If I don't?"
"If you don't, you can fix your own ****** gear," she said. "I give you leverage, but I'm damned if I'll let you abuse it. I lost everyone who mattered because we let it out that we discovered something. I won't do that again."
He was confused. "What do you mean, you mean you found-"
"No, I used to be a scientist… and an engineer," she told him. "That's why I know so much about the fundamental theory that makes 'mechs run. And finding out new things cost me everything because I didn't know to keep my ****** mouth shut. Leverage it where you won't be seen, Jerry, or only if you absolutely have to." Her hard eyes made more sense to him now, and he felt sympathy for her pain.
"I'll be careful, I promise," he said.
She accepted it, and finished her adjustments. "Alright, we're going at zero three tonight, means you have a couple hours, get some food and a potty break."
At zero three hundred hours, a group of 'mechs moved through sections of the city that 'mechs aren't supposed to go, and they moved without being seen.
Some of that was ECM, some of it was… well… not ECM.
It might have made an impressive parade, if witnesses didn't have other, more important things to pay attention to, if even the people awakened by the multi-ton footsteps didn't roll over with a thought of someone else's problem.
This even affected the guards at the targeted location. The arriving 'mechs were simply… not their problem.
By the time their minds overcame the fuzz of fatigue and boredom to realize that maybe there WAS a problem, it was too late.
Portable radio comms were flatlined, the land-lines from the Stable's office and 'mech hangar were cut, followed by the power.
Then the killing really began.
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===Act 6===
"...reports this morning, investigators are still close-lipped about last night's incident. Fire and safety officials are refusing to discuss the death toll, but given what airborne survey and surveillance suggests, the entire complex was gutted by fires and explosions. Game officials are not releasing information on how this apparent disaster will impact standings in the run to the championship, but…"
Jerry turned off the broadcast. Nixon handed him a cup of something strong. "You'll get used to it, New Guy. Trust me, the feeling goes away."
"When?" Jerry asked.
"It takes… it's different for everyone," Nixon told him. "I think I lost that feeling after Elbar. I'm pretty sure Mike still feels a twinge when we're being really effective, but then… he's a good man."
"And you?"
"I haven't been a good man in a long time. The best I can manage is to be… careful. Not let it out unless there's a damned good reason."
"We didn't leave anyone alive, did we?"
"That was the job," Nixon told him. "We took the pay, we did the job, we did it completely, got the job done."
'Did we?"
"The Lady running the show was on site with her lover. It's why we had to go last night-the targets were concentrated, the job could be finished faster."
Jerry drank from the cup and tasted honey-wine, that sickening fermented beverage made from honey and yeast… and his uncertainties and his guilt bled away.
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