CnC Chpt 9

==Cat and Crescent - Chapter 9 -==
<<Previous Chapter - Return to Story Index - Next Chapter>>
----
===The Cats of the Hondo===
Trojan-class Dropship Hondo
Departing Herotitus, Rimward Periphery
Saturday, October 2nd, 3024 
"Nine," Aksu said, standing at attention in the middle of the cargo bay. "I think."
 
"You think?" Remihel asked, rounding on him quickly. "You smuggled multiple cats onto this dropship and you didn't count them?"
 
Aksu opened his mouth, reconsidered his planned statement, and closed his mouth again to reconsider. Only when the silence threatened to grow too long did he speak again. "They aren't all mine, sir."
 
"So you didn't count them all... because you're not responsible for them all?"
 
"Yes, Commander."
Remihel sighed. "How many are you responsible for?"
 
"Six, sir. There's Cinnamon, and his sister Sticky Buns-" 
 
Josie's hand quickly shot up to cover her mouth, but a series of high-pitched squeaking sounds leaked through. She sat on a wooden crate and drummed her boot-heels into the side, in perfect time with every suppressed giggle. Remihel struggled to maintain his blank expression.
 
"-and then Rebel and her three kittens. They nested in my toolbox, sir. I didn't have the heart to evict them."
 
"Your toolbox."
 
"Yes sir - the big rolling one with a panel missing off the back? Rebel snuck in there when we were on Herotitus and-"
 
"No, stop, that's enough, just…" Remihel sighed. "Captain Harwood is allergic to cats, and he didn't want one cat on board, let alone six."
 
"Nine!" Josie corrected.
 
"An indeterminate number of cats possibly equal to or exceeding nine," Remihel said, letting his sarcasm run loose without a leash. "Of which three remain unaccounted for. Where are these other three cats, and who smuggled them aboard?"
 
Aksu looked more unhappy. "Sergeant Reich keeps charge of Lonestar and Cornet Wednesday. And Madison Diao brought…" he hesitated. "She brought… Bitty Bootsy Sugar Sprite."
 
"Bitty…"
 
"Bootsy Sugar Spr-"
 
Remihel couldn't take it any more. "This is a mercenary company, not an animal shelter!"
 
As his voice echoed through the cargo hold, Chief Lottie stepped out of the elevator. "Requestin' permission to enter, sir!"
 
"Yes, come in," Remihel said.
 
 Chief Lottie immediately stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Aksu, the classic pose of a mid-ranking officer preparing to shoulder blame for her subordinate. Abstractly, Remihel appreciated her gesture, even though he didn't feel it was strictly required. "What seems to be the issue, sir?"
 
"Did you know we have nine cats aboard the Hondo, Chief?"
 
"Yes, sir." she replied instantly. "Is that a problem?"
 
"The problem, Chief Lottie, is that I had to spend quite a bit of time petitioning Captain Harwood to accept one cat aboard. One cat, which I guaranteed would remain safely out of range of his allergies, down in the Lower Bay. Now, I discover that we have smuggled in not one, not two, but an additional eight cats…"
 
"We've kept them all in the Lower Bay," Chief Lottie immediately said. "And we-"
 
"No, no, no, stop," Remihel said. "Look Chief - I don't care about the cats themselves. But I thought I made it clear - before we left Herotitus - that I'd negotiated with Captain Harwood for one cat, with conditions! And at no time did anyone bother to ask me about any other cats! And I suspect, frankly, that you've been intentionally hiding all these extra cats from me…"
 
For a few moments, everyone remained quiet. Aksu finally coughed. "What would happen if we'd asked for permission rather than forgiveness, sir?"
 
"We probably could work something out," Remihel said. "But now I have to apologize to Captain Harwood, rather than bargaining for permission."
 
Chief Lottie stepped forward. "Commander, the blame is mine. I instructed the other Rangers to keep quiet about our menagerie."
 
"Do you have a reason?" Remihel demanded.
 
"Yes, sir." Chief Lottie said. "You… didn't know Captain Salazar, did you?"
 
"The former owner and commander? No, we never met," Remihel said.
 
"You accused him of planning to airlock Cinnamon for his financial scheme," Chief Lottie said. "And if he did, it wouldn't be the first time. Most days he'd be just fine, but occasionally he got these moods…" She hesitated. "When we did garrison duty, we could keep all the critters hidden, or scattered to the barracks Captain Salazar never went to. We got really good at hiding all of 'em, sir. I just… didn't know how ya might take it, sir. I told everyone to keep their critters on the down-low."
 
"And everyone listens to you because you're 'Mom' to the company," Remihel said.
 
"Yup, that's right."
 
Remihel sighed, and paced briefly back and forth while thinking about how to respond. "All right, Chief Lottie," he said. "I understand, but - I shall not mince words - I don't appreciate the deception. Why don't you take tonight to give it a nice long think... then report privately to me on anything else I might want to know. Tomorrow."
 
Chief Lottie nodded. "All right."
 
"Dismissed," Remihel said. Before they could respond, Remihel immediately turned on his heel and headed for the elevator, intent on leaving the scene as quickly as possible.
----
===We are not a High School===
Remihel retreated back to his cabin. He shed his boots, threw himself into his chair, and stared at the far wall in a funk.
 
Why does this thing with the cats bother me so much? It felt like such a silly thing. Captain Harwood might drop a few snide remarks or use it to leverage a bit more pay out of the Rangers, but in the end, what harm was really done? No, the issue lies with me. Why?
 
He'd been deceived, and that angered him. 
 
Not maliciously deceived, of course. But in his line of work, that sort of failure could be fatal. 
After his first experience on Herotitus, he struggled with paranoia. Training from TMI's experts helped him control it. He learned to read someone's body-language. A lot of invisible cues could betray a lie. He harnessed and used that paranoia to keep alive in his various covert roles.
 
And then there was Josie. Deception there, too. And all on Remihel's side. 
 
I flirted with her, then act surprised when she responds? Idiot! What did you expect? He tried, for a few moments, to justify it. He needed to coax her into the ranks of the Rangers. That's a lie - and it almost makes it less forgivable. I didn't need to go that direction. That was my choice.
 
Remihel thought about that for a few minutes and mentally blamed Volker for setting the wrong tone in their very first conversation. And yet, Remihel begrudgingly admitted, I can't make this all his fault, no matter how much I want to.
 
Once he'd assigned blame - even though mostly to himself - he worked on the harder question. What do I want to do now?
 
He pulled out his noteputer, entered the code to access his secure files from TMI, and found Josie's file. It drew heavily on material from the Herotitus gladiatorial leagues, including a rather hefty archive of professional glamor photos and holos, used for advertising. She'd changed her hair color a dozen times over the course of the last two years, he noticed. First her natural sandy brown, then a spectrum of dyes ending with her present bubble-gum pink. He paused on a swimsuit holo of her, kneeling in the surf with a smoky gaze for the viewer behind the camera. Staged, he quickly determined, and heavily touched up by the photographer. He stared at it for a few long seconds. Doctored for effect, but still quite effective...
 
A knock echoed through Remihel's cabin. With a pang of guilt, Remihel hastily turned off the noteputer and set it aside. "Yes?" he called.
 
"A moment of your time, sir." Wes called through the door.
 
"Come in."
 
Wes took a seat opposite Remihel. "I heard you hate cats."
 
"I do not hate cats."
 
Wes grinned. "That's what I figured." He kicked back in his seat. "In the middle of our last Solaris round, one of the mech-techs came up into the lounge all in a panic. 'The commander found our kittens!' Chief Lottie bolted out looking white as a sheet. I guess you chewed her out, huh?"
 
"A bit."
 
"Sarah spotted you in the hall. Said you looked... like nothing she'd ever seen before." Wes folded his arms. "She told me to come check on you."
 
"I'm fine."
 
"Yeah, see, that's bullshit." Wes pointed an accusing finger at him. "When Sarah's mad about something, she says I'm fine, and I have to decode that. Don't be like Sarah."
 
Remihel looked away and stared at the blank cabin wall. After a few moments, he cracked. "I don't like being deceived."
 
"Big deal, boss. So what? There's extra cats aboard. The mech-techs have a secret still for cooking up booze. Cesar Rimac runs a side-hustle and has a line to the black market. Ramram's a dirty Marik lawyer on the run from a mob boss. Doc Oz faked his medical credentials. Half the company is related, and you just chewed out their team mom."
 
"So it seems," Remihel hissed.
 
Wes remained in his seat, unmoved. "What else is there?"
 
"I'd prefer some peace and quiet to think. Tell Sarah I'm fine. Back to normal tomorrow."
 
"So there is something else..."
 
Remihel sighed. "I ran into Josie down in the mech bay. Drinking alone. Sat down and talked with her for a bit. A moment before the kittens appeared, she tried to kiss me."
 
Wes blinked. "Tried?"
 
"A kitten meowed. We got distracted."
 
"Huh." Confusion showed on Wes's face. "Well, there's always tomorrow."
 
"Wes." Remihel sighed. "It's not a good idea for me to get involved in a relationship with a subordinate."
 
"What, seriously? What did you think was going to happen, Baron? You've been flirting with her for the last week."
 
Remihel glared. "That obvious, huh?"
 
"No. Sarah pointed it out to me." Wes frowned. "I understand the military rules about relationships. But are you going to hold me to that standard? Everyone knows what's going on between me and the finance lady. Nobody cares. Aside from your comments about how we ought to get married."
 
"You should," Remihel said. He crossed his arms. "You go well together."
 
Wes glared at him. "Sarah's grandmother made her a wedding dress before her family fled Capellan space. Sarah was five at the time. Every time you make that comment, she gets reminded that she can't fit in it. She asked to wait until she could."
 
"Oh." Remihel sighed. "Now I feel like an insensitive jerk."
 
"You are. Usually. Though right now, you're all angsty. This is a mercenary company, not high school." Wes grinned and stood up. "As punishment, I'm dragging you down to Tiny Mike's gym to pump some iron with me."
----
===Missing Home===
Trojan-class Dropship Hondo
Arriving at Lyreton, Rimward Periphery
Saturday, October 2nd, 3024
The jump came in the wee hours of the morning. Josie woke up, confused in the darkness of her bunk, hearing a voice over Hondo's intercom announcing the upcoming transition. A familiar but dull headache of a mild hangover pulsed behind her eyes, though it faded quickly.
 
She felt light, and her hair floated in front of her face. Zero gravity, she realized. That means the engines have stopped. No acceleration. Three bungee straps held her down in bed, though she didn't remember securing herself before going to sleep.
 
Soft breathing informed Josie that her roommate - aero-tech Stephanie de Pascale - simply intended to sleep through the K-F jump. Maybe Stephanie's done it often enough to get used to it. But this is only my second jump. She knew the process in abstract terms. The Hondo hitched itself up to an Invader-class JumpShip. The Invader then dumped its vast reserves of energy into its Kearny-Fuchida drive, and in the course of a few seconds, lunged across space to its final destination in another star system.
 
//"Thirty seconds."\\ A soft countdown echoed over the DropShip's internal speakers. Josie stared at the ceiling above her bunk and wondered if she'd suffer the same nausea as last time. //"Ten seconds,"\\ the intercom declared. Josie counted down in her head, but at three-
 
The only physical clue from the jump was a soft creak from something shifting within the cabin, but Josie felt it between her ears - a momentary stabbing pain that dulled into uncomfortable dizziness. But unlike her first jump two years prior, from Lyreton to Herotitus, her stomach remained calm. In the lower bunk, Stephanie tossed, muttered a few profanities, and went back to sleep. 
 
Oh, that's not pleasant, Josie thought. She checked her chrono. 0320 hours shipboard time. Josie pushed her head back against her pillow, figuring she'd only gotten three hours of sleep. Her dizziness remained, fading slowly and preventing her from drifting off again.
 
I'm back, she realized. Back to Lyreton… can I call it 'home' any more? I fear I can't - there's no one here to make it home.
 
A half hour passed as Josie lay in the darkness, struggling to coax herself back to sleep. She felt faint vibrations through the hull as the Hondo disconnected from the JumpShip and floated free. The engines fired, and the DropShip's acceleration built steadily to one half gravity.
 
Now I need to go to the bathroom, Josie realized, checking the time once again. Maybe I just ought to get up, and try to sneak a nap in during the afternoon…
 
When her chrono ticked over to 0405, she finally gave up, loosened the bungee straps on her bunk, and dropped quietly down to the deck. Half gravity felt… odd. Though she'd grown up on Moab, entirely immersed in its point-four-eight gravity, she'd gotten used to the point-nine-eight gravity on Herotitus. She felt… lighter. I've changed.
 
Moving carefully in the dark, cautious of the low gravity and wary in case her dizziness returned, Josie slipped out of her nightgown, donning athletic shorts and a tank top before slipping out of the cabin. Stephanie, still sleeping in the lower bunk, mumbled when the external light flooded briefly into the room, but Josie quickly rushed out and latched the door behind her.
 
Her bare feet sounded quiet on the cold deck, and Hondo's passageways remained empty. The ship's crew lived two decks above, and didn't mix very often with the mercenaries they carried around. 
 
After hitting the bathroom - or is it the head, on a DropShip? - Josie headed for the impromptu gym. As she passed Remihel's stateroom, she remembered what she'd nearly done the previous night. The memory caused her to flinch with embarrassment. Momma's Rules never said anything about snogging your commanding officer. She hurried along, now dreading the awkward moment when she'd see Remihel again. Probably can't pretend it didn't happen… and there's no way he didn't understand what we nearly did. Oh well - problems for later.
 
Given the early hour, the gym was empty, leaving Josie free choice of the various pieces of equipment. Guess I'll make Sergeant Reich happy and complete my mandatory daily exercise. She adjusted the height of a stationary exercise bike, donned her headphones, and peddled.
 
A half hour of this, she decided, and turned up her music. The martial wail of Highlander bagpipes rose in her ears - Pure Dead Brilliant's modern cover of March of the Soldiers of Robert Bruce. Growing up, she hated her father's constant need to play bagpipe music, instead preferring "That Canopian Rubbish." Only after getting to Herotitus did she rediscover some of the music from her ancestors, and much of it spoke to her primal wish for justice and revenge. I'm coming to finish your work, Daddy, she vowed to the silent gym. I nearly forgot what you taught me, but your creed shall not die. I'll pass it on - someday, somehow.
 
The music shifted to some of That Canopian Rubbish - the latest hit by Black Knight Meteorite. Josie lowered her head and pedaled, though she kept the stationary bike on a low difficulty setting, and sang a few of the lyrics under her breath.
 
When she finished, the dropship remained quiet. Still too early for everyone to be awake. With nothing better to do, she found the Battlemech simulators and slid into the cockpit mocked up to best resemble her Griffin. Random scenario - one-versus-one - same weight class. 
 
Her neurohelmet lay in the seat where she'd left it the prior evening. She'd received a new-but-used helmet upon joining the Rangers - a teal green helmet decorated with stickers of Gray Noton's Legend-Killer, the Capellan Confederation's curved sword, and white letters mis-spelling the previous pilot's callsign "Centiped." She'd scraped them all off and replaced them with her own - a stylized teacup and a Valkyries team logo.
 
The holographic screens sparkled alive to create the impression of a full environment. <{"Reactor online,"}> the simulator declared, imitating the startup sequence of a real Griffin. <{"Sensors online. Weapons online. All systems nominal."}>
 
She found herself in one of the Solaris arenas. This is Boreal Reach! She'd seen it on the Solaris tournament replays running in the lounge, and had a good feeling for the layout. 
An SHD-2H Shadow Hawk faced her, and Josie moved to meet it. The simulated Griffin responded to her every whim, running smoothly through the snow. It felt exhilarating to once again practice against a lone opponent. About this time, Remihel would tell me to fall back into formation. The thought caused her a moment of hesitation, and the Shadow Hawk winged her with a surprise salvo from its five-pack LRM launcher. Focus on the goal, she reminded herself, dismissing the damage as negligible. A distracted mechwarrior is a dead mechwarrior.
 
While the Shadow Hawk scuttled back toward cover, Josie brought the Griffin into action, quickly slapping a PPC bolt into its center torso and then rippling out ten LRMs from the canister-like launcher on her right shoulder. The open arena suited her skills. Whether with Battlemechs or small arms, she performed best at long range. The Shadow Hawk, meanwhile, wanted to brawl, and sprinted from cover to cover, seeking to close. Josie mentally mapped all the various lanes of approach, and slowly fell back to cover them as the Shadow Hawk came at her. 
 
Not today, Denise, she vowed, mentally placing her foe in the enemy cockpit. Maybe someday I'll forgive you, but not today. 
 
Not every shot hit true, but by the time the Shadow Hawk entered brawl range, Josie's weaponry battered the armor to pieces, wrecked the shoulder-mounted autocannon, and set the mech limping. 
 
With the range now point-blank, Josie triggered her jump-jets, rose into the air, and came down on the enemy's shoulders. The dramatic death-from-above attack sheared off both the enemy mech's arms, and left it pitifully vulnerable. Even as her own Griffin tried to keep itself upright, Josie brought the mech's left arm up and punched the Shadow Hawk in the head. The cockpit yielded to her blow, killing the pilot and ending the simulated duel. And there we go. Off to the morgue, Denise.
 
She reviewed a playback of the duel. Mostly satisfactory, she decided. I could stand a bit more practice with my PPC. Her time with the Trebuchet came in handy for using the LRMs, though she missed the raw overwhelming firepower from the Treb's twin LRM-15s.
 
Josie considered a few more rounds of practice, but instead queued up an empty map. Over the last week, the Rangers practiced a dozen different scenarios on Moab, preparing for their battle with the Reavers, and she spawned the Griffin in Bingham Prefecture, only a few kilometers outside the capital.
 
She'd grown up here, but the sim-pod's software made it feel alien. The raw terrain was mostly there - hills to the north, sea to the east, and rolling ground where the Tamarindo River flowed. But the simulator used generic tropical jungle as ground cover, made the houses rather too orderly, and populated the streets with expensive Inner Sphere autos. The ocean looked too dark, the sandy beaches looked too white, and where sea and land mingled, the computer failed to generate the large waves ideal for surfing. Only Mandrinn Crivoi's old Capellan fortress-turned-palace translated into this virtual world, with its walls, underground battlemech hangers, and the various different barracks and pagodas set aside for the lord and his retainers.
 
I miss home, Josie sighed. She halted her Griffin near the palace, and reviewed the scene with longing. I'm never going to get it back. The best I can do is build another one, and try to keep it safe.
----
<<Previous Chapter - Return to Story Index - Next Chapter>>
Chapter 9