Chapter 327 – The Wolf Of The Wasteland

December 11th, 2499

22:07 SCT

Mar Sara Colony Command Bunker

"How do you think the command training went, Ma'am?" Diaz asked Aqua as she took off the helmet she was wearing.

"It was... interesting. I'll be honest, they never warned me that this was a possibility." She replied, fixing her hair quickly with her hands instead of using her magic.

"That's fair, though I thought you did quite well considering it's your first time. You'll use this interface to link yourself to satellites or drones above a command centre, and can relay your orders to the troops on the ground this way. It gives you real-time intelligence on the base's surroundings, lets you place defences quickly, and helps you keep people alive."

"It just seems odd to me that you don't have a commander who would normally be using this."

"It is normal in the regular army for the commander or one of his subordinates to use the interface, but in tiny militias like ours, it falls to the Magistrate. You're the commander of both the militia and the colonists' leader, after all. Here." He said, handing her a weird-looking grey stick with a curve on one end that gave it a resemblance to a miniature shepherd's crook. 

"What is this?" She asked, taking it from him.

"It's the mobile version, not the VR training sim. Just hook it over your ear and tap that button; it puts a screen over one eye and lets you access the command system without being stuck in the command centre. Once we get out to the relocation area in the wasteland, you will probably want that instead of being stuck in one of these command centres. Unless we fall under attack, then you probably want to be in here, protected by all this metal."

"Right. Are the civilian leaders here yet?"

"Some are; the rest are on their way."

"Any further word from Colonel Duke yet?" 

"No, Ma'am. Just the orders he sent you earlier."

"Fine. These orders just seem odd. Why are we being quarantined because of what happened on Chau Sara?" She said, grabbing the transcript the Adjutant had made of the holographic message that Duke sent her and reading through it again. To paraphrase the Colonel, Mar Sara was being quarantined, and she was to gather the colony's population and prepare the world for a total lockdown in forty-eight hours. The message had arrived while she was eating dinner at 1900, so she had forty-five hours remaining to get the population there. 

"Maybe he wants everyone in one centralized location that can support the number of ships required to move us off world? We do have 80 000 people to get off planet after all, and over half of them are spread around the rest of the settlements." He offered.

"This doesn't say anything about evacuations off world. Just being locked down and quarantined."

"Beats me. Ya never know what the upper ups are thinking half the time, and the rest of the time you have to deal with the mess they make when you realize they weren't thinkin' at all. Ahem, pardon, Ma'am, didn't mean yerself, of course. Helluva first day for you." 

"You can say that again. Any word on Jo- Marshal Wayne?"

"Yes. Johnny came by while you were in the sim and I was out having a smoke. He took one look at the Duke's orders, shook his head and hopped back on his Vulture. Said he would scout out the route and catch up with us tomorrow."

"He what!?" She said, her eyes snapping up to the towering man in the combat armour. 

I need him here! What in the world is he thinking, leaving me here hanging like this???

"Ahem. He said it would be a good learning opportunity, and that I should make sure you don't get into any trouble. Ma'am."

"I see. Well... I guess I'll do just that."

"Ma'am?"

"Nothing." She said, standing up. "Take me to the civilian leaders, please." If John wanted her to take this opportunity to learn how to manage a large number of people, she would take it as a challenge. She would become useful to him, even if it turned her hair as grey as his was.

Cliffside wedding! Do you hear me, John Wayne! Cliffside wedding, overlooking the sea. And I want zero complaints from you if I turn into a bridezilla for this, cause if you're going to drop 80 000 people into my lap to evacuate in less than two days just to run off and ride a damn hoverbike, I get what I want too!

An odd chill ran down John's spine, causing him to shiver for a moment as he flew across the wasteland at well over 130 mph. Normally, doing something like this would be insane in the dark, but with his new reflexes, he could push the bike hard in the limited visibility. Even if he did crash, he would just activate Divine Shield. His bike, and probably this power armour, would be wrecked, but he would be fine. 

After hearing that their sister colony in this system had been destroyed, John had immediately dropped everything and headed over to the barracks where his armour was stored. With one look at the line of a dozen suits, he sighed. They were all beat up and damaged, obviously hand-me-downs from regular line units and had probably seen service in the Guild Wars that this body had served in a decade ago. One even had beer cans and metal twine patching some holes in its chest piece. 

Not thinking about it, he pulled out the Sonic Screwdriver again and started a hasty repair job on all the suits, turning these ancient, beat-up clunkers made by the lowest bidder into... well, new ancient clunkers made by the lowest bidder. He then donned his suit and fired up its vespene gas-powered motor. It reminded him of a cross between an old 60s astronaut suit and the power armours from Infinite Frontiers. Just thinking about having those suits made him sad; this thing was... well, fairly primitive by comparison.

Still, he could walk around in it, and while it wasn't as powerful as his Ogre form by any means, it was armour the same as everyone else's. Plus, it had a HUD, and if a nearby command center was available, he could link to its network and use satellite and drone imagery for a bird's-eye view of his position and a readout of anyone in his squad. 

As he finished the repairs, other militia members started showing up, and since he was the only one there, they questioned him about why they had new suits. He cursed under his breath, said he had no idea, and suggested they might be a gift from the new Magistrate. Not wanting to answer any more questions about the suits' origins, he told them to suit up and report to the command centre for further instructions.

He drove over there on his Vulture and met Arnold, one of his deputies, while he was outside smoking. Apparently the new Magistrate was in the middle of some simulation training for company command and control. John's memories had knowledge of it, but he had never used it himself. He was just a grunt during his time in the army, and ever since he came to Mar Sara, he'd been pretty much just a peace officer or game warden, not a soldier.  

After Arnold apprised him of the situation, he looked at the orders the regular army had sent to the Magistrate and decided to clear out any of these Zerg in the surrounding region before the civilians and militia got there. He told Arnold he was going to scout the route, then slapped him on the back and told him to take this as an opportunity to learn some new things so he would be ready to become a Marshal himself, and to keep her out of trouble.

It might have been a hasty decision, but after I read that message, I felt the canon pulling me in this direction. I figured coming out here to investigate might allow me to change it...but so far its been nothing but rocks.

A red blip flashed on his Mental Map, and a moment later he flew past a couple of zerglings. He laughed a bit and brought the Vulture to a halt. This would be as good a place as any. 

Jumping off the bike, he opened the suit's chest plate and climbed out. The night air was cool, and he let the breeze run through his hair for a few moments before reaching into his pocket and pulling out his Timberwolf. It might be a bit overkill for some Zerglings, but he hadn't really had a chance to use it yet, other than as a glorified transport through the woods.

After checking his Mental Mapping to make sure he was far enough away from those Zerg, he walked a few steps away from his power armour and pulsed his magic into the figure. Within moments, a forty-foot-tall black mech stood in front of him. He climbed up the boarding ladder, slid into the cockpit and put on the neurohelmet. A familiar female voice spoke through his headset.

Reactor: Online.

Sensors: Online.

Weapons: Online.

All systems: Nominal.

"Hello, darlin'. Long time, no see." He said idly, laughing yet again that even though both mechs he owned were vastly different, their computers had the same voice.

The machine hummed to life in a much more civilized manner than Suzy Q, even though the massive engine below him was much larger than the little Jenners. He flicked through a bunch of system checks, checked his sensor readings, then looked at his weapon loadout.

Timberwolf Prime

ER Large Laser x 2

ER Medium Laser x 2

Medium Pulse Laser

LRM 20 x 2 (240 Missiles)

Machine Gun x 2 (200 Burst)

He laughed at that last one... he saw what these clans called a machine gun as he climbed up. They were 20mm chain guns that had a stupidly high rate of fire. Perfect for turning zerglings into swish cheese without raising too many questions about incinerated corpses from firing his heavier laser weapons.  

I mean, I can't imagine too many people would ask questions about it, but there will be a convoy moving through here tomorrow. After fighting these things last night, I can only imagine they're why this planet is being put into quarantine. Alec did allude to the fact that this world was under threat by the Zerg, so burning out as many of them as I can seems to be the best way to save as many of its people as possible. 

He checked the DEN screen for upgrades and found he could swap the weapon pods for a bunch of premade Timberwolf variants, or choose his own loadout. He considered swapping the pulse laser for more machine guns, but let it be for now.

He marked this position on his navigation map, turned on his thermal vision, and loped off into the darkness. He quickly found the zerglings he had passed; his cameras and sensors picked them up long before his Mental Mapping skill did. A quick burst of fire, and several hundred depleted uranium shells the size of pop cans cut them in half. 

He plotted the convoy's route from town to this evacuation point and began clearing a corridor nearly a mile wide on either side. As he moved north, he came across more and more zerglings, though not as many as the night before. He mowed them down before they even knew he was on them, the machine guns easily tearing them to shreds. 

Eventually, he crossed an old bridge and moved through some foothills near the evacuation zone. It was harder to find his targets among those hills and ravines, but he made good use of his jump jets and kept clearing the path. He even accidentally landed on a pair of the beasts, giving them the old 'Highlander Burial'* under the seventy-five tons of fury called a Timberwolf. 

Finally at the evacuation point, he stopped and wondered exactly what he was looking at. Several wide concrete buildings stood in front of him. Clearly abandoned, they were only a single story high, at least on the surface, but hundreds of yards wide and deep, with multiple doors and broken glass windows scattered along their walls. Each one had several ramps that led up to the equally wide roofs and could easily accommodate multiple dropships landing on them, or even larger craft if necessary.  

He scratched his head; yes, they could land ships up there if they were being evacuated off-planet, but... why? There was plenty of flat ground elsewhere; why come here?

He checked his sensors again for any electronic signals, but found nothing nearby. Nothing indicated anyone had lived here, at least not for a very long time.  

"Well, let's clear out the surrounding area of zerg first, then head back. I'd rather not get caught driving this beast around in daylight. A black machine disappearing in the darkness is a ghost story; a four-story-tall machine disappearing in front of people in broad daylight is a news story." He mumbled to himself as he pushed the throttle forward and chased after a couple of red dots, like a predator that had found its prey.

December 12th, 2499

09:23 SCT

Outskirts of Mar Sara Colony

"This went surprisingly smoothly," Aqua said, looking out the truck’s window at the convoy of vehicles that was passing them. 

"Ain't the first time we have had to pick up everything and relocate in a hurry. Back during the Guild Wars, the Kel-Moriane's raided us time and time again, and with those bastards, it's best to not be in the colony when they arrive. When they raid, they ain't just taking minerals, gas, and food with em, if you know what I mean." 

"I do." She replied, but her memories told her the Confederates were no better; some of the Old Families had factories full of slaves, not to mention she was a child soldier herself. They were just the best of two bad options; At least the Confederates would feed their slaves regularly. 

Me, this is a rotten world. I'm going to need some serious cuddle time soon...every time I explore these new memories, I feel like I'm becoming more and more traumatized. 

A notification sounded through the truck cab, and the Adjutant's holographic head popped up on the dash. "Good Morning, Magistrate. You have five new messages from various outlying settlements with updates on their evacuation efforts, three personal messages from various foremen voicing complaints about the necessity of the evacuations, and a request from Michal Liberty, a reporter from UNN, for an in-person interview when he gets planet side later today."

"You've got to be kidding me. Didn't we just go through all the messages twenty minutes ago?" She said, shaking her head. Meeting the reporter would probably blow her cover; he wasn't local news, but one of the Confederacy's most well-known reporters. She was already on borrowed time as it was, but talking with him would turn weeks into hours once the clip aired.

She sighed. And there was still no word from John. "Send word to the foremen that their concerns are noted, but while personally I would love to help them, the Confederacy doesn't care about their concerns. Tell the reporter that I'm busy right now, but would be willing to take an interview in a few days once things settle down. In the meantime, give him a generic overview of how things are proceeding, and that further questions can be sent to Colonel Duke. Now, play me the messages from the outlying settlements." She told the machine.

She was here to sow seeds of discord between the population and the Confederacy, and as far as she knew, that mission hadn't changed. However, she was still a former goddess of healing, and John's fiancée; she would do her best to keep these people safe, both for herself and because she knew that is what he would try to do. 

* - Highlander Burial is a term used by many MechWarriors when a Highlander pilot does a Death From Above attack. Prior to the Clan invasion, it was one of the only assault mechs with jump jets, and its pilots were known to be crazy bastards who would often ignore their long-range weapons and opt to close in to melee range and perform crazy aerial maneuvers with their 90-ton mechs. There were many reports of the mechs literally driving other mechs into the ground when they dropped on top of them, coining the term ‘Highlander Burial’.