●　●　● Akkadia One, Eden Space Territories

Al was working from home where had an already established office from his previous job. While the walls around his desk were neatly arranged with multiple achievement displays, all complimented by well-placed framed photos of family and friends, it harshly contrasted his cluttered desktop. There was no to-do tray or inbox in sight, only halfway separated piles of folders and portfolios which often received scorn from passing viewers as this was, after all, more than a century into the paperless business world. Al never cared for going with the 100% online norm as he preferred hand notation of much of his work and thought, finding it easier to organize in his head what had physically touched paper.

He was reviewing Infinity’s ground footage from Colombia Vincent had handed to him, and while he had plenty to choose from, he focused only on the feeds that contained records of the mysterious trio of cloaked LTACs. He went back and forth between distorted views from the helmet view feeds’ last moments, studying the only discernable portion of the screen. His eyes then caught a glimpse of something glowing a bright blue that rang a bell.

Plasma arc technology for sure. To have this much proximity distortion technology… and have their hands on old war tech downsized this much? I could almost swear this would’ve all been highly locked down by any of the few producers. He then scrolled back to Sam’s feed. He saw her rifle aimed at what was a clearer view of friendly Ai20’s locked in battle with the mechs he couldn’t identify, but once the Ai20’s were knocked down, Sam’s feed, too, became completely distorted. They are locking cameras with this device. She was that close to getting a good look. She did well to survive against this, he continued in thought as he watched until her feed was abruptly cut off during the last impact delivered. But after watching this, I learned it wasn’t her fighting skills necessarily that got her out alive. It was almost pure luck, if not completely deliberate. Vincent, you’d better move fast.

At Hexa’s main office, Vincent was seated in his chair in the executive board meeting room, where his plaque read “Vincent Vrey, CEO”. He sat around four other men in their 50’s and 60’s with one vacant seat. “How was his news taken, Mr. Lucian?” He asked across the table to the man with the plaque reading “Rafael Lucian, Head of Internal Affairs”.

“We all knew stockholders were already calling specifically for his head. He had no choice but to take it well and leave. His office will be empty before the end of the hour.” He then looked to the empty seat that read “Eric Jarro, Head of International Affairs and Logistics”. “Issue is, we can’t exactly wait for another round of interviews for the spot. And then vote? We have a mess to clean up, and I think we need someone with more war expertise is needed.”

“Even though at no point in the world is anything remotely considered at war?”Another man asked, his plaque reading “Bramo Nabransky, Head of Corporate Expansions”.

“I’m not saying anyone is at war, because that’s obviously not the case,” Lucian continued. “You can get that from anyone here. My point is, we are now dealing with military grade weapons on a regular basis as far as logistics are concerned. We saw the feeds. Those are military weapons fighting back, and now we have a different problem on our hands. Mr. Jarro had no experience with such, and to be honest, I regret my vote allowing him onto the board.”

“Then do you have anyone in mind? Who did you think you should’ve pursued instead?”

“I have a motion to make,” Vincent spoke up as he stood up. “In agreement with Mr. Lucian’s point, I am referring the position to Alexander Knight, currently employed by the state legal defense network, former Forerunning Labs R&D contributor, former Union Navy Pilot and Commander.”

“So, you are seriously suggesting a warhawk after all?” Nabransky replied. “What kind of negative PR are you asking for, pardon my frankness?”

“Why not?” a man whose plaque read “Rion Mugen” joined in. “Mr. Lucian made a good point. We need someone with not only military tactics experience and years of leadership, but we also need someone familiar with our technology and R&D enough to provide better leadership with logistics considering the sudden surge in resistance and their weapons availability to use against us.”

“I agree,” Lucian added. “I had the misfortune of working against him in the last war when we tried to reverse engineer the Antares series against the Union Navy. He was the most influential force behind the adjustments made to counteract our advances. Much respect for his abilities, and we might need those exact same skills seeing someone is funding our opposition too well if I may say so myself.”

“I have no dog in this fight,” the man whose plaque read “Symo Zaeras” spoke, “but I can agree to any position as long as we agree today. None of us are going to just… step up and do Mr. Jarro’s job for him, are we? Let’s not kid ourselves.”

“But if we put Knight in charge of logistics, there’s no guarantee his actions won’t cause wars to start popping up,” Nabransky persisted.

“But he can’t!” Lucian quickly refuted with a befuddled laugh. “It’d be impossible to speak of something that large scale all from the result of just trying to augment government responses to riots and terrorist attacks! We are not talking about international struggles here! These are all within each country! The only way war is even remotely a possibility is if we start helping pit nations against others in some kind of business-minded proxy war.”

“He’s right,” Mugen added. “We all know what two wars looked like in our lifetimes. This is a non-threat, a non-possibility. We need to neutralize extremist activity where our services are ordered, nothing more. And for that we need someone who can handle logistics against stiffer opposition to do that. And when we speak of someone who dedicated year after year to his craft, I believe we are getting more than just someone who wants to save their child. He will want to save them all, which is what we need.” He then turned to Vincent. “Mr. Vrey, I believe we can start the deliberation process if you are to approve.”

●　●　● Bogota, Colombia

Sam washed her face at the sink in the restroom, dried, and then took a long pause staring into empty space. Flashbacks of the rocket fire, tank blasts, and the LTAC attacks flooded her mind. Her attention then went to her still sore arm and unwrapped it, washed and dried it once more, and placed an adhesive bandage over the wound. Her thoughts then took her back to when she failed to pull the trigger after the cloaked LTAC jumped for her. She then took a deep breath with a quick shake of her head. “I need a shower, rinse all these thoughts out of my head” she mumbled to herself, still dressed in her pilot suit up to her waist, sleeves tied, black undershirt only on top. “I can’t even take care of my own present self, much less anyone else. No bag, no spare clothes, all sweaty still, not even a change of underwear… gross.”

She noticed how unkempt her hair was but knew any attempt to straighten it would be futile. But the thoughts returned once more, this time with the returned realization there was no luxury of worrying about such things for the other eleven pilots. She tried to fight off the overwhelming feeling of guilt, crouching and sitting against the wall near the sink, hands over her head. Her hands began to pull down her face, eyes shut tight. I can’t do this. I just can’t. I can’t sit here and break down with my chance to get back home, she thought to herself, finding strength to stand back up. If anything, I really need to go thank everyone. I really could’ve been dead like everyone else out there.

With that she headed back out into the break room. All of the lights were still on, but it was noticeably darker as the sun had long been set and the night sky could be seen from the windows. At the table where she sat earlier, she only saw leftover glasses, ash trays, and other various items. Amongst the silence, she walked around the table, subconsciously taking in the distant sounds of music playing and the smells of cigarette smoke, something she had never smelled up close before. She then eyed a peculiar round handle-less mug with a large metal straw stuck in what looked to her like dried grass, giving off another new, nose biting smell. She continued past the table to the balcony where the door was still open. She found Sebastian sitting there reading through news cards on holographic display from his mobile, all the while humming a tune.

“Are you not going to sleep? Or is the bed we have for you not good?” he called out to her, hearing her approach.

“Oh,” she waved with a smile and a shake of her head. “I’m just too exhausted and stressed out to sleep. You know what I mean?” she continued outside, now leaning against the ledge, looking across the compounds yard to the view of the neighborhood apartment buildings and shops filling the narrow, packed horizon just beyond the wire-wrapped concrete and steel fences. She then felt exposed, taking a nervous step back.

“It’s OK. There are barriers up to stop small bullets. Anyone inside the compound walls is safe.” As Sam stepped back up to continue looking in thought, he continued: “Anyway, I don’t sleep much these days, either,” he replied, returning to his sifting through the news. “I always worry about our city. Nothing is the same since the change of powers. I don’t like the situation. I feel like people are getting too angry at the wrong people, and somebody is coming to use that to… I don’t know… make money or get attention for something. And we pay for it.”

“You were the group I must’ve read about that took down the A-7 way back. I heard a little bit about it on the news.”

“That really big robot? Yes. After that and fighting foreigner brought AiX the next day, we lost so much. That’s why you see only a few of us moving around. Many of our paramilitary is running out of supplies… men… things to fight with. Many don’t want to fight anymore. I am afraid one day we will be the last dozen men standing for Kennedy and Bosa, so I read the news to always be ready to move again.”

“How long has this been going on? I mean, why is there no proper military? Why do you have to do all the work?!”

“You don’t know how many problems our economy had after the Confederacy was dropped. Since there was not enough tax money to pay for a military, the Familias just made their own. Like for us. I started helping when we turned into secondary school students. My brother, sister, and my friends were drafted into the Galeanos where we were picked to drive tanks and armor cars. A few years ago, we changed to what we call the Caballeros. Now we only have two left. So, everything I have known since I was in secondary school is starting to fall apart.”

“But what are you all fighting? If I may ask. I got some information from our commanders but I feel like I should trust you more than them.”

Sebastian let out a sigh before closing his news card viewer. Why does this girl talk so damn much? He saw her open her mouth to apologize but cut her off: “No… It’s OK. I want you to understand.” He sat back with a stretch, letting out a deep breath. “It’s like I said. The Familias run Bogota. You can like it or hate it. It’s life here… you know… you can only accept it. So, since about maybe a few years after the war, people didn’t like being ran by the Familias and wanted the old government back. But the old government was lazy and already controlled, but no one noticed. It had us all lazy. We could just sit back and the SAU would get international money from other unions, like the NAU or Europe. Money fixes problems, and when it’s free in your mind, you are happy.

Now? That money has been gone for a long time. They blame it on us Familias. But now they want to destroy things to get attention and they think if the Familias fall, then there will be someone to come in and save everyone. That’s what the Rochas are doing. They got people believing they are the people to save them all, but they are the most corrupt Familia of them all. They are the ones giving them guns and rockets to their protestors. They also control the airport, which is why we can’t just expect you to be able to fly out with no problem. But, if they win, I think it’s the worst dream for everyone if that does happen, not a good dream like they expect.”

That’s a lot to digest. Sam knew she would never come to experience anything at all like just described, thinking perhaps for the first time how good her life had been. “I’m sorry to hear all of that. I… don’t know what to say.”

“I don’t like people being sorry,” Sebastian was quick to flatly reply. “I like people being reasonable. Being real.” He then looked over to her. “Can you be real with me?”

She couldn’t help but let out a confused chuckle. “Real with what? I haven’t been hiding anything.”

“Why are you here? Why did you come to Colombia? You don’t seem like the type to get involved in something this… messy… dangerous.”

Something had her feeling vulnerable as if the sky itself, absent of the comfort the upward-curving city streets and buildings of the satellite nations provided, all taken for granted up until now. She took a while to digest the question all the while. “Why did I come?” She let herself once more stare off into the distance for a moment. “This is what I felt I had to do. Something in my conscience told me I needed to do this, just like the rest of my family. But I don’t know why I keep feeling that. I just acted on that idea. Now, here I am, regretting my decision.”

“So, you don’t want to be a pilot after all? Were you any good?”

 “I guess I really don’t know. I had great scores and all, but that was all simulation. Now, all I know is that I am in over my head. And maybe it’s to do with my parents and my brother having been pilots… Harbingers...”

Not making eye contact, she missed Sebastian reacting to that word.