Futuristic NCQuest: Tactical Mech Action, Story

[Windsock]

Previous story thread.

NCQ; A continuation.
The year is 2471; two centuries after the Great Disaster that reforged the surface of the planet and all but reset mankind's progress. The old American continent faces its own cold war in this brave new world, between a variety of interests, both shared and disparate.

To the north, the Commonwealth; a descendant of the old powers that ruled in the Pre-Disaster world, continuously seeks a new manifest destiny. The reborn republic finding a new unity in the goal of spreading itself from one end of the continent to the other in the eternal pursuit of the romatic ideals of justice and liberty for all. A young realm in the south, a sprawling Kingdom conquered and unified by the efforts of one gifted man, wishes to forge a new future where all mankind is equal under the unquestionable authority of the one true king; his own rights guaranteed by the universal languages of military excellence, divine providence, heavy-handed law and sheer noble pride. To the west rests a Union of Independents; a collective of merchant-cities, tribesmen, nomads and communes, working together as equals to resist the expansionist powers of the day; relying on vast wealth and material to maintain an iron-clad grip on their own solidarity.

Besides these, the true reigning powers of the day continue their own concurrent battles; the Ruling Companies that economically dominate the current Post-Diaster societies. These Ruling Companies constantly seek a true monopoly where every resource, no matter its nature, is controlled by one entity; their respective selves. Denver-Vegas Industrial, Paragon Technologies, and Unified Atomic-Oil pluck the strings of industry and conspiracy in their efforts to destroy the others, and their combined goal to justify and bring about the 'Pax-Economica', a new reality where state and company are indisputably one.

As these polities and corporate giants vie with one another in a brewing conflict that threatens to go hot, the latest aspirants in the organization, MAVERICK, have begun their careers. Surely these junior Linkers will be instrumental in the coming time; but for now, they're embroiled in the modest conflict of their first deployment. The city-state of New Baltimore, one of the few small independents on the east coast, finds itself beset by a terrorist organization of unclear goals. Will the rookies help this small polity maintain its security, or will they be tempted away by coming conflicting offers?

 

[Windsock]

Spoiler: Mentions

Viper Actual
SkyHawk MK III
YsFanatic
Tanya Degurechaff
AnonyMouse
Aldur

Episode S1-E1: Nobody expects the MAVERICK Inquisition
With a vigor only a man notified of a possible harsh punishment could possess, Oswald Freilan was busy at work as the de-facto lead manager of MAVERICK's sole coastal operating concession in New Baltimore, setting demands and scheduling special duties to the underlings that were under his effective command as the technically highest-rated Handler on-site at the moment. Though in theory he was only a regular Linker-attache, in practice that was like saying a Medic was attached merely to his squad and wasn't expected to operate on anybody else when bullets started impacting craniums. His superior and technically the true manager of the base was serving some other function in another facility entirely lately, which at least allowed Oswald and his compatriots a taste of freedom from oversight that was appreciably rare in the greater organization... even if it was a pain in the ass in how he had to do two jobs at once.

Still, he wasn't one to complain, and was glad that he, at least, had an unlikely ally in being prepared; having a tip-off from a 'little bird' or two that he knew. The facility under his practical command was facing a 'surprise' inspection, and on top of that an interview and secondary analysis of each Linker under his own, and by extension his fellow Handlers' purview at the base. It wasn't uncommon, but with the high strangeness of MAVERICK operations lately he had a mild suspicion that something was going on internally. One of the Linkers attached to the base was very suddenly assigned elsewhere by the higher-ups, and he wasn't even allowed to know the reason. Took the Linker's attache too, which was annoying; he was an asshole, but reliable.

But, no matter; he had the base well-prepared as the hours went by, and when he was officially notified of the 'surprise inspection', he wasn't actually surprised by the fact that his superior's own superior, with a full inspection team in tow, was due to arrive at his workplace in about an hour and a half, alongside an order for him to rally up the Linkers assigned to the base by that time. All the floors were clean, the machines were washed, bullets and energy cells counted, and the 'secret' stash of some engineers who presumed themselves more clever than they really were, confiscated. The chemical weapon of mass intoxication was clandestinely dumped into the ocean, killing several fish from acute alcohol poisoning.

With a simple message to each Linker's PDA, at least those who were still assigned to the base, it wasn't long before the disparate collection was fully assembled; leaking through the base's attached train terminal, and sitting about in the Operation-Command building's first floor, which was still set up to act as the mission briefing room. They had plenty of time to comport amongst themselves before the horrible date, after Oswald took time to explain the full situation for their posterity, pacing to and fro each end of the projector-hosting blackboard, as one of the moonshiners was busy erasing less than mature scribbles behind him.

"...I know, I know, y'er eyes'r glazed over already, but just bare with me here. They're gonna inspect all yer implants too after the interview I'm sure, 'make cert'in they're prop'ly installed and in operatin' parameters' and all that. So's, just play it cool, and, as a favor to me, don't cause too much trouble for 'em. They might ask weird or just really personal question's, but don't take it all harsh; they gotta git a somewhat... private understandin' of you for their shit is all." He looked like he was about to dismiss the Linkers, but his eye-lids tightened as he beamed his gaze across the Linkers in attendance, remembering something.

"Oh, and I know those two couldn't be the only ones workin' on the damn moonshine!" Oswald exclaimed, like a disappointed teacher finding salacious trash in a student's desk. "I can guess whichofs you helped 'em out, but I ain't naming names. You know who you are. If yer gonna start that up again you best build it better next time, a'least do it proper when you ain't followin' the rules... Shi' was downright poison... Well, thas'all I've to say. You lot are dismissed for now."

With that, they had maybe half an hour to steel themselves for the coming probing and polite interrogation.

 

[AnonyMouse]

Camille AzataA Few Minutes Prior to the Briefing"This is bullshit," Cammy said for the millionth time as she watched the city streets glide by. Every time she said it, she sank a little deeper into the heated leather seats of Halliwell's sedan, arms folded, face contorted into bottled rage. The safety belt was up to her chin now.

"You're acting like a child, Camille," Halliwell replied, calmly resting a book on the steering wheel while the car's autopilot did the work. She thumbed to another page.

"Bull. Shit. A steaming pile of it."

"Why yes, a steady intake of bovine fecal matter is part of the MAVERICK experience. Welcome to the corporate lifestyle," Halliwell said with a thin smile. "You'll get used to it. Until then, say what you want to say now. Throw a tantrum, kick the dashboard, scream to the heavens... but get it out of your system before we get to base. I need you on your best behavior today."

"I'm chill," Cammy said as the base's gates came into view. She sat up a little straighter, slicked back her neon blue hair, which immediately returned to its spiky shape, but at least she had tried. "Seriously, I got this. I know how to schmooze these corporate jerkwads. I'm cool as penguin penis."

"How about we not talk about genitalia today," Halliwell said.

"They're tryin' to fuck us, so why not?"

Halliwell cast her a sharp glance as the car pulled up to the booth, but ultimately sighed and let it go. Her demeanor shifted as she lowered the window and flashed her ID at the guard along with one of her signature million-watt smiles. It hit the man like a death ray to his soul and Cammy could've sworn he had an out-of-body experience for a millisecond before opening the gates.

How the hell does she do that? Cammy thought as the gates lifted and they were allowed inside. It was not a trait unique to Halliwell, though she seemed better at it than most. These people --the people who ran the world-- they all seemed to have that gift, in varying degrees. The ability to charm people or terrify them. The ability to get what they want just by being who they are. They all had such a powerful presence that a glance was all it took. The ID was just a formality, a thinly-veiled act, as if to say, "see, I have to do this too, just like you 'normal' people." No, you don't, you fucking liar.

"Are they gonna inspect you, too?" Cammy asked, though she was already certain of the answer.

"Unlikely. Anyone and everyone is fair game, but I'm a known variable. You and your peers are the wild cards," Halliwell said as she took over control of the car and guided them to the command center. "If they do interview me, it will likely be about you... and I've already answered those questions more than enough times, I think." The car came to a stop in front of the command center and she properly turned to face Camille. "I know you're nervous, but-"

"I ain't nervous," Camille spat back.

Halliwell grinned. "Of course not," she said, meeting a lie with a lie. "You're wondering who you should be, who do they want. This early in the game, it's impossible to know. They may not want anything at all. They might be feeling us out, appraising our worth. There's no point in contorting yourself to fit a mold which may or may not exist at this phase of the game. And, even if there is a master plan in play, the low-level interviewers and inspectors sent here today likely know nothing of it."

"So, what should I-"

"What should you do? Be yourself. Be the best you that you can be," Halliwell said as the door locks clicked open and she gestured for her client to depart the vehicle. "Consistency is valuable in the corporate world. They need to know they can trust you, the way we trust a dog to bark, a cat to meow, and a pig to wallow in mud."

"I'm not a-"

"Not an animal? Of course not, you're an asset."

"Dammit, Ell, you know I-"

"I know you hate when I finish your sentences... but I can only do that because you are consistent. You are not a wild card to me, Camille. So what if you started a little moonshine distillery." Camille opened her mouth to deny that accusation, but Halliwell cut her off, "Oops, I meant jet fuel," she teased. "That's all that was, right? Experimenting with new fuel mixtures? Anyway, these are all things we expect you to do. They are part of who you are and I doubt Oswald cares any more than the rest of us."

Cammy unfastened her safety belt and reached for the door handle, but paused. "Is that your ass-backwards way of sayin' you trust me, Ell?"

Halliwell stifled a small laugh. "I trust a wolf to howl at the moon and a rooster to crow at dawn and I trust Camille Azata to tell someone when they're being a dick. They may think you a simpleton but some, like me, find your honesty refreshing." She shrugged. "Go. Do your thing. Then, I'll do mine."

 

[Windsock]

Around the base...
Outside the Command-Operations building of which MAVERICK's coastal base was formed around, it was a surprisingly beautiful day outside; the sky was calm with a tasteful amount of gentle clouds, alongside equally milquetoast waves of the ocean that quietly merged into the shoreline that the Linker-oriented military facility was built on. Logistical trucks were busy finishing up their duties of carting about equipment to and fro the main storage areas, as technicians and other workers collated all the little gizmos and doodads left lying around the base as usually happens, compared to the administrative dream of everything being directly returned to its proper storage immediately after use.

Sweepers manned brooms as the resident Neural Combatant compatible quick-launch catapult was cleared of the rare leaves or miscellanious trash, while the lifts for the machines themselves were checked a final time. The hydraulics were being tested at a leisurely, steady pace of utilization; test-weight provided by standardized spare NC parts and another truck or two. The base's sole dedicated helicopter landing pad was cleaned off by a duet of air-blowers, and the submarine pen for submersible NC transports was checked. The submarine they were promised was still missing.

Off the beach, the floating, chained ammo dump was the last piece of the puzzle, as engineers in small-scale amphibian exosuits inspected each stainless steel link before them. After a while, they declared it 'Plenty good enough!', and wrapped them around their assigned posts again. The extensible bridge to the glorified water-tight ammo crate was re-installed, and it returned to being half-submerged; expecting its isolation and the water surrounding it to dampen the hypothetical worst case scenario, as it was designed.

The modest, mostly-quiet sanctity of the touch-up operations was lessened when, away from the coast, a sudden appearance revealed itself. A lone periscope breached the waves; analyzing its surroundings. Possibly after it liked what it saw, the beast the periscope was attached to began to surface. The whole assemblage slowly vectored to the submarine pen, the submersible was proof that the inspection team decided to kill two birds with one stone, coming to base in the long-awaited NC transportation submarine.

As its body breached the surface, its form was revealed; a wide-body, nearly stubby design, resembling a whale in its utilitarian enormity. What could've been a simple sail was instead extruded backwards as an entire humpback, which merely furthered a sense of its large scale. In total, it was perhaps one-hundred and fifty meters long and twenty abeam; quite a bit taller than that overall due to its exaggerated ventral extrusion. Its fins adjusted for surface maneuvering, while the whole vessel adjusted itself to meet with the submarine pen.

Soon afterwards, the inspection team disgorged itself from the submersible after it docked...


The Linkers attached to the base were situated in the briefing room, and promptly introduced to their two interrogators for this evening; A woman and a man, naming themselves August Yu and Barry Wallace, respectively, alone with these two. August Yu, a woman of some kind of asiatic descent, was the apparent Regional Director, which made her relative youthfulness somewhat surprising. Her metaphorical height was further enhanced by a modestly tall literal height, and she balanced the expected ostentatious attitude with a simpler forthrightness.

Wasting no time, she fully introduced her assistant and herself. "It's a pleasure to finally meet all of you in person; but, I'll waste no time on useless pleasantries. My name is August Yu, and this is Barry Wallace, an assistant of mine. He'll be speaking with Mister Fosse and Mister Lancelot upstairs, so if you two could follow him up there, that would be ideal."

Wallace gave a slight bow, and after focusing in on him, he seemed fairly normal in and of himself. He was a gentleman of a fairer number of seasons, but maintained a rigorousness that was evident in even the way he moved; but, so far, he was fairly quiet, considering he hasn't talked at all yet. A man of few words, evidently. Besides that, he was somewhat closer to being short and stout, but not awfully so. Finally, he deigned to speak a very little bit, as he walked to the stairwell and motioned for the two men he was assigned to. "After you."

Afterwards...
As a door was gently shut at the top of the stairwell, Yu waited only a few moments before walking over to the blackboard, examining it, before turning back once again to the three Linkers still in the room with her. Azata, Davion, and Scott. "Information is difficult to acquire and confirm these days, so I'm going to be reciting what we know of all of you from both the public and private documentation we have on file. I'd like for you to confirm or correct what I'm about to say, and answer what immediate questions I have afterwards."

She waited for silent acknowledgement of her demand before continuing. She slowly walked past each Linker as she explained their own histories to them, pacing from one end of the room to the other. "Cammille Azata, born on the surface to an old clan, alleged to be descended from a Pre-Disaster NC Pilot. She grew up on these stories and soon enough began working in the family business, which at this point was salvaging Pre-Disaster ruins for technology and resources. Her family was ambushed by bandits during one of these expeditions, which resulted in her father's injury and a switch to the courier business, but her brother continued sifting through wreckage with a new team. She was actually very good at this courier business and soon started solo-work, where she was eventually noticed by another Linker, and was soon convinced to become one herself."

Moving over to Adam Davion, she took a moment to breath. "...Adam Davion was born underground in Los-Angeles Burrow, to just another working class family in the subsurface city. He had an entirely mundane accident in his childhood that injured him severely, but his parents' meager means could never afford the proper care, which ultimately cost him his usage of his legs. When he became of age he started working at any odd-job he could to help his family make ends meet. Suddenly, his parents both died in a fatal car accident, and after some time he decided to see if he could become a Linker."

She maintained a curt, polite smile as she went on to the last Linker. "Also born underground, Hazel Scott was similarly milquetoast in her upbringing, but in her teenage years she found an unexpected, and parentally disapproved, interest and talent in both mechanics and in chemistry; particularly in the context of explosive pyrotechnics. After a while, she did manage to convince her parents to allow her this hobby, and she managed to find work in the garage of a family friend. As an adult, she went official and started working at a big demolitions company. She became the leader of her assigned team, but after an accident her team was disbanded with two injuries, and two fatalities. An investigation cleared her of any wrongdoing, but she couldn't find any stable work, until she decided to try and join up with MAVERICK, as a Linker."

Yu toed back to the blackboard, visibly appreciating the blankness of it. She lost her slight smile as she turned back to the Linkers, one by one. "I have several immediate requests. Speak up as soon as you can, yet don't interrupt one another, please."

"I'd like to hear one of these old family stories about your ancestor, if you wouldn't mind; Azata. Miss Scott, if you could tell us about your old team, that would be ideal; and for Mister Davion, I'm very curious what your thought-process to becoming a Linker was, after the car accident. Why was it, apparently, your first choice?"

For an initial round of questions, these were somewhere between expected and really quite strange.

Upstairs...
Coming up the stairs to the mid-level, it was the base's offices and file storage room; for now, three of the vacant offices sacrificed their chairs in a triangular formation, the farthest of which Wallace deigned to sit on, after making sure the door was closed, then locked tight. He produced a flip-book and a pencil from his pockets and waited for Fosse and Lancelot to sit.

After they did so, the interviewer, presumably, checked his questions; his eyes darting from one end of each small page to another as he flipped several times.

"Have to confirm our data is correct. If I get anything wrong, tell me about that first. Afterwards, two questions for now, one for each of you. Speak as soon as you've formulated your official answer, and don't interrupt each-other, or me."

He turned to Fosse and went between his notepad and his target while he explained, apparently expecting a simple nod of confirmation after each line. "Hadrian Fosse; Butcher's son, himself, ex-military, Commonwealth military. A long time of service, then court-martialed; honorably discharged. Insiders say it was a moral issue; he had an issue against his superiors. Floated around serving for several PMC's. Eventually joined MAVERICK.", he smiled a little bit about the obviousness of the last tidbit. "First question is about your time in the Commonwealth's military. Could you tell me about what you did to earn your unit a Distinguished Service Citation, while you served? It was quite early in your career, it seems some of the records were lost."

He turned over to Niko Lancelot, and, this time, flipped through several more pages, while he waited for Niko's own nods of confirmation after each sentence. "Niko Lancelot. Due to being a wastelander in his early life, very few records exist. Some of this is just conjecture. Raised by an elderly guardian who may, or may not be, blood related; worked as a wandering tradesman. His guardian must have been born in the ending days of the 'Century of Chaos' after the Great Disaster; still remembered many Linker related horrors. Had an obsession with NC's, but still maintained a strong moral code. Both qualities inherited by a young Lancelot. Any information we have on Lancelot and his guardian, ends here. Eventually, Lancelot ended up signing up to MAVERICK, likely inspired by his guardian's old obsession; turned out to be compatible with NC's."

"The first question is why there's so little record of your guardian in any database we can access. Tell me about this old man."