The Beginning

         “Merc scum, we don’t serve your kind here.”  The speaker’s face was a round and snarling mass of scars, tattoos and piercings, and not a second after he’d finished his rebuttal the snarl flashed to surprise and pain as Evan hooked a finger through several big hoops that crossed the bridge of the bouncer’s nose and twisted hard.  Evan let go as a wet pop elicited screams from the bouncer and calmly walked past him.  Behind him, his Executive Officer Myrta rammed a steely fist into the bouncer’s gut and he went down through a table, throwing ashtrays and three varieties of shitty local ales spectacularly through the air.  She, too, walked calmly past the fallen bouncer, amid howling laughter from the denizens of the tavern.
         “Go easy on him, Evan, he’s new,” a second bouncer said.
         Evan grunted, without a glance her way.
         “You gonna check your guns,” she asked, pointing to a sign on the door.
         “What do you think,” Evan said.  He’d spotted the man he was looking for, and threaded his way through the tables toward a rough looking man with shaggy grey hair wearing a patchwork red set of arena mechanic’s coveralls.
         He must be on break, Evan thought, glancing out through a wide set of windows that occupied most of the tavern’s west wall.  An arena battle there was still going strong; three Battlemechs were warily circling each other in a stale and staged routine that attempted to pass itself off as somehow gladiatorial.  Evan allowed himself a snort.  He’d recruited an arena fighter once and swore never to do so again; no arena fighter ever seemed to be able to hack it once they found themselves on a real battlefield.  They seemed too concerned with making it look good, or fielding showy weapons.  Evan remembered leaving his own gladiator with half his face blown away in a back alley somewhere on Outreach, not from any attack by the enemy of the week but Evan’s own Imperator. 
         Good use of ammo, Myrta had said.
         “Evan,” the man said, standing and extending a hand, “and Myrta, good to see you both.”
         “Toby,” Evan said, shaking the man’s hand.
         “Been too long,” Toby said, sitting again and hitting the call button on the table.  “Let me get you something.”
         A small hologram of a girl with a pen and paper wavered into existence over the tabletop and asked for drink orders.  Evan ordered a local whiskey but Myrta shook her head.  Always cool, that one, always professional.
         As soon as the hologram had faded again Evan leaned forward, smirking at the older man across the way.
         “How far we fall, Toby.”
         “It’s a living,” Toby said, shrugging.  “You’d be amazed what those Arena Jocks spill to their trusted mechanic.”
         “I’d believe that if this were Outreach, or Solaris, but we’re in the middle of nowhere, one the very edge of Rasalhague.  These guys are two-time losers looking for that golden ticket they’re never gonna get.”  Even paused, watching the fight.  The center of the table dropped out and returned a second later topped with two shots of an amber liquid in smeared glasses.
         “Who’s the big one,” Evan said, nodding at a hulking war machine in the pit of the arena.
                   “Big Mario Tirelli,” Toby said wearily.  “Local hero, hooked in with the Bandit kings that tool around in this area.  Everyone is, really, that’s what keeps this little dirtball spinning.”
         “And you?”
         Toby smirked and picked up the shot glass, downing it in one fast motion.
         “I’m looking to retire, Evan.”  He looked off at the arena, but Evan could see him looking past it now, not really paying attention.  “I like it here, like the forest.  I saw twenty years of action in all the stars the Sphere has to offer, and another twenty on my own, running for me, running for you and Jack and Jill and whoever had the C-Bills to keep it running.  And all the while looking over my shoulder for the one with my name on it.  No, this is it for me, Evan.  You’ve always done me right.  When I got the call, I thought only of you.  I figure, half and half, you patch that piece of shit Dervish and I’ll disappear out in the trees somewhere, me and Jenny.”
         Jenny wasn’t a person, Evan knew, but a nickel-plated Lassitor tucked away somewhere on Toby’s personage. 
         “Sounds good,” Evan admitted, plucking up the shot of whiskey and giving it a swill.  “So what do you have, Toby?  Why did I fly all the way back here?”
         Toby glanced over his shoulder and scanned the drunken lowlifes that dotted the meager establishment.  He then produced a small device and flipped a switch.
         Sound Sponge.  A small electronic noise-canceling device that matched sound frequencies to ensure the voices didn’t carry to unwanted listeners.  In a place where Evan could’ve shot the patrons at the next table without any consequence, this was very serious.
         “Some action in the trees not long ago.  Someone made landfall with five ‘mechs talking some weird shit about trials and wars, some weird religious group or some shit.  But the thing is, they showed up with some hardware no one’s ever seen, some hard-hittin’ artillery.”  He jerked a thumb back at the arena, where Big Mario was finishing up with a hapless Catapult.  “Some of the boys used to keep a militia for this region of the planet.  I say used to because they’re gone.  Vanished.  They went out to find out who’d landed out there and why they were geared up for war, never came back.”
         “Arena fighters aren’t worth a shit,” Evan interrupted.  “I’m not surprised.” 
         “Anyway,” Toby growled, “guess their dropship left spouting some kind of shit about the trials and whatnot, but since then there’s been rumors one was left behind.  People are seeing some kind ‘mech, very military, nothing anyone’s ever seen before in the forest, and now everyone’s after it, the Bandits, Rasalhague, everyone.”
         “Good story,” Evan said, frowning, “but it don’t mean shit if we can’t find it.”
         “Well, it only matters if we know where to look.”  He leaned even further in.  “I know where to look.  Running a test pattern few days back on some numb-nut’s dropship, picking up a little overtime, and I pick up this weird-ass signal.  Recorded what I could, of course, and there’s no guarantees.  But it’s a better shot than anyone else has.  What do you say?”
         “Who’s buying?”
         “Anyone,” laughed Toby now.  “That’s the point.”
         Evan tossed back the whiskey and stood, Myrta standing immediately beside him.
         “You remember the Claw,” Evan asked.
         “How could I forget that deathtrap?”
         “Dock 117 in an hour, come alone, Francisco will let you in.”  Evan straightened his jacket and slipped a 20 C-Bill credit-stick into the table.  He nodded at the bouncer they’d accosted when they first came in, cradling his nose in the corner by the door.
         “Make sure he gets this, no hard feelings.  And thanks for the drink.”