Chapter 45 — The Raider Mask
The contract looked clean.
That was the first warning.
It landed in Moonjaw's queue less than a day after the Chapter 44 mess, routed through brokers who specialized in "no questions," stamped with refinery authority codes that were technically valid but felt… old. Escort a short convoy through an industrial basin. Protect haulers. Keep a salvage team alive long enough to peel usable parts off dead infrastructure. Good pay. Fast turnaround. No politics listed.
Nothing looked wrong.
That didn't mean it wasn't.
Lyra ran the approach profile twice from the Union's cockpit, quiet and focused, her dark eyes reflecting scrolling terrain maps. The basin was wide, with long sightlines and too many ridgelines that could hide metal. A place where ambushes had room to breathe.
"Landing zone is an old transit hub," she said. "Flat enough for quick pickup. But once you're down there, you'll be exposed."
Jinx leaned against the bay bulkhead, arms crossed, long dirty-blonde hair tied back but already slipping loose. Her blue eyes were bright with the kind of excitement that always came before violence. "So it's bait."
Taila stood closer to Dack than she used to, posture straighter, chin up. She didn't try to look fearless—she looked ready. "We can still take it."
Dack stared at the contract packet one last time, then nodded. "We take it. Fast. Clean."
Morrigan sat on a crate near the ramp, black lace and gothic attitude hidden under practical layers—dark, fitted clothing meant for movement, with a red-lined jacket tossed open like she didn't care who stared. She clicked her tongue. "It's never clean."
Dack didn't argue.
The Union dropped through atmosphere under a sky the color of old smoke. Below, the world was dead industry—strip-mined terraces, slag dunes, cracked service roads, collapsed conveyors, refinery towers leaning like broken teeth. Wind dragged dust through empty structures and made the planet sound like it was breathing.
Lyra set down in the transit hub with a controlled thud. The bay doors opened. Light and dust poured in.
The Dire Wolf stepped out first.
Its weight cracked old pavement, and the ground answered with tremors. Dack brought it upright and still, sensors blooming outward as if the machine itself didn't trust the world.
Jinx's Highlander followed, heavy and eager, a walking threat even at idle. Taila's Griffin moved left, taking the flank lane Dack had already chosen for her without needing to be told.
Morrigan stayed aboard the Union—at first. She watched from the ramp as the convoy rolled in: ore haulers, sealed containers, a few wheeled escorts that wouldn't survive real contact. The refinery reps stayed inside their armored car. Nobody waved. Nobody looked relieved.
Dack didn't like that either.
They moved out.
Four kilometers.
Then the basin lit up.
Missile trails streaked in from ridges—multiple racks, overlapping arcs. Not one opportunistic launcher. Coordinated fire. Energy beams cut through dust like hot needles. Mechs burst from cover along slag lines: a Catapult hurling LRMs, a Hunchback trying to bully the center lane with that ugly shoulder hump, a Shadow Hawk hunting angles, a Wolverine pushing hard, and more shapes behind them painted in scrap colors meant to look like raiders.
"Contacts!" Lyra snapped over comms. "They were cold until now—dozens. East ridge and south cut. That's too many for a normal hit."
Jinx's laugh turned sharp. "Told you."
Dack drove the Dire Wolf into the center lane and took the first wave on armor. He answered with discipline: LRMs to break momentum and force the enemy line to spread, then a tight autocannon burst to punish the Hunchback's approach lane. The Hunchback checked itself hard, AC/20 muzzle flash dying as it ducked behind broken refinery plating.
Taila held the left like she'd been built for it. She fired her PPC once—clean, bright—forcing the Shadow Hawk to abort its flank run. She followed with LRMs just long enough to keep it pinned while she reset position. No chasing. No panic. Lane control.
Jinx played impact. Her Highlander snapped a Gauss rifle shot downrange—one loud, brutal punch that ripped through the Wolverine's torso plating and sent it stumbling like it forgot how legs worked.
But the "raiders" didn't break.
They pressed in waves with spacing too clean and timing too patient. They rotated machines out when heat climbed and pushed fresh ones in without chatter. No opportunistic greed. No sloppy overextension.
Professional.
The convoy stalled, drivers abandoning cabs as alarms screamed. Escort vehicles scrambled for cover, tires skidding in slag dust. The salvage team—if it existed—was nowhere to be seen.
"Dack," Lyra said, voice tighter now. "You're getting boxed. Their numbers are still rising."
He could feel it. The net tightening. The lanes narrowing. Too many angles.
Then another ridge line lit up with movement.
More "raiders" cresting.
Too many.
Dack didn't hesitate. "Morrigan. Get in."
Morrigan's answer was immediate, flat, almost pleased. "Finally."
Seconds later, the Marauder powered up inside the Union's bay, its reactor hum rising into a hungry growl. Mag clamps released. The heavy mech stepped down the ramp and into the basin like it had been waiting for an excuse.
Morrigan slid into the fight on Dack's rear-right, not crowding him—covering the lane the raiders were trying to exploit. The Marauder's weapons came alive in short, controlled bursts: PPC energy flashing through dust, then medium lasers snapping to punish anything that tried to close in under the glare.
A raider medium tried to dart into her lane.
Morrigan's PPC hit it hard enough to make it stumble sideways, and her follow-up laser fire forced it into cover with armor sloughing off in smoking sheets.
Jinx whistled. "About time, goth queen."
Morrigan replied, bored and venomous. "Try not to die while I'm here."
The battle stabilized—barely.
Moonjaw held formation with brute discipline: Dire Wolf anchoring center, Highlander smashing anything that tried to bully the line, Griffin controlling the flank, Marauder denying the rear-angle push.
Even then, the math stayed wrong.
And then the channel opened—clean, familiar, smug.
"Dack Jarn," the voice said. "Still standing where everyone can see you."
Dack's jaw tightened. "Sable."
The raiders shifted as if obeying a drill, opening a lane through their formation.
A Black Knight stepped out of dust and false paint, its lines too clean beneath the raider act. It moved with confidence, not desperation. Medium lasers flared in a controlled burst, raking the Dire Wolf's forward armor to test weak plates, followed by heavier fire meant to keep Dack's attention centered.
Jinx's voice went cold. "I hate him more every time he speaks."
Dack answered with another measured LRM ripple to force Sable to adjust, then a short autocannon burst that made the Black Knight stop thinking in straight lines.
Sable laughed anyway. "You're outnumbered. You're tired. And you're exactly where I wanted you."
The "raiders" pressed harder on the flanks, trying to exploit Taila's lane and Morrigan's rear-right coverage.
Taila's Griffin shuddered under sustained fire. Warning lights blinked. She forced her breathing steady and held her position, voice tight but controlled. "I'm good."
Morrigan took a hard hit that peeled armor off her Marauder's shoulder. She didn't flinch. "Cute."
Jinx absorbed pressure on her Highlander, heat climbing fast, and still kept laughing—until Dack heard it change, the laughter turning into a sharp edge as she saw the same thing he did.
A shift in the enemy line.
Like someone had just arrived.
The ground shook.
Not from raiders.
From something heavier.
The "raiders" stopped advancing—parting—as dust rolled back and a massive silhouette stepped through smoke like the planet itself was standing up.
An Atlas.
No bright paint. No banners. Just dull gunmetal and ash-gray plating, scarred but maintained, gait steady and practiced. The machine didn't need decoration. It was intimidation made of steel.
Two heavy mechs crested behind it and stopped on the ridgeline. Personal guard. Weapons idle. Watching with the calm confidence of professionals.
A new channel opened.
Female voice. Calm. Absolute.
"That's enough."
The fighting didn't stop because anyone wanted it to.
It stopped because everyone obeyed.
Even Sable's Black Knight checked itself mid-advance like it hit an invisible wall.
"Call your people back," the woman said.
Dack didn't like being commanded by strangers, but he recognized control when he heard it. He raised a hand inside the cockpit. "Hold."
Jinx growled but complied. Taila eased back. Morrigan held too, Marauder still and ready, PPC charged and waiting.
"This was never Sable's hunt," the woman continued. "He was useful. Nothing more."
Sable snapped, "You said—"
"I said you'd get a chance," she cut in. "You wasted it."
The Atlas took one heavy step forward, then stopped.
"I'm not here to trade volleys," she said. "I'm here to end this cleanly."
Jinx's voice went sharp. "Dack—don't."
Dack didn't look away from the Atlas. "Talk."
There was a pause, as if the woman appreciated he asked for terms instead of begging.
"One duel," she said. "One on one. Dire Wolf versus Atlas. No interference."
Then she laid it out, clean as a contract.
"If I win, you and your people power down," she said. "All of you. Mechs shut down. Weapons safe. You stand still and allow yourselves to be captured."
Jinx barked a sharp laugh. "Custody. Cute word for kidnapping."
The woman didn't react.
"If you win," she continued, "I power down. My machine shuts down. My guard stands down. I am taken into your custody. No tricks."
Sable's voice cut in, strained and eager. "Don't accept—"
"Quiet," the woman snapped.
Sable went quiet.
Dack watched the battlefield through the Dire Wolf's sensors: the guard on the ridge holding perfect angles, the raider line frozen but still armed, Sable itching for betrayal. He watched his own people—Taila and Jinx and Morrigan—ready to burn the world before they let him be taken.
He decided fast.
"Clear the field," he said.
Jinx snapped, "No."
"Do it."
Flat. Final.
A long beat passed. Then the Highlander backed off, repositioning for overwatch. The Griffin slid into a flank lane where Taila could punish any interference. The Marauder moved with them, Morrigan taking a rear-right vantage that kept her in line to cut off any raider surge.
No one left.
They just gave the duel space.
The Atlas powered down part of its weapons—not all. Just enough to make the duel look clean.
"Begin," the woman said.
The duel opened with violence.
The Atlas pushed hard, using mass and presence to force Dack back through refinery wreckage. It fired in measured bursts meant to break posture and force reaction. Dack absorbed it, heat climbing and falling under his control, then answered with disciplined sequencing: LRMs to force the Atlas to shift, then autocannon bursts to punish any turn that exposed the leg line.
The Atlas pilot was good.
She didn't overcommit. She didn't panic. She advanced with steady pressure, trying to dominate space the way an Atlas was meant to.
Dack refused to give her what she wanted.
He anchored.
He let the Atlas commit to forward pressure, then punished balance and timing. The Dire Wolf's missiles forced micro-corrections. His autocannon hammered the same actuator path again and again—methodical, inevitable.
The Atlas staggered half a step.
Recovered.
Drove heavy fire into the Dire Wolf's torso. Alarms flared red across Dack's cockpit.
He didn't flinch. He kept cutting angles, kept forcing corrections, kept dragging the Atlas into a narrower lane between a collapsed conveyor spine and a slag wall where its mass mattered less than its balance.
He watched the tiny lag in the right leg actuator.
Then he hit it again.
The Atlas dropped to one knee with a sound that carried across the basin like a verdict.
Dust rolled outward.
For the first time, the woman's voice tightened. "You fight like him."
Dack didn't answer.
He struck again, forcing the Atlas lower until compensators screamed. The machine could not rise cleanly anymore.
Dack leveled the Dire Wolf's weapons.
"Yield," he transmitted.
There was a pause.
A heartbeat where the battlefield held its breath.
And then Sable ruined it.
"Kill him!" Sable screamed.
The Black Knight surged forward, medium lasers flaring, trying to rake the Dire Wolf's exposed flank while Dack's attention was still on the kneeling Atlas.
Jinx moved instantly.
Her Highlander cut in, interposing itself in the line of fire. A Gauss rifle shot cracked the air and slammed into the Black Knight's torso, staggering it mid-stride.
Taila followed a heartbeat later, Griffin sliding into position like she'd rehearsed it a thousand times. Her PPC snapped bright and clean, forcing Sable to twist away from his line.
Morrigan didn't chase glory—she cut off escape. The Marauder shifted just enough to deny the Black Knight any clean retreat lane.
Sable tried to push through anyway.
He didn't last.
Jinx broke his posture with another hard hit. Taila punished the opening—LRMs to pin him, then another PPC strike that made armor fail in a way metal shouldn't. The Black Knight collapsed in burning wreckage.
Sable died screaming about broken promises.
Every raider mech on the ridges raised weapons.
For one heartbeat, the battlefield hovered on the edge of a new massacre.
Then the woman in the Atlas spoke.
"Stop."
One word.
And everyone obeyed.
Weapons lowered. Target locks released. Even the raiders who wanted blood froze in place.
The Atlas remained kneeling, defeated—but its pilot's control over her people didn't waver.
"I lost," she said calmly. "Terms stand."
Dack held the Dire Wolf steady. "Power down."
The Atlas's systems cycled down in stages, heavy machine going still in the dust.
Her personal guard didn't move to interfere. They held position, weapons idle, waiting for the next command.
Dack didn't waste time.
"Lyra," he said. "Bring us in."
The Union descended minutes later, its shadow swallowing the basin. Mag-clamps locked onto the Atlas's frame and lifted the assault mech—pilot still inside—into the open bay.
The raiders withdrew in silence.
The personal guard backed off without a word.
Moonjaw stood alone in dust and broken concrete, battered but upright.
Dack turned the Dire Wolf toward the pickup point and started walking.
Inside the cockpit, the familiar count advanced once—quiet, like a ritual.
Another line added.
Unspoken.
Unforgotten.
And behind him, an Atlas that had been forced to kneel was carried into the Union's belly—along with the woman who had come to take him and had instead been taken herself.