The ledger sat on the Union's table like a threat.
Lyra had it open beside a second slate full of numbers—fuel, spares, actuator seals, armor plate, ammo, port fees, storage rent. The kind of list that didn't care how good you were in a cockpit.
"Union upkeep alone will eat us if we don't keep working," Lyra said. Calm voice, sharp eyes. "And if we want to go after Mother Lark, we do it with cash and bodies. Not wishful thinking."
Jinx lounged back in her chair, boots hooked around the table leg, like money was optional. "Then we take work."
Taila nodded quickly. "We're mercs. That's… literally the point."
Morrigan stood off to the side, arms crossed, black miniskirt and red shirt making her look like trouble that learned how to sew a patch. Twin tails high, stockings clean, boots laced tight. She didn't sit yet. She watched like she was waiting to see if the table would bite her.
Dack listened, eyes on the numbers. "We take a contract that pays and gives salvage."
Lyra flicked her gaze up. "Agreed."
Jinx grinned. "And we steal something fun."
Dack didn't smile. "We steal what's worth C-bills."
He pushed his chair back and stood. "I'll hunt jobs."
Lyra slid her slate across the table without a word—already queued with listings. She knew his habits now.
Dack took it and disappeared into the Leopard's bay office nook, the one corner that felt like it belonged to him: plain desk, terminal, a rack of printed maps, and a view of the mechs through bay glass.
The Dire Wolf stood there like a sleeping animal. The Highlander beside it, all weight and attitude. The Griffin with its cleaner lines and newer scars. The Centurion waiting in reserve, ready but underused.
He scrolled listings. Escort work. Security patrols. Dirty border skirmishes. Pay too low. Risk too high. A couple "mystery employers" that smelled like traps.
Then he found something else while he was in the boards.
Two mech tech postings. Both experienced. Both priced like they knew their value. Both available now.
It was exactly what they needed.
He didn't overthink it. He sent the request. Set up a meet in the Union bay within the hour. Professionals in, credentials checked, job offered if clean.
Easy.
He walked back to the galley and said, "Two techs are coming. If they check out, we hire them."
Silence hit like a dropped tool.
Jinx's smile vanished. Taila went still. Lyra's expression didn't change, but her eyes sharpened. Morrigan's mouth twitched like she was about to enjoy the chaos and then decided she didn't want to admit it.
"Two techs?" Jinx asked, voice too sweet.
"Mech techs," Dack said. "We need hands. We need refits done right."
Taila's cheeks warmed—anger first, then something she pushed down fast. "No."
Dack blinked once. "No?"
Jinx leaned forward, elbows on the table, grin back but colder. "No men."
Dack looked from Jinx to Taila. Taila nodded hard, like if she nodded enough it would become law.
"We can't just—" Dack started.
Lyra cut in smoothly. "I can source techs."
Jinx snapped her fingers. "See? Problem solved."
Dack's gaze lingered on Lyra. "You can?"
Lyra nodded once. "Yes."
Taila added quickly, "It's OPSEC. We don't know them."
Jinx piled on without missing a beat. "And we don't have berthing for randoms. And I'm not having some port rat stare at us in our own ship."
Dack held the silence a moment longer than they liked.
He saw it. The pattern. The way it wasn't just security.
But he didn't pry.
"Fine," he said. "We still need techs."
Jinx smiled like she'd won a battle. Taila exhaled like she'd stopped a disaster. Lyra stayed composed, but her shoulders loosened by a fraction.
Morrigan watched Dack's face like she was expecting him to snap.
He didn't.
He just turned and walked back toward the bay.
The techs arrived anyway, because Dack had already called them in.
Two men in grease-stained coveralls and tool harnesses, datapads in hand. One older, one younger. Both with the calm posture of people who'd spent years standing under tonnage that could fall wrong and erase them.
Dack met them at the ramp. Checked their cards. Asked three questions. Got direct answers. They were real.
Jinx and Taila showed up behind him like guard dogs.
The older tech nodded politely. "We heard you have an assault platform and a heavy needing attention."
Dack replied, "We do."
Taila said, flat, "No."
The younger tech blinked. "No?"
Jinx stepped forward with a smile that didn't reach her eyes. "No tech slot. Sorry."
The older tech's gaze flicked to Dack, confused. "You called us."
Dack didn't argue with the women in front of strangers. He didn't embarrass the techs either. He just took out a chip, held it out.
"Wasted time fee," he said. "No hard feelings."
The older tech stared at the chip a moment, then took it slowly. "You're burning money."
Dack's voice stayed level. "I'm avoiding enemies."
The older tech's mouth twitched like he respected that. "Fair." He looked at the Moonjaw sigil on the hull, then back at Dack. "If you change your mind, board's open."
Dack nodded once. "Copy."
The men left.
As soon as they were out of sight, Taila's posture relaxed. Jinx's grin returned. Lyra looked mildly relieved.
Dack watched them. Saw the relief.
He didn't comment.
Instead he said, louder than he usually would, "Next time I don't bring anyone aboard without consensus."
Jinx blinked. Taila blinked. Lyra's eyes softened.
"Good," Jinx said, pleased.
Taila nodded fast. "Good."
Lyra added, calm, "I'll find you techs."
Dack looked at her. "Two. Soon."
Lyra nodded. "I know."
Dack's gaze drifted to Morrigan. "You're training. You'll have a say too."
Morrigan's eyes narrowed. "Why."
"Because you're on the ship," Dack said. "Patch says it."
Morrigan's fingers brushed the Moonjaw sigil on her red shirt like she hadn't realized she'd been touching it. She didn't answer.
But she didn't take it off either.
---
The sims became routine. The kind of routine that built killers.
Taila ran the Griffin profile until her mistakes got bored and stopped showing up. Heat discipline. Lane control. Ridge fighting. Breaking contact without turning her back. Killing without chasing.
Morrigan ran the same scenarios.
She wasn't a prodigy. She wasn't an ace.
But she wasn't dead weight either.
Her instincts were sharper than Taila's sometimes—more aggressive, quicker to take openings. Her discipline was rougher, but improving. Dack watched both of them like he was shaping a future lance with his eyes alone.
"Taila," he said over sim comms, "stop overcorrecting. You're pulling your own reticle off target."
Taila snapped, "Copy."
"Morrigan," he said next, "you're chasing. You die chasing."
Morrigan's voice came tight, offended. "I had the kill."
"You had a trap," Dack replied. "Reset."
Morrigan went silent. Then: "Fine."
Jinx watched from outside the sim pod, lounging like a queen in her black-and-red kit, and heckled them both.
"Taila, you're doing great!" she sang. "Morrigan, you're doing terrible! But you look hot failing!"
Morrigan's sim mic crackled with pure venom. "Shut up."
Taila's laugh slipped out before she could stop it.
Morrigan didn't like that Taila was laughing at her. She liked even less that it didn't feel hostile anymore.
After the session, Morrigan climbed out of the pod breathing hard, eyes bright, hair slightly messy in the twin tails. She wiped sweat off her brow with the back of her hand and tried to look unimpressed.
Jinx clapped slowly. "Not bad."
Morrigan glared. "It was fine."
Taila stepped closer. "It was good."
Morrigan hesitated like praise was a weapon. "Whatever."
Dack watched her for a long beat.
Then Morrigan did something she hadn't done yet.
She asked.
"Dack," she said, voice low, almost grudging. "I want extra sim time."
Jinx's eyebrows shot up. Taila went still. Lyra looked up from her tablet immediately.
Dack didn't tease her. Didn't make it into a moment.
"How much," he asked.
Morrigan's jaw tightened. "An hour. Maybe two. I'm… behind."
"You're not behind," Taila said quietly.
Morrigan snapped, "I said I am."
Dack nodded once. "You get it. Night schedule. When the bay's quiet."
Morrigan blinked, caught off guard by how easy that was.
"Why," she asked, defensive reflex.
Dack's answer was simple. "Because you're asking to be useful."
Morrigan's throat bobbed. She looked away first. "Fine."
But she didn't hide the small relief in her posture.
Lyra spoke then, calm. "If you're training, we should start discussing what chassis you could sit in later."
Morrigan's eyes flicked up sharply. "Later?"
Lyra nodded once. "Later."
Jinx grinned like she'd just tasted a new kind of chaos. "Ooooh. A future cockpit for lace gremlin."
Morrigan's glare returned. "Stop calling me that."
Jinx laughed. "Make me."
Dack, unusually talkative today, added, "If you want a cockpit, you earn it. Sims first. Then we talk."
Morrigan's jaw tightened with something that wasn't anger. "Fine."
---
Lyra found them a contract by dinner.
She slid it across the table to Dack. "Pirate cache hit. Planet-side."
Dack scanned it quickly.
A local municipal authority—too broke to hire a battalion, too desperate to ignore the raids—had located a pirate supply cache hidden in a basalt ravine system outside their refinery town. The pirates were using it to stage hit-and-run raids on convoys and strip equipment. The authority wanted it erased.
Pay was decent.
Salvage rights were the real prize—partial, but meaningful. Anything disabled on-site belonged to Moonjaw after arbitration.
Dack's eyes stayed on that line.
Jinx leaned in. "We get to steal their stuff and get paid for it."
Taila nodded, serious. "And it cuts raids."
Morrigan hovered near the wall. "They'll have traps."
"Good," Jinx said. "We like traps now."
Lyra added, "Also… the contact chain in the ledger? One of the yard codes matches this region. That could be coincidence. Or the pirates are buying through Mother Lark's network."
Dack's gaze hardened. "We take it."
He looked at Jinx and Taila. "You both deploy. Lyra stays air. Morrigan stays ship."
Morrigan's eyes narrowed. "Why."
"Because we're not risking you in a cockpit yet," Dack said, direct. "Not until you can do more than sims."
Morrigan's jaw clenched like she hated how fair it was. "Fine."
Jinx leaned back, stretching. "After we get paid, we can buy you a coffin-shaped bed and call it growth."
Morrigan glared. "I already have a bed."
Jinx smiled. "Not the big bed."
Taila's cheeks warmed immediately. Lyra's did too.
Dack looked up. "Big bed?"
Jinx clapped her hands like she'd been waiting. "Yes. The biggest cabin on the Union. We make it the crew room. The safe room. The family room."
Lyra's expression stayed composed, but her voice went slightly tighter. "That's a security argument."
Jinx grinned. "Exactly."
Taila, surprising herself, nodded. "It would be… safer. If something happens, we're together."
Lyra glanced at Taila, then down at her slate as if reading numbers would hide her blush. "It's efficient."
Dack stared at them for a second, then exhaled. "Fine. As long as everyone agrees."
Jinx's grin turned predatory. "Everyone except Morrigan."
Morrigan snapped, "No."
Jinx leaned in sweetly. "Not yet."
Morrigan's cheeks went hot. "Not ever."
Jinx's smile said she didn't believe her.
Dack watched Morrigan for half a second longer than necessary. He saw the way her eyes flicked—just once—toward Taila and Lyra and Jinx like she was watching warmth from outside a window.
He didn't push.
"Not yet," he said, neutral.
Morrigan's glare softened by a fraction, as if she'd been bracing for a shove and got space instead.
---
They rearranged the cabin that night.
The Union's largest room wasn't luxurious. It was just bigger—more floor, more storage, a bunk frame that had been welded wrong by someone who didn't care about comfort.
They made it work.
Lyra supervised the practical parts—lock integrity, sensor coverage, how fast they could reach the corridor in an emergency.
Jinx supervised the "morale" parts—sheets, lighting, where the Moonjaw patch banner would hang, how close the bed would be to the door "for reaction time" while somehow still being "sexy."
Taila helped carry and install, cheeks warm half the time because Jinx kept brushing into her on purpose.
Morrigan stood in the doorway for a while, arms crossed, watching like she was judging them.
Jinx waved her in. "Come admire our sin room."
Morrigan's glare sharpened. "It's not—"
Taila cut in softly, "It's just a room."
Morrigan's mouth tightened. She looked at Taila like she didn't know what to do with Taila's gentleness.
Then she said, quieter, "I'll keep my bunk."
Jinx smiled. "For now."
Morrigan glared, then walked away—boots sharp on the deck.
But she didn't slam the door this time.
That was its own kind of progress.
When the big bed became a real thing—fresh sheets, dim lights, the soft hum of the Union around them—Jinx made a satisfied noise and crawled in like she owned it.
Taila hesitated in the doorway, shy.
Jinx patted the mattress. "Come on. It's not scary."
Taila muttered, "It's not the bed that's scary."
Lyra, standing near the locker, looked away too quickly to be casual.
Dack stepped in last and shut the door. No ceremony.
Jinx immediately scooted closer to him, pressing her body to his side like a claim. Taila followed a second later, sliding in on the other side, nervous until Dack's hand rested on her thigh—steady, grounding.
Lyra climbed in after them, quieter, but she didn't hang back the way she used to. She settled close enough that her shoulder brushed Dack's arm.
Jinx smiled in the dim. "Look at us."
Taila's cheeks were pink. "Jinx…"
Jinx leaned over and kissed Taila—slow, confident—then pulled back with a grin. "We're a merc unit. This is unit cohesion."
Lyra murmured, dry, "You can't justify everything with doctrine."
Jinx's grin widened. "Yes I can."
Taila, emboldened by the warmth and the room and the way Lyra wasn't running from closeness anymore, leaned across Dack and kissed Lyra's cheek. Gentle. Honest.
Lyra froze for half a second—then softened, eyes bright in the low light.
"Careful," Lyra murmured. "You'll make it a habit."
Taila swallowed. "Maybe I want to."
Jinx made a delighted sound like she'd just watched someone step off a cliff voluntarily.
Dack, more talkative than he used to be, said quietly, "Sleep. We drop on the ravine at dawn."
Jinx sighed dramatically. "Yes, boss."
Taila nodded, voice small. "Yes."
Lyra's hand found Dack's wrist under the blankets, fingers squeezing once—silent, private.
Dack let it happen.
---
The ravine system was ugly.
Basalt walls like broken teeth. A refinery plume on the horizon staining the sky. Dust that tasted like metal even through filters.
The Leopard brought them in low and fast, then kicked up and away.
The cache sat tucked into a side cut: old cargo containers stacked into makeshift walls, tarps stretched over equipment, heat blooms in the shadow where vehicles idled. A pirate camp pretending it wasn't a camp.
Lyra's voice came clean over comms. "Multiple vehicles. At least one turret bank. Two light mechs. One medium sitting cold in the back—could be sleeping."
Jinx's Highlander shifted on the right flank. "Let's wake them up."
Taila's Griffin held left, careful and disciplined. "Copy."
Dack's Dire Wolf moved first, heavy feet cracking basalt crust. He didn't rush. He watched lanes. He watched ground. He watched the way pirates tried to funnel you toward your own death.
Then the camp spotted them.
A turret spat rounds.
Dack answered with LRMs, ripping the turret bank apart in two controlled bursts—enough to silence it without wasting the whole rack. He followed with his autocannon into the container wall to punch a hole and deny the pirates cover.
Jinx fired next—missiles into the vehicle line, turning a fuel truck into fire and panic. A gauss shot followed, slamming into a technical truck and scattering bodies into dust.
Taila held her fire until she had a clean line on a light mech—Panther, stepping out of shadow, PPC charging.
Taila's PPC flashed first, striking the Panther's torso and disrupting its aim. Her missiles followed a moment later, forcing it to stumble back behind containers.
The second light mech—Jenner—tried to sprint wide, aiming for Taila's flank like it wanted to test her nerves.
Taila didn't chase. She didn't panic. She shifted position, kept the lane, and punished the Jenner when it tried to cross open ground.
Jinx laughed over comms. "That's my girl."
Taila snapped, "Focus."
Dack, unusually generous with words today, said, "Good lane control. Keep it."
Then the medium in the back woke up.
Heat spiked behind the deepest container wall. Something heavy scraped metal as it moved.
Lyra's voice tightened. "Medium coming online—Hunchback. Big shoulder mount. It's inside the cache yard."
Jinx's grin sharpened. "Finally."
The Hunchback shoved through the container gap Dack had punched—like a beast forced out of a cage—shoulder weapon swinging toward the Dire Wolf as if it wanted to take a chunk out of his day.
Dack didn't flinch.
He stepped, angled off the obvious lane, and fired—gauss round into the Hunchback's torso plating, autocannon following before it could settle its aim. The Hunchback staggered, tried to answer—
Jinx hit it from the side with a heavy missile salvo, forcing it to twist its shoulder weapon away from Dack and exposing its flank.
Taila saw the opening and put a PPC shot into the exposed armor.
The Hunchback rocked hard, smoke venting.
It didn't go down.
It just got angry.
And as the pirates began to break and scatter—some running into the ravine shadows, some dying where they stood—Dack's sensors picked up something else inside the cache.
Not a mech.
A sealed container bank with the wrong heat signature.
A booby-trapped ammo reserve, rigged to cook the whole cut if anyone got greedy.
Lyra's voice came tight. "Dack—there's a heat spike in the rear storage. That's not engine heat. That's… chemical."
Dack's eyes narrowed. "Trap."
Jinx sounded annoyed. "Of course it's a trap."
Taila's voice turned cautious. "Do we pull back?"
Dack watched the Hunchback, watched the containers, watched the fire spreading in ways that could get stupid fast.
"We finish the Hunchback," he said. "Then we take what we can without dying for it."
Jinx laughed once, sharp. "That's the spirit."
And the Hunchback lifted its shoulder weapon again, deciding it would rather die than let Moonjaw walk away with its cache.
---
When Dack climbed back into the Dire Wolf cockpit later—after the first exchange, after the first fire, after the first decisions—he sat in the dark for a moment while systems stabilized and heat sinks ticked.
His thumb found the marks beneath the HUD.
He scratched one new line.
Then, quietly, he said the number out loud.
"Sixty-one."
The Dire Wolf hummed around him like it agreed.
Outside, Moonjaw kept fighting for C-bills, for steel, and for the kind of future that only existed if you survived the next contract.