The new system felt colder.
Not in temperature—space didn't care about that—but in the way the traffic moved. Less chatter. Fewer fat merchant signatures drifting like lazy whales. More empty. More room for someone to disappear… or for someone to hunt without witnesses.
Lyra kept the Union tucked behind a ragged belt of tumbling rock and dead metal, using the debris field like a curtain. The ship drifted with engines low, attitude corrections measured. Nothing flashy. Nothing that said we're here.
In the mech bay, the captured Atlas hung in clamps like a giant animal trussed for butchering.
Powered down. Chained. Silent.
Dack stood on the deck plates below it, looking up at the cockpit seam. The brass bird insignia on the Atlas's shoulder caught the bay lights and made the metal look like it was smirking.
Jinx hopped down from the access ladder behind him, tugging her red jacket straighter. Her dirty-blonde hair was tied back, but loose strands kept slipping free like they were as undisciplined as she was. Morrigan followed at a slower pace, arms crossed, dark eyes narrowed, gothic scowl set like armor. Taila stayed close to Dack's shoulder without meaning to, hands clasped behind her back, trying to look like she wasn't nervous. Lyra watched from the catwalk above, helmet hooked on one finger, calm and unreadable.
Rook and Rafe were already on the Atlas, moving along its plating with small tools and larger intent. They weren't gentle. They were precise.
Rafe: "Second—" Rook: "—layer."
Rafe: "She—" Rook: "—planned."
Dack glanced at the twins. "Find it all."
They nodded once, together.
Mother Lark's voice drifted faintly through the Atlas's emergency speaker—weak now, because they'd already torn out the first obvious transmitter. Still too smooth.
"You think you can strip a bird of feathers and make it stop flying," she said.
Jinx laughed. "We're not stripping feathers. We're pulling out your bones."
"Careful," Mother Lark murmured. "You'll cut yourself on confidence."
Morrigan tilted her head, twin tails of dark hair brushing her shoulders. "You talk a lot for someone tied to the floor."
Mother Lark didn't answer her. She aimed her attention where she wanted it—always at Dack.
"You're stalling," she said softly. "Because you don't like the answer."
Dack didn't raise his voice. "You'll talk when I'm ready."
A pause. Then that faint, pleased laugh again. "You think you get to choose."
Dack looked up at the cockpit seam. "I do."
Lyra's voice came down from above, calm and sharp. "Rook. Rafe. Full sweep. Anything that looks like it shouldn't be there comes out. Anything that looks like it should be there but is too new—comes out."
Rook's answer was immediate. "Copy."
The twins worked like they were reading a book only they could see: maintenance access points, hidden cavities, places a battlefield tech would never bother to open. They didn't just hunt transmitters. They hunted patterns.
Minutes passed.
Then Rafe's voice snapped tighter. "Dead—"
Rook finished. "—man."
She held up a thin black wafer between two fingers. It was inert, but the design was too clean, too professional. It looked like it had never been near a battlefield.
Lyra leaned over the catwalk railing. "What does it do?"
Rafe: "It—" Rook: "—waits."
Rafe: "If—" Rook: "—cockpit power rises, it bursts a location pulse."
Jinx's grin sharpened. "So if she tries to 'wake up' in the hold, her retrieval ship knows exactly where to stab."
Mother Lark's faint speaker voice floated down, amused. "You're learning."
Morrigan stepped closer, boots clacking. "You're predictable."
Mother Lark's tone cooled a fraction. "And you're brave when you have walls."
Dack held out his hand. Rook dropped the wafer into his palm. It felt like nothing.
It felt like a lot.
He crushed it slowly until the casing cracked. No drama. Just a decision.
Then he looked up again. "Anything else?"
Rook and Rafe moved higher on the torso plating, opened another seam.
Rook's hand paused.
Rafe's breathing changed.
Rafe: "Passive—" Rook: "—tag."
Rafe: "No—" Rook: "—signal."
Rafe: "Just—" Rook: "—something that reflects."
Lyra's eyes narrowed. "A radar corner."
Dack's jaw tightened. "So every sweep paints us brighter."
Jinx swore softly, then smiled again anyway. "Oh, she's nasty."
Taila swallowed. "How many?"
Rook held up two more, then another.
"Four," Lyra said, more to herself than anyone. "She wanted redundancy."
Mother Lark's voice floated down again, still smooth. "Redundancy is survival."
Dack spoke without looking away from the cockpit seam. "You always do this?"
Mother Lark laughed quietly. "Always? No. Only when something matters."
Dack's voice stayed blunt. "Why did Kess use Featherline."
The silence that followed was different. Not absence—choice.
Mother Lark's emergency speaker hissed faintly, then her voice returned cooler.
"Kess used whatever rail paid him," she said.
Dack didn't move. "He had your money."
Mother Lark didn't deny it. "He had a contract."
Jinx leaned in, eyes bright. "Say it. He worked for you."
Mother Lark's tone sharpened. "He worked for profit."
Dack's gaze didn't flicker. "You profit off revenge too."
Taila's breath caught at that word—revenge—like she'd been thinking it but hadn't wanted to name it.
Lyra spoke from above, voice like steel. "Who brokered Ronan's death contract."
Mother Lark's laugh faded. "You're asking the wrong question."
Lyra's eyes narrowed further. "That's not an answer."
"It is," Mother Lark said softly. "Because you assume it was business."
Dack's voice cut in. "Was it you."
Mother Lark's silence lasted long enough that it stopped being a dodge.
Then, faintly: "Ronan didn't die by chance."
That was all she gave. Not the full confession. Not the name. Just the confirmation sharpened into a blade and slid under Dack's ribs.
Dack's hand tightened against the crushed wafer pieces until they bit into his palm.
Lyra watched him closely. Jinx went quiet. Taila's fingers curled into a fist against her thigh.
Morrigan stared at the Atlas like she wanted to smash it with her bare hands.
Dack exhaled once, slow.
"Later," he said.
Mother Lark's voice came soft, satisfied. "Yes. Later."
Lyra straightened on the catwalk. "We're not sitting here. We need credits, parts, and distance."
Dack nodded once. "Contracts."
Lyra tapped her slate. "Already looking."
---
They spent the next stretch of time the way mercs always did when they weren't bleeding.
They planned.
They patched.
They made the ship feel like a home without admitting they were doing it.
Rook and Rafe dove into the Dire Wolf's left torso damage first, because Dack's machine was the anchor. Their hands moved fast, confident, finishing each other's assessments with the ease of people who'd only ever relied on each other.
Taila stayed nearby, watching and learning. She didn't talk much unless spoken to, but her eyes tracked everything—tools, cabling, armor seam placement, the way the twins adjusted things like they were making the Dire Wolf breathe easier.
Jinx got bored in under an hour.
Bored was dangerous for Jinx.
So she made it everyone else's problem.
"Uniforms," she announced, hopping up onto a crate like she was calling a meeting in a bar. "We're Moonjaw now. We need to look like it."
Lyra didn't look up from her slate. "We're a merc unit. We need to look competent."
Jinx smiled brightly. "We can do both."
Morrigan's eyes narrowed. "I'm not wearing whatever trash you think is 'cute.'"
Jinx put a hand to her chest like she'd been wounded. "You think I'd disrespect your vibe? Morrigan, please. Your vibe is the vibe."
Taila looked like she wanted to vanish into the deck plates. "Do we… need outfits?"
Dack's voice came from near the Dire Wolf's open paneling. "We need contracts."
Jinx pointed at him. "And we need intimidation. People pay faster when the mercs look expensive."
Lyra finally glanced up. "And you think revealing clothes makes us look expensive."
Jinx's grin widened. "Absolutely."
Morrigan snorted. "She means it makes us look like trouble."
Jinx winked. "Same thing."
Lyra's eyes flicked to Dack, as if asking if he was going to shut it down.
He didn't.
He watched the women in his bay—Taila trying to be brave, Jinx trying to be loud enough to hide her own cracks, Morrigan pretending she didn't care, Lyra steady like she always was, the twins quietly listening like they were cataloging it all.
Dack's voice was blunt. "Make it practical."
Jinx's smile went softer for half a second, like she hadn't expected him to give an inch. "Oh. I can do practical."
Morrigan stepped off the wall. "I want input."
Jinx's eyes lit up. "Of course you do."
And that's how it started—Jinx and Morrigan in the tiny cargo-office space with fabric samples pulled up on Lyra's slate, spec sheets from whatever suppliers Lyra could access without pinging the wrong people, and the twins chiming in when it came to what could be worn under a pilot harness without snagging or cutting circulation.
They designed two sets.
Public / casual gear: black and red, tight, revealing in ways that fit each of them instead of turning them into copies.
Jinx wanted a cropped armored tank that showed her stomach when she moved, a red jacket cut high with utility straps, short shorts with thigh holster points that made it obvious she carried a sidearm because she wanted people to notice.
Morrigan wanted a black dress cut short with asymmetrical red accents, layered over tight leggings, combat boots, and a collar-harness that looked like fashion until you saw the armored inserts. Something gothic that still said don't touch me.
Taila wanted to object, but Jinx pushed a halter-style top with red striping and high-waist combat leggings—tight enough to make her blush, practical enough to move in. Taila's face stayed pink for an hour after.
Lyra kept hers sleek: a fitted black bodysuit with red piping, a cropped tactical vest, and a long coat option for public spaces—clean, calm, intimidating in a different way.
Rook and Rafe ended up with matching techwear sets: tight black tops with red seam-lines, shorts with tool-loop belts, and detachable sleeves that kept grease off skin while still looking like they belonged.
Combat-ready gear: sealed pilot suits, black with red accents, reinforced in pressure points, with Moonjaw's dire wolf patch on the shoulder and a removable collar guard. Tight enough to move, tough enough to survive shrapnel and heat.
Jinx insisted the combat suits still had to look good.
Morrigan made sure they looked mean.
Dack didn't comment while they argued.
He just watched.
And when Taila walked out later in her new casual set—haltered top hugging her, leggings making her look more confident than she felt—Dack's eyes tracked her once. He didn't smile.
But he nodded.
Taila's blush went deeper anyway.
Jinx caught it and nearly vibrated with joy. "He approves!"
Dack's voice was flat. "Stop."
Jinx's grin stayed wicked. "No."
---
Lyra found the contract on the third search pass, which meant it was either good… or it was poison.
Planetary name: Varrin's Scar — low-pop industrial world with a refinery belt and badlands eerily similar to the last one. Pirates had been hitting ore convoys and cracking open depot vaults, then vanishing into the canyon maze.
Employer: a consortium manager who sounded nervous but paid in hard C-bills and salvage rights.
Conditions: ground operation. No orbit fireworks. Get it done fast.
Lyra laid it out on the bay table. "We drop in, hit their depot, kill or capture leadership, and take what they've been stealing. Payment plus salvage."
Jinx leaned over the slate, eyes bright. "Pirate depot means pirate mechs."
Taila swallowed. "How many."
Lyra highlighted the threat estimate. "At least a full lance. Possibly two. Reports mention a heavy anchor."
Morrigan's lips curled. "Good."
Dack's eyes stayed on the map overlay—canyon networks, depot layout, possible ambush lines. "We take it."
Lyra hesitated. "We're still carrying an Atlas hostage."
Dack didn't look away. "We need money. We need parts. We need to keep moving."
Lyra nodded once. "Then we do it smart."
Jinx grinned. "We always do."
Taila muttered, "That's a lie."
Jinx laughed and hooked an arm around Taila's shoulders for a second—only in the bay, only out of combat. Taila stiffened, then… didn't pull away.
Dack saw it.
He didn't say anything.
But he didn't hate it either.
---
Varrin's Scar greeted them with dust and the smell of burned metal.
The Union came down behind a ridge line a few klicks from the target depot, in a dead zone between radar sweeps. Lyra kept the landing short and ugly—no wasted time on pretty.
The mech bay doors opened onto a world of cracked basalt and jagged canyon mouths that looked like they wanted to swallow machines whole.
Dack stayed in the Dire Wolf. Jinx took the Highlander. Taila in the Griffin. Morrigan sealed into the Marauder, posture stiff like she was trying to convince herself the machine didn't scare her.
Lyra stayed with the Union, not in a mech, because her job was the ship and the sky—comms, extraction, and making sure nobody tagged them again.
Rook and Rafe stayed bay-side, ready to slam doors and cycle clamps, ready to patch armor the moment anyone limped home.
The plan was simple.
Simple plans survived first contact longer.
They approached low through a canyon channel, sensors passive. The depot sat in a bowl—rusted prefab structures, fuel tanks, a landing pad with scorch marks, and a perimeter fence that looked like it had been repaired too many times with scrap.
Pirates didn't care about pretty.
They cared about holding just long enough to steal.
Heat signatures flared.
Four mechs moved in the bowl.
A Hunchback—thick torso, brutal shape, built for close-range punishment.
A Catapult on the ridge line—missile racks like raised shoulders.
A Shadow Hawk stalking near the depot's main gate.
And the heavy anchor—standing behind the fuel tanks like a guard dog.
An Awesome.
The sight of it made the canyon feel smaller. Assault-class bulk. Three PPC barrels glinting even in dust haze.
Jinx's voice came through comms, delighted. "Ohhh. That one's expensive."
Taila's voice was tight. "We can't fight that head-on."
Dack's voice stayed calm. "We don't."
He moved first—Dire Wolf stepping up onto a canyon lip, just enough to be seen. Not fully exposed. Just a presence.
The pirates reacted immediately.
The Catapult's missile doors opened.
The Shadow Hawk shifted toward him.
The Hunchback started forward like it wanted to get close enough to bite.
The Awesome held still, patient.
Dack waited until their targeting spread widened—until the depot defenders committed to the idea that he was the main threat.
Then he spoke, blunt. "Morrigan. Left. Cut the gate."
Morrigan's voice came back rough. "Copy."
The Marauder slid out of shadow along a side channel, using the canyon wall as cover. It moved like a predator trying to remember it was one.
Taila's Griffin followed behind Morrigan, not as close—spacing disciplined, the way Dack drilled them in sims. Taila wasn't confident, but she was learning to obey patterns under pressure.
Jinx's Highlander held high ground on the opposite ridge, using elevation to make the enemy divide attention.
The Catapult fired first—LRMs arcing toward Dack's Dire Wolf.
Dack answered with his own LRMs, not dumping everything, just enough to disrupt. Missiles crossed overhead and detonated in the bowl, throwing dust and shrapnel into the air. The Catapult backed up instinctively.
Jinx punished the movement with a gauss shot that cracked into the Catapult's ridge cover, forcing it to reposition. "Stay still and die," she sang.
The Shadow Hawk darted forward and fired—harassing fire meant to test Dack's armor.
Dack didn't chase. He stayed anchored. He fired his AC/10 once, the shot slamming into the Shadow Hawk's shoulder plating and making it stumble back behind a fuel tank.
The Hunchback kept coming.
It wanted the brawl.
Dack let it.
He stepped back just enough to pull the Hunchback into a lane that exposed its flank to Jinx's angle.
"Jinx," Dack said, flat.
"I know," she replied, grin audible.
Her Highlander fired again—gauss thunder cracking the air—and the round punched through the Hunchback's side armor with a brutal, wet crunch of collapsing internal structure. The Hunchback staggered, still moving, stubborn as a mean animal.
Then Morrigan hit the gate.
The Marauder's PPC flashed, white-hot, and the depot's main gate vanished into sparks and twisted metal. Taila's Griffin followed it in, firing its PPC into the Shadow Hawk the moment it reappeared—this time striking the torso plating hard enough to make the medium mech recoil and backpedal.
Taila's voice was tight with shock. "Hit."
Dack didn't praise. He just acknowledged. "Good. Keep pressure."
The Awesome finally moved.
It stepped forward from behind the fuel tanks with slow certainty, raised an arm, and fired a PPC that tore through the air like a lightning bolt and slammed into Dack's Dire Wolf's torso plating. Armor flared. Warning lights blinked.
Jinx's laughter died.
Taila's breath caught.
Morrigan went quiet.
Dack's voice stayed level. "That's the anchor."
The Awesome fired again, second PPC striking close, forcing Dack to shift.
Dack didn't trade shots with it. That was what it wanted—to make the biggest machine in the bowl become the center of attention while the rest of the pirate lance moved freely.
He didn't give it that.
He angled the Dire Wolf back behind the canyon lip, breaking direct line-of-sight, and instead hammered the Shadow Hawk with LRMs, forcing it to either retreat or die.
The Shadow Hawk chose retreat.
"Depot's falling back!" Taila said, voice sharp with adrenaline.
"Good," Dack replied. "Take the bowl."
Jinx dropped her Highlander down a sloped ridge path, landing hard in the basin, dust exploding around her ankles. She fired her SRMs once into the already-wounded Hunchback, finishing what the gauss shot had started. The Hunchback collapsed in a smoking heap.
Morrigan pushed deeper through the gate breach, Marauder stepping into the depot like it had been born there. Her lasers cut into a prefab tower that had been hiding an infantry AT team; the structure folded inward with a crunch, dust and sparks spilling out.
Taila followed, Griffin keeping close to Morrigan's shoulder—spacing tight enough to support, not so tight they became one target.
Dack moved in behind them, Dire Wolf's bulk filling the breach lane like a wall.
The Catapult tried to reposition for a new missile line.
Jinx saw it and fired again—gauss cracking into the Catapult's leg. The heavy mech stumbled, and for a moment its missile fire went wild, exploding harmlessly against canyon rock instead of chewing into armor.
The Awesome stood in the open now, the last real threat, PPC barrels glowing.
It fired again—one bolt slamming into Jinx's Highlander, armor flaring off her shoulder.
Jinx hissed. "Okay. I hate that thing."
Dack's voice stayed blunt. "We take it."
Taila's voice cracked with disbelief. "We can capture an Awesome?"
"We can," Dack said. "If we break it without coring it."
He shifted target priority instantly—legs and arms, not center mass. He fired LRMs in a controlled pattern, forcing the Awesome to adjust its footing. Jinx added pressure with SRMs and a measured gauss shot aimed low, chewing armor off a knee joint.
Morrigan's Marauder stepped out from depot cover and fired its PPC into the Awesome's right arm—forcing one of the PPC housings to spark and dip.
The Awesome's pilot reacted like they were good—because they were. The assault mech tried to pivot and keep its strongest barrels facing the biggest threats.
Dack didn't let it settle.
He drove forward, Dire Wolf closing distance just enough to make the Awesome's pilot uncomfortable, then fired his AC/10 again into the already-weak knee assembly.
The Awesome staggered.
Not down.
But hurt.
Jinx's Highlander advanced on the other side, boxing it in.
Taila's Griffin—heart pounding, hands steady by force—fired her PPC into the Awesome's left torso plating, helping strip armor without punching deep.
"Nice," Jinx said, almost gentle. "Taila, that was—"
"Don't," Taila snapped, flustered and furious at herself for liking the praise.
Jinx grinned. "Okay. Sorry. I'll praise you later."
The Awesome tried one last move—stepping backward toward the depot's fuel tanks, trying to use them as cover.
Dack saw the danger immediately: fuel tanks meant explosions meant accidental cockpit kills.
"Stop it," he muttered.
He fired LRMs not at the Awesome, but at the ground behind it—detonations throwing slag and debris into the path and forcing it to stop short of the tanks.
Then he hit the other knee with a gauss shot—careful angle, controlled, not the kind of shot you took if you didn't trust your aim.
The round slammed into the joint.
The Awesome's leg buckled.
The assault mech dropped to one knee with a grinding shriek of metal, PPC barrels dipping toward the dirt.
Silence hit the basin for half a second.
Then the cockpit popped.
The pilot ejected—small, bright flash against the dust haze. A chute blossomed.
Dack didn't celebrate. He just held aim until the machine stayed down and the rest of the pirate signatures faded—mediums and heavies retreating out of the bowl, broken and unwilling to die for a depot.
Lyra's voice came through comms from the Union, cool. "Local sensors are waking up. You have minutes before someone else comes looking."
Dack's answer was immediate. "Secure the prize. Fast."
---
They didn't "salvage" the Awesome on the ground like amateurs.
They secured it like mercs who'd learned the hard way that victory didn't matter if you couldn't carry it home.
Rook and Rafe guided Lyra's remote cargo rigging from the Union—winch drones and tether lines, drop nets designed to snag a fallen mech without needing anyone to walk out into the open in soft skin.
Jinx's Highlander and Dack's Dire Wolf held the perimeter. Taila and Morrigan stayed closer to the downed Awesome, weapons ready, watching for infantry or desperate pirates trying to reclaim their anchor.
No one touched.
No one got out.
The drones did the risky work.
Steel cables snapped tight around the Awesome's torso and shoulders. The machine lurched as the Union's winch tugged. Dust exploded around it. The assault mech dragged across basalt like a dead giant being hauled by hooks.
Morrigan watched it with a hungry, almost offended look. "That thing is ugly."
Jinx's grin returned. "It's beautiful. It's C-bills."
Taila's voice was quieter. "And it's… ours?"
Dack answered, blunt. "For now."
Lyra cut in. "We lift the moment it's in the bay. No loiter."
They got it in. The Union's bay doors sealed. Clamps bit. The ship shuddered as it took on even more mass, like it was swallowing another bone.
And in the shadows of the hold, the captured Atlas still hung—silent, chained, waiting.
Two cages now.
One for their enemy.
One for their future.
---
By the time they were back in orbit, the adrenaline had started to thin, leaving behind the kind of quiet that made people do stupid things just to feel something again.
Jinx did not handle quiet well.
Neither did Morrigan, in her own way.
So the clothing project became a ritual over the next couple days—something to pour energy into while the twins and Lyra turned salvage into stability.
They didn't just sketch.
They fitted.
They argued over seams and straps, over what looked "too cute" versus what looked "too boring," over how much skin could be shown without compromising the ability to throw a jacket on and sprint down a corridor if alarms went off.
Jinx kept trying to make everything tighter.
Morrigan kept trying to make everything darker.
Lyra kept making sure it worked in real life.
Taila kept blushing and pretending she wasn't secretly excited.
Rook and Rafe kept adding small functional touches that made it all feel real—mag pockets for comm tabs, hidden knife sleeves, harness-friendly cuts, heat-safe fabric for bay work.
Dack watched more than he spoke.
But when he walked into the bay and saw them lined up in their public gear—black and red, Moonjaw patches set clean, each outfit fitting the woman wearing it instead of drowning her—his eyes lingered.
Jinx flipped her long dirty-blonde hair over one shoulder and winked, blue eyes bright. "Well?"
Morrigan crossed her arms, glaring like she expected criticism. Taila held her hands behind her back, blushing but smiling. Lyra stood with a small, calm tilt to her mouth, holding her helmet at her hip like it belonged there. The twins stood side by side, nearly identical in stance, finishing each other's silence.
Dack nodded once.
"Good," he said.
That was it.
And it hit them like praise anyway.
Jinx's grin turned wicked. "He likes it."
Taila's blush deepened. Morrigan looked away like she didn't care, but her posture eased a fraction. Lyra's eyes softened for a beat, then went professional again.
They were building something.
Not just a unit.
A pack.
---
In the hold, chained above the deck like a captured idol, Mother Lark's Atlas remained powered down.
Silent.
But Dack knew she was listening anyway—through whatever tiny emergency circuits still existed, through any crack she could exploit.
He stood beneath the Atlas and the newly captured Awesome, staring up at the two assault machines like they were bookends to the same story.
Lyra joined him, slate in hand. "Payment hit. Salvage rights confirmed. We're ahead for once."
Dack didn't look at the slate. "Good."
Lyra's gaze slid to the Atlas. "And her?"
Dack's eyes stayed hard. "She talks."
Lyra nodded once. "Soon."
Jinx's voice carried from behind them, amused and sharp. "Soon after we decide what to name the Awesome."
Taila muttered, "We don't name everything."
Jinx grinned. "Yes we do."
Morrigan's voice came low, almost reluctant. "It's not staying painted like pirate trash."
Jinx beamed. "Oh, don't worry. We're putting Moonjaw on it."
Dack finally looked back up at the Atlas cockpit seam.
No speaker hiss. No taunts.
Just silence.
He didn't trust it.
He spoke anyway, voice blunt, calm.
"You're losing," he said.
A long pause.
Then, faintly—just enough to make his skin tighten—Mother Lark's voice drifted through the emergency line like a whisper through steel.
"This," she said softly, "is you getting comfortable."
Dack's jaw clenched.
He didn't answer her.
Not yet.
But he didn't step away either.
Because now they had money in the account, an assault mech in the bay, a crew wearing Moonjaw colors like they meant it… and an enemy in chains who thought the story still belonged to her.
It didn't.
Not anymore.