Like spears of gleaming steel, corporate warships appeared above the atmosphere of Veles. With a flash of rainbow light, another joined the host of nearly a dozen vessels. It would have been simple (albeit illegal) to use orbital weapons, but that wasn't the point of this, no. From the underbellies of these great ships streaked what, from the ground, appeared to be falling stars. Each pod held a single Einherjar, a ten meter tall humanoid weapons platform. And on that day, they fell like rain. 

From inside one of the falling stars a man named Artur tried to ignore the rocking of his machine and the pounding of his pulse. 

"Calm yourself, pilot." A woman's voice in his mind spoke through his cranial implant.

He shook his head. This was a mistake. Enlisting was a damned mistake.

"Your heart rate is exceeding safe parameters, pilot. Please apply the breathing exercises taught during basic training."

"I am trying…" growled Artur.

"Synchronization will not initialize until your heart rate is stable."

It wasn't like he didn't already know that! It was just that real battle wasn't something he felt ready for, and it only became apparent to him on the descent. The machine shuddered as the pod's deceleration thrusters kicked on. 

"Just breathe…" he muttered to himself.

"I will keep you safe, pilot. After all, that is my purpose as your assigned combat AI."

The pod landed with a heavy crash that would have thrown Artur, had he not been secured inside. 

"Fucking shit!" he shouted.

His mind shifted from the dread of combat to the immediate pain of the landing. 

"Landing successful, Einherjar frame operational, awaiting synchronization."

Several loud thuds came from one of the pod's walls; weapon fire connecting. He had to calm down enough to sync, or he'd be gunned down in an inert mech.

"Einherjar scale munitions fire confirmed."

"Just shut up!" Artur shouted at the AI.

 "Forwarding exterior camera feed to augmented reality display."

Outside stood another Einherjar, an aftermarket model with a submachine gun pointed at the pod. It squeezed the trigger and another volley of rounds impacted the outer plating of the drop pod.

"Pod integrity nearly compromised."

How was he meant to get relaxed enough to sync with the frame like this? He bodily shook as a missile battery rose from the enemy machine's shoulder.

"I'm going to die here… You do it!" He shivered, wanting to ball up, "I… I can't."

A quartet of missiles streaked toward the pod, toward him.

He shut his eyes, not that it blocked the display fed directly into his ocular nerves. The walls of the pod fell away, he felt a sudden rush of movement and watched the missiles fly past the now barren frame of the drop pod. His vision was pulled over to that of his Einherjar's as it spun and brought its rifle up in a fluid motion, glimmering cinders from the frame’s boosters lingering in the air, then fired. The burst of gunfire tore through a building and into the enemy frame. 

"I will keep you safe, pilot."

_____

Warm rain fell against the corrugated metal of the prefab hangar's roof like a low roar every time a new sheet of it came down. A woman with dark hair leaned against one of the support struts, idly sipping coffee and staring across the hangar up at an Einherjar frame. A communications channel opened in her augmented reality suite. Her handler was calling; with her free hand, she reached out and accepted the call. 

"Aria, are you alright?" asked a man's voice.

Aria took a sip before replying, "Yeah, I told you it would be a while until they got the comms equipment working down here. How are things back home, Rufus?"

"Other than being worried about you and Nimue? I'm okay, my back hurts and I'm beyond sick of trying to get contracts without being able to go through Æsir," he complained.

"I get it, they're the biggest name in the game, even got the economic council’s backing." Aria cracked her neck. "But it's not like we're particularly welcome with them, what with my whole deal and Nimue being Nimue."

Another voice intruded on the call, a woman's. "And what is that meant to mean, pilot?"

"You know exactly what it's meant to mean. Æsir and the council don't like it when their machines can talk back," said Aria, taking another sip.

"I can play the good AI, promise. It's not like I couldn't just send data that indicates I'm non-sentient. How close do you think they'd look?" 

Rufus groaned, "Nimue, you can barely stop yourself from engaging in banter with other pilots we work with."

"The prohibition on AI is foolish–"

"Yes, we know it is, but what can a pair of mercs and their AI friend really do about that?" grumbled Aria, interrupting Nimue.

"Additionally, their issue with you is similarly foolish, Aria."

Aria didn't reply. 

"We know. Not everything makes sense, else we wouldn't have a job," said Rufus.

"If things made sense neither of you would need a job."

"Nimue. Enough," said Aria.

“Yes, it would be simpler if things were about the well being of people– and AI as well,” said Rufus, catching himself.

Aria sighed. “I’ve seen enough dispatches from Blivet Heavy Industries to know they’re making moves on the fringe systems. All while war between Mobius Sci-Tech and the Penrose Foundation continues on and on while still calling it a dispute over mining rights.” She took another sip of her coffee. "We'll have work as a deniable asset until it kills us… or we can retire," she laughed bitterly 

"You think anyone has ever retired from this without severe injury or sync syndrome?" asked Rufus. 

"Since the formalization of the mercenary pilots’ charter, there have been nine," clarified Nimue.

"The modern machines aren't like the mark ones. They're stable, so you shouldn’t end up like me." said Rufus.

"A bullet slips between the armor plates, a pilot can get cooked in the cockpit, and then there's plenty of can openers. Rufus, you've seen what I can manage with a solid combat blade.” Aria pulled a knife from her thigh, like a smaller version of the one on her machine. “And just imagine if we can afford one of the Penrose models or a Blivet pile bunker after this job.” 

“If it’ll help keep munitions costs down, I’m for it. Though I worry about yo–” said Rufus as a blast of static cut the transmission. 

“The uplink seems to be unable to pierce the storm above us.” 

Aria grumbled and drank the rest of her coffee as she looked out of the hangar at the clouds above. They sparked with electricity that coursed over their dark bodies. “Clearly.”

Aria turned back to her Einherjar, her Caliburn, a full ten meters tall with angled armor on the front and sides with a few thick plates on the back of its torso with holes cut for the adjustable thrusters. On each of its thighs was a combat knife for close quarters engagements and hanging near the hands were its standard armaments: a battle rifle and a medium sized metal shield. Lastly was the single back unit, a rail cannon and accompanying battery pack. The frame had served her well since she’d gone into independent mercenary work, and it gave Nimue something of a body to inhabit. 

The rain just kept falling as a few more craft landed. From the cargo bays rolled out multiple vehicles and more four-meter tall Alfar industrial frames. Aria took the time to read over the briefing, looking for why they needed a combat model and a mercenary at that. Her employer for this job was the Necker Group, a primarily pharmaceutical company with only Mobius being a competitor in their field. There weren’t even any notes of megafauna on the planet, nor did there seem to be any particular reason to worry. 

“Nimue, can you get me a view from the Shahrat?” Aria said, leaning her head back. “Can we see the Nastrond Anomaly from here?”

“Just a moment. I should be able to, we have class two access to the vessel.”

Shortly after Aria’s vision was replaced with the view from one of the exterior cameras on the Shahrat. Out in the twinkling sea of stars she saw it, that stretch of inky blackness that lingered within inhabited space like a great wound. Beyond it was the Milky Way galaxy. If the history was accurate, humanity’s ancestral home was somewhere in that spiral disk in the sky. 

“Nimue, you think we’re here because it’s near the anomaly?” 

“Potentially, but if you want me to probe Necker’s records I can probably find out.”

“Don’t bother, we don’t need them getting testy over it. We need the pay anyway. Mind switching my vision back over?”

“Not a bit.”

Aria blinked as her vision returned to her actual eyes. ”And don’t go digging without telling me.”

“I won’t,” Nimue paused, “I’ll run the prep on the Caliburn instead.”

“Just don’t be obvious about what else you’re doing as you run prep, then,” said Aria, putting her cup down on a nearby table. “I’ve got to see the head of this about what they need us to do.” 

“Am I allowed to listen?”

Aria took a step out of the hangar, sticking to the portions of the prefab base with overhanging roofs. “I couldn’t stop you if I wanted to, babe.” 

As Aria walked she could hear the Caliburn moving, joints being checked and systems examined. Nimue was still an AI meant for an Einherjar and she’d often run these checks several times before combat or just when she was bored. Aria focused back on matters at her scale. As the wind picked up and the rain that it carried sent her running through the muddy earth between units, she cursed that she’d forgotten proper rain gear. The briefing hadn’t specified that the deployment zone was a rainforest, so she’d only really brought clothing for a regular forest like those on her home planet. 

Dripping wet, she stepped into the command building, the first one sent down after the perimeter walls. Inside were dozens of Necker employees wearing their logo on the back of their heavy raincoats. 

A woman carrying a spare approached her with a slight smirk. “Didn’t expect to see you here, Aria.” 

Aria narrowed her eyes. “Thought you died back during that convoy fiasco on Odessa, Maks.”

“You could use my call sign–”

“And you could use mine too.” Aria groaned. “Now, are you gonna let me freeze, Koschei?” 

Koschei thrust it out toward her, still smirking. “Maybe. That’s up to you, Avalon.” 

“Thanks,” Aria said, taking it. “Give me a moment, I need to at least get some of the water out of my clothes. After that, we’re gonna have a talk.” 

She nodded. “Fine, maybe you can tell me why they needed two of us here for what looks like a survey job.” 

“I was hoping you could tell me,” replied Aria, stepping into an empty side room.

A short time later she stepped back out, still damp, but not soaked through anymore, with the insulated raincoat over her. 

Koschei looked her over. “You’re pretty small, you know that?”

“I’m just under the height to need adjustments to standard cockpits. You’re just a giant.” She moved to lean against a wall. “So, you have any clue why they need not just one, but two of us?” 

“Most I’ve been told is that we’re here ‘just in case’.” Koschei rolled her steel blue eyes.

Aria groaned. “Then they’re expecting something messy, and just refuse to tell us anything about it.” 

“You know how corps are. This is really out in the sticks, no settlements at all on this planet,” Koschei said, eyeing the nearby Necker personnel.

Aria shrugged. “We could actually attend the briefing.” 

“Fair point. I was honestly just waiting for something interesting to come up or one of them to flag me down. Getting kind of antsy out of my machine,” said Koschei as she turned and walked toward the group of Necker employees. 

Aria followed the other merc, off to one side so she could see the command table around Koschei’s sheer size. For a moment it looked like nothing but a plain metal table until her Augmented Reality Chip connected to it. Once it had, the bare metal was covered with an image of the site from orbit with the addition of in atmosphere drone imaging to account for the cloud coverage. 

Koschei whistled as she scanned the terrain. “Damn snarl of a jungle. You get your Einherjar’s joint seals checked?” 

“Yes, we did,” said Nimue directly to Aria’s mind. 

“Yeah, been done since we got the initial brief, you?” asked Aria, waiting for the rest of the team to gather around the map display.

Koschei nodded as an older man with clearly artificial eyes began speaking. “Now that our mercenaries are here we can begin to discuss operations.” He swept a hand over an area that was hazy and ill-defined, only for it to sharpen, revealing a mass jutting out of the jungle. “I’ve heard plenty of speculation as to why we’re here, and this is it.” The display zoomed in on the object. “This object contains heat signatures within, and possesses the distinct emanations similar to the Nastrond Anomaly. That, along with this planet’s proximity, are why corporate has reason to believe the object originated from within it.”

The gathered crew murmured amongst each other. The anomaly had somewhat predictably taken the place of imagined hells for much of humanity since these distant from Earth star systems had been colonized; things could go into Nastrond, but nothing ever came out. The image blinked out and switched to a feed from a drone near the object. It was not just a hunk of space rock that had crashed down to the surface, but some sort of machinery, a vessel.

“And that’s why we’re here. Mobilizing corporate legions would be too obvious, and we’re mostly outside of Æsir’s system,” Aria whispered to Koschei.

Koschei nodded. “They’re expecting something, still–” 

Her speech was interrupted by the feed cutting after a flash of light.

“I suppose that’s the something,” said Aria as the sound of the shot reached the base. 

A moment later alarm klaxons blared across the just barely completed base. Aria and Koschei ran toward their respective hangars as the storm raged overhead. 

“All systems are ready for you,” said Nimue as Aria ducked inside the hangar.

The Caliburn had detached itself from the docking clamps and was kneeling, hand down and open. Aria tossed the raincoat and her own jacket, exposing the top of her spinal implant rig as she climbed up the arm and into the open cockpit. 

“Ready for connection.”

Inside the cockpit, Nimue guided the cables into the sockets on Aria’s implant, each connection making the woman hiss in pain.

“Remember to steady your breathing.”

“Well aware,” said Aria as she began to count her breaths.

The cockpit closed with a thunk, and the restraints meant to hold her body in place locked around her as her senses transferred to the Einherjar frame. The Caliburn’s eyes, a bank of cameras on the cranial unit, focused and lit up with cold blue light as Aria’s vision fully came online. 

“Synchronization complete, you’re good to go.”

“You’ve got my back, right, Nimue?” she said inside the cockpit before switching to the exterior speakers.

“Of course.”

The Caliburn grabbed the rifle and shield from their hooks and stepped out into the rain. As she watched for the crew on the ground, trucks and industrial frames were moved from the courtyard. She saw Koschei step out as well in her Einherjar, Deathless. Maks had stuck with the machine gun and grenade launcher that Aria was used to seeing her with, but had added a back-stowed precision rifle since the last time she had seen her. 

“Get the hell inside!” blared Maks' voice from the speakers on the Deathless as it brought up its machine gun toward the forest. 

The Caliburn advanced, steps pressing the soft mud down as it raised its shield and rifle. The pair of Einherjar stood facing the gate out into the jungle. Several Alfar industrial frames grabbed their own weapons and joined the pair of mercenaries. They were overall smaller and meant more for construction, wildlife disposal or infantry scale engagements. 

“Nimue, can you get a feed from any remaining drones out there?” 

“On it,” said Nimue as a feed opened up in the bottom right of Aria’s vision.

With a thought she made the drone’s camera turn downward toward the jungle, scanning for any hostile. A moment before a shot took the drone out she caught a glimpse of a matte black-painted machine, a quadrupedal one clearly meant for hazardous terrain. There was no sound accompanying the shot, indicating either a variable or low-power rail weapon. Aria forwarded the image to the network she, Koschei, and the Necker crew were on.

“That’s our problem unit.” she said over the external speakers. 

The single eye of the Deathless flicked to green, “Any heat signatures are likely to be masked by the weather.” Koschei switched to direct comms with Aria. “I don’t like this.”

“Me neither, reeks of corporate rivalry. Got any idea whose?” asked Aria.

“It appears to be wholly custom, though some design notes are evocative of Mobius Sci-Tech's style,” added Nimue, speaking to the two mercenaries.

“I see your AI is still chatty.” The Deathless stepped forward. “Mobius parts tend to be fragile. We just need to pin the spider down.” The magazine ejected from its machinegun and a feeder arm connected an internal ammo belt to the gun. “Then we pull off its legs.” 

Aria scoffed, “You’ve not changed at all, have you?” 

“And why would I?” retorted Koschei.

“The near death experience back on convoy duty,” said Aria.

Koschei smirked in her cockpit. “Just means I should strike harder and faster.” 

“I’m surprised you don’t have a pile bunker on the Deathless,” commented Aria, taking a moment to look over the readouts from the Caliburn.

Koschei shook her head. “Even I have my limits on what risks I’m willing to take.” 

“I’d assumed you’d want to try pulping your opponents in their cockpits,” said Aria, brow raised.

“Maybe, but that shit gets you shot in your bed,” replied Koschei with the certainty of one who’d seen it happen.

Before Aria was able to retort, a thin line of light shot out from the jungle and through one of the Alfar. The pilot inside didn’t even have a chance to cry out as their body popped from the sudden heat, and if they did it would have been swallowed by the deafening crack of the shot. Koschei shot out into the jungle, 30mm rounds tearing the plantlife apart and setting its barrel aglow with steam rising from it. From over the Caliburn’s shoulder, the barrel of the rail cannon leveled, aided with Nimue’s processing power it adjusted, waiting for the first sign of the hostile machine. 

The arrayed forces stood still, save for the micro adjustments of weapon barrels from onboard AIs as the nearby jungle was lit by floodlights and sporadic fires from Koschei’s volley. Rain continued to pour down, lightning crackling in the upper atmosphere. Something moved in the treeline, and Aria fired. The five pound spike of metal was propelled down the magnetic rails and out of the cannon at thousands of meters per second. Air turned to plasma as it passed. Rain drops burst into shimmering steam and the spike hit something that flashed like a small sun, then the spider pushed out of the still hanging cinders. Panels across its form glowed, dripping slag as they sparked. 

Wordlessly the pair of Einherjar split. The Caliburn’s rail cannon folded back as it took potshots with its rifle, while the Deathless hosed the enemy with its machine gun. The spider fired a series of shots into the slow-to-react Alfar, but the damage from the rail cannon shot clearly threw its aim off. It dropped its weapon and focused on dodging what incoming fire it could; blasts of superheated fuel erupted from its thrusters as the several ton machine moved at speeds too fast for a normal pilot to survive. 

In a moment where the spider’s foes were reloading, a unit on its back opened up and fired a volley of spikes at the Caliburn. Were it not for Nimue overriding the controls, they would have been needled by the spikes that had nearly punched almost all the way through the shield and were jutting out on the other side. Koschei raised the Deathless’s grenade launcher and blasted the spider in its side, stripping off parts of its armor and disabling its right arm. 

Before either pilot could press the advantage, the spider surged forward toward Koschei. Its shoulder knocked the launcher aside, as it pressed its left hand against the hip of the machine. A moment later a shaft of luminous crimson tore through the Deathless, slicing through the top half off its legs. Aria raised her rifle for another volley and the spikes embedded in her shield exploded, sending the machine toppling back against the walls of the camp. 

Aria, dazed and reeling from the force, struggled to get the Caliburn to stand as the spider walked over to her. The Deathless lay in the mud, non-responsive aside from Koschei’s cursing over the comms. Fire from the Alfar pinged off the spider’s remaining armor as it approached the Caliburn, blade of solidified red energy sizzling in the rain. One of the Alfar brought a saw meant for clearing forestry to bear against the spider, digging into one of its back legs only for the energy blade to cut right through it. This didn’t buy much time, but it was enough for Nimue and Aria to redirect power to the Caliburn’s main thrusters, launching the damaged machine up and toward the spider, drawing its combat knife. 

The blade dug into and split the spider’s head as the Caliburn collided with it, the damaged leg buckling as the machines fell into the muck. The energy blade turned earth into molten rock then severed one of the Caliburn’s legs in the struggle. Aria screamed from the sensory feedback and stabbed the blade deep into the torso of the spider over and over until finally it went still. 

Aria panted inside the cockpit, sweat drenching her clothing. She’d had close calls, but nothing quite so visceral as this. She made the Caliburn twist the blade ninety degrees inside the inert machine. As she slowly calmed, she was dimly aware of her surroundings; Koschei climbing out of the Deathless, industrial frames closing in on the spider with their weapons trained on it. Her vision trailed down the length of her weapon and into the ruined torso of the enemy frame. She pulled the blade up to see it without any gore on it. The unit had been unmanned. 

With the blade out of the wreck, and more weight on the remaining leg and damaged left arm, it couldn’t keep itself upright and fell into the mud. Aria laid inside, utterly spent from the engagement, the visual feed of the Caliburn showing her the storm above. 

“Nimue, just what was that?” asked Aria, beginning to disengage from the Caliburn.

“Unmanned Einjerhar, not remotely operated either. There were no signals coming from it, at least in the bands commonly used for communication.” 

“No reaction delay either.” Aria carefully pulled the plugs from her neck, wincing as she did. “Think it was an AI?” 

“Nothing else really fits.”

“Hopefully no one looks at you too close after this. Open the cockpit, please.” 

The torso of the Caliburn opened, letting the still falling rain in. “Try to be quick, I’d like to keep water damage minimal.” 

Aria pulled herself out, body aching from forces it was subjected to during the fight. “Least of our problems,” she said, standing on the front hip plate, her eyes looking at where the Caliburn’s right leg had been cut off. 

The cockpit shut. “I am aware.” 

“Sorry, Nimue.” Aria ran a hand over her long dark hair and down her side braid. “Rufus is gonna be pissed.”