MEKTON CHRONICLES

THE RETURN OF MISERY & COMPANY.

Episode 1 : Farewell to a Friend
The problems began with the death of Iceman (Caleb Henry Phillips) , a former mecha-fighter
ace who had risen in the ranks to Commander following the aftermath of the Kargan-Elaran conflict.
During a Officer's Club brunch, he collapsed and succumbed to an aneurysm. This was witnessed
by many officers, including Angie Vallister and her fatima husband Perseus, the pilots of the Marauder ,
Big Momma IV. They had been doing extensive evaluation and test piloting of the new generation of
Marauders geared for mass production, along with the training and hand-picking of their pilots.
His demise came just prior to naming Angie a Wing Captain, in charge of her own lance of
Marauders. His death left her deeply and intensely shaken, to a degree that begot some truly vile
repercussions that were not known until later. This string of events caused her to call home the other
members of Misery & Company.
Maki Natiko-Hendricks, her husband Cam and her family were in semi-retirement on the tropical
island of Theros in the southern hemisphere, along with her Fatima, Iolaus. Her idyllic lifestyle was
composed of mostly tinkering and repairing the island's fleet of fishing boats and mini-subs at Maki's Tiki
Garage , fresh fish for dinner every night (provided by Iolaus) and unlimited tanning. Also, Maki had been
working on a series of gadgets in her spare time, not the least of which was a spotting system to allow
groups of mecha to share fire control data between units to negate range penalties in group fire exercises.
The first inklings of trouble in paradise began when Maki's youngest daughter began showing an
intense rebellious streak, beginning with her skipping school to make out with a jock from the football
team. Confrontation led to an awful blowup between Maki and her daughter. It became an argument which
led her daughter to proclaim her hatred for Maki and anything having to do with a mecha .This phase came
right on the cusp of the announcement of Iceman's death.
Always in the heat of things, Samantha McDowell and her cyborg co-pilot Robert were involved
in a intense guerilla war aiding the People's Liberation Front in the southwestern jungles of Jakara. Her
mercenary group, after months of brutal fighting and grueling conditions , was set to case a landing strip
with some rich prizes for the group. This was obtained after a fast and furious assault.
One of the captured enemy wore Kargan fatigues, a relative rarity, especially in the depths of the
sweltering jungle. Aside from this oddity, there was a virtual king's ransom in goods, especially excellent
quality rations, cigarettes and bottles of liquor earmarked for an anti-Jakaran militia officer.
The rations, cigarettes and liquor seized turned out to be tainted with deadly poison and a VX gas
trap (hidden in a crate marked as mecha-fighter parts) had been engineered to kill the group, all except for
the commander, Hector , who was part of the trap.
Sam's legendary luck allowed her to rescue one of the other pilots , a young guerilla named Julio,
before a recovery group of Kargan mecha and commandos came. They were especially interested in “that
red-headed bitch" . Enduring punishing firepower she managed to get the boy to safety and fly home after
receiving word of Iceman's death, but not before swearing vengeance on Hector. She nursed her nearly
crippled Mekton for over eight hours of flight to get home.
Upon arriving home, the groups reunion was warm, but tinged with the sadness of Iceman's
passing.
The day of the funeral was cool and crisp, with a biting wind. A single white horse bore the flower
strewn wagon bearing Iceman's flag-draped casket the mile to the cemetery, surrounded by a seven man
honor guard, two hundred man escort and numerous officers in elaborate staff cars . Some bad elements in
the crowd jeered and threw things, but the majority of the people were properly mournful for this fallen
hero of the War.
The entourage was smartly attired in their dress uniforms and moved with precision, guiding
Iceman to his final rest in the Peace of Elara cemetery. The eulogy was delivered in stately grace and
dignity, followed by a heart-stirring rendition of "Amazing Grace", performed on the bagpipes by Master
Tech Sean Bannockburn. As the tears began to flow among the mourners, four variable form mecha-
fighters flew overhead, reenacting the Missing Man Formation, a tribute to the fallen .
Then, Iceman's casket suddenly burst into flame as it was struck by a mecha laser, as four Kargan
Mauler Mk. II's attacked the funeral, slaughtering indiscriminately by firing their autocannon directly into
the crowd.
Thinking quickly, Sam got to safety and ordered one of the pilot's down to use the mecha to
defend the crowd.
Maki, however had to physically restrain Angie from charging the Mauler units barehanded. They
acquired two of the other pilot's mecha and decided to use them to get to the base and pick up their own.
Meanwhile it was Sam's decision to allow them to do so, while she held off the four Maulers.
Some fancy shooting allowed her to eliminate their surprise advantage and disarm some of them,
although she took massive damage to do so.
Upon their arrival back at base, Angie and Maki discovered that the main hanger had been booby-
trapped with some form of aerosol-based sulfuric acid. Clever thinking allowed them to board their mecha
and rally to Sam's defense , with minor burns because of their ordeal.
It was here that Angie's stress soon reached its breaking point , erupting into berserk fury as she
took one of the Mauler units down and finished the other Mauler's helpless pilot with a point blank particle
cannon blast. She then succumbed to a near catatonic state after being informed that Iolaus, Maki's fatima,
had been killed in the fighting.
As Sam and Angie dealt with their opponents, Maki gave chase to a Mauler that had made a low
level run for it , using the street as a canyon to try to slip away. A quick and dirty scuffle ensued, but Maki
was able to get the upper hand on the less talented pilot and disable his mekton, even capturing its escape
pod.
Upon her return, she went into a killing rage at the mention of Iolaus' death. Her anger was so
abrupt that she and Sam had a Mexican style standoff, fist to pistol, before she settled for breaking the guy's
face.
At the debriefing, Misery and Company were brought up on charges of negligence and improper
conduct. Sam took full responsibility, but asked that Angie undergo psychological evaluation and that Maki
be cited for insubordination and threatening an officer. Commander Phillip McDowell, Sam 's husband,
could not sway the review board due to his "personal bias and involvement" and was even accused of
misconduct involving Misery and Company's actions, which disbarred him from taking over as Iceman's
replacement. That position was given to Colonel Warren Winters , a 38 year old OCS graduate with no
combat experience but extensive political pull.
Before being taken into incarceration by the authorities, many of whom got through their teen
years on Misery and Company legends, Angie asked for a favor from Perseus.
"Please get in contact with Sterling. Tell him to seek the Predecessors , because of this new
military regime, the Misery and Company they know may have to go rogue.............................."
As usual, Misery and Company's unique attitude seems to be spelling the virtual death of their
military careers, as Sam's fiery temper landed her in the brig alongside Angie and Maki .

Episode 2 : Inquisition
After a two day stay in the brig, Misery and Company were given evaluation by a review board of
Inquisitors, the judicial review personnel of the Avalon Corps.
The Inquisitor mercilessly tried to take apart Angie's testimony, searching for evidence of
misconduct and deliberately trying to twist her testimony to make it seem that her sanity, morals and even
competence were compromised. Her attempts to explain herself ( "If I could have turned it [her shock and
grief] on myself, I would have........" ) was construed to mean that she had been battling suicidal tendencies
. It became obvious to her that their was no right answer to give, that the Inquisition was out for blood and
it was hers they wanted. A scapegoat, as it were.................
Maki fared no better. The Inquisitor assigned to her tried to call into question her loyalty to the
Elaran cause and even suggested that she was a Kargan double agent. Of course this was not true , but
every tactic Maki tried seemed to be twisted to seem that Misery and Company were an unstable and
extremely volatile group of self-serving anarchists, especially her policy of serving the " idea of the rules"
over their precise letter.
Samantha's interrogation began with a sheet of safety glass between her and her Inquisitor, who
was rightly feared of her "black market cyber ware" ( her rippers) . It seemed that Sam was more amused
than outraged until he began to cast aspersions on the reputation and effectiveness of the group. Her
response to her dereliction of duty was that " military justice is often subject to interpretation" . This was
concerning her lack of punishment for Angie's killing of a Kargan officer during the War. That was an
issue that had not been addressed due to the development of the unstable tectonics, a side effect of the
plasma tunneling laser developed by the Kargan military, that had doomed Algol to destruction in less than
a year's time.
After these testimonies, the group got a visit from Sterling, their longtime (secretly-draconic)
friend. He told them of news about unsuccessfully contacting the Predecessors and the presence of
protesters outside, clamoring for justice against the group. Seeing Maki , who in her depression had gone
on a hunger strike , caused him grief, so he used a simple enchantment to give her an appetite after a short
visit . However, before he got too far, Maki gave him Iolaus' crystal, in hopes that he could possibly do
something for him. He then left to find Perseus, because the group had not seen their spouses for two days
Perseus was their next visitor , about two hours later. He brought news of the impending
destruction of their mecha and his own scheduled reprogramming. He also brought the gun camera footage
from all three mecha and admitted to their destruction, unaware that the cells were bugged.
He was abruptly ordered to leave by the arrival of Major Carl Weiss of Internal Affairs. He had
been ordered to try to facilitate the trial by offering Misery and Co. the opportunity to plea bargain their
sentences down from 10 years plus in a maximum security penitentiary in general population with some
Kargan inmates (a virtual death sentence) . In exchange for one year's private incarceration , all they had to
do was sign a paper declaring Angie psychologically unfit for duty and she would be put away for up to 18
years (the authorities were counting the previous slaying in with her sentence, as she had gone without
punishment) Sam refused...
Maki accepted after Weiss, taking advantage of her depression, sweetened the offer to include a
position with Ares War Technologies, Inc. But after signing the document she expressed her distaste by
stapling his hand to the desk (with his own pen ) and smashing him in the face with her cyber arm, which
earned her a beat-down by I.A. guards.
Upon learning this , Sam was aghast and Angie nearly crushed. Sam urgently requested to talk to
the Major. Maki was taken to get medical attention by the MP's .
In her privacy, Angie sent a tearful cry to the heavens to her absent daughter .
" ...Stay away, Cat.....stay away........Misery and Company is no more ...." she said, weeping
silently. The only thing that quieted her anguish was the presence of a tiny Monarch butterfly that alighted
on her hand., then flew away on its capricious path.
Sam 's meeting with the Major went better. Her tactics were more controlled and each mutually
recognized competence and professionalism in one another.
Softening his tactics, Weiss gave some good advice. He notified Sam that , according to their own
testimony, it could be inferred that Misery and Company were indeed dangerous and that Angie had some
serious issues she needed to straighten out. Further, he recommended that Angie plead temporary insanity
to at least calm things some and that she should name Sterling as her doctor for therapy. He also revealed
that although her flight status would be revoked, it could be regained. Sam agreed and , before returning
her to her cell, the Major revealed that his father had been one of the co-pilots of the old "Tweedledee"
MAC II Monster series mekton , who had been saved more than once by Misery and Co. on old Algol,
The team was reunited in one cell and as they lounged about, narrowly avoided being poisoned by
their food thanks to a tiny mouse.
If that were not bad enough , a mystery assailant outside the prison fired an anti-mecha rocket at
the cell from atop the prison wall. Luck , quick thinking and Maki's cyber arm saved their lives. The
gunman did not survive as an MP's gun in Sam's hands ended his life.
The driver of the getaway car suffered a crippling shot to the collarbone due to Maki's one cyber-
gun round, that had been jealously hoarded since their arrest. They did not try to escape and demanded that
Weiss get Perseus and put him in protective custody. The officer Weiss later dispatched did not check in
and was shortly found with his throat cut amidst signs of a struggle.
Weiss decided to move the team to a safe house until the next day, utilizing a New Avalon
Corrections transport bus, but a run in with some gunmen successfully derailed that plan..
Sam had to wrest the wheel from the driver, who had been shot in the gunmen's initial volley.
Angie's spectacular upside down shot, using Weiss' loaned pistol, through the bottom maintenance hatch of
the transport bus blew out the tires of the vehicle. However , the bus careened into a bridge abutment and
teetered precariously over the river.
As Maki worked feverishly to free a trapped and injured Sam, Angie used Weiss's sidearm to
dispatch the gunman from the wrecked car. As sirens began to wail, the team waited in their delicate and
unstable balance....(ah symbolism)
 The bus was rocked from beneath as a particular Marauder tipped it back to safety and laser-
carved a trench in the road to keep the police at bay.
Maki , going to check on the progress of the goons in the car, grabbed the driver's ID. Nothing
special in it , but in doing so , she saw a peculiar tattoo on the deceased driver's neck: a stylized triangle.
Hmm, it seemed vaguely familiar...............
Sam's Panthercat was the next to show up, along with Maki's Max piloted by Sean Bannockburn,
who agreed to help the team clear their reputation. Weiss also agreed to come along, to see for himself. He
later removed a tracer from his armor to see who would come to claim it. He , too , had some suspicions
regarding some various inquiries reported to Internal Affairs concerning the new regime.
As the mecha fled, Maki called Bannockburn "Iolaus " out of habit, and he gave her shoulder an
affectionate squeeze in understanding .
Now, Misery and Company's choice was thus: Go back and risk death or leave and find out who
has their agenda against them.....................

Episode 3: More Complications

Misery and Co.'s flight led back to the jungles of Jakara. Sam had gone back to check on the sole
other survivor of the treachery on her mercenary outfit.
Julio was a fourteen year old guerilla mecha pilot and Sam's maternal instinct led her to make sure
that he was safe and also to give the team time to think. And so, Misery and Co. grew by one, as Sam
promised to take him to the "Big PX".
Purchasing the boy's contract from the Generalissimo was no easy thing, requiring her to do a little
bumping and grinding in the Officer's Club in a skimpy bikini. Bannockburn requested photos.........
Angie , who had been silent the entire trip, stayed solitary that night , gazing up at the stars and
watching the telltale flares of the engines of high flying spacecraft.
Maki and Bannockburn had the duty of reconditioning Julio's old variable fighter, stuck in robot
form, overnight. They were assisted by Mayan, a young People's Liberation Front technician., who was the
only one who was interested in working with "some woman", as the other techs put it.
Mayan later turned out to be a sixteen year old girl, who was posing as a guy to remain in the PLF
army. The girl's plight and obvious mechanical aptitude impressed Maki, especially since her own daughter
loathed anything mecha related with a passion. Maki's gift of a pair of her old grease-stained coveralls,
complete with the Misery and Co. logo, caused the girl tears of happiness. Misery and Company picked up
another orphan.
The next morning, Sam called the group together for a pep talk, which ended prematurely with
Weiss' discovery of a broadcast on a scrambled frequency.
The broadcast detailed the discovery of Weiss' body, killed execution style and dumped
unceremoniously on a small island that the team had visited only the day before.
Identification of the attending officers revealed that the man in charge was an Agent Robert
Simms, a man Weiss had been at odds with his entire career. This prompted the team to consult the base's
long range scanners, which detected a large radar contact on the way, obviously following some sort of
beacon.
Quick acting by the team led them to find that Angie was impregnated with some peculiar
nano-machines that had grouped in her brain and glands and gave off some sort of homing call. Some hasty
kit-bashing by Maki allowed the creation of a blocking device for the nano-machine's signal. The team
made a rapid retreat as the base itself began to mobilize to attempt to collect the bounty offered for Misery
and Co.'s capture.
The group evaded capture by plunging into the ocean, prompted by Julio's devious example of
using an old hose as a makeshift snorkel. Angie revealed her idea to go to the isle of the Predecessors, a
retreat hidden in the ocean several hours away.
After a long travel , the team arrived at the isle to find the secluded island deserted except for
some feisty gun-drones, which required some fast talking to get past.
A preprogrammed limited AI hologram told the team that the Predecessors were to be gone for at
least twenty five years, but that their son, Skimmer, was on patrol in their solar region and would get
within telemetry distance on the 28th of every month. Facing a four day wait, the team faked an SOS to get
him to speed up.
Meanwhile, while Angie browsed various technological ideas, Sam's experimentation and research
in the Predecessor's medical bay with a sample of Angie's blood revealed that the peculiar nanites were
called psychoms. Also , certain methods of treatment lead to some potentially dangerous side effects in all
the simulations that Sam ran.
According the database, these psychoms could direct psionic energy. This data was corroborated
by Weiss, who admitted that the New Avalon military had been experimenting with technology of that type
to create thought guided weaponry. He also indicated that the psychoms had the devastating side effect of
driving the pilot's insane because they magnified brain waves to an intolerable point, and had been
discontinued. He also swore that he had not , nor had his team , been responsible for their introduction into
Angie's system. Many theories abounded about their possible introduction, from the food to their
imprisonment by the Kargan military at one time.
Meanwhile , Angie's research began to show fruit. She had been considering her options for a long
while, ever since the incident of the death-entity that the team had defeated to save New Arcadia and their
star system. She had been more deeply troubled by this encounter than any had supposed and decided that
her emotions were unbalancing.
She believed that , by converting herself into a cyborg and undergoing radical memory restructure
borrowing from fatima technology, she could avoid the "weakness" and optimize herself as a perfect
soldier. This meant losing her family and friends, as well as her body forever; an option which, in her
troubled state, seemed a perfect compromise. Perseus was not willing to let her undergo this option,
however, and was vocal in his dissatisfaction.
" Why would you so willingly give up the humanity that others so envy you for..?" he asked, his
anger driving him to stalk away, not wanting his beloved wife to become "property" like the fatimas, who
had no legal rights according to the government.
Angie , reflecting on his words, decided to use the fatima technology to download a copy of her
essence into a liquid crystal matrix, similar to Perseus' own crystal . She also incorporated a transponder to
allow her essence to be transmitted to her waiting crystal in the event of her physical death.
After conferring with her teammates, they began to make preparations to remove the psychoms ,
using Sam's own personal nanites reprogrammed to Angie's specifications. Also , the computer identified
the psychoms, earlier identified as Kargan, as a creation of an "unidentified third party".
While the rest of the team made preparations to try to help Angie, Maki used her own wiles and
traced a surface-to-space transmission made from the Personnel Exchange in New Avalon City. With help
from the Predecessor mainframe, she eventually hacked into the PX's surveillance camera files.
In the cubicle where the call originated was a androgynous blue haired tech in coveralls, speaking
into the phone unit. Upon showing this to the team, Maki magnified the image and saved a copy for her
own uses..
To her surprise and fury, Angie recognized the tech as a figure at Iceman's final brunch. However,
at the brunch , the tech had worn a Captain's uniform. The team had discovered the mole, especially since
the photo resembled none of the personnel in the base file.
Maki recognized the black triangle logo as the symbol of the Axis, a group of extremists,
terrorists and thugs who had been in operation since the creation of the Kargan Empire nearly a hundred
twenty years ago.
Still in the grip of surprise at this revelation, the team heard a broadcast of a special news bulletin
on the channel that a fascinated Julio had commandeered. According to the news report, Emperor Korax
IV of Aldersgate, the seat of the Neo-Kargan empire and New Arcadia's sister planet, had been assassinated
publicly at a banquet . The perpetrators were identified on screen as none other than Misery and
Company.............................................
The team also discovered that Commander McDowell was being held in conjunction with their
"escape" and flight......................

Episode 4: Things Fall Apart.....

Things are becoming more serious. As Sam began the process to restore Iolaus with the
Predecessors superior technology, Maki began using the computers to locate any information on the blue
haired mole, using biometric data and image recognition to locate evidence of the mole. She found two
matches, one male and one female, each coming from a long voyage from Earth space by way of the
Venusian Spinner Colonies and Jupiter. The second match was exactly 24 hours behind the first.
Skimmer, who had "grown up" into a young adult Predecessor and could take human form, soon
arrived. Strangely, Angie suddenly flew into a berserk rage, which manifested itself at Sam. So deep was
this rage that she broke her own hand punching the bulkhead and Skimmer had to physically restrain her.
 When Sam saw to Angie's health in the med lab, she soon discovered a build-up of the psychom
nanites around certain vital areas. The nanites were mobilizing to destroy select portions of Angie's spine,
brain and coronary arteries. She immediately went to work.
Thanks to Sam's medical training, Angie's will to survive and pure luck, the nanites were
incapacitated before they could inflict lethal damage. However, she sustained severe neural and coronary
damage from the destructive nanites, to a degree that would render her soon unable to pilot her mecha. In
her comatose recovery state, her mind manufactured a specter of Lucky, a long slain team mate, who urged
her to take steps to correct her situation.
Sam decided that this had gone on too far and with Weiss' help , she intended to find a doctor
capable of repairing the damage wrought by the nanites. Utilizing Skimmer in his mecha form, the pair left
at once for New Avalon, following a lead established earlier by Weiss.
As soon as they left , Angie broke her oath and initiated the cybernetic surgical procedure, using
Perseus' love to hold him to helping her. The process was to take approximately one hundred and eight
hours.
Maki, acting on her own accords, left also for New Avalon with Julio , needing a steady back-up
pilot for Max. Her intention was to locate Jean-Claude, a good friend in the Espionage Branch who had a
reputation for being able to procure almost anything at short notice, and also to search for the mole.
Sam's search led them through the underbelly of New Avalon to the private estate of Dr. Alastair
Moreau. His reputation was that of a man who corrupted medical science and committed "crimes against
nature" according to Weiss, who evidenced distaste at his very name.
Escorted to his door by cyborged Dobermans, the pair was led into the opulent mansion and
presented to the good doctor, who appeared the very model of ageless grace and gentility, except
concerning Weiss, who admits to being the officer who caused the Doctor's pronounced limp.
Sam enjoyed the Doctor's youthful looks and cool manner, especially his bias against Weiss. Her
questions soon bring the truth of his research to light; Moreau was arrested for using animal DNA to
genetically change creatures into humanoids. He introduced a beautiful young woman called Lillian as his
daughter, who , after being revealed to be a black panther genetically altered into human form, sat
contentedly at his side and purred.
One of his "children" (who indeed called him Father) was a calico cat/human hybrid child named
Gwendolyn that was so precious as to touch even Sam's heart, especially seeing that Moreau ,indeed, did
love the child.
When negotiations turned to his services, she could not accommodate his asking price. Sam was
determined to sell the Panthercat to help Angie,if it came to that. But before things got that far, Dr. Moreau
was called away by a servant.
Naturally, following the Doctor into the depths of his home revealed a variety of his children,
including a splendidly handsome man called Viktor evolved from a Siberian tiger. Sam left with the
determination to use the Doctor's abilities, because of his facility with medical science. Unbeknownst to
her, Dr. Moreau's genetic genius was part of the pioneering work behind the creation of the Fatima Project
(and that he had also unknowingly sold some of his earliest information to an Axis sympathizer.)
The second leg of their journey involved checking Iceman's burial site. Sam had been deep in
thought and had the theory that Iceman was not in the casket when it was destroyed...it seemed too heavy in
retrospect.
A small piece of the casket, found in the cleared away debris of the attack , revealed a lead lining .
Also, Sam found a small shard of crystal, nearly identical to the type in Angie's nanites. However, simple
handling of the crystal drove Sam and Weiss to blows before they could stop themselves. This proved to be
a potential case solving breakthrough for the team; even Weiss seemed optimistic, considering the crystal's
anger inducing properties.
A chance encounter with a group of young toughs led Sam to the discovery of a heretofore
unknown fan club, as well as a street savvy taxi driver called Maurice.
Maurice's Mama , whom he made frequent reference to , turned out to be a sweet older woman
with a kitchen on wheels and enough home cooking for an army.
She was also no fool ,and a first rate Fixer ; she kept her eighteen wheeled kitchen flooded with a
simple relaxing mist that slowed the reflexes and kept her visitors mellow, while she and Maurice were
unaffected. Having made some valuable contacts (and having some great home cooking ) , she and Weiss
headed home.
Maki managed to get to New Avalon by hiding Max about a hundred miles from town and using a
small hover pad to travel on . Purchasing a 4x4 roadster for easy transport, she visited her parents first, who
gave her less noticeable civilian clothes and her father's antique Negotiator, a sawed-off shotgun with two
explosive shells.
Next she sought out Jean Claude. In short order, he had located the mole and her whereabouts. He
also determined that the two blue haired figures were one person, utilizing his own spy training as well as
the biometric data that Maki had collected .
Also , Jean Claude informed her of his own hard earned knowledge about the psychoms and their
effects as experimental weapons from his earlier espionage exploits. He acquired a Needler with knock-out
ammunition and a fairly extensive disguise as a Tech team private selected for janitorial duty. Maki left
with intent to get some answers, while Julio watched some TV, his new favorite pastime..
The confrontation in the Tech barracks turned into a vicious melee, when Maki's Needler
ammunition failed to penetrate the mole's Skin-weave and provoked a no-holds barred grappling match for
survival.
Midway through an exceedingly vicious melee in which the mole demonstrated very competent
martial arts training , Maki (having been disarmed ) , tripped the mole as she leapt onto the bed and
snatched her back from getting at something under her pillow.
Maki followed her , getting kicked back against the foot of the bed as the mole did a kippup at the
head of the bed, drawing a hidden pistol from its hiding place. Maki instinctively and narrowly dodged a
point-blank shot to the face by jerking the sheet from under the mole's feet and spilling her through a glass
window.
The battle evolved into a foot chase into traffic , weaving in between speeding cars , with Maki
making a spectacular aerial tackle that carried herself and the mole out of the path of an oncoming truck. A
final desperate scuffle on the ground (and a well-placed blow from the butt of the Needler) saw Maki
emerge as the victor.
The mole , who bore the Axis triangle tattoo on her inner bottom lip , refused to talk when she
regained consciousness on Jean Claude's work bench , even after having her feet caned. Maki, however,
eventually lost her temper and permanently scared the mole's face with a soldering iron, earning herself an
enemy for life and a stern dressing down about interrogation techniques from Jean Claude.
The next morning, Jean Claude's overnight research revealed that the mole had used a "honey
trap" to get Iceman. He had come across a picture , taken two weeks prior to Iceman's death and one used
in the local paper as a memorial photo , of the mole in a black wig sitting with Iceman at the Officer's
Club . A honey trap , he explained, was a method used by some spies to administer drugs or poison, using
the spy's own sex organs as the delivery device. In this case , the method was a tiny pod full of poisoned
nanites tasked with infiltrating Iceman's system and killing him at a predetermined signal. This explained
her disguised presence at his final brunch.
Feeling guilty about her actions, Maki decided to try to make apologies, but all the mole would do
was promise her a swift death, when she would bother to talk at all. Jean Claude revealed that the girl had
undergone some intensive brain washing from a possibly brutal source from about age eleven, according to
certain earmarks of her responses and his own analysis of her training.
At Jean Claude's suggestion, she made ready to take the mole back for the team to question , but
not before he made a rather blatant pass at her.
" I'm not asking for a relationship, Maki." he said. " After all I've done for you, it's the least you
could do......" Maki left a bit more quickly than she had planned, troubled by that remark.
Upon her return , she and Sam discovered that Angie had gone ahead with the surgery with
Sterling's help . Sam was so furious that she began considering disbanding the team after the crisis was
averted.
After some time to cool down, Sam's interrogation of the mole was more successful. She used a
shard of the crystal recovered from Iceman's gravesite to incite the mole's anger, who blurted out one
word : "BLACK" before passing out .
That one word eventually led her to an old enemy, long dead, who seemed to have transcended the
grave by having his vengeance through his offspring. Vasily Black was an old Kargan officer who
commanded a base that Misery and Company had infiltrated on an intelligence gathering mission. The base
was working on prototype advanced mecha and the team had barely escaped intact. The charges that
destroyed the base also destroyed Black.
After an intense showdown with Weiss concerning his real motives, Sam managed to get into the
Internal Affairs database and track Black's two known offspring.
 One was a daughter Sascha Black, who lived on Earth .Very little was in the file about her and
nothing that seemed to indicate any need or ability to make the kind of trouble that Misery and Company
was experiencing..
The son was Arkady Black, a Colonel who was listed as AWOL for about three years. Further
intelligence showed that Arkady, who was skilled in Medicine and Theoretic Science, had his own mecha
team.
One of its members was the much maligned Hector , whose file called him the "Jungle Butcher",
after his slaughter of a group of insurgents in an old Algol guerilla action. This seemed to fit the profile that
the team was looking for. as well as giving Sam some useful information to put with Hector's face.
Investigation of her own files produced expected results, except for one thing. Her parents, whom
she originally believed had defected to the Kargan side, were actually in Muria.
The Murians were well known for their extremely advanced technology, mental powers and
somewhat reclusive nature. They were the people that Angie's half-fatima daughter, Kat , had gone to for
help in controlling her nearly-wild fledgling psionic powers. They were also near impossible to spy on from
afar , even by superior Predecessor technology. Her father, Simon Foxx, was revealed to be a Minister of
Technology. Her mother, Alizia , was a Healer . Sam wondered why they had gone there , but decided to
pursue the issue later.
Sam eventually checked out Weiss' background, using his IA pass code to view his personal file,
which cited his bravery and dependable nature. It also detailed his predilection for using his own translation
of his orders and his tendency to follow his own instincts. A lot like the people he was being paid to
investigate........
After a few beers and the exchange of old war stories, she began to believe that Weiss (or "Boy
scout" , his new nickname ) might be worth keeping around after all.
The press meeting was in another day, and many important people would be there, including
Richard Krieger. Krieger was the Kargan ambassador who was coming to negotiate an extradition treaty
concerning the Emperor's assassination. She had contacted the at-first skeptical Krieger earlier that day.
She also contacted her husband, who was being held in lockup at New Avalon's base. Weiss had
revealed that Commander McDowell was under suspicion of embezzlement of over 56.3 million in military
hardware funds, a suspicion facilitated by his alleged affair with a military adjunct in charge of spending
allocations.
A furious Sam was greeted with McDowell's calm voice, telling her that "it was plane to see, that
if she couldn't see what was right in front of her eyes, she was blind". Also , he derided her for abandoning
his daughter, speaking of how she had packed his variable fighter with the intent to run away.
Sam knew that her daughter , Alex, had done no such thing ; she owned her own mecha and had
not been home for months. McDowell then hung up and Sam began to feel a lot better about this potentially
crushing event, realizing her husband's subterfuge.
She made her plan to go and steal his mecha-fighter and see if it contained a backup file to his
computer. Surprisingly, Weiss used his IA codes to get an officer rotation schedule...........

Episode 5: Ups and Downs

The morning dawned of the press conference. The plan was for Maki and Angie to follow Sam
after a four hour period. Sam and Weiss left in the early hours of that morning, unsure of how events were
to unfold.
Maki, true to form, left only two hours afterwards. She wanted to be sure to be in position in the
event of trouble. Angie decided to hang back and follow Sam' s orders, especially after Sam's comment that
she had to "prove you're still Angie...".
The Black Cat sped into New Avalon's airspace and was greeted with an escort of mecha-
fighters.
At first, they tried to talk Sam and Weiss down, then threatened them with force. Their presence
over civilian territory prevented them from making good on this threat. They were directed to land at their
pre-approved landing site, the local football stadium, at Sam's insistence.
The stadium was crowded with reporters, military troops , fans and foes alike. The Black Cat
formed an impressive backdrop as Sam took the stage to answer for Misery and Co. 's actions, while Weiss
stayed hidden inside the Panthercat monitoring the radio and tactical frequencies. Defending her team
against all detractors and managing to keep the rowdy crowd in check, she distributed disks containing all
the proof of innocence Misery and Co had.
 Both the Kargan ambassador, Krieger, and the Elaran Colonel on the scene, Jackson Briggs, were
intensely skeptical of the team's proof. Each cross-examined Sam viciously, attempting to shoot down her
testimony .
The Blue Angels , Iceman's own mecha-fighter squadron that was ironically hand picked to cover
the visiting and local dignitaries, stayed close to cover the fearsome visage of the legendary Black Cat,
secretly relieved that it was only one member of the team that was present. Friend and foe alike were
extremely vocal about their support or condemnation as the interview went forth.
Meanwhile, as Angie finished completing her preflight checks, Perseus noticed a small,
intermittently flashing radar contact, high up in the atmosphere. She contacted Sam, who advised that she
and Maki go and intercept the radar contact.
Upon hearing that Maki was already gone, Sam blew her top, much to the amusement of the
listening crowd.
Because of the object's trajectory and descent rate, Maki actually would be close enough to
intercept it first. Maki , with Julio as the co-pilot, quickly put Max into a ballistic approach vector and soon
closed with the strange object, high over the ocean , headed for New Avalon.
The object was huge, nearly two hundred feet across its rear area and about one hundred fifty feet
in length, and was roughly acorn shaped, segmented along its length into twelve sections around a larger
core. No radio or sensors would penetrate its dull black finish as it slowly altered its course on a downward
rendezvous with New Avalon .
Maki began to try to damage its stealth coating so its radar presence would be detected and
radioed ahead to Sam with its course and trajectory. After a time, as the strange craft began to spiral
towards the continent below, Angie and Perseus soon caught up to it and began to help try to expose the
craft, which began opening hatches exposing thrusters which began to power up.
When Sam and Weiss tried to leave to help, the Elaran mecha were ordered to stop them. Misery
and Co.'s fans, the youth gang that Sam and Weiss had met on their earlier trip interspersed themselves in
the midst of the two forces to prevent any of the military mecha from firing on the Black Cat.
"IS THIS HOW THE MILITARY REPAYS ITS HEROES ???????..."one cried in outrage, a
sentiment echoed by his colleagues, who began loudly protesting .
As the crowd threatened to riot ,the Elaran Colonel realized that he had no choice but to allow
them to take off, unhindered. He did not want the bloodshed any more than Sam did, despite his gruff
words to the contrary.
As the team reunited over New Avalon, their efforts to open or expose the cargo of the strange pod
were virtually unsuccessful. It began to separate into its component sections, which kept pace with the
larger coffin shaped core .Angie and Sam actually landed on it and tried to open it manually by exiting their
mecha while clipped to their lift-wires.
As Maki flew point cover, Angie used her plasma blade to try to cut an opening while Sam found
an access panel. When Angie's blade severed a hydraulic coupling inside the casing, Sam manage to open
the hatch .
Inside was an emergency release switch that triggered explosive bolts. As the pod flew earthward,
Sam activated the switch.........
...........and she and Angie were swept free as the pod began to fragment, sending the two Misery
and Co mecha tumbling wildly with their pilots still dangling in their EVA harness.
As they wrestled themselves into their seats, the central coffin pod finished shattering and revealed
a huge mecha swathed in a fabric cloak; the dozen sections also bursting open to reveal a new mecha type
they'd never seen before.
The new mecha quickly ignited their thrusters and headed for the hard deck , with Misery and Co
in hot pursuit and furiously pouring fire into the new arrivals. The hunt streaked across New Avalon as the
enemy mecha streaked deliberately towards New Avalon Base.
The battle turned into extremely high stakes close quarters battle, with the combatants playing cat-
and-mouse (literally in Sam's case) among the base's many buildings.
Angie put Big Momma's firepower to good use, discharging shot after shot into a mecha that
seemed to ignore her in its efforts to attack the armory. She made quick work of it, disarming it efficiently
and holing its chassis after sustaining a nasty slash with a beam saber.
Maki poured fire into her opponent as it flew, bulldogging it viciously and discharging nearly half
of her flamer's ammunition. The Axis mecha's return volley of point blank beam rifle fire found a chink in
Maki's armor and blew Max's head off, disabling her spare sensor pod. With great vengeance and furious
anger, Maki smote her foe brutally with her automatic cannon., destroying it in a blistering fireball.
In the personnel section of the base, Sam literally crushed the mecha she fought against. Using
buildings for cover to foil radar , she managed to sneak into range and pounce.
Black Cat's sudden arrival drove the mecha into the asphalt. As the pilot struggled to recover,
adamantine claws ripped through the mecha's torso with ease and punctured its powerplant, forcing Sam to
drag it away from its target, the infirmary, before it went critical.
One by one, the invaders began to fall. Sam noticed that one of the downed mecha's shattered
internal chassis revealed a structure studded with psychom crystals.............
As Angie searched for her foes near the communications array, a blast out of nowhere from the
fabric cloaked behemoth 's Spectrum cannon crippled her Marauder, the ionic energy pulse from the
weapon paralyzing her cybernetic body as well and blinding Perseus, who was linked into the craft's sensor
array at the time.
The team quickly rallied to her side. Maki used her shield's beam function , with power shunted
from her weapons array, to overlap it's protection across the team and used Max to prop up the Marauder
and its failing hydraulics, while Sam got into position and unlimbered her own Spectrum cannon and fired
as the towering Axis juggernaut , now shed of its cloak and displaying a dazzling yellow paint scheme,
fired again.
By some incredible misfortune, the two beams collided and exploded into a plasma inferno that
effectively leveled an area about a thousand feet wide, buffeting the team's mecha mercilessly. Maki's
shield, however, took the brunt of the blast , but deactivated, its circuitry fused and ruined.
When asked his identity, the huge mecha responded “ Ironclaw.....I will return.....” and slowly
walked away, turning its back on Misery and Co. As it went, its surviving mecha cohorts laid down a
withering barrage of missiles indiscriminately, as the team opened fire on the seemingly invulnerable
gargantuan mecha.
As the mop up from the battle commenced, it was revealed that some of the mecha had been
carrying VX gas canisters and had detonated them in the mecha hangars and the tech barracks, slaughtering
many unsuspecting pilots and techs that were responding to the emergency scramble.
Expecting to be apprehended, Misery and Co. found themselves sworn back in as Commander
Winters destroyed the papers naming them guilty, on the condition that their re-activation required them to
have a minder from Internal Affairs present with them in all activities. Surprise mounted as the officer was
revealed to be Agent Simms.
Simms surprise turned to anxiety as Weiss revealed that he was, indeed, alive and ready to give a
full report, presenting Commander Winters with a disc containing his affidavit. He also made mention of a
smaller report sent the evening previous; a report that had not been received, according to Simms. This cast
Simms’ credibility in a bad light and Winters dismissed him with the assurance that his report would be
verified by certain computer experts, with help of a Blue Angels mecha if IA denied them access, if need be.
The team received Winter’s complete discretion to undertake a mission against the Kargan military
to determine their involvement if the team would give him an account of what they needed. This came as a
surprise; being so against his by-the-book nature. This led the team to wonder if they were actually playing
into the hands of the Kargan ambassador.
Due to the lack of pilots for guard duty, Tweedledee and Tweedledum were pulled out of mothballs
to once more stand vigilant, causing Weiss to show some real emotion.
When one of the pilots evidenced disdain for the slow and ponderous mecha, he yelled "Show
some respect!".
A comic interlude with a barely-sixteen MP led to the recovery of McDowell’s home computer
core. With Commander McDowell released on town quarantine. Sam had a chance to be with her husband
again.
Analyzing the core revealed some interesting data, such as McDowell’s innocence on IA’s
infidelity charge. McDowell was actually organizing his own investigation of the embezzling, using the
female military attaché for inside information and records evaluations. Some of the data implicated most of
the higher rank officers in the New Avalon Corps, including Winters and Misery and Co.’s members.
One of the prevalent items McDowell lists is that some of the funds, totaled to over 1.6 billion
credits seem to be channeled into a corporation called Yoyodyne, a corporation that now handles mecha
construction but used to be a key producer for the Fatima Project, under the guidance of a Dr. Alistair
Moreau !
As things become clearer, the team begins to rearm and revitalize itself for this new turn of events.
Episode 6: I Love It When a Plan Comes Together.......
Analysis of the surviving pilots from the Ironclaw Raid, as the fiasco was being dubbed, was
startling.
Each seemed to be a derivative of the old fatimas. Each had an "unfinished " look and anextremely
childlike nature. The pilots (named Four , Three and Twelve) only evidenced hostility when shown some
representation of a Misery and Co. mecha.
Upon further cross questioning, Sam and the team discovered that the peudo-fatimas (referred to
as Organoids) were made from Iceman's DNA.
Sam discovered this when Four, who she later nicknamed "Ice", responded to her with the terms
"pretty" and "silk", while he pantomimed touching a bed sheet. He also called her "beautiful fox". This was
an item of intimate pillow talk from her brief but intense period as Iceman's lover, many years ago.
His eyes were the defining feature, a delicate ice blue like his namesake.
Three was more childlike, asking only for food, and Twelve was a video game junkie.
Each was able to communicate that they were scared.......having overheard the plans of the officer
in charge.
She had to go to get permission to take custody of the Organoids from an Elaran officer from
R&D, who had plans to vivisect them to find out their secrets. When he denied her, she went over his head
to Winters.