As Samuel awaited for his new exoskeleton to be completed, he found out how bad his situation was during one of his grandfather visits. The old man seemed to be at death doors, although his eyes looked as fiery as ever.
"Sorry Sam, things are a lot different from back in the day. None of the current top brass want anything to do with you. There are even a few rumors that you might be a traitor"
"What?!" Samuel was flabbergasted.
"Is just a dumb rumor, but still you got a bad rep out there. I am really sorry Sam, if it wasn't because of me... I didn't knew, things have changed, I..."
"Don't worry grandpa, is not your fault, I just realized people are stupid. I am not worried, I am pretty sure that we will need all pilots we can find in the next months; those last battles I had. Something is going on Gramps"
"I know Sam, I know"
They kept quiet for a while. With the AI listening they had to be careful with what they said.
"Sam, you remember Gio, right?"
"Yeah, the technician that works at the museum, why?"
"If something happens to me and you need answers, go see Gio, he will take care of you?"
"What do you mean Gramps?"
Magnus looked all around him.
"Gio has knowledge and experience, he can guide you in your times of need. Remember; if something happens to me and things don't make sense anymore, go see Gio"
Williams came back from work, Magnus left. Williams prepared dinner.
"Are you not going to eat?"
"I told you dad, I not hungry, food just feel so disgusting in my mouth"
"I know son, but you have to eat something, you can spend the rest of your life using that tube"
Samuel forced himself to swallow the pasta reluctantly; as he and his father dined they watched the last stats from the battle field. The feed was almost live. The number of pilots dropped fast for a few minutes.
"Damn, that must have been a massacre. I don't care if you disapprove of my words, but I am glad that is not you out there"
Samuel kept silent looking at the numbers shown on the hologram and ignored his father words.
One week later, the army send a convoy to take Samuel to one of the underground facility to give the engineers and technicians some idea of his preferences and test the basic configuration of the new variant of the Executioner.
"Welcome captain Terrence. As far as we know you want a similar configuration to your previous machine, however, your request to reduce even more armor of your machine and make room for better short range fire..." one of the engineers clarified while looking troubled.
"What is the problem?" Asked Samuel.
"That machine is too unbalanced, is a Cristal canon; if you ever get surrounded and fall into a lump of tencts... You are not gonna make it alive captain"
"I know" Samuel acknowledged.
"Understood, any other preference?" The engineer gave up.
"The name and color. Paint it pitch black, the name will be Magnus Doom"
The engineer looked at him.
"Captain I am aware of the bad fame you have garnered the last months. Is good that you are taking a positive spin on it; but that name, It wont help"
"I don't care. Lets do the calibration test"
The engineer sighed and led Samuel to the new cockpit, he new better than to argue with stubborn pilots. The test went without any complication. As Samuel got dressed and prepared to leave, one of the technicians gave him some news.
"Captain, we received a message from the medical unit, captain Gonzales is awake and has recovered enough to be visited"
Samuel smiled.
"Finally some good news. When can I see him?"
"We can take you there right now if you wish"
"Lets go"
Samuel was taken by the convoy to the medical facilities, he went through the usual security controls; saliva, body hair, finger prints, retinal scan, and finally an identification of his implants. The elevator taking him underground kept its doors closed for what seemed like an eternity.
"Captain Terrence, this way please"
A nurse guided him to Hector bedroom. The man was sitting in a wheelchair, skinny, sunken eyes, the swollen feet's and hands made him look like some Popeye cartoon.
"Men, you look like shit"
"Back at you; I was the one in a coma, still you look more like a zombie than me"
They both laughed.
"How is rehab going?"
"Slow and it hurts like hell. But getting sponge bath from the nurses makes it worth it; I am lucky, I always get the sexy ones"
"You are sick Hector"
"Thanks homs. How is shit going?"
Samuel told Hector how things had turned out the last months.
"Damn homs, those shit head really think you might be a traitor?! Da hell is wrong with people?"
They talked about mundane things for a while. Then Hector attitude turned somber.
"Sam... I... I might not be able to pilot again"
There was silence for a while.
"Look at the bright side, no risk of dying, right?"
Hector denied with his head.
"I volunteered for the experimental implants program"
"What?! Are you crazy? You know Lena died right?"
"Yeah, I know"
"Why? You already got your family to safety and proved to be a brave pilot. You don't need to risk your life anymore"
"Sam, do you remember when you where a kid and played with the Exoskeleton models, how you dreamed of being a pilot?"
"We all did, Hector, every kid did"
"I still want to do it, I still want to be a pilot; I though I just wanted to secure my family papers, but, I really want to be a pilot. Besides, our mates, they are all dead; I can't stop now, I can't just run away, they are all dead Sam. We have to keep going, We can't stop. If we stop it means they died for nothing"
There was silence. Samuel face let Hector know he understood. They changed the subject and talked about many things, from family to Exoskeleton choices. Finally they got up to date with one another. Before leaving Samuel asked.
"Will I see you again?"
"Can bet your ass homs. I am gonna make it. You ain't gonna get rid of me that easily"
Samuel left and went back home. A month later, his new exoskeleton was ready for deployment and he was reassigned to a new unit.
"As expected, they sent you to a shit hole; Jerkins base has the worst of the worst. You will find all kind of unruly pilots there, they don't follow orders; forget about team work, you might even get accidental friendly fire. The casualty rate his higher than in any other base. Fortunately this base gets the lower degree of attacks, there is nothing important out there, just a few small towns and an old coal mine, it seems not even the enemy is interested" Magnus told Samuel as they sat at home.
"I bet their casualty rate isn't higher then my personal rate"
"That joke isn't funny son"
"I was not joking"
A few days later Samuel left his father's home one more time and joined the ranks at Jerkins base. The looks in his new team members face was not good.
"Welcome to base, I am supposed to be the commander, call me Richard; is the same crap here as every where else, set your practice time with the technicians down the hangar. Now, we do things a little different; do your own stuff, don't mess with others, don't mess with me. If you have a problem, deal with it yourself, I don't give a shit. The alarm sounds, you get on your personal mobile coffin, go there kill the enemy, come back alive, that's about it"
The commander just left after that brief introduction. Samuel saw many things that were all kind of wrong, not many of the pilot trained, most of them were just being lazy all day and getting high in whatever drug they could find.
"Hey, is that guy smoking weed?"
"Yeah, why?" one of the pilots answered Samuel question. The man was a white short guy with a crooked nose.
"You guys are not afraid? What if he gets a psychosis attack during a mission"
"We shoot him down" the pilot simply answered shrugging.
Samuel stood there like a deer in the headlights.
"Listen pall, once that alarm sounds we will go out and who knows if any of us will come back; so, I say fuck it, you can go to the local whore house and get your dick sucked by a cheap syphilitic whore for all I care. You are dead anyway, what is wrong with living a little bit?" the pilot didn't wait for an answer, he just went away and let Samuel to deal with whatever idea was passing through his mind.
And just like that, after a while he got used to it; one day Samuel woke up, filled his stomach with one bottle of enteral nutrition and got out his room. He passed in front of a sofa were a pilot was getting high on heroin and just walked away towards the hangar; he waited a few minutes until the technicians were ready and then got into his exoskeleton for his daily practice without paying any attention to what was going on in the base.
A week later, the alarms rang through the base.
"Okay fuckers, lets go" the commander ordered. When he saw one of the pilot unconscious in the sofa high out of his mind, he used a terminal to call for a group technicians.
Samuel saw as they carried the skinny man to his exoskeleton and dropped him in the cockpit; a few minutes later the guy was awake and active, pumped full of naloxone and a few stimulants. The team of exoskeletons flew off to the battlefield. The Magnus Doom black paint job gave it a dreary aspect, the two curved giant sword made it look like an evil murderer from a novel.
"Network link" ordered commander Richard as soon as they got to the battlefield.
Samuel grunted as the already known load of information poured into his brain; however it was a lot different than his past experiences, everything was so chaotic. The information shared by the link was the only thing giving his team a resemblance of a organized unit. An exoskeleton was just supposed to moved out of the way when another pilot was about to shoot in his direction; if he were too slow to react, there would be a hole in his machine and maybe his body. There was no strategy, everyone fought on their own.
"Help!" someone screamed.
They all knew what the situation of that machine was, but no one took the initiative to help.
"Commander, Commander"
"What the hell you want Samuel?"
"The Dad's Rigor is calling for help"
"So what? This is war, someone is always in danger; if you wanna go a play the hero, suit yourself; otherwise fuck off and mind your own business"
"Damn it!" Samuel started running towards the machine that called for help. The Dad's Rigor was a machine of red color, using a pair of long daggers and a pair of middle range auto cannons. The machine secondary weapon fire rate proved too slow for the amount of enemies surrounding it. The pilot was a white, tall man called Hendrix.
As soon as the Magnus Doom made it near the Dad's Rigor, its machine guns started mowing down the enemy giving the other Exoskeleton some breathing room. Before Samuel could realize even with the Network link; the Dad's Rigor retreated leaving him in his position.
"Son of a bitch!" Yelled Samuel as the pressure on him increased.
Someone laughed in the open communication channel.
"You damn fool"
Mean while Samuel kept shooting his machine guns as the ammo reduced rapidly and the muzzles started to overheat. Luckily his fire rate proved good enough to keep the enemy at bay, after the other Exos had finished their targets, they started to advance getting close to the Magnus Doom and freeing it from a bad situation. The battle ended shortly after.
"Just two units down, no one died, not bad" informed commander Richard in the post mission briefing to which only some pilots assisted.
"Not bad? That was a mess; that was a low difficulty battle, still two Exos went down. The pilots are wounded, they wont recover in a month or so" complained Samuel.
"Well, that was better than your last mission lucky boy, everyone in your former teams is dead. Who do you think you are? An elite pilot? Tell me, you think you are Irene Broflosky or something. Oh no! I get it, you thing you are the legendary Magnus, you think you are your grandfather. Well, you are not, welcome to Jerkins Base mother fucker. By the way, next time stop trying to be a hero and mind your own business; there is no sponsors here, no need to look good for the camera"
"I am sure you wouldn't mind the help if you were the one in danger" Samuel replied.
"Listen kid, if you ever try to pull that hero shit on me and come try to save me in the battlefield; I will shoot you myself. Now fuck off. Dismissed."
The next battles were similar, the team took some heavy damage in almost every battle, although in the next two months there was only one dead pilot; many machines were too damaged to fight any time soon. With time, Samuel got used to this dysfunctional team AT Jerkins base.