Lothian League
Marian Hegemony
The Periphery
3 March, 3149
Freyja didn't bother fighting the tussling as the she sat in the back of the large, six wheeled crawler that rumbled over the uneven surface of whatever god forsaken rock she found herself on. She let the now dreary pacing of her thoughts synchronize with the thud of BattleMech steps that forged on ahead of the vehicle convoy. Whatever fragile hope had sprung up with the realization brought on by the steady gravity of a burn towards this planet had long since died off again, and the numbness of the past days, weeks, months, settled in again. Planetfall made no difference. She was just as lost as she had been since the hijacking. Nothing had changed.
The vehicle didn't even oblige her with a window to peer out at the passing terrain. For all she knew, they could be driving along through a desert, a frozen tundra, or a barren rock. Part of her told her that it didn't matter. Wherever she was going, she had no control over her fate, whether she could see it passing or not.
The ride so numbed her mind that she she did not at first notice when the steady thump of BattleMech feet slowed, then stopped, just as the vehicle that carried her slowed and stopped. Her reverie was broken only by the harsh stabbing of light as the rear doors of the truck swung open.
"This is your stop. Get out." the voice was unremarkable, as was the face of the man who glared at her as she gingerly stood up and climbed out of the back of the truck as steadily as she could with her hands bound by steel manacles. She squinted against the harshness of the sunlight and steadied herself for a moment before an iron grip took her by the arm and urged her forward.
The owner of that grip had a face she would never forget. The scraggly beard and worn lines of the seemingly expressionless face of Bart Carter, the two-bit pirate that had derailed her carefully and naively laid plans for self discovery and turned them into the nightmare she was currently living. The man who had put a laser bolt through the temple of the man sent to escort her to her mercenary career.
She tried to take some measure of her surroundings. It was definitely a habitable world, they were in the inner courtyard of some kind of estate. The outer edifices were of stone, and somehow managed to look neither old or new. It was not traditional Marian architecture, at least not to her eye, but it also lacked the historical flair that was a signature of Castle McCarron. Nor was it anywhere near the size of her ancestral home.
They entered though the front great doors, and Carter, seemingly aware of the layout, led her up a set of curved stairs. Each step seemed ponderous as she scuffed along wearing the boots her captors had given her, which ran far too large. Finally, they entered room which seemed amazingly cozy, an office or study of some sorts, the lighting fairly dim so as the shadows cast by the large fireplace danced over the walls and ceiling.
To the left of the fireplace stood a sizeable wooden desk, broad, and obviously painstakingly crafted to preserve the likeness of the great tree it had been carved from. In front of the desk there were two exquisitely carved chairs, and the floor covered with a huge rug made from the pelt of some animal that must have been massive for the size of the amber covering that now marked it's remains.
Seated behind the desk was a man of clear Rasalhaguian decent, middle aged by her guess, with a well groomed beard. He looked slightly surprised upon their entrance, but covered it quickly as he stood and ran a hand through his amber hair.
As they approached the desk, Carter grabbed her firmly by the hair and forced her to her knees. Her eyes darted around the room, chasing the crackling shadows at first, noticing a carved figurine here, some kind of plant there, before finally her gaze settled on the floor.
"Told you I'd come through for you Ned. Just what you asked for," Bart said in a dismissive way. Freyja could feel the other man's eyes on her, but she refused to meet his gaze.
"She's practically a child, Carter." The man's voice surprised her in that it was neither threatening nor sinister as she had expected. Instead it was neutral, almost with a turn toward softness.
Bart Carter scoffed, "Beggars can't be choosers, Ned. Besides, you didn't give any age requirements. You ought to be damn grateful I came through this quick. Not like there's a market or something where I could go to get what you needed. Just kinda stumbled into this one raiding some poor corporate charter run. Sold off most of 'em as plain old labor. No idea why she was holed up with them, don't care either. You got the coin?"
The other man seemed somehow deferential towards Carter, in spite of the fact that obviously this was the lord of the estate, or whatever it was. "I'm not meaning to find fault, Mr Carter. I'm grateful for your efforts on my behalf," He tossed a small bag towards Bart, which from the jingling sounds contained some kind of hard currency. "It's all there, your regular quarterly tribute plus the price for her. And of course, you have my hospitality at your disposal if you should so choose."
Carter smiled. "Always a pleasure, Lord Bakker. I'll take you up on that, and leave you to break in your new prize." And with that, the brigand left, closing the door behind him. Freyja still forced her gaze downward. The few seconds of silence felt like an eternity. Kidnapped, she had just been sold as part of some casual transaction, to whom the likes of which, she still had no idea or measure.
"I'm Edward Bakker. This is my house, my lands, my business. I trust you are well?"
Her mind raced a light year a minute. How could she possibly answer that question? What was she to say?
"You speak standard English, yes?" There was no harshness in his tone. Nothing made sense. "You're bought and paid for, you might as well speak, child. Or at the very least look up."
She steeled herself, unsure of how to proceed, cognizant of the fact that her fate likely rested on what she said and did now. "Apologies, Lord Bakker. I am not altogether well, no, having been kidnapped, my companion shot, and now finding myself sold into some sort of servitude. And now I find myself here at your apparent mercy."
Ned Bakker sighed. "You can start by getting off your knees, girl. Be seated." He waited for her to rise and take a chair before taking his own seat behind the desk. "Your accent, not from this part of space. You're no periphery scoundrel. Republic, I'd wager?"
Freyja fought to control her breathing. "No, sir. I was born on Altorra, in the Capellan Confederation.
"You don't sound Capellan to me."
"No, sir. I was raised by my mother and my aunt, we traveled a lot." She gripped one hand in the other to keep from trembling.
"And how did you end up here, in the Periphery? Bart Carter might be a mean old pirate, but I know damn well he didn't sail halfway across the 'Sphere just to run into you."
She paused for a time before answering. "I suppose I was running away. I had expectations, assurances, I had things all laid out for me. But I ran away from all of that. I thought I was going to find myself or forge my own way somehow. And now....now I'm just here."
Bakker stood and walked over small side table and picked up two glasses and a bottle. He poured a dark amber liquid into each glass, and handed one to Freyja. "Drink. We distill the stuff right here, and you'll find finer potions throughout the Sphere no doubt, but in my years on this planet I've found it's kick is suited perfectly to it's home."
She took a small sip of what she could discern was some potent form of whiskey, and almost immediately regretted it as the alcohol vapors tickled at the back of her throat. "You will forgive my ignorance, but I don't even know what planet this is."
Ned Bakker took his seat again and drank a strong swig of the whiskey. "You find yourself, girl, on the planet Lummatii, in the Lothian League...well, how much of it is the Lothian League and how much is the Marian Hegemony, who's to say. And on my estate, which I've run for nearly twenty years now. My lands are a mix of agriculture, but the big money is in the old mine, about ten kilometers away. That's where I make most of my money, run my business, support my family. I've a number of tenants who rent my land, the feudal system works quite well out here. But you, I brought here because I need a Mech pilot."
There was no scale to measure the speed at which Freyja's mind was running wild at that moment. "All of this, just to get a MechWarrior? I don't understand."
"You're thinking like a Spheroid, my girl. Mechs are rare out here, and so too are Mechwarriors. There's hardly anywhere that trains them, and anyone that has a Mech is likely out selling his or her sword for some lord or other, or turning to plunder like your friend Bart Carter back there. The fees they would command, well, it wouldn't make much sense for my business. So, I went the only route I could, I bought one. You. I confess that I didn't think Bart Carter was going to snatch me up a girl, barely old enough to be out on her own. But as the man said, beggars can't be choosers."
Freyja swallowed hard. "I don't know how any of this works. I...I never....I don't know, my lord."
"The legalities of it? This is the Marian Hegemony. Slavery is legal. How Bart Carter came about you is his business. I bought you fair and square. You are my property and you will follow all of my orders. I'll not treat you harshly unless you give me cause. You needn't worry yourself over your honor, I didn't bring you here for anything like that. You'll live here in the main house with me and my family. You'll serve at my pleasure. I'll not hurt you in any way that I musn't, but know this: You belong to me and my family and if you do anything to bring harm on that family, I will punish you most severely. Do we have a measure of each other?"
Part of her wanted to run. Part of her wanted to just give up. But she had nowhere to run, and she could not give up. "Yes, my lord. We do."
"Good. My wife, Clarissa, will get you settled. We'll discuss particulars tomorrow if need be. And I beg your pardon, but in all this mess, Bart Carter never made mention of your name?
"Freyja McCarron, sir."
Mere moments later, she found herself in a fairly small room, a bed against one wall, a single window set deeply into the stone of the wall perpendicular to it. There was a meager amount of furniture, all of it of the same dark wood that most things she had seen so far seemed to be carved from. There was a small fireplace, which currently sat dark, and an open doorway off to the far corner. She shivered slightly as she felt a touch on her shoulder.
"At ease, child. I'm sorry for startling you." The speaker was a woman, probably in her forties, Freyja guessed, with rich auburn hair and gentle gray eyes. "I'm Clarissa Bakker, Ned's wife. I wanted to stop by and see that you got settled. I had the staff bring up the bag with your things that Mr. Carter brought along. It's not much, clothes and such. I'll have the maid check in on you after a time to see if there is anything you need. This is your room, we don't keep the fire going much during the spring and summer, but you'll need it come autumn and winter here, it can get quite cold."
Freyja said nothing, and stood relatively motionless, only her eyes moving to take in the surroundings of the room that was to be her new home, her new prison of sorts.
"I'll not pretend to understand how you feel right now. I can only promise that it will be ok. You'll not be harmed here, you'll be well treated. You were brought here only for one thing, because apparently you're a MechWarrior. Do that, and I can promise, I'll do all I can to make the adjustment easier on you. It's not a bad life at all here, and I'd hope that some day you come to feel you are a part of it of your own choosing."
She wished that she had some sort of words to reply with, but her mind stayed empty, numb. She just wanted to curl up into herself, withdraw into a shell and never come out. The older woman waited for a few minutes, saying nothing, before turning to leave. "The wash room is just through that doorway. The Lord and my room is at the far end of the hall, my two children's rooms on either side. When you're up to it, you'll dine with us. For now, I'm sure you'd like to be alone for a time. Don't hesitate to come downstairs if there's anything at all that you need. I suspect Ned will be wanting to get you out in the field tomorrow as early as can be, so rest up."
Freyja waited several minutes after she heard the click of the door shutting before she allowed herself to collapse on the bed in a sea of her own tears.
(Prologue: Later that evening...)
"Good lord, Edward Bakker, you didn't tell me you'd gone and bought a child to pilot your damn 'Mech! What were you thinking?" Clarissa paced the floor of the downstairs family room as the fire crackled behind her and Ned stood at the far end of the room, a glass in his hand.
"I didn't put down any requirements when I told Bart Carter what I needed. Hell, I rather figured he'd just take one of his own crew that was on a short leash or something and sell them off to us. But this was the only way I'm going to get the mining and refinery equipment going again, we talked about that. I'm not any more keen on the whole slavery thing than you are, but that's the economy out here. It's the way of life. We knew that, you knew that when we decided to put down roots here."
"I know that, I know we're not back in the Commonwealth, and that we'd probably have never made it back there. Certainly not the life that we have here. But for lord's sake, the girl's barely older than Peter is."
Ned took a long sip of his drink. "I've got all the paperwork from Bart from when he nabbed her, knocking over a passenger liner. She's 19, born in the Capellan Confederation, a noble no less. I guess she ran off to prove herself a Mechwarrior, signed up with some unit stationed in the Hegemony, and got nabbed when Bart raided the ship. Just her luck too, back before the blackout, he'd have made way more ransoming her back to her family than he ever could selling her off to us."
"I'm still not easy with this Ned. It seems wrong."
He sighed. "Look, if I went and let her go, she'd run off in a heartbeat, my industrial mech would still be stuck in the works with no way of getting it out, the equipment not running, and our bills come due faster than I'd like to think. Is it a pretty solution? No. But it's how it has to be for our family to survive. It's dog eat dog out here. We knew that when we settled."
Clarissa stood with her hands on her hips. "Alright, but know this. Nobody lays a hand on that girl. She's as safe as if she were one of our children. You understand?"
"Like family. You've my word, love."
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