“You are going to fight the Scorpions and Spiders? For twenty pesos?” Magdalena asked, clearly thinking she had either misheard or misunderstood. Junebug nodded her head sagely and Taya grinned openly. The idea had gained traction after the firefight at the unnamed village when the villagers had enthusiastically thrown the bodies of their oppressors into the flames of the burning processing shed. The locals had begged the off worlders to stay and celebrate, regaling them with tales of the brutality of the gangsters as they enthusiastically incinerated the bodies.
 
“But you said… you said it would take a… regiment?” Magdalena asked, stumbling over the unfamiliar words but with growing hope in her eyes. Junebug nodded and ran a hand through her hair. She wanted to get back to the highlander and take a bath and change, mud from the sluice trench had dried on her pants and in her boots, but they still had some things to do.
 
“I did, but I’ve been thinking about it, and it occurs to me that maybe there are two rather shitty regiments already here,” she explained. Magdalena’s eyes brightened.
 
“You mean the gangs, you are going to get them to fight each other?” Magdalena guessed, proving that even in unfamiliar territory her natural intellect stood her in good stead.
 
“They are not supposed to fight each other, the cartel on Kimberly tolerates the gangs so long as they keep the drugs flowing but if they go to war…”
 
“We are going to convince them that they can have the situation sewed up long before anyone on Kimberly even knows the balloon has gone up, trust me, these greedy bastards will go for it.”

“Why are you doing this?” she asked with wonder in her voice. Junebug shrugged uncomfortably. The type of people who hired armored cavalry regiments were rarely people filled with light, purity and a genuine desire for the advancement of the human condition. She had suppressed rebels, crushed dissenters and captured empires for whoever was paying the Armored to do it and she hadn’t really worried too much about the morality of any of it. It was Andor who made those contract after all and she was just fulfilling hers with him. Now though, she was picking the job, a fact which made her feel a little guilty she hadn’t consulted with Neil or Taya before putting their necks on the line, and although she doubted she was about to become a crusader for Truth, Justice, and the Terran Way, there wasn’t any reason she always needed to work for whoever was worst in any given situation. She smiled crookedly, ironically if Stinger had just paid out at the get go Junebug would have been honor bound to support her. It was a funny universe.
 
“Most places you go, the rot and corruption is so baked into everything that there is no way to ever get it out… here though… maybe its possible, even if it is going to be very, very, bloody.”
 
 
Night was beginning to fall when they stepped out of the small shop. Magdalena was already closing up and barring the doors and windows before heading for her subterranean home. The rumble of trucks was already evident in the distance as the gunmen rode back from the fields, eager for booze, women and violence although not necessarily in that order.
 
“So how are we going do now?” Taya asked, excited but uncertain. Junebug drew a cigarette from her pack and ignited the striking pad with a flick of her finger.

“Well, Neil is going to go and report to the Stinger about how we were ambusheds by Spiders. You are going to go back to the ship… me… I think I’m going to get a drink…”