Cassidy's Crusaders

(From Bullets, Books and Bylines: a blog about mercenary literature; Galatea InfoWeb, 3144)

Cassidy's Crusaders (Volumes I-IV) by Cameron Kennedy et al. Red Tower Books, 3142. Fiction. Will punch you in the gut and make you cry.

Today we're going to be getting a little more visual then normal for something interesting form the fiction bin. Our subject for today is also rather extensive, so I'm not going to be breaking it down into as detailed a summary as I normally do. Or maybe I’m just going to encourage you to read the thing yourself to get all the juicy bits. As always, this is a bit spoiler-riffic, only of the board sweeping plot points. I'm not going to tell you who lives or dies, even if one of those did break my heart.

Okay, preamble aside, our review for today is Cassidy's Crusaders, volumes I-IV, released by the Red Tower Books It's written by Kennedy Cameron and drawn by a variety lfo luminaries including Carlos Espozito, Rick Wallach and the Flanenco brothers (Who may have been more than two and possibly not even brothers). Wait a moment, you say, drawn? What's this? Am I reviewing a comic book?

From Matthias Kaine's Personal Corrispondance

Sharkey,

I know that our alliance wasn’t exactly founded on mutual respect, and that we have never liked each other. Hell, we only really tolerate each other’s existence because we both need things that the other can get. But I’m sending you this letter for a reason.

See, just under an hour ago, a bunch of mercs broke into the spaceport. They managed to sneak their way in somehow, getting past all my guards, all my perimeter patrols, all the roadblocks I set up in the crawlspace and everything else. They gassed my men with some sort of anaesthetic; had the Starport’s filters not caught it and tried to shut the system down, they would have flooded the place and knocked out me and all my men. As it happened, they still managed to knock out everyone inside the underground for a few minutes.

Audio Log File #75892-Rho

(Once again, I only got half the conversation. Right now, Sharkey's so on edge that he's not going to let anyone near his stuff, so I can't see that changing any time soon. I can only imagine what your boys are up to there. Whatever it is, though, they have him scared and angry - K)

(Understandable. I'm beginning to think that Sharkey has reached the end of his usable life anyway, however I will leave that to your discretion. In the meantime, thank you again for bringing this to me)

Sharkey: I've had another incident, and it was the same pair of fraggers as last time. I tell you, somebody is out to get me. No, I'm not being paranoid. I'll tell you what happened; they stole all the info from my computer and they used it to find my assets. And now they're moving in on me.

(Inaudible)

Sharkey: One of my men got a good look at them, and it was the same pair as last time. Yeah, the moustache guy and the Cappie criminal. No, I got no idea who they work for, as I've never heard of them before. I don’t think it's that bastard Kaine, though. If he wanted me out of the way, he'd have just marched his 'Mech up to my place and flattened it.

Andiron Spaceport

(Thought it would be useful to know what we're walking into - NK)

Andiron's first spaceport was built while the planet was a part of the Rim Worlds Republic, then known as Hellbrent. Dating back to the world's colonisation, the port grew slowly over time with the planetary population. It underwent a major expansion during the late 28th century to handle increased traffic by RWA forces, especially after elements of the 6th Republican Guards were stationed to the world. It’s also possible that the world was used as a staging ground for the discrete shuffling of Rim Worlds forces before the coup.

Following the collapse of the Republic, the spaceport fell into disuse and disrepair. Much of its remaining technology was scavenged by the locals to keep more vital life-support infrastructure operational. By the time Andiron was incorporated into the Circrinus Federation, little more than a few gutted buddings and cracked ferrocrete remained. The Federation did little but stabilise the structures, with the facility being used as an occasional staging ground for piracy.

Audio Log File #75891-Rho

(A technical failure meant we only got half of this conversation. The lack of communications infrastructure on this miserable rock is to blame. I added a few annotations where needed - K)

(Thank you for this. It is relevant to our case no less. I’ve added a few notes of my own)

Sharkey: As near as I can tell, there were two of them. My men are still trying to figure out how they got into the mansion grounds, given that they didn’t actually cut through the fences or disable the cameras. When I find out what was the problem, I’m going to make sure that it doesn’t happen again.

(Inaudible)

Sharkey: You’re right there. Somebody’s going to get his hand fed to a dogodile over this, mark my words. (Dogodiles are a reptile native to Andiron that. They have a vicious bite, and can be tamed and used as guard animals - K)