Chuck Horner marveled at the sheer idiocy of the Confederacy. It was far from the first time that he had done so, and he figured it'd be far from the last, but this one... it boggled the mind. Alpha Squadron was the highly honed dagger of the Old Families, their most elite unit, a weapon that was actually used - not some decadent Praetorian Guard meant to sit on Tarsonis. No, Duke's boys got so good because they were constantly on the move putting out one fire or another, killing and fighting as often as possible. They were the best because they were the most active, and they were the most active because they were the best. It was one of the few smart decisions made by the entire sclerotic military establishment, even if in practice they spent most of their time massacring strikers and suppressing rebellion than anything one might consider honorable combat.
Which led to the question gnawing at Chuck as he looked around the massive warehouse. Why the hell had their stockpiles of SCVs not been cracked open after the Protoss started glassing entire planets? Rows upon rows of the machines were stacked up, going off into what seemed like infinity, and Duke was as much at a loss for explanation as Horner was.
"Hell, Chuck, maybe they just fell in between the cracks after I joined up with the Sons. Betcha most everyone who even knew these existed were on my staff or bit it on Antiga," the Dominion's generalissimo said with a shrug as he gummed on an unlit cigar.
"You expect me to believe that they'd just lose all of this?" the Chancellor replied incredulously, a small army of construction jockeys following behind the two generals to hard boot the machines for the first time in nearly a decade. At best. Probably worse. Probably much worse. Luckily, there were a ton of the things, so even if age and neglect had knocked any out of commission, they'd still have more than they knew what to do with. "The Old Fami-"
"Don't tell me about the Old Families, Chuck. Trust me, more than SCVs got lost whenever things got hairy. You should know that," Duke interrupted, jabbing the cigar towards the other man. "Every single one of 'em had their own slush funds and rainy day plans, and they'd rather die than hand them over to any of the bastards they were feuding with that week. Most did, and probably with a smile seeing whatever poor fool they decided was the scum of the earth get eaten alongside 'em."
"Look Eddie, I know you've got... whatever you've got going on there, but I just..." Chuck trailed off, shaking his head in disbelief. "They could've won," he whispered under his breath.
"Yep. Damn right they could've," Duke replied with a serious nod. "But if the Confeds were the kind of people to know what they were doing and not shoot themselves in the head, we wouldn't be here right now. So get over whatever you've got going on there and clear your civvies out of my warehouse as quick as quick can." Edmund stomped out without any chance for Chuck to get a word in edgewise.
He just... stood there for a moment as he let that sink in, looking over the ranks and ranks of SCVs as they slowly whirred their way to life. Chuck knew on a certain level that the Confederacy was a degenerate and dilapidated failure of a state - that was half the reason anyone joined the Sons, the other half being plain old revenge - but to see it on display so bluntly made a man wonder about the world. The nerds had done the count, twice after he insisted they must have been wrong, and there were enough SCVs in the Alpha Squadron warehouse alone to have done a crash rebuilding program during the early days of the war. Enough, maybe, to have turned the tide and held back the Zerg. But instead they had just... sat here, the whole time.
"SCV, good to go sir!" shook him from his thoughts, the familiar cry of every driver for the past thirty years ringing like music.
"Alright boys and girls, you all heard Eddie. Load 'em up and let's get out of here before Alpha decides we overstayed our welcome," Chuck ordered as the first of the walkers moved under its own power towards the cavernous doors of the warehouse. It was soon followed by its rackmates, thrusters gently bringing them down from where they had hung down to the floor. He didn't deny that the sight, the sounds, even the command all took him back to a much simpler time.
Fact of the matter was, Chuck liked SCVs. Most of the Sons did, which made Mengsk's pathological hatred of them all the stranger. They had more armor than a Marine's power armor, and were infinitely less suspicious on the sort of fringe worlds that they had operated out of. The ungainly assortment of mining and construction equipment packed a wallop too, and more than once had a cell gone to ground only to fight their way out from within the comforting confines of T-280 Space Construction Vehicles.
The Chancellor had tried to get production of the walkers restarted of course, but Mengsk was an ornery old cuss and found them an effete bastardization of both labor and war, and stymied every moment of the effort. With this windfall from Duke, Chuck figured he had about half a year before he really needed Ardonin online anyway, and who knows, by then the Emperor might have changed his mind yet again. Odds of that seemed somewhat unlikely though.
Really, Chuck wasn't too surprised Arcturus hated the things. He had grown up on the stories of his grandfather Augustus Mengsk, and had a penchant for wanting everything done like they had managed it way back when - which meant no SCVs. The first had come off of the line in 2480 to begin building the Tarsonis orbital platforms, the greatest act of self aggrandizement in Confederate history so far beyond the capabilities of the industrial base that they accidentally ended up making something good for the poor sods who worked for a living. It was, Horner mused, probably the first time that had ever happened.
"I can't believe they put me in one of these things!" one of the fresh DLS members cried as he flew through the warehouse, losing control and spinning out almost lazily.
Ah well, they can't all be winners.
A/N: Less happy about this one, but this is what I get for trying to write while struggling to stay awake after stuffing my face with turkey.
