My name is Lyle Banks and I am a TAC armor controller in the Red Fang Mercenary Company, Lone Wolf TAC armor squad. The Lone Wolf squad is made up of my fellow TAC armor controllers Iella Stransky, Nate Rydel, and Damon “the demon” Walker. The commander is Ben Jacobs, our communications officer is Sonya Hayes, and the command vehicle driver is Marty Sorenson. The command vehicle driver also acts as a backup controller if necessary and is in charge of the command vehicle’s defenses. It was supposed to be an easy mission, boring even; train the planetary militia for a month then report back to Hell’s Gate, the Red Fang mercenary company’s base. Lone Wolf had jumped in-system aboard a scout vessel and reached the planet’s surface in a small dropship, barely large enough to hold what remained of the squad.  The supply vehicle, most of the Anti-Grav (AG) vehicles, and half the TAC armor had been left on Hell’s Gate. It wasn't deemed necessary to bring the whole squad and they had drawn the short straw. A normal TAC armor squad consists of a command vehicle, a supply/recovery vehicle, 12 TAC armor units controlled by four pilots, and usually some support AG vehicles. Lone Wolf would be just one of many squads that had helped train the planetary militia in the past and the militia would be supplying most of our needs. After offloading Lone Wolf, the dropship returned to the scout vessel which left the system. It would be back in a standard month to pick us up. The planet was called Providence and was a lush green world, heavy on agriculture. The Red Fang held close ties to the planet. Hell’s Gate was a barren moon and received most of its food supply from Providence and Red Fang recruited many of the locals into the mercenary company. There was even a military school on Providence, tailored specifically to Red Fang’s needs. Not widely know, but equally important, was the research and development center secretly built beneath the school specializing in TAC armor development.

TAC armor, short for Titan Arms Company, is the king of the modern day battlefield. TAC armor comes in all shapes and sizes but is usually between 15 and 30 feet tall with some weighing as much as 60 tons. Most TAC armor units have backward canted legs giving the TAC armor a lower profile and more stability. Typically the largest and most heavily armed things on the battlefield, they are also unmanned, being remotely controlled by human pilots from specially designed command vehicles. The pilots or controllers as they are often called are a special breed. They have to go through rigorous training and are surgically implanted with chips allowing them to control a TAC armor unit like it was an extension of their own body. A controller treats one TAC armor as the primary unit and the other two as secondary. The primary unit is the one that is directly controlled while the secondary units are only given general orders and are primarily guided by artificial intelligent (AI) systems. The controller can switch primary units at any time since if left alone too long, AI guided units tend to get into trouble. By switching units rapidly, it can appear as though TAC armor controllers are in three places at the same time. Some TAC armor units are equipped with tracks or wheels on their feet, which give the units greater speed, but if the situation requires it they are also capable of walking. These tracked/wheeled units can’t handle the stress of running or jumping however. The Red Fang uses exclusively tracked TAC armor except for special scouts equipped with jump pods. TAC armor is used by nearly every major military power including mercenaries. The huge success of the armor made the Titan Arms Company the undisputed leader in military hardware. Since Titan Arms invented the first units the name stuck, even if some of them aren't actually Titans Arms Company models anymore.

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AG vehicles on the other hand are all manned and have AG pods mounted to them, that when adjusted to a Planet’s electromagnetic field, allows them to glide several feet above the ground. The distance an AG vehicle can float above the ground depends on the vehicles weight, the number of AG pods, and the size of the AG pods. AG vehicles are much faster than TAC armor but usually have less armor and fewer weapons. AG vehicles cannot be remotely piloted like TAC armor due to the AG field they produce which interferes with the signal used to control TAC armor.