She had run a number of scenarios through her head while she was waiting. All of them involved victory for the invaders, of course—given what she had heard and seen, she didn’t see how the Silver Hawk Irregulars and Stewart Militia could hold them off, even if the units that Roderick believed were hiding somewhere finally came into play. The real question, for her, was who would get the most glory from this battle, and part of the problem was that the commander most likely to look for glory was the one who really shouldn’t have it. If Duke Vedet came off as the hero of Stewart, she would have plenty of work in front of her trying to keep him in check. Turning Roderick into the battle’s hero was a much more enticing prospect—heaping glory upon the Steiner name wouldn’t hurt the archon. But Roderick was so unassuming that anything he accomplished here could be easily overlooked. Unless someone made sure Roderick was front and center in any battle reports that went out.
He’d hate her for it, probably, especially if it meant he had to endure media interviews afterward. But it was all for the good of the archon and, by extension, the Commonwealth. He’d understand.
The real wild card was Alaric Wolf. He wasn’t a glory hound like Vedet, but he was a relentless, fierce fighter who probably could win the battle on his own. He didn’t seem to care much for publicity and wouldn’t likely do anything to exploit his own personal accomplishments, but what would he do if he was the first into the heart of New Edinburgh? Would he claim the planet for his Clan, locking out Vedet and Roderick? If he did, this could devolve into a Wolf/Lyran grudge match all too quickly.
What made it worse was that she was powerless to affect Alaric, at least for now. He was in his element, and he would do what he did best. She could only wait and hope he did not accomplish too much too fast.
Duke Vedet’s voice interrupted her reverie. “Lady Steiner, I’m pleased to tell you that it’s started.”
“What’s started?”
“What we have been waiting for,” Vedet said in a tone so smug it made Trillian want to hit her comm.
“And what is that?”
“You’ll see. At this time, you should proceed back toward the tarmac. Don’t get too close, though—there should be some fighting there soon. Go about two kilometers south of the tarmac.”
“Are you going to tell me what this is all about?” she asked, but Vedet did not respond.
Cursing, she started the jeep’s engine and drove back toward the tarmac. She didn’t see anything on the scanner that would have gotten the duke’s attention. What had he seen?
She’d ask Roderick. He had more eyes out there than she did.
“Roderick, are you busy right now?”
“What the hell kind of question is that?” Roderick snapped. “No, Trill, I’m just sitting in a lawn chair getting a tan. Of course I’m busy.”
“Okay, okay, sorry, stupid question. But I thought you should know that whatever Vedet’s been waiting for is happening.”
“What is it?”
“I don’t know. He won’t tell me.”
There was a pause. Trillian guessed Roderick was taking a moment to utter a few choice words about Vedet without broadcasting them.
When he spoke again, he was surprisingly calm. “So what do you want me to do?”
“My view of things from down here is a little limited. What’s changed in the past few minutes?”
“Well, the Silver Hawk Irregulars that were north and northwest of the city have figured out we’re not coming from that direction and have moved around to engage us. One group was coming pretty fast—I thought they were going to charge right into us, but then they kind of just stopped.”
“Where?”
“Middle of the city, almost exactly. Northwest of me.”
“Anything else?”
“Yeah. It looks like some of the rats are abandoning ship.”
“What do you mean?”
“A helicopter said a motorcade came out from underneath the palace. A good-sized one, maybe a dozen cars.”
“What kind of cars?”
“Nothing special. None of the big limos or anything, so it’s probably not anyone important.”
“Roderick, if anyone important is on the move, do you think they’d be dumb enough to go in a car that broadcasts where they are?”
“I would hope they wouldn’t be dumb enough to leave at all. They should sit in a bunker somewhere, safe and sound.”
“Where is this motorcade headed?”
“Ummmm…south-southwest. Right through the heart of town.”
Trillian tapped the steering wheel of her jeep. “So it will go past the Silver Hawks that just moved down there.”
“Yeah. Looks that way.”
Then she saw it. It was like dropping a jigsaw puzzle on the ground and watching the pieces bounce around for a minute before settling into a perfect, interlocked position.
“Roderick, Anson Marik is in that motorcade!” she said.
“I don’t think so,” Roderick said.
“He is! He’s coming to this temporary DropPort to get off the planet. Vedet found out that was his plan—that’s why he’s been hanging around back here. He wants to get his hands on Anson, and this is how he’s going to get him.”
“Wouldn’t Anson know that Vedet and his boys are down there? I think that would make him think twice about leaving from there.”
“How much choice does he have?” Trillian shot back. “Alaric’s taken part of the highway, you’re putting pressure on from the southwest—he’s not going to have any better opportunity as this thing goes on. That’s probably why the Silver Hawks came around, to give him an escort to punch through the Hesperus Guards.”
“A DropShip can’t take off quickly,” Roderick said. “He climbs in, and it’ll be bombed out of existence before it can take off.”
“Unless he’s got something more in that hangar. I can’t get any sort of a reading on it, and Vedet’s troops are staying away. Maybe Anson’s got some trick up his sleeve.”
Roderick took a moment to think it all over. “I don’t know, Trill,” he finally said.
“Roderick, there’s a motorcade from the palace on its way here, and Vedet’s camped out because he thinks it bears watching. If Anson’s on his way here, Vedet intends to take him. And, Roderick—that can’t happen. We can’t have Vedet marching around with a captive Anson Marik.”
“Okay. Okay, you’ve made your point. I’ll send some units over.”
“I don’t need units—I need someone else who could take Anson Marik prisoner. I need you.”
Trillian could only imagine what Roderick was saying in the few moments he left his microphone off, but she guessed it wasn’t pleasant.
“All right,” he said. “I’m on my way.”
* * *
Roderick took his command lance southwest, leaving the rest of his units behind to harass downtown New Edinburgh. He didn’t like this, since he still didn’t believe Anson would take this big of a risk, and he didn’t like having to play politics in the middle of a battle. But Trillian had been right—it would be disastrous if Anson fell into Vedet’s hands. If the duke got what he wanted from this battle, he’d probably be challenging the archon for power before the year was over.
He hoped he would make it in time, since his Rifleman was relatively slow. The motorcade, though, had farther to travel and, from what Trillian had told him, they would not be able to take highways to the tarmac south of the city. They’d also be bringing the Silver Hawk Irr-regulars with them to keep Vedet back, which also would slow them.
He would be where he needed to be in about an hour. Hopefully by then he’d have some idea of what he would do.
* * *
Alaric had paid careful attention as his scouts told him of Silver Hawk Irregulars units coming around to the middle of the city. They had stayed put briefly, but then moved south again, apparently accompanying a group of cars that had emerged from the palace.
Alaric did not know what sort of foolish
ness the defenders were up to, but he was determined to make them pay for it. The Silver Hawk units moving south would soon be isolated from any other defenders, making them extremely vulnerable to an attack from behind.
He intended to deliver that attack.
“Striker Trinary, I want two Stars to accompany me. Everyone else stay by the highway, but accompany the First Steiner Strikers if they make a move forward. Move out.”
It would not be easy. He would have to make an end run behind the First Steiner Strikers, then dash west. But it was worth the gain—if he executed properly, a significant portion of the defensive force would be utterly decimated.
He was already moving south as the Stars from Stalker Trinary ran to catch up.
* * *
Time went very, very slowly for Trillian. Vedet had essentially stopped moving forward and was shuffling his troops back and forth to keep them from being easy targets. The motorcade was making them wait, moving slowly as the Silver Hawk defenders traveled in front of it. She was impatient for something to happen, but she consoled herself with the knowledge that the slow pace gave Roderick more time to get into position.
She was still south of the tarmac, knowing she might need to move farther back if Vedet’s troops had to give any ground or if the Silver Hawk Irregulars broke through.
She was keeping to a regular pattern, looking out her windshield at the sky, then the ground ahead, then at her scanner, then right side, then left. Then start over. Her movements were as steady as a metronome, but her heart was beating faster and faster. The battle had been mild to this point, but ahead of her it was about to explode.
* * *
It was coming. Everything was moving the way Vedet wanted it to. The motorcade carrying a panicked Anson Marik was rolling right into his arms. Maybe Anson had enough misplaced faith in his Silver Hawk Irregulars to think they could fight their way through, but Vedet would show him the error of that idea soon enough.
The Silver Hawks were getting closer. It was time to stop milling around and get into formation.
“Everyone to your assignments,” he said. “Be ready.”
Stalker Company, which had been doing little more than running in place, now dashed west, preparing to flank the approaching Silver Hawks. Tiger and Dagger companies drew even with each other, forming a wall a few kilometers north of the tarmac, with Vedet’s command lance buttressing it from behind.
“Prepare to charge on my command,” he said. They would meet the Silver Hawk Irregulars head-on, then take them apart, piece by piece.
* * *
Roderick was close enough to see the flashes and smoke when the firing started. He could see how Vedet had his troops lined up, and their formation looked firm. The Silver Hawks, in contrast, looked disorganized, shuffling this way and that as the motorcade moved south. It appeared that this was something they hadn’t planned for, some duty they had drawn in the last minute and didn’t know how to execute. Which Roderick thought was odd—it was his impression that the Silver Hawks drilled for every possible situation.
He came at them from the east, running into their left side. He didn’t want to get in front of them, so that he would have a chance to sneak behind and get to the motorcade if the opportunity arose. Low houses and shops gave him a little cover, and it helped that the First Hesperus Guards were moving forward. The pressure from Vedet’s troops made it tough for the Silver Hawks to devote any attention to Roderick and his lancemates.
The first unit Roderick saw was a Condor tank, a hover vehicle that seemed barely large enough to hold the arsenal of weapons piled on top of it. It turned toward Roderick as he approached, and it let loose a volley of missiles. Roderick responded with his autocannon, rounds ripping into the side of the tank while sparking off the guns on top. Roderick moved to his right, taking shelter behind a two-story brick building to avoid fire from the much shorter tank. He stopped behind the building, counted to eight, then moved back south.
The tank had started to move north to try to head him off, but had turned when Roderick started moving, and it was waiting for him. Hot metal flew out of the large gun at the front of the tank, but Roderick had been expecting it. He was already slowing before he emerged from the cover of the building, and the shot passed in front of him. Roderick triggered his pulse laser and it beamed into the tank, catching it right on the missile launcher. A series of explosions lit up the rear of the tank, and it backed up, retreating before Roderick finished it off.
Roderick let it go. There was a Spider in front of him, and it looked like it was itching for a fight.
* * *
Vedet believed his charge was stately and beautiful. The Silver Hawk Irregulars had not looked that organized to begin with, and the pounding fire the First Hesperus Guards greeted them with slowed them to a crawl. His Atlas took steady steps forward, relying mostly on its PPC to push back the Silver Hawks. The defenders mostly rode the smaller, quicker machines they generally favored—Ocelots dashing this way and that, Blades doing the same thing only faster—with a few bigger ’Mechs, like the Warhammer that had been harassing Tiger Company, thrown in for good measure.
The only weakness to Vedet’s charge, as far as he could tell, was that he personally was not landing too many hits. But that was not his role. Not yet.
Then it happened. Stalker Company came in from the right, blasting the Silver Hawks at will. Fire poured through the streets and ’Mechs took shuddering steps backward. Vedet saw a Stinger reflexively move away from the Stalker charge, putting him right into the duke’s line of fire. A combined PPC and laser blast blew into the Stinger, and the impact melted away most of the ’Mech’s left side. The Stinger didn’t have much left in it, and its last few staggering steps took it back into the line of fire of units from Stalker Company, who did their job thoroughly. The remains of the Stinger smoked as Stalker units made their way past.
Then the voice of one of Vedet’s scouts came over the comm and ruined the battle’s perfection.
“Sir, we have units joining the battle from both the east and north.”
“Who? Defenders?”
“No, sir. Roderick Steiner’s command lance is engaging units on the east.”
Vedet smirked. He wasn’t surprised that Steiner was here. Trillian had undoubtedly passed word that something was going on here, and her cousin had come to get his shot at glory. It didn’t matter, though—four ’Mechs would not be enough to allow the First Steiner Strikers to play any significant role here.
“And from the north?” he said.
“Clan Wolf units. At least three Stars, and it looks like Alaric Wolf is part of it.”
Vedet’s good mood disappeared. The damn Wolf had slipped in the gap and was now the closest invader to Anson Marik! This couldn’t be!
He switched to his units’ general channel. “All units, we are changing plans. We don’t have time to grind this out. We’re going for the motorcade and going now. Move!”
His Atlas punished the ground as it moved ahead. His energy weapons cut through the Silver Hawks, who looked more confused than ever. But he wasn’t looking at them. He was looking north.
Anson Marik would be his captive. No one else’s.
* * *
The explosion to Roderick’s left blinded him for a moment, filling his vision with yellow and red dots. He kept firing even though he couldn’t see, knowing that the pilot of the Spider would be just as stunned.
His shots were wild, but it didn’t matter. A ’Mech from the First Hesperus Guards, a Firestarter, was plunging ahead, and it caught the Spider off-guard, practically pushing it over as it charged past, weapons blazing. When it passed, the Spider did not move again.
Roderick looked at his scanner. Vedet’s troops were on the move, charging fast. They were going straight for the motorcade.
Roderick stomped on his pedals and his Rifleman moved too. It was a footrace now, but one that would pass through fire and bullets and laser blasts. Reaching the finish wouldn’t be e
asy.
* * *
The lack of discipline in the Silver Hawk Irregulars lines surprised Alaric. He had not seen any units in formation yet, and they were doing little if anything to help each other out. This made them porous, easy to run through.
It was different from the Silver Hawk units he had fought before, especially on Gannett, where their discipline and teamwork made them difficult to track down. Perhaps what was happening here was an echo of the discipline breakdown on Helm that had led to the attempted surrender of some units. Alaric, though, had seen too many tricks and deceptions from the Silver Hawk Irregulars; he would not be caught underestimating them.
He radioed all the units that had accompanied him to the middle of the city. “If they offer you a breakthrough, do not take it,” he said. “There is no reason to overrun them yet. Stay in formation and pick them off one by one—we do not have to kill them all at once.”
This style of fighting suited his Mad Cat quite well. He could herd the Silver Hawks as they scrambled around, pushing them back and mercilessly turning on anyone who was foolish enough to run too far from the main body of defenders. A battlearmor squad paid the price when Alaric’s lasers caught them trying to flee west, incinerating the group of them. A Stinger found itself backing away from one of the Stalker Stars only to be hit by Alaric’s pulse lasers. He had startled the pilot enough to freeze him, which allowed his other ’Mechs to move forward and finish the job.
The Silver Hawks were penned in now, attacks coming from all sides. The assault would be exactly as devastating as Alaric hoped. He was satisfied.
* * *
The pace of fire became faster the closer Vedet came to the motorcade. The Silver Hawks were falling back in their last, desperate effort to protect their leader. His Atlas, big as it was, drew a lot of the fire, lasers and shells seeming to bend corners just to find him. Fighting through this was like walking underwater, and alarms and warnings had started to flash all over his cockpit. But so far everything was functional, so he stomped ahead. The goal was close—once he had that, all the damage he had absorbed would be worth it.
The Last Charge Page 26
