* * * *
Sirens wailed across the wide, flat valley lined with broad-bladed stalks of deep blue vegetation. A mobile headquarters, a wheeled, multiple-trailered vehicle that dwarfed the men standing fat its shadow, blared warning through its external speakers. Nearby, a Marauder hulked, motionless and waiting. Across the valley, one heavy Orion and a pair of Stingers also waited mutely while thunder boomed from a green-clouded sky.
The Leopard DropShip settled to the ground among billowing clouds of dust, whipping bluesward, and venting steam. Her hull armor was scored in several places by recent battle, but the ideographs above the black-on-scarlet circled dragon insignia still picked out the ship's name: Xao.
Colonel Kevlavic stepped down the ladder from the mobile HQ's cab and received a subordinate's salute. "Board the command as soon as its ramps are down. Lieutenant," he said. "I will lead the lance personally."
"Sir!"
His communicator chirruped at his belt, and he touched the switch to receive. "My Lord Colonel," a voice tinned in the speaker clipped to his ear. "Communication received from the Subotai. She has completed boarding of the company of Galleons, and is boosting now. Her ETA at Hunter's Cape is twenty minutes."
"Good."
"We've also got confirmation of close air support from Regis-port, my Lord."
"Very well. Inform Subotai's commander that we should ground at the rendezvous at the same time." He checked his wrist computer. "Make it 1240 hours, local." Kevlavic was not convinced that they would need the Galleon light tanks, but they would provide useful close support and covering fire if there were rebel forces in the vicinity. ‘Mech operations in the Silvan Basin were always hazardous. Small rebel units were everywhere and anywhere. Though they posed no real threat to ‘Mechs. A determined attack could threaten the defensive perimeter established around a DropShip landing zone.
Below him, the Xao's ‘Mech holds gaped wide. The Colonel brought the transceiver to his mouth. "Stand by, Com Central. We're moving." He clicked to battle frequency. "This is Kevlavic. Lance, form up for boarding."
As the three ‘Mechs began lumbering across the valley toward the Leopard DropShip, Kevlavic climbed the ladder dangling by the leg of his Marauder, hauled himself through the narrow belly hatch, and slid behind the battle machine's controls. He swung the neurohelmet and its trailing tangle of cables down from its mount and secured it across his shoulders, then checked the adjustment of the feedback loop that would mesh his sense of balance to the great machine's electronic actuators and coordinators. The Marauder stirred and lifted one armored foot. The thud of its ponderous steps hammered through the ‘Mech's open cockpit hatch as it began moving toward the valley.
The Governor General's instructions had been most explicit Though the mission was a simple one, Nagumo's face and manner had showed his concern that it be successful. And when the Governor General was concerned, Colonel Kevlavic was concerned. It was a good way to retain rank, honor, and life.
The intruder ship had been badly damaged during the last moments of its approach to Verthandi, and probably was destroyed during its spectacular flaming re-entry. Planet-bound radar and the combat scanners aboard the Xao had tracked its trajectory across the northern hemisphere of the planet They had lost the signal under the clouds, somewhere among the jungles, marshes, and salt dunes of Hunter's Cape, along the coast of the Azure Sea, six hundred kilometers north of Regis.
It was unlikely that either vessel or passengers had survived, but an immediate inspection was still vital, Rebel forces were strong along the Azure Sea coast, and further east, in the Vrieshaven District Even if the blockade runner's crew was dead, the rebels might be able to salvage cargo and military supplies from the shattered wreckage. They might even find BattleMechs still cradled in their travel cocoons. Even more important, the wreckage might contain some clue to the intruder DropShip's origins and masters.
Nagumo's orders had also gone out to the two Kurita DropShips in the system. They were to ground, not at Regis, but to the north, at the edge of the Bluesward Plateau, where a company of light tanks attached to Kevlavic's command and one lance of his own ‘Mech regiment awaited their Colonel's return. Though such a mission would normally be assigned to a company Commander or even to the Lieutenant in command of a single ‘Mech lance, this was a special case. Colonel Kevlavic was not in the habit of delegating to junior officers when the mission was as important to the high command as was this one. He would personally search Hunter's Cape for the crash site of the downed intruder DropShip.
The operation's only possible weak point would be if there were any problem coordinating the Xao's landing with the Subotai's, A delay in either ship's arrival would leave the other ship's forces without support
As he backed his Marauder into the harness supports in the Xao's hold, the Colonel dismissed these thoughts. In twenty minutes, his ‘Mechs would be on the ground. He had no doubt that they could handle anything they were likely to find at the crash site, be it survivors or the whole, damned rebel army. AeroSpace Fighters from Regisport would provide close air support
Kevlavic was sure the Subotai's tanks would not even be needed.
* * * *
A hundred kilometers above the cloud-swirled ochers and greens of Verthandi's surface, the Subotai Captain had noted the automated distress beacon of a small craft. The ship was on a free-flight course close to her own vessel's, and so she altered course to intercept it The Captain assumed that it was one of the Kurita fighters damaged in the short battle with the intruder DropShip.
It turned out that she was wrong. The damaged fighter was a Chippewa, a design not in use in Kurita space. The young woman that the Subotai's Techs pulled from the cockpit seemed to be in shock, unseeing, unspeaking.
The Captain ordered a medic to care for the prisoner and that she be given food and a comfortable place to sleep. Though the war was over for this pilot, the Subotai Captain had heard enough rumors about Kurita interrogation units that she wondered if the young pilot might not have been better off in her metal coffin in space. That was not for her to decide, though, and she knew it It was her duty to report to her superiors with the prisoner, not to tell them what to do with her. Besides, she might even get a commendation for the chance capture of one of the enemy pilots.
With silent bursts from her steering jets, the Subotai eased back into a re-entry approach vector that would take her and her cargo of Galleon tanks to the rendezvous at Hunter's Cape. She would be arriving late.
* * * * ...
Tollen Brasednewic held up one hand, and the ragged line of soldiers behind him froze in place. Their guide slipped through the twilight created by the jungle foliage, while they waited, straining every sense against the background warble of unseen lifeforms. Chirimsims brayed and chirped in the distance.
They were a piratical-looking band, and none knew that better than Brasednewic himself. No two were dressed or armed the same, their uniforms a hodgepodge of civilian clothing arid bits of uniforms and body armor taken from Kurita troops. Brasednewic carried a 5 mm Magna laser rifle taken from a Combine soldier, and Yolev cradled the massive squad machine gun he'd lifted from the body of a Verthandian militiaman. The rest carried a variety of hunting rifles, competition weapons, and handguns. Javed carried a single-shot flare pistol, with extra rounds for the ungainly, snub-nosed launcher stuffed into the pouch slung at his belt From the brush behind them came the low rush of silenced swamp skimmer engines. That meant the pilots were keeping their vehicles ready for a fast getaway, if one was necessary.
Their guide was Li Chin, son of a local plantation owner named Li Wu. None of the rebels trusted the man entirely, not with so many orientals serving in the ranks and in command of the hated Kurita legions. Li had often helped the rebels before, however, warning them of sweeps by Kurita patrols and of ambushes along the roads at the jungle fringe. This time, Li's story of a spaceship thundering across his plantation and into the sea to the north had been too intriguing to igno
re. If the man was telling the truth, the vessel had crashed just a few hours before, and it might yet be possible to salvage the wreckage before the hated Brownjackets arrived on the scene.
That Kurita troops would arrive was a foregone conclusion. The spacecraft was almost certainly one of theirs, probably containing military supplies that they would not want to fall into the hands of Brasednewic's little rebel band. Radio transponders or emergency beacons would bring other DropShips to rescue the first Maybe, though, with cunning and a bit of luck, they could arrange a surprise for old Nagumo's troops when they arrived. It would be nice to be the hunter rather than the hunted for a change.
Li signaled them ahead. They moved forward cautiously, parting the vines and overhanging branches that partly blocked the path. Beyond the jungle was the tidal marsh, a barren wasteland of salt pools, sand bars, and mudflats. Beyond that lay the sea.
The sound of the surf was a gentle, distant thunder, intermittent behind the racketing of bright-winged marine omithoids circling above the water's edge. The sea was flat and azure-blue, tinged with green from the sky. Not far from shore, the surface of the water was broken by the hemispherical curve of a huge, metal shell lifting and falling with the waves that broke against its steel-grey flanks.
Brasednewic raised his Micheaux electronic 'nocs to his eyes and touched the zoom adjustment. That hand scanner was a battered souvenir of a raid on Port Gaspin, and the carrying strap bore the stain of where it had bitten into the throat of its former owner. At high magnification, he could make out streaks of rust across the DropShip's hull and the vast, coal-black scars that spoke of violent re-entry. High up along the flank, the re-entry burns could not quite mask the black-on-red dragon circle of Kurita. Down at the water-line, waves broke and surged through a gaping hole. Everywhere, there were puckered craters and the slashed and partly melted gouges of laser fire. The surf rumbled and roiled in white foam around the hulks of what appeared to be hull armor fragments or blocks of heavy machinery scattered about the wreck and sunken in the shallows along the shore. There could be no doubt that this DropShip had been brought down in combat.
The rebel leader dropped the scanner from his face, suddenly puzzled. What combat? If a Kurita ship had been knocked down, that meant friendly ships must be in the Norn System. But whose? The rebels had no ships of their own, no AeroSpace Fighters, no way at all of striking at Kurita DropShips from the sky. Who had? And why?
He raised the scanner again. Movement had attracted his eye, a disturbance along the beach. He could make out a party of men, apparently the wet and bedraggled survivors of the crash. There were too many to count. Many seemed to be...what? Digging, it looked like. They were digging in the sand. What were they doing... burying their dead? Scratching an SOS into the sand? Strange. As he watched, black smoke began boiling from the largest knot of people.
His jaw muscles clenched as he ground his teeth together, a nervous habit acquired long before the coming of Kurita's soldiers. Troops and vehicles from Regis would be along at any moment to rescue their own, and they would be drawn by the smoke. The rebels would have to strike fast if they hoped to capture some of those survivors for interrogation.
Brasednewic gave orders, hand signals understood and passed on by the men waiting silently behind him. Preparation was silent, save for the soft clicks of bolt-action and slide auto-weapons being cocked to fire rounds. The band split up into teams of four and five men apiece, each group slipping through the jungle and out onto the mudflats by a separate route. Messengers melted back into the swamp to alert the skimmer pilots.
The survivors numbered perhaps fifty or sixty, though small parties were scattered up and down the beach collecting boxes and crates of supplies that had drifted ashore from the wreck. Norte appeared to be posted as lookout, and none appeared to be armed. Brasednewic smiled to himself. So much the better. This was going to be too easy.
* * * *
Grayson looked up as his communicator whispered in his ear. "They're moving, Captain. Spread out along the jungle line, range one hundred meters."
"I've got them, Lori," Grayson said. "Be ready."
He stood up, still a bit unsteady on his feet. The shock of the fiery plummet through Verthandi's atmosphere, of Martinez's last-second thruster maneuvers, and their nearly successful landing at the edge of the Azure Sea had left him weak and rubber-kneed.
It was Martinez's skill that had kept them from plunging too steeply into the atmosphere. After the grazing collision with the plummeting fighter, she had recovered control of the ship and braced them against the shuddering vibrations of re-entry, tail-first. They had not burned on their descent, though the hull temperature had soared so high that outer hull elements of the main drive had slagged away entirely. Enough thrusters had survived the heat to allow their semi-guided touchdown at the water's edge.
Once down, the sea had poured in through the rents and slashes in the DropShip's hull, of course, but the wreck looked far worse than it actually was. Five of the Phobos's crew had been injured in the descent, but no one was killed. That they were all alive with much of their gear still intact, Grayson was more than willing to count as a miracle. There was even a chance that the Phobos might even fly again, if they could find enough time and a well-stocked repair facility. Repairing the Phobos would require a second miracle.
Now, though, Grayson was willing to defer Miracle Number Two if they could only secure a third miracle in very short order. Forces that Devic Erudin had identified as rebels were approaching rapidly, and Grayson knew they had to establish friendly relations with them, fast. If he failed, the firefight could end their mission before it had properly begun.
Sergeant Ramage was on his knees nearby, using an entrenching tool from the Phobos's equipment locker to scrape a hasty depression into the sand. "You look right at home, Ram," Grayson said, "and that hole looks deep enough. Why don't you pass that thing on to someone else?"
"Bloody-funny," Ramage said, but he grinned as he handed the tool to Tomlinson, a young Tech kneeling nearby.
"You never looked better, Tom," Grayson said to the Tech. Tomlinson was another Trellwanese, a red-haired minor genius with things mechanical, and Grayson's own personal Tech. Tom had replaced his usual layer of grease with a smearing of wet sand and mud.
"I'll be ready to join Ramage's commandos after this," Tomlinson said, and Grayson laughed. Ramage had been boasting of late how he would put the Verthandian rebel recruits through a Trellwan-style commando training course. For reasons not entirely clear to Grayson, that included plenty of digging.
He walked on, pacing slowly across the beach past others of his command preparing their trenches or gathering crates washed up on the beach from the Phobos's gashed-open hold. "Steady, everybody," he said, keeping his voice low but penetrating. "They're coming. Be ready... my command."
He found Erudin squatting close by the fire that several troopers had coaxed from a pile of damp driftwood with a hand laser. "Your friends are on their way. Are you sure you don't have any kind of password or recognition signal we can use?"
Miserable, Erudin shook his head. "We're a good 200kilometers from where we're supposed to be. The local commander may have heard I'd be bringing help back, but he wouldn't know when...and he wouldn't expect it here. There's a password I was to transmit on a certain radio frequency once we were grounded to let him know it was me. I doubt anyone patrolling out here would know about that." He gestured toward the wreck behind them. "That black dragon on your ship isn't going to help, either."
"Don't you have any way of maintaining communication throughout your... army?"
Erudin spat into the sand. "Army? Captain, the Resistance is made up of maybe eighty or a hundred 'armies' wandering all over Verthandi's northern latitudes. I think the biggest must number something like a thousand men and women, but they're scattered among towns and plantations throughout the Vrieshaven District The smallest numbers exactly one—usually some lone scavenger who likes to slit the th
roats of drunken militiamen in Regis alleys. They—"
A signal keened in the speaker in Grayson's ear. "Hold it," he said. "Here they come."
In a glimmering curtain of spray, a skimmerfoil burst from the cover of an arm of jungle reaching out onto the mudflats. At the same moment, bands of ragged men bearing awkward weapons rose from rocks and from behind low sand dunes. There was a stutter of automatic rifle fire.
"Now! Everybody down!" Grayson yelled, and across the beach, men and women who had been waiting for just such an attack threw themselves flat into the shallow trenches they'd been scraping into the wet sand. Grayson alone remained standing. This was the riskiest part of the plan, for now he was the only target the attacking rebels had. At the same time, though, the rebels would know something unusual was happening if this lone survivor stood, empty-handed and defenseless, on the suddenly deserted beach. He was counting on surprise and curiosity to make them hold their fire.
Autorifle slugs cluttered through the air a meter above his head, and the deeper-throated wham of a hunting rifle popped a geyser of sand near his feet. Just as Grayson was thinking that guerrilla soldiers might not have the luxury of indulging their curiosity, someone began bellowing an order to cease fire. The charging rebels dropped in their tracks, wary of a trap, weapons ready.
"Hold your fire!" Grayson yelled. He remembered training sessions with Weapons Master Griffith in his father's regiment, and it all seemed so long ago. He shook himself. Was it only one standard year since those days? Pitch your voice so it carries, but keep it sharp with authority, with control. If you're talking to your own troops, they have to know you're in control. If you're talking to strangers, you can't let them hear your fear.
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