Impetus of War

by Blaine Lee Pardoe

  But the second Thor reacted quickly, beginning to move toward them. Jake swung his weapons at the second Jaguar even as it began to fire its ER PPC and long-range missiles. The deadly blue bolt of the PPC lashed into Jake's Cerberus, hitting its left chest, twisting and contorting the Aldis heavy ferro-fibrous armor like wax under a hot flame.

  Jake switched on his McArthur anti-missile system just as he heard the tone of the missile lock squeal inside his neuro-helmet. The small fire door popped open on his 'Mech's chest, spraying out a wall of fire as the Thor's long-range missiles came arcing in toward him. There were a series of flashes as some of the missiles exploded before they could hit, but one pair of warheads did get through, digging into his right leg.

  In the distance he heard a deep rumble followed by a massive fireball rising into the air above the aerodrome's buildings. A communications signal came on as Jake dodged his Cerberus to the right, breaking into a full run. "Communications building destroyed," came the voice of Sho-sa Parkensen from the other end of the tarmac.

  Both of his Gauss rifles signaled as fully loaded and charged. Locking onto the second Thor, Jake saw the first one getting to its feet again. Things were going to get hot very quickly. "I could use some help here, Parkensen," he muttered into the microphone of his neurohelmet.

  Locking his cross hairs onto the second Thor again, he opened fire. The pair of Gauss slugs raced out and streaked into the Jaguar 'Mech's right leg, one hitting high, the other hitting at the knee actuator, severing the joint cleanly as it passed through the leg. It was the second Thor's turn to fall forward, while the first was now standing and ready for a fight despite its damaged legs.

  Then, a Point of Elementals rose into the air over the fallen Thor. Painted tan with gray streaks, their camouflage blended in with the bleak clay soil of Wayside. They were still far enough away for Jake to keep concentrating on the first Thor, but they were a threat nevertheless.

  He kept an eye on his Gauss rifle indicators as the weapons slowly loaded and built up the necessary charge to fire. The first Thor, now rising like a phoenix, let go a wave of missiles that went just wide of his position. Jake pivoted his torso and locked his weapons the moment his Gauss rifle came on line. He aimed low, locking his targeting cross hairs onto the legs, which he'd hit in his initial attack.

  The diehard Thor opened up with both its large and medium lasers just as Jake fired his rifles. The lasers found their mark first, slashing at him like ruby-red sabers, slicing massive pieces of armor off his legs and torso. The damage was minimal, but it was still damage. His own Gauss rifles raced down-range, one slamming into the Thor's leg while the other shot missed altogether, creating a massive crater just behind the Jaguar. The Elementals rose alongside and began to provide supporting fire, their missiles twisting at him.

  Sweat rolled down Jake's brow as he prepared to exchange another salvo with the stubborn Thor. Just once, he wished something would go right on this planet.

  * * *

  Santin West cursed to himself as the Jaguar Warhawk moved backward out of his reach in the streets of Deep Ellum. The communications signal had indicated that it was from the Smoke Jaguar Star Colonel, Loren, and it was his Warhawk that had opened up a barrage that kept him pinned for what seemed like hours, but in reality had been less than a minute. He looked at the tactical display in the helmet of his Elemental suit and saw the damage taken by both sides. His Binary had inflicted significant damage on the Jaguars, but had taken almost as many losses themselves.

  A part of him wanted to press on with the battle. This was, after all, a Trial of Grievance. The thin line of Jaguar 'Mechs still stretched from their DropShip in the HPG park to a point near the cliffs overlooking the oddly serene Backlick River. His assault had not broken their line running through the narrow city streets. Instead, the entire line had moved back, recoiling from his assault and inflicting damage of its own. He knew he could crush them with a simple order, but the price of that order would be his own life and the lives of his command. The gains would not be worth the losses. Memories of his vision taunted him. He had not yet held the throat of the Smoke Jaguar in his power claw, crushing it.

  Seeing the Warhawk as he came around the corner, Santin West opened fire with his short-range missiles again, splattering armor and shooting black smoke and flames into the air as the pair of SRMs struck firmly into the heart of the Jaguar Omni. The Warhawk began to move away, firing one of its PPCs as it went. The shot missed, but one of the trailing arcs of charged particles danced over and into his leg. Santin felt every hair on his massive body stand on end as the huge electrostatic discharge burnt a hole in his armor. His flesh had been spared, and the suit's self-sealing protection system covered the opening with a quick-drying plastic coating.

  The time had come. Biccon Winters had told him that the fight in Deep Ellum would be a stand-off—it was part of her dream. Now he would fulfill her vision, and be one step closer to realizing his own.

  * * *

  "I'm on fire here," squealed the voice of Sergeant Ralston McAnis over the unsecured wide-beam frequency in the ears of each of the mock-Jaguars.

  "Eject—damn it! Punch out," shouted Sumpter Burke. McAnis was farthest from the DropShip, and Burke was responsible for covering him in case of trouble.

  "Oh God . . ." came Glenda Jura's call, followed by an explosion in the distance that seemed to shake the streets and buildings of Deep Ellum.

  Loren read the data being fed to him from his own sensors and from Trisha McBride aboard the Bull Run. Half of his force was either dead or near death. The rest were falling back, retreating toward his position, fighting for each meter of terrain. He only wanted to hold until he heard back from Mitch, to make sure that the clue had been planted, the HPG transmission sent.

  He was considering ordering retreat, conceding the battlefield and giving the Nova Cats the victory. It didn't matter now. The voice of Captain Mitchell Fraser came on line: "The Nova Cat techs were a lot more cooperative than the warriors you're facing. Our message was sent to Wayside V's coordinates as planned."

  Loren swung his right arm into firing position and opened up with one of his PPCs at an approaching Elemental. The burst missed by five meters, but the arcing particle beams leaped out and scarred the glossy black armor of the Elemental. In the distance he saw several other dark blue Elementals rising to join Loren's attacker, who was firing his small laser into Loren's chest just below the cockpit canopy.

  He pivoted his torso as he moved the Masakari further down the street to remain facing his foe as he prepared to concede defeat. Suddenly, he heard a deep and menacing voice over his neurohelmet speakers.

  "Star Colonel Loren of the Smoke Jaguars, have you come today to die with your warriors, or do you hide aboard your ship watching them die?"

  West. Loren activated his commline. "I am Loren of the Jaguars. I assume this is the esteemed Star Colonel Santin." His tone was openly sarcastic.

  "To continue this fight would leave us both dead, with our hands wrapped around each other's throats," West said, sounding weary. "You have fought well enough even for mere Smoke Jaguars, spawn of a gene pool laden with weaklings and surat blood."

  Loren gave a short laugh. "You too have fought well, for old warriors and bandits. Perhaps you will one day learn the meaning of honor, or at least how to spell the word, quiaff ?" he said, checking his short-range sensors. He found the source of the transmission, the lone jet black Elemental who had fired at him. "Words are of little value with warriors. Is there a point to this banter?"

  "Aff," replied Santin West. "Waste is not the way of our Clans. I wish to declare, with you, this Trial void. Let no more warriors die needlessly. We shall settle this trial again, at another time, in another place."

  He wants to postpone the fight, leave the Trial open. What choice do I have? I'm not here to wipe out the Nova Cats. "This is not how such battles should end. I accept your offer, on the condition that you and I will face each other again."


  "I assure you that I shall hunt you and find you, Star Colonel Loren of the Jaguars," Santin West said. "And the next time we meet, all I will leave behind are your ashes."

  BOOK III

  Crucible

  One more such victory and we are undone.

  —Pyrrhus of Epirus

  They've got us surrounded again, the poor bastards.

  —General Creighton W. Abrams

  This man Wellington is so stupid he does not know when he is beaten and goes on fighting.

  —Napoleon Bonaparte

  42

  South of New Scotland

  Wayside V (Wildcat)

  Deep Periphery

  25 July 3058

  Major Cullen Craig's Victor towered over the array of 'Mechs and equipment the Fusiliers could not carry with them up onto the continent of New Scotland. In addition to his Victor, there were four other BattleMechs that could not make the trek due to damage they'd taken in the earlier fighting. In the dim green twilight, they appeared like emerald giants, misting as their heat vents channeled out the heat from their internal structure. The mists hung at their feet, giving the BattleMechs an almost mythical appearance, like titans or giants of ages past.

  There was a reinforced lance of tanks as well, heavy ground armor support that the Fusiliers had planned to use in attacking the Jaguar command base—an attack Craig knew would never take place. Even the arrival of Mulvaney's reinforcements would only prolong the Fusiliers' death agony. Captain Lewis's infantry platoons and deadly Infiltrator power armor were set up in concealed positions near the route that the Smoke Jaguars would take.

  That route had been easy to predict. The old sea bed rose upward, with rolling hills, and the only relatively clear area was the kilometer-wide pass where Craig and his people now waited for them to come. The thin yellow grass and moss showed scars of the passage of the rest of the Fusiliers two hours earlier—a steady stream of 'Mech tracks running to the north. As he faced south, the direction from which the Jaguars were approaching, Craig knew that nearly seventy kilometers away, in the much higher and thinner air, Colonel Stirling must have reached the edge of what had been a continent eons ago.

  The regimental vehicles for communications and control were concealed nearby, ready to make their escape toward the landing zones where the Fusiliers had first touched down. His mission was simple; slow the Smoke Jaguars and then try to get away to safety. Moving along the rugged hillsides, the survivors of his small holding action would head to the southwest, hopefully making their way to the wreck of the Stonewall Jackson. That was easier said then done, Craig knew. He'd seen how the Jaguars fought back in the Isthmus of Bannockburn. They didn't stop coming in battle, even when they were losing.

  The infantry scouts were the first to signal and relay the information about the Smoke Jaguar forces. The leading elements consisted of a Binary of mixed 'Mechs. The information being relayed from the scouts was feeding into his secondary display as if his own short-range scanners were picking up the information. Cullen Craig braced himself for the onslaught and stared at the communications controls inside his cockpit. At least we haven't seen their fighters. That would be the end of this quick enough.

  The jamming from his regimental comm vehicle seemed to alert and breathe life into the Jaguar Binary. They rushed forward into the open pass where Craig and his Victor stood ready. The leading two Omnis were a Dasher and a Koshi, moving so fast it was impossible to get a lock on them. The next 'Mech, a stark gray Vulture, was a much more viable target. Craig locked his targeting cross hairs onto it at the same time that one of the other Fusilier 'Mechs, a poorly patched Rifleman, also opened fire on it.

  The Vulture's right side took a scarring cut from Craig's lasers while the Rifleman's Ultra autocannons peppered it with shells. The impact of the weapons didn't even seem to slow the movement of the 60-ton Clan war machine. Instead it pivoted its torso and opened up with its long-range missile racks, spraying the Rifleman with a full barrage at its minimum range. Almost all the missiles found their mark, rattling the already battered Rifleman and sending the replacement armor patches scattering among the rocks and clay soil. The warheads that missed dug into the rocks behind the BattleMech and sprayed them down on the Fusilier.

  Craig fired his Gauss rifle and medium pulse lasers, ignoring the sudden rise in his cockpit's heat. The impact from the rifle slug slammed into the lightly damaged right torso of the Vulture. The slug sent armor into the air as it plowed into the 'Mech's internal structure, lodging inside. The right missile rack dropped halfway and jammed in place, rendering the weapon useless. Craig's medium lasers tattered the chest of the Vulture as another Highlander 'Mech, a Grim Reaper, rose and opened up with its lasers and short-range missiles on the same target.

  Cullen Craig broke position, racing past a Fusilier Demolisher tank that was entangled with a pair of Koshis at devastating range. A pair of missiles hit his 'Mech, but from where they came Craig didn't know. It's falling apart all around me. "Rear guard, break for cover. Disperse immediately." It was every man and woman for him- or herself. I've got to get up on the highest of these hills so I can get some better range or I'm as dead as the rest.

  * * *

  "Message from Star Captain Klark on priority channel," came the voice of the Cluster communications officer in Devon Osis's neurohelmet. He slowed the pace of his 'Mech and broke from the ranks of the Star that held the rear of the Jaguar formation. The path left by the Fusiliers had made tracking all too easy for Star Colonel Patricia and her officers. Devon Osis had remained with the reserve unit, pulling up the rear as Patricia and her forces rushed forward, hoping to nip at Stirling's own rear guard.

  "Put him through," Osis commanded.

  "I have completed a scan of our aerodrome, Galaxy Commander," the Captain of the Dark Claw began. "The complex, the defending troops, and from what we can tell, most, if not all, of our aerospace fighters are destroyed."

  A wave of fury swept over Devon Osis as he moved his 'Mech forward. "Impossible. You must have made a mistake, quiaff?"

  "Negative, Galaxy Commander. We have verified it with a low-altitude pass as well. Some of the complex is intact, but the communications array and the fighters are destroyed."

  "Any sign of who committed this dishonorable act?"

  "We have seen no one in the vicinity, Galaxy Commander. It is possible that they are in the buildings themselves, or have moved on and were not in the area that we scanned."

  Star Colonel Patricia's voice came on line from her position at the head of the formation, nearly three kilometers further north. "Status report, Galaxy Commander. We are encountering only a small BattleMech force. The rest are ground armor and infantry forces. The bulk of the Fusiliers have apparently moved to the high ground of the continental surface. We have captured a number of their technicians and support staff."

  Devon Osis smiled, his mouth a cruel slash. "The ones you have captured, do not waste our resources on them."

  "What would you have me do with them, Galaxy Commander, release them?"

  "Kill them all," Osis said casually. "Shoot them or crush them as you please."

  * * *

  From her cockpit, Cat Stirling saw the last hill she'd climbed give onto the rise of what had once been a continent on Wayside V. It was void of life, almost as airless as an asteroid, yet this was her last sanctuary on this uncharted world. This place was her last desperate chance to save her command and troops.

  Andrea Stirling's headset came to life with a voice she had heard before, that of her enemy—Devon Osis, Galaxy Commander of the Smoke Jaguars. "You are only prolonging the inevitable, Colonel Andrea of the Fusiliers. Your vain attempt to slow us has cost us nothing but a few minutes, easily made up as we chase you."

  Hopefully Craig and some of the others managed to escape. "You still have not beaten me, Devon Osis. Only those we were forced to leave behind."

  "You speak boastfully for one fleeing like a coward," he returned. "But so th
at you realize what the heart of the Jaguar is, I show you this." The secondary display inside the cockpit of Stirling's Grand Titan flickered, showing a battlefield camera projection. She saw the ripped and torn image of a Demolisher tank with several of her ground forces standing on top of its mangled hull, holding their hands up.

  The combat camera, which must have been attached to a 'Mech, swept past the surrendering Fusiliers. There was a flash, the sparks of a machine gun rattling the ground and the surface of the tank. The Fusilier troopers attempted to bolt, but only one made it away; two of the others were mowed down in a hail of gunfire. Colonel Stirling saw their blood splatter as the machine gun cut a swath through them.

  The message was all too clear. The Smoke Jaguars were simply killing her people rather than taking prisoners. These troops had already surrendered. But apparently the Smoke Jaguars did not acknowledge any moral obligation in the case of surrender. She bit her lower lip at the terrible sight, then shut off the secondary monitor.

  "You bastard," she said into her neurohelmet's microphone. "They were surrendering."

  "A curse like that from a freebirth is not the insult you might think. Such filth from your mouth is to be expected. As I told you before, we do not have the facilities to play Inner Sphere games of taking captives. True warriors fight to the death. Those who surrender are a burden on my Clan and one I will not undertake.

  "You have hurt me too much already. Do not think your victory at our aerodrome changes anything. It will not be long before I can paint my face with your blood."

  The communications signal shut off. Stirling fought back the frustrating tears that welled up suddenly. She clung to one bit of information, something vital, something Devon Osis had given her that still held out a shred of hope. The Jaguar aerodrome was destroyed. That meant Jake Fuller was still alive out there, somewhere. It was a small victory, but the only one she had.