Principles of Desolation

by Randall N Bills

  "Impatient?" Sandra said over the comm as her Marauder drew near.

  "Yes, dammit."

  "Just save some of them for the rest of us," said Sandra, sounding oddly jocular before battle. Like the rest of the battalion, she clearly didn't think this conflict would amount to much.

  "Artillery!" Danai barked. "How soft are they getting?"

  "Like soggy tofu," Cheung said. "We've got the range measured and are hitting them regularly and hard."

  "Keep firing for fifteen more seconds," Danai replied. "Then we'll engage at close range. Maneuver around after that, and put spotters on some rooftops. Keep dropping shots on the rearward units for the rest of the fight."

  "Yes, Sao-shao."

  Danai switched her comm to the channel for her entire battalion. "Center group, artillery's about to concentrate its fire on the rear, so the front will be open for us. Be ready to move forward hard on my mark."

  She grabbed her control sticks tight, and her feet tap- danced on her pedals in anticipation. Time seemed to stand still for a good long while, but then the wait was over.

  "Now!" she said.

  She moved ahead, quickly leaving Sandra and her Marauder behind. If Sandra wanted some action, she'd need to hurry up. Danai was easily outpacing most 'Mechs her size or bigger, with only the smaller Wasps and Blades able to keep pace. She got glimpses of them, particularly the distinctive long legs of the Wasps, as she crossed east-west streets.

  Then there was no more time to look anywhere but straight ahead. The militia, which had stayed out of the north-south streets to take shelter in the cross streets, opened fire. The lines had met.

  Danai made a left turn and was greeted by an Ocelot with its right arm firmly extended, lasers shooting from its arm and chest. Danai kept her turn wide, feeling her feet skid lightly, her raised ax gouging a hole in a building's concrete facade. The beam from the Ocelot's arm laser went wide, while the chest laser was harmlessly absorbed by Danai's vast rectangular shield.

  If the Ocelot's pilot had kept his head, he probably would have had time for another shot, which might have done some actual damage. But Danai knew full well the intimidating effect Yen-lo-wang could have, especially on a smaller 'Mech, and she used it every chance she got. She raised her ax higher, her machine tilting slightly left as she wheeled it around. The carapace over Yen- lo-wang's cockpit gave the 'Mech an almost Neanderthal visage, and the sight of a 50-ton caveman bearing down with a five-meter-long ax blade unnerved many warriors more hardened than a simple militia pilot. The Ocelot seemed to tremble as the pilot tried to move back and make a fast turn to get away. But he couldn't move fast enough, especially without good traction.

  Danai didn't bother with the more rounded swing this time—she went from five o'clock to eleven o'clock in a swift, direct line. The ax came down in a straight, slashing line, catching the rotating Ocelot in the chest, just above its laser. Metal cracked and whined, and the force of the blow staggered the militia 'Mech. Knowing he couldn't run, the pilot tried to bring his right arm laser back into play, but Danai pivoted, pulling her ax back and stepped forward, extending her shield arm and slamming it into the Ocelot's laser. The militia Mech Warrior absorbed the blow by letting his right arm swing back limply, while his left arm, a closed fist, came swinging up at the same time.

  "What are you going to do, slap me?" Danai muttered. She took her ax arm out to the right and aimed a low, crossing blow at the Ocelot's midsection.

  The blade buried itself deep. The Ocelot bent at the waist, off-balance and falling. Through the darkness, Danai could see all kinds of lights blinking inside its cockpit, and she could almost hear the klaxons that must be filling the pilot's ears. She'd hit something good.

  With a terrible screech, she pulled her ax out of her enemy's side as it crashed to the ground, lifting the machine slightly before the blade finally came free. She raised it up again, intentionally holding it high for an extra few seconds, before she got the result she wanted. The top of the canopy flew away, and the pilot ejected. The two blows he'd received were all he wanted from the ax.

  Danai straightened herself and turned, surprised that no one had come to aid the Ocelot while she had been pummeling it—its pilot undoubtedly had been calling for help. The militia must be badly undermanned.

  The streets immediately around her were clear. Time to check in with her lance.

  "Sung, Parks. Bell, what's going on? Sandra, did you manage to catch up yet?"

  "I've got two kills," Sandra said with pride.

  "All right. Clara?"

  "They're tenacious, but their line's thin. We've got at least three breakthroughs, but they keep trying to regroup and come at us. No retreat yet, but just say the word and I'll make it happen."

  Danai smiled. That was one reason she'd wanted Clara in her command lance. Clara would willingly charge into just about anything without much of a hint.

  "They're masochists on a suicide mission," Bell said, without waiting for a prompt from Danai. "Normal troops would have run when we first hit them."

  That meant one of two things. "All right, they're either fanatics or they want to hold us here for a reason. I'm not discounting the former, but it would be a good idea for everyone to shift a little in case they're trying to pin us here. Try to push things to the north at least half a kilometer. Make them chase you if you need to."

  Unfortunately, as far as Danai's battalion was concerned, her order came too late.

  Danai walked to a north-

  south street

  , heading for a skirmish one block north and a half block east, when it happened. She saw the light first, orange flashes like lightning in a humid sky, except too low. She heard the explosions next, a series of concussions that shook the ground and blew out hundreds of windows. The flashes of light continued, seeming to rise higher into the air. Glass fell across the streets like icy snow.

  Danai had been whirling, looking for the source of the flashes, then finally saw it two blocks to the south—a tower at least 150 meters tall, with orange fire enveloping its corners. The explosions continued for a half minute, then stopped, leaving a severely damaged building filled with fire.

  "All units, get away from that building!" Danai yelled. "Get away now."

  It was perhaps the most unnecessary order Danai had ever given, as troops had started clearing the block when the first explosion occurred. By the time the fatally damaged building started falling on itself, most of her people were clear, except for one 'Mech that lost its footing in the panic.

  Dust billowed through the streets and over buildings, and Danai immediately saw the Aldebarians' purpose in destroying one of their own structures. Any Capellan units actually damaged by the explosions and the collapse would be just a pleasant side effect. The militia troops wanted the chaos, confusion and poor visibility.

  Danai couldn't see more than a few meters in front of her, and her sensors were cluttered with static and false images. Certain blips were larger and brighter than any other images, and she knew what they were.

  "Center units, use your sensors and head toward the biggest, clearest blip you can find. Those'll be the 'Mechs. We give them enough trouble, the support troops will come running to them. Move!"

  Blood thundered in Danai's ears. This was her fight now. It would be a close-quarters battle, and she was convinced no one else on the field could match her there. She didn't appreciate the Aldebarians blowing up a piece of their city just to throw her off guard, and she would make sure they felt every bit of her wrath.

  She let her sensors guide her, little caring when her ax or shield took a piece off a building's corner as she ran toward her target. Nothing she did to the city would match the damage its residents had inflicted on it.

  She leaned forward in her harness, straining, as if the force of her body could add to Yen-lo-wang's speed. In an urban fight, she became almost strictly a melee brawler—it was tough to get enough of a bead on an enemy to justify the heat expenditure of firi
ng her heavy laser, and the high amount of cover made it equally difficult for her Artemis system to obtain and hold a target lock. Her ax was easily her most useful weapon in this kind of fight.

  Now. thanks to the dust filling the air. her ax was even more useful. Drawing a bead on a target from as little as half a block away would be difficult, so no one would be able to get a good shot at her while she charged. Her speed would put her on top of her targets, swinging hard, before they could do anything about it.

  The brawl she targeted was a good one, a Ghost and a Hellstar grappling with one of her Phoenix Hawks. The Hellstar' s size, together with the rounded, clublike PPC mounts on the end of each arm, gave it the advantage, and it rained blows on the Capellan 'Mech. The Ghost moved into and out of view as the dust clouds blew and shifted, looking for opportunities to fire small laser bursts at the Phoenix Hawk. They glowed fiery red through the thick cloud of particles in the air. Danai saw the Ghost get off three shots—one miss, one hit on the leg of the Phoenix Hawk, and a wild ground shot that sliced through the pavement.

  Clearly, the Hellstar was the real threat here, and that was the way Danai wanted it. She positioned her shield and swung her ax in one motion, bringing it crashing down on the Hellstar s back. But either her aim was off or the militia 'Mech shifted. All she managed was a glancing blow.

  The Hellstar's pilot was too smart to panic. Instead of turning on Danai and giving up his advantage over the Phoenix Hawk, he brought his right arm down in a punishing blow that took his opponent to the ground. His left arm already in position, he leveled a devastating PPC shot at the Phoenix Hawk's head. The bolt slammed the head to the ground, splintering the cockpit's ferroglass, making the remnants glow red. The Capellan 'Mech remained where it fell.

  'Tfl ma de.r Danai yelled. She didn't care if the Hellstar was twice as big as her own machine and had help behind it. It was going down.

  Her hands moved in a blur while her feet worked the pedals, keeping Yen-lo-wang pressing ahead, not wanting the Hellstar to get into a firm stance. She was going to give the Phoenix Hawk one last chance to strike back.

  She led with her shield, pushing the militia 'Mech, then wielded the ax twice, once in the back, once in the shoulder. The Hellstar tried to use its weight, leaning into her, but she didn't give a centimeter. Her shield came up, pushing on the Hellstar' s arms, not letting it take any aim, giving it no chance to inflict more than glancing blows. Of course, the "glancing blow" of a 95- ton 'Mech was enough to send shivers down the length of the shield arm and into her cockpit. Once the Hellstar even managed to fire its right shoulder PPC into her shield. The blow set off a cockpit alarm or two, but she didn't care. She leaned forward, pressing her attack.

  Then the Ghost shuffled into view, waiting for a clean shot. Danai made sure he didn't get it, sliding to her left to put the Hellstar between herself and the Ghost. She used the same move to give her next ax swing a little extra pop. The Ghost tried to circle for a clear shot, but then smoke and dust blew in and took it out of view. For a few seconds, at least, Danai had the Hellstar to herself.

  She shoved her left control stick forward in a hard push, her shield arm straining against the big assault 'Mech. The giant machine didn't give much ground, but it gave enough.

  The Hellstar''s feet came into contact with the motionless Phoenix Hawk, and it stumbled. Danai was waiting for that moment, and she took full advantage of it. Yen-lo-wang's ax came down with all the force she could muster. The blow shook her entire 'Mech, but did a lot worse to the Hellstar. It nearly severed the assault 'Mech's left arm. and the force of it sent the Hellstar even more off-balance. With the Phoenix Hawk below it, the Hellstar had no place to get firm footing. It went down, sprawled across the Capellan machine's corpse.

  Danai's ax came down, once, twice, three times. The dust outside her cockpit was gray, but all she could see was red. The Hellstar tried weakly to bring its right arm and shoulder weapons into play, but a crossing slash of her ax put an end to that.

  Then the Ghost emerged, ready to get off a clean shot with no Hellstar in its way. But Danai was ready—she'd kept her shield arm up for just this purpose. She only had to turn slightly and press the trigger to sent a blast of energy from her shoulder laser into the Ghost. Surprised and hurt, the Ghost disappeared back into the dust.

  Danai returned to the motionless Hellstar. She swung again and again and again, sparks flying with each impact, slowly turning the once mighty 'Mech into rubbish. The red drained from her vision as she chopped and chopped, and it went from an act of fury to an act of anger to cold, remorseless battery. She didn't notice that the Ghost hadn't returned, and she couldn't say how long she stood there dismantling her enemy.

  "Sao-shao Liao-Centrella?" A static-filled voice broke into her head. Oh, yeah, she remembered. I'm supposed to be commanding a battle.

  The voice belonged to Clara. "Yes?"

  "The militia has been routed. They are in full retreat, heading to JifangPoCity."

  "Then we will meet them there. Have the troops regroup as quickly as possible so we can advance. I don't want to give them time to recover."

  "Yes, Sao-shao."

  The dust had begun to settle a little, and visibility was improving. Then a gust of wind cleared out most of the block where Danai had been fighting, and she was surprised to see Clara's Tian-Zong, its weapons giving its shoulders an oddly hunched appearance, standing above her. She looked at her sensor. Sure enough, it indicated a large, friendly 'Mech only meters away. She should have noticed it sooner.

  She lowered her ax and shield as she straightened, and she imagined Yen-lo-wang looked as abashed as a 50- ton king of the underworld could. She thought about asking Clara how long she'd been there, how much she had seen, and if she wondered why her commander was so intent on reducing a single enemy to little chunks, but then she decided she didn't owe anyone, even her XO, an explanation. She pulled her ax back up and prepared to head to JifangPoCity.

  Jifang PoCity

  Aldebaran

  The news from Daipan was not good. Legate Juk knew it wouldn't be, of course, but this was worse than even her low expectations. She knew her forces would lose the battle, but she had hoped the confusion caused by the collapsed building and her troops' advantage of fighting on their own turf would help them slow the Ca- pellans down. For God's sake, she would have accepted two-to-one casualties in favor of the Capellans if that at least meant her people had hurt them. As it stood, her forces had inflicted little more than a flesh wound on the advancing elements from McCarron's Armored Cavalry.

  She was in a round room on top of the planetary defense headquarters. Two hundred meters in the air, she had a perfect view of the surroundings, which, like the nearby cities of Wen Ho and Daipan, were almost entirely dark. The evacuation, at least, had gone relatively well. The residents of her planet took the Capellan military very seriously, and they had no desire to be present when the invading troops arrived. Government personnel and other related residents had remained behind, but they were all squirreled away in bunkers and shelters. Only the army was out to greet the soon-to-arrive guests.

  Neither the tower's sensors nor the relays from the militia's scouting vehicles nor Legate Juk's own eyes registered any Capellan troops yet. When they came in sight, Legate Juk would likely have to abandon her lofty perch. As commanding as the view was, it didn't seem like a good idea to be perched high in the sky, surrounded by ferroglass, as the troops below came to grips. Before long she'd take an elevator that would shoot her 250 meters down, into a bunker well underground, where she'd monitor the battle.

  This, then, would be her last glimpse of a whole, intact JifangPoCity. The only positive result she had gleaned from the battles so far was that the structures of Wen Ho and Daipan were relatively intact—in fact, her troops had done more damage exploding the building in Daipan than the Capelians had done in both cities combined. JifangPoCity, though, was not likely to be so fortunate. Conquering it would, for all intents and purp
oses, mean conquering Aldebaran. The Capelians would want to make a show of force here, to make JifangPoCity an example of their might for the rest of Aldebaran to see. When the sun next rose on her city, the place would likely be unrecognizable.

  She wished she could do more for it. She wasn't entirely without resources—the planet's conventional fighters, a last-ditch measure, would hopefully make life uncomfortable for the Capelians (and provided another compelling reason for her to leave her high tower)—but her tricks wouldn't be enough. In the end, she was facing a force with more 'Mechs and more skill than she could hope to put on the field. Her city was doomed.

  There were, of course, the incoming DropShips. She kept waiting for them to hail her, to tell her they were reinforcements coming to chase the invaders away. But they had remained stubbornly silent. She knew of no other reason a group of DropShips would be inbound at this moment, and so she clung to a slight hope. In the end, though, if they didn't hurry, the reinforcements might do no more than batter the Capelians after the Capelians had routed her militia.

  She looked at the sensors and at the horizon, waiting for the first signs of the invasion to arrive. She wished briefly, irrationally, that some of the residents of Jifang Po would come back, would turn on the bright lights of the city and make even a small section of it look like it was supposed to, for one brief moment, before the city fell.

  10

  Jifang PoCity, Aldebaran

  Republic of the Sphere

  25 November 3135

  "The middle of your shield looks like an old candle," Clara said as the battalion tramped along.

  "I know," Danai said regretfully. "I don't know when I'll be able to get it sculpted right again."

  "Why bother?" Clara asked. "Just hold a lump of unfinished metal in front of you. It's going to look like that eventually—whv spend time on a temporary cosmetic fix?"