A Rending of Falcons

by Victor Milán

  Although she looked terrible, even Black Rose had mostly been repaired in transit to Antares and then while Malvina went raiding in a borrowed Thor. Her torso-mounted LRM launchers’ magazine-feed system had resisted repair, so that for today’s battle Malvina had only the single ten-rocket volley loaded up in her Longbow tubes. She was content to rely upon her pair of torso-mounted extended-range medium lasers, her ER-PPCs and her marksmanship, augmented by her targeting computer. Between those things and an intuitive feel for heat that enabled her to put out every joule of destructive energy her ride was capable of without driving the reactor to safety shutdown, Malvina felt as arrogantly self-assured as usual.

  But the invaders outnumbered her by a small margin, even counting the Fire Horse Galaxy. Erik Chistu, she knew, had his force bulked out with inferior solahma, second-line and garrison troops. But then, so did she. And her Falcons and Manas Amirault’s Horses had gotten no time to practice fighting as any kind of cohesive unit.

  So she must cheat. Not only was Manas Amirault fine with that, he suggested it. He and Bec Malthus, trickster to the core . . .

  And so bad war began.

  While neither side made any pretense to challenge or zellbrigen, once Falcon locked on Falcon neither turned away, however outnumbered, whatever befell them. MechWarriors slugging it talon to talon died oblivious when other BattleMechs came up behind to incinerate their cockpits at touch range. Their minds held but one thought-sequence: Find enemy. Engage enemy. Destroy enemy.

  The blood-madness of hate seized even the infantry. The Falcon khan’s warriors and the Mongols killed each other rifle to rifle, knife to knife, bludgeoned each other with rocks when batteries drained and battleblades broke. Screaming Falcons armored in no more than camo battledress attacked elemental battlearmor with bare hands. Sometimes in such numbers that they managed to rip open the suits’ closures and slay the giants within with hands and teeth despite horrific losses.

  Personal survival never entered the equation. No more than mercy did.

  Malvina strode and slew through maelstroms of dust and smoke though her Shrike streamed molten armor like blood from a score of wounds. She rode down a Spirit that was hobbled by a laser-fused knee-actuator and trampled chest and cockpit of the light BattleMech into crumpled ruin without glancing down as she lashed a distant Thor with alternate lightnings from her PPCs.

  The red sun had risen fully now. It was a drawn-out process. Antares was a cool star, and the zone capable of sustaining life hugged its scarlet-flaming skirts. Now hanging like a runaway planet about to fall, it would have caused vertigo and apprehension among the newcomers— it always did—had they not had eyes and minds fixed firmly upon butchery. Antares seemed to fill the sky, so great it almost showed its globularity. Nor was it bright enough to dazzle: human eyes, unprotected, could gaze full at the giant, see world-storms warring their way across it.

  Now Antares seemed to laugh like a monstrous idiot face at the doings below. With evil joy: for its fire was blood’s own color.

  Many acts of great courage played out beneath the gloating sun. And cowardice too. But no glory would be gained in these hills soaked in blood scarcely darker than their rocks and soil. For the first time in the Clan’s collective memory Falcon fought Falcon in a battle as immense as any in the Remembrance.

  But they were still Falcon killing Falcon. Now that tactics and even skill was largely abandoned, mere numbers ruled. Galaxy Commander Erik Chistu had more big ’Mechs and vehicles than Malvina. So the tide slowly turned against the warriors of the Chingis Khan.

  But if the Eyes of the Falcon and even their commander had lost themselves in happy murder, in blood-drinking ecstasy that welcomed death if it came with beak and claws at an enemy’s throat, tactics had not been altogether given over.

  The Hell’s Horses’ Mongol doctrine (as opposed to Malvina’s calculated use of atrocity) tended to exclude the middle. Fire Horse Galaxy, having come into existence since the Jihad, particularly reflected that. They possessed few infantry, even elementals, except for garrison troops, nor many medium-weight vehicles or ’Mechs. Rather the preponderance of their forces comprised the very fastest and most agile machines: hovercraft, VTOLs, super-speedy light ’Mechs like the Dasher Amirault had used to open the battle. All built around a core of behemoths intended to deliver the killing blow.

  Outdistancing their pursuit with practiced ease—for unlike most Clans, Hell’s Horses did drill for mass maneuvers— Galaxy Commander Manas Amirault had led his well-bloodied but largely intact mangudai back behind the sheltering hills. Unlike the Falcons, who had proven so resistant to the turning and running part of the plan, they had suffered light losses, but their munitions, fuel and pilots were completely exhausted. They needed time to rest and recharge.

  But the plan gave them such time. Leaving them to recover, Manas transferred to a waiting Masakari. In the 85-ton BattleMech he led the tulughma, the standard sweep of Hell’s Horses heavy and assault machines, moving wide to strike at the rear of the Peregrines, who were utterly engrossed in trying to destroy the hated heretic rebels.

  With a grinding shriek, three meters of the end of the Shrike’s right wing gave way and broke loose. The stub glowed red where a laser had cut through it.

  Malvina slammed her Shrike’s right elbow into a Thor’s front viewscreen. The heavy ’Mech reeled back. It raised its right arm as if to fire; disoriented, its MechWarrior had forgotten its PPC was gone, torn away by a burst of heavy autocannon shells from a D1 Schmitt tank.

  Malvina fired both her own PPCs into the torso of a smoke-wreathed Loki approaching from her left. Ignoring an Oro heavy tank smashing autocannon and laser fire into its legs from less than a hundred meters behind, the Loki fired back its own particle projector. For a moment three strands of twisting artificial lightning linked the two huge machines, lighting their fronts blue as liquefied armor splashed away and clouds of white vapor enveloped them. Then the 65-ton ’Mech went dead as its reactor scrammed in redline shutdown.

  The Thor’s autocannon raked Malvina’s left side. As damage warnings sang in her ears she put the targeting computer’s pipper onto the enemy machine’s cockpit. Her elbow had holed and cracked the ferroglass screen. She shot a single PPC bolt into it. Yellow flame jetted from the pillbox-like cockpit. The great machine toppled forward to the ground.

  The Black Rose rocked forward as two more PPC bolts slammed into its back: an invader Puma attacked from the rear. The Shrike’s cockpit filled with terrible metallic screaming as the entire left wing, weakened, tore free and fell away of its own weight.

  Malvina tried to turn to confront the lesser BattleMech, but her machine responded slowly. Her damage display indicated serious short-circuiting in the controls for the Shrike’s leg-actuators. Multiply redundant backup buses had been knocked out by the pummeling Black Rose had absorbed.

  Malvina uttered a falcon scream of frustration. It cannot happen that I be defeated by a machine massing hardly more than a third of mine! But the Puma’s only weaponry, a pair of particle cannon, gave it terrific striking power for a 35-ton machine. If the bigger BattleMech could not maneuver fast enough to bring its own battery to bear . . .

  The Puma reeled as a pair of particle beams struck its right side. An autocannon burst sparked across it, blowing chunks of armor from its shoulder-housing and the crab-like carapace.

  The blocky bulk of a Masakari closed with the Puma at a full run. It was painted gleaming black, with a stylized Hell’s Horses head snorting flame from its nostrils painted across its head and back. The Puma fired both PPCs at Malvina again, risking redline in a frenzy of desire to take down its great enemy. Red lights flared on Malvina’s damage display as all armor was sliced from her right hip as if by a great plasma cutter.

  A volley of LRMs struck the light ’Mech full in the side. It staggered. Then the Masakari halted its headlong charge to loose a terrifying blast of all four PPCs against armor cratered by the missiles. The Puma’s right arm fle
w away as its carapace was ripped open. At nearly a hundred kilometers per hour it stumbled as control systems slagged.

  The 35-ton BattleMech lost balance and began to fall to its left as momentum drove it on. Warnings lit up Malvina’s threat display as its magnetohydrodynamic fusion engine’s containment field generators failed. Autopolarization darkened Malvina’s viewscreen as sun-bright light flashed from the ’Mech’s violated side. Its neck severed by superhot plasma, the Puma’s jutting head fell off as the ’Mech tumbled across the ground.

  ‘‘Why did you have to destroy it?’’ Malvina flared over her private channel to the Hell’s Horses commander. ‘‘We need all the machines we can get!’’

  The black-and-orange Masakari raised its right arm in salute. Heat shimmered upward from the muzzles of its particle guns.

  ‘‘You are welcome,’’ said Galaxy Commander Manas Amirault. Despite their generally easygoing ways, the Horses were utterly scrupulous about avoiding the use of contractions.

  Malvina Hazen saw the threat before her battle computer, still well taxed by the fight surging all around, picked it out. She raised her left arm to bear on the Masakari fifty meters away. Twin lightnings leapt from the PPCs.

  Both struck the cockpit of a Donar attack helo diving on the unsuspecting Horseman from behind. The hawk-nosed Peregrine Galaxy VTOL simply vanished into a yellow fireball that struck the pink dirt so close that blazing fuel splashed up the back of Amirault’s BattleMech.

  ‘‘You’re welcome,’’ Malvina said.

  All around Vau Galaxy VTOLs had broken off dogfighting to fall upon the Mongol ground forces. Malvina soon saw the reason.

  Though a few isolated machines stood and fought, the Peregrine vehicles and BattleMechs had broken. They streamed away from her and her ally, fleeing toward ships waiting beyond the rubble of distant Alba.

  The Battle of the Rakusian Hills had ended in one of the greatest victories in the glorious history of Clan Jade Falcon.

  And its greatest defeat.

  21

  Camp of the Golden Ordun

  Near the Rakusian Hills, Antares

  Jade Falcon Occupation Zone

  14 December 3135

  ‘‘My Khan,’’ said Beckett Malthus over Malvina’s left shoulder, ‘‘this assault was extremely well coordinated. It was likely engineered by Jana Pryde herself. She does possess a marked degree of executive ability.’’ He sounded almost proud of his former master and protégée.

  The self-proclaimed khan of Clan Jade Falcon, and all humanity, sat in a dim-lit pavilion upon a camp chair turned by silks and cushions into a field-expedient throne. Gazing at the assembled senior commanders from her Galaxy and Manas Amirault’s, their faces quietly exultant in the golden glow of lamps turned low, she idly stroked the unbound yellow hair of her ward, Cynthy. It rested on the sheer, pale-green silk robe covering Malvina’s left thigh.

  Hell’s Horses, Malvina thought, do these things in better style than we.

  ‘‘You sound almost proud of your former master and protégée,’’ she said. Malthus stiffened. She uttered a low, husky laugh. ‘‘She does not fight herself, though, does she? But sends her attack dog Erik Chistu in her stead.’’

  ‘‘She awaits you, O my Khan,’’ her gray eminence said, ‘‘on Sudeten.’’

  ‘‘Where I shall not disappoint her,’’ Malvina said softly.

  Cynthy turned to look at her. Malvina smiled at the child. The little girl smiled shyly back.

  I will allow nothing to spoil this moment, Malvina told herself sternly. Least of all thought of that unworthy creature who calls herself khan of Clan Jade Falcon.

  With both DropShip flotillas grounded side by side a few klicks east of the dragon’s spine of the Rakusian Hills, the victorious Mongol Galaxies made a sea of raucous celebration beneath the obsidian dome of night. At the center of all the light and joyous noise, hard by the landing jacks of the great DropShip Bec de Corbin, Manas Amirault had decreed this pavilion for the Great Khan.

  Malvina had earlier appeared on the Bec’s ramp in the B-sun glare of spotlights to accept the plaudits of the mob of Horses and Falcons, screaming the chant, ‘‘Chingis Khan! Chingis Khan!’’ until their throats were as raw as if they were back in their BattleMechs in the brutal heat and infiltrating dust of the day’s great battle.

  She had also accepted the submission of more than two hundred surrendered Peregrine and Vau warriors and numerous auxiliaries. Ever mercurial, she greeted them with smiling benevolence, having gotten past the shrieking fit she had thrown in Black Rose’s steaming-hot cockpit that afternoon, when Galaxy Commander Beckett Malthus’ voice, powered by his DropShip’s fusion generators, reached out across the wreckage-dotted plain to offer amnesty to all warriors who would acknowledge Malvina Hazen as rightful khan of Clan Jade Falcon and swear fealty to her.

  Manas Amirault had spoken quickly to soothe her from his Masakari. She barely restrained an impulse to blast him with an alpha strike. But the fury squall passed quickly, and in its wake Malvina’s matchless military mind reasserted itself.

  Her Mongol cause needed all the fighters she could get, the more skilled the better. She was not naïve enough to believe this crushing victory would completely implode opposition within Clan Jade Falcon. Rather it would polarize: even as it energized her true believers and swung sympathizers to open allegiance, it crystallized her enemies’ determination. Likely it would bring Jana Pryde more converts than she lost through defection; Falcons were nothing if not stiff-necked and contrary. For all the Clan ethos of success worship, many of Turkina’s spawn would see Malvina’s victory over her own as supreme dezgra.

  Playing on that very success worship, allowing the disgraced losers to redeem themselves by binding themselves to the victors, was an inspired means of expanding her force. As for their pledging allegiance to Malvina as Chingis Khan—

  That last was an innovation, all out of synch with the Clan way. On this great and terrible day on which all things were turned upside down, if not smashed to pieces, such a sea change could pass with small remark.

  The thoughtful frown that had replaced Malvina’s twisted scowl of fury smoothed into a smile. And so a new and different thing comes into the circumscribed world of the Clans, she thought, sitting in the furnace heat of her cockpit with sweat streaming down her face, her pale naked skin and hard black plastic.

  Once again the wisdom of Bec Malthus is proved. And so, of course, was his danger to his present khan.

  Seeing their fellow warriors overwhelmed on the surface, the invading VTOL pilots had ceased aerial combat to dive to help them in a wholly un-Falconlike act. That lay behind the Donar’s death stoop on Manas’ Masakari, so rudely interrupted by Malvina’s PPCs. It was a gallant gesture. Perhaps the day’s only one.

  It was also suicidal. With the land battle whirling at daggers-drawn, aircraft had little chance to fire for fear of hitting their own. Meanwhile Malvina’s and Manas’ VTOLs, which had begun losing to superior numbers, were allowed to devote full attention to shooting down the distracted invaders. They themselves were never meant to play a significant ground-attack role. Loadouts one-sidedly weighted for air combat reflected the fact.

  The Vau flyers’ heroic efforts to succor their ground-bound Clansfolk got them wiped out even more comprehensively.

  Most of the fleeing ground forces accepted Malthus’ offer. The rest were hunted down by Mongol VTOLs and light mechanized forces fully recovered from baiting Chistu’s augmented Galaxy into its fatal charge. Only a handful of survivors reached the ruins their own side had made of Alba.

  But they found only temporary shelter, not escape. So stunned by their impossible defeat were the surviving invaders that Star Captain Manfredo Mattlov, Malvina’s senior surviving elemental, led Horse and Falcon elementals riding Cardinal transport VTOLs in a lightning raid that seized an enemy DropShip, the Union-C-class Emerald Egg, sitting on its jacks. The spaceship’s armament exacted a brutal toll, including all but
one of the escort VTOLs, but it was as nothing compared to such a prize.

  A second Peregrine Galaxy DropShip, fleeing, was shot down a hundred kilometers west of Alba by Malvina’s aerospace fighters. It crashed with the loss of all aboard, but from such a low altitude that it might well be salvageable. Even if it proved not to be, the wreck was still a treasure trove if scrapped for parts.

  The other enemy DropShips had escaped to space. As many as could docked with the WarShip Jade Talon, which then risked jumping out via pirate point rather than contest the victorious Mongols and their still formidable WarShip. Bec Malthus suggested the cruiser’s commander, Star Admiral Edwina von Jankmon, had acted on sealed orders from Khan Jana Pryde to sauve qui peut, using the charge stored in the ship’s lithium-fusion batteries to jump back to Graus.

  Mongol DropShips pursued the remaining Jana Pryde faction ships toward their JumpShips waiting at the zenith point. They could not catch them, but did ensure they kept heading the right direction.

  As for Galaxy Commander Erik Chistu, Manas Amirault and Malvina Hazen vied for the honor of slaying him. But it was not to be.

  Finding himself left quite alone by an eddy of the brutal battle, Erik Chistu had done the thing he knew best how to do: doggedly advance, seek out foes, smash them. Then move on and repeat the cycle. He did not concede defeat. He did not concede the possibility.

  But a Kelswa heavy tank rolled from the mouth of an arroyo not fifty meters to his left. With brilliant aim, or luck, both ferro-nickel projectiles spat from its paired Gauss rifles struck his Night Gyr in the hips, penetrating and jamming both leg-actuators.

  Though anchored immovably, Chistu twisted the big ’Mech’s torso and blasted his assailant with as much of his battery as remained after he had fought and disabled two heavy BattleMechs: one Falcon bloodfoul, one interloping Horse. Two medium pulse lasers, a heavy Ultra autocannon restricted to normal-cycle firing by damage to its regulator chip and a lone PPC lashed the rebel tank. As enemy BattleMechs closed in like jackals from every side, Chistu burst the barrel of the Kelswa’s starboard gun and smashed the right side of its forward set of tracks.