14
Outside Amarillo, Alkalurops
Prefecture IX, The Republic of the Sphere
24 August 3134; local summer
Grace studied the sun-seared rolling land before her. As her mind switched from miner’s to soldier’s thoughts, she could almost hear a click. Beside her, Ben eyed the defenses thrown up ten klicks south of Amarillo where the main road made a series of hairpin curves through a deep wash. A culvert covered a trickle of a river, but a gully-washer anywhere in the valley would have water pouring over the riverbed’s five-meter-high banks. Regularly washed out, the road was mostly potholes this summer. Few folks were feeling motivated toward their civic duty to repair the road.
Chato’s Navajos had taken a good three hundred riflemen from the south valley and shown them how to vanish. Even ’Mech MODs were either in cover, in fighting positions or hidden behind rocks. The command post was a small cattle shed, its roof falling in, lined with a double wall of sand bags. It smelled of heat and shade and cows.
“We have the main road blocked here,” Grace said. “East and west of here, the riverbank is deep and nasty. Bliven’s the only other good crossing,” she said, pointing to a map and the town a hundred and fifty kilometers east. “Syn and Wilson are down there setting up ambushes. West is your territory, Ben.”
“Any other defense in front of Amarillo?” the albino asked, his pink eyes squinting as he studied the potential battleground.
“None. Everything from here to town is too flat.”
“So we give up the town when this falls, quiaff?”
“We’ll have to. Most folks have already fled. Everyone’s heard stories of the Black and Reds. Nobody wants to be here when they show up. ’Course there are always stragglers, but with luck they’ll be too few for the mercs to notice.”
Ben eyed the land for a long time. Below them a rickety, overloaded truck chugged through the potholes at the bottom of the wash, then began its slow climb out. Once at the top, it halted and a woman in a huge straw hat and shapeless dress struggled down from the packed flatbed. She shouted her thanks, then plodded toward the barn as the truck drove off, its people, bedding and boxes swaying. One of the passengers began to sing, and others joined in.
“Nice people, those,” the woman said, setting down a box in the shade of the barn and sitting on it.
“Excuse me,” Grace said. “We’re kind of busy here. Don’t you belong somewhere else?”
The woman lifted the sleeve of her sweat-drenched smock, sniffed, and made a face. “Three days on the road, and I think a barn’s the only place that’ll take me.”
“Totally untrue,” Ben said, turning to the woman and actually smiling. “On you, mademoiselle, it is merely what other perfumes strive to be.” Grace looked at her Lone Cat. Had he gone totally crazy? “Grace, do you not remember Betsy Ross?”
Grace looked closer at the woman under the straw hat. The interloper stood, made a formal curtsy, then hiked up her dress, giving a good eyeful, and rummaged around her waist for something. With a slight victory yell, she pulled out a flat block which, when unwrapped from a reeking cloth, turned out to be an unusually large ’puter.
“I have here the full download of Alfred Santorini’s personal files. Brilliant of him to turn off the Net. Most of his security went down with it. Left his files wide open once I cracked his encryption. Here’s everything you need to know about his little operation.”
“What’s the most important thing you found?” Grace asked.
“My old master always used to say, ‘Follow the money,’ so here’s the money,” Betsy said, and brought up a spreadsheet. “Or here’s the money,” she said, bringing up another. “Or it could be this or that,” and two more screens filled with numbers, then flashed away. “I’ve been in a few ops that ran two sets of books, but four! Santorini’s way twisted.”
Betsy frowned for a moment, then shuddered. “By the way, we are killing this bastard, aren’t we? ’Cause if you folks aren’t, I’ll do it myself. He dies. Slow and very dead.”
“As far as I’m concerned,” Grace said, “that’s the plan. You have the proof in your ’puter that says we should kill him.”
“There and a few other places,” Betsy said, started to rub at her hip, then stopped herself. “Just so long as we’re agreed that bastard dies, I’m in this with you all the way.”
“What do you make of those spreadsheets?” Ben said.
“I’m sure an accountant will find all sorts of funny money in them, but taken as a whole, they point in too many directions. This one,” she said, bringing one up, “is what you’d expect him to send to his boss at Lenzo Computing. Nice, easy-to-swallow numbers for not a lot of activity.”
She flipped to a new screen. “This one has a lot more in it. For example, he lists his acquired properties. Seems that all the property that got into tax arrears was sold at auction. A very private auction. He bought it for not even pennies on the C-bill. Even that was covered by a loan he wrote himself on the Allabad Mechanics and Agriculture Bank. He’s gonna make a killing when Lenzo Computing moves here.
“But then there’s this one,” she said, frowning at the screen. “I think it’s for if he gets in trouble and has to call for help, say Landgrave Jasek Kelswa-Steiner and his Stormhammers. Here he sells a lot of stuff at a discount.”
“And the fourth?” Ben said.
“A whole lot more interesting. Note the bottom line,” Betsy said, pointing at a blank space on the sheet. “There is none. Everything gets converted to cash-producing holdings. And there’s another change. The mercs go from the cost side of the sheet to the asset side. All their property’s there, but no costs.”
“Troopers have to be paid,” Ben said. “No avoiding that!”
“He thinks he can. Santorini sends a lot of e-notes to the Roughriders’ adjutant. This one didn’t get sent. He wrote it the day things started to go bad, so maybe he was saving it. He asks the adjutant to take on a cook from Santorini’s staff.”
“The mercs are that hard up for staff?” Grace asked.
“The Major was trying to hire my maid services.”
Grace scowled. Hanson hadn’t come across to her as the kind who couldn’t keep his hands off the help. Betsy shook her head. “What I really think he wanted was info from Allabad. Anyway, I turned down the job offer in a chatty letter that told him stuff that would have cost him a pile of stones if he was paying my usual fee. He came right back with another nice, friendly note, and we kept up the chat, me feeding him intel before he asked for it. But why would Santorini send a cook?”
“He knifed the Governor and Legate,” Grace pointed out.
“And if he declared the mission accomplished and called for a victory dinner, there might be few survivors if his cook had orders to poison them,” Betsy said as if she were practiced at that.
“That wouldn’t get every merc,” Grace pointed out.
“No, but it would get so many that even his Black and Reds could sweep up the leavings.”
“The mercs would take bloody revenge,” Ben growled.
“Not if Santorini shot the cook and told everyone he was one of the terrorists the mercs had been fighting,” Betsy said slowly.
“A profit-and-loss sheet that turns the mercs’ equipment into a source of annual income for Santorini and that letter makes for pretty damning evidence,” Grace said.
“Now all you have to do is tell that to Hanson. Good luck,” Betsy said.
A specialist manning the long-range radio in the corner sat up, took the earphone off one ear, and stood. “Grace, Ben: The mercs are pulling out of Dublin Town, heading this way.”
“How long till they get here?” Betsy asked.
“Tomorrow,” Grace said, looking back at her map table.
“Uh, ma’am, a Black and Red column, battalion-sized or larger, is skirting Lothran,” the specialist added.
“Looks like Santorini has everything headed north,” Ben said.
Grace tapped Dublin Town on the map. “The mercs are coming out. I’d have expected them to wait until early morning, but this will put them here around noon tomorrow or, if they push all night, just after first light.”
“Count on them pushing,” Ben said.
“It’s the Black and Reds that are the question. They can take the road to Amarillo through Dublin Town, following the mercs, or go due north until the road forks just short of Nazareth and heads east along the Colorado River to Amarillo.” Grace shook her head. “This doesn’t fit together for me.”
Betsy traced the road lines with her long fingers. “Santorini would never put his Special Police under the mercs. He knows Hanson won’t string up civilians.”
“A separate approach march would keep them out of each other’s hair for a while,” Ben said. With one hand he traced the route between Dublin Town and Amarillo. With the other, he covered the dogleg route between Lothran and Amarillo.
“Could the Black and Reds try a push into the valley along the west side?” Betsy asked.
“Not after our fight at Nazareth,” Ben said. “I am not saying they all are bad. But the ones sent out so far have not demonstrated much skill against armed resistance.”
“Santorini has some good MechWarriors he picked up drunk or deep in gambling debts,” Betsy said. “The head of his shock troops was a captain in a ’Mech unit—don’t remember the name. He got off-planet one jump ahead of a firing squad for rape. I think he’s found his calling with Santorini,” Betsy said, this time massaging her left breast.
Grace started to say something, then swallowed it. Betsy would talk about what happened to her in Allabad when she wanted to and not before. We’ll get all those bastards, Grace promised herself.
“I have an idea,” Ben said.
“You haven’t been dreaming while I’ve been standing here,” Betsy snapped.
“Only about you, my fine, raven-haired beauty.”
“Nova Cats don’t take a vow of chastity, do they?”
“I certainly didn’t,” the albino said.
“So this isn’t just a waste of air. Good, keep it up. The girl likes it. Somebody show me where I can get a bath. I have a sudden need to be clean.”
As Betsy left with a guide, Grace leaned across the table. “Now can I talk to Hanson. Tell him what I know. Certainly he can break a contract with a client who isn’t going to pay him. A client who is planning to kill him and his mercs at the victory party.”
“That is certainly good cause to break a contract. However, Grace, you cannot talk to him just now.”
“And why not?”
“You are his enemy. He is now under orders to attack you. He cannot talk to you, and he will not talk to you until your conversation consists only of you negotiating your surrender.”
“You’re crazy!”
“No, Grace. We are at war. We fight now. When one of us is prepared to surrender, we talk about surrender—and maybe contracts. But first, we must do something about those Black and Reds. It will be much easier to arrange things with Hanson if the Black and Reds are not turned loose in Amarillo.”
“But that would mean a sortie outside the valley. Won’t Hanson have us bottled up pretty well in the next day or so?”
“Yes, but what if you hold here stubbornly? Put up more of a fight, and, say, Syn and Wilson fold quickly and fall back. Hanson knows how to fight. He will reinforce success.”
“And if his right is successful, where will he pull reinforcements from to send there?” Grace asked.
“That, my commander, is what we help him decide.”
Grace eyed the map. She pulled up a chair and studied it from her vantage point, then moved the chair around to study it from Hanson’s side. While she sat, Ben moved a few pieces of paper and wood around the map.
Santorini was running with his plan. Should she change hers? “Ben, I see what you’re up to. Now, what if Wilson and Syn . . .”
“How bad is it?” Major Hanson asked Captain Graf, CO of C Company and Hanson’s point on the drive for Amarillo.
“Not good, sir. Your best view is from the upstairs porch of this old house.” The house was deserted but undisturbed. L. J. followed the captain out a window and stood on the porch roof. The land had looked flat from his command van. Now he saw what he’d missed. The land was rolling, and ahead was a slight but significant rise. The two lead platoons of C Company were deployed to either side of the road. A Joust tank had rolled out of its treads on the road. The infantry had gone to ground.
“What happened, Captain?”
“A mine damaged the tank, sir. There’re so many potholes it’s impossible to tell which are just potholes and which have mines under them. I ordered my sappers forward to clean the road, but they came under very accurate sniper fire, which I couldn’t locate. I deployed my infantry. Snipers dropped four including a lieutenant and a sergeant, and I still can’t identify where the fire’s coming from. When they dropped a second sapper, I quit, sir.”
“How far is it to that deep gully on the map?” That was where L. J. had expected resistance.
“Almost two kilometers, sir.”
“So somewhere in those two klicks are a couple of guys with rifles. Can’t your sensors find them?”
“No, sir. We’ve got the magscan gear up, but it’s gone crazy. The dirt around here is red—rich in iron—and somebody spread a lot of tacks out there.” The captain pulled a small carpet tack from his pocket. “Between the iron in the dirt and these damn things, my sensors say there’re a thousand rifles out there. Do we have enough artillery to flatten a half-klick around the road for the next two klicks, sir?”
L. J. scanned the ground. Rocks, brush, a few trees—mostly dead—more rocks, and more brush. “No; we’re light on artillery this contract,” he said as Captain Fisk of B Company joined them on the roof. “C, form to the right of that road. B, form a line to the left. Let’s see just how far out those snipers go.”
L. J. remembered his own recent experience with Grace’s resistance. “Watch for woven mats—the grass around here matches the dirt. Get the infantry moving. Put them in the lead to check for holes. Have ’Mechs and tanks cover them.”
“Yes, sir,” came back at him. Grace O’Malley was a terrorist and too damn smart for either of their good—her and the six MechWarriors she’d hired. “Get your teams out. Find their flank. Let’s get behind them, come up their asses and put them down. We’ve got to secure this road.”
An hour later a hundred men, plus tanks, gun trucks and eight ’Mechs had beat the bushes. A small rise that seemed the source of their trouble had gone quiet as a church when they reached it. Now the next ridge over put fire on them.
Casualties came in dribs and drabs, but they kept coming. Men whose ceramic armor had shattered under a hit were sent to the rear to draw new armor. L. J. checked with Supply; there wasn’t a lot more armor to issue.
A sniper was finally flushed and brought in. “We dug him out of a hole under some brush,” the sergeant told his commander.
“Yes I was, under that brush and unarmed. They told me to bust my firing pin when you guys got close, so I busted it and I was unarmed and you guys treated me right nice,” the fellow in jeans and a plaid shirt said without taking a breath.
“How many of you are there?” L. J. asked.
“They told me you’d ask that, and they told me I didn’t need to know so I honestly don’t know. But there’s a lot of us, and we’re out there with our water jugs and our rifles, and if I was the first one you got, there’s a lot more of us still there.”
L. J. got in the guy’s face. “How many are out there?”
The guy bent his head back. “I told you, they didn’t tell me and I don’t know.”
“What were you, a platoon? A company?” L. J. roared. The man looked back as if L. J. was speaking some strange language. The guard took the prisoner away and Mallary stepped forward.
“Sir, if what he said is right, they’re behind us as well as in front of us. We’ve got a mess on our hands. I just got a report from A Company outside Bliven. They met resistance where they expected it and brushed it aside. They are advancing unopposed into the Gleann Mor Valley.”
L. J. followed her to the map table on the porch below. In the shade with a cold glass of water, it was pleasant. Strange, the refrigerator was still running. “Where’s D Company?”
“Sir. They haven’t gone far since they broke away from our route three hours back. Seems the locals have been out digging the potholes deeper. With water in them, trucks and ’Mechs don’t know if it’s just your garden-variety hole or a bottomless pit. Makes for slow going.”
“Company A report anything like that?”
“No, sir. I get the feeling the defense kind of fell apart on our right.”
“And the gang to our left is the bunch that swallowed a pretty good slug of Black and Reds,” L. J. muttered. Two good roads came out of Bliven that a flanking company could use to hit Amarillo. He faced an opposed crossing here, as would D on his left. Why fight for more crossings when he already had one?
“Order B and C Companies to fall back. Have B Company get on the road to Bliven. Tell D to have a platoon task force set up a roadblock on good ground and the rest fall back on us.”
“Yes, sir,” Mallary said, and went to execute her orders.
L. J. studied the map. Grace, you’re good, but I’m better. You’ve put together an army in damn fast time, but I brought an army trained and equipped to this fight. “Training will tell,” he thought, quoting his uncle. He frowned. On his left somewhere was a mess of Black and Reds. They’d be road-marching across the front of whatever was holding the west entrance to this valley. So far the enemy had dug in and fought where they stood or run as they had at Bliven. True, the west group had gone out to find the fugitives. The satellite had caught the end of that battle. The Black and Reds had been taken by surprise on their flank. One amateur fighting another, and the Special Police had shown they weren’t all that special.
Should he have that platoon from D Company search forward to make contact with the Black and Reds? L. J. weighed the problem and found that he had a solid basis for assuming the B and Rs could hold their own, and that if he extended his platoon he risked his flank. No, the Special Police should be able to handle any problem that came their way.
L. J. turned back to the situation on his right. That would make or break his attack.
Outside Bliven, Alkalurops
25 August 3134
Captain Yonni Brassenbird, commander of A Company, realized he might have misled Hanson a bit as he heard the new orders come over the static of the long-range radio. He hadn’t actually forced a crossing of the river up ahead. What he had done was flush out six snipers and they had fled in their pickups for the river. Minor difference.
Yonni urged his first platoon forward—a task force with two tanks and two squads of infantry mounted in Giggins armored personnel carriers. “Keep those trucks under fire, but don’t hit them. If they got the need to flee, let ’em go, and anyone they talk to.”
That was Major Hanson’s idea. If a bunch ran, encourage them. Send enough fire their way so they don’t forget why they’re pedal to the metal. Prisoners were to be passed through to the Black and Reds. Yonni didn’t need that blood on his conscience.
First Platoon reached the last bluff this side of the river. Yonni halted them on overwatch and ordered Second Platoon to pass through. Second had two hovertanks well suited for the riverbed. Its infantry were in trucks. They dismounted and began the river crossing on foot. Third and Fourth Platoons, ’ Mech-infantry task forces, would come up on each flank, provide cover fire, and be ready to exploit forward. The ’Mechs should have no trouble climbing down the riverbank and crossing a river barely two centimeters deep.
Yonni led his headquarters section forward in his newly assigned Legionnaire. This big ’Mech was one of the best in the battalion, and Yonni intended to show he knew how to lead from the front. Chasing a running bunch of civilians wouldn’t be much of a test, but the Major expected this push wouldn’t stop until they took Falkirk. Yonni intended his Legionnaire to be the first Roughrider into that burg.
Leaving his command van with First Platoon, Yonni joined Second Platoon as it made its way gingerly down the riverbank. There were plenty of paths worn by the local cows, but only the bridge offered an easy crossing. One squad of infantry moved across it under desultory and inaccurate long-range rifle fire.
“Bridge is rigged for demolition. We’re yanking wires,” the corporal leading that squad reported.
Well away from the bridge, the hovertanks sped down the bank, bouncing right and left as they nosed over. A Condor landed hard on its bow at the bottom and ended up stalled sideways. Yonni took his Legionnaire down a cow path, then patrolled back and forth in front of the stalled tank. Stopped dead, the tank was a perfect target for a antitank rocket, but all the hostiles got off were a few rifle shots.
“We got a tank stopped dead on our front and a Legionnaire just prancing back and forth,” Syn Bakai reported on radio.
“Hold your fire,” Wilson reminded her. He could spot her ’Mech MOD, as well as Jobe’s, under cover behind an iron grain elevator. “I’m coming up. Remember the plan.”
Syn snorted. “You won’t let me forget it.”
Wilson’s son gunned the jeep forward. Two pickups passed them, headed north out of Bliven. The good old boys in the back waved, rifles in hand. They’d done their jobs. Wilson shook his head. Sometimes herding dumb cows was easier than getting ’Mech pilots to do what they were told.
There was no cover the last hundred meters to the elevator. They took some fire, but nothing came close. Yep, there was nothing wrong with Syn’s eyes. A hovertank and a huge ’Mech with one nasty-looking rotary autocannon marched back and forth in front of a parked hovertank. Across the gulch came the sound of a starter grinding. That would be the dead tank.
A Navajo trotted out from the elevator’s office, grinning. “We’ve got everything in place,” he said, climbing in the back of the jeep. “Those mercs are going to love dancing with Coyote.”
Wilson pointed for his son to park at the foot of Syn’s MiningMech MOD, and reached for the large wrench he kept under his seat for just such occasions. Shouldn’t be long now.
The stalled motor caught, and the tank got under way slowly. “I think we bent a blade,” the driver reported. Infantry were halfway across the trickle that the locals called a river. Yonni waded in behind them. Here and there, rocks created eddies in the water. He avoided the potential deep spots behind them as consciously as he negotiated the questionable footing of the rocks.
Suddenly, on his left, two gray ’Mech MODs stepped out from behind a tall metal building. They fired missiles, as well as a long stream of slugs. He snapped off a quick burst of fifty-millimeter rounds and sidestepped right, positioning himself at an angle that would complicate their firing solution. He adjusted his pace to avoid a rock as he tried to sight in on the lead ’Mech for an aimed burst.
Then he felt his left footpad sink into the muddy water. He bent his right knee quickly, taking the pressure off his ’Mech’s hips and hardly felt the explosion that sent water geysering up around his left leg. He pulled that leg up as a spray of enemy fire splashed a line of mud and water to his right. His footpad dangled uselessly.
“Damn.”
Yonni tried to fire off a burst even as he set his left leg down gingerly. Standing on one leg and shooting was not something ’Mechs did. Gyros screamed, and he jammed down his damaged leg to keep his ’Mech from toppling over.
To his right, infantry fire reached out for the gray ’Mechs from the perimeter on the north side of the bridge. That squad had cut all visible demolition wires. A Demon medium tank from First Platoon slowly nosed onto the bridge, its turret rotating to take the hostile ’Mechs under fire.
Then all hell broke loose.
An explosion shattered the middle bridge span, sending chunks of deck and girders skyward. Then charges sheared off the two spans on either side of the middle one. Two final explosions dropped the last spans, intact, so they now led down to the dry riverbed at totally unusable thirty-degree angles.
“What did I tell you?” the Navajo crowed, tossing the remote detonator on the seat of the jeep. “They got the ’Mech. I got the bridge. Perfect!”
To Wilson’s right, Syn’s and Jobe’s ’Mechs each took a step forward. They were supposed to be backing out. He was out of his jeep in a second, wrench in hand. Behind him, his son shouted, “Get back! Get back!” into the jeep’s mike. “Remember the plan.”
Wilson caught up with Syn’s back leg and rapped it, then rapped it again. “Back up,” he shouted in case she had her outside mike on. “We retreat now. Remember.”
“You are no fun,” came from the ’Mech’s outside speaker.
Wilson hammered the leg again.
The tank that hadn’t made it onto the bridge sent a large-caliber shell their way, reminding Wilson just how exposed he was.
“Maybe we should back up,” came Jobe’s voice from the jeep’s speakers. “If they clobber this grain elevator, things could get real bad.”
One ’Mech backed up. The second one joined it. Wilson ran to his jeep, and his son gunned out to the left, away from the ’Mechs who retreated into Bliven, snapping off short bursts at anyone who sent fire their way.
For a long moment Yonni watched the expanding clouds of explosives. Around him, everyone did the same. Here and there a man, ’Mech or tank maneuvered to dodge a falling chunk of debris.
Then the Demon tank that hadn’t been blown up with the bridge expressed its opinion by snapping off a laser shot at the gray ’Mechs. They started backing up, firing back at anyone who fired at them. When they passed out of sight behind the multistoried buildings that must represent Bliven’s main street, the riverbank grew silent.
“Uh, sir, you probably can’t see it,” the XO reported from the vantage point of the van on the south bluff, “but there are about a dozen pickup trucks beating it for the hills fast.”
“Can you put fire on them?”
“Wait one,” the XO said, and was back well before the full minute was up. “No, sir, First Platoon’s tanks are out of position, and the ’Mechs were either heading down the riverbank or for the bridge. The land over there is full of folds, and we can’t get any good shots as they duck in and out of ’em.”
“So what else is new?” Yonni said, biting back worse comments he didn’t want on the radio. “I’m all right. ’Mech’s only slightly damaged. Call Battalion for the repair truck and try not to say what it’s for.” The cheap client had budgeted the companies for only one maintenance van each. That wouldn’t help his Legionnaire. “Also advise Battalion that we will need a bridging unit here, five spans’ worth.”
“Yes, sir.”
Thirty minutes later, First Platoon was across the river. Third was following them, and the HQ van waded to a stop beside Yonni. Climbing down his ’Mech to join the XO on the roof of the van he asked, “What’s the situation?”
“B Company should be here in two hours. I’ve assigned Fourth Platoon to guard the ford until they get here. We are ready to exploit forward.”
“Did the major have any luck in front of Amarillo?”
“Doesn’t appear so, sir. Snipers made the advance tough sledding. We have the only troops across, sir.”
“So let’s get busy exploiting,” Yonni ordered.
Outside Amarillo, Alkalurops
25 August 3134
“They are exploiting forward, sir,” the XO said.
“Now they are,” L. J. pointed out.
“That’s what they said, sir.” Art worked his jaw. If he wasn’t careful, he’d need caps before he made Major. The Colonel did not like paying high dental bills and did not trust worriers. L. J. made sure his jaw was loose.
“Art, why don’t you take your Arbalest and get yourself over to A Company—make sure its reports are accurate when they’re made, not an hour later. And find out what their casualties are. They’ve made two requests for the repair rig, but I still don’t have any damage report.”
“Yes, sir,” Art said, a big grin taking over his face. Getting free of the HQ in his BattleMech was great. Commanding the battalion’s spearhead wouldn’t look half bad on his next contract’s résumé.
L. J. turned back to his map table. So Grace’s right had turned out to be a bit tougher to crack than had first appeared. Still it was cracked, and as best as L. J. could tell, even the ’Mechs were just shooting and bugging out. If the opposition had any maneuverability, Grace should have counterattacked at that river crossing. Hell, if there was anything really in front of him, it should have attacked him when they saw one company head east, and before the other company got in from the west.
So, Grace, all I have to do is peel you. Wonder what that creamy white skin will look like when I have you down to the buff? L. J. glanced at the west side of his map. The Black and Reds still hadn’t made contact with his lone platoon covering his left flank. L. J. frowned. They were overdue. As much as he really didn’t want them, by later this afternoon he would have to go hunting for them.
Along the Colorado River, Alkalurops
25 August 3134
Jonathan Fetterman, Field Marshal of Special Police, wondered what the holdup was this time. Santorini, er, the Leader had told him it would be easy to get three hundred Special Police up to Amarillo and start cleaning out that nest of dumb-ass farmers who didn’t have the smarts to see which way the wind was blowing. “Send me a lot of pics of full lamp poles,” Santorini had told Fetterman before sending him off.
Well, moving a bunch of commandeered trucks and sixteen ’Mechs in various states of conversion was no picnic—no, sir, it wasn’t. Fetterman scowled at the Atlas under him. Buying it on time had really impressed Santorini back on Nusakan. He’d made him a Field Marshal in a snap, or rather in a snap after Jon had helped another dozen guys buy up every available ’Mech. Like him, they bought on time, mortgaging stuff they really didn’t own and wouldn’t need if things turned out as well as they looked here. Jon grinned, remembering that he’d already tossed his payment book in the trash can. Let old man Benton try to repossess a Field Marshal’s ’Mech on Alkalurops when he’s sitting at the right hand of the Leader. Fetterman enjoyed a laugh, which got his whole body moving. He’d forgotten his hands were on the joysticks. His laugh got the laser-equipped arm of his ’Mech moving. In the truck ahead of him, people pointed and acted as if they were really scared.
He’d never gotten that reaction selling siding on Nusakan. He could have used a bit of that fear-mongering when he was foreclosing on scumbags who didn’t pay, claiming it was his fault for selling bad siding. It had cost him a fortune to keep judges around who believed in enforcing contracts.
“Field Marshal Fetterman, are you having problems with your ’Mech, sir?” Colonel Brisko called over the radio.
“No, I am not, Colonel. What I am is hot in here with the sun beating down. Do we have to travel in the heat of the day? Isn’t it time for a break yet?”
“No, sir, we’re due in Amarillo before sunset. Between potholes and breakdowns, we have to keep moving when we can. This is why I suggested you not wear your uniform, sir. Having it between you and your cooling vest is heating you up, sir.”
“Hasn’t anyone told you that clothes make the man? I am not going to show up in Amarillo half-naked. What’s holding us up?”
“Sir, the lead truck has a flat. It’s off to the side now, being fixed. Had to assign a new lead truck.”
“Well, tell them to hurry up.”
“I will, sir. Remember what I told you about moving those arms.” Brisko started into what Fetterman knew would be another lecture on how to shoot the damn thing.
“I remember how to work it, Brisko. You just keep the trucks moving,” Fetterman snapped. After all, he was the Field Marshal. Three months ago Brisko had been a cashiered merc who couldn’t handle his whiskey. I pulled you out of a homeless shelter. If it wasn’t for me, you’d still be singing hymns for your supper.
Fetterman glanced down at his cockpit. Damn, the yellow tabs he’d stuck on things so he could remember what was what and how to work it had come off. He reached down to collect them off the floor and found he’d accidentally bent his ’Mech at the waist almost to the ground and dumped the tabs in a heap on the controls. He’d get them straight later. There was a manual he kept meaning to read. Maybe tonight. Well, not tonight if the hotel had three hotties like last night’s.
Fetterman concentrated on walking. Brisko was right. If you worked the pedals just right, you could miss most of the potholes.
Benjork Lone Cat wondered what he had done to deserve such a fate. The trap was laid, and then the lead truck went lame and limped to the side of the road. Now the convoy was moving again, apparently none the wiser, but six men were standing around that truck while three struggled to change the tire. Already they had all pissed. They had drunk water. Some were now passing around a bottle. How long before even blind men spotted that they were in the very epicenter of a trap?
Through the crack of the door, the MechWarrior eyed the terrain, which had decreed where to spring the trap. Here water cut a narrow passage through a tight canyon, less than a hundred meters wide, with walls of aged and worn rock almost ten meters high. All morning, troops had labored with pickaxes and shovels to dig rifle pits close to the road. Behind two parked dump trucks in a road-maintenance yard, a metal garage gave cover to a dozen gray ’Mech MODs not sixty meters from the road.
A blind cub should have spotted the danger here and sent a foot patrol to scout ahead. But the Black and Reds were truly blinded by their confidence that it was their destiny to kill, not to be killed. They drove into the trap with only a slight delay, as they argued who would take point and who would absorb any mines on the road ahead. Now the trucks full of infantry filed by. Coming soon would be the ’Mechs. A huge Atlas led them, or at least stumbled in the first position. That one would be almost comical if he didn’t have at his fingertips the power to smash every machine that stood behind the Lone Cat.
But it was the Spider following the Atlas that caused fear. The pilot of that one knew what he was doing. While those ahead and behind him moved with a tipsy jerkiness, that one walked smoothly, even through the inevitable potholes. Ben turned to Sean and Maud, who were beside him. “That Spider is the one we must kill.”
“Looks a whole lot easier than the Black Hawk we took down,” Maud said.
“Th-three ’Mech MODs against one real B-BattleMech driven by a trained MechWarrior will be j-just about even odds,” Sean told her. Usually, the boy agreed with whatever the girl said. Now Sean looked past her to the enemy. “It can j-jump. It has two lasers and a cooling system that lets it jump, f-fire, and run when others might be overheated and locked up. With an average warrior, it would take the th-three of us to bring it to ground. If th-that man is good, it will be b-bad for us, Maud.”
“Aw, it’ll be fun dancing with someone who knows how,” the girl shot back. “Those guys out Harlingen way were pussycats.”
“Close up,” Benjork ordered. He tightened his harness and made sure all his cooling lines were free. The lightweight neurohelmet had shifted, so he repositioned it. He set his Gatling gun spinning slowly and punched his mike.
“Lieutenant Hicks, flares on my count. Three, two, one, fire. ’Mechs advance,” he ordered.
Rather than charge out the garage door, the strike team had rigged the thin metal walls with charges. They blew out, dropping metal sheets on the ground. The ’Mechs stepped over the pole frame and in two seconds, twelve ’Mech MODs stood ready for battle, facing other ’Mechs that were still concentrating on following their leader.
Then the daisy chain explosions went off.
Dynamite charges set under the road blew up in a running explosion that quickly flew from the front of the line to the rear. The leading Atlas was just past the first explosion. Benjork doubted the charges were strong enough to knock that huge thing down, anyway. It swayed, but remained on its legs.
The Spider driver showed his worth. Knocked sideways, he hit his jump jets and shot into the air. Working his wings, he stabilized himself in midflight and even got off a slashing shot. Benjork gave the Spider a burst of thirty-millimeter tungsten slugs as it set down in the stream. Even with surprise, water, rocks and incoming fire, the Spider made a good landing.
Farther down the line, the explosive charges did their best to convert Black and Red ’Mechs into pretzels. Those that survived the initial experience came under fire from the gray ’Mechs from Falkirk. The Black and Reds that could, fired as they backpedaled into the river. Nearly half could do nothing more than pop their canopies and throw up their hands.
Trucks with their loads of potential hangmen came under fire from rocket grenades and machine guns. A good chunk of the men stood up in the trucks, hands in the air. Others grabbed at the mounted machine guns or tumbled over the truck sides, pulling back the arming levers on their automatic rifles. They died quickly. In the ditches on either side, men and women fired from the concealment of their fighting pits, taking down those who wanted to fight, usually missing those who did not.
The Spider clearly fell into the fighting category. He raced upstream, back the way he’d come, his laser raking the back of the fighting holes, killing men and women as they killed those around the trucks.
“Get him!” the Lone Cat shouted, sending bursts after the Spider and leading Sean and Maud in chase. Behind them, militia infantry began peeling drivers out of damaged Black and Red ’Mechs. Four men in Gnome battle armor began an assault on the still befuddled Atlas.
In a shower of white water, the Spider jumped for the top of the stream bank. He landed well, twisted around, and fired twin lasers. He missed Benjork, but there was a short scream on the radio before it cut off.
Ignoring everything but the fleeing Spider, the MechWarrior put his engine in the red, raced for the wall, chose a fallen stone for his launch pad, and threw himself at the top of the riverbank. Here it wasn’t quite ten meters high, and he landed just below the lip. Firing two rockets to keep the Spider busy, Ben used his repaired rock cutter to slowly pull himself up the rest of the way. Not pausing to regain his balance, he threw himself after the Spider, converting the near fall into speed.
Behind him, Sean’s voice was intense. “I’m coming. Quick, s-somebody give me a hand up.”
Benjork left Sean to others. The Spider was just disappearing over a small rise. Following, he upped his periscope for a quick check before crossing that rise.
The Spider was trotting backward, both arms up, lasers aimed back at the exact spot where he had crossed the hill.
Benjork sent his ’Mech ten long paces past that point, then pedaled it into a turn. Using his periscope—this time for targeting—he lobbed his last two missiles over the hill. The Spider staggered sideways, firing his lasers at nothing. Benjork trotted his ’Mech across the rise, sending stream after stream of heavy tungsten slugs at him. The Spider’s right winglet took hits—possibly the right rocket outlet as well.
“No more flying, rocket boy,” Benjork growled.
The Spider backpedaled, bringing his lasers around to aim at his tormentor. Then a burst of thirty-millimeter fire from the right grabbed the Spider’s attention as it shattered his left laser.
“G-got you that time!” came from Sean on radio. “How do you like that, you bloody hangman?” He loosed two missiles that sent the Spider hopping sideways to escape them. The Spider regained its balance and fired its remaining laser at Sean.
That left Benjork free to carefully aim his Gatling gun at the Spider’s side. Rounds slammed into the BattleMech, spalling off its armor. The Spider tried to sidestep out of the line of fire, but Ben followed him, holding him, pinning the Spider and hammering it with shot.
So the Spider hit his jump jets.
Maybe he didn’t know how damaged his wing and rocket outlet were. Maybe he forgot. It didn’t matter. The Spider shot up, arcing to the left as soon as it left the ground. The pilot tried to correct, but the damaged wing drove the Spider to the left as misdirected plasma from a split rocket motor burned through the bottom of the ’Mech.
The flight ended in a pair of wild uncontrolled loops. Then the Spider buried itself in a surprisingly small hole only a hundred meters from where it had taken off.
“Let that be a lesson to you, Sean. Never trust one of those jumpers,” Benjork told the young MechWarrior and anyone listening on the radio as he turned to the young man’s gray ’Mech.
The ’Mech stood deathly still, a red-hot hole in its chest sending up wisps of smoke.
“Sean!” Benjork shouted, and put his engine in the red as he raced for the ’Mech standing frozen in place, as if even a soft breeze might be more than it could handle.
He slammed to a halt in front of the ’Mech. Now he could see that a laser had cut through it, straight as a diamond drill. He peered into the armorglass hood as it slowly fogged over with sweat and blood. Sean’s lips moved. Over the radio Benjork heard a weak, “W-we got him.” Then the gray ’Mech that had meant so much to the young man whose regiment would not entrust one to him, toppled over.
As a Nova Cat, Benjork had learned that the universe is a fickle place. He did not expect material things to reflect what other people call rationality. He knew that karma rules us all whether we be rock and water or flesh and blood. Nova Cats do not weep for what must be.
Benjork Lone Cat knew all of these things—not as a man might know it in his head, but as only a dreamer can know it in the deepest essence of his being.
So now he walked apart from the others who gathered around their fallen comrade, murmuring about how sad it was that the young girl had died, too. Distant from all others who mourned, Benjork opened his cockpit and let the spurious dampness that some might mistake for tears flow from his eyes and be swallowed down by the thirsty red dirt of Alkalurops.
When the dampness was gone, the Lone Cat lifted his right arm to the universe. He shook it, his threat to the very stars. “Know you who watch, you who send dreams. I will stand with Grace and all her kin. This land beneath my feet is my land, the land of my dream. And neither hell nor demons may take it while I breathe.”