“It will take more than a knight’s BattleMech to back such a call to arms. Allow me to demonstrate.” And from extreme range, Torrent let fly with every long-range missile at his disposal.
The XX-rack dumped a full score of warheads into the air. His Advanced Tactical Missile System automatically selected for extended range and chased the first flight with another nine missiles. Before these had arced over, Torrent was already in range for his laser and timed it so that the spear of bloodred energy carved into the Jupiter at the same time as his missiles pummeled the enemy ’Mech.
“Steel Wolves,” he said calmly, waiting for his weapons to cycle, “engage at will.”
River’s End
Achernar
If Erik Sandoval had not demanded quarters befitting his new station, River’s End might have been lost.
Ducking his Hatchetman into an alleyway, its shovel-blade feet kicking a dumpster along in front of him as Erik might a tin can, the young lord escaped the crossfire that had been set up at the nearby intersections. The Demon’s lasers angled up and past him, slicing free only a small ridge of armor from his left shoulder before he made his full escape. Safe for the moment, Erik throttled back, planted one wide foot through the alley’s thinner ferrocrete and then shoved himself back the way he had come, ax poised in the air overhead and sensing more by instinct than any sensor shadow that one of the Demons, at least, would chase him into the narrow side street.
One did. Saving his autocannon ammo, Erik smashed down his titanium hatchet once, twice. His first cut crushed both laser barrels into mangled ruin. His second caved in the tank’s cockpit, bursting ferroglass shields into a rain of splinters and jagged shards that littered the street and sparkled dully in the yellow glow of a streetlamp. Erik kicked the end of the Demon around, letting him gaze down through his own shield at the telltale insignia.
Achernar militia.
Backstabbing sons-of-a-Liao.
Michael Eus had been able to tell him very little, rousing Erik from the president’s apartments at Steyger Railways’ city offices. Erik was not one to dwell on creature comforts, not usually, but the office complex also had the good fortune of being located only a dozen blocks over from the Achernar HPG station. From his new living room window he could see the massive dish suspended over the compound by geared towers. An impressive underground vault, left over from pre-Republic days, was large enough to house his BattleMech as well as two Condors.
Most of the Swordsworn had mobilized for the city’s edge by the time Erik fired up his Hatchetman and set it on a similar course. He still could not say for certain why he had spread the Condors out in a flanking search except his inherent distrust—now—of Michael Eus. Erik’s care had tumbled the militia’s plans several minutes sooner than would have happened otherwise, as first a dark-running VTOL and then a hostile VV1 Ranger was sighted.
Erik’s small unit claimed the Ranger, but then lost one Condor to a prowling Legionnaire and an AgroMech conversion. Since then, the nobleman had traded block by crucial block, summoning up both MiningMech conversions from the HPG station and calling in VTOL support and fast tanks from Eus.
The second Demon was missing, likely trying to head him off further down the avenue. Instead, Erik turned again for the station, intent on regrouping his forces as close to the HPG as possible. He chose the larger city streets—those which had been reinforced to allow ’Mech movement without collapsing. Then, rounding a corner, he stepped into the middle of an infantry firefight with Hauberks routing a rooftop emplacement of his Purifiers. A Saxon APC waited in nearby shadows while a converted AgroMech disappeared around the next corner.
Erik dealt with the APC first, again slamming down with his handheld ax. Better than against wheeled or tracked tanks, however, the impact was enough to ground out the hovercraft and hold it in place while its lift fans tore themselves to pieces against the concrete walk. A few Hauberks turned on him with their missile-firing backpacks. He easily shrugged aside these detonations while the Purifiers leapt down for hand-to-hand combat. Erik lent a hand—and a foot—as he could. One Hauberk moved too slowly, and ended up a smear of mangled metal and flesh.
“Back to the station,” Erik ordered. “All free units, converge.” He set off again, this time giving a ride to a few of the Purifiers while more ran and leapt along in his wake.
The militia plans became clear enough as pieces fell into place. A heavy push at the Steel Wolves, to draw everyone’s attention, while a covert strike force penetrated River’s End from another direction and tried to reclaim the HPG. Except that now he had the small raiding force nearly surrounded, cut off from the spaceport battle by the same soldiers he would have sent to aid against the Steel Wolves. Aid in a limited and self-supporting manner, perhaps, but the militia could have expected some relief.
Now, instead, he would hunt down the raiding force and deal with them personally, leaving the rest to Torrent. And when the Steel Wolves tried limping back to their DropShips, bloodied and weak, then Erik would be waiting.
But first, the Legionnaire and its supporting force.
Ortega. No matter that Eus claimed to have intercepted a transmission, placing the militia warrior at the spaceport. Erik bet family money on the Legionnaire being piloted by Raul Ortega, who had made a point to defy the noble at every turn since the two of them met. Even before the customs officer turned MechWarrior, he had shown a penchant for disregarding Erik’s authority. Like a mosquito, biting and biting at him, always just out of reach and believing that he could not be smashed. Well, he would learn.
All of them would learn before this day was finished.
Some faster than others, he decided as his sensors painted a Warrior H9 attack helicopter cruising over a shopping mall and parking itself over the top of a bank. Its missile system reached for a lock on the Hatchetman. Erik pulled his crosshairs over the fragile craft, held the shot for a solid tone, and then pulled into the trigger with a gentle caress. Eighty-millimeter slugs roared out of his left-arm autocannon, tracking in over the VTOL’s thermal silhouette.
The pilot tried to sideslip, banking his craft over the main avenue, but Erik corrected his aim faster and the armor-piercing metal chopped into and through the H8’s light armor. Walking the stream of hot metal up into the rotor blades, he chopped away one, long vane and chipped up another. The unbalanced craft slewed through the air, losing altitude and finally dashing itself into the middle of the wide avenue where it erupted into a ball of orange fire and spreading pool of greasy flames.
Erik watched the fall, the fire. He rocked his throttles forward, kicking up into a walk, before he saw the Legionnaire standing on the far side of the wreckage.
A gout of yellow flash-fire erupted from the Legionnaire’s overhead rotary, and fifty-mil slugs buried themselves in the Hatchetman’s chest and upper right leg. The hammering impacts shoved Erik back, but could not knock him completely off his feet. The young noble brought his left arm up again, drew a bead over the Legionnaire and chased it into a side street with a long pull from his Imperator Class-10 autocannon. He chipped more stone off the bank’s facing than he did armor from the fifty-ton BattleMech. Before he could lower his aim, a pair of militia Jousts burst from the opposite side of the same street, crossed the main avenue, and chased off after the Legionnaire.