A bolt of blue lightning leaped from the PPC and caressed the Victor'sright arm. Molten armor coursed down the limb like blood from an open wound. The two medium lasers bracketed the assault 'Mech, each stabbing into the armor on an arm. The autocannon's stream of slugs slashed a bar sinister across the Victor'schest, but nothing penetrated armor to cause internal damage.
With his autocannon out of commission, Victor sent his 'Mech racing forward to beat on the Cataphractwith the useless weapon. A quick blow could knock the autocannon out of commission, and being in that close would make the PPC much more difficult to aim. Victor smiled as he raised the 'Mech's right arm. "It's all over now, Sun-Tzu."
Out of the corner of his eye, he caught movement. To the extreme right edge of his display, he saw Kai's Centurionstep away from its hiding place near the canyon mouth. The autocannon came up, and even as Victor tried to cut to one side, the weapon vomited out a rain of metal.
The depleted-uranium slugs hit the Victorin its already damaged left leg. The projectiles blasted away the battered remnants of armor clinging to the leg, then zipped through the myomer muscles corded in the 'Mech's thigh. Sparks flew as shells chipped away at the ferrotitanium femur, snapping the inorganic bone in half.
As the lower half of his 'Mech's left leg dropped away, Victor fought a losing battle to retain his balance. The 'Mech twisted as it fell, smashing its back against the far canyon wall. The command couch's special panels punched into Victor's own back, crunching him between them and the restraining belts. The blow stunned him for a moment, leaving him unable to do anything but watch as Hohiro and Shin entered the canyon.
From his vantage point, Victor saw the other two members of Kai's lance, an Orionand a Catapult,both 'Mechs with LRMs in their arms. The Catapultdirected both its fifteen-missile flights at the Phoenix Hawk,while the Orionconcentrated on the Grand Dragon.The Cataphractbrought its weapons to bear on Hohiro, while Kai swung his autocannon around to take the Phoenix Hawk.
The missiles covered the mouth of the canyon in a sheet of flame. The explosions stripped all the armor off the Phoenix Hawk'sarms, and a subsidiary blast took out the medium laser mounted on the underside of the right forearm. Even more damaging, the missiles hitting the left arm shredded the myomer muscles in the upper arm, leaving it dangling and useless. More explosions sent sheets of armor flying from the 'Mech's left flank and leg, with two scoring hits on the Phoenix Hawk'shead.
The Grand Dragonfared better, as most of the missiles undershot the target. Even so, they managed to whittle away armor on the 'Mech's chest and left leg, providing the Cataphractwith viable targets for its attack. Yet even as the fire condensed into black smoke, the Grand Dragonhad sighted in on the Cataphractand the two 'Mechs exchanged volleys.
The azure bolt from the Grand Dragon'sPPCs lashed hunks of armor from the Cataphract'sleft arm, but failed to penetrate it fully. The medium laser mounted in its left breast stabbed.out and melted more armor over the left flank that Victor had previously hit, but again failed to do more than damage armor. In return, the Cataphract'sautocannon peeled a strip of armor from the Grand Dragon'sleft flank. The Liao 'Mech's medium lasers missed their target, but the PPC made up for the misses with a vengeance.
The cerulean energy whip flayed the last of the armor from the Grand Dragon'sleft leg. As it dropped away, the particle beam sliced like a scalpel into the myomer fibers in the thigh, melting them like candles. The Grand Dragon,having lost control of its left leg, started to tip, but Hohiro shifted the 'Mech's weight back over onto its right leg and kept the machine upright.
Kai's Centurionfired at the Phoenix Hawkfrom point-blank range. The autocannon's salvo hit the Phoenix Hawkin the right shoulder, spinning the 'Mech around like a toy. Sparks flew as the large laser shorted, and a string of firecracker pops sounded as the machine gun's ammo cooked off. The Phoenix Hawkslammed into the canyon wall face-first, then rebounded and dropped to its back on the rocky floor.
Another concentrated volley of rockets brought Hohiro crashing down. He struggled to rise up again, but Kai blew the Grand Dragon'sright arm off at the elbow with a shot that could just as easily have destroyed the cockpit. The computer controlling the exercise asked if Victor wanted to surrender, and he reluctantly replied in the affirmative.
As the screens died and the hatch at the back of the simulator opened, Victor unbuckled himself from the command couch. He set the neurohelmet back on the shelf over his head, then rubbed his eyes with both hands. "What a disaster. I'm never going to hear the end of this." He gave himself a few seconds to dream up some excuse that could explain how he'd managed to lose his whole command of battle-hardened veterans to Kai and some rookies, but nothing even remotely viable occurred to him.
Victor was the last one to reach the lounge area outside the simulator pod room. Kai was already there, flanked by his sister Cassandra on one side and Ragnar Magnusson on the other. Hohiro and Shin stood nearby while Sun-Tzu scowled at the assembly. Galen straightened up from the drinking fountain near the door and just shook his head.
Victor sighed heavily as he crossed to where Kai was standing. He offered him his hand. "Damn, you did good work out there. I haven't ever been nailed that badly."
Hohiro agreed. "Taking down four heavy BattleMechs, with only one of your command taking any damage at all is remarkable."
Ragnar beamed. "Sun-Tzu wouldn'thave taken any damage if he'd done what Kai told him to."
Sun-Tzu spun Ragnar around with a hand on his right shoulder. "I am not a little weakling to be ordered about by an inferior."
Galen moved between Sun-Tzu and Ragnar, while Hohiro laughed. "You can hardly consider a MechWarrior with three kills to his credit today an inferior, Sun-Tzu. Your 'Mech, as well as the CatapultRagnar piloted and Zandra's Orion,are well-suited to long-range combat, while Yen-lo-wangis built for infighting."
"Kai ordered all of us to stay back," Romano's son snarled, "so he could steal the glory of the kills for himself."
Victor shook his head. "No, Sun-Tzu. Kai placed himself in extreme jeopardy to act as bait for a very well-sprung trap. I should have known better than to lead my lance straight into it. Kai used his personnel in the best possible way, taking the most dangerous jobs for himself. Had Kai not been there, you would have died at my hands."
Shin bowed his head toward Kai. "I would also note that Kai moves with Yen-lo-wangas though the 'Mech were part of him. I knew, from seeing the Victortumble, that the Centurionhad to be lurking off to the right side of the canyon. Even knowing that, however, I could not follow his movement well enough with my weapons to be able to target him." Grinning at Kai, Shin added, "I am very glad I only have to face you in simulator battles."