//------------------------------// // Prologue - Evacuation // Story: Mechwarrior: Equestria - Living Legends // by ReachNetwork //------------------------------// Prologue - Evacuation “How much longer is going to take?” Casey asked. Water dripping down the outside of his 'Mech cabin. Condensation forming on the inside of it. 'Mechs ran so hot that even in freeze your ass off environments the pilot seat would still get drenched in sweat. Northwind may have been an ice ball in the northern regions but it sure didn’t feel like it when piloting a 'Mech. “Delta 3, this is Delta Actual, please keep COM’s chatter to a minimum.” Planners said over the communications channel “This is Delta 1, what is the ETA on dropship powerup? It’s getting a bit hellish out here.” “Delta 1, this is Delta Actual, approximate time to dropship powerup is fifteen minutes. One of the APU’s has been destroyed. It will take longer if anymore are destroyed.” “Alright gentlemen... and lady. Current objective is to prevent loss of any further APU’s. Elizabeth, discourage the curious around the dropship. Connor you’re on cleanup duty, destroy any incoming missile carriers. Casey, you’re on me. We’re taking out these Steiner sons of bitches.” Ethan ordered. Casey was already off engaging an incoming Steiner scout 'Mech, an Uller. That terribly annoying scout class ‘Mech that looked suspiciously like a miniature Daishi. The poor bloody Steiner 'Mech had already lost an arm to the Thor’s light gauss by the time Ethan’s Uziel had shot it with his twin PPC’s.     Fifteen minutes before they could evac Ethan thought to himself. This entire operation had gone to hell. But with Steiner anything could possibly happen. Those sorry sons of bitches would rue the day they made their entire lance retreat, all friendlies in the entire region had been ordered to pullback. In his own defence, no one expected the Steiner’s to have three Atlas ‘Mechs waiting for them just inside Northwind’s capital in this province. Whoever did their intel needed a smack in the face. ‘Expect mild resistance.’ It was an urban area, but that was ‘urban’ for this province, small fry compared to the actual capital. Fortunately all the 'Mechs in Delta lance were faster than any Atlas could ever dream to be. They easily outran them when they were issued orders to retreat. The capital city of Jerome’s Basin was a mildly industrialized city. Which is why Clan Wolf, Kuritans, and the Highlander’s  wanted it back. However what neither faction expected was that the Steiner’s would put up five lances of assault 'Mechs simply to deny either of them the minimalistic rewards of the city. This winter hellhole of a planet was only fought over because of it’s place in the Inner Sphere, two jumps from Terra and an easy way to get a foothold of the entire sector. Anyone controlling Northwind, which had been fought over for nearly the last two centuries, could defend an entire quadrant of planets within the Inner Sphere. The Highlanders had done a job defending it, but they were two stretched thin trying to fight across several planets. Only 20% of their entire military force had been stationed on Northwind when the damn Steiners showed up. Wolf’s Dragoons had been plundering the planet for themselves to see if they could find anything, and they did. An old, but still functional Hyperpulse Generator. The Dragoons and Kuritans had been on very good terms. The Dragoons happened to show up at the right time on Thestria to help repulse a planetary invasion. Since then, the groups had been pretty buddy-buddy with eachother. Among other rumors including they found a data-cashe but that was unlikely. The Dragoons had been fairly popular talk as of late. Ethan couldn’t tell, for the most part who was the good guy and who was the bad guy anymore. None of the factions, houses, and merc groups seemed to lean to either side. Sure Steiner’s were conquesting asshats, but the worlds under their control blossomed into massive centres of industrialization, material output and profit. Comstar had long since fallen from their path of “preserve the lostech.” Was no one really a good guy anymore? Ethan supposed he was trying to find a needle in a haystack with a blindfold on, it’s just not gonna happen. The squabbles of the Inner Sphere both internally and externally was ripping the cosmos apart, he just wanted to get away from it all. But something had to pay the bills; and he was a damn good 'Mechwarrior. As a merc you got to choose the jobs you do, that was probably the best part. The worst part about this mission wasn’t the freezing cold of Northwind, the poor visibility created by whiteouts and the like, or even the under par cheque he would be might receiving at the end of it. The worst part was they had been ordered to retreat. Even as mercs you still had to follow the orders of whoever was paying you, and now they might not be paid at all. “Delta lead, please be advised, I’m picking up 3 'Mechs on the Long Range.” Ethan snapped out of his stupor. He hadn’t even noticed he scored the killing shot on the Uller. “Shit that must be those Assault 'Mechs we evaded. When will they be here?” “In approximately 12 minutes, lead.” Planners replied. “Is that good or bad?” Ethan asked. “As long as we don’t lose another APU we’ll be able to get this dropship off the ground in 8 minutes.” Wow, six minutes had passed already. Had it really been that long to kill the Uller? Elizabeth was shooting down the last of the scout helicopters, and Casey had destroyed all the missile tanks coming into the area. Looks like there was nothing left for him to destroy. The advancing Steiner forces hoping to pick off easy to kill fleeing targets got more than they bargained for. “Delta 4, assist Delta 2.” Ethan barked into the headset. “Roger that, assisting Dela 2.” Ethan heard come from his headset. “Boss, should we go try and slow down those Atlases?” Casey, Delta 3 asked. “Negative, negative. We might not be able to make it back in time.” “This is Echo lead, does anyone copy? Is anyone out there?” A new, female voice popped into the COM’s. “Echo lead, this is Delta Actual. What’s your status?” Planner’s asked. “We’ve been ordered to retreat, however our dropship was destroyed when we got to our evac zone. Can we get a lift with you guys?” “Echo lead, what’s your location?” “Approximately five kilometers south of your position.” “Copy that Echo lead. Haste is advised, we have three assault class 'Mechs inbound on our position. ETA seven minutes. If you move now you can make it. We take off in three minutes.” “Five kilometers in three minutes? Negative on that, my lance contains an assault class 'Mech. We’re not going to make it there in time.” “Echo Lead, this is Delta Lead. What does your lance consist of?” “Delta Lead, this is Echo Lead. My lance is one assault, one heavy, one medium and a light. Copy? We can make it there in five minutes.” “Copy Echo. Delta Lance.” “Yes sir?” “What’s up sir?” “Delta Lead?” “I hope you guys are feeling lucky. We’re about to kill three Atlases.” Ethan said. “Awww yeah!” “Stow it Casey.” Elizabeth said. “We don’t leave people behind Planners.” Ethan said. “Affirmative Delta Lead.” Planners acknowledged. The wait for Echo Lance to show up was greweling. Even with eight 'Mechs, taking on three Atlas’ would be a challenge. He just had to work out how to execute this correctly. Visibility was getting worse so his Heads Up Display had taken over and outlined the ground infront of him and specified friendly units. He was staring at Casey’s Thor. He had taken a double laser round to the left shoulder during the fight with the Uller. It wasn’t a damaging shot so to speak, the only thing wrecked was his paint job. “Sir how we gonna take down those Assault 'Mechs?” Casey asked. “Not sure yet. But we need to see them before they see us. Delta 4, Connor you there?” Ethan asked. “I’m here sir. What’s up?” Connor asked. “I’m giving you a nav marker. Make sure your Beagle Active Probe is on. You’ll need the extra radar range.” Connor was looking on his HUD, it showed him a nav point five hundred meters north. Connor had chosen the Beagle Active Probe to decrease the long lock on times of his missile packs. Not that he really needed that, CSTRK6’s had pretty much no lock on time; it was point a shoot and the missiles would track somewhat. What mattered though is BAP linked into the radar system, giving you better range. Standard radar on a 'Mech could keep track of everything within a kilometer, unless you extended the range. Most pilots didn’t unless they had to, extending your radar range would make you easier to track. BAP gave extra distance without the cost of giving yourself away. Connor’s Cougar had been a gift to him by his uncle years before the clan invasion of the inner sphere. It was outfitted with an array of lasers and missile packs. It had been built to hit and then run away. It also had two sets of machine gun arrays installed but those weren’t much use outside of lightly armored vehicles like APC’s or jeeps. Connor’s 'Mech lower torso self aligned with the upper portion, which had been looking at the navpoint. Capable of pushing speeds of over 100 kilometers per hour, the light 'Mech moved through the packed snow with ease. Though it hadn’t been repainted for snow camouflage the olive-grey colour blended in surprisingly well to the rocks that stuck out causing ragged formations across the never ending blanket of snow. The 'Mech accelerated fairly quickly, crossing the gap to the nav point in only a 7 seconds or so seconds. “Elizabeth, I need you watching out for Echo Lance. Head south and link up with them” Ethan ordered. “On it Ethan.” Elizabeth complied as she turned her Stiletto 'Mech to the south and took off, pushing her 'Mech to a staggering 85 kilometers per hour. Unfortunately the Stiletto was designed for speed rather than firepower. At least Ethan’s Uziel could mount a pair PPC’s, the Stiletto had a single ammunation based spot that could house a Light Gauss Rifle. Fortunately, she had packed it with three times the standard ammo cap. Letting her fire almost 100 times before it needed to be resupplied. Her missile packs, that came pre-outfitted with SRM4’s were also filled with ammunition. Leaving a single spot open which she had opted to put a flame thrower in. Nothing quite blinds a pilot then having the front of their 'Mech on fire for a few seconds. Even with alternate viewing modes through their helmets, Infrared or low light was thrown out the window, thermal was also thrown out the window seeing as you can’t see through the heat created by fire. It effectively left the pilot blind. A very good tactic if she got up close and personal with an enemy 'Mech. The other weapons systems on her Stiletto was based around long range. The LGR she mounted was useable when closed in on your targets, but it was really a job more meant for the Auto-Cannon sets. Elizabeth was worrying about Ethan again, he normally talked more in missions. Which generally was frowned upon by their advisor. Then again, they were mercs so long as they got the objective done it didn’t really matter. In this case they had failed on a colossal scale. Maybe that’s why he was quiet, they might not get paid. They had cleared the way relatively easily until they walked through the city limits and three Atlas 'Mechs did a cold start up. What she didn’t get is why the damn Steiners put Assault 'Mechs to defend a tiny (relatively speaking) industrial centre. That didn’t add up, something was going on and they hadn’t been told. Elizabeth continued to watch her radar, when new contacts appeared on it she opened up the COM’s. “Echo, I hope that’s you I’m seeing on radar else I’m in big trouble.” “That’s us, no worries. Whom do I have the pleasure?” Echo 1 asked. “Delta Lance’s second, Elizabeth Winters.” Elizabeth replied as she halted her 'Mech and waited for Echo to show up. “Sara Price, Echo lead.” Said Sara, “I’ve got your location on radar. We should be coming over that large hill 700 meters south of your position any moment.” Elizabeth looked up from her radar over to the white landscape. Depth perception was nearly impossible, snow was everywhere and visibility hadn’t improved much. Still, when the familiar outline of a 'Mech showed up over the invisible hilltop, she breathed a sigh of relief. “Delta 2 here, I’ve met up with Echo.” “Delta 2, this is Echo 1. We may have been followed. Keep an eye out.” “Sir did you get all that?” Elizabeth asked. “Yeah, I got it. “Echo 4, here, I just got a radar contact. It’s big enough... wait now it’s gone. Anyways it was big enough to be a 'Mech.” “Echo Lance, we’re being followed. Spread out, stay loose.” Price said. Elizabeth did a once over of Echo Lance, it consisted of a Shadow Cat, which pinged as Echo Lead, Sara’s ‘Mech, a Loki, which registered as Echo 2, and a Cougar which was Echo 4. She recalled that Sara said they had an assault ‘Mech in their lance. Where was it? “Echo Leader, Delta 2 here. Where’s Echo 3?” Elizabeth asked Sara. “Good question. Lauren’s dropped off radar. Echo 3, report position.” Sara broadcasted. Another female voice, though this one sounded a bit less urban emitted from Elizabeth’s headset. “Right here boss. Radar’s off. Sorry, can’t push this Blood Asp any faster than 45 kay-pea-aitch on ice.” A Blood Asp? That was an assault ‘Mech if one ever existed. The Blood Asp was perhaps the meanest assault class ‘Mech in existence, though it was even slower then an Atlas because of its leg design. The chassis Blood Asp was built on at the cost of speed made up in stability, it was nearly impossible to knock a Blood Asp over. “Need a really big gun?” Echo 3 said. Her Blood Asp was painted red. “How the hell did you get your hands on that?!” Elizabeth asked. “Star Adder boys won’t miss it.” Elizabeth let out a laugh, they had stolen it from Clan Star Adder. The Blood Asp was a feat in itself, having stolen it an outright achievement. “Echo 4 here, I just got three major radar contacts, forming up behind us. Incoming enemy ‘Mechs with tank support.” “This situation is getting seriously out of hand!!” Casey shouted over the radio. “Elizabeth haul your ass back here, Echo you gotta speed things up a bit.” Ethan ordered. “Echo you heard the man, MOVE!” Sara yelled, “Avery get up there, we’re going to need every last bit of firepower we have available to take down those assault ‘Mechs.” “Sara, with all due respect, with eight ‘Mechs this is a still a heavy weighed fight. I’ve only seen an Atlas once and it was on our side. Those DO NOT die when they should.” Demetri, Echo 2 complained. “Not to mention those bringing up the rear.” Avery interjected. Elizabeth brought her Stiletto about to see a Cougar run past her back towards the dropship, although she couldn’t keep up with the Cougar across the ice pack she couldn’t help but notice her ‘Mech was faster than Sara’s Shadow Cat. In it’s defense, the Shadow Cat was built to be a ‘Jack of all trades’ it had weapon slots for everything. “Ethan, Echo lead here, what’s the plan for the stragglers coming up the rear?” Sara asked. “I’m open to suggestions. How many are there? Elizabeth are you getting anything on radar?” Ethan asked. Elizabeth was getting a headache, there was too much COM chatter going on. Sara was going on about something else. “Echo 4 have you met up with Cascade yet?” “Not yet boss, almost there.” “I got him on radar.” Casey said. He was a hundred or so meters further south than Ethan. Ethan’s radar picked up a contact and emitted a ping, it registered as friendly. “Confirmed, Echo 4 on station. Glad you could make it.” Ethan said to Avery. “Yeah, no problem. I see you haven’t started the party without me.” Avery said. Ethan couldn’t tell if he was making a crack at the current stance of his lance, scattered, unorganized or if he was just joking around. No matter. Connor started speaking again. “Lead, those assault ‘Mechs have to have me on radar by now. What do I do?” Connor had the clear sound of worry in his voice. Ethan’s mind was racing a mile a minute. So much to worry about right now. His radar pinged, four contacts coming in from the north one thousand meters out. Elizabeth and Sara were less than four hundred meters from them, what he assumed Echo 2 at a little over six hundred meters and Echo 3 at eight hundred. Sara was starting to formulate a plan. “Lauren, you think you could take an Atlas by yourself? Lauren was unsure, could she attack an Atlas by herself? Definitely, could she come out on top was questionable at best. A Blood Asp was a mean ‘Mech, but the Atlas could be just as mean. “I think I could definitely last a bit. That’s not confidence inspiring is it?” She replied. “No not really, but I think you’re gonna have to suck it up. Just be smart about it, you’ll be fine.” Casey jumped in. “Hey, I could take on an Atlas... with a tiny bit of fire support.” “Da, I could as well. With a ‘tiny’ bit of assistance.” Demetri said. Ethan jumped on the opportunity, “You think you two could take on an Atlas?” “With comrade Stalingrad over here, no doubt about it.” Demetri ignored the remark. “Just point me to the enemy, and stay out of my way.”         Ethan was still sweating. What about the last one? An Atlas was a hell of a tough nut to crack. He still didn’t understand why there had been three of them waiting there for them. What was worth protecting in that city? “Looks like it’s you and me Liz.” Ethan said nervously, “We better get lucky.” “Hey, what about us?” Avery called out. Sara interjected. “We gotta cover the rear. Enemies inbound. Echo 4, you’re on me. Delta 4, form up.” “You heard the lady Connor, get going.” Ethan ordered. “Everyone from up, we’re going to hit them all at once.”         The terrain was fairly flat as it was required for the Talon class dropship they had been deployed out of to land, they were on the interiour of a large basin, with two open ends, an extremely large bowl almost. The basin stretched for a dozen kilometers or so east and west, north and south were the only easy ways in or out, though it was still fairly rough terrain for ‘Mechs because of the permanent ice pack. “Echo 3, you’ll be on your lonesome. Delta 3, Echo 2, you’ll have to work something out. Elizabeth, you’re on me. We’re splitting into three groups, designate Alpha, Bravo, Charlie. Delta 3, Echo 2, head to NAV bravo, you guys attack first on my mark. Echo 3 get to NAV alpha. You attack second, don’t want them hatin’ on the Blood Asp. Sara, you’ve got command on the rear. Connor do as the lady says. Elizabeth, we attack last. I’m bold but not crazy.” Ethan assigned, “Anything else anyone want to add?” “Drinks on me when we get back?” Casey asked. Elizabeth was already standing on the NAV point her display said ‘New NAV point’ then immediately followed up with ‘NAV point reached. “Incoming!!!!” Casey yelled into the microphone on his headset. “Casey, Echo 2 you’re clear for engagement, I repeat GO now.” Ethan ordered. Casey and Demetri had set up behind a pack of freshly dropped snow. Demetri’s Loki had been repainted with a snow camouflage, Casey’s Thor had been painted an urban grey as they expected to be fighting in the city. With their radar’s off the first Atlas which had been the furthest to the east. Demetri had attacked first, his Loki was outfitted with: two Particle Projection Cannons, or PPC’s for short mounted to the arms of his ‘Mech, two Clan Machine Gun Arrays, four guns per array attached above the PPC’s on the arms, two Medium Laser’s on the ‘Mech’s left torso, and a single Clan LRM 15 pack that was attached above the ‘Mech’s right shoulder. “Engaging Atlas now.” Demetri said over the radio as he first both PPC’s in unison followed by a non-locked missile barrage. One of the PPC shots missed the other impacted on the Atlas’ left arm causing it to turn slightly to the left. Three of his six fired missiles hit the Atlas, one in the left arm, two in the left torso. The already weakened and superheated plating on the left arm was softer when the missile impacted which burned through some more armor.  The enemy pilot was experienced but overconfident when he broke off in the direction towards Demetri. The lance lead also broke off towards Demetri, the one Demetri had attacked first shot what looked like an Auto-Cannon 10 at him followed by a Light Gauss Rifle shot. The incredibly accurate gauss shot impacted right in the centre of Demetri’s Loki, shaking the ‘Mech violently causing the corrections systems to put a leg back for stability. “Echo 3, here engaging target.... wish me luck.” Lauren said, the fear in his voice apparent. “Ethan, the leading Atlas is heading right for us, we can’t hold our own here for long.” Casey spoke louder usual. “I’m attacking it now.” “Casey, ignore it. We’re moving in on it. Elizabeth, lets go.”         Lauren caught the Atlas that hadn’t broken formation off guard as well. It had continued towards the drop ship. Her Blood Asp wielded as deadly set of six machine gun arrays, 3 guns per array, one on each arm and two on the left and right torso. She also had two LRM 10’s on the shoulders of her ‘Mech above the MG arrays, a vast set of laser’s including: one heavy laser on each arm, four Clan Medium Lasers on the cannons above the cockpit, and four Medium Pulse Lasers, two each below the MG arrays on the left and right sections of the ‘Mech’s torso. She had so many energy based weapons that it took an ungodly amount of heat sinks to manage it all, before the OP Lauren had torn most of them out because of the freezing environment they would be fighting in and had upped the amount of armour she had on her ‘Mech by a few metric tonnes she now regretted that choice now as those were her main weapons and hadn’t been expecting to go toe to toe with an Atlas.         The Blood Asp unleashed a rainbow of colours green, blue, and red mostly when Lauren fired all of the laser banks at once, her target, the west Atlas was four hundred metres away and only got scratched by the Pulse Lasers but had otherwise been hit by the full force of everything else right in the right arm. The pilot clearly flinched when their targeting computer identified what was attacking their ‘Mech. Most cringed under the words Blood Asp, the pilot failed to be intimidated however. The pilot turned the Atlas and charged fullspeed towards her stationary Blood Asp. Lauren cranked the speedometer to as fast as the ‘Mech would go, which slightly increased the already moderate amount of heat build up that had only just peaked. It was enough for the AI in her ‘Mech to say ‘heat exceeding recommended levels.’  the thermometer read that her reactor temperature was over 4000 kelvin above running temperature which was indicated as 0 kelvin on the thermometer. The Blood Asp lurched forwards at a speed of 45 Km/h, which wasn’t unrespectable for an Assault Class ‘Mech. The distance closed between her and the Steiner Atlas, which had already shot two sets of Gauss rounds at her, both of which barely dented her ‘Mech and had followed up with a PPC shot that missed. The distance between the two behemoths fell below 200 metres and Lauren veered to the left trying to circle strafe around the Atlas, which was slightly slower than her at the moment. Firing all 6 MG arrays at once Lauren pelted the Atlas in armor piercing ammunition only to have the HUD chime in with a notification ‘Target Atlas appears to be using Reactive Armour, Ballistics Weapons may be ineffective.’ “Shit!” Lauren shouted, but hadn’t activated her radio so no one heard her say it. Firing both LRM 10’s brought the reactor temperature up, it was over 4000 kelvin again, she followed up with both sets of medium lasers and pulse lasers, which were fairly effective at the range she was in now at. This further pushed reactor temperature up over 5000 kelvin. ‘Heat exceeding recommended levels’ Lauren however ignored this looking at her HUD showed that she had done a substantial amount of damage to the Atlas’ right arm and torso. The Atlas retaliated by firing it’s gauss rifle again and a set of pulse laser packs out of its torso, it then fired a single PPC out of its left arm which impacted right after the gauss rifle. The Blood Asp shrugged off the gauss round but her electrical systems were interfered by the PPC blast. She wasn’t able to aim properly but fired the pulse lasers again hitting the Atlas in the left arm, and fired again a few more times hitting the left arm repeatedly.         The Atlas suddenly reversed when it fired a set of LRM 20’s out of it’s torso and a medium laser out of it’s head. Lauren’s AMS system did it’s best but she was struck by 8 of the 16 missiles that had been launched, 6 missed 2 eliminated by the AMS she had installed. Her HUD status showed that her the left arm of the ‘Mech had gone from blue to green. There wasn’t that much armor on the arms as they only contained 2 weapons across both. She returned fire from the right arm firing the heavy laser, which missed. She continued with both LRM 10’s which now had a lock on for the right arm of the Atlas, the impact threw the pilot’s aim off because the PPC shot missed by at least a dozen metres. Lauren noted nothing had been fired from the right arm of the Atlas yet, so there probably wasn’t any weapons in that arm, and therefore no armour either. She was wasting her time shooting the right arm. From what she could tell, there was a gauss rifle on the torso by the hip and a light version on the left arm. Those and the missile packs were the main threat. The pair were now over 400 metres apart again, the Atlas had backed off enough and fired it’s PPC again, which hit Lauren’s ‘Mech in the right leg. Lauren smiled, the chassis the Blood Asp was built on made it stable because of the design of the legs, which had also been made extremely heavy accounting for 30 metric tonnes of the entire ‘Mech’s mass in just the legs, this meant they had literally tons of armor on them. The shot did little more than burn the paint off. Casey had stepped out to help Demetri after he reactivated the radar only to see two targets coming towards them, Ethan had ordered them not to engage the rouge Atlas. Casey’s Thor was outfitted with two heavy lasers, one on the torso and one on the left arm, one of which was a clan version. Two Clan Medium Pulse Lasers on the torso and left arm. A single light gauss rifle on the right arm, and a Clan Streak SRM6 or C-Strike6 for short on the missile pack which was mounted above the left shoulder. Having been told to ignore the second Atlas, Casey fired both the light gauss and both heavy lasers at the approaching Atlas, which was still concentrating on Demetri. “Taking a lot of hits here Delta 3, need assistance!” Demetri was shouting over the radio. “Roger that.” Casey replied as he stepped in between the Atlas and Loki.  Firing the CTRK6 all of which impacted, “Oh, great now I’ve got it’s attention.”         The Atlas turned around then fired a PPC out of it’s right arm followed by an LRM 15 barrage out of it’s right torso and three medium lasers, one from the left torso, two from the left arm. The missiles missed, but the PPC and lasers hit Casey’s Thor directly in the torso. “Keep him off of me for a few more seconds! PPCs recharged almost!” Demetri yelled over the radio. Loki which had come up beside him fired both PPC’s and then continued with machine gun arrays. “‘Mech heating up here. Delta 3, sticking to missiles and machine guns.” “Affirmative, comrade.” Casey joked. Demetri’s Loki kept the machine gun fire constant, with the occasional barrage of missiles LRM 15’s which were fairly accurate. Firing a single PPC to keep the damage going the AI voiced ‘Heat exceeding recommended levels.’ the Loki’s temperature read 5700 kelvin, but was dropping fairly quickly, 5400... 5000... 4500... he had heavily invested in heat efficiency and armour rather than firepower. The twin PPC’s on his ‘Mech accounted for 70% of the damage output, the next 25% coming from the LRM’s and the remaining 5% from the machine guns. Casey on the other hand had sacrificed a large immediate damage output for durability, having the maximum amount of possible armour. His energy weapons weren’t heat heavy either, as he had enough heat sinks to manage the build up so long as he didn’t spam the weapons constantly, the reason why he had the light gauss rifle installed. Casey shot another round of SRM’s and continued with laser fire. The heavy laser set doing it’s job as he scored the shot that brought the Atlas’ torso into the orange that his HUD indicated. Demetri had gone around to the rear of the Atlas where the armour wasn’t quite as tough, reigning hell with his machine guns. Casey shot another light gauss round whilst strafing around in a circle in front of the Atlas, the round ricocheted right off. Demetri only heard part of what Casey had said over the radio, but he did see the round reflect off the armour. Casey had said something along the lines of. ‘Oh that’s Bul...’ but Demetri had fired another set of LRM 15’s which had muffled out the noise. “I can’t stand toe-to-toe here much longer Echo 2!” Casey screamed into the radio, his ‘Mech status was reading yellow to orange on almost every part of his ‘Mech. “I suggest you do something!” Demetri’s fusion reactor had finally passed below 3000 kelvin, he fired both PPC’s in unison again, both of which smashed into the Atlas’ left leg, hitting it in the joint. “He’s immobilized. Finish him off.” Demetri ordered. Casey fired another light gauss shot, which had hit right where the AC 10 that was mounted on the enemy ‘Mechs lower right waist, the autoloader exploded and ripped the side of the Atlas open. Casey finished it off with a full pack of missiles with laser fire. Casey watched the pilot eject. The Atlas was engulfed in flames then fell to the ground with a large THUMP. “Target eliminated, but Delta 3 isn’t suited for any further combat.” Demetri said. “We’ve got the situation well in hand. You guys stay out of it.” Ethan said.         Demetri had no arguments, his Loki didn’t have as much armour as Casey’s Thor. The few shots he took at the very beginning had reduced his torso to less than 50% armour, as indicated by a solid yellow on his HUD, he targeted Casey, his Thor was a mess. It came up to be yellow in both arms, and right leg. The left leg was orange, along with the torso and shoulders, the left arm was green while the other was red. Most of the paint on the ‘Mech was blackened from the weapon impacts. The only part of his ‘Mech that wasn’t damaged was the cockpit which showed blue.         Lauren wasn’t doing so bad, but she had her back to the wall. The enemy Atlas had charged again, and Lauren didn’t have any choice but to back up until she had reversed into a hill which was too steep for her ‘Mech to climb backwards. The Atlas had her beat at long range, as it had two gauss rifles, one on the lower torso and one on the left arm. The left arm also contained the PPC, while the right arm continued to appear weaponless. The Atlas had closed in on her and was less than 300 metres away. At this range Lauren didn’t have any choice but to continuously fire the medium pulse laser banks and standard medium lasers, which were pushing the reactor temperature up at an alarming rate. After dumping the remaining coolant into to fusion core, the reactor temperature still read 2000 kelvin, down from the 6100 kelvin it was at previously. The damage each assault ‘Mech was doing to eachother was taking it’s toll, according to her HUD, her Blood Asp’s torso had less than 40% of it’s original armour still on its torso, mostly because of the gauss impacts that had shattered it all off. The Atlas on the other hand was damaged as well, but still had about 60% of it’s torso armour on it. She was losing... slowly.         After firing both packs of LRM 10’s, Lauren dropped both heavy lasers right into the torso of the Atlas, following that with continued pulse laser fire. The Atlas retaliated with it’s PPC and gauss rifles, the PPC hit her dead in the torso again. This caused the gauss rounds that had followed right after to do full impact damage. “Need some help here!” Lauren called over her radio. “I’m on my way. Just hold on!” Casey replied. “Neit, Delta 3, you are no longer fit for combat. Disengage.” Demetri ordered. “You’re not the boss of me!” Casey retorted. “Do as the man says Casey.” Ethan ordered. “Ethan, she’s getting pulverized by that thing!” Sara chimed in. “Demetri, go give Lauren a hand.” “Echo 4 here, south flank is secured. We’re on our way.” Avery said. “Affirmative, south flank is clean.” Connor said, “ETA two minutes.”         Ethan and Elizabeth had brought the lead Atlas over from Demetri and Casey who had already beaten on their Atlas pretty badly. Elizabeth attacked first, firing her Stiletto’s light gauss hitting it in the leg, Ethan backed her up, firing both of his Uziel’s PPC’s. Ethan and Elizabeth both ran circles around the slow Atlas in their medium ‘Mechs. Avoiding the majority of it’s shots, and clearly pissing the pilot off. Until Elizabeth accidentally overheated her ‘Mech when she got in close and started burning the Atlas with her Stiletto’s flamethrower. Elizabeth’s Stiletto had overheated, the reactor automatically shutdown to avoid it from overloading, that could have caused a meltdown. She had pushed her ‘Mech to over 7000 degrees kelvin, and the AI had said ‘Heat levels critical shutdown imminent.’ Ethan had been behind her, flushing some coolant as the PPC’s on his ‘Mech were the only weapons he had capable of doing damage to the Atlas. Elizabeth’s Stiletto hunched over, as the reactor shutdown temporarily. Her radio still worked though, the Atlas had turned around and was staring right at the inert ‘Mech. “Ethan!!!!” Elizabeth screamed into the radio. Ethan turned his Uziel to look right at the Atlas dead on, with Elizabeth’s Stiletto in front of it and pushed his ‘Mech to the fastest it would go, 89 Km/h. Firing both sets of PPC’s and the LRM 15 mounted on his ‘Mech. The Atlas took the bait and had retargeted the incoming Uziel. The Atlas failed to react when the Uziel took off the ground and sailed right over Elizabeth’s Stiletto, hitting the Atlas in the upper torso with it’s full 50 metric tonne mass.         After the massive CLANG caused by metal hitting metal, the Uziel dropped to the ground upright. Even though the airtight pilot seat of Ethan’s ‘Mech, he could hear the Atlas’ gyroscopes screaming to keep the ‘Mech upright as it leaned further and further back after he had hit it at over 100 Km/h near the top of the ‘Mech. Gravity overpowered the Atlas and brought it crashing down into the ground on its back where it sunk into the hard snow at least three metres. Ethan’s Uziel was fine, but the cockpit glass had cracked in several places, making it difficult to see. Bringing the ‘Mech around, Ethan’s line of sight brought Elizabeth’s Stiletto into view as it finally powered back up, she shot her light gauss rifle right into the head of the Atlas, Ethan followed with his PPC’s hitting it in the same place. The head of the Atlas blew clean off, and the ‘Mech shut itself down. Casey who had been watching, cheered over the radio. “Oh that salvage!” Ethan let out a laugh, as Elizabeth was speechless at what he had just done. Knocking over an Atlas by flight his ‘Mech into it. “Are you freakin’ crazy?!” Elizabeth yelled into the mic, “You could have gotten yourself killed.” “Yeah, whatever. Oh and dibs on the LRM 20.” Ethan remarked. “Fair enough, if that LGR is a clan make, I’m taking it.” Elizabeth said. “Echo 2 on station.” Demetri said. “Just shoot the damn thing! I can’t take much more of this.” Lauren was struggling to hold it together. The AI advisor chimed ‘Weapon destroyed’ she had lost all the weapons on her left torso, both the pulse lasers, MG arrays, and the LRM 10. She hit the Atlas again right in the left arm which blew the bottom portion off completely, bringing her reactor temperature up to over 3000 kelvin again. The Atlas had lost one of it’s gauss rifles and it’s PPC cannon. The right arm continued to be silent. The Atlas had reverted to using it’s remaining gauss rifle and it’s laser packs, it had ran out of missiles to shoot at the Blood Asp, her AMS system had taken out over a quarter of it’s available missiles, and ones that missed accounted for another quarter. Lauren was pushing the maneuverability of her assault ‘Mech to it’s limits, now that she had finally gotten away from the really steep hill she couldn’t drive up.         Demetri approached the Atlas from the rear slightly more off to the right and fired a single PPC into the ‘Mech hoping to hit it in the arm, it missed and traveled right into the remaining hip fired gauss rifle, frying the electrical components and effectively neutralizing it. Leaving the behemoth with only a few medium laser batteries on it’s torso. Lauren shot the torso again with her medium lasers, as the Atlas was now basically a 100 metric tonne paper weight, it had no more functioning weapons. The pilot ejected from the ‘Mech, leaving it for the taking.         Lauren moved her Blood Asp backwards from the Atlas, and let out a sigh of relief. She had almost started crying during the fight. Lauren’s voice cracked as she radioed Demetri. “Thanks... I owe you one.” “It was nearly dead anyway, you just didn’t know it, did a good job. Respectable work. Looks like it’s... ahh it’s nearly in one piece. Good salvage if you didn’t damage any of the weapons systems beyond repair.” “Aww looks like you guys had the party without us.” Avery said. Lauren was at her wits end, she nearly had just had her ‘Mech ripped to shreds by an Atlas and Avery was joking around as usual. But she was too relieved to tell him off for being a jackass. “Lets get the hell off this iceball.” Sara said. “Planners here, I’ve notified the guys upstairs, we’re to launch and meet up with the jumpship for repairs.” Planners was the mission advisor that handled intel and ground operations for Ethan and his lance. They had been told they were only going to meet mild resistance, if a city filled to the brim with Atlas’ was considered mild, he would have hated to had dealt with heavy resistance. “Planners, get on the horn with the idiots that gave us bad intel. Better you deal with them then my self.” Ethan said, “I knew military intelligence was shoddy at best but whoever looked at the radar scans and said ‘mild’ resistance for what clearly was assault ‘Mechs needs to have his teeth ripped out individually.” Elizabeth was listening to what Ethan was saying, he was normally fairly chilled out when on duty or on an OP, but he was clearly very upset at the moment. She hadn’t seem him this mad in a long time, and they had been working together for nearly half a decade now. Elizabeth walked her ‘Mech which was still running hot, she assumed some of the heatsinks had burnt out entirely, into the bay of the Talon class dropship. “Roger that Delta lead. Notifying salvage teams to come clean the area out.” Planners said “Delta Actual. Echo lead, get some people to take a look at the south flank, we messed up some ‘Mechs back there and a few tanks. Still might be some usable stuff. And make it fast, snow will cover it up in a matter of hours.” Sara said. “Copy Echo lead. Even out the weight on boarding. Port side holding bays, bow to aft: Delta 4, Delta 3, Echo 3, and Echo 1. Starboard side, same orientation: Echo 4, Echo 2, Delta 1, and Delta 2. I’m also going to report the area secure, the Steiner’s will think twice when they realize three of their toughest ‘Mechs are dead.” Planners replied. The Talon dropship ‘Cascade’ had been designed to be able to launch with all eight ‘Mech bays loaded and both sets of cargo bays completely full. That was the extent of it’s lifting capacity. However each of the bays were considered ‘full’ at 70 metric tonnes each, with the weight evenly distributed throughout all eight bays. When they had gone from orbit to ground, Casey and Connor had been put in the middle two bays on the port side, and Elizabeth and Ethan had taken the middle two bays on starboard side. From what Ethan could remember, a Blood Asp by default came in at around 90 metric tonnes, but they had all used quite a bit of ammunition. It looked like Planners was trying to average out each of the ‘Mechs weights. If she did it wrong, the dropship could be bow to stern heavy or port to starboard heavy, which was the reason why she hadn’t put both heavy ‘Mechs on one side. After about fifteen minutes each ‘Mech was in designated bay and secured to the floor. “Echo lead, reporting secure.” “Delta lead, ready to launch.” “Delta 2 here, I’m good to go.” “Delta 3, Lets get the hell out of here.” “Echo 4, ‘Mech is seat belted in.” “I hate microgravity.... Echo 3 secured and ready for launch.” “Delta 4 tucked in.” “Echo 2, confirming ready to launch.” The Jumpship had artificial gravity through gravity well generators, which allowed for people to walk normally through most parts of the ship, dropships however were too small to be able to sport GWG’s so they had to be designed to not let stuff fly everywhere once they made orbit, that including gripping the ‘Mechs into the bays with massively powerful electromagnets and huge clamps around the ‘limbs’ of the ‘Mech. With the rest of the crew which numbered around 20 not including the Mechwarriors had to be strapped to part of the ship to stop them from flying upwards at the rate of 9.9 metres per second squared (Northwind gravity 1.01 Earth g’s) once the ship made orbit. The Talon class dropship could do vertical lands and take-offs, making it technically a ‘VTOL’ but was so long that it needed to have a strip of open land for it to use.         The airtight cockpit of Elizabeth’s Stiletto failed to stop the noise from coming through when the rockets fired, shaking the ship incredibly. After a minute or so, the noise dropped and the shaking lessened considerably. Loose items around her cabin floated up off the floor and ricocheted around the cabin of her ‘Mech. “Entering the Jumpship’s Gravity Field in 5.” Planners informed the lances. The floating items in Elizabeth’s cabin fell “down” a few seconds later. She unharnessed herself from the pilot seat of her ‘Mech which was drenched in sweat, and always was after an OP no matter what she did. Her ‘Mech pilot suit smelt terrible and needed to be washed. Popping the hatch on her ‘Mech she climbed out and saw that repair technicians were already out examining the ‘Mechs. “Docking with the Jumpship Atlantis. Please stand by.” Planners said over the intercom. The dropship jostled a bit and the clang of metal on metal was heard. Ethan was already out of his ‘Mech and was walking briskly towards the docking port, fists clenched. Sara met up with him, she was clearly just as angry as he was that they both got garbage intel on both of their operations. Planners could be heard over the intercom again. “Repair teams, estimated time to completion: completion two days.” “Sara follow me, lets go find Planners and then go find the idiot liaison officer that gave us bad intel. There’s no way you FUCK UP that badly. Mild resistance my ass.” Ethan was practically fuming. Sara was quiet, which meant that she was pissed off. They were told light resistance with possibility of ‘Mech support, not lances of ‘Mechs defending a single target with tank support and artillery. Her ‘Mech had taken a few rounds before she got orders to retreat, just to find the dropship in ruins. Planners walked out of a door ahead of them. “Ah, there you are Ethan.” Planners said offering an outstretched hand, “And Echo lead I assume? Pleased to meet you.” Sara accepted the handshake. “ Sara Price. Thanks for getting my team out. Both of you actually.” “It was no problem at all. Well you know other than the whole we had to kill three Atlases thing.” Ethan said, he had calmed down considerably. “I’ve got three salvage teams contacted to go down and strip what they can. Words already buzzing about what you guys did.” Planners said, she was clearly impressed. “Lets focus on the real matter here. Who handed you that mission briefing Ashley?” Ethan asked. “Came down from upstairs. No name on it, but it was approved by the brass. I thought it was all accurate.” Planners explained. “Seeing as my advisor is dead, I’ll have to assume they got the same garbage intel.” Sara said. “Sorry, I wish I could help you out more. But to cheer you guys up, I’ve delayed the next time you’re being deployed, you’ve got some time off. Additionally, I just got word from the guys upstairs, Echo you’ve been transferred and are now under my advisory, you’ll be staying with us for the duration of the mission.” Planners said. “Time off? How much? And where.” Ethan asked. “You’ve got the lounge here, and any non-combat facilities on the jumpship. Might I note you also get access to the refreshers?” Planners joked. “Oh thank god, it’s been a week since I’ve last taken a shower.” Sara said. “Round up your teams, and relax, I’ll be getting our next mission ready. You have four days.” Planners said. Ethan and Sara wheeled around heading back to the ‘Mech bay, when they arrived they found Casey and Demetri arm wrestling using a flipped over, expended Auto-Cannon shell casing as a table, Elizabeth and Lauren were watching with interest. “Hey Ethan what’s up?” Connor asked, he had been absent during the battle so this was the most he had heard out of him all day. He was sitting with Avery who had been telling him a joke. Sara spoke to get the groups attention. “Ladies, and the rest of you. Echo we’ve been reassigned, we’re now with Delta for the rest of the op.” “RAAAHHHH!!!” Casey shouted as he was starting overpower Demetri, but Demetri held fast, but the shout was muffled slightly as the repair crews started their work on the ‘Mechs. “Anyways, we’ve got time off...” Ethan trailed off. The mentioning of time off got the attention of all of them as Casey unknowing lost to Demetri, and Lauren and Elizabeth immediately looked over. Avery and Connor had already been listening. “We’ve got until the end of this business week. The lounge, bar, and dormitories are free for use as much as you want. We also have any of the fun places on the Atlantis. That being said, Delta I’m ordering all of you to the showers. Go clean yourselves up, then you’re free to do whatever the hell you want.” Ethan said. “Echo you too, showers. NOW. You guys stink, I can smell you from here.” Sara insulted. Sara barely heard it, or who said it for that matter. Avery whispered something to Connor, and they both instantly burst out laughing. “Got something you wanna share Avery?” Sara asked, looking down at him. Connor had his back. “Nope, nothing at all.” As the pair kept laughing. Sara shook her head and rolled her eyes. “Get out of here. Both of you.” Connor got up and Avery followed him they were off to the refreshers. Demetri had followed them afterwards with Lauren and Casey tailing him. Sara parted in the same direction soon after. “You saved my ass down there, again. Thanks.” Elizabeth said. “That’s six you owe me now.” Ethan remarked. “Four. That time on Dante doesn’t count, and well you know...” Elizabeth retorted. “Whatever you say, come on lets go. I have private quarters on the Atlantis.” Ethan said, grabbing her by the hand she blushed. --- Ethan woke up the next morning, Elizabeth in his arms. He hadn’t slept well but that was better than what he normally slept, which was nothing at all. He took a cold shower and left a note for Elizabeth. Swapping out his pilot suit for his civvies, he had fallen asleep with her in his pilot suit. Ethan left for the dropship, making a stop at the galley on the way there for some food. Space food wasn’t all horrendous, just most of it. You had to know what to get and what to avoid. Ethan found Casey and Demetri there with Avery. Demetri and Casey were downing shots of vodka. “Knock it off you two, it’s too early to be drinking rubbing alcohol.” Ethan barked. “Don’t take orders from you.” Demetri said, downing another shot. “Right, but Casey does.” Ethan retorted. “Sorry boss.” Casey said as he drank what he had left in his shot glass. “We’ll pick this up later.” Casey walked off somewhere, Ethan hadn’t caught them far into their contest, so he wasn’t pissed drunk, maybe a light buzz. Sara walked in after he left, and saw Demetri with the bottle. “Dammit Demetri, lay off the sauce. It’s 9:00 in the friggin’ morning, Gee-Emm-Tee.” Sara barked. “I just told him the same damn thing.” Ethan said. “He didn’t listen to you?” Sara asked. “Well lets set this straight right now. As long as we’re working together you take orders from both of us am I clear? Avery spread that around to the rest of them once you get out of here.” Avery nodded his head even though he hadn’t really done anything, but Demetri downed another shot. Much to Sara’s distaste, and Ethan’s annoyance. “Am I CLEAR? Echo 2?” Sara barked again. The rest of the bar had gone quiet, staring at her. “Yes ma’am.” Demetri was clearly annoyed, as he got up and left immediately. “Jesus Christ, some time I wonder.” Sara said under her breath. Sara and Ethan sat down beside Avery who was getting to the end of his meal. Sara got hashbrowns with steak, Ethan got eggs and toast. Surprisingly, Planners walked into the mess. “Did expect to see you here. Whadda got for us?” Ethan asked. “Mission plans, you’re due back down there in three days, before the break of dawn. We’re going after the same prize again. Capture the city, but we’re going in with reinforcements this time.” Ashley explained. “Reinforcements?” Sara asked. “Both of your lances are being tasked with capturing the city, along with a VTOL squad, armour brigade, and body armour backup. “At least the odds are in our favour this time. What will our forces be like?” Ethan asked. “On top of the eight ‘Mechs, two flights of VTOL’s for air support, three per flight. Four Rommel Mk II tank brigades, three per brigade, and five manned BattleArmour Mk. I’s.” “BattleArmour mark one?” Ethan asked again. “I’ll send you a dossier later today. It’ll give you everything you need to know. Nonetheless, the guys in charge of this operation send their apologies for the information screw up and also said if you fail to take the city with this force, you’re not getting paid.” That was the one drawback to being a merc. Your employer can choose not to pay you. Had they been actual clan members, they would have huge rewards for the ‘Mechs they had brought down the day prior. “Salvage teams are bringing up the loot tomorrow, hopefully we’ll get a good cut, or some good tech. Either way, we did some good work there yesterday.” Ethan said. “Speaking of which, I need to go see what the repair teams are doing on our ‘Mechs.” Avery said, as he pushed his plate away from him and walked out of the galley. “Free seat Planners.” Sara motioned her to sit down. “Sorry, I’ve got a lot of work to do. You’d be best helping with the refit of your ‘Mechs.” She said. Ethan finished up his own breakfast and left, Sara caught up to him a minute or two after he left the mess hall. She was shorter than he was, and had dirty blonde hair that was cut short, it fit better in the helmet that you had to wear when piloting a ‘Mech.         The repairs were already well underway on their ‘Mechs, Lauren’s damaged Blood Asp was starting to look new again, all it needed was a new coat of paint. One of the techs approached Ethan. “Hey, we salvaged a pair of Clan Extended Range PPC’s from another OP. We noticed your ‘Mech. It’s the Uziel right? We noticed that you’re running older versions. Do you want us to replace them with these or leave it? The ER PPC’s have a further range, and more power output per shot, they also weigh a few tonnes less. But they run hotter faster and take longer to recharge the capacitors before they can be fired again.” “No, it’s fine. I run a bajillion heatsinks anyways, I’d have to add more. Also, give me the salvage manifest.” Ethan replied. “We’re not quite finished, we’ve got another haul to do before we’ve got everything up here. Also, we managed to use parts from one of the Atlases to repair two of the three. We’ve got plans to fix two of them, and sell them off to the Highlanders. Seeing as your team brought them down in mostly one piece you guys get 30% of the sale price on top the 20% pot on any salvaged parts you guys don’t use. After restocking fees on your weapons of course.” The tech said. “Alright let me know when you’ve finished raking that stuff in, and I want it on a per Atlas basis on the list.” Ethan said. “Will do. I gotta get back to work here. Drop by sometime tomorrow morning for the full list.” This operation just might get better after all. 30% on two used Atlas’ that would be new parts and full restock. Put some wax on the shiny overhauled ‘Mechs and Ethan might just consider yesterdays engagement worth it. Casey was helping out with the repairs on his ‘Mech, he didn’t like leaving it alone or having it repaired without him there for everything. Ethan could tell he was lecturing one of the techs for something, he wasn’t entirely sure. The noise in the dropship bays was deafening, the welding torches adding new armour, or cutting off burnt remains of armour according to each of the ‘Mechs specifications stored on the individual technical readouts. Elizabeth wandered into the bay, cupping a hand over her ears in an attempt to keep the noise out. Analyzing her Stiletto, one of the technicians came over to her shouting to try and talk to her over the noise. “This one yours?” The tech yelled. “Yeah! Why?” Elizabeth asked, yelling back. “You did a number on your heat sinks, we’ve had to pretty much scrape what was left of them out with a chisel. We’ve replaced them and added a few more, you didn’t have your tonnage maxed out, so we threw them in. Any objections?!” Asked the tech. “No, that’s fine. Just don’t replace any of the weapons unless you have to.” she said. Elizabeth admired the handy work done by the repair technicians, when she was tapped on the shoulder. Spinning around on the spot, she found Ethan almost right behind her. He was a bit taller than her so she had to tilt her head back ever so slightly to look him in the face. “Still a few days to wait for the leftovers on the surface to come through. Though, we’re all gonna be slightly richer.” The background noise of the bays drowning out most of his voice. “You ever gonna tell me where you get your crazy ideas? Driving your ‘Mech into another one to knock it over, crazy bastard.” Elizabeth said. “What else was I supposed to do?” Elizabeth shrugged, “Idunno.” Another day past had past, and Casey woke up hungover. He had picked up his drinking contest that night with Demetri. He had never seen anyone down that much pure alcohol straight up. He did manage to keep up for a while, but eventually fell behind. After admitting defeat Sara had to help him back to his bunk on the Cascade. Demetri on the other hand was only slightly dizzy, though he started complaining about random stuff. “Hey, for record. You’re a pretty fun drunk.” Demetri said. “Huh? Hey what? Oh hi. I feel like shit right now. Gonna go take a cold shower.” Casey said. Demetri happened to bunk on the bed above him, god knows why. Casey didn’t care, his head felt like it was going to split open. --- “Demetri, got a task for ya.” Sara said. “Da what is it?” Demetri asked, slur in his words. Casey had given him a good run for his money. “Make sure the poor kid doesn’t choke on his vomit while he’s sleeping.” Sara said. “A...al...a Alright.” --- Though he still felt like crap at least he was awake and alert now. Casey did a few laps around the dropship. As he ran through the ‘Mech bays, he saw Ethan with the ‘Techs. Casey used his lap time to think to himself. About the mission mostly. Why was that city so worth defending? No matter, they’d take it for themselves when they got redeployed on Friday. “Casey! Get over here.” Ethan called over the noise. Casey ran over, “Yeah what’s up boss?” “Salvage just finished. Also, I got your cut. But can you get everyone else first? If they don’t listen tell them we have money to split up between the eight of us. On top of new weapons to choose from.” Casey’s heart skipped a beat. New toys for his ‘Mech? That’s the best damn thing that’s happened since they got into this freakin’ mess of a war. Casey had been with Ethan for the longest time, aside from Elizabeth, no one had been with him longer than he had. Connor got sucked into the group of friends that he had been slowly assembling over the years on an op gone bad, almost like this one. Except this time instead of just one person they ran into an entire lance of new people. Whipping the datapad out of his hands, Casey went down the list of stuff they got to access but only got a few parts in before Ethan grabbed it back. “Hey hold on there, you and Demetri get the split on your Atlas,yours, and yours only until everyone else is done with their share of the pot. Now go get everyone.” Ethan ordered as he pulled out a few more datapads. Ethan made it customary for his lancemates to keep communications active between them at all times. Casey favoured a standard pack radio which attached to the waist so he could take it off. Ethan preferred his headset, with an eye piece, which he wore at all times, it was waterproof so he could wear it wherever. Elizabeth had earpiece that just wrapped around the ear with a microphone, and Connor had hearing problems so he had to have a communications link implanted into his left ear which doubled as a radio, so long as he had the wireless microphone attached the collar of his shirt he could talk to everyone. None of that mattered when they were in their ‘Mechs because the helmets came with headset radios. “Hey, you guys. Ethan wants us down in the ‘Mech bay stat. Just got the swag list in. If any of you are with Echo get ‘em down here too.” Casey spoke into his radio. It only picked up noise that sourced a few feet away from it so he didn’t have to yell over the background noise to get his voice through it. --- Elizabeth had been in the rec centre with Lauren watching a bunch of guys play ping pong, the ball was traveling at blur like speeds when two ‘vets’ of table tennis showed up and started playing. She was getting dizzy watching it go from one side of the table to another with Lauren paying more attention to one of the players rather than the actual game itself. “Hey you guys. Ethan wants us down in the ‘Mech bay stat. Just got the swag list in. If any of you are with Echo get ‘em down here too.” The first few times Elizabeth had the ear piece and got a call on it had startled her, but after awhile you got used to a familiar voice popping in out of the blue. “Hey Lauren.” Elizabeth said, but Lauren was clearly still watching the guys. “Lauren.” Elizabeth said again nudging her slightly, failing to get her attention. Elizabeth shook her by the shoulder to get her snapped out of her gazing trance. Lauren turned to her as if she barely even noticed. “Hmm?” Lauren asked. “Salvage manifest just came in, lets go look at what we got.” Lauren simply nodded her head as she took a last look at the guys playing ping pong. Following Elizabeth, the two females got looks as they walked down the narrow corridors of the jumpship, mostly from men. “Lookin’ good ladies.” said the lead of a group of men that they passed. “Fuck off.” Elizabeth scolded. The other men in the group started laughing at their lead, saying things like ‘Denied’ or ‘Shot down’. Lauren didn’t seem to mind being ogled by the idiot jocks onboard. Elizabeth remembered Ethan had stepped in on one occasion when some of the more sexist crew members or people they met in general got on her case. Though she appreciated the gesture, she had proven she was capable of handling herself most of the time, in the past. Casey had stuck up for her a few times, Connor as well. But he was just a kid, well he was fairly young, more so for a ‘Mechwarrior. At 19 he was the youngest of the group. Making their way back to the dropship, they were the last two to show up. Sara, Ethan, Demetri, Casey, Connor, and Avery were already there. “Thanks for coming out. Here catch.” Avery joked, he threw a tacpad at Lauren who caught it. Lauren instantly dropped that shallow feeling Elizabeth had been seeing from her the second she had walked into the ‘Mech bay. “What’s this?” Lauren scrolled down list of parts by swiping a finger from bottom to top on the pad. The list kept going and going. Out of her peripheral vision Elizabeth had done the same thing except hers had stopped a lot sooner than Lauren’s did. “Lauren you pretty much single handedly killed an Atlas, all the salvaged parts from that one are yours for the taking. Anything else gets sold off, and goes to a pool. We get 20% of whatever they make and then split it evenly.” Sara said, Ethan had filled her in. “I should probably get my pulse lasers upgraded. Those things are useless. Also, I had the ‘Techs reinstall my heatsinks. No more overheating problems. I don’t care how cold it is in the future.” Lauren said. “Ethan, can I get that Clan Light Gauss? It would be REALLY helpful.”         Ethan and Elizabeth had taken even share on their Atlas. Demetri admitted Lauren had nearly killed her Atlas by herself but she had started to panic. Casey and Demetri had very different weapon system tastes, so there was no problem there. Avery, Sara, and Connor had been dealing with a few ‘Mechs to the south. As it happened they scrapped a Madcat, an Osiris, and an Argus, plus some tanks. So they split their stuff up. “Hey Demetri, I’ve been trying to convince Ethan to upgrade his PPC’s. Whadda you think? You use the ER Clan version right? He’s using inner sphere tech.” “Yes, I recommending using them. HOWEVER, the Uziel shouldn’t because of the increase heat build up. Better off with inner sphere in my opinion. Heavier ‘Mechs should use Clan version yes.” Demetri commented. “Shucks, I still think it’s worth it.” “Hey Casey, you don’t even use PPC’s so shut it.” Ethan leered. The group had a good laugh. Ethan had his ‘Mech refitted with Reflective Armour, and had the MG arrays replaced with Clan versions that weighed less so he still had his armour maxed out, which was better at resisting energy based weapons. Sara’s Shadow Cat got an engine upgrade, she could now move as fast as Ethan’s Uziel. Avery had another AMS system installed on his Cougar, bringing the number of point defense guns on the shoulders of his ‘Mech to four. Lauren swapped out her medium pulse lasers for clan variants. Everyone knew that in general, Clan was better than Inner Sphere or IS tech. Elizabeth’s Stiletto now had a Clan Light Gauss on it, which was the first Ethan had ever seen, the spare tonnage she put into adding heat sinks to the flamethrower, and mounted two medium lasers now beside the cockpit. Connor replaced his old CSTRK 6’s with ones that had better ammo capacity. Casey swapped out his CSTRK6 for two Clan LRM 10’s. Demetri left his ‘Mech the way it was saying ‘it’s the pinnacle of the Loki’. With that ended another day of their time off, they got redeployed the day after tomorrow. --- The following morning, their reinforcements had started to arrive through the large docking port. A single flight of VTOL’s would be coming down with them, the others would be launched from space, as they brought their own fuel and oxygen to burn. Rommel tanks took up the cargo bay and the battle armour specialists squad came in fully suited up and ready to go. They were being sent down at night, so they had to be ready for combat insertion at 4:00 AM the next day. So in reality, they didn’t have another day, it was less than that now. VTOL’s were mounted to racks that let them suspend from the ceiling of the bays, The Rommel Tank brigades were put in the cargo hold. The Talon dropship max load was being fringed upon with all the extra stuff it had to carry. It was rated for 700 metric tonnes of lifting power, fully loaded and fully fueled. Their ‘Mechs alone, not counting the ammunition in them came up to about 450 tonnes. Throw in three aircraft and a bunch of tanks, and Ethan knew they were well over 550 metric tonnes, at a 1000 kilograms a tonne. That was a huge amount of mass on board. The pilots for the VTOL’s were nice enough, they had an Ace with them as well. Her name was Samantha, but went by Sam. Apparently, according to her she had dropped a handful of ‘Mechs single handedly, on top of the other kills she claimed that were hers. Her two wingmen were brothers, cocky as hell and made Avery and Connor look mature. Alexander and Zach were constantly finishing each other's sentences, they were identical twins. VTOL’s were popular for their ability to drop in supplies right into the battlefield. Most long term combat zones required the regular top up, whether it be: replacement armour plating, ammunition for missile and ballistics weapons, capacitors for energy weapons, mobile turrets, even explosive ordinance which turned VTOL’s into long range bombers as they could drop it on unsuspecting enemies from great heights. The tank pilots were different, they mostly kept to themselves, save two of them. Nicole and Nick, they both when by ‘Nic’, they only approached the group because of the VTOL pilots. They had worked with them before, VTOL’s were capable of transporting tanks in and out of combat with it’s cargo lift. Nicole and Nick were specialists in hot LZ combat drops. Which is why they weren’t in ‘Mechs. Rommel Tank Mk. II’s were nasty machines, known for being ‘Mech killers when used properly. Their main cannons were energy based so they had no drop off over distance, the only thing required was a line of sight and a target within that line of sight to do damage. On top of being extremely accurate, Rommel Tank’s came with advanced zoom functions on their main cannons. Letting them use vantage points and distance to their advantage. Aside from the main gun, the Rommel Tank came equipped with a heavy caliber machine gun, which ripped most vehicles to shreds within seconds. The BattleArmour soldiers were the weirdest of the new additions. Elizabeth said she heard one of them call another by name. ‘Garrett’ was one of them, he had stayed behind in the dropship to run some diagnostics on his armour as it was acting weird. The Mk. I Powered BattleArmour suit was an exoskeleton for infantry. This particular version came with a left handed claw specifically designed for climbing buildings, jump jets, a mortar launcher, and a multi-tool right arm which housed a variety of different weapons including: A small pulse laser, medium laser, a precision cutting laser, and a few other tools that could be useful in the battlefield. An ensemble of most of the mercenaries, All the pilots, Sam, Zach and Alexander, Nic and Nick, and Garrett were in the Cascade’s ‘Mech bay getting ready for the mission. After all the preparations were done, it was already after 12:00 AM. Demetri had climbed into his ‘Mech and pulled out few bottles of liquor and a bunch of glasses. Sara gave him a look and he stopped dead before she said ‘Give me the first shot’ where the entire group had a good laugh. Ethan had said not to bother sleeping as they were being deployed in less than three hours. Everything was fine until the question came up. “Hey Ethan.” Sara’s voice sounded numbed a bit from alcohol she had drank. “Yesh?” Ethan asked, he too had sounded a bit more than just buzzed from drinking. “What was your objective anyway, back a few days ago.” “Oh the Kuritans  we were supposed to go secure a nuclear plant in the city. It’s powering the entire region. What... what was your objectives.” Sara laughed. “The Highlanders ordered us and a few other lances to go over run an old ground to orbit mass driver cannon. The guys upstairs said it had no power to it, but it looked like the Steiner’s were getting it ready.” Sara was drunk enough she didn’t even put the pieces together. Demetri however who had built up a tolerance to alcohol dropped the bottle of wine the second he Sara had finished. Ethan stopped dead, and Casey spat out the wine in his mouth. “Oh shit...” “Planners, we got a problem!” Ethan yelled into his headset. “I over heard everything, Casey forgot his transmit button sticks sometimes.” --- Ashley was overlooking the dossier for the teams next mission, which was cued to start in just four hours. Everything had been going as planned, the repairs were finished and they had their reinforcements. When her headset started blurting out noise. “Hey Ethan. Yesh? What was your objective anyway, back a few days ago.” “Oh the Kuritans  we were supposed to go secure a nuclear plant in the city. It’s powering the entire region. What... what was your objectives. The Highlanders ordered us and a few other lances to go over run an old ground to orbit mass driver cannon. The guys upstairs said it had no power to it, but it looked like the Steiner’s were getting it ready.” Said a jumble of voices, one of which she could tell was Ethan. She got another message from her headset. “Planners we got a problem!” “I overheard everything, Casey forgot his transmit button sticks sometimes.” The Highlanders had years ago tried to set up a planetary defense grid, but had failed epically. They just didn’t have enough resources to supply it with, still a few had been manufactured and then put into service, only to be retired but not dismantled. The Highlanders and Kuritans clearly weren’t communicating on this one, as the Kuritans completely overlooked the fact there was an Anti-Orbital Gun that was almost functional, with a power station only a few kilometers from it. The Highlanders hadn’t overlooked that the second the Steiners had taken interest in the region, but forgot to tell the Kuritans. This would probably go down in history as one of the biggest military fuck ups of all time. “Kuritan dispatch this is Cascade, we have new intel.” “Roger that, please report.” “Steiner’s have taken control of an Anti-Orbital Cannon near Jerome’s Basin. We believe it may be functional at this time.” “We have no information saying any AOC’s are currently set up in that region.” “A  MechWarrior lance that transferred from Highlander Command has informed me that their objective was to retake the cannon in that area from the Steiners.” “Lance name?” “Echo, they’re with us right now. Transferred over from Highlander Defense Command.” “We’ll need to confirm this, please stand by Cascade.” Minutes passed that seemed like hours. But Ashley continued to wait for a reply from the console she was working at. --- “Captain, we just got some bad news.” “Can’t be any worse than the deployment reports.” “We’re in range of an active Anti-Orbital Cannon. Highlander’s just confirmed that.” “Get my ship out of range. NOW.” The Atlantis shook violently as it was hit with the first slug from the ground to orbit cannon. Alarms were blaring everywhere, and panicked crew were on the ground. “Spin up the K-F drive, get us out of here.” --- After the first round hit, the noise ensuing wasn’t enough to overpower Ethan’s shouting. “MechWarriors, Mount up.” Ethan screamed at the top of his lungs. Though damage reports hadn’t came through yet, the round had hit fairly close to where the Cascade was docked, he could hear the ripping metal whining and groaning in its struggle to hold together. Sam order her wingmen into VTOL’s there were rated for zero atmosphere because they brought their own oxygen to burn. Garrett who was still in his battle armour running tests froze, not knowing what to do. “Nick, what are we supposed to do?” Nicole cried. “Only thing we can do. Get in the tank.” Zach who had been close to Nick overheard them and knew they couldn’t make it out in one piece. “VTOL’s cargo lift can get you out of here! Alex you hear that?” “Yeah! Lets do this!!!” The ‘Mechs were equipped to hot-drop which allowed them to be dropped from low orbit, and land safely, some ‘Mechs with jumpjets didn’t need the dropjets but were equipped with them anyway. Delta and Echo lances were mounted up. The cockpit managed to drown out some of the noise from the Cascade. “Ethan, it’s Ashley, they’re jumping us out of here. Just hold on.” “Roger that.” K-F drives took time to align themselves for a jump, as they essentially used a gravity well caused by two stars any distance apart but inline with each other to ‘Jump’ up to 30 light years in any direction. Unfortunately, the jump took place slightly after the second impact from the Mass Driver. The resulting explosion from the round tore the entire Invader class Jumpship to pieces. The dropship ripped clean off the side of the Invader class Jumpship, the force put on the ship made the hangar doors rip clean off.