Sarna March, Hsien system

Dropship Aurelius-7

3057


WAR IS HELL
"There is many a boy here today who looks on war as all glory, but,
boys, it is all hell."
-General William T. Sherman,
speech 1880 from which we derive the phrase "War is hell"

Klein's Avengers: Cutting Teeth

The clattering of hammers, the whirring of power tools and streams of profanities, to an old tech sounded like a symphony. That 'sweet' smell of the mech bay, a combination of sweat lubricants and mech' coolant, wafted into his nostrils like the sweetest perfumes. Battlemechs were like sculptures, great works of art and engineering, worthy of the great Michelangelo himself. At least to Chief tech Vincenzo Medici they were. While some were overawed by the shear size of battlemechs Vincenzo found himself mostly impressed by the innovation and technology of them. It was this outlook, at least in his point of view, that allowed him to connect to and fix them so well. Besides when you spend most of your life around them and fixing them size alone is not enough to keep one in 'awe'.

"Hey Vencenzo how is she?" asked a much younger a man who just walked into the Mech bay.

Now when you're the Master Chief you have much more discretion in answering questions from mech jocks than an ordinary tech, of course that doesn't matter when the question comes from your CO.

"Fine, this bird is ready to go." Vencenzo said with his soft hint of a Florentine accent as he patted the Falconer's foot. At 75 tons it was a big mech and with a top end of 86 KPH it was a big mech that could move. Developed during the clan invasion it was meant to be a mech which could meet the clanners on their own terms. Considering its combination of speed armament and lostech components it was easily one of the deadliest mech designs in the Inner Sphere.

"I just hope you bring it back in one piece Andrew." Many COs didn't tolerate such informality, it was always either Sir of rank when you addressed them on duty. But if Vincenzo wanted to put up with all the formal BS he would be with the Com Guards right now.

"I'll try." You'd better. He could only depreciate the value of a Falconer so much.

"Oh and by the way you'd better wear shorts."

"Huh" the Captain seemed perplexed.

"I've heard some stories of Mech jocks going out ass naked and when those pilots get into combat they shit on the command couch and-"

"Hey Vencenzo! I shit where I want" the Captain said with a wink.

"Does it matter if its always in your pants?"

"Not at all" said the captain while chuckling as he climbed up the ladder. Vincenzo had to admit the kid had a sense of humor, a lot of mech jocks were liable to take a swing at you if you insinuated that they were anything less than God like. As far as Vincenzo was concerned they mostly morons not worthy of the machines they piloted, but he had to admit Andrew was a pretty likable guy and almost intelligent even if he was a mech jock. Good luck kid, you'll need it. Vincenzo thought to himself as the Captain disappeared into the cockpit.

"Hey Vincenzo"

"what is it George?" asked Vincenzo to the younger tech who'd just showed up behind him. He had 'just out of secondary school' written all over him.

"Is there really 2 regiments of Cappies down there?"

Hmmm George sounds a bit nervous. "Yeah there is, and they've got a regiment of feddies pinned down planet side, but take it easy kid if the Captain could survive the Kado-Guchi valley..."

"He can get us through this." Probably not but oh well.

"The Kado what?"

"Luth- get back to work"

With sweat dripping down his face the mech pilot side stepped his mech to avoid a stream of 200 ml slugs only to catch a pair of large lasers to the chest slicing off more than a half ton of armor.

Static poured over his comm., "damnit Captain Barnes just took a gauss shot to the head." Guess I just got promoted.

The mech pilot keyed his throat mike "this is Lt SG Andrew Klein, I've got comm.," as he mashed his firing stud sending a stream of Heavy AC shells at that damnable Daishi.

Captain is a tricky rank, you have to lead your troops and command them. You had to fight bravely and at the same time stay alive. If he was going to last longer than his former CO he'd have to get knock out that Daishi which seemed to have its sights set on him.

"Bravo Lance form on me"

"Nelson I want you to get in their and take that Daishi apart on my mark

"Command lance alpha strike on that Daishi on 3"

"Nelson Mark, 3 2 1 Fire. ."

Nelson's 65 ton Axeman took to the air as Gauss, missiles, and PPCs slammed into the Daishi slashing and ripping off tons of armor staggering it backwards. Yet with commendable skill the clanner managed to keep himself upright only to recover just in time for Nelson's hatchet to slice into the cockpit.

"Alright the rest of Bravo Lance with me"

Pushing his throttle to the wall Andrew brought his Orion into a full run with Bravo lance in position on his flanks. A PPC blast washed over his mech and Andrew brought his mech to sliding halt just in time for two more PPC beams to whip by his cockpit only meters away.

A Masakari...

Pivoting to his right Andrew centered his recticle over the clanner and sent his Orion into a trot. Gold, a chirp, and a mashed firing stud sent 15 missiles corkscrewing into their target.

The onset of turbulence from the dropship hurdling into the atmosphere snapped Andrew back from his day dream.

The rich smell of coffee mixed with sweat and Cigarettes, it was a TAC room just like any other Andrew Klein had been in. However, you do something for the first time and you can't help but feel a little nervous, especially when a number of other people depend on you. This time all eyes were on him and they felt like lasers boring into him. Sure he'd directed them in training exercises but never in an actual operation. They can smell fear if you let em.

"Listen up we've got two regiments of Cappellan regulars down there, they've got one AFFC regiment on the run," said Andrew with authority, his deep bass rumbling out the words. It was relieving, the realization that he'd delivered those lines with all the confidence he'd wanted washed over him and reinforced his spirit. In a situation like this confidence is often more important than sound planning.

"We'll be making our insertion here, just North of the Nevada Mountain range it's a little out of the way but we should be able to be land in one piece this way since their aerospace assets are further south. Our target is an airfield 700 klicks south. It houses approximately 1/3 of Liao's on planet Aerospace assets, taking it out should hurt them quite a bit"

It was a beautiful autumn afternoon with a slight breeze and a bright blue Sky. Birds were chirping and bullfrogs were croaking as the sun hung low just over the horizon. The river gently rolled along with a slow and steady beat impervious of the thirteen logging barges slowly floating downriver. The Mackinac provided a vital link between Peridot's Northern logging industry and its Southern Factories. Consequently it was a heavily traveled river which happened to pass by a certain Liao airbase.

Sarah McKinsey lay back on her command couch and tried to stretch out as best she could. She'd been in her cockpit almost constantly for three days and the boredom was enough to kill. She was tempted to start her mech up and get off this barge and if they weren't just another 6 hours away she might have done it. Of course Andrew had spent nearly a million in C Bills to get hold of these barges complete with timber and that certainly wasn't a trifle sum. With luck they'd power up their mechs, slide them into the river and the rest would be history. The unit could make a name for itself in one mission assuming every thing worked out alright.

Which of course was always the problem as the old adage goes, "no plan survives first contact with the enemy". Whether that would hold true or not tonight was anyone's guess. The last time she'd been in combat was Luthien, like Andrew she'd been picked up by Dragoon recruiters on Outreach out of Tri-M. She'd gotten to 'know' him on the ride to the Black Pearl, after being assigned to the same company. Know him being somewhat figurative as well as suggestive, on account that Andrew almost never talked about his past. The little she did know was that he was from New Avalon, had a great deal of money, and that Klein's Avengers was a merc unit under the command of his grandfather. When he decided to build his own unit she followed without a second thought.

It'd been a long night for 'San-Ben-Bing' Chu Li Tsang as usual. Guarding the front gate went beyond boring it'd been completely uneventful with the exception of one damn irritating truck driver whom he'd been arguing with for the last 5 minutes. He wasn't sure whether to be grateful or utterly pissed off.

"Look this is a military facility of the Capellan Confederation we have authorization to kill any intruders, your paperwork hasn't cleared, if you keep arguing with me you're going to wind up in a cell if you're lucky." Chu said angrily, he may have been bored before but this was plain irritating. His indecision was gone and he found himself wanting to pull his sidearm. Thankfully he was only another half hour away from returning to his tent, writing letters to his wife and calling it a night.

Yet the driver hadn't had enough. "Look if you send me off I'll have to drive an hour to get to Wessex and after that it'll be another hour before I hit the sack. Throw me in the stockade if ya want, at least I'll get a good night sleep and when this can be cleared up with the local authorities in the morning I can head out," Said the trucker with a damning cockiness almost as if he was in control.

Bastard.

Chu was about to rebut him as static poured in over the Trucker's CB, "Breaker 4 I'm headin in".

"Sanna-Bung whatever just look at these documents again."

"Shove em up your-" were Chu's last words as the trucker pulled the trigger of a laser pistol he'd hidden behind his documents.

Lt. Ismail Farahadin slammed his foot on the pedal and left the gate house behind. He had another minute for him and his Platoon to reach the mech hanger, after that the Cappie Mech jocks would likely make it into their mechs. 30 meters from his destination Lt. Farahadin brought the truck to a stop leapt out and sprinted to the Mech hanger with another 35 black clad troopers following closely behind as a series of explosions ripped through the camp personnel quarters.

Lt. Alton Myer's was having the time of his life, he was flying his Corsair so close to the ground that he swore to God he could hear the fuselage scraping along the ground. He'd never done this before, at least not this close, and the adrenaline high was intense. His part of the plan was to take his fighter in at ground level, in this case almost literally, and hopefully their sensors wouldn't pick him up until he was only 10 klicks out and at the speed he was going it would only be 40 seconds before he'd reach his destination to bomb the personnel quarters, hopefully catching mech jocks and flyboys in their beds. At just over 10 klicks Alton keyed his mike.

"Breaker 4 I'm headin in"

45 seconds later he'd just cleared the perimeter, and pulled back on his stick to gain altitude over his target. Thumbing the bomb release he let go his cluster bombs, Retarded Anti Personnel Munitions, each bomb carrying at least a dozen bomblets which would wreak havoc in the tent city below. The Cappies would never get a chance to reach their entrenchments. With the bombs released and Alton pulling back on the stick and pushing the throttle to the wall the Corsair leapt skywards. The G-Force was intense but he had to put distance between himself and the now active missile batteries.

A screeching whine pierced his ears indicating a missile lock. Alton rolled his fighter left before breaking right just as a flight of missiles passed by. Another incoming flight of missiles and he pulled the stick back and right executing a hard vertical barrel roll. His vision grayed as the blood left his head, but he couldn't stop now. Out of targeting range but with missiles still incoming he countered his roll, cut the thrust, slammed the air brake managed the equivalent of an aerial pirouette and once again the missiles passed by harmlessly. Maintaining level flight Alton had a new threat, 11 contacts popped up on his sensors. 5 friendlies and 6 bogies, two of those friendlies were slated for ground support so this would be a 6 on 4.

Meeting up with his friendlies, Alton increased his thrust and put some distance between himself and the three-point fighter formation behind him. While this was a certainly unorthodox approach, if not outright foolishness, victory is often the result of calculated stupidity. Besides Alton was always a few cards short of a full deck when it came to sanity and it struck him as a challenge to get in close with half a dozen Transits each one armed with an AC/20. At weapons range Alton triggered his large lasers scoring hits across the lead fighters nose as he pushed his fighter into overdrive and brought his fighter screaming into the Cappellan formation, in between the first and second fighter forcing both to take evasive action. It was like a cross between bowling and chicken and it played havoc on the Cappellans, who were formerly in a standard Delta formation, each fighter trying to avoid hitting each other they were a disorganized mass when the Avenger's slammed into them lasers blasting.

Water poured off the behemoth weapon of war as Andrew brought his Mech out of the river. Flanker Lance was just ahead of him on their way to link up with Farahadin's platoon and Alpha lance was just behind him on their way to seize the runways. Andrew and his Command Lance would be heading towards the vehicle park after taking care of one little distraction.

"Alpha Lance take out that radio tower."

That should delay reinforcements.

"Command Lance target the control tower." Andrew barked into his mike while fighting back his adrenaline. It's hard to stay focused sometimes when you're sitting atop a 75 ton beast of war 10 meters above the battlefield with lightning at your fingertips. It's all too easy to feel God like and it's all too easy to get killed when you lose track of your limits.

Like Zeus letting loose a thunder bolt Andrew sent an Azure whip of manmade lightning into his target followed by a melon sized ball of Nickel-Ferrite. The heavily armored structure groaned under the impacts but it held solid. Concentrated fire from three other mechs poured into with missiles from Lisa Pearl's Crusader finishing it off.

"Hack missile turrets are down begin your bombing run, over."

"Roger that Boss."

Turning his Falconer toward the Vehicle Park Andrew brought his mech into a full run with his target 1 klick ahead Andrew zoomed in his HUD and centered his recticle over a Shrek PPC carrier. Pressing his firing stud Andrew sent a 120 millimeter slug into its turret and a Lighting bolt into its side. At 800 meters the crew could be seen scrambling into it through its hatches. Squeezing his trigger again Andrew sent another Lighting bolt into his target followed by a second gauss slug. A pair of Burke's attempted to hold off the onrushing lance of heavy mechs only to be engulfed in a series of Explosions ripped through the vehicle park from bombs dropped by a pair of Stukas.

Andrew's comm. unit came to life. It was Jerome winters of Flanker lance, "Sir we've got incoming contacts. 8 mechs, looks like mediums and heavies. We're going to need some assistance."

"Copy. I'm sending Hack and Wilks..." A piercing whine interrupted and Andrew stomped on his pedals to leap over the incoming missiles, avoiding all but a few which pockmarked his legs. Landing right in front of an SRM carrier, which had just emerged from a repair hanger to shower his mech with high explosive SRMs, Cussing and twisting his torso right Andrew toggled his lasers and sent four beams up its nose. "Hack and Wilks to provide air support along with whatever support Alpha Lance can provide."

Sitting in her death's head Sarah grinned as her Autocannon and lasers tore into the helpless fighter in front of her. She and her point mate Carson Reeves in his Awesome walked from hanger to hanger blasting the Capellan aerospace fighters as they lay in their beds. When her comm. unit crackled to life, she acted before receiving an order.

"Reeves, we're going to support Flanker lance. Sanchez, Yamato, finish off the last fighter's and then get over to the Mech' hangers." Turning her mech, Sarah eased the throttle forward and brought her ponderous Atlas into a full run, its long steady strides quaking the very as all 100 tons rushed forward. She could see the lasers and missile blasts ahead indicating the Cappellan patrols and Flanker lance had just come into firing range.

"Captain we need those Stukas, up here." Alton Myers crackled over the radio, his voice straining from high G load.

That will make things harder, Sanchez and Yamato had better hurry up.

Coming into range Sarah slid her recticle over a Liao Catapult, which got the jump and sent 30 missiles slamming into her slamming into the massive mech's torso and arms. Responding in kind Sarah toggled her LRMs and sent a flight of 10 missiles which hit mostly dirt as the Liao Catapult took to the air. Squeezing the trigger again she stabbed two large lasers into the support mech with a trio of PPCs from Chris Reeves' Awesome following up. A Guass cannon passed just over her cockpit so close that it scratched the paint compliments from a Liao Cataphract this fight wasn't going to be easy.

Casualty report, butcher's bill whatever you preferred to call it it was the worst part of being a CO. 4 KIA, and 10 wounded, Andrew must have read over those numbers more than a dozen times almost ignoring the equipment losses. 1 fighter down, 3 damaged, 2 mechs destroyed, 3 crippled, and 6 more damaged. As would be expected the grunts suffered the most they'd been in a fierce firefight with Liao infantry when Flanker Lance showed up and broke the Liao ranks. Jacob Reed and Tracy Morton, both of Flanker lance, had been shot out of their mechs and both were had minor injuries. The salvage trucks were able to get a hold of a very impressive haul, extra parts, components, and 4 complete mechs.

Still he couldn't replace those who died for a few C-bills... They didn't die for money they died for each other and for the unit, Andrew thought to himself and with that outlook he was able to push his darker thoughts of casualties to the back of his mind, for a while where they could gnaw at him with the rest. Some ate at him harder than others, some simply refused to go away, Klein's Shipping and Transport, Klein's Shipping and Transport... Sometimes those words would come upon and like the name of a man he'd killed it kept playing and replaying over and over again.

Alright its been awhile since my first entry and I hope I've improved, please review and offer any advice you have.