Star Adder Symphony

by drakensis

In 3050 four Clans invaded the Inner Sphere. Four? No, five. One Crusader Clan breaks ranks and dares to seize the moment.

4. Battle of Poulsbo

Dropship Juno, Assault Orbit, Poulsbo

Tamarind March, Federated Commonwealth

20 March 3050

Costigan was in his cockpit long before the Juno reached low orbit over Poulsbo. Star Colonel Hannibal Banacek had ordered all personnel to be ready for the drop as soon as Alpha Galaxy's little fleet had arrived at the pirate point. With a single moon, there were five such points around Poulsbo and since full astronomical data from the Star League's archives had been taken with the Star League Defense Force when they left the Inner Sphere it had been no great challenge for the Star Adders to jump inside the orbit of Poulsbo's small moon, only a few hours from Poulsbo itself rather than the eleven days that it would take to reach the world from the usual jump points well above the star's gravity well.

Like every other Mechwarrior in the force, Costigan was wearing a reinforced jumpsuit with medical sensors lines of coolant running through it. Once plugged into his command chair, the suit began circulating the coolant, giving him an unpleasent crawling sensation as the suit drew away his body heat. He had heard other warriors refer to the feeling as having worms crawl over them and didn't find the image particularly amusing. Once the Assassin warmed up he would be glad of the coolant. Although the medium battlemech had enough heatsinks to handle the full burden of firing all five lasers, even while using the jumpjets at full power, it still took time to disperse the heat and the temperature inside his cockpit would rise accordingly.

Reaching back behind the command couch, Costigan lifted down the neurohelmet stored there and took a moment to make sure his hair was secured at the nape of his neck where it wouldn't interfere with the fit of the helmet. As the only thing cushioning his precious head against the more or less inevitable knocks and bumps, the last thing that he wanted was a poor fit that would leave his head bouncing around the inside of the helmet. Satisfied, he donned the helmet and adjusted it to ensure that it had good contact with his temples. The neurohelmet's sensors would detect brainwaves, particularly those related to the inner ear and help the sophisticated computers strung through the battlemech to keep the ten metre tall warmachine balanced even while running or jumping.

Finally sure that he was ready for action, Costigan closed the five point harness that held him into the couch and hit the primary ignition for the fusion reactor. As the multi-ton reactor rumbled through its activation, sending waves of heat through the cockpit, Costigan went through a series of security locks that prevented any bandits or disaffected lower castes from making off from a battlemech that could potentially level a small city simply by walking through one without a skilled pilot. By long tradition the final security step was a short verbal phrase that would be matched against both a recording of his voice but of the brainwaves being detected by the neurohelmet. Some warriors chose high flown phrases or quotes from the Rembrance, the oral history of the Clans. When he set the code for this battlemech, mindful of Clan Star Adder's purpose, Costigan had chosen something he found fitting.

"Now we return from whence we came," he told the computer and it lit up, lights from a half hundred displays detailing the status of his Assassin. For the moment, Costigan refrained from taking the safeties off his weapons - wrapped inside a drop cocoon, he would not be able to use them and an accidental discharge could only endanger him if it damaged the thermal shield that would guard him during re-entry. He brought every other system to full readiness however.

"Star Commander, I am ready for action," he reported. Costigan would have preferred to be assigned to Oscar but the 10th didn't have official Novas, so Oscar commanded Trinary Delta's Star of ProtoMechs while Costigan served under Star Commander Rebecca in the the second Battlemech Star of Trinary Gamma.

Rebecca was only a year old or so than Costigan but she'd passed her Trial of Position with two kills and Star Colonel Ivar Hutchinson of the 10th Hussars had recruited her out of Kappa Galaxy before he was removed from command. Although she had survived Hannibal Banacek's reorganisation, it had not done her prospects any favours. "Secure for the drop then," Rebecca ordered. "The Star Colonel will be giving the final briefing in a few minutes."

Sure enough, a moment later, Hannibal Banacek's voice came across the Cluster command channel. "Warriors," the Star Colonel announced. "We have arrived in orbit of Poulsbo, Alpha Galaxy's first target of the invasion. Already we have been challenged by the defenders of this world: the 42nd Avalon Hussars and we expect their aerospace fighters to attempt an interception as we are dropped so be prepared. Once we reach the ground, we will face a regiment of their battlemechs, three regiments of armoured vehicles and several regiments of infantry."

"For this purpose the Galaxy Commander has assigned four Clusters, all of which will be dropping onto the Tammerfors continent as planned. The role of the 10th Hussars remains as a reserve against unexpected attacks so the bulk of our number will drop behind the leading clusters. However, the planet's hyperpulse generator has been detected in the city of Bangor Heights and it has been decided to detach Trinary Gamma to silence it. Take control if you can, but destroy it if need be. The updated drop data is being sent to your machines now and as the rest of the Cluster will be covered by fighters from the rest of the Galaxy, Binary Epsilon is free to provide dedicated cover to Gamma's drop." Epsilon, the 10th Hussar's aerospace complement, was made up of twenty Issus light aerospace fighters which should be ample fighter cover for the trinary. "Keep our eyes and ears open for problems and do not hesitate to report them."

Without any more ceremony, Hannibal Banacek ended the briefing and Costigan felt the Juno shudder as it detached from the Star Lord-class jumpship that had carried the 10th Hussars, the 191st Adder Guards (who would not be part of the invasion) and two Garrison Clusters from Sinclair along the edge of the Inner Sphere and then between the Lyran systems and the territory claimed by the piratical Circinus Federation to reach this world. It would be only a few hours before the Juno reached a close enough orbit for her passengers to disembark and complete their journey to Poulsbo's soil.

.oOo.

"Who the hell are these guys?" Randolph Chaufee grumbled as his Sparrowhawk rocketed skywards behind the wing leader. He'd been looking forward to a week of rest and recreation (or intoxication and intercourse as the unofficial version had it) on the beaches and in the bars of Tammerfors, only for all personnel to be recalled before he'd even reached Fort Bangor's gates. The Fortieth Federation Attack Wing's Stukas had already been rumbling off the ground before he'd been briefed.

"There have been rumours of trouble in the Periphery," the Old Lady said absently as she led her wing in pursuit of their heavier brethern. They would rendevous in low orbit and then 160th Crucis Interceptor's Sparrowhawks would be guarding the heavily armed Stukas as they made attack runs on the incoming dropships. "I guess it's finally spilled over into the Inner Sphere."

The last vestiges of the atmosphere fell away behind them and Randolph stiffened as he saw a short-lived star that didn't belong in any of Poulsbo's constellations. "Major, you'd better talk to the Forties, because I think they're already mixing it up with the bad guys."

"How truly good," the Russian woman retorted grimly. "Good eyes, Randolph. Ivanova to all pilots - it looks as if our guests have arrived early. Let's find out if the Forties have got their dance cards filled or if there is room for us." She opened her thrusters and the little fighter leapt ahead, nineteen others just like it in hot pursuit.

"Foxtrot Actual, this is Charlie Actual, what is your situation?"

"Charlie Actual, this is Foxtrot Eleven," responded one of the Stuka pilots. "Foxtrot Actual bought the farm. These guys are cutting us apart! They've got the speed to stay out of our lasers' range but it isn't hurting their accuracy at all."

"Roger that, Foxtrot Eleven. The cavalry's here."

Accelerating at more than seven gravities towards the dogfight, Randolph saw three more explosions signalling more deaths. Two of them looked like Stukas, but the last looked like a smaller fighter, one without ammuniton bins to be destroyed.

Ivanova cut across the path of one of the invaders as it twisted away from a revenge-minded Stuka and for a moment the craft flashed across Randolph's viewscreen. He fired reflexively and the medium lasers in the nose of his fighter drew furrows through the unmarked fighter's armour. It was relatively broad, he noted, with wide wings and a snub-nose. Two weapons were mounted in the wing-roots. Then the fighter was past him and he rocketed through the same space, following his wing leader as she closed in on another of the fighters.

The enemy didn't have the same agility as the nimble Sparrowhawks, but the margin was not as great as Randolph would have liked, the aerospace fighter twisting and turning to evade their guns, while also trying to bring its own to bear. The deadly contest swept across a similar match where two Sparrowhawks fought to drive a pair of the enemy away from a clearly damaged Stuka. The added vectors threw both contests into disarray as the fighter that Randolph had been chasing fired both the wing-root weapons into one of the other Sparrowhawks as they closed, despite the extreme range.

"Blake's blood!" he exclaimed as he saw that both shots had hit the wing squarely and all but torn it off. "Those lasers have a lot of punch!"

"Hit them back!" the Old Lady snapped and rolled to bring her own lasers into play against one of the enemy fighters. "Damn them," she added after a moment. "How much armour do they have?"

Randolph couldn't shake his head, there was too much pressure on his neck for that during the high-G turns that they were pulling. "It can't be that much!" he protested. "Not moving that fast and with lasers that heavy." It was the immutable triad of any military hardware: armour, speed and weapons. To increase one required that it be done at the expense of one or both of the others.

"I hit it right on the nose where it had already been damaged and I didn't even penetrate," he was told. "All fighters, this is Charlie Actual. Head for the atmosphere - we can't do anything up here, we'll try to hit them again once they enter the atmosphere."

.oOo.

Quite unaware of the brief battle that had raged in space, Costigan was dozing in his command couch when the five minute warning sounded. The harsh squeal jerked him awake and his hands were on the controls before his eyes were entirely open.

"Five minutes," the Juno's commander reported. "Five minutes to Drop Point One."

Drop Point One was where Trinary Gamma would be dropped. The rest of the Cluster would be waiting for Drop Point Two, which was calculated to place them behind the rest of the Galaxy.

"Star Captain Konrad to all Trinary Gamma Warriors," the unit commander ordered. "Final equipment check. If anything is broken after this point then don't expect sympathy when you hit the planet at terminal velocity."

Costigan checked his status boards but everything aboard the Assassin was showing as green. Those systems he could check for himself while inside a drop cocoon were also functioning perfectly, which he reported to Rebecca, who somehow seemed disappointed to hear that.

The Juno was creaking slightly as the hull was touched by the uppermost traces of the atmosphere. Costigan adjusted his straps carefully. It wasn't his first drop - warrior training included simulations and one live drop - but it was the first into combat.

"Entering Drop Point," the voice of the technican running the drop advised them all. "First drop... now." The Juno rocked around Costigan and for a moment he thought that he'd been dropped first, rather than second as he had expected. Then he realised it was merely ship adjusting for a hundred or so tons of its cargo being suddenly removed. A moment later his stomach fell out towards Poulsbo and his Mech followed, the whisper of the atmosphere against the Juno's hull replaced by the howl as it bit into the ablative shielding wrapped around the Assassin.

The fall seemed endless. Sensors could not have operated through the shields without fatally compomising them so Costigan was falling blind. Even the estimated altitude displayed on one of his monitors was just that: an estimate, based on the altitude of the Juno when it dropped him and the expected rate at which he would fall under Poulsbo's gravity.

Thus, he was relieved to hear the sharp cracks of explosive bolts as the computer determined that either the heat of re-entry had reached a survivable level or that the shields had been so worn down that they weren't safe to retain and he'd be better off taking his chances, such as they would be if the shields failed during re-entry.

The computer quickly reset the altimeter now that it was able to see for himself. They were a little higher than expected - probably someone had miscalculated Poulsbo's gravity slightly - but the temperature was well within the safe zone and what did another thousand metres matter when at best you had another eighteen kilometres to fall? Costigan felt the Assassin begin to tumble and then there was a jerk as the parachutes attached to the Mech's shoulders deployed. A simple parachute couldn't bring forty-tons of BattleMech safely, but it could halt the tumble before it really began and bleed off a little of the speed that had built up through the fall. The Assassin stabilised with feet pointing straight down. All Costigan could see below were clouds. Hopefully no one had screwed up on the drop zone - there was a lot of water on Poulsbo and if he wound up in the middle of the ocean then he had better hope he could reach the shore before he ran out of air.

Putting the possibility from his mind, he took the safeties off his weapons and began to search the air around him for any sign of the defender's aerospace fighters.

.oOo.

"The enemy are dropping troops over Bangor," Randolph told the other pilots in the amalgamated wing that was all that was left of the 42nd Avalon Hussars Aerobrigade. The Old Lady hadn't made it out of the furball and nor had four of the six squadron leaders. Technically command should have gone to Captain Harris, but everyone knew that he had a bad case of tunnel vision once he had a fighter in his sights and Captain Sanderson had only been on post for three weeks so no one really trusted her yet.

Personally, Randolph thought that the short, broad woman from Galax was doing pretty damn well, but there wasn't time for bitching over assignments so Harris was signing off on anything that Sergeant Major Randolph Chaufee said and otherwise acting like a good officer who know he was in over his head. Not that Randolph had a much better idea what to do - getting attacked by super fighters wasn't covered anywhere in the training and retraining that had featured periodically in his twenty years in first the Armed Forces of the Federated Suns and then those of the Federated Commonwealth. Dealing with an orbital drop had been something that he had been trained in however. "There's heavy cloud cover, so their fighters will have trouble tracing us. But their Mechs will be on predictable paths, so as long as we can get one good lock on them we can trace them through the clouds and make sure that they land in pieces!"

"Did you all get that?" Captain Harris asked. "Okay, we don't have much time. We'll hit them as they reach the top of the clouds and follow them down."

Harris's Sparrowhawk bolted forwards at a speed that was just barely attainable for the Stukas in the formation – seven of them, just barely a squadron's worth. The same speed was not much more than a leisurely stroll for a Sparrowhawk, which suggested that Harris was learning some self-control at last. Maybe he might make it as a Wing leader after all, Randolph thought, assuming of course that there was a wing left to lead by the end of the day.

The fighters formed up into three ragged V formations as they flew over Fort Bangor and then angled sharply upwards into the clouds, following radar traces from outlying stations that had detected the orbiting Dropships. The rainclouds were thick and grey, obscuring anything more than a few dozen metres in any direction, Randolph noted. Usually flying in these conditions was just asking for an accident – it would only take one fighter's instruments to go fuzzy and someone would be wing-tip to wing-tip or engine to engine. In theory the latest upgrade of the navigation systems should prevent that – some upgrade that NAIS had developed to be refitted after '39. It sounded good to Randolph but he wasn't going to trust any machine more than he did his own eyes and he kept them peeled for other fighters drifting into visual – and therefore dangerous – range of his own. A Stuka might survive a glancing hit, but none of the Sparrowhawks would.

The radar chirped as it picked up other radar sources up ahead and above of the wing, eight sources - all strong enough that they could only be dropships. Using their own radars would be a bit too revealing, but the movements of the dropships made it perfectly clear that they were carrying out orbital drops of the Mechs aboard.

"Danver, Porkins," Randolph ordered the two Sparrowhawk pilots who had taken the most damage. "Don't worry about trying to get any shots in, just get a count of the drop. If we can let the groundpounders know what they're dealing with then General Waters will get us some payback for the Old Lady."

The two Sparrowhawks obediently fell back a little as the rest of the wing tore through the upper layer of clouds. Randolph could see the shooting stars of drop cocoons burning as they made their entry into the atmoshphere. "Blake's Blood," he muttered to himself. "There are hundreds of them."

"Porkins to Chaufee," one of the trailing Sparrowhawks said. "Permission to light them up with Radar and get a count?"

Randolph checked the spotter's distance and confirmed that they were now diverging at maximum speed so any radar emissions would only draw attention away from the attacking squadrons. "Confirmed, Porkins, light them up."

For a moment his radar display flickered as the powerful radars of the two Sparrowhawks swept across the falling Mechs and then cut out as Porkins and Danvers dived down into the clouds. "I'm sending you my tracking data," Porkins said after a moment. "We have at least a regiment of mechs and a lot of other signatures. Half of them can't be more than a dozen tons, the others are even smaller. Warbook doesn't know what to make of them. Best guess is decoys, maybe with some infantry mixed in with them."

"Understood, Porkins," Randolph said. "Not as bad as I thought. Okay, get that news back to Fort Bangor."

"Roger that, Chaufee," Porkins replied. "Light a pyre for the boys and girls."

"Count on it, Porkins," the Sergeant Major agreed and as he reached the spot where the Mechs were beginning to reach the clouds, the wing popped up over the clouds for a moment and then dived into them after their dangerous prey.

The cloud limited the range of the shots that could be fired and the aerospace fighters opened fire at almost point blank range. Randolph fired his lasers squarely into an Assassin and then corkscrewed as he dove to fire on it again. He never saw the Guillotine firing steadily from above and behind the Assassin that crippled his engine with a shrewdly placed salvo. Only the automatic ejection saved his life.

.oOo.

Costigan's view of Poulsbo cleared up as he plunged past the clouds, now only two kilometres up. He was relieved to see that he wasn't coming down over water - well, he was, but only because rain was hammering down around him onto the city below. It wasn't dark enough for lights to be on, but he had little difficulty picking out the sprawling military base to the north of the city and from there he was able to orientate himself to locate the HPG site on the south side. A major road artery cut through the sprawl of houses and shops a little south of the centre of the city and the Assassin picked out a point on it as the designated landing zone, seperated from the HPG - run, he understood, by some organisation called ComStar - by a ridge covered by one of the city's suburbs.

Checking his flanks it only took a moment to pick out the other nine BattleMechs and twenty-five Fangs plummeting alongside him. All present. Good, now to avoid hitting the ground hard enough to drive the gyro buried deep inside the torso up and through his cockpit. Keeping a close eye on the altimeter, he fired off his jumpjets, letting them draw in the air being forced into them by his descent and then redirecting and igniting in a carefully balanced downward thrust. The Assassin shook, but remained upright as his descent slowed, heat rising as the jets fought against the impressive velocity that had built up over the long fall.

He was just over a kilometer up when safeties cut in to let the jets cool - there was no way that they could maintain that furious drain long enough to halt him completely - and he watched the altimeter and the temperature inside the jets both dropping swiftly with one eye as the other checked where he was going to land. A little south of the road, but not far. There was an open grassed area inside a more or less rectangular building that he could reach - probably better than anything else he'd get to unless he wanted to plough directly into an area effectively covered in closely packed - and almost certainly highly inflammable - ground cars.

The jets were almost out of the yellow zone and there was barely five hundred metres between himself and the grass when he fired his jets again, balancing the Assassin on seven columns of fire from its back as he hurtled downwards, seeing the couple of dozen men on the field scattering towards the edges as he fought against Poulsbo's gravity well.

Several thousand people who had gathered to watch what was likely to be the last match of the Poulsbo Soccer League until the 42nd Hussars saw off the incoming invasion were startled to see a battlemech in blue and grey urban camouflage crash into centre field, fire blazing from the rear. Dirt and grass went flying and for a moment smoke obscured the new arrival.

Costigan shook his head, having cracked it against the back of his command couch during the landing with enough force that if it wasn't for his neurohelmet he'd probably have knocked himself out. Checking the status, he noticed light damage to his leg armour but nothing more serious than he would have taken falling over. Fairly predictable. Looking around he realised that he was inside some sort of arena, with stands about half full of people looking at him in disbelief.

"Costigan!" called Rebecca over the Star's channel. "Check in."

"I am fine," Costigan reported. "Came down a little north of the drop point. Should I move back and join you?"

"Neg. Take point," Rebecca ordered. "We are moving up to the railway line that leads across this road and past the target. Go up the hill and check for opposition, then meet us on the railway."

Costigan nodded sharply although she could not see it. "Understood, Star Commander."

Straightening his Mech, he noted that the jumpjets had cooled back to full readiness while he was checking in and fire them again to depart the stadium by leaping over one of the stands and onto the access road. Unknown to the Mechwarrior, a spectator with a camera would take a shot of his Mech's take off - a picture that would feature on the sports page of one of Bangor Heights newspapers the next day with the caption: 'Game Called For Falling BattleMech'.

.oOo.

Star Commander Rebecca's Grendel loped along the railway line at over seventy kilometers an hour. The line was sloped to ascend the hill at a gradient comfortable for the trains and Mechs alike, although she truly pitied anyone foolish enough to try to take a train along the route after her Star had passed. Although they had not intentionally caused damage, it only took one foot landing on the rails to wreck them, something that would unquestionably derail any train that tried to use them without significant repairs.

Behind her, the Star Captain's Star were following, their Mechs slowed slighly by the burden of the five Fangs each was carrying. Even a single point would be enough to slaughter a company of infantry - add in the Battlemechs and even an entire Mech company would not be enough to stop them from taking the generator.

"Warrior Costigan," Rebecca demanded. "Do you have a visual of the target?"

There was a long silence and for a moment she suspected that he would not answer. Then: "Costigan to Star Commander Rebecca. I have line of sight. Target is visible, fortified and defended. Two armoured vehicles and two Battlemechs in sight. All are painted white, presumably for parade purposes rather than camouflage. However, the facility is of sufficent size to house a much larger force."

Rebecca sighed. "Costigan, it's a communications centre, not a fortified bunker. What is your position?"

Another pause. "There is a railway bridge across a residential street that leads to the target building. I am sheltering behind the bridge. I assume that I have been sighted by now but the guards have not left their patrol zones. The warbook identifies them as a Crab and a Sentinel of Star League vintage and two Zephyr hover tanks." He paused. "I have an infantry platoon in sight. There are ramps leading to subterranean parking that closely resemble armoured vehicle bays from the older Castle Brians on Dagda. I do not have line of sight into them."

"Our ETA is thirty seconds," Rebecca told him, figuring that this would calm his nerves. "You are clear to engage."

Ahead of her she saw Costigan's Assassin rise out of cover on a column of fire - clearly he was using his jumpjets to clear the houses that lined the hillside facing the Comstar compound. Tracer fire from an autocannon flew below him, clearly he was correct that he had been sighted but the warriors guarding the HPG station had not responded until he made a hostile move. Costigan fired his own lasers and the cover of the trees either side of the railway finally thinned to the point that she could see the target, a Crab stagger under several hits from the lasers.

"Drop the dish!" Rebecca ordered and hit her own jumpjets, narrowly missing a house as she bounded down the slope. Opening fire at extreme range her large lasers lanced into the dish of the HPG. Running closer and dodging fire from the two Mechs, Costigan did likewise with his medium lasers and sections of the large dish fell away.

The two hover tanks darted out of the shelter of the complex but weren't quite fast enough to avoid Athene's Fire Moth. The small OmniMech was actually slightly faster than either and her missile launchers were laiden with infernos warheads that spread napalm across the upper surfaces of both tanks. A moment later the rearmost exploded as the fire heated the tank's own ammo bins and the second skidded to a halt, the crew baling out and rolling on the ground to try to extinguish the flames on their flak gear.

"Star Commander," Costigan snapped. "We have company."

Rebecca's eyes went wide as heavier tracked vehicles started to emerge from the ramps - at least a dozen heavy and assault tanks and other armoured fighting vehicles. And three Mechs had emerged from what she had thought was a warehouse and now looked more like a Mech hanger. A hanger that probably had room for more than just half a dozen Mechs. "Star Captain Konrad, our intelligence was out on the defences. The installation is heavily defended. We have damaged the transmitter but not conclusively."

Konrad growled irritably. "I am one minute away. What numbers do you face?"

"Twelve tanks, five battlemechs and an unknown number of infantry, Star Captain." Rebecca fired at a Black Knight - the heaviest unit to emerge from the hanger - and missed with one of her large lasers. The other laser carved into the right leg of the heavy Battlemech, which returned fire. The lasers overshot, blasting in the side of a house behind her but the particle cannon whiplashed across her right arm, savaging the armour. "Additional units continue to emerge however."

The white painted Mechs and vehicles seemed to hesitate as she spoke and then moved back, taking cover inside the complex. They seemed reluctant to target her Mechs for some reason, Rebecca mused, ignoring the handful of civilians fleeing up the hill on foot.

"Understood, Star Commander," Konrad said. "I am requesting air support. Be prepared to direct them towards targets."

"Very few are on the streets," Rebecca reported. "I presume that they have taken shelter elsewhere."

.oOo.

There was no sound in the universe like a regiment of Battlemechs moving across the battlefield. Add the rest of a Regimental Combat Team moving around them - regiments of tanks and infantry backing up each battalion of Mechs, while helicopters and scout cars probed ahead for the invaders' positions - the cacophany made Hauptmann-General Roger Waters truly glad for the insulation of his Griffin's cockpit.

"Alright, Bill, what are we dealing with?" he asked on the command channel.

"The reports from what's left of the Aerobrigade counted eight dropships making the drop," Kommandant Wilma 'Bill' Waters, his niece and also the 42nd Avalon Hussars chief intelligence officer reported. "Each dropped about at least a company of battlemechs - possibly two companies, it's hard to say because they were dropping decoys as well - and a platoon or more of infantry. So roughly four battalions of Battlemechs and a battalion or two of jump infantry. Not exactly a raiding party and they've pretty much got control of the skies - our fighters have taken a real beating."

"Wonderful. Just wonderful," Waters grumbled. Those were uncomfortably even odds - the 42nd only had three Mech battalions but considerably more infantry and tanks which should balance things out. Hopefully their knowledge of the ground would counterbalance the attacker's greater Mechs. "Okay. Where do you make their landing site?"

"Just south of Rouasville," she told him.

Waters called up a map to remind himself. He knew Rouasville of course, it was a good-sized town north of Bangor Heights and a favoured place for the officers at Fort Bangor to relax in the sure knowledge that virtually every enlisted soldier would head to the more accessible pleasures of the city. The ground between was mostly pastoral farmland spread over rolling hills and shallow rivers that even his infantry could probably ford with little difficulty. Not much cover against fighters, but otherwise good ground to fight over.

"Then we'll probably be on top of them within the hour," he concluded. "Did the aerojocks see any markings?"

"No markings," Bill said reluctantly. "But I think that we're dealing with the same raiders that have been working their way around the periphery since last year. The description of some of their mechs matches a report we had relayed from the Periphery March - a Catapult with Marauder arms."

"They had some sort of long range laser," Waters said, recalling the report himself. "Sounds a lot like what our fighters ran into. Everyone remind your troops to get in close. We can't risk a long range fight if they have that sort of -"

An explosion ahead of Waters drew his attention back to his surroundings in time to see a desperately dodging Ferret scout helicopter swatted out of the sky by a flight of long range missiles. The rotor torn away, the Ferret displayed all the aerodynamics of a brick, ploughing into the ground barely a kilometer ahead of Water's command lance. A column of smoke was already rising from beyond the next line of hills - presumably the other helicopter in the reconnaissence lance.

"The scouts are taking fire," the Captain of the Reconnaissence Company reported somewhat redundantly. "I'm pulling them back." Again, something that Waters and everyone else could see for themselves as a dozen hovercraft and helicopters were making for them at flank speed and didn't look inclined to stop until they had reached the shelter of Fort Bangor. Given that there were almost twenty vehicles in the Recon Company, that suggested that the two helicopters weren't the only ones that had been taking fire. "The enemy force is approximately one twenty - repeat one two zero - battlemechs and the same of some sort of miniature BattleMechs. No idea what they are but they're fast. There's some infantry riding on the real Mechs."

"I guess they weren't decoys after all," Waters said. "Alright. All regiment and battalion commanders: tanks and infantry are to take defensive postions on the hills behind us; Mechs are with me. We'll hit them hard and fast to take their measure and fall back on the conventional regiments once we know what we're dealing with. Formation is delta-three."

It wasn't a complicated plan and the 42nd had been working together for decades so that was all it took to have the tanks and personel carriers backing up and turning to make for the top of the hills that they had just crossed. Hull down behind it they could provide support for the planned withdrawal. The Mechs spread out more, taking a combat formation, each battalion sending two companies forward and holding a third in reserve. Waters and his command lance shifted right to march between the first and third battalions, their faster medium Mechs allowing them to move easily through the heavier mechs of the first battalion. Waters preferred the relative inconspiciousness of his Griffin on the battlefield, as well as the mobility that allowed him to support any of his soldiers rather than being all but trapped in place in a lumbering assault job.

The hill was not forested and the minute that his Mech's head was above the edge, Waters could see the enemy forces spread out and moving fast towards him. A moment later and something snapped past his head, missing the Griffin by inches. The size had looked more like an artillery shell than he liked although there didn't seem to be any artillery pieces up ahead that he could see. With annoyance he realised that the shot hadn't quite missed, having taken off one of the aerials that rose from the Griffin's domed helmet.

Taking a second look as he crested the hill he picked out one of the larger Mechs in the central group and fired his PPC and LRMs into the hulking humanoid Battlemech, sweat running down his face as a wave of heat flooded his cockpit. The charged particles whiplashed across one shoulder of the Mech but the missiles overshot as the towering Mech moved accelerated forwards, the scattering pint-sized Mechs in front of it moving even faster to keep ahead of their larger brother. Waters could see that the other two battalion-sized groups were moving further out and speeding up, as if to envelop the flanks of the Avalon Hussars.

"Hit them hard, Hussars," the General snapped. "Second and Third battalions wheel out and hit your opposite numbers, first battalion take the centre." He fired his LRMs this time, letting his Mech cool. This time they hit the towering Mech, smashing into armored plates along its left flank and leg. In return his target fired the two lasers attached to its left forearm, following it up with a shot from the cannon whose muzzle jutted out of the right wrist in place of a hand and another laser in the chest firing - probably on a seperate firing circuit from those in the left arm. The first three shots hit squarely to the chest and the only reason that the second didn't was that Waters' Griffin was tumbling backwards, more than two tons of armour removed from the torso's protection knocking him badly off balance. "By Jesu," he exclaimed as his status monitors lit up. None of his armour was breeched, but another volley like that would punch right through - he'd taken lighter hits off of a Marik Awesome the last time the League sent a heavy raid across the border.

An unfamiliar Mech looked down through his cockpit and it took him a moment to reconcile the unusual persepective to realise that it was one of the dwarf Mechs, its helmet little more than a dimple between the broad shoulders. Struggling to rise he swatted at it with his PPC, forcing it back. A laser mounted inside its chest lashed out and Waters felt heat rising. Checking his armour he realised in horror that the laser had dug through the last quarter ton of armour over his engine and damaged the reactor. More lasers bit into the Griffin as he stood and found three of the little goblin-like mechs picking away at him viciously. Fortunately none of them hit the weak spot, but it was only a matter of time.

To his left, an explosion marked the death of one of first battalion's Archers as its ammuntion bins detonated. Glancing at the side monitor that showed the IFF beacons of the regiment, Waters was shocked to see that almost a third of them were out of action. "All Mechs withdraw!" he shouted and fired his jump jets to get clear of his attackers, blasting himself backwards over the crest of the hill. He landed behind the hulk of a Wolverine, recognising it as Command Sergeant Major's machine only when he saw the lanky mechwarrior struggling out of the cockpit. He stooped to pick up his comrade - and that was all that saved him as half a dozen of the dwarf Mechs jumped over the crest of the hill, lasers blazing. Instead of hitting him squarely in the chest, the shots peppered his head and shoulders.

Caught with his hand extended for Pike, Waters could do nothing to fight back - his particle cannon and missiles would not be effective at these close quarters. However, the same was not true of everyone and a cannonade from a JagerMech with the markings of the Third Battalion smashed into one of the small Mechs, hurling it to the floor, the armour pockmarked by the explosive shells.

A moment later, three lasers punched into the JagerMech's chest. Another of those monstrous cannon shells caught the heavy Mech in the face and it fell backwards, cockpit caved in. Looking up, Waters saw a lean, blocky Mech with birdlike legs march over the hill, the weapon barrels that made up its arms tracking from the fallen JagerMech towards his own Griffin. Desperately he hit his jump jets, evading all but one laser shot, that tore through more than half the armour on his left leg. The hit sent him into a spin that Waters skillfully turned into a turn and landed facing away from the enemy, legs already moving to send him running at almost eighty kilometers an hour away from the invasion and towards the cover of his tanks. On the side monitor he could see barely half of his Mechwarriors were able to do the same.

"Waters to all commands," he snapped. "Be warned that the 'decoys' are minature Mechs armed with something equivalent to a large laser and moving at least as fast as a Jenner. We are in full retreat. I am ordering all battleroms to be transmitted directly to Fort Bangor. Kommandant Waters - I need you to have ComStar transmit the data back to Bolan highest priority. Pay whatever they ask, this information has to get back to Tharkad no matter what."

Bill's voice was strained as she replied. "Negative, General Waters. The ComStar compound is under attack. The ComGuards report they are repelling the attack but the HPG is damaged and they estimate six hours to repair it."

"What?" Waters exclaimed. "Someone's attacking ComStar? Inside the city!?"

"Yes sir," confirmed Bill. "Precentor Caputo wants to speak to you as soon as possible."

"Put her through," Waters ordered as a volley of fire from the tanks hurtled over the head of his Griffin and into the pursuing enemy Mechs.

Waters had met Precentor Nina Caputo several times since the former mercenary had arrived on Poulsbo with the 143rd ComGuards Division. He'd never heard her sound quite so angry. "Who the hell are these bastards!" she snarled the minute that Fort Bangor relayed her call (probably coming across the secure landline between his headquarters building and the ComStar station. "The motherless savages are firing on our compound from the houses opposite! If we fire back there's going to be a bloodbath."

"We don't know who they are," Waters responded as he slowed to drop Pike - white-faced after the wild ride he'd had - off next to an armoured personnel carrier just behind the cover of the hill, before turning to add his long range missiles to the vollys being fired by tanks all along the line of hills. "They haven't replied to any of our challenges - all we know is that they are hostile."

A Partisan tank raised its autocannon to a high elevation and started sweeping the sky with depleted uranium shells. Waters checked his threat board and grimaced. Aerospace fighters. Wonderful. "Frankly, Precentor, we're getting hammered up here and as soon as my Mechs regroup I'm ordering a fighting retreat back to Fort Bangor. Any support that you can offer would be gratefully accepted."

Caputo hesitated for a moment. "I have four Level III formations on planet," she said, confirming Waters own intelligence reports on the ComGuards deployments. "I will detach two of them to circle the city and meet you at Fort Bangor. The other two will be needed to secure my base here." A Level III formation was essentially a combined arms battalion - a quite welcome reinforcement.

"Sir," Bill broke into the conversation. "The 201st Light Armour reports that a fourth battalion of the enemy is moving around their extreme flank."

Waters grimaced. The 201st were his extreme right flank. If they someone was getting around them then his entire force was in danger of being encircled. "Understood, Major. Precentor, I would appreciate any reinforcements you can send me."

Then he cut her off and started trying to extricate his force from what was looking increasingly like an utter disaster.

.oOo.

Hikaru popped around the corner swept his suit's laser across an improvised barricade that the defenders were using to try to block the point's approach to the controls for the HPG. Soldiers ducked away from the beam, one of them falling backwards with a fiery gouge slashed across his face below his helmet brim, and the rest of the Point leapt forwards to exploit the moment of suppression. In an instant, Jolyne had crossed the distance to the barricade and rocketed over it on her jump jets. Point Commander Rache caught the corner of the heavy table that had been turned on its side across the passageway to provide most of the cover and yanked it back to let the other two Fangs pass, firing his own laser into the nearest soldier as he did so.

By the time Hikaru caught up with them, the squad guarding the barricade had been wiped out. It was surprisingly clean: lasers tended to cauterise wounds caused. The smell of burning flesh (two of the corpses were on fire) was probably choking, but inside the protection of their armour, the five Clan warriors didn't notice it at all.

"Anyone hurt?" Rache asked gruffly. No one replied as he looked at each of them through the narrow, straight visor of the low, domed helmet of the Fang, checking for injury that someone might have missed or was brazening out. "Fine. They are still trying to stop us from going in this direction, so this is the way we will go." Without access to maps of the facility, it was the best way that they had of finding the control room. The only catch was that it might not be the only thing that was being protected - one of the other Points had barrelled through three blockades only to find that what was being protected was an armoury for the compound's infantry. They had fused the door shut before they moved on, denying the defenders access to the weapons there, but it was wasted time.

The point moved quickly down the corridor, forcing open every door they came across to check the rooms behind, only to find nothing but empty offices and meeting rooms.

"Next floor perhaps?" Jolyne suggested. "They might keep the controls off the ground floor to prevent visitors from stumbling into it."

"That sounds reasonable," agreed Rache. "The stairwells are too obvious though. Make a hole in the ceiling."

The rooftiles were cleared away easily with Hikaru and Johannes each making two quick slashes with their lasers at right angles to each other. The concrete above was more resilient however and it took a dozen shots from the other three Fangs to carve deeply enough through it that a panel about a metre and a half around crashed down between them. That was annoying, Hikaru noted. The batteries in their armour were highly efficent but they had some limits and one of them was a large but finite number of shots from the lasers.

"Turn the power on your lasers down a notch," Rache ordered, echoing Hikaru's thoughts. "We don't need to waste energy against these lightweights." He jumped up through the hole and there was a chatter of automatic weapons being fired at him, then the sizzle of a laser cut them off. "Two notches," Rache corrected himself and Hikaru jumped up after his commander to see that the other infantryman had amost decapitated the two man machinegun team who had managed to bring their gun around from the stairs in time to cover the hole in the floor behind them.

"Watch your feet," the Point Commander ordered. "This facility wasn't built for anything as heavy as our suits. The corridors are probably alright, but the rooms are likely to have fewer supports."

.oOo.

Costigan snarled as he dodged a volley of short ranged missiles from a Kintaro. He'd been careless earlier and the larger Mech had managed to land a Narc Beacon on him. It was making it a great deal harder for him to avoid the missiles - and that in and of itself was distracting him from the fire of the rest of the little battlegroup that was hunting him through the ComStar military base.

He wasn't sure where the rest of Trinary Gamma were. To keep the 'ComGuards' distracted, Star Captain Konrad had ordered them to scatter once the infantry had breeched the buildings. Inside, the battle armoured troops would be all but invincible and with the Mechs outside, the defenders were presented with two fronts to fight on.

Jumping over an office building, he heard the explosions as almost a dozen missiles ploughed into the upper floors trying to reach him and spun to fire all five of his lasers into the Sentinel that had been lurking behind the building, waiting for a chance to ambush anyone coming around it. The other Mech staggered as deep slashes were carved through its armour by the ravening beams of coherent light, but it raised its high speed autocannon and casings flew from the breech as it sprayed a line of shells across his position, about half of them hitting the Assassin's already battered chest. Costigan assumed that the missile launcher hadn't locked, as no warheads followed the tracers towards him. Fortunately, the Sentinel's missiles didn't seem compatible with those being used by the Kintaro.

Still, three Mechs were a little much and Costigan moved a toggle on one of the two joysticks, changing the targeting mode for his lasers. An hexagon over the Sentinel in his main display expanded, showing him a magnified view of the white-painted Mech. Settling the crosshairs over the gash that one of his lasers had made in the Sentinel's left torso he fired all five lasers again. Only two struck the gash, but they tore through the weakened armour and the right arm of the Mech, along with its autocannon, went flying as the lasers severed the shoulder joint. Unfortunately, the ammunition bins weren't hit, but with almost half it's chest - and the only major weapon system - gone, the Sentinel had been dispensed with as a threat.

There was a crashing sound from behind Costigan and he barely managed to kick his Asassin into a hasty run before the needle-nosed Crab crashed through the building behind him, lasers firing. Much of the white paint had been scraped away in the passage, and fortunately the pilot's aim was off due to the debris, or Costigan suspected that his rear armour would be looking rather threadbare.

Seeing the Kintaro emerging from around the corner of the now collapsing building, Costigan broke right and into an open Mech Hanger. Hopefully it would have another exit, he thought - or at least not have any Mechs still parked inside it. He was fortunate in both cases - only to find a Mech re-entering the hanger from the opposite end. "You're surrounded, pirate!" boomed a woman's voice from the Shootist. "Don't be a fool."

Costigan's crosshairs were almost perfectly placed over the heavy Mech's right chest and they fired almost simultanously. Costigan swore as the heavy autocannon in the Shootist's chest shredded the left arm of his Mech and one of the pulse lasers carved a crooked line of craters down the faceplace of the Assassin. His opponent was worse off however. All five shots had torn into the chest right over the ammunition bins and although the cellular storage had saved the powerful Mech and its pilot from death, the explosion had hurled the seventy ton warmachine from its feet and into one of the empty Mech Bays. At least it wouldn't need to go far for repairs, Costigan smirked, noting that the large laser in the right arm was lying in the opposite bay and that without ammuntion the cannon would be effectively useless. Even if the pilot managed to stand up again, the Shootist was effectively out of action.

Not even slowing for the loss of his arm he ran past the fallen Mech, its pilot still cursing through the open microphone and feathered his jumpjets to kill his momentum and turn in place as the Crab was the first Mech to reach the other end of the hanger, then run out of its line of sight. "This is Gamma Two-Four," he called into Trinary Gamma's channel, hoping that it was being monitored as Konrad had promised. "Requesting an airstrike on the building I just left."

There was a crackle over the channel and then: "Gamma Two-Four this is Three-Four Epsilon One-Three. Target confirmed. We are incoming."

Costigan broke into a run away from the hanger as a pair of Jagatai heavy fighters from the 34th Armoured Cavalry Squadron dove towards the building, lasers and particle cannon blazing. The roof of the hanger had evidently not been hardened against this sort of attack and the roof collapsed inwards. After a moment a tongue of fire and smoke rose from the ruin. "Excellent shooting Epsilon One-Three," Costigan thanked the fighters. Free of pursuit for the moment, he orientated himself and then headed towards the eastern end of the complex where he had entered and where the HPG dish still loomed above the buildings.

Passing the broken wreckage of what his warbook identified as a Champion, he also saw the wreckage of Mechwarrior Athene's Fire Moth. The head was flattened back into the body, the indentation with the sharp deformation that showed it had been a slow kinetic impact - such as that of a larger Mech's foot - that had finished Athene off. She had been an extremely attractive warrior, Costigan noted regretfully as he passed her, noting the location on his battle computer for the salvage crews.

The Star Adder mechwarrior ducked back from one of the internal roads as two Fury tanks roared along it in the opposite direction, followed by a Lancelot. With all the metal of the complex and his Assassin having cooled from the fusillades of a moment before, visual targeting was the only only way that he was likely to be detected. He saw two Jagatai, perhaps the same point as before, descend to strafe the little column and rise, one of them trailing smoke from the return fire.

The defenders had managed to retake the gates to the ComStar compound and a small force of three tanks - two Pumas and a Burke - were in the open yard behind those gates. Standing on the firing step within the wall, a platform specifically designed to carry their weight, two light Mechs were firing lasers at a target further inside the compound. The warbook marked them as a Spector and a Night Hawk - neither of them a design familiar to Costigan. Interference on his sensors revealed that one was equipped with electronic countermeasures but he wasn't sure which one.

The tanks were more worrying. All three had excellent long range firepower that could batter his Assassin into wreckage in an instant or ward off aerospace fighters providing ground support. Only the relatively constrained lines of sight within the compound restricted them now and they were also heavily armoured. All four of his lasers combined would be hard pressed to seriously damage any of them unless he was lucky or managed a sustained barrage.

His moment of analysis was cut short as the Burke suddenly lowered the angle of its turreted particle cannons and spun the turret in the direction of Costigan's Assassin. The much smaller Mech sprinted away just in time to miss being hit by the three cannon, although even the near miss considerably increased the static from the ECM that was clouding his sensors as the electromagnetic systems of the Assassin struggled to compensate for the power burst.

"Gamma Two-Four to all units," he advised urgently. "The compound gates have been secured by three heavy tanks and two light Mechs. The tanks are Pumas and a Burke - heavy with a lot of range. I do not advise an air attack except from well above their maximum range."

"Gamma Two-One has visual of the Mechs," Rebecca commented over the radio, then exhaled in satisfaction just as Costigan heard the crash of a Mech hitting the ground. "Make that one light mech," she corrected.

Star Captain Konrad cleared his throat. "Good work, all of you," he advised. "Star Commander Helmuth advises me that his infantry have secured the control centre for the HyperPulse Generator and are disabling it now. We've completed our objective, now all we need to do is withdraw and join forces with the rest of the 10th Hussars. Star Commander Rebecca, you and Mechwarrior Costigan are to secure the gates for us. All other Mechs are to gather on me to pick our infantry."

Costigan grimaced. It would take five Mechs to carry all the infantry and Konrad wouldn't take more than that, so that meant that besides Athene, two other Mechs had been taken down - which wasn't as bad as it could be given how many of these white-painted surats had crawled out of this so-called communcations centre but was still painful losses from the Trinary this early in the campaign.

"Understood," he confirmed. "I am moving towards your position, Star Commander."

"Neg," ordered Rebecca. "I will join you. We will engage at close ranges - Spheroid missiles are less effective within two hundred metres and their particle cannons are little better. You concentrate on dealing with the Mech and I shall handle the armoured vehicles."

Costigan paused. "Star Commander, did you load Infernos in your SRM racks?" he asked incredulously. That was the only thing that he could think off that would polish off those three tanks in a hurry.

"It is recommended for at least one Mech in every Star to carry some, Costigan," she reminded him. "And those tanks will be much less of a problem if they're on fire."

"And if they get even one shot into your ammuniton bins, Star Commander, then everything within ten metres of your Grendel will also be on fire," pointed out Costigan. "A distance that I plan to exceed at all times."

"That is acceptable," she responded haughtily as her Grendel came into view from behind a building, "but only if you do so while also keeping that Spector off my back."

Costigan sighed and kicked his Assassin into a run, Rebecca's Grendel trailing behind him, essentially using him as a shield as they charged into the open yard. Not that he could fault her for that. If the Grendel was knocked out of action then he didn't have the firepower to handle the defenders on his own - in fact it was questionable whether they could do so if the tanks only managed to knock out Rebecca's two short range missile launchers. That would become... challenging.

As it was, only a handful of missiles actually hit him, pummeling the armour on his remaining arm and sending shards of armour flying off his right leg in a fashion that would have been devestating to any infantry underfoot if there had been any such. Rebecca darted off to the left, large lasers firing into the frontal armour of the nearer of the two Pumas (and doing disturbingly little damage, to Costigan's mind) while he swerved right and hit his jumpjets to vault over what what was left of the Night Hawk and close in on the Spector.

Both of them hit with only one laser - in Costigan's case that meant that the Spector's large laser sliced away half the armour left over the major systems in the chest of his Assassin, and in the case of the Spector it meant that a deep gash was carved from elbow to shoulder of its left arm.

The ComGuards pilot then made what was, in the experience of Costigan, the cardinal error of light Mech combat: jumping up and forwards to try to hop over the Assassin to get a clear shot at his weaker rear armour while remaining outside his firing arc. Costigan waited until the other pilot was committed to the move and then used his own jumpjets to skim backwards underneath the Spector's feet before they landed - moving through the effective blindspot beneath the other Mech's standard visual display and into its own rear arc.

In credit to the ComGuard, he realised what was happening in time to bring his left arm around to put two shots squarely into the Assassin's left leg, blasting away almost every remaining plate of armour on the limb. It wasn't enough to prevent Costigan from firing all four of his lasers squarely into the back of the Spector and arguable contributed to its fate since the angle meant that the shots dug from a little below and behind the shoulder directly into the engine shielding.

Silvery-fire erupted from the newly made-gap in the Spector's armour as air was sucked into the reactor and superheated. The mechwarrior's ejection sent him hurtling upwards moments before the same fire erupted from the various structural weak points, slagging the interior of the thirty-five ton battlemech.

A moment later, an explosion scattered parts of the Burke across most of the courtyard and Costigan saw flames leaping from the napalm mix that liberally coated the turret of one of the Pumas. Rebecca fired two salvos of missiles into the other Puma, spreading more fire across one track and the frontal armour and then jumping for the rooftop of the communcations centre. Not reinforced to deal with forty-five tons of BattleMech, the roof collapsed and the Grendel dropped out of sight.

Costigan ran for cover behind the same building, a cluster of long range missiles hammering into his rear armour, shaving away almost all of the protection. There was a thunderous explosion as flames reached the ammo bins of one of the Pumas, he wasn't sure which one - not that it mattered as he could hear the engine of the other one roared as it chased after him. The tank was moving at almost fifty kilometers an hour when it failed to corner and ninety-five tons of metal hit the opposite building, half-burying itself. Costigan suspected that even if the fires didn't reach anything vital inside the tank, it wouldn't matter with almost half it's own weight of concrete piled over it, but he ran behind it and fired a full volley into the rear armour anyway.

It took a second salvo from his lasers to finish chewing through the thick armor and gut the interior of the tank.

"Mechwarrior Costigan to Star Captain Konrad. The gates are now clear," he reported.

There was a crackle over his radio. "What is the status of Star Commander Rebecca?" Konrad asked.

"I am well," Rebecca cut in. "I am disabling the HPG systems more thoroughly," she reported. A moment later her Grendel leapt out of the building, tongues of flame reaching after her from the broken roof. "I am now confident that they will not restore communications without extensive repairs."

Konrad sighed. "Remember that we will want the station to be repairable," he chided her. "The garrison forces will require use of it."

Less that two minutes later, six Star Adder mechs came into sight, two of the Assassins splitting a point of Fangs between them while the other Mechs all carried full Points on them. "The rest of the 10th Hussars are securing the military base north of the city," Konrad advised them. "The enemy's mobile forces are being pushed around the western side of the city so we will move around the east to avoid them."

.oOo.

The armored regiments had not held together long enough for Waters to regroup his Mech units. He could hardly blame them - the shattered remnants of two regiments were all that was holding his rearguard together. The 201st couldn't contribute because as far as he had been able to tell, every single vehicle in the entire regiment was a smoking wreck somewhere in the hills north of him. The truly depressing thing was that as best he could tell only a dozen or so enemy Battlemechs had been disabled or destroyed, although casualties had been higher among the dwarf Mechs. Some of the troops had started calling them redcaps after some kind of horrid goblin from a children's fairy tale.

Waters didn't give a damn what they were called, he just wished they'd stop harrying his retreat. He'd already given up on making it back to Fort Bangor - Bill's last transmission had been to confirm she was evacuating the base ahead of the flanking Mechs that were storming it. Her plan to change into civvies the first chance she had and then go to ground sounded desperate but so was the situation.

"General! ComStar mechs ahead!" reported the forward elements of the column - currently a pair of scout cars doing little more than acting as a tripwire for any serious threats that might be in their path.

Waters moved forward through the column, his Griffin limping as he did so. The Mechs and infantry transports were a sorry sight and he quailed at the thought of how many of his men must have been burnt alive inside the vehicles that had been hit by the invaders. He had been fortunate to have never before seen infernos used outside of training exercises but he knew from those exercises that anyone inside a vehicle struck by the hellish missiles had little to no chance of escaping with their lives.

A pair of white painted light Mechs - a Mongoose and a Mercury to judge by the warbook - were bracketing a lone tree next to the road. Neither was pointing weapons at the column, but it was clear from their movements that both mechwarriors were on edge.

"Demi-Precentor Johnson is only a few kilometres ahead of you, General," the senior of the two ComStar mechwarriors reported once introductions had been made. "Our compound has been secured again, but Precentor Caputo was injured when a hanger collapsed on her Shootist and the HPG took heavy damage. There is doubt that it can be repaired without replacement parts from offworld."

"Dammit!" Waters grumbled. He had sent word to every world within range of the Black Box in Fort Bangor that Poulsbo was under attack so the news would get out, but Bill had given him a codeword during her last message confirming that she had destroyed the box to keep it out of the invaders hands after sending one final message advising of the dire situation that he faced. And that report could hardly be as detailed as the information that ComStar could have sent by HPG signal.

"Yes sir," the Mechwarrior agreed with feeling. "The last message sent was that the planet was under attack, but ComStar has no way of knowing that we are under attack. Precentor Caputo ordered that we transmit a warning to both jump points in the hope that a jumpship will arrive and be able to relay the message, but..."

"No ships are due here for another week or so," confirmed Waters. "And if they do, they'll need a week to recharge their jump drives. Fortunately, the jump points are far enough out that the invaders might not be able to reach them before they're able to leave."

The three Mechs moved aside to let the leading elements of the reinforced company that was all that was left of Second Battalion, 42nd Avalon Hussars pass them by. "Blessed Blake," the Mercury pilot swore. "They really got a working over." Half the mechs had lost large portions of their armour and at least three were missing all or part of one or both arms. More were limping badly due to damage taken to their legs. The most damaged Mech in the group was Lefttenant Kuramitsu's Marauder, which had lost the right arm entirely when shots had savaged the right chest and the autocannon there. The left arm also hung useless due to its damage, leaving the heavy Mech totally unarmed. There was still a flapping panel on the back of what was left of the Marauder's back where she had ejected her now useless autocannon magazine.

Waters grunted. "I hope that the troops left at your compound are in better shape," he said. It was an open secret that the ComGuards were equipped from stockpiled equipment dating back to the Star League, equipment that was still considerably better than that available to most of the AFFC despite the best efforts of NAIS and Hanse Davion over the last few decades.

"I don't know that, sir," the Mechwarrior admitted politely. Then his guns jerked skywards. "Incoming fighters," he snapped.

Waters checked his sensors, surprised not to have seen anything. Nothing. What was... Calls of warning started coming from the back of the column and he saw icons begin to appear at the extreme edge of his rader. Clearly the ComGuards mechs had longer range radars than his Griffin. "Waters to all units. Disperse the formation. Take whatever cover you can."

The enemy fighters descended out of the clouds, sweeping across the dispersing 42nd Avalon Hussars no lower than three hundred metres, lasers firing steadily. Waters fired off a volley of missiles and watched them clip the wing of one of the fleet little craft, causing no more than a slight stagger in its flight path. The Mongoose and Mercury were moving evasively away from the column, not that he could blame them. Neither light mech had any weapons that could reach the fighters as long as they remained at that altitude.

Explosions began to occur as damaged Mechs and vehicles succumbed, black oily smoke rising from the wreckage. Waters narrowly avoided a three lasers that hit the tree behind him. Sergeant Rodriquez' Quickdraw was not as fortunate as one of the enemy fighters sliced deeply into his rear with lasers, reaching the stock of short ranged missiles stored within. The fireball sent parts flying across the fields either side of the road, one arm crashing down on an APC, immobilising it. The infantry within prudently baled out a moment before more laser fire shattered their ride. Waters hoped that the driver had also escaped.

"Damn you!" the General shouted, raising his particle cannon and firing it upwards into one of the fighters, heedless of the heat that swept through his cockpit. "Damn you!"

He fired again, this time firing his last long range missiles. Even though they missed, better than letting them overheat in his ammo bits. A ton of armour was battered off his Griffin by one of the circling fighters but he locked the Mech's knees and was unshaken.

A third shot and the crosshairs on display fizzled and then the entire display vanished as the targeting computer overheated. Waters slapped the override as the Griffin's computer started to shut down the straining reactor.

His fourth shot, aimed by eye through the dome of the cockpit, missed clearly and Waters gasped for breath in the ovenlike heat of his cockpit. Reluctantly he lowered the particle cannon slightly, allowing the heatsinks to dissipate some of the massive heat burden that he had built up.

"General!" called a voice. "General Waters! Can you hear me?"

"Y-yes. I hear you," he said hoarsely.

"The ComGuards are coming, General," the voice reassured him. "Just hold on." He recognised the voice as that of Kuramitsu and as his display winked up, he realised that the young Leftenant was standing her battered and weaponless Marauder in front of his Griffin, literally shielding the smaller Mech with its body from the fighters.

However, the white Mechs that were coming over the hills were a far less welcome sight, for they bore the clear marks of battle damage and familiar columns of smoke was beginning to rise from the hills that they were emerging from. As he watched, a running Kintaro toppled forwards, legs all but cut out from under it as a strafing run swept across the ComGuards at low altitude.

Looking around, Waters realised that no more than a company of his Mechs were still upright. A company more might have been salvagable if he could hold the field. The tanks were doing a little better - perhaps a battalion were still moving, but even they were shedding tracks or had burnt out projections which had once been cannon or missile racks in all too many cases.

"Demi-Precentor Johnson," he sent on the frequency that the ComGuard scout Mechs had used. "This is Hauptmann-General Waters. What is your situation?"

The voice that replied was distant and unbelieving. "This is Demi-Precentor Verble. Johnson's tank was hit by infernos, none of the crew got out. We're getting cut to pieces, General. I think there are enemy Mechs between -"

Waters shook his head as he heard the other man's voice cut off. Probably permanently.

More Mechs were moving onto the hillside now, following the ComGuards survivors. Birdlike, predatory shapes. Waters blinked tears out of his eyes. How could this have happened? How could it have come to this? So fast. It was not even a day since the enemy had jumped into the system!

Reluctantly, he set his radio to a general broadcast. "This is Hauptmann-General Roger Waters of the 42nd Avalon Hussars calling the leaders of the invasion force. I repeat, this is Hauptmann-General Waters. We surrender. I repeat. We surrender."

For a long moment, nothing happened. The mechs continued down the hill. A lone Crab fell to the floor as lasers bit into it.

"Hauptmann-General," a flat voice replied. "Your surrender is accepted. Order your warriors to exit their battlemechs and other vehicles, laying down any weapons they carry."

Weeping in shame, Waters gave the hardest - and the final - orders of his professional career. Then he unbuckled himself from his command couch and rooted through the compartment beneath it that held a survival kit to extract the sidearm that went with it. He wasn't one of the rocket-rangers who liked having one strapped to them as they piloted, but it was common sense to have something to protect yourself with if you had to eject.

A moment later, there was a muffled boom inside the cockpit of his Griffin.