AUTHOR'S NOTE: This one gets a bit talky. I apologize for another delay, but this is an extra-long chapter. Teton Field
Virentofta, Pesht Military District, Draconis Combine
13 September 3060
Night had fallen across Teton Field, and the clouds had blown away to reveal a star-studded night. Lunitari lit the area so well that work lights weren't needed around Phase Dock, or the Tigershark nest, where the night shift mechanics pulled off burned armor plates, replaced them with new ones, and painted them over to match the preexisting camouflage.
Reina Siddeley knew she should probably be getting some sleep. Though she hadn't been up over 24 hours like Vought had, it had been an eighteen hour day already, and no guarantee tomorrow wouldn't be the same. Still, she wanted to give her Tigershark a last once-over.
Terri Curtiss, who didn't seem to need or want sleep after the events of the day, walked up to her. "Reina, how's the Major?"
"Fine, Terri," Siddeley replied. "I think she went to sleep an hour ago."
"That's good. She sure is taking this rescue thing personally."
"I agree. She's not being professional about it." Siddeley shook her head. "There's more to this than just rescuing a pilot. I thought maybe it was something personal with Condorcet, but there's something else. It's almost as if " Her voice trailed off and she looked to the sky.
"What—" Curtiss began.
"Shh. I hear something."
After a few moments, so did Curtiss. It was a whine that increased to a steady roar. It was different from that of the Hercules—rather than the high pitched sound of fighter engines, this was the bone-tingling rumble of something far larger than even the 100-ton interceptors. Soon the base itself was shaking, and looking beyond the runway threshold, Siddeley and Curtis saw why.
"It's a DropShip," Curtiss said, somewhat unnecessarily, since Siddeley had already recognized it. "Horizon-class—the Sentinels only have one of those, the Kagoshima Rubicon. No base alert, so they must be legit." The Horizon-class were actually smaller than most DropShips, weighing in at a mere 2000 tons. It was rather sleek, built like a metal swan, with wide wings and canards built for aerodynamic reentry, unlike the egg shaped mammoths such as the Union and Overlordclasses, which weighed upwards of 10,000 tons. This was designed to deliver small loads, not entire companies and battalions of BattleMechs.
"Yes, and it's Commander Arla-Vlata's personal ship. Now what?"
The DropShip landed, rumbled to a stop after belching three titanic dragchutes, and turned onto the crowded transient tarmac. Siddeley caught hold of a jeep driven by the ubiquitous Renee Larzac. They reached the DropShip just as a tall, powerfully built woman walked down the air stairs that had been placed next to the main hatch. It was not Sheila Arla-Vlata: this woman was even taller, and the body armor she wore made her look even bulkier than she was. There was no fat on her, however; it was all muscle. At the sight of Siddeley, she came to attention and gave the other woman a perfect salute. She wore subdued rank boards and no shoulder patches, but the black beret with its pin of crossed naginata polearms told Siddeley everything she needed to know. She returned the salute. "Lieutenant Commander Mikkansia Jackson, commanding, Sentinels Light Infantry," the tall woman said, her voice crisp. "On orders from Commander Sheila Arla-Vlata, commanding, Sentinels RCAT. Good evening, Section Leader Siddeley."
Siddeley nodded. She had heard of Mikkansia Jackson and the Sentinels Light Infantry. A reinforced battalion, the SLI were the only infantry the Sentinels had, but they made up for their lack of numbers by skill and sheer ferocity. Known as the Black Berets to friend and foe alike, the SLI were not people that anyone wanted angry at them.
"Where is Lieutenant Commander St. Mawgan and Major Vought?" Jackson asked.
"Lieutenant Commander St. Mawgan is over at the ready room," Siddeley answered. "Noel er, Captain I mean, Major Vought is—"
"Good evening, Lieutenant Commander Jackson." Noelani Vought had appeared at Siddeley's side, dressed in her uniform, her hair neatly combed. Only the fatigue in her face betrayed that she still needed sleep.
"Ah, Major Vought," Jackson returned, with a brief smile that was more frightening than friendly. She handed Vought a datapad. "Our orders. We're here to supplement your rescue efforts. I admit I hadn't realized that Flying Officer Condorcet carried so much value, but then again, we Sentinels look out for our own."
Vought scanned the datapad, confirming what she had suspected—the SLI force was the ground forces Arla-Vlata had told her to expect. She had to admit she was impressed. Vought had expected another battalion of the Silvanesti Rangers or a company of hovercraft, not the elite special forces of the entire regimental combat team. "I didn't ask for this, Commander. All I did was report to Commander Arla-Vlata with my updates. She told me we were suspending offensive operations."
"An order which you promptly disobeyed." Another quick smile. "The Commander asked me to pass onto you that the next time you plan on disobeying an order, to come up with an excuse better than a garbled transmission. That was a dead giveaway. She does congratulate you on a successful sortie, however, though she said if you do it again, she will how did she put it have your ass in a wheelbarrow." Jackson took off the pack she was wearing and passed it to another infantryman standing nearby. Vought noticed that the pack had strapped to it a collapsible naginata, the traditional bladed polearm of the SLI. "Right or wrong, Major, we're here now and more's on the way. I have two DropShuttles arriving within the next two hours. We're planning a complex procedure here, and I will need your help, along with that of Martin that is, Commander St. Mawgan. Please meet me in twenty minutes at your office with the latest updates to enemy strength in that area, along with Commander St. Mawgan so we can discuss the best way to handle this." She inclined her head to Vought. "I apologize for my rather brusque nature, Major, but time is short. Will you excuse me?" Vought nodded dumbly, and Jackson turned back to the shuttle. "All right, Sentinels! No one told you to stop working! Let's unload those travel pods!"
"Wow," Larzac said. "First we got J.J. Condorcet. Then Lieutenant Commander St. Mawgan, then Major Engram, and now here's Lieutenant Commander Jackson. All of a sudden we're loaded with brass." She glanced at Vought. "Things were a lot quieter when it was just you here, Major Vought."
"All of a sudden," Vought sighed, "I just don't give a damn."
True to her word, Mikkansia Jackson was waiting at the front door of Vought's trailer exactly twenty minutes later, when Vought arrived with Siddeley and Yakovlev in tow. She had divested herself of the body armor, revealing a surprisingly wiry figure. She had also unpinned her hair, letting it fall in black waves to the small of her back. Though her words were polite and punctuated by the occasional smile, Jackson was obviously at the base to execute her mission quickly and efficiently. Vought had despaired of ever rescuing Condorcet at the rate she was going, but Jackson seemed convinced that he would be back at Teton in time for dinner.
Lieutenant Commander Martin St. Mawgan arrived a few minutes after Vought did. He had been largely absent during the day, either flying around the area or taking care of administrative details, arranging air cover for the supply routes through the Targhee and Silvanesti. Given the antics of the Gang Green, she wondered what kind of outfitt he AeroWing was. In contrast was the way he worked with Jackson. The two obviously had known each other for awhile, addressing each other by their first name, and Vought found herself envying their easy familiarity. She still very much felt like an outsider looking in. She felt a little better after Jackson asked permission to call her by her first name rather than her rank.
It took an hour, though it seemed longer with fatigue tugging at Vought every minute, but they had a workable plan—though to Vought it seemed overcomplicated. Whatever the case, the sixteen remaining pilots of the Fyrebirds, the six pilots of the Gang Green, and two of Jackson's lieutenants crammed into the base ready room. This was an underground briefing room with walls covered in maps, enemy Aerofighter and BattleMech recognition posters, and the occasional pithy fighter pilot saying that was common to all rooms like this, no matter what nationality the pilots were.
"Attention on deck!" one of the SLI shouted. The pilots leapt to their feet as Jackson, Vought, and St. Mawgan walked down the aisle. "At ease," Jackson said, and the pilots sat. At an icy glance from her, even the unrepentant Ken Mikasa stowed his cowboy hat.
"All right," Jackson began, "I and the Sentinels Light Infantry are here to provide you with the proper support you need to rescue your downed pilot, so we can bring this problem to a quick conclusion. I have been designated by Commander Arla-Vlata to lead this mission; however, Lieutenant Commander St. Mawgan is in command of all air elements, with Major Vought in command of operations. This is going to be a maximum effort." She paused. "I know what many of you are thinking: we're doing this only because Flying Officer Condorcet happens to hold the rank of Captain in the House Davion armed forces and is the heir to Condorcet Enterprises. I can assure you that you are stone wrong. If any pilot goes down and there is a chance to rescue him or her, I would happily lay down my life, and those of my battalion's, to get them out. You people in Fighter Squadron Six already know this, or should; you new members of Fighter Squadron Seven are about to find it out. We do not leave people behind." Her eyes traveled the crowd. Vought wanted to cheer: Arla-Vlata had gotten her point at the Sancrist meeting, that she wanted to rescue Condorcet because he was one of her pilots, not rescue a pilot because he happened to be Condorcet.
"I have three Goliath DropShuttles on the way, and they should arrive within the hour, with the rest of my team and equipment. Goliath 10 will be carrying two Lynx hover armored personnel carriers for ground support, which will give us more firepower against Clan Elementals, should we run into any. Goliath 11 will deliver our own battlearmor to the drop zone. Goliath 17 will act as an airborne command post and medical ship." She turned to Vought. "Major?"
Vought walked over to a projector mounted in the wall at the front of the ready room. She flipped a switch, and a holographic three-dimensional map of Sector 46 sprang into place. "We were hoping that we could make this a relatively simple operation, but due to the unexpectedly heavy concentration of enemy activity in the Targhee as of late, we're forced to use a somewhat more complicated setup." She touched a key, and a side menu appeared next to the map, listing aircraft assignments and callsigns. "I'll be flying Tiger Eight, our remaining two-seat Tigershark, while Section Leader Siddeley will be flying Tiger Nine. Both of us will be carrying rockets and white phosphorus to provide escort for Goliath 10 and 11. At Commander Jackson's suggestion, my callsign will be Sandy Lead, and Siddeley's Sandy Two. Eight more Tigersharks led by Section Leader Koolhoven will provide RESCAP combat air patrol and additional flak suppression and/or ground support in case we need it." She pointed to the map. "Since Flying Officer Condorcet has failed to or is unable to activate his primary or backup survival beeper, we can't use direction finding to get a fix on his position. We know he is roughly within the confines of Sector 46, between the Targhee River—where we lost Sgt. Hind yesterday morning—and this mountain here, Promontory Point. It's bounded by Highway 191 to the north and the Palisades mountain range to the south.
"Because we assume that Condorcet, if he's still alive and hasn't been captured, will be moving east to try to get to friendly lines, he's probably closer to Promontory Point than the river. We'll start our search there. For those of you unfamiliar with the area, Promontory Point is a very easy visual reference—it looks like a volcano or a small mesa. It's also bare of trees around the top, so you shouldn't have any trouble seeing it.
"The SLI will land here, at this clearing on the edge of Pinnacle Swamp. We're designating this LZ Alpha. Once the SLI has located Condorcet, they will pull back to Alpha. Failing that, they will either move west to the river, here—LZ Bravo—or set up a perimeter at their location and blast out an LZ. We'll support them with plenty of white phosphorus and strafing runs. The SLI will mark their positions with smoke." Vought nodded to Jackson, who turned to St. Mawgan.
"The Gang Green's Hercules will provide top cover," St. Mawgan said. "Fortunately we were able to get another Karnov down here earlier with a maintenance crew, so they were able to repair the defective radar software and should be combat ready within the hour. Major Engram will lead four Hercules; Tai-i Mikasa and one other Hercules will remain behind as base defense with the Virentofta Militia's Malthis." Mikasa noticeably deflated; there would be no kills for him today. "Sorry, Ken, that's the way it goes. There'll be plenty of Clanners left for you after today."
That'll teach him to call me 'man,' Vought thought with vengeful satisfaction.
"As most of you know already, there seems to be a lot of fighter activity in the area, with the addition of BattleMechs on the ground, too. Yesterday, the Fyrebirds only ran into medium fighters—Jagatais, though there was a light Bashkir shot down and an unconfirmed report of Sabutais as well. Be especially careful if you sight a lone Bashkir. If he heads for the deck or hightails it west, let him go—he's bait for a flak trap. That's how we lost Flying Officer Kfir. Also be especially watchful for Scythas, which are bad news. They're heavy fighters, like the Tigershark, but more manueverable and more heavily armed. Intel says that the Nova Cats have less than twenty of them—one less now, since Section Leader Siddeley got the one that shot down Major Vought and Condorcet two days ago."
"Atta girl!" grinned Gota, who delivered a lung-collapsing slap on the back to Siddeley, who nearly fell out of her chair.
St. Mawgan touched a control on the holoprojector, and the map expanded out to all of eastern Abananasia. "Our last satellite pass caught a pic of a squadron of Omnifighters here, at Krynn Falls. We expected they'd be based out of here, though we frankly have no idea how they're getting Jagatais and Sabutais this far east without external tanks. In any case, Section Leader Yakovlev has volunteered to use our AV-4 Urei to suppress the base at Krynn Falls, for additional insurance. Because the Urei's stealthy, it should be able to get in and get out without being detected. For withdrawal support, Flying Officers Baaz and Nesher will orbit east of Krynn Falls in a Stuka and a Chippewa, respectively. If they sortie any Scythas after you, Katerina, you'll at least have some heavy fighters to back you up. Your primary target there is the main runway and the fighter stands." He collapsed the map back to Sector 46. "As for me, I'll be flying top cover with the Hercules in my Jayhawk. I'll also be carrying ECM pods to provide standoff jamming support for the operation. We'll also have a Wildcat tanker in the area in case we need it—but no Catseye airborne radar support. Sorry, guys, I tried, but they need it too bad in the north."
Yakovlev raised her hand. "Sir, what about a target marker aircraft?"
"That's a job for Sandy Lead and Two, Katerina."
"Yes, sir, I understand, but the Sandies will have their hands full in case we run into ground opposition. We need someone who can put spotter rockets in exactly where the SLI need it."
"You're talking forward air control." St. Mawgan nodded. "Not a bad idea, at that. Who do you have in mind for the mission?"
"Flying Officer Curtiss, sir."
That raised eyebrows, and there were some mutterings in the ready room. "I realize she lacks flight hours and combat experience," Yakovlev said above the din, "but she knows the ground. She also checked out on the Malthi very well yesterday, and a Malthi is suitable for the spotter role. She can loiter for awhile as long as she carries a drop tank. If we don't run into ground opposition, she can return to base."
St. Mawgan stroked his beard. "I like it. I'd prefer someone more experienced, but it sounds like she's ready. What do you think, Major Vought?"
Vought was less than enthusiastic. Curtiss needed the flight hours, but she was inexperienced. The Malthi could not take the pounding of a Tigershark. If there was a Rifleman down there on the other hand, Curtiss would never get combat experience unless she flew combat. "If she agrees to it, I have no objections," Vought finally said.
"Very well," Jackson nodded. "Brief her for the mission. She'll have the callsign Nail. Make sure she knows what she's doing. If she gets bombs dropped on my people, I'll come back her and flay her alive." The room nervously laughed, because they weren't sure if Jackson was serious or not. "Commander St. Mawgan, if you could handle takeoff times and such—" She was interrupted by the sound of heavy engines. "All right, that's the Goliaths. Commander, please take over the briefing."
Jackson walked briskly out of the ready room, followed by her lieutenants. The walk turned into a run when someone shouted, "Goliath 10 is on fire!" Pandemonium ensued as the pilots piled out of the ready room.
Like the Horizon-class DropShip, the Goliath DropShuttles were aerodyne types, equipped with huge, high-mounted delta wings, and were half as large as the Kagoshima Rubicon. As Vought reached the top of the stairs, she could see the flames licking back from the DropShuttle as it flared for landing. Vought paled, wondering if she was about to see the huge ship immolated in a fiery explosion, but the pilot was skilled. The Goliath made a perfect landing, and deployed dragchutes the moment the wheels touched the pavement. As soon as the shuttle had slowed, the pilot taxied it onto the grass, away from both the packed Tigershark revetments and the transient tarmac. Fire crews were already there and began covering the Goliath with foam. The fire was out in less than two minutes, the time it took for Jackson, Vought and Siddeley to rush across the field.
A short, stocky man came out of the forward hatch of Goliath 10, looking haggard. He pulled off his flight helmet and leaned against the shuttle, despite the dripping, smelly foam. "Thomas!" Jackson called out. "Are you all right? What happened?"
The man looked up at Jackson. "Hi, Mik. Son of a bitch." He pointed at the ragged holes in the shuttle. "Bastard jumped us over Island Park, just northwest of here. Hit and run; came in at the speed of heat. Never even saw him coming. Luckily he only made one pass; didn't want to chance our defense batteries or low on fuel, I guess."
"Any casualties?"
"No, everyone's okay, and the APCs are fine." He slammed a hand against the hull of the Goliath. "This bird won't be flying for awhile, though. Lost two engines and she's leaking fuel like a sieve. We're just lucky the damn thing didn't blow up."
Jackson abruptly noticed the two pilots standing behind her. "Major Vought, Section Leader Siddeley, this is Major Thomas Mayumi, commander of my 4th Company. He's our airmobility specialist." Mayumi gave them a tired wave.
"Did you get a good look at the fighter?" Siddeley asked.
"Just a quick one. Split-V tail, three engines, fast as a thief, packs a wallop." Shit, Vought thought to herself, Scytha. So much for Siddeley getting all the Nova Cats had. "These DropShuttles aren't designed for combat, but they're pretty durable. Whoever the bastard was, he knew right where to shoot."
Jackson had turned back to Mayumi. "There's no way we can load the APCs into the other two Goliaths, can we?"
"Not a chance."
Jackson shook her head and looked at the other two Goliaths, unhurt and safely parked at the far end of the runway. Her eyes fell on the transient ramp. "Major Vought?
"Yes, Commander?"
Abruptly, she noticed just how tired Vought looked. "Didn't you get any sleep?"
"Yep. A whole hour."
"Where did you get the two Karnovs?"
"Oh. Those came in for supporting the Hercules. Why?"
"Are they ours?"
"I suppose so."
Jackson smiled. "I think I'm going to make a slight alteration to the plan "
