Chapter 36

Southeast of Mach 'Beh

L.C. LaPointe listened in as Venom gave the grim report—his son's lance was down, and half of them were "out." He couldn't confirm if his son was among those dead, and unfortunately he didn't have time to find out. The massive, deadly chariots for the 2nd Legion had landed, creating a shroud of dust and dirt all around the landing zone. Circling the wagons, he thought as a few more LRM's screeched by his right side. He answered with a PPC shot form his arm that went nowhere in particular, but still managed to graze a Jagermech deep within their formation. Both sides had given each other more than an arm's distance. The Overlords were the biggest and last chip on the table, and this Oka Kuri fellow was going all in with it.

Once LaPointe's side started losing their gun cams, he ordered everyone back to beyond max range of most 'mechs until the Legion decided to push forward. What was Kuri's greatest asset at the moment wasn't being used to its full potential, which probably meant they were trying to get the hell out of here.

For now, the combined air cover plus the fire support from the Overlords themselves might give them the time they need to evac the planet completely. Their commander seemed to be weighing his options, because both sides were trading sniping shots, with the 2nd Legion having far more success in that regard, being able to actually aim their weapons properly. There wasn't much physical cover on either side, so LaPointe's people were busy rotating in and out, but he knew that was just borrowed time.

The 2nd Legion never made it to the capitol. The RoughRiders blunted the advance, with the mercenaries on the other side keeping them flanked at all times. Now all that was left was the final brawl, and Kuri wanted to make it as costly as possible. He knew the gig was up.

RoughRider artillery and dropships, mostly Union class were less than eight minutes out, and LaPointe had sent all his airborne assets as well as anti-air to cover their arrival. It put more pressure on the main bulk of his force, but they were holding. Though, word came back that Rapier had been knocked out by an aerospace fighter, and he felt a pang of guilt for what felt like sacrificing his son for the sake of the mission. Most of the Draconis fighters overhead were also Rapiers, which only added to the wound.

If my son is among the dead, there will be no negotiating with this…Kuri.

"Message from Firebase Yankee, Whisper." Sphinx over the command channel. "Said they fixed the gun cams. Will relay with their package."

His HUD showed the translucent image of Corporal Wilson's face, both smiling and nervous at the same time. Since he wasn't aiming at anything in particular right now, it was easier to read his facial expressions. "Chief, we found a way to convince the virus to give up the gun cams, but you'll still have it running loose in your 'mechs. Tests showed it was benign, so we can find it again after the fight. We've sent packages to every 'mech on-planet to auto-download and run. Your 'mechs might…need a reboot after this. Good luck, sir."

The message winked out, and a small borderless window on the right side of his HUD started running lines of text at an incredible rate.

He backpedaled a little further, keying in his entire regiment. "All RoughRiders, this is Whisper. We have good news. What you're probably seeing on your HUD is a program that should get our crosshairs working again. Everyone needs to do a quick shutdown and restart of their 'mechs, so get as much distance as you can and organize that by lance. Our cavalry is about eight mikes out. Hold the line. This is almost over.

"On my signal, everyone alpha strike their entire line as close to the red line as you can get with anything that will reach them. Then rotate restarts by lance. Watch the skies, they'll be diving on us when they figure out what we're doing."

He put his 'mech's arms up straight-out towards the 2nd Legion. Only his PPC in his right arm was going to hit anything at this range, but he went for maximum theatrics for this little maneuver.

"In three…"

He gave them all plenty of time to get lined up for this shot. He needed everyone for it.

"Two…"

More 'mechs to his left and right were copying his idea. Blind fire was something they had trained for in the past, and some of them still remembered how.

"One…"

Several 2nd Legion 'mechs seemed to be looking for any cover they could find, though both sides had almost none to work with.

"Fire!" From all across his field of vision, the sky lit up with colors of blue and bright yellow as PPC's and missiles discharged from his 'mech and dozens of others. LRM's arced in various curves towards the south. Most lasers were out of range to do anything other than scribble on the paint of the Draconis 'mechs, but many were fired anyway.

A young couple brave enough to set up a picnic spot just outside of Kevilston on a small knoll recorded this, and commented later it was the most horrifyingly beautiful sight they had ever seen. More than an entire battalion simultaneously unloading in any direction, let alone towards other 'mechs had a way of drawing the eye in.

Seconds later, contrails arrived at the entire 2nd Legion line, erupting in tiny fireballs from this far away. Nothing seemed to take any significant damage, but it certainly got a lot of them on the other side of the fight moving around like lightning had just struck a few places near them.

"Begin restarting by lance! Hurry it up before their air support gets here. Whisper out."

"Whisper, this is Leather. Two-Step and I will restart first."

"Copy Leather. Tango." He went for another PPC shot at the Draconis line, and missed again. His heat, and the heat of over five-dozen 'mechs near him were all spiking hard. The extra energy radiating from all of them in that area would have been enough to keep a small city warmed up for an hour or two. If the planet wasn't typically a swampy mess most days.

To his right, multiple 'mechs had slumped or went completely still while frantically restarting.

After a tense moment, several of them reported their crosshairs had returned. LaPointe smiled as the sweat rolled through the creases in his face. First bit of good news I've heard all afternoon.

Above him, aerospace fighters screamed overhead like vultures sensing their meal was ready. All around him, multiple 'mechs still in their startup sequence were simply shoved over by focused ballistic fire and missiles of all shapes and sizes, into holes and scars created by laser fire. The same kinds of guns that took Jean out of the fight.

He watched helplessly as two 2nd Legion Rapiers dove in with their AC-20's at an Awesome in his main battle line to his right, still shut down. As they fired, LaPointe visibly flinched, thinking the shells were meant for him. The added velocity from the fighters themselves gave some extra punching power to the stationary assault, taking both rounds directly to the chest, sending it crashing backwards with a crater vomiting smoke through its spine.

80 tons of firepower deleted just like that. Is that how Jean got taken out?

As it fell, it revealed a Blackjack that had lost its left arm and was just powering back up. Smoke poured from the opening where its shoulder was, but the 'mech stayed upright, moving its remaining arm in a split-second test of its own targeting systems coming back online.

"We're up and running, Whisper! Crosshairs are online. You and Pharaoh. We'll cover you."

"All RoughRiders, cover the skies! The 2nd legion is out of range. Focus on those fighters if you can reach them!" With that, he flipped the cover on his emergency shutdown switch and pressed it. His 'mech went slightly darker, most lights going dim or shutting off entirely. His cockpit stayed still. Everything went slightly muffled. Even his external microphones were customized to be off during shutdowns, due to the massive amounts of comms chatter he normally had to deal with.

He gave himself about two and a half seconds of time to mentally reset himself. He looked at the horizon and saw the 2nd Legion had begun advancing northward once more. At least some of them were. He squinted and saw more dust was being kicked up from the dropships up ahead. Like they were about to take off again.

"Whisper, Sphinx. Getting reports they might be trying to evac from where they're at. If I were this guy, I'd be leaving, too. Our own dropships should be here about the time our arty gets here."

As he began the sequence for a hot start, he wondered if that wasn't a ploy to get them to overcommit before the biggest guns arrived. "Roger, Sphinx. If they start boarding, I might charge us. Not yet, though." Too many lives at stake and he needed everyone able to shoot, first.

"Leather reporting, guns back online. Wooooohoooooo!" His enthusiasm even in a firefight was both refreshing and slightly annoying at the same time, but LaPointe was grateful right now.

While some extreme-range fire went back to suppressing the 2nd legion, almost everyone put their weapons skyward and created a show of laser light, autocannon shells, and a few well-intentioned missiles that tore up a few Rapiers and sent most of the Draconis air cover back up into high altitude.

A piece of a tail fin landed in the ground front of LaPointe's Battlemaster like a meteorite, piercing the ground and crumpling on itself into a hot, metallic mushroom that looked like it had suddenly sprouted from beneath the surface.

Everyone's voices seemed to go from frustrated, tired, or angry to downright relieved or just plain ready to get back in the fight. He could see 'mechs doing little movements with their weapons, like dozens of men and women who were suddenly had their hand-eye coordination return, flexing their hands.

And curling them into angry fists, primed for payback.

He only needed a few more seconds and almost everyone would be back on their feet that didn't get knocked out in the air raid. He needed about six more minutes for the cavalry to get here and he could end this fight entirely.

"Are they boarding?" A random pilot's voice came over command frequencies by accident.

Someone else answered in a drawl. "Hey, it looks like the 'mech doors are opening up on them dropships!"

LaPointe turned on what little zoom was available on his HUD, and moved it over the nearest Overlord. One light 'mech was already running up the ramp and inside. Son of a bitch!

"All RoughRiders, advance by bounds!" LaPointe shouted. "Go for the legs of the biggest 'mech you can hit if you aren't under fire yourself. Nobody jump unless you're under fire from the dropships! Give the air to people who need to move fast." A natural instinct of many MechWarrior pilots was to hit the jump jets to add more dimensions to a bad guy's targeting, and their formation was rather crowded for everyone to be doing that at the moment.

LaPointe lumbered his own 'mech forward once Leather had given the go for his company to move. It was generally better to let someone else handle the driver's seat of moving a dozen giant robotic death machines while giving cover fire to each other and not crashing into each other, while one was busy in the driver's seat on a regimental scale.

Switching to a rear camera, he panned behind him quickly and saw five of his 'mechs went down during that restart sequence. Two Vindicators, an Awesome, a Jagermech, and a Griffin, along with more than a few missing limbs from other 'mechs ahead of him. The glint of so many pieces of armor on the ground looked like small tombstones in the Inner Sphere's most unorganized graveyard.

Close to ten percent of his starting 'mechs, but that little move had got the rest of them back in fighting order.

The RoughRiders were down to just a battalion of decently-functioning 'mechs on the field, with approximately a battalion and a half remaining on the 2nd legion side. LaPointe hoped his merc friends down south would be able to rejoin as well. Sphinx had been on top of transmitting the package to both groups, and estimated they would be ready themselves within another minute or two, and be back in the fight in three.

Still gonna take way too long for the big guns to get here, he thought. We might have to do this without them.

On Leather's command, his company halted to give some cover fire while other companies advanced. A small autocannon shell bounced off his curved cockpit with a loud ping, and he locked up a 2nd Legion Blackjack and responded with his own PPC. The shot hit the left arm under the shoulder, and no armor was left to guard it. The whole limb collapsed out of its socket, key joints in the structure now twisted and melted away.

The much smaller 'mech backpedaled to get behind his larger brethren, also as battle-scarred as he was now. A tiny subconscious part of his brain told him there were two Blackjacks on the field with almost identical damage, one on each side. The odds of that ever happening were staggeringly low.

Both sides were starting to get into what the RoughRiders called the "fun zone." Medium range. The kind of range where almost every weapon system on any battlemech was viable. Despite the rising heat on the 'mechs on both sides, the bloodlust rose even faster. Shorter-ranged lasers in a massive number and larger-bored autocannon began opening up, causing more and larger explosions on both sides.

Short-ranged missiles, mostly fully-loaded on both sides, began replacing the nearly-or-already empty long-range launchers. Typically fatter and with bigger warheads, they added to the carnage that began increasing exponentially. Simple pockmarks, scars, or parts of a missing limb became huge craters, amputations of entire limbs, or 'mechs entirely knocked down or out.

Several SRM's wound up screaming into LaPointe's own Battlemaster, enough of them to rock back his forward walk into a rearward balancing act. He leaned his 'mech into the small barrage, bending slightly at the knees in case anything else arrived behind it. Nothing did. His company was on the move again, always forward. There wasn't much to be done for maneuvers with numbers of 'mechs on this large of a scale in open terrain. Simply providing enough cover fire while advancing until the other line broke was the order of the day for both sides.

Except if they went any farther, those Overlords would begin chewing LaPointe's people apart. They had to wait for backup from the south. "All RoughRiders, dig in here. Wait for our support to the south. Anyone with any super-long reach, put your crosshairs on those 'mech bay doors." Nobody was in range of it, but he wanted them thinking that kind of thing when they got closer. A few red laser flashes went underneath his HUD and his computer reported his left shoulder had almost no armor left.

"I got you, Whisper." Leather's voice again. "Back up and let us take over a minute." His Marauder walked forward, almost directly in front to shield LaPointe, and also to encourage him to back up a bit.

He caught a glimpse of Leather's left side, and it was almost entirely gone. The arm wasn't there, nor was any armor on his small shoulder, and the autocannon nestled up there had a bend to it that didn't seem natural. A barrel that was visibly red-hot. He was down to one main weapon left, with less overall armor than LaPointe had and was still using himself as a shield for his CO.

"Whisper, this is Dirk with the Coyotes. We got your package and are restarting all our mechs. ETA thirty seconds for us, two minutes for the Renegades. They're a little further out."

The relief washed over him, but he kept his voice firm. "Roger Dirk. They're boarding the dropships. Might be evaccing. Our guns are online and we're advancing, but we're outgunned almost two-to-one over here. Our big guns aren't gonna make it in time."

"We could just let them leave…" Her voice sounded suggestive.

"Yes and no. Our garrison contract says we shoot them until they're well above the range of our guns. Not an option, Dirk."

"Fair enough. We're on the way. We'll go for the other Overlord when we get there. Oh, and Rapier's alive, and in Kevilston. Dirk out."

LaPointe's closed his eyes for a second and laughed. You lucky bastard, immediately realizing the irony of calling his own son that. He laughed again.

He switched back to regimental comms. "RoughRiders! The next five minutes will be the minutes you will remember the most for the rest of your lives. Make them the ones you don't have to embellish on to your friends and family. Make them real! Make them the best damn minutes of your life! Start circling around to the east. Don't let anyone retreat into Kevilston. Keep closing in."

His voice dropped an octave. "Death awaits us all. Let's go say hi." With that, his comms erupted in ragged cheers and shouts. One of his Centurions with "the one who knocks" emblazoned on his arm-mounted autocannon let the first shot of the charge ring out, sending the round into a 2nd Legion Catapult's ear, severing it clean off the mount with a wrathful explosion.

"Forward!"