Black Knight Legion Dropship Black Falcon

In transit to nadir jump point

Corvatti Mining Colony HB-3

5th October 3063

                Colonel Lawhorn stood silently at the viewport in his quarters as he watched the mining planet disappear slowly. The Black Knight Legion had finally finished their duties on the planet and was now able to burn for Kentares IV. Without much information, Lawhorn wasn't sure if Striker Lance was having any problems or not, not after the Corvatti dropship Black Spear had left them there and escaped before the Dresari forces caught them. But the latest piece of information from Major Dupree's contacts on Kentares IV proved promising. According to the black market dealer, Striker Lance had suffered no major losses yet, which was quite incredible considering the odds against them. Amazing how fast the news travelled. Dupree certainly has some ways of getting information.

                Apparently, the Dresari loyalists were embroiled in their own civil war and could not bring any major forces to bear on Striker lance, which probably was a great stroke of luck for them. But the report of the rebellion on Kentares IV starting to falter was disconcerting. If this gets any later, Striker lance would be overrun by enemy reinforcements, unless they were able to knock out the orbital guns and create safe passage for their Legion mates. He hoped that he didn't misplace his hopes in Eric McLair. He sighed and returned to his bunk. It would be a long burn to the nadir jump point, and he might as well get some sleep first.

Correl Peninsular

Kentares IV

5th October 3063

                Corporal Reynolds didn't know how long he could last further. The small-sized Mechwarrior wasn't used to withstanding so much verbal and mild physical torture, at least, not this long. Nobody in his training cadre had been prepared for interrogation rooms. If he ever got back, he would make sure the stupid Sergeant in charge of his training would know how it was like to be incarcerated.

                If he ever got back.

                Another backhand slammed across his left cheek. He felt one tooth loosen and almost fall out, but then he already had lost two teeth already. Who would care?

                An angry face filled his blurry vision.

                "Hey did you hear me? Tell me who ordered you on this mission? Which unit are you from?"

                Reynolds just smirked. He wanted to give a snide comment but his throat was parched dry from hours, maybe days, of this interrogation. So he just grinned a toothless grin.

                The man 'interviewing' him wanted to backhand his face again, but suddenly another voice spoke, one with greater authority.

                "Enough, Jenkins. Let him be. Throw him into one of our temporary cells and get him some food and water."

                Jenkins abruptly whirled around to the speaker, who was still out of Reynolds's view, saluted and left. The other man followed suit, closing shut the door to the room.

                Reynolds didn't see anything more. His eyes were so tired. His eyes closed and he fell into a disturbed sleep.

                "These men are tough, sir. They might break in a few days, given more time," Sergeant Jenkins said while rubbing his sore hand. He had been slapping the two prisoners that they caught at the abandoned village for so long that his hand was almost bleeding. He knew how bad the Dresari men felt, but he didn't care. They had killed a lot of his fellow men already; the whole lot of these Dresaris loyalists.

                Lieutenant Oswald shook his head. "No Jenkins, that's enough. We didn't really need to interrogate them, and you knew it. Consider yourself lucky that I will not court martial you for this. I gave you a direct order to use just passive tactics and mild interrogation. We just wanted to confirm our suspicions."

                Jenkins protested, "But sir, these damned assholes side with that bastard Ian! I wouldn't even call him our Duke."

                Oswald gave a sharp glance at Jenkins which quieted him down. Jenkins dropped his head in resignation.

                "All right, sir. End of interrogation. What is the condition of Lieutenant Logans?"

                Oswald sat down on a chair and he watched a medic and two soldiers walked into the interrogation room to move Reynolds to his cell for further medical treatment. Then only he spoke.

                "He'll most likely never pilot a Mech again. He .... lost his legs. The Kentares National Hospital might have the technology to save his limbs, but with our meagre resources, we can't help him." Oswald shivered at the thought of that. Nothing could be worse to a Mechwarrior than to lose the ability to pilot a Mech, ever again. "What a fool."

                Jenkins picked up on that last phrase. "Why do you call him a fool, sir? He tried to parley for Sir Karl's release; it's just that he didn't expect the Dresaris to track us down and ambush us instead."

                "That's why he was a fool! The Dresaris need not worry about these mercenaries. We are a bigger threat. We have the support of the locals in this area. We know the nooks and crannies of this terrain. We have forces hidden all over the globe. The mercs don't. Now the Dresari forces have the upper hand. Logans went ahead to tell them of their rough location without even securing Karl's release yet. He even spoke to them long enough for them to triangulate Calypso's location, leading to the attack. I wouldn't be surprised to hear a lance or two detached to hunt down these mercenaries, and soon we'd be next."

                The men left with the unconscious prisoner as Oswald held Jenkins' gaze with a sharp look. "If any one of you were to get such wise ideas again without consulting headquarters, you can be sure that there wouldn't be any other KFA base left for you to return to. Because we wouldn't accept total idiots as freedom fighters."

Correl Peninsular

Kentares IV

6th October 3063

                "The coast looks clear."

                Eric blinked when he heard the sound of his radio. He was … day-dreaming again, or actually more like night-dreaming. He picked up the radio and keyed the transmit button.

                "Where's your location, Kilo Six?"

                "Uhh …. we're just about two kilometres off the firebase, sir. Gerard – I mean, Kilo Seven is getting into a better position to view the firebase. Just another 10 minutes, sir."

                Eric grunted, but didn't bother to rush the reconnaissance team. He replaced the radio on the table and looked around the command tent. Radcliffe was busy shuffling a deck of cards, which seemed to occupy him a lot lately, while Isabel was chatting quietly with … someone. Eric didn't recognise the person. His mind had been so distant lately that he has not taken notice of a lot of things. His eyes inadvertently swept over Mandrill, sitting further off and busy discussing something with one of her intelligence staff. She was the source of his troubled thoughts.

                After his return from the eventful supply run, he didn't know how to handle himself around Mandrill then. Isabel's information just complicated his thoughts and jumbled his mind further. He had been quite insensitive towards Mandrill, but he didn't know how to start apologising. Instead, during the debriefing, he just sat stonily and let Isabel answer Mandrill's questions, even though Isabel hadn't really been in the fire fight with the Dresari Mechs. After the debriefing, he tried to speak to Mandrill in private but she told him matter-of-factly to go rest instead. The discussion ended there, obviously. He hasn't been able to speak to her since then.

                What a mess.

                Right now they were waiting for a reconnaissance team to report on the status of the Mech base which they were about to hit. Mandrill had given them the briefing earlier: "We're going to need some heavier chassis before we take on the MODL patrols. Dresari has a remote Mech base in the region that may be just what we are looking for. The local rebellion appears to have enemy forces stretched pretty thin. If we can occupy the base for even a few hours, it will greatly increase our firepower throughout the operation."

                Eric didn't disagree, but he was worried about bringing along both of his best Mechwarriors along on this mission. Robert Olsen would remain on base, but his Assassin would barely be able to hold up to any Mech attack. Furthermore Olsen probably needed more action to train his skills. But this mission was crucial, and this was no time or place for Eric to be training any kid. Once again, Eric gave in to Mandrill's analysis of the situation. Which is probably better than facing her anger again.

                Mandrill came over and spoke to the assembled Mechwarriors.

                "I think we shouldn't delay any further. So far Kilo team has not seen any signs that we are heading into a trap. I suggest that you men and women get strapped into your mounts and power up. Time is of the essence."

                Her suggestion seemed more like an order, but Eric wasn't in any mood to nitpick. Isabel and Radcliffe were already gathering their gear and moving out of the tent. Eric quickly followed them.

                Eric found a technician already waiting for him at the base of his Ryoken. The technician gave him a thumbs up while Eric scaled the ladder to his cockpit. Eric just smiled slightly. He dropped into his cockpit seat and quickly started flipping switches to start up the Mech. He noticed that the system diagnostics bypassed his targeting computer, then realised that the techs had not been able to repair his computer yet. Looks like he'd be relying mostly on his gunnery skills this time. He felt a little angry that the tech didn't tell him about it before Eric jumped into the cockpit, but he was in a rush anyway, and wouldn't have time to listen to the tech.

                He was soon up and moving out of the encampment with the Catapult and Bushwhacker on his six. His radio soon crackled to life. It was a lance-wide transmission from Mandrill. It seemed not long ago when Mandrill used to transmit to him alone. Eric sighed. She was probably doing it on purpose, he thought.

                "Striker Lance, be advised, the Mech base appears to be on full alert. The rebels are staging a full-blown attack on a prison facility northeast of the base we're after. The techs are held up just north of the base, and can't move in until you neutralize the base defenders. I've deployed forward recon to keep tabs on the battle lines. It looks clear for now but to be safe I'm running your nav points well away from the action. There's a comm. station at nav Alpha. Expect light point defences and possible Mech patrols. Take out the station to further disrupt Dresari's communication infrastructure."

                Eric cursed silently. He spoke into his microphone.

                "Mandrill, we should consider cancelling the op. There's – "

                Before he could finish speaking, Mandrill cut in. "Kilo Seven reports only armour and point defences on site at the Mech base. If we do not strike now, when the Dresari Mech forces return we will have more trouble on our hands. Taking out their airbase also has severely limited their fighter cover. That should keep them guessing where the next attack is coming from. Recommend we go ahead, sir." She placed much emphasis on that last word. She was definitely in no mood to mince words. Eric winced.

                "All right. Striker lance, move out at flank speed to nav Alpha."

Prison Facility (East of Mech Firebase Lambda)

Correl Peninsular

Kentares IV

6th October 3063

                Corporal Marian squeezed her trigger and sent 2 blazing beams of light into the flanks of a Harasser, gutting the already savaged vehicle and setting it alight. A piece of shrapnel, maybe with bits of human flesh, pinged off her Osiris. However, she felt no pride at the death of the vehicle crew.

                They were all her friends. Okay, used to be her friends. She still found it hard to believe that about a year ago, she was busy celebrating the death of Roland, the Archon's representative on Kentares IV. The bastard had killed off the Duke and his family, just to enforce the Archon's rule over Kentares IV. His forces threw soldiers loyal to the Duke, like her, into obscure jails and left them for dead. Fortunately Roland had failed to kill the Duke's son, Ian. Together with his uncle Peter and sister Joanna, Ian led an initially small band of rebels to a bitter victory over Roland's troops. Joanna had been killed in the fighting, and so had Sir Peter.

It was along those lines where previous allies started to split hairs. Some felt that the death of Joanna was orchestrated by Ian in his bid to gain power, and rallied behind Karl Sonntag. Ian gathered his own loyalists to his side, and it wasn't long before the war of words turned into a full-fledged war. Another bloody civil war!

                She side-stepped the burning hulk of the Harasser and aimed at another Harasser which almost hit her with its SRMs. Her medium lasers pitted the armour on its flank and the hovercraft quickly skipped away, not intending to face her full complement of weapons. She held back on her weapons, not willing to kill more of her so-called enemies. What was she doing here, anyway? Lieutenant Oswald had sent them on this raid to try and rescue Karl from his desert prison. But the problem was that nobody was really sure where Karl was being held. This raid was turning into a nightmare. Dresari forces had reacted quickly to the attack and brought in armour and Mech forces to reinforce the prison defences. She was cut off by a wedge manoeuvre and now she was struggling to re-group with the main force. She seemed to keep getting swarmed by hovercrafts. The reports over the comm. lines weren't too good.

                "Need backup here! I've got a dozens of Condors and Harassers all over me!!!"

                "Damn it, somebody get those laser turrets!"

                "I'm hit! I'm hit!"

                Quite a number of the other pilots on this sortie were quite young and inexperienced. There were probably only two or three lances of hovercrafts around but their superb speed and manoeuvrability allowed them to harass the rebel forces easily. The rebels had already lost two vehicle transports to the hovercrafts, plus most of their ground armour. Marian was worried that even if they got found Karl and got him out, he would get killed when the Dresaris managed to destroy his transport.

                Just then, her alarms wailed at her. Laserfire lit up the sky around her as she realised that she was being attacked by Mechs. She saw a Wolfhound and a Scarabus come over a ridge, gunning straight for her. She spied another Wasp running up the ridge too. Armour sloughed off her as their fire became more accurate. The Dresari ground armour was pulling back but about there were almost two lances of Dresari Mechs, compared to the rebels forces of only one lance of Mechs and barely any armour assets left. How could they hope to survive?

                "Marian! Where are you?!! We need help here!"

                Marian snapped. She whirled her Mech around and started to run. She didn't care which way she was going. She just had to run.

Communications Station (South of Mech Firebase Lambda)

Correl Peninsular

Kentares IV

6th October 3063

                Explosions lit the night as Eric's laser beams found their mark on the Hellspawn's LRM ammunition bin. Eric watched in horror and fascination as the Mech appeared to twitch and jerk life-like as the ammunition robbed life out of the metal chassis. When the Mech crashed to the ground, barely metres away from another smoking Uziel, it was with no doubt that the pilot had died in his machine. Eric felt a slight twinge of sympathy for the pilot, but he knew that in war ….. it was kill or be killed.

                The communication dish had been easily destroyed in the initial attack. Radcliffe's LRMs were more than enough to wreck the sensitive equipment and render it useless for the time being. The base defenders, the Uziel and the unlucky Hellspawn responded quickly to the attack, but were quickly cut down by Eric's heavier lance. Even the base laser turrets could hardly hold up to their firepower.

                Well, that was the easy part.

                "All right, now the element of surprise is gone," Eric said over the intercom to his two lance-mates.

                "Sure, after those brilliant fireworks, there can't be much doubt about that!" Radcliffe laughed. Eric chuckled at the remark on the Hellspawn's explosions, and was about to comment on them when Mandrill cut in.

                "Striker One, activity to the northeast is increasing. Pockets of fighting are drifting all over. Some may be coming your way. Stay alert."

                Eric clicked his radio twice in reply, not really wishing to speak any further. Hearing Mandrill's voice made him feel melancholy again. He moved up north at flank speed and his lance followed him, leaving the burning hulks of Mechs and destroyed communications station behind.

                Barely a minute has passed before there was another transmission from Mandrill.

"Striker One, forward recon reports a rebel Mech engaging Dresari forces vicinity nav Beta. I've uploaded his IFF data to your computer. Your HUD will register him as a friendly. We don't know what these rebels are really about so use caution."

The computer displayed nav Beta as just a little southeast of the Mech base, nearby their location. That's weird; the prison facility was a few klicks away. That rebel Mech was waging a battle far from his comrades. Could be a runner.

                Eric sighed softly. "Roger Mandrill. We'll watch out for him."

                Just then, his Beagle Active Probe warned him of a intermittent sensor contact. Probably the rebel Mech was in a bit of a fix. It was in the general direction of nav Beta. The thought of being left out on some action disconcerted him. Why not? He grinned.

                "I've got a possible bogey near nav Beta …. What do you think guys? Perhaps somebody needs their ass hauled out of the fire?"

                Isabel didn't quite like the idea but she couldn't talk Eric out of it. Striker lance moved toward nav Beta. Eric continued to get intermittent contacts, sometimes showing more than a few Mechs. Far off, they could see some ruby beams slicing the darkness of the night. There was evidently a battle going on.

                When Striker lance came on to the scene, Eric was lost for words. Radcliffe summed it up nicely, "Three to one! Hardly sporting of them!"

                A badly beat-up Osiris was participating in a running fight against a Wolfhound, a Wasp and a Scarabus, and it was obvious that the Osiris wasn't in much of a shape to run any further. The Wolfhound's heavy laser weaponry had already severely damaged the Mech's leg actuators, limiting its speed, so that even the Wolfhound could outrun the Osiris. The outcome of the battle would be without doubt ….. until Striker lance showed up, again.

                On Eric's cue, the lance first targeted the fleet-footed Scarabus and the vintage model Wasp. LRMs and miscellaneous laser weaponry smashed armour all over the two Mechs. Their fire was pretty accurate, even from long distance, since the enemy Mechs were not aware of their presence. The Wasp, light on armour to begin with and also equipped with aging technology, fell to the ground, though it wasn't out of the battle yet. Eric failed to score many hits on the Scarabus, which deftly avoided most of his laser shots. But at least that took the heat off the Osiris. The enemy Mech immediately disengaged the rebel Mech and turned their full attention on Striker lance.

                The Wolfhound tagged Eric squarely on the centre torso with a blast from its PPC, causing him to stagger. Fortunately the Wolfhound's other lasers either missed or were not within range. Meanwhile, the Scarabus attempted to close in on Radcliffe to use its short-ranged lasers. The Wasp staggered to its feet shakily, the pilot obviously shaken by the impact of over 20 LRMs. 

                Without remorse, Isabel targeted the hapless Wasp again and let loose an almost full alpha strike. Her LRMs mostly missed, but her autocannon fire successfully clipped the small Mech and tore its right leg off. The Mech crashed to the ground for the final time, but not before the pilot ejected to safety.

                Radcliffe was trying to calm his nerves, chanting "Almost, almost" while trying to attain a lock-on against the rapidly-closing Scarabus. For the most part, the enemy pilot was good; he was darting left and right and confusing the Catapult's tracking systems.

                Eric's Ryoken was getting hot and he toggled to fire his medium lasers only to skimp on the heat. His fire was a complete miss as the Wolfhound attempted to close in and utilise its small lasers. Its medium lasers splashed a little armour off his left arm and his left torso. Eric cursed under his breath.

                Isabel decided that Radcliffe needed help first and brought her guns to bear on the Scarabus. Her fire was mostly just a show of force – it forced the enemy pilot to dodge her, and allowed Radcliffe to get a lock on him easier. The Scarabus was hit by no less than 30 LRMs, stripping it completely of armour. Either by luck or skill, the Mech did not fall to the ground. The pilot instantly lost heart and angled off to run back to its comrades further northeast.

                That left the Wolfhound.

                That Mech once again scoured more armour off Eric's left torso, but fortunately missing with its PPC. Eric gave a louder curse this time, and this time fired his full complement of twin large lasers and twin medium lasers. His laser fire scorched armour and melted the light Mech's torso dry. The Mech barely held its ground, and before it could retaliate, Radcliffe's large lasers cored a hole into its reactor.

                Eric thought that the enemy Mech would try to detonate itself near him, but it appeared that the pilot thought better and managed to shut down his reactor before it turned his Mech into a minor fission bomb. It fell to the ground in a salvageable heap, much to the delight of Eric. The extended range laser weaponry on the Mech would prove useful, if they could recover  it.

                "Sir, that damned Osiris didn't even stop to say thanks. It's gone off to the south. Lost it from my sensors a while ago," Isabel grumbled as if to say 'I told you so!'

                Eric finally checked his sensors and found the Osiris just leaving his radar scope.

                "Leave him be, Striker Three. We've done our part. We better get on with the mission."

                Isabel grunted her acceptance while Radcliffe remained quiet, probably the wiser after being ridiculed a few times by Isabel for butting in uninvited on her conversations. Striker lance moved on towards Mech Firebase Lambda.

A/N : My apologies for leaving this story dead for, like, a year now! My studies are really taking up a lot of time, and I'll be graduating soon so I'll be putting in more effort on my studies. Hope you like this latest addition though, late it may be.