BOOK II
CHAPTER 1
Author's Note: Big 1000+ hits! Thank you for all who check this story out, and thank you even more for all who leave reviews. We amateur writers like to get reviews. It makes us feel appreciated.
So what's in Book II? Same mech-stomping-n-bashing stuffs, except now it's real. These guys are out in the real world. And somebody has to make a life-and-death decision. It's just the nature of being in the military.
I hope you're having fun as much as I'm having fun writing it.
Recharge Station,
Donegal, Donegal Province,
Lyran Alliance
July 3, 3073
Noloty kept her eyes glued on the 2 Bushwacker and 2 Enforcers coming toward her direction. Her Chimera crouched behind a bank, buried within the busy traffic of Meadow, the capital of Strantor. Waiting for ambush with her were her lance mates, all in Chimeras, 20 meters apart from each other. All ran with passive radars, hoping to maintain the element of surprise when the 2 lances came into the inevitable.
"They took the bait," Noloty whispered on her comlink. "Hold fire. On my mark, open fire on the nearest Bushwacker and leg it quickly. We only have seconds before they realized they are walking into a trap."
"Yes Ma'am," her lance mates replied.
Three hundred meters and the enemy lance broke formation. The Bushwackers turned right, painting the vicinity like giant dogs sniffing for preys. The Enforcers took the opposite route, rushing to the left as if they spotted a threat outside Noloty's peripheral vision. They probably aimed to flank Noloty's lance, but she would worry about them later. Her priority was the two Bushwackers as they posed the biggest threat.
"Get ready," Noloty armed her MRM20 and rested her boot on the pedal. The Bushwackers came within 200 meters, and soon their radars picked up the Chimeras waiting for them behind a barricade of buildings. They backpedaled and strafed the buildings with missiles, 20 in total.
"NOW!" Noloty yelled and slammed her boot on the pedal. Her Chimera went airborne, and once she cleared the building, she fired her MRM20 in a wide arc. The dumbfire missiles peppered the Bushwackers at random locations. The Bushwackers weathered the firestorm, then fired their autocannons. The cockpit seemed to explode in brilliant colors. Noloty covered her head from shards of plexiglass. Her Chimera twisted upon impact, and only by her quick reflex it landed on its feet, not on its back. Her front armor was completely shattered. Noloty knew she couldn't handle another frontal hit.
Noloty's lance mates took a more conservative approach. They slipped out from their cover and flanked the Bushwackers, still busy shooting Noloty down. Lasers and missiles converged on the Bushwackers' low torso, tearing armor apart like a swarm of locusts.
"Leg it leg it leg it!" Noloty ducked behind the building and took potshots at the closest Bushwacker. Her laser bolt drilled a hole on the Bushwacker's right hip. The Bushwacker backpedaled and threw everything it had, but Noloty slipped under the cover, watching the HEAP munitions razed the building down. She jumped over the rubbles, fired her missiles, and took cover behind another building before the Bushwacker could get a lock on her.
Noloty's lance mates intensified the pressure on the Bushwacker. The laser bolts gutted the hip of the Bushwacker like a trio of bear cubs mauling a trapped moose. Soon the myomer caught fire, and the Bushwacker was left a limping behemoth, switching from Chimera to Chimera without any particular target. Noloty came out of her cover and alpha-struck the Bushwacker's leg. Sparks fizzled from the impact, followed by a shower of charred splinters from where the legs connected to the body. With a loud groan the Bushwacker tumbled.
The other Bushwacker reversed direction and latched on a Chimera. Laser beam weakened the armor, and the ballistics ripped the outer layer, exposing the engine and gyro to the open. The Chimera jumped backward to escape the Bushwacker's murderous assault, but the inexperienced mechwarrior lost track of position. It crashed into a building.
Noloty pounced from the other side of the building and slammed home a volley of laser and missile at the rear armor of the Bushwacker. The thin armor caved under pressure, and the Bushwacker lurched forward. Smoke gushed from the wound. The Bushwacker pivoted and twisted to return fire, but Noloty was already out of its firing arc.
Noloty darted through the narrow street of Meadow when suddenly she was hit with something. The Chimera's torso flipped upward as the feet lost purchase. The 40-ton mech fell and skidded on the pavement until it crashed onto the entrance of a department store.
Groaning, Noloty pulled her mech up, scanning the area to find the shooter. Through a very narrow passage between buildings, she could see an Enforcer retracting its arm. That was a very difficult shot, and to be able to make it the mechwarrior was either very lucky or very skilled… which violated the mission parameters briefed earlier.
"Oh, Come on!" Noloty fired her jets and shot the Enforcer in vain. Her laser bolt ended up in a concrete wall. The Enforcer slipped behind a building and made haste toward her lance mates. "Heads up! Bogeys coming from 168 hot! Disengage the Bushwacker and attack the Enforcer!"
As the two other Chimeras turned around, the Bushwacker launched an alpha strike at one of the Chimeras from the rear. The Chimera jolted, as if stung by gigawatts of electricity. The rear armor was shredded to pieces, and the engine casing cracked, giving way to the horde of missiles coming a split second later. The Chimera disintegrated, causing considerable damage to the other Chimera.
Now Noloty stood alone against 3 Lyran high-powered mechs looking for blood.
Noloty fired her laser, stabbing the Bushwacker in the left torso, then took cover behind a building as the Bushwacker's returned fire. The building took the brunt of the Bushwacker's assault, but a couple of missiles miraculously went through the building and hammered Noloty's Chimera in the chest. Warning light flashed inside the cockpit as the MRM20 went offline.
Pulling herself together, Noloty watched as the two Enforcers split up to box her in crossfire. It was a textbook maneuver for somebody with numerical advantage. She turned and charged the Enforcer flanking her from the south. But the other Enforcer found a clearing in the buildings. It took the sky and sniped Noloty from behind. Noloty's Chimera was thrown off course. It veered right and slammed into a concrete structure. A long train of curses escaped her lips as she backed up her mech, right into the path of the very Enforcer she was charging.
Then her monitor turned static, before a red 'Simulation Terminated' sign leapt into her eyes.
Noloty pushed the canopy of the simulator pod open. She was drenched in sweat. The pod recreated all aspects of the cockpit of a battlemech to the minute detail, including heat. Especially heat. Her lance mates groused and griped coming out of the simulators, soaked in their own body fluid.
"Fall in, Mechwarriors," Enrique called the lance for the debriefing. "You have failed your mission."
"We wouldn't have if the simulation parameters were correct, Sir," one of the mechwarriors lashed out. "Cadets are supposed to use Chameleons, Sir! Not Bushwackers!"
"You want to take that chance?!" Enrique roared. "You want to beat up simulated Chameleons then fight a real Bushwacker?"
"With all due respect, Sir, he is correct," Noloty spoke calmly so as not to agitate Enrique more. "First of all, we built our strategy based on our knowledge of the enemy. Chameleons are prone to overheating, so we developed our maneuver to exploit that weakness. It does not work against Bushwacker and Enforcer. Second of all, we were not fighting against Lyran training cadre. We were fighting Davion Guards. The enemy's maneuvers were typical Davion."
"So what if they are Davions? The Steiners and Davions enjoyed 30 years of 'holy matrimony', so don't tell me their units did not share strategies and battlemechs. You have to have a Plan B. Intelligence is wrong from time to time. Expect the unexpected."
"Lesson learnt, Sir," Noloty nodded. "I take full responsibility."
"Good," Enrique flashed a smirk. "Then I should expect to see improvements on the next session. Now dismiss."
"Yes Sir," Noloty snapped a salute. Her lance mates did the same mockingly, but Enrique didn't pay attention to it. He just turned and returned to his cabin.
"That was unfair! He intentionally gave us the wrong parameters!" Noloty lance mates grumbled.
"I said I took full responsibility!" Noloty replied. "It is on me, not you. Now take a break. We'll convene in 2 hours to talk about this."
"Alright, fine!" the mechwarriors walked away begrudgingly.
An hour later, Noloty sat alone at the business center, typing encrypted message to her friend Kayoko back in Buckminster. Or so she thought.
Hi Girl!
What is going on with you? I haven't received your message for like… what, two months? Work caught you off guard? Or is there a stud with ribbed abs I don't know about? XOXO I miss you.
Nothing interesting in here, just black void. Same people every day. Same stale beer. Same living quarter. Same television programs. I think I have watched that 3066 Solaris Championship game about 3 dozen times. Do you know what I'm talking about? Some guy named Kerensky and another guy named Barrett or Garrett or something? The boys still whoop and hoot like it was live. It's getting old. But there's nothing else. Either that or 'Kuch Kuch Hota Hai' and I'm not about to watch a Bollywood Chick Flick.
Arrived at Donegal a few days ago. We'll stay here for a week to recharge. This should be interesting since Donegal is the capital of Donegal Province. Even the recharge station is more 'metropolitan' than those 'Podunk Hollow' of planets we jumped through to get to here. I'll pick up some shows to watch later. I think I saw somebody carrying a copy of 'Girls und Battlemechs: Das Mechwarrior aus Narnia' when we got out of the dropship. Should be an interesting flick.
Chu-I Enrique keeps us sharp the whole time. Gym everyday, no exceptions. Simulator pods 3 days a week. Reviews of tactical maneuvers 5 days a week. We ran through countless of scenarios, on paper, and on simulator battles. We thought we were about to throw up, but Enrique wanted us to memorize those scenarios by heart. I don't blame him. That's what I would do, too, if I were him. You can't be too prepared.
Some good news, though. We were told that we would get Chimera on site, so we've been practicing with Chimeras on simulations. Nasty little buggers. Endo steel, 97-kph top speed, 180-meter jump capable, large and medium lasers, MRM20, and double heat sinks to cool it off. The MRM20 kicks ass at medium range. I'd take this over Chameleon any day of the week, even though I'm giving up 10 tons.
I have been serving as the company's 2IC, somewhere along that line. I don't mean to brag, but I know some Lyran stuffs that others don't. How Lyrans fight, how Lyrans move, how Lyrans ambush, that sort of things. It helps Enrique plan his strategy. He can set up complex maneuvers and I'm there to flow it down to the other mechwarriors. I screwed up sometimes, but hey, I'm still a noob.
Speaking of Enrique… you were right. His abs was amazing, and it was only a 'teaser' of what he was packing underneath. Yes, yes, we had sex. We did it once on Buckminster, then a few more times during the flight. But we hadn't share a bed for a few months now. I don't know why we drifted apart. Perhaps the pressure of this mission got into our heads. Or perhaps I had been 'replaced'. Meh. I don't want to get romantically involved in the first place. Shame, though, because he's really good in bed. We'll see what happens ;P
I'm sorry, I meant to tell you about it, but I guess my deployment overstepped.
Oh, remember those 4 assholes from the training center? They are in this excursion too. You said they were going somewhere after the training, and you were right. They were scheduled to go to Luthien. But the top brass overturned the plan and sent them with us. You should see their faces. They were mad. Boy, were they furious! But there's nothing they could do.
Which begs the question: What are we to Black Dragon Society? How do they see us? Assets? Tools? Warriors? Minions? The Black Dragon seems to regard its operatives lightly, and send us to our death on a whim. I know I may still be biased toward my father, but I see the same trend. We are going deep inside enemy territory, without support, and if things go FUBAR, they would just wash their hands. I'd like to think that I'm not that expendable. I'd like to work for something, or someone, that value my loyalty more than what the Black Dragon Society is showing.
I don't know, Kayoko. I just don't know.
But hey, I talked enough. What about you? Are you getting a promotion? Or commendation? What about that 'Treasure Hunt' to Port Moseby you were telling me about? Did you get to do it? Write me about it. Or not. If you're busy, just write me to say hi, to let me know you're still there. It'll make my day.
Warm hugs,
N
Noloty sent the message through HPG uplink, then checked her account, hoping there was something from home to cheer her up. But the screen spitefully gave her a cruel 'ping' while boasting that Noloty didn't have any incoming message for the last few weeks.
Noloty sighed audibly.
"Tough, isn't it?" Enrique appeared behind her. "To communicate across the galaxy."
"Comes with the territory, Sir," Noloty replied. "I just want to talk to her, see what she's up to."
"Don't' we all," Enrique sat next to her. "She's in a planetary defense unit. She's still there. She will be there when you return."
"I can't wait," Noloty cleaned up her belongings. "I will see you around."
"Noloty," Enrique grabbed her wrist.
"Yes Sir," Noloty turned around, looking straight into his eyes.
Enrique struggled to find words, as his eyes noted. There was a range of emotions blended together in his dark brown eyes, and somehow his brain couldn't decide what he wanted to do. In the end he let go of Noloty's wrist. "Carry on, Mechwarrior."
"Yes Sir," Noloty said, as it was the only thing she could say.
