Chapter 33
Southeast of Mach 'Beh, Highway K-12
Alshayra Continent
Leutnant Jean LaPointe hopped his Otscout along Highway K-12 yet again, trying to see if any forward elements were visible over some of the smaller rolling hills to the southeast portion of the capitol. Nothing showed up yet, just more trees and random civilian vehicles running for any cover they could find.
"Negative visual, again. What are we on, now?"
One of his RoughRider lancemates came over the comms. "One hundred…forty-one? Or two. I forgot again."
Another one, a female this time. "Forty-two. The pool is up to enough that the winner could buy their own Commando or something of the older, lighter 'mech variety."
Jean laughed. "What're you betting on, Venom?"
The woman replied again. "I have two-thousand C-bills riding on somewhere between two twenty-two and two twenty-five. But that's our own company pool. And another five hundred in our lance pool."
Jean whistled. "Damn, that's a little more than a month's pay without bonuses."
He had already beaten the previous record of one hundred fifteen, but his father asked that the new record goes as high as possible, to keep more of the spotlight on the unit in general and boost recruiting standards. The main battalion-sized pool was the largest, though it excluded his company to avoid collusion. The old record was beaten, and Sarna Interstellar Records already had a representative on-planet who would leave when the record was finally set.
From what Jean had heard, this guy wasn't in any hurry to go home, and he was happy to keep the streak going as long as he could.
"Rapier, picking up seismic contacts bearing abouuut…one-seven-seven." Then his voice went up sharply. "Danger close! Must have something messing with our sensors in these hills."
"Think they know we're here?" Jean braced himself for another possible jump to get a visual, and to possibly use himself as bait.
"I'd say fifty-fifty. They at least know you're here. Care to pop the strudel? LRM's on standby. Venom's old Griffin had been replaced with a spare Valkyrie, which brought their old Otscout, Griffin, Wasp, and Locust configuration to an Otscout, Locust, Valkyrie, and Commando. Venom had been ransomed back to the RoughRiders after their fight down on Gimli which resulted in some serious losses for his lance, despite his single-shot Jenner kill. Venom recalled the Coyote's food being no better than the rations the RoughRiders provided.
It took all their Battalion's remaining light 'mech parts and mothballed 'mechs to get their lance back up to speed, and back to a standard all-light configuration. Fortunately, the Coyotes were on their side this time around. Let's hope they can do more than just their little Paphos shenanigans in the next few hours, Jean thought.
His split-second daydreaming was snapped back to the present when Venom confirmed she was ready for his next jump. He slammed his feet down for what felt like the seventh or eighth time today, and rode his fusion jets for about half the normal length of time. Just enough to get his head over the horizon, to see two fast-moving Wasps running along to his right side. He went for a lock on the lead 'mech, but it failed as he came back down with a thud.
"Confirm two Wasps running north very fast. No way their big guys could have gotten here by now. Probably forward scouts like us. Get ready for another jump in about ten seconds." He moved a few dozen meters to his left and braced for what was left of the large amounts of water he'd been drinking to push against him in ways that would make him have to pee very soon.
As he rose again, the Wasps had slowed to a walk and were turned right at him. Further behind, he saw two Panthers aimed at the spot he had previously jumped from. A PPC from each of their right arms went over his right shoulder as his lock acquired on the lead Wasp this time. Machine gun fire pinged off of his 'mech to no effect other than making a lot of noise, and the lasers went high.
As he landed, he could hear a more distance roar of ten LRM's being fired from Venom's Valkyrie, and the missiles arced over the low hillside into a series of dull orange flashes on the horizon as they hit their mark. "Good hit, Venom. They're keen to me now. Can't jump a third time yet."
"Copy. Think I hit something good, but can't really tell yet."
"All scorpion charlies, scorpion actual here." His company commander was calling his lance commanders.
A pair of "go actuals" sounded as he also chimed in the same.
"Talk news channel 1440. You've gotta hear this."
"Blue copies."
"Black engaged with a lance of lights. Stand by."
"Scorpion white is a little busy at the moment. Contact with a lance of lights. Care to summarize for us?"
"We'll bring you up to speed once you break contact. Continue south, bearing let the RoughRiders behind you clean that up."
"Copy." He switched back to lance comms. "Listen up, white knights. The cavalry will handle these guys. We have orders to continue south, so we can slow down the bigger guys from the east. Let's go."
Everyone swung southward, though as a single Wasp poked its head and shoulders over the hillside, a rapid pivot from him and his lancemates with a flurry of shots sent him tumbling backwards in midair without a head. After they broke contact with no further shots being fired, his commander came over a private channel.
"Rapier, you get a chance to listen in?"
"Negative. What's up?"
"The short version is it was Alvarez allegedly responsible for The Langley Affair. You know, the babe in charge of merc contracts and such you slept with that one time? Said the Drac commandos killed the only witness, so it's all speculation now."
He closed his eyes and shook his head sadly. The two had shared a brief night of their own at a cocktail party, and it saddened him to see such an exquisite-looking human being responsible for such black-hearted things. He didn't want to believe it, really.
He didn't want to believe someone he had gotten close to was responsible for the deaths of some of his own people, as well as thousands of others.
"I'm not gonna buy that until I see more evidence, actual. Anyway, we're continuing south. Will make contact with their heavier forces in about five minutes."
His gravelly voice didn't seem to disagree. "Let's just worry about that later. I just wanted to pass it along. Good hunting."
Further north…
Franklin LaPointe shook his head at nearly the same time his son did, though neither of them would ever know that. The lady holding our garrison contract in the tens of millions every month is allegedly conspiring with the Dracs they're fighting. The MRB are going to have to send a whole crew of people to clean up this mess. If Hansen were here he might have even tossed the whole contract to the wind if they had any actual evidence.
He couldn't give himself very long to listen to this talk-radio broadcast, but he got what he needed from it. Emily's liaison had gone and gotten himself killed trying to find out what was going on. Even got himself taken out of a casino in shackles doing it. Then the commandos got wind of what was going on while they were doing recon work nearby and one of them apparently was more tied into this than the rest of them, because he took a bullet to the head for his efforts.
He found it ironic that someone so respectful and quiet was capable of so much mischief.
His lumbering Battlemaster gave a clear view of the sun, preparing for its daily descent behind the gap between Paphos and Mach 'Beh to his west. He switched his radio back to the usual recon chitchat his son and everyone else were doing down south. Normally he allowed a counter to display on all his pilot's HUDS relaying the tiny number of consecutive jumps Rapier was at, but right now it was just a distraction, so he turned it off for everyone.
He knew of one remaining mercenary unit besides the Coyotes remaining on-planet, and that they were at near Kevilston, based on news reports being passed along to him. If they teamed up, that'd put them almost half a battalion coming up on the 2nd Legion's rear.
His mental calculator went back to figuring out the approximate time they might make contact, assuming his transmission went through. He didn't want to risk too much with such a broad transmission, given the work the commandos have been doing in preparation for this assault. If Emily made contact in the next fifty to sixty minutes, they'd have a shot at defending this planet without taking grievous losses. The air cover was still an issue, which tipped the entire thing slightly in the Legion's favor.
"Whisper, this is Dirk." He had overlapping channels, including one he had set aside for an eventual meetup with Major Wright of the Coyotes. He was rather surprised to hear it now, but grateful.
"Dirk, Whisper. Glad to hear you again, Major."
"Likewise. We have some news. We're up two lances with Romero's Renegades working with us temporarily. Take it out of my cut. You up for keeping this fight out of Mach 'Beh if we can bait them into Kevilston?
LaPointe was rather fond of Kevilston, particularly the west side as it had a sprawling performing arts complex. But he was a mercenary first, and there was merit to bogging down the Legion forces eastward, or just drawing them away from the capitol in general.
"You can try, Dirk. But it's unlikely they'll take your bait. You've become pretty infamous with that on this planet.
"We'll give it the old military college try, Whisper. Expect us to make contact in about five mikes with their rear."
"Whisper acknowledges. Will relay to my guys. Out." Despite the massive field of vision from the cockpit of a Battlemaster, which to some people resembled an ancient Terran jet fighter's canopy strapped to the top of a 'mech, he only half-looked out as he walked, doing most of the complicated yet repetitive tasks such as walking a 'mech forward purely on muscle-memory. As far as 'mechs go, generally the bigger the ride, the smoother.
That gave LaPointe more brain power to do things such as commanding the better part of an entire regiment.
"Listen up, RoughRiders." He didn't bother for radio protocol when it came to motivational speeches. "We have good news and bad news. The bad news is in about five mikes we're about to pick up the pace and pound this highway into rubble." As he was talking, he activated the counter normally broadcast to every unit he had, except he adjusted it to a five-minute countdown which he started. "The good news is the Coyotes are back, and they have backup. They'll be flanking the 2nd Legion from behind just before we make contact.
"Everyone stow the Alvarez shit for now. We're in the middle of a war. That kind of doubting on our employer has no place here right now. Let us higher ups take care of that. Focus on keeping your shots on target and your heat just below the red line. There's a good chance we'll be charging right at them soon, so be ready for it. Save your strength until then. Focus on anti-air until we're decisively engaged. When that counter reaches zero, there better not be anyone moving less than fifty KPH or I'll shoot you in the ass myself to get you moving. LaPointe out."
The hooting and hollering in anticipation got everyone fired up on comms for a moment, then things went back to intermittent reports of contact here and there with forward elements. His armor and infantry were busy directly south of Mach 'Beh, setting up a firing line in case things went from bad, to worse.
Most of his limited aerospace were committed to hit and run skirmishes with the fighters up in the air. LaPointe had almost all his anti-air 'mechs in a single lance within his command company, so as he adjusted along the battlefield, the umbrella went with him. His goal would be to put himself where they needed the most anti-air during this next phase.
Every Militia unit was tied up in the riots allegedly caused by Alvarez, but he forced himself to think about something else immediately. That pit of fire in his stomach had no place here right now.
All that was left was to keep marching until the Coyotes and the Renegades made contact.
