Chapter 19
Marik Tower, Montenegro,
Solaris City, Solaris VII,
Freedom Theater, Lyran Alliance,
January 15, 3069
With the acquisition of Class-6 arenas by the Word of Blake, mechwarriors that were not associated with the Blakist had been restricted. But few non-Blakist mechwarriors still busted through the new system. Elements of the old underground mafia were still in the works, and no matter how hard the Word of Blake tried to subdue the mafia elements of Solaris games, they still existed. Solaris games, after all, were all about money. Everything was possible with a price.
Mac led his Black Knight through a maze of cranes, cables, coolant lines, and ammo loaders to get into his position in the arena. A standard AGS-4D Argus stood in front of him, swiveling its turret in anxiety. It didn't have the marking of Word of Blake, and Mac snorted in disgust. Clearly the Blakists intentionally pit the two non-Blakist mechs side by side so they would beat each other up. The winner would be an easy sweep for the Blakist combatants.
The fight started, and the Argus in front of him immediately opened fire. Mac sidestepped the attack, and the RAC shells flew harmlessly in front of him before slamming into rusty machineries behind him. The Argus immediately followed up with its missiles, but the rushed salvo only hit his right hip, digging craters on the smooth surface.
Mac grinned. The Argus carried more advanced weaponries but the pilot was an amateur. He could beat him in a matter of minutes. He lined up his crosshair on the Argus' right torso and fired his PPC. The azzure bolt cored the torso, and the impact twisted the 60-ton mech to the right. His assault stunned Argus for a moment, and he fired his lasers in unison, melting two tons of armor on its right torso, then sank his Gauss slug right where his lasers landed. Molten armor sprayed into the air as his slug ripped the Argus' torso. A sickening groan ensued as the Argus' legs strained to keep the mech on its feet.
The Argus came back with a vengeance. A long trace of ballistics hammered his front amror. Mac gripped his joystick, holding his mech steady. Another wave of missile came and pounded his left torso, leaving scars on the armor. The Argus tried to score another hit with its medium lasers, but Mac brought his mech behind a concrete panel.
So predictable, Mac sneered as he prepared his guns. The Argus, anxious to score another hit at Mac, foolishly swung around the concrete panel directly into Mac's weapon range. Mac fired his lasers and PPC together, evaporating armor on the center torso. Just as the Argus swerved to shoot him, Mac let loose his Gauss slug, burrying it deep into the Argus' right torso. Sparks burst like speckles of blood, and the Argus reeled in smoke.
The Argus came back up and fired its missiles. Mac easily dodged the salvo. Two laser beams grazed his right arm, creating canals on his shiny new paint job. Mac waited for the RAC to bark, but the multi-barreled cannon never fired again. Mac supposed his last Gauss attack jammed - or incapacitated - the unreliable gun.
Smelling blood, Mac circled the Argus while firing his large lasers. The Argus pivoted, trying to return fire with its own lasers. Heat spiked as he fired his PPC. The Argus flinched, missing the blue bolt, and quickly lined up its missile launcher with Mac. But Mac had been waiting for it. His Gauss slug beat the missiles, ripping the Argus' right torso for the third time. Fire belched from the impact, followed by a fireball that split the torso. The mechwarrior, morally destroyed, ejected from his mech.
Mac steered his Black Knight and went deeper into the center of the arena. Marik Tower provided many obstacles from abandoned industrial complex that employed mechs for hard labor. Doors, hallways, large open floors — everything was built to the scale of battlemechs. They often served as covers during a heated arena battle. Leaning against a concrete panel, Mac watched a Catapult duking it out with a modified Dragon at the center. The Dragon sported Lyran's monstrous Heavy Gauss rifle. A hideous pothole on the Catapult's left torso told him how dangerous the Heavy Gauss was.
A missile fusillade from the Catapult stripped the torso armor of the Dragon, exposing the Heavy Gauss rifle to the hot, arid air in the factory arena. The Dragon lurched forward, flailing its arms to keep it from stumbling. It went back up, aligning its crosshair at the Catapult and blasted the Heavy Gauss gun. The well-placed salvo wrecked the Catapult's engine. Three consecutive explosions tore the Catapult from the inside, and the gutted mech reeled back, flat on its back.
Mac took the opportunity while the Dragon was reloading. He took a quick aim at the Dragon's exposed torso and threw everything he got. A wave of heat surged on his body, but his marksmanship eviscerated the Dragon's weakened torso. His energy bolts ruptured the remaining armor on the chest, while his Gauss slug crunched the Heavy Gauss rifle. The critical explosion gnawed everything inside. The Dragon's torso expanded into a fireball, seconds before splinters rained down on Mac's Black Knight.
Waiting to cool off, a blip on his radar caught Mac's attention. The heat signature of an Excalibur C-1 popped up in his screen. It was the last combatant standing except for himself. Although the Excalibur was originally intended for long-range fire support, the C-1 variant carried enough armor and short-range weapon to fight in point-blank range. The fact that the Excalibur didn't have a scratch in its paint told him that the Word of Blake was protecting it and pushing it to win the game. Mac knew how it worked. He was on that boat long time ago when the mafia protected him during games and pushed him to win. It wasn't that fun if he was on the losing side of the game.
The Excalibur zoomed at him and fired its Gauss rifle. Mac backpedaled behind large machinery just in time. The nickel-ferrous slug bludgeoned the rusty structure, taking down half of the crooked beams and bent platings and locked-up gears in a loud avalanche. The Excalibur tried to follow up with its missiles, but Mac slid deeper behind the machinery, forcing the Blakist to resolve in an idle.
Mac found a small opening and launched a one-two laser combo. The first strike sailed past the Excalibur's head but the second one drilled a large divot on its chest, finally ruining the broadsword painting on its chest. The Excallibur lurched forward, but quickly compensated the loss of mass.
"Hey," Mac tried to reason with the Excalibur pilot. "Do you really want this to come down to the final stupidity?"
"The only end in sight is you burning in hell, infidel!" the pilot hissed in response.
Mac lunged forward and fired his PPC. The heat spike made him cringe, but his particle bolt jabbed the Excalibur inches away from the laser mark on its center torso. The Excalibur jerked behind. Its knees wobbled to sustain its body weight, and blue static charges spewed from the cavity. Mac's charge disabled its electronics, and for a moment the Excalibur swayed groggily, struggling to line up its crosshair with the Black Knight.
"What makes you think you're winning this game?" Mac taunted the Blakist, but was careful enough not to coax him into a fit of rage. "Use your head; it doesn't have to end with death. We can split the winning and both of us will get out of here happy and rich."
The Excalibur answered with a stream of missiles, but since its radar was fried by Mac's PPC, the missiles spread in a wide angle. Mac came into the open to bust the Excalibur open with his Gauss gun, but the Excalibur war one second faster. Its silvery ball zoomed in hypersonic speed and ripped Mac's left shoulder apart. Mac grimaced as the neurohelmet feedback signal skewered his brain. Critical-hit alarm blared, and his PPC went offline. The Black Knight slowly careened backward, and it took Mac everything he had to keep his mech standing.
Cursing, Mac realigned his crosshair with the Excalibur's midsection and fired as fast as he could. The rushed shot missed its intended target but still hammered the Excalibur right under its chin. The Excalibur keeled over while tattered behind, then slammed its back against a pile of rusty machinery. It leaned on the massive metal scrap while pulling itself together.
Mac knew pressing the attack was not a wise decision. The Tower arena was a confined place with restricted air flow. Heat would build up quickly. But he had to seize the moment. The Excalibur was partially immobilized, and it was the best time to inflict maximum damage to the Blakist mech. He fired whatever was left on his arsenal, and his eyes slammed shut when waste heat waded into the cockpit like a tidal wave. One bolt missed the Excalibur miserably, but the other one cored the Blakist mech center mass, turning its torso armor into drooping smelter.
But Mac's shot served as a double-edged sword. While it critically wounded the Excalibur, it overheated Mac's Black Knight to the point it was kissing the shut down sequence. Mac desperately dumped half of his coolant reservoir, but it didn't help much. His mech moved like a sloth, giving the Excalibur enough time to regain footing. The Blake took a good aim and fired everything with conviction. Missiles, laser bolt, and Gauss slug shredded the Black Knight to pieces. The left arm was sheared clean at the shoulder. The Gauss slug buried itself on Black Knight's side, crushing one laser cannon.
Hunkering down, Mac realized that the Excalibur would just take the fight to the bitter end, and just as any other fanatics in Solaris, the pilot believed that he would win. Fortunately he had to wait until his weapons recycled. Mac had one chance to end the game in his favor, but if he failed, he would have to pay with his life. His life hung on his next shot. He understood the gravity of his next shot. So he took his time, taking a solid aim at the Excalibur's glowing torso, then pulled his trigger.
His Gauss slug whizzed and struck the oozing blotch on the Excalibur's center torso. Weakened by repeated blows, the structure didn't stand a chance. Tongues of fire bled from the crater, and the Excalibur crumbled backward. A series of explosions ripped the Excalibur from inside, turning its upper body into charred debris.
Mac leaned back on his chair to take some deep breaths, but his celebration was short lived. As the Excalibur succumbed into a pit of flame, half a dozen Word of Blake mechs barged into the arena and boxed the Black Knight. Mac snorted in disgust. He knew he wasn't a poster child for dignity, but even for his standard the Word of Blake's maneuver was low.
"You don't get anything out of this, you zealot fools!" he chortled as he prepared his Gauss rifle for his last stand. If he were to die in the hands of the Word of Blake, he'd take as many of them with him.
"This is Precentor Adhem," a raspy voice rang on his comset. "You took something from me. Now you have to return it."
"Since when you care about money?" Mac spat.
"I am not talking about money. You killed my pilot. Now you will take his place."
"Is this the way you recruit your agents? Pathetic! You can just kill me, jokers, because I'll never join you and your zealous crusade!"
"That is not a recruitment. That is a command. You will take his place. And believe me," Adhem paused briefly to chuckle, "You're gonna like working for me!"