Battletech a question of.., p.17
BattleTech: A Question of Survival, page 17
“These are desperate times, my Falcons. I will not mince words about that. But we are on the precipice of rebuilding our Clan as a force to be reckoned with for now and all time. So, to preserve ourselves, we drill. We learn how to fight our enemies and we do it in unexpected ways. Let no one say the Jade Falcons do not have what it takes to win at all costs.”
Deacon shrank in his chair. Suddenly he did not look so imposing a Warrior.
“You are right to question what we are doing now, Deacon. I do not mean to make light of your service to the Jade Falcons. I know you have fought for your Clan for your entire life. Our Clan. But I also know they left you behind and robbed you of your final glory on Terra, and left us all in a situation where we must build a Clan from scratch. You intend to do this with me, quiaff?”
“Aff,” Deacon muttered.
“Quiaff?” Jiyi repeated, louder this time.
“Aff!” Deacon said, this time with much more conviction.
“Good.” Jiyi turned to the rest of the assemblage, gathering his thoughts for a moment before continuing. “Before we continue our lesson, I want to offer one last thing for you to consider. Are you familiar with the Raging Bears? They are the Ghost Bears’ Omega Galaxy. And they are tasked with fighting against Inner Sphere forces by using the Inner Sphere’s own tactics against them. They do this because the Clans suffered far too many defeats at the hands of the Inner Sphere at Tukayyid and other places. Those defeats were possible because the Spheroids are not obligated to follow our Clan rules of honor in combat. The Ghost Bears can do this if we force a free-for-all in our Trials. Imagine that these Raging Bears are our opponent. Why can we not use their own tactics and ways of thinking against them? So, here we are. We study their tactics and we counter them. I have spent much time in the lands of the Ghost Bear during my post defending VaultShip Gamma. I have learned much from them. And when was it ever against the Clan way to learn about your enemy and exploit their weaknesses?”
And still, no answer came from those assembled.
Jiyi pointed back to the screen. “So, I ask again. What else could be done in a situation like this?”
MechWarrior Hosteen, a graying Warrior nearing the end of his run, looked back and forth to see if anyone else would offer an answer before raising a hand.
Jiyi pointed at him. “MechWarrior Hosteen.”
“We can smoke them out?”
Jiyi furrowed his brow. He liked where Hosteen was heading, but had not puzzled out his method himself. “How do you propose to do that?”
“Use our lasers to start the forest ablaze?”
“It could work, but you could end up overheating your ’Mech. But the theory is sound. Rob them of the advantage of the cover, same as with the cave dens. This is how Ghost Bears think based on their traditions and culture. This is how they react. And the Fourteenth Battle Cluster stationed on Quarell is as traditional as it gets within the Ghost Bears.”
Jiyi scanned the faces in the room. Their confusion and unease, for the most part, was being replaced with determination. He would take the unease on himself, still wondering if they would be able to pull it off. It did not matter how unsure he was, though, it was confidence he had to project. “We still have much training to do before we arrive at our destination. I want you all to be ready, so we continue to drill and study. Quiaff?”
“AFF,” came their unified response.
* * *
ALIS FALCONIS
RECHARGE STATION
LA GRAVE
JADE FALCON OCCUPATION ZONE
02 NOVEMBER 3151
Star Commander Dawn wished she could sit on the command couch of a real ’Mech instead of a simulator, but when the day came for her to do that again, the fight would be real. In the meantime, she would have to content herself with practicing however she could, and the simulators were still a significant improvement over the training she had had to do in the infantry.
This time, she piloted a Bane, which gave her the distinct impression she would be piloting an assault ’Mech when they reached their objective, which suited her just fine. An assault ’Mech could do lots of damage and it would help her do her part. She had a lot of lost time to make up for.
“Star Commander Dawn,” MechWarrior Hosteen said on the comm. This particular exercise had placed them in pairs to find ways to flush out Ghost Bear ’Mechs from their dens and enclaves. “The target area is up ahead.”
“Aff,” Dawn said. But she was not seeing anywhere the Ghost Bears could hide. There were no hills or caves and no trees. The only thing that was ahead of them was a placid lake. “I do not have any ’Mechs on my scopes.”
“Same. Where could they be hiding?”
Dawn’s first thought was that they could be under the water, ready for an ambush, but that sounded further from Clan thinking than even a Ghost Bear would go. She scanned further beyond the target area. “There are outcroppings in the hills beyond the target area.”
“But why would they give us this particular target area if they are not here?” Hosteen echoed Dawn’s first instinct as well, but they sounded just as sheepish about verbalizing it. “Do you really think they could be under the water?”
“I mean, ’Mech cockpits are watertight.”
“But their weapons would be useless from below.”
“Only some of their weapons.” Dawn switched to infrared mode, but the surface of the water appeared the same on her scope. A gently sloshing mirror, colored lighter than everything else because the water was much cooler than the rest of the area. It would make sense for them to hide there, given the parameters of the exercise and she said so. “I bet they are hiding beneath the water.”
“Then how do we flush them out?” Hosteen asked.
It was a reasonable question. All of the Bane’s weapons were ammo-based. She boasted ten Ultra autocannons and four machine guns. She was deadly at long range, but at the mercy of how much ammunition she carried. She could not rely on lasers to lure out a target or paint it in the meantime. Every shot had to count. Shooting into the water with limited ammo did not make sense. But Hosteen was piloting a Marauder IIC, and was nothing but lasers.
Dawn switched back to her standard view on the HUD, trying to get more detail out of it. “Hosteen, fire into the lake. We will see if we can draw them out.”
“Aff.”
The Marauder IIC fired its small lasers, bathing Dawn’s entire console in ruby light. When the lasers subsided, steam rose from the boiling lake, but no ’Mechs appeared.
“Try it again,” Dawn said.
Hosteen stepped closer, aiming down into the water before opening fire with his golden medium pulse lasers. Maybe he thought he would boil off more water with the shorter wavelengths and hotter beams.
Steam completely obscured the surface of the lake now, but it was enough to get the desired result. A gigantic Mastodon rose from the steaming water, rivulets dripping down its massive shoulder bay LRMs and dual PPC arms. As it moved backward, the assault ’Mech opened fire on Hosteen, unloading a fierce salvo of 40 long-range missiles that smoked across the lake, mixing with the steam and making the battlefield all that more chaotic. Half of them pummeled Hosteen’s Marauder, exploding in a brilliant cascade of flame and fury.
Without waiting for further invitation, Dawn opened fire with her Ultra autocannons and machine guns, hoping to take the early advantage and blast as much armor off the Mastodon as fast as possible. Hosteen did not need to be told twice, either, firing a brilliant array of lasers and PPCs at their enemy. Half of their shots missed through the smoke and steam, but enough hit to see the Mastodon’s torso and arms crack with the impact.
“Let us hope,” Hosteen said, “the lake holds no more surprises. In this case, one is more than enough.”
“Aff,” Dawn said, backing up as she tried to keep outside the Mastodon’s firing arc, but keep it inside of hers. The Mastodon fired again at Hosteen, peppering his Marauder IIC with missiles.
Melted armor splashed into the lake, creating even more steam obscuring the view. The Mastodon stayed focused on Hosteen’s Marauder IIC, ignoring Dawn entirely.
One assault ’Mech had enough armor to stand up to most attackers, but no assault ’Mech could stand up to two others and not suffer some consequences.
Although it took some time to break through the Mastodon’s 15 tons of armor, Dawn and Hosteen were eventually victorious. They limped away from the engagement and onto the next.
The pair ran through similar scenarios in different places. They caused a rockslide to trap a Star of Ghost Bears in a cave. They tried igniting a forest with Hosteen’s lasers to smoke out a pack of Ghost Bears, but it did not work. That simulation ended poorly for them, and booted them when their ’Mechs were destroyed.
“I do not know how I feel about all of this,” Hosteen told Dawn later in the mess hall.
“Which part?” There were a lot of potentially objectionable things happening; she could not be sure which one he meant.
“Well, any of it. The Jade Falcons are a shadow of their former selves.”
Dawn smirked. “Is a shadow not enough? When a falcon swoops in, the shadow across the ground is often enough to freeze its prey in place.”
“I wonder if the Ghost Bears will really believe we are the shadow with the falcon behind us, then. Do you think they even know about us and our survival? Or do you think they believe we all went to Terra and perished?”
Dawn shoveled more food into her mouth, tasteless rations meant to meet minimum nutritional standards rather than taste good. “I do not think the Khan would send us all the way into Ghost Bear space if anyone thought us truly talonless.”
Hosteen ate more of his own nutrient-fortified paste. “I just worry. About a lot of things.”
Dawn thought she knew what he meant. “Dezgra tactics?”
“Aff.”
“I am, too,” Dawn said, swallowing another mouthful of mushy goo. “But are they still dezgra if the Khan is right? That this is how we have to fight to survive?”
“Would Kerensky say, ‘Then we do not survive’?”
Dawn cocked an eyebrow. “I do not know what Kerensky would say. The more I discover about our history, the more I wonder if it has been taken to an extreme. The Wardens and the Crusaders all changed so much from the original teachings, so why do any of us pretend to know what Kerensky wanted or intended?”
“Because that is the way things are.”
Dawn nodded. “But does that mean they always have to be that way?”
Hosteen shrugged. “All I know is I am told I should follow my Khan. And he seems trustworthy and intelligent. But will he make the right call for our honor as well as our Clan?”
Dawn found an answer inside her, but was surprised by it. Doubly so when she verbalized it. “What honor is there without a Clan in the first place?”
“A fair point.”
“The Jade Falcons are going to survive, Hosteen, and we are MechWarriors in its new touman. We are no longer relegated to the dregs of the paramilitary police. And if the Khan is correct, we will be there at our destination to ensure our clan survives.” Dawn’s eyes drifted to a distant spot beyond her Starmate, many kilometers away. “Before this, we would have been nothing but footnotes in the history of the Jade Falcons, if we were ever even mentioned at all. But if we can truly succeed here, then we will be remembered. Quiaff?”
“It will definitely be better than the stories they tell of the police,” Hosteen said, but did not get a chance to elaborate further.
An alarm sounded.
Time for another simulator drill.
Dawn sighed deeply and shoved a final spoonful food in her mouth as she stood.
Hosteen rose to his feet and picked up his food tray. “I just hope all of this drilling is worth it.”
Dawn turned to him. “It will be as long as we have a Clan left at the end. And if we do not, then, at least we will have died fighting.”
“We will know soon enough. Just one jump left.”
Dawn left the mess and headed right back to the simulators. “One jump left,” she repeated to herself.
CHAPTER 20
FELDSPAR
QUARELL
RASALHAGUE DOMINION
06 NOVEMBER 3151, 0920 HOURS
Alexis could not believe she was sitting in a BattleMech, ready to defend the vacant city of Feldspar and surrounding areas.
Their stunt in the last event had given them enough points to make it to second place and knock the Porbjorns down to third. That meant the Mektid Bears from Lothan were in first place, and would be laying siege to the city.
All Alexis had to do was defend the city. That was it. But she had no idea which direction they would be coming from—and she would have to coordinate the defense with Daniel.
Thanks to her performance in the stealth game, Alexis had been chosen to be one of two commanders; unfortunately, Daniel was the other. As one of the commanders, she got assigned a heavy ’Mech—an ancient 70-ton Grizzly. Daniel went out in a 60-ton Mad Dog Mk III.
That the Den Mother kept shoving Daniel into a leadership position after each subsequent mistake and loss was laughable. It did not matter how much the other Ursari argued that Daniel was not worthy of that position; the Den Mother insisted. His command of the other Star was a compromise between all the Bearclaw Ursari and the Den Mother to allow Alexis to even compete in the final competition, let alone command one of the Stars.
The Grizzly rumbled beneath her. The town of Feldspar was hers to defend, and there was nothing the Den Mother could do about it at that point.
“Bearclaw Cubs, report in,” Alexis said.
“Cub One here,” Thomasin said. Thomasin and Sophie both chose raptor-legged Lobos. The Lobos were good long-range fighters and boasted anti-missile systems. “Nothing on my scope yet, Cub Leader.”
“Cub Two, same,” Sophie said.
Lewis and Anna filled out the rest of the Star in a pair of Solitaires. Essentially mobile laser cannons, the Solitaires were capable medium-to-long range fighters, and then could take hits while dissipating their heat.
“Cub Three here, nothing to report,” Lewis said.
“Cub Four checking in, it is quiet as a tomb out there,” Anna said.
They had been patrolling for a solid thirty minutes since the official start of the exercise. Feldspar was small, wedged into a little valley and surrounded by hills. Two main roads led into and out of the small town, and there was no guarantee the Mektid Bears would use either of them. Alexis had studied their favored methods of attack, and found them very traditional in their thinking.
She had positioned all of the ’Mechs in her command on the hills, watching for any attacks from all directions. “Cub Three and Four,” she said, knowing their Solitaires were the fastest ’Mechs at her disposal, “I want you to keep scouting, head from hill to hill. The second you see something, hit it at long range and then fall back to the city.”
“Aff!” they both said.
The colored dots that represented them on her HUD zoomed from one spot to the next, looking for anything that would even remotely resemble the Mektid Bear assault.
“Cubs One and Two,” she said to Thomasin and Sophia, “I want you to keep closer to the city and patrol. Anything appears on your scopes, call it out.”
“Aff, Cub Leader.”
Alexis sighed, switching over to her command channel. Now she had to deal with Daniel. They had to coordinate their defense somehow, but she was not sure how that was going to happen. He had already refused to talk about tactics or an overall strategy, instead opting to stay close to the center of town. His ’Mechs did no patrols except for the immediate vicinity of the city center. Daniel’s Star consisted of Jezebel, Zoe, Kaleo, and Yrsa. Jezebel and Zoe had each each chosen a Rime Otter as their medium ’Mechs. Kaleo and Yrsa took the extremely light and fast Bear Cubs to round out the second Star. As for Daniel, nothing he said could be trusted, and he could be counted on only to make the most foolish of moves. If they won the competition, it would be despite him instead of because of him.
“Bearclaw Alpha Leader, do you copy?”
“What do you want?” Daniel sneered into the comm.
“Report in. Any sign of the enemy?”
“If my Alphas saw anything, do you think I would just wait for you to ask me if we had seen something? Or do you think I would just tell you?”
“Honestly, Alpha Leader, I am not sure what you would do.” Alexis tried to keep from laughing at him. “I have not expected you to do many of the things you have done in the games so far, but you persist in the most fascinating ways. One day, someone will write a book on the way you continually surprise your sibkin.”
“Ha, ha, ha,” he said. “Laugh while you can. When the glory of this battle is recorded, your name will be forgotten.”
“I asked if you had seen anything, not for your fantasies. I have my Solitaires patrolling on the nearby hilltops, and I have my Lobos between them in the city. What formation are you in?”
“As I have repeatedly stated, we have taken defensive positions in the city center, surrounding the capital to protect it. We will not be deviating from this strategy.”
The city center complex was the enemy’s target. The Mektid Bears merely had to reduce fifty percent of it to rubble to win full points on the exercise, and the glory of the entire cross-training exercises and war games.
“It might be wiser,” Alexis started, despite her knowledge of Daniel’s hard-headed stubbornness, “to keep up defensive perimeters that fan outward and collapse. If we just defend the target, they will be right there with everything they have.”
“I understand,” Daniel said.
That response sounded too gracious for Daniel, until she realized it dripped with sarcasm. He did not care what she said, one way or the other. He was going to camp at the objective and let them come to him. Which meant Alexis and her Star had to cover the entire circumference of Feldspar and the nearby hilltops to keep their defensive net as far from the objective as possible. It made sense to collapse the lines as they broke through and keep the enemy on the defensive as long as they could. It gave them more chances to win.
