TEXT: BATTLECORPS
  TRIAL UNDER FIRE
  Chapter 8 
  Stress Fractures
  by Loren L. Coleman
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Trial Under Fire • Page 2
  —No blastin’ way! Tell me we didn’t just see that!—
  —All right, if it makes you happy. But what you didn’t see was 
  the bloody DropShip we needed to get out of here, launching.—
  —Why am I not surprised?—
  —We’ll ﬁnd another way, people! But for now we’re still holed 
  up inside the canyon and we can’t stay here much longer. Argue 
  later.—
  
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  Durghan City 
  Tranquil, Clan Homeworlds 
  5 May 3060
  By the time Connor Sinclair recognized what had happened to 
  his commando, it was almost too late. 
  He’d left behind Allen and Dominic just north of the canyon egress 
  to deal with a force of armored vehicles and Elementals, as well as 
  any ’Mech chasing after them from Durghan. Meanwhile he and 
  Epona took after a Cauldron-Born and a Mad Cat tempting fate by 
  placing themselves between the commando and spaceport. The 
  DropShip might be gone, but the spaceport facilities were still a 
  vital link in Galaxy Commander Corbett’s logistics network. Since 
  it appeared they would now be taking a much longer route to the 
  Eclipse, anything which weakened Corbett was of top priority.
  Then Allen had split away from Dominic to rejoin when a trio of 
  Avatars answered the Mad Cat’s alert. He chased his Sunder after 
  one of the Avatar’s further to the north than prudent. 
  He and Epona put down the Cauldron-Born and another Avatar 
  before splitting up. He moving after the Mad Cat Sorenson had 
  identified as belonging to Star captain Dana Wimmer. 
  Epona pursuing the third, wounded Avatar. 
  Everyone riding the adrenaline surge which had 
  carried them through Durghan, and now thrown 
  off by the DropShip’s escape as well, anger 
  and a desire for personal revenge overrode 
  tactical sense as the lance broke up 
  into four individual warriors chas-
  ing their own fight.
  Realization broke cold and hard 
  over Connor when Allen first ran into 
  trouble. And found no one there to cover him.
  “I’m down. Blake’s blazes! Anyone, I’m down!” 
  There was a grunt of pain which might have been 
  the MechWarrior being bounced around as 
  the Sunder struck hard against the ground. 
  “Avatar took my leg off.”
  Losing their assault ’Mech could only 
  prove disastrous. Then Epona punched 
  
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  out, her Shadow Cat disintegrating in a fiery explosion as the fu-
  sion plant sought release. Sorenson informed him of that. 
  “It wasn’t pretty, but she’s alive. I have a vehicle splitting off to 
  pick her up.”
  Breaking from his duel with Dana Wimmer’s Mad Cat, he raced 
  back to give Allen some cover as the Avatar tried to swing around 
  behind the Sunder to finish it. He would never make it in time. Too 
  far away. Epona might have had a shot, having chased her target 
  further north. Now the Avatar which had brought her down moved 
  in at Dominic who limped back into the battle after smashing the 
  last of the Elementas. 
  From extreme range he cut loose with his LRMs, the missiles 
  falling just short of the first Avatar. Still, they served to worry the 
  Clan MechWarrior, turning him back into the Sunder before com-
  ing fully around at Allen’s back. 
  The Jaguar warrior’s elation colored his voice, even through the 
  static of a comms intercept. “At your best!” he cried, trying to 
  rally his comrades with the kill of the Sunder. “You heard the Star 
  captain. We defend this spaceport or we die trying.”
  But Allen had propped his assault ’Mech up on one arm, tar-
  geting with his Gauss rifle. The silver ball of nickel-ferrous 
  material cracked into the Avatar’s chest, smashing aside the last 
  of its protection and punching deep into its core to hammer at 
  the OmniMech’s sensitive gyro. Metal chunks spat out at high ve-
  locities as the critical piece of equipment tore itself apart, and the 
  Avatar went down hard on its face. 
  Just to be safe, Allen pumped another Gauss round directly into 
  the downed ’Mech’s head.
  “Wouldn’t ya know it? He died trying.” 
  Conner read the intense relief in Allen’s voice. Knew the humor 
  to be nervous energy seeking release. “Glad to hear you’re still 
  with us,” he said.
  “Thank you, sir. Sorry to say I’ll be sitting out the rest of this 
  battle.”
  A flight of five missiles gouging into his rear armor interrupted 
  any reply Connor might make. 
  Alone on the field but for one Avatar now, Star captain Dana 
  Wimmer press forward determinedly while she held the advan-
  
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  tage. “I will smash this upstart freebirth myself!” she vowed, never 
  knowing her words carried into the enemy comm systems.
  Connor ran a wide turn, trying to draw her back toward Dominic, 
  but then gave that up as the remaining Avatar drove Domini’s Thor 
  back toward the canyon. From range he cut loose with missiles 
  and lasers, using the last of the ammunition for his right-shoulder 
  launcher. Better than half his flight struck home, though one laser 
  missed low.
  Wimmer’s answering barrage gouged deeply into his arm and 
  right leg, smashing an ankle actuator which stumbled the seventy-
  five ton Mad Cat. A deft hand on the control stick saved him from a 
  fall, though left him open to a new attack. Even as Dominic crowed 
  out his success at putting down the last Avatar, Wimmer rained 
  another short flight of four missiles into Connor and splashed ruby 
  darts from her pulse laser into his savaged left side. The energy 
  pulses ate into his left-shoulder launcher, failing to detonate the 
  missiles inside but ruining it as an effective weapon. 
  “Enough of this,” he shouted to his cockpit. 
  He throttled back, limping his own Mad Cat’s speed down until 
  it stood still on the spaceport tarmac. With careful deliberation 
  he drifted his targeting reticle over the enemy Mad Cat’s outline, 
  then speared out with both large lasers coring ruby energy into 
  Wimmer’s torso. The punch stopped her solid. Three hundred 
  meters downrange Wimmer’s Mad Cat stumbled to a halt. It shud-
  dered as if from a gyro graze, but did not go down. 
  He slapped at his shutdown override as his heat spiked deep 
  into the red band, then centered his lasers over her chest and fired 
  again.
  Golden-red fire blossomed at the Mad Cat’s heart, ripping out 
  through shoulder joints and at the turret-style waist of Wimmer’s 
  OmniMech. The raging fire touched off both ammunition bins, 
  detonating a combined weight of half a ton of missiles. An orange 
  fireball seemed to hang overhead for a second, and then the Omni 
  flew into four large pieces which spun out from the central explo-
  sion.
  Sorenson’s voice overrode the others, the benefit of coordinating 
  communications for the commando lance. “Well done, Lieutenant! 
  That clears the field.”
  “Neg.” A new voice. “It does not.” 
  
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  Cold. Almost devoid of any life. For a moment he couldn’t place 
  it. Absent the usual static that came with an intercepted trans-
  mission, he had thought it one of his team. Then a glance at the 
  comms system showed it coming in on an open civilian channel 
  reserved for lower castes. Sorenson had used the frequency as a 
  matter of convenience, scanning the lower channels for intel. The 
  new arrival selected for it to allow communication between the 
  two warring sides.
  Dominic picked it up first. “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding.”
  “It’s him,” Epona agreed, having taken over a headset in one of 
  the mobile field bases. “Bloody cocksure.”
  Star colonel Ratache Osis walked a Supernova toward the 
  spaceport, having arrived through the same canyon pass which 
  the commando had used to escape Durghan City. His ninety-ton 
  assault ’Mech put an Annihilator to shame, using Clan technol-
  ogy to field a superior war machine. Six extended-range large 
  lasers—three in each arm. Slow but well-armored, this ’Mech was 
  designed to destroy anything which came against it so long as the 
  pilot could survive the heat spike. 
  A fact which did not seem to worry the Star colonel. “My death 
  has been assured,” he said simply, with no trace of personal con-
  cern. “At least one of yours will be too, I promise. One at time, if 
  you have the courage, or all together. It no longer matters.”
  On the ground to the north, Allen’s Sunder stirred as if it might 
  try to raise itself back on one leg. “He wants a fight, I’ll give it to 
  him.” 
  Dominic said nothing but simply reversed his path, sweeping 
  back from the southwest to place himself between Ratache Osis 
  and Connor Sinclair.
  “Dominic, Allen, stand down both of you!” 
  Connor had switched over to the same channel as Osis, want-
  ing the Star colonel to remain focused on his Mad Cat rather than 
  one of his severely-damaged lancemates. He turned his wounded 
  ’Mech west to face Osis’ advance. 
  “This is my fight. You two hold your positions.”
  Sorenson cut in, interrupting. “Sir, you can’t duel him. That 
  Supernova’s in pristine condition. You won’t have a chance. Allen 
  can still fire his Gauss rifle, and Dominic—”
  
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  “And no one will fire without my order,” Connor cut him off 
  sharply. He was playing a dangerous game here and could not 
  afford distractions. He blinked away the sweat burning at the cor-
  ners of his eyes. 
  “No one,” he repeated, “without my order.”
  “Yessir,” Allen acknowledged, a bit too easily. 
  Dominic at least managed to invest a bit of his usual sullen na-
  ture, saying nothing but pulling his Thor back to stand exactly 
  south of Allen’s downed Sunder and just out of the path which 
  separated Connor from Osis. 
  The Star colonel bothered no more with words. Thrusting an 
  arm forward, three lasers stabbed scarlet destruction at the com-
  mando Mad Cat. Two of them scored wounds across its outline, 
  an impressive salvo from such long range. One splashed away 
  armor from the chest, and another dug into the ruined left side 
  though failed to damage any critical equipment. 
  Having lost his shoulder-mounted missile launchers and now 
  limited to a pair of lasers only, Connor knew he couldn’t hope 
  to match Osis in raw firepower. His hastily-snapped return shot 
  passed both ruby beams wide. 
  Careful of his damaged ankle actuator, he stepped his Mad Cat 
  backward, trying to maintain distance on the Star colonel. 
  In disgrace or not, Osis apparently knew to wait for his chance at 
  a full barrage of all six lasers. He stalked the Supernova forward, 
  heedless of anything but closing with his enemy. His other arm 
  stabbed forward, and three new beams sliced the air. Only one 
  hit this time, laying bare the Mad Cat’s left leg down to titanium 
  bones. But this time Connor made Osis pay, grazing both of his 
  own lasers over the Supernova’s chest.
  Trying to make up for his poor showing, Osis fired five lasers on 
  his next salvo. Again only one hit as Connor struggled to keep his 
  Mad Cat at long range. The heat spike cost the Star colonel, his 
  Supernova slowing down as myomer muscles reacted negatively 
  to the high heat. But once begun, the heavier barrages were hard to 
  give up. Osis fired four lasers the next time, then five again hoping to 
  increase his damage ratio against the already-savaged OmniMech 
  that limped back always just on the outside of optimal range. 
  Conner took two more laser cuts against his left leg and arm, but 
  easily shrugged them aside.
  
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  Now, he decided, throttling out of his reverse walk and limping 
  forward to close with Osis. His ruby-bright lances sliced into the 
  right side of the Supernova. Molten armor runneled to the ground, 
  splashing bits if fire against the spaceport tarmac as better than a 
  ton of armor sloughed away.
  Osis thrust both arms forward as Connor stepped over the line 
  and into optimum range, and six separate lances of scarlet energy 
  converged on the stricken Mad Cat.
  But the Star colonel had already been fighting a rising heat 
  curve, myomer muscles responding sluggishly. Only half of his 
  lasers struck at Connor, two of them working to sever his left arm 
  and the third coring into his Mad Cat’s right leg to claim his other 
  ankle actuator. 
  The Omni staggered back under the assault, giving up two tons 
  of armor and structural support. Connor knew that to fall was 
  to die, and his command with him. The gyro protested, having 
  already lost its struggle with gravity. The MechWarrior worked 
  control sticks to regain his center of balance. 
  He finally managed to drag around his wounded right leg, care-
  ful of the damaged actuator, to get a leg solidly beneath him.
  The Supernova stood still on the tarmac, smoke curling from 
  nearly every joint in its armor as the extreme buildup of waste heat 
  all but shut the machine down. A geyser of gray-green coolant 
  jetted from one jagged scar in the BattleMech’s torso; a heatsink 
  overworked to the point of bursting. Connor was amazed the ma-
  chine did not shutdown, or that Osis was still alive in that furnace. 
  The man was all the more dangerous for his fury, caring nothing 
  for himself so long as he struck at his enemy.
  For Connor Sinclair, he cared everything for his team. And so 
  would strike down his enemy in any way he could.
  “Allen, Dominic,” he said over the Clan common frequency, let-
  ting Osis hear the death sentence. “Commence firing.”
  Both lancemates had been ready. On Connor’s order, Allen swung 
  his Sunder’s Gauss rifle into line with the heat-stricken Supernova 
  and Dominic raced forward autocannon already hammering out 
  lethal streams of heavy-caliber slugs. 
  Connor continued to limp at his best pace, stabbing out with his 
  lasers again. And again.
  
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  The Supernova rained armor to the ground in shards and splin-
  ters and molten streams. The initial onslaught shook the assault 
  ’Mech under a violent cascade of weapons fire. It toppled to the 
  tarmac, though was far from dead. 
  Allen’s second and third Gauss slug combined to tear off one 
  arm, depriving the assault ’Mech of half its firepower. A rapid-fire 
  burst from Dominic’s autocannon chewed into the right torso and 
  scrapped enough of the reactor’s physical shielding to drive its 
  heat scale up another large jump. On the thermal imaging scan-
  ners, the Supernova read white-hot. 
  The Star colonel was still alive in that furnace and defiant to the 
  last. “I will not fail! I will not…”
  Walking right up to the downed ’Mech, Connor set the barrel 
  which capped his right arm directly over the Supernova’s head. 
  “Last time pays for all,” he said, and squeezed into the trigger.
  A burst of static overrode Ratache Osis’ dying scream.
  Connor’s Mad Cat and Dominic’s Thor stood over the smoking 
  BattleMech corpse; both of them savaged, both down to a few 
  last working weapons. Perhaps two tons of armor between them 
  and looking one small laser hit away from joining the vanquished 
  Supernova. The Mad Cat swayed unsteadily on its feet, destroyed 
  actuators leaving it borderline unstable. Connor kept a careful 
  hand on the control stick, muscles still tense from their exertion 
  and nerves singing tight as if he expected Ratache Osis to rise 
  again and complete the commando’s destruction.
  He apparently was not the only one to feel that way.
  Dominic’s Thor leaned in over the Supernova. “Can we be sure 
  he’s dead?”
  “I don’t trust him,” Epona said as two field bases pulled up. The 
  third had stopped by Allen’s fallen Sunder. “What say we pump a 
  few more shots into the wreckage?”
  A hail of slugs ripped into the Supernova’s corpse, chased by a 
  tongue of flame belching out of the Thor’s autocannon.
  He opened a channel. “Dominic! Stand down. Osis is dead.” 
  There wasn’t much left of the assault ’Mech’s head but a charred 
  cavity where the cockpit and various control components had 
  been housed.
  
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  “He’s dead,” Sorenson echoed, “and we have bigger problems. 
  We just picked up a new transmission, Lieutenant. Clan sideband 
  frequency, no scrambling, repeating itself over and over. Sir, you’ll 
  want to hear this. Patching in.”
  A brief pause, and then a new voice filled Connor’s neurohelmet. 
  Calm and almost conversational except for the hard edge to the 
  words. 
  “This is Galaxy Commander Brendon Corbett. You have caused 
  enough trouble, freebirth. I relieved Star colonel Osis of his 
  command when he failed to contain you in Dhurgan. He had no 
  authority to offer you batchall, amusing as it was to hear. If you 
  think his death bought you any reprieve, any measure of vindica-
  tion in my eyes, you are sadly disillusioned.”
  Allen broke in over the transmission as Corbett paused for breath 
  or simply to let the news sink in before continuing. “I don’t believe 
  this sh—”
  “I do,” Dominic interrupted, then quieted as the galaxy com-
  mander began talking again.
  “You denied me the pleasure of hunting Osis myself. If for noth-
  ing else, I would kill you for that. I am nearly finished with this 
  annoyance in the mountains, and then I will return for you. The 
  bulk of the Smoke Jaguar fleet has arrived at the jump point, and I 
  plan to have all resistance ended on Tranquil before they land.
  “As for the DropShip you were chasing, it has relocated to a re-
  mote spot far from reach. You are stranded,” he said with obvious 
  satisfaction. “Cut off.”
  “Dead.”
  
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