29 replies to this topic

[Arnold J Rimmer]

This started as a one-shot on a fic site of some ill-repute, back before I even thought MW5 was going to be a thing, let alone MWO. A Fourth Succession War DC invasion of a FedSuns world near their borders, with a rough campaign half-figured out in my head. RL snuck up on me, though, as it is wont to do, and I lost track of the story. However, I figured I may as well post it here for your perusal and hey - if people like it, I might even get around to finishing it one day! So. Here we go.

---

Theo applied the last brushstroke with a flourish, and stepped back to get a better look at the canvas. It would do, he decided. Not his best, but he was sure it would sell for even more than his last one. His favourite gallery had drummed up massive hype for his paintings, which had netted progressively larger amounts of money. His last sold for a seven-figure sum.

No longer concentrating on his painting, he started to hear the newscast after tuning it out a few hours ago.

"... are hearing reports that a surprise attack has been launched against Marduk by the Draconis Combine. According to a source in Federated Suns Intelligence, they had hidden their military movements, apparently simultaneously openly preparing for an attack on Lima. Over to our guest analysts now."

"Thank you, Jan. We were just discussing the possible intentions of the Combine. If the Federated Suns lose Lima, then supply lines to Marduk will be stretched thin, probably to breaking point. This will make it much harder to defend the planet, and it will probably be lost to the Combine. The conflict will also likely draw out several regiments of Suns forces and leave surrounding systems less well-defended. This could in turn lead to..."

Theo turned away from the screen and walked to a window overlooking the park next to his apartment building. It was the largest in the capital, a verdant expanse of green easily seven or eight kilometres on a side. He had chosen this apartment for precisely this view; high enough to get a good view, low enough to seem close.

Faintly, he could hear a bass booming, coming from the direction of the nearby military base. He looked left, and saw vivid puple beams spearing into the sky, one after the other, leaving seared silhouettes across his vision. Squinting, he followed their path, and saw what he thought was a meteor shower, until he clicked 'invasion' and 'orbital defence lasers' together.

He was aware that Marduk was one of the first major worlds on the Federated Suns' side of the border, but the possibility of attack had always seemed remote to him. And now, Dropships were thundering down towards the planet, towards him.

He watched, fraught with worry, as the lasers pounded the air. A few Dropships were hit, and tumbled down out of control. He couldn't see enough of the sky at once, he was looking left and right so fast he felt like he was having a fit. He saw a Dropship, a big blocky thing, clear the buildings on the other side of the park, on fire. It dipped, lower and lower, and ploughed into the grassy hill, throwing up a cloud of dirt and dust.

The shockwave of the impact rippled outward, finally meeting the bottom of his apartment complex and travelling upward, shattering every window it touched. Theo screamed as he was thrown to the floor, his hands scraping across the shards of broken glass littering the carpet. His easel, still with his drying painting on it, toppled forward and landed face down on the floor.

There was a rumbling sound outside, different from the impact. He crawled over to the window over the road, gingerly used the sill to lever himself upright, gasping as his lacerated palms gripped the edge, and looked down on the street. A pair of tanks growled past, towards the park, their main barrels sweeping left and right, hunting. The floor shook rhythmically with titanic footsteps.

The 'Mech stomped down the causeway, arms held ready, four metre long lasers aimed forward, humming. It stopped between his building and the one opposite, almost directly in front of him. The pilot inside looked tiny, dwarfed by her war machine. He could see her flicking switches and watching readouts, before she glanced up and looked around. She saw Theo standing at what was left of his window, watching, and waved a greeting. The cavalry's here, the wave said. We'll show them.

As he watched, her head snapped round, facing forward and looking at her instruments, and the 'Mech set its feet. It fired a laser, the bright ruby beam stabbing forth. Theo looked quickly back to the park, but the beam faded before he could see what she was shooting at.

Suddenly, a shockingly loud triple sonic boom echoed between his apartment building and the one across the street, followed a second later by a muffled thoom from between the trees in the park. The thoom was accompanied by the screech of tearing metal and groaning myomer muscle bundles as the cockpit of the 'Mech was ripped apart, debris flying backwards. It staggered back a step, then seemed to topple back in slow motion, striking the concrete with an almighty clang.

Theo couldn't move. That 'Mech was the largest weapon he'd ever seen; how could it be gone? There were several little voices nagging at him to move, to get out of there, but he couldn't. It was as if his legs belonged to someone else. He was distracted by the growl of more engines, and turned to watch almost dispassionately.

Another pair of tanks threaded their way around the 'Mech, autocannon hammering the air. Another 'Mech, much smaller than the one with the female pilot, sprinted out from between the trees. It scored a glancing laser strike on the flank of one tank before the other hit it in the shoulder with its main cannon. The arm hit on the 'Mech flailed, loosing a flight of missiles towards Theo's building. They struck a couple of floors above him, sending him to his knees. A cracked support beam swung down from the ceiling and clipped his temple, throwing him spinning to the floor, greyness exploding across his vision.

The sounds of battle became quieter and quieter, fading to nothing as he lost consciousness.

[Arnold J Rimmer]

The Combine forces in the middle of the city recovered fairly quickly from their (barely) controlled crash landing in the park. A beachhead unit comprised of light 'mechs, armour and heavy infantry cordoned off the park while the rest of the personnel and materiel were unloaded from the DropShip. More ships were landing in the outskirts of the city, with units moving into the governmental and military districts of New Pontiac.

"Do we know how many units they're bringing down?" demanded Field Marshal Metzger. He watched as the base's garrison lances moved towards the main gate, to help defend against the Kuritan assault. Mainly made up of the medium-class Griffin and Wolverine chassis built in the equatorial 'mechworks, they weren't likely to hold the line for long against the Combine's assault. The turrets and emplaced positions were throwing enough fire at the advancing enemy that it sounded more of a permanent bass rumble rather than individual reports. Great gouts of dirt, concrete and fire were throw up around them as returned fire chewed into the ground. The contrails of massed missile salvos almost entirely blanked out the vista; targets were being acquired on electronic basis alone.

One of the harassed strategic analysts tore his gaze away from his station. "No, sir. There are too many ECM-capable units out there, and our satellite network is being systematically destroyed. Just about the only units we know about directly we only have knowledge of because they are currently engaging our own units. Current strength on-planet is estimated at division-level deployment."

Metzger allowed himself a private grimace. An enemy aerospace wing strafed the base, flashing lasers and whickering tracer-fire down towards the running personnel in the open base. Anti-air batteries replied in turn, chasing the fighters through the sky. "What about Duke Rastkel? Has he been evacuated?"

"He is en-route to the mountain fortress line. His family are already there."

Metzger sighed. "Sound the evacuation. We are relocating command to the mountain bases. The garrison is to give as much time as possible for the personnel to get to the airstrip. And have the weapon stockpiles destroyed."

The command bunker, already a hive of activity, became even more frenetic as technicians gathered paperwork and rushed for the exits, analysts wiped their stations' memory cores and data viruses were left behind in the base's mainframe. No trace of their access codes or operational plans would remain by the time the Draconis Combine took control of the base.

----

"Get over here!" the sapper bellowed over the noise of the battle. He waved his team over to the towering doors of the stockpile, backed against the thirty-metre tall, five-metre deep curtain wall of the base. Four men burdened with bulging backpacks, filled with explosives, huffed over to the personnel access door. Inside, the cacophony was barely diminished.

"Charges every ten metres, gents. Make sure you rig the good stuff by priority." He looked out the door as a particularly close explosion bathed a wedge of the room a baleful orange. "Maybe be quick about it."

A Griffin fell backwards as it was felled by a lucky shot, blackened, burned and pitted by countless munition impacts. A yelling corporal fought to be heard as she tried to get her heavy weapons team into good order. The wind carried smoke over the squad, hiding them from view. A Bulldog tank was gutted from stem to stern by a hypervelocity gauss round, the crew being sucked explosively thorugh the twenty-centimetre hole in the rear armour. A fine mist of bloody gore spattered the hangar wall behind the wrecked vehicle.

He followed behind his men, moving between the shelves and crates, making sure the radio detonators were all online and sync'd. This was only one of three such buildings to be razed, and it looked as if time were running out.

"Last charge laid!" one of his men, Caffran, called.

"Right, next one!"

As they were moving to the next stockpile, he looked over to the airstrip. A huge cargo plane was taking off, engines screaming in protest. A pair of Stilettos rose with it, providing escort. The evacuation was proceeding apace. He fully intended to be on one of those planes in the next ten minutes. His team wired the stockpile quickly; perhaps they sensed the ticking clock as well.

Partway through wiring the last stockpile, mostly ammunition and electronic gear, he noticed a change in the noise from outside. Sticking his head out of the door, he looked over to the gate. He couldn't see any friendly forces through the haze... but he couldn't hear any, either. The Combine forces were still firing, though, making sure any survivors were suppressed. A gigantic, hulking shape resolved out of the smog: a Thug assault 'mech. Further colossal footfalls from the smoke heralded its lancemates, as well as the throaty roar of armour engines and the shouted combat-cant of the Kuritan infantry.

"We are out of time. Rig it. Now."

"It's gonna take a few more minutes, boss."

"Now!"

The enemy 'mechs moved into the base, occasionally blowing a hidden team away. APCs skidded up to the entrances to the command bunkers, and the infantry fanned out to take defensive positions and sweep for traps. Several squads headed towards the stockpiles.

"Caffran, get over here and cover the door."

"Arright." He jogged past, unholstering his pistol.

He busied himself with the detonators. Willing himself to work faster. He doubted he'd see an evac plane, now. He was pretty sure at least one of those 'mechs was heading for the airfield. Any of the planes caught on the ground wouldn't stand a chance.

"S***! Boss, I think they saw me," Caffran called. A shout wafted through the door, followed by the sound of sprinting booted feet. A helmeted head appeared in the doorway - his visor was shattered by a well-placed shot from Caffran. The trooper slumped in the doorway. More shouting outside. Schmidt tugged the rifle from the dead soldier's shoulder. He readied his own pistol, looked at the detonator in his other hand. It sounded as if a 'mech were coming closer; maybe they were hoping to intimidate them into surrender?

"Heh," he chuckled to himself. "Come closer, you b*******."

Three Kuritan troopers launched themselves through the door, cutting Caffran down before he could fire again. Schmidt claimed another before being torn to shreds by a long burst.

"Hey!" the sapper shouted. More Combine infantry had entered the hall. They all looked towards him now. "F*** you." He thumbed the detonator.

Several thousand tonnes of munitions and weaponry exploded. The blast bounced back from the curtain wall, sending most of it right back at the Combine forces arrayed within the base. Windows shattered in the city for a kilometre in all directions. 'Mechs and tanks outside the stockpiles were ruined or destroyed outright by the fireball. Most of the infantry not already under cover didn't stand a chance.

Edited by Arnold J Rimmer, 26 December 2015 - 03:32 PM.

[Arnold J Rimmer]

Corporal Jule Hasen carefully clambered up a two-metre tall slump of rubble that hugged the corner of a high-rise in New Pontiac. He poked his head around the building to see if the way ahead was clear.

"Okay," he whispered, looking back over his shoulder. "Combine position down the road. Looks like they set up a line without checking their backs. They're facing the other way. Delta fireteam, you're crossing first. Charlie, you're with me. Set up firing positions here in case we're spotted."

His lance-corporal, Canavan, nodded and made sure his team were ready. "Ready, boss."

Delta fireteam scampered across the thoroughfare as quietly as they could, while Charlie aimed their rifles down the street towards the Draconis Combine's line. Once across the road, Delta took positions behind an abandoned flatbed and covered Charlie while they did the same. A block down the street, the platoon's support section mirrored the move, their silhouettes somewhat bulkier due to the extra weapons and specialist ammunition they carried. The platoon's other section were providing close defence for the support section and moved with them.

The invasion had caught the FedSuns defenders mostly by surprise; the only warning they had of hostile intent was a lack of transponder signals from descending freighter-weight spacecraft. Those 'freighters' turned out to be dropships holding an unknown number of military units, along with their naval escorts. The most optimistic estimates ran to two full regiments of ground troops. This was just the first wave; more were surely on their way. As far as he knew, no message had been able to reach the HPG stations before links were cut, so relief forces were distant at best.

Their objective lay in a courtyard about another three hundred metres away. A gutted Hunchback chassis, cockpit module gone, and the ruined Dragon it had been fighting. A flight of Boomerang spotter planes found the wrecks on a flyover of the city, and now HQ had sent salvage teams to claim the 'mechs before the enemy could do the same. It looked as if the timing were going to be tight, though.

The courtyard was mostly ablaze.

Rubble was strewn everywhere, and almost all of the combustible materials in the surrounding buildings had either taken direct laser hits or suffered secondary fires. Smoking craters had been left in the walls from varying calibres of autocannon, and the ground was chewed up by footprints and weapon hits. To think that the place had been inhabited by a tenement block and a retirement community just days ago was all but impossible.

Many parts of the city were burning, the civilian fire brigades unable to reach many places in the city, and the two competing militaries having better things to do. This courtyard, the 'Bellevue Towers', seemed determined to show the surrounding city the meaning of the word 'fire'. Thick smoke filled the little plaza, completely obscuring visibility from one side to another for seconds at a time before the prevailing wind cleared the view for a moment. Flecks of ash glowing a lambent orange drifted against dirt-and-concrete craters, settled and cooled on the gutted floors of the tower blocks, brushed against crepitating armour plate. The corner of one building had partially collapsed, probably knocked down by one of the 'mechs in their desperate brawl in the confines of the courtyard.

They had beaten the Kuritan forces to the punch, for now. A sweep of the courtyard and the first eight floors of the surrounding buildings had turned up nothing. Hasen would have been more comfortable with a more complete check, but they were up against a time limit. He set his men up in nests in the buildings, with a pair of spotters at each entrance to the courtyard, hidden under chameleon nets in the larger barrage craters they could find. Once the area was secure, he called the techs in.

They worked quickly, inspecting the damage to the two machines. Both were scarred and pitted, laser strikes cutting in jagged lines across armour plate, bullet holes, missile impacts and cannon hits leaving scorched craters and holes. The Hunchback was missing an arm and half a leg, as well its entire cockpit module - an ejection rather than decapitation. Four ugly holes near the middle of its torso left a clear picture of a ruined gyro and engine cooling manifold. A lucky laser shot had holed a side torso and ripped open an ammo bin - either it had already been emptied or the rounds escaped detonation.

The Dragon had fared worse. The entire centre torso and head had been riven; judging by the massive craters and holes in its armour, the Hunchback's huge autocannon had been the culprit. The 'mech had fallen backwards into the apartment block behind, partly buried by rubble and brick dust.

"This one's unrecoverable. We should trap it," called one of the techs.

"Canavan, get some charges inside this thing," Hasen ordered.

"On it, boss."

There was just enough room left between the corners of two of the buildings, after one of the ruined 'mechs had taken out a corner, for a tracked crane transport to back its trailer into the courtyard. The crane arm was extended over the Hunchback, ready for the claw to grab it and place it on the trailer bed, when a hydraulic line split with a noise like a gunshot.

A technician slumped to the ground.

"Wait..." Hasen murmured. A spray of sparks spanged from the armoured foot of the Dragon, right by his face. "Contact!" he bellowed. "Return fire!"

The support section's heavier machineguns and shoulder-launched missiles lanced into the smoke, aiming for targets Hasen couldn't even see. He became aware of another sound, under the staccato crack of the guns. The rumble of a tank engine.

A Bulldog MBT prowled around the edge of the far tenement, its turret swivelling to cover the courtyard. DCMS infantry poured around the flanks of the vehicle, putting down a punishing volume of fire.

Their trap had sprung.

Edited by Arnold J Rimmer, 03 September 2013 - 10:39 AM.

[Xorv]

lol thought this was about the black metal band

http://rateyourmusic.com/artist/marduk

[Arnold J Rimmer]

There was something at the edge of his consciousness, teasing his nose. A familiar smell, but overwhelming, urgent... Smoke. Burning.

The sound of fire came to him as if he were surfacing from underwater, the noise filling his ears with a building roar until he couldn't ignore it. Theo pushed himself off the carpet of his apartment so hard he fell backwards, still groggy. He reached up and touched the side of his head, finding it sticky with half-congealed scabs where the ceiling spar had hit him. It hurt.

He managed to get to his hands and knees, and crawled towards a table, wincing as his lacerated palms found more shards of broken glass on his floor. He reached for the tabletop, and carefully pulled himself to his feet, swaying unsteadily as he stood. He felt vaguely sick. He staggered towards his shattered windows, a look of dawning horror creeping over his face.

"The city," he mumbled, to no one in particular. "The city's on fire..."

The park his apartment overlooked had transformed, in however long it had been since he'd been knocked out. It was no longer a verdant rectangle cut into the heart of New Pontiac, but a cratered collection of muddy hills and ruined, spindly tree trunks stripped of their bark and branches and scorched by air-burst shells. It was wounded. He could see the outline of the hulk of a Dropship backlit by a flaming skyscraper. It looked as if it had been hit by a few bombs, as well as the scars from the orbital defence bombardment. Maybe an airstrike at some point?

How did I sleep through all this?

He looked down, and saw soldiers moving down the street. A tank rumbled across the intersection at the end of his block, turret pointed straight ahead. He watched as a trench-coated soldier carrying a shotgun slammed his booted heel into a door lock across the street. Bang. Bang. Crash. The lock splintered, and a dozen more soldiers followed the first into the dark interior of the building. They didn't look to be on a mission of mercy.

I have to get out of here.

There was a civilian shelter nearby. He'd head for that. Turning for the door, he picked up a coat and slipped into his one almost-unused pair of walking boots.

The door locked with a click behind him.

[Arnold J Rimmer]

Glad you're enjoying it! I'm writing the next post now, should be up in a few days. Finding the old chapters and posting them up here got my creative juices flowing again Couldn't not carry on writing it, after that.

[Arnold J Rimmer]

Oh wow, thanks!

I'll check it out

[Arnold J Rimmer]

Metzger had watched through a window as the cargo plane lifted, some of his staff with him, some techs, a few of the more sensitive records from the command centre. The rest of the staff and officers were in other planes, in case any were shot down. The huge plane had still been close enough to the airfield to actually shuddder when the stockpile had gone up. He'd been gratified to see the amount of damage it had caused the Combine forces, before the plane banked away and blocked his view.

That was days ago, now.

The HQ had taken up residence in the mountain fortresses, along with the Duke and his family. The complex was a sprawling underground warren of hardened chambers, bunkers, strongpoints, dugouts and cloches that was designed to withstand nuclear attack. Entry points and weapon batteries were hidden artfully in emplacements made to look like rockslides or under overhangs. The records of its construction had long been lost, but there was also no record of the fortress having ever been taken by force during its lifetime.

The Field Marshal strode into the complex's main command bunker, arrays of computer stations facing the gigantic map wall. The screen was easily twenty metres on a side, and covered with blocks of scrolling statistics and information, as well as blinking infographic icons on the terrain map that displayed unit locations and intelligence gathering. He nodded to a tech as the man braced up in salute, coming to a rest at a holographic globe at the back of the room.

"Colonels," he greeted. A murmured chorus of "Sir"s came back. A man he'd managed to miss on the way over was underlit by the projection table as he stepped forward. "Duke Rastkel," he said, surprised. "Is everything to your satisfaction?"

The Duke scowled. "No, it damn well isn't. Not until these bloody Kuritists have been ejected from the surface of my planet. How close are you to accomplishing that?"

Metzger blinked. He'd never had cause to come into conflict with the duke before, but being spoken to like this when- He drew a breath, and killed his line of thought. "Sir, we are fighting them every step of the way. But the likelihood is that the best we can hope for is a holding action until reinforcements arrive. At the moment, they are pushing us back."

"You are losing to these... these..." Words seemed to fail the duke.

"Respectfully, sir, I did not say we were losing. Our withdrawal has so far been well-ordered and hard-fought. We still command significant forces near New Pontiac, despite losses. We continue to bloody the Combine's nose."

Rastkel visibly took a hold of himself, and took a deep breath. "I expect you to finish this, Field Marshal. Beat them back into their dropships and into orbit." He turned on his heel and stalked from the room, an aide following him. Metzger watched him go without comment, keeping his face impassive. He didn't feel it was necessary to say out loud what most of the staff in the command centre already knew - they weren't likely to hold this planet against determined invasion without direct intervention by FedSuns forces.

He looked back to the assembled officers for the daily brief. "How fare the cities?"

Colonel Vitor cleared his throat. "We have lost the governmental district of New Pontiac, sir. They finally pushed us out in the early hours of the morning." He paused. "We lost a medical contingent. You saw what happened to the main garrison as you lifted off. The other barracks in the city fell shortly afterward, and the forces we had in the spaceport didn't last long after they took central defence control." Metzger grimaced. Retaking the spaceport would be difficult-come-impossible as long as the heavy laser and missile batteries remained in enemy hands. "We still hold a large chunk of the commerical quarter; the high-rise buildings and covered malls are helping conceal our forces. The Combine haven't quite closed the air gap, either, so they're not cut off from resupply. Once they gain air superiority - and they will - those forces will need to withdraw or be slaughtered."

The Marshal nodded. "That's the capital... the other major cities?"

"Largely ignored. They're mainly population centres supporting agriculture and commercial industry - they won't want to cause too damage there if they can help it. Strikes against police and militia headquarters is all we've had reports of so far."

"Colonel Rouine, have they reached the mechworks yet?"

"No, and apart from some spy plane flyovers we've had no sign of them coming anywhere near. None of the known Combine ships have made orbital passes either... seems they know about the orbital laser there. Hopefully they won't find out that the bloody thing doesn't work. We'll have plenty of warning of a ground assault, though. They'll either have to take the two roads leading to the facility or force a path through the jungles; we shouldn't be able to miss that. The works itself is still functional, and the mining facilities attached to it are still feeding the foundries. So the main thing we'll be running out of is pilots to man the 'mechs coming off the line."

"Salvage operations in the combat zones?"

"As you might expect, sir," replied the last colonel, Borman. "Heavy fighting over the good stuff. We lost contact with a unit sent to extract a Hunchback and a Dragon; it's likely they were ambushed. Most of the other 'mechs we've found or had to leave behind have been too badly damaged to bother with. The Hunchback pilot was one of ours... I hear she's anxious to get back to her machine." Metzger snorted at that - as if they could divert resources to suit one soldier's preferences. That said, potentially two more 'mechs to aid the defence of the planet would help. He'd take all he could get.

"Divert a unit to assist that salvage crew. We need those 'mechs in our hangars. With luck, they'll put another dent in Combine forces holding the city while they're at it."

[Arnold J Rimmer]

She slipped down the alley, her boots whisper-quiet on the concrete, skipping over puddles and rubbish bags. A bottle clinked and rolled across the hard ground behind her; she threw a glance over her shoulder in time to see a cat's shadow scamper through a pool of light from a streetlamp. She released her caught breath and carried on running.

Sliding to a halt at the next street, she peered around the corner to check the way was clear. Fighting was still intense all over the city, and hundreds of civilians had been caught in the crossfire already. She didn't intend on becoming such a statistic. This block seemed empty, but there was fighting around a warehouse down the road, and there was the risk that it would spill her way. And more soldiers from both sides were pouring into the battlezone, the city's latest flashpoint. Low clouds in the nighttime sky flashed a diffuse yellow as they were underlit by explosions.

High technology industry in this part of the city. It was inevitable they'd fight over this.

She should have seen it coming, really.

She stepped out into the street, and was knocked sprawling by the chestplate of a jogging DCMS trooper.

"Who are you?" several voices demanded at once. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm- I'm going to the shelter a few blocks over," she stammered, holding her arms over her head and not making eye contact. "Please, don't hurt me... I'm not a soldier or anything."

"There is no shelter here. Who are you?" many voices had condensed to one; probably an NCO.

"Please, my sister is in that shelter, she'll be worried sick. Will you let me go? Please, I'm begging you."

Some combination of her nervousness, apparent fear, and the fact that the battle for the warehouse was growing in urgency tipped the scales in her favour. The NCO looked to the side. "Private Tanaka, escort this woman to the shelter. Return immediately afterwards. We will continue on to the objective. Sergeant, form the men up."

Inwardly, she cursed. An escort was not what she wanted. She got to her feet, brushing herself off and mumbling apologies, still looking at the ground around their feet, every inch the terrified civilian.

"I do not know where your shelter is. You will lead the way." The private held his rifle shouldered, ready to fire. She chose to believe that was in case they ran into Davion defenders, and tried not to think too hard about the fact he'd essentially have a gun to her back the whole way.

"Uh, okay... It's this way." She set the pace, an easy jog to the next alley. She disappeared into the darkness with the DCMS soldier not far behind her. She listened carefully for the Brownjackets in the street to move away, then slowed her pace. The darkness of the alleyway meant the soldier didn't see her slow down. As the barrel of the rifle began to brush against the back of her jacket, she spun on the ball of her foot, nudging the line of the gun away from her as she turned closer to the private.

A rapid series of explosions in the distance covered the sound of the gunshot as his trigger finger tightened in reflex. She faintly heard the bullet spank against a dumpster. Her elbow slammed into his throat, to choke off the inevitable call for help. He crumpled backwards, clutching at his crushed airway. The rifle clattered to the ground. She picked it up.

Sighing in exasperation at the delay, she knelt one knee on the man's chestplate. He feebly tried to push her off, one hand still grabbing at his throat. She raised the rifle above her head, then brought it crashing down butt-first into the man's visor. The plexiglass shattered under the impact, the rifle stock crunching into the bridge of the man's nose. He fell still.

She tossed the rifle into a corner, then turned and continued her flight. She had to get to the HPG station; the Combine had cut all hard lines from the government and military headquarters almost as soon as they landed. Transmitting anything to the HPG over radio, even if it weren't open to interception, was currently impossible with the noise of electronic warfare blanketing most of the continent.

So they were reduced to couriers. If they could get a message chip to the gates of the ComStar compound, it would be sent. That didn't stop the Combine setting up a perimeter, though. Getting to the gates was a problem all of its own - a problem she could now plainly see. Circuiting patrols of half a dozen brownjackets each, parked armoured vehicles, sandbagged support weapon emplacements...

Her dark clothing helped her slip between patrols, mere luck ensuring no one looked her way. The main gates of the compound were closed and barred; no one would dare attack a ComStar outpost, but the gates were shut all the same. Their neutrality could not be compromised.

A guard stood sentry at the man-sized hatch set into the gate proper. He eyed her warily as she furtively approached. "It is not safe, miss. Report to the nearest civilian shelter immediately."

"They wouldn't let me in; I'm not a civilian. I am carrying a message bound for New Avalon, from the DMI to the AFFS HQ." She proffered the message chip. "Scan this; it carries our encryption codes and account details."

He took the chip and placed it into a little reader. Numbers and symbols largely incomprehensible to her scrolled up the screen. The guard looked back to her. "Immediate transmission," she said, staring the man down. He glanced over her shoulder, then nodded and turned away, disappearing into the complex. A new guard stepped to the gate, laser rifle shouldered.

She turned to see what the first guard had glanced at, just in time to catch the rifle stock as it struck her temple. She hit the ground, hard, red spots exploding across her vision. She attempted to stand again, but was kicked viciously in the gut. She sank back to the ferrocrete, gasping.

"You! Guard!" someone shouted. "What is her business here?"

"I do not know," the guard replied, truthfully. He didn't seem in the least bit concerned that six armed Kuritists were shouting at him. All he did was tighten his grip on his rifle almost imperceptibly. He couldn't rise to her defence, even if he wanted to.

"Tell me now! She is a spy?"

"I do not know."

She was kicked again. "What was she sending?"

"I do not know."

Rough hands grabbed her jacket front, hauling her upright. Her vision swam, and her head lolled on her shoulders. "Take her."

Edited by Arnold J Rimmer, 20 October 2013 - 04:54 PM.

[Arnold J Rimmer]

Almost as soon as he left his apartment, Theo regretted not thinking his plan through a little more. He had no idea how long it had been since he'd last eaten anything or drank any water, and he was now feeling hungry and thirsty, sore, and tired all at once. The nighttime chill wasn't helping his mood, either, and with the fighting still raging all over the city...

He'd turned back at the end of his block, about to go home and at least grab some food and water before setting out again, but DCMS soldiers had been in the process of kicking down the doors to his building.

You're a bloody fool. What if they catch you out for a stroll through a warzone? They'll probably think you're spying on them.

The FedSuns broadcasts he watched had shown him plenty of documentaries about the rescued victims of Kuritan interrogation. He didn't fancy being one of them.

So, he'd hurried away, running into the night.

Ten minutes later, clutching a nasty stitch in his side, he slid to a halt outside a pair of steel doors.

"Oh, no. No no no."

The doors were about the only thing still standing freely. Behind the doors was a collapsed concrete entryway - underneath which would be the civilian shelter. Even if he could shift enough of the broken blocks to get at the stairway, there would still be the problem of the broken bipedal war machine sprawled over the debris, pops, pings and creaks sounding from its burning metalwork.

He ran both hands through his hair, grabbing handfuls as he bent nearly double. What now?

The next nearest shelter was at about 3 kilometres away, under the hospital. And they'd only be admitting casualties from the hospital... unless he could talk his way in somehow. Although if he stayed on these dangerous streets long enough he'd probably be carried into the hospital on a stretcher anyway.

He heard the rumble of an approaching vehicle. He didn't know what it was, but it sounded big. He looked about him desperately, spotting an alleyway across the street. He sprinted for it, skidding to a halt behind a dumpster. A dumpster! Him! God, if his agent should see him now... His indignation was swallowed by his fear when the prow of the tank growled past the alley entrance, followed by a short column of jogging soldiers. He couldn't tell which side they fought for in the bad light.

There was a noise behind him, then a gasp. Two pairs of feet running away.

"Hey!" he hissed. "Wait!" The sound of running didn't even slow down. A shadow flickered against the wall. "Come back!"

He ran after them.

[Arnold J Rimmer]

"Canavan! Canavan, where are you?"

"Boss!"

"Canavan?"

"Here!"

Hasen spotted a figure hunkered down next to one of the platoon's machineguns, waving through the smoke. He sprinted over, skidding through rubble and scorched dirt to slide into the shell crater they were using as cover. A small cloud of ash followed him, making him cough. "Did you get the thermite set before the ambush?"

"Oh, yes. It was on a timer though, no remote detonator. It hasn't been set."

Hasen swore. "Where did you set the charges?"

"Next to what looked like a fuel tank, marked 'H'. There was an ammo bin that hadn't been emptied... then just bundles of electronics." The lance-corporal paused to take a potshot at the advancing brownjackets. "Why do- No. You're not. Are you?"

"I am, yes. Not yet. Lay down as much fire as you can. If I come back and see you still have ammunition for that thing," he jerked his thumb at the machinegun, hammering .50 cal shells at the DCMS troopers, "I'll be pinning you to the front of it."

"Righto, boss, you mad b******."

He fired a few rounds at the enemy himself, before running flat out into one of the courtyard's tenement blocks, taking the stairs three at a time to get to the fifth floor, where his snipers and AT team were. He would have used his radio, but there was something out there blocking their short range units. "Browning," he gasped. "Front and centre."

"Boss."

"You still have those inferno rounds?

"Hah, sure do. Didn't want to use them, though. Smoke's making it impossible to distinguish blue from red."

"Alright, I want-" They both ducked as one of the snipers fell back, his rifle clattering to the floor, a neat hole in the front of his helmet. His spotter took up the rifle and went to a different window. "I want you to put two rockets either side of the tank. That should keep their infantry from pressing on, and give that Bulldog something to think about as well. Get some tandem charge missiles into the tank, while you're at it. Hey, if you see any e-warfare units out there, kindly have the snipers pin them to a wall."

Browning nodded. "It'll get done, boss."

Hasen turned and ran back down the flights of stairs, sprinting from cover to cover once he was outside to get back to the fallen Dragon. He skidded to halt, fetching up against a thigh plate, panting for breath. There was a short burst of static in his ear. Was that the radio?

"Corporal?" the voice still hissed with the city-wide blanket of signal jamming, but it wasn't as bad as before.

"Browning? That you?"

"Sure is. Think we got the e-war guy."

"In that case, rockets. Now."

In reply, two missiles streaked from windows on the fifth floor, almost lazily performing narrow corkscrews before exploding five metres from the ground. The smoke-smothered night lit up with new flames burning phosphorous-bright, blanketing the chewed ground either side of the Bulldog tank. Hasen could hear the shrieks of burning men, the firecracker pop of ammunition cooking off. A wave of heat washed over the beleaguered Davion defenders.

The Bulldog started to back off, its turret traversing and elevating the main gun, a 12cm laser. Another shoulder-launched missile screamed out of the building towards the tank, striking close to the turret. A shaped-charge blew a hole in the armour just large enough for a second, high-explosive shell to penetrate and detonate inside the hull. Hasen heard the second explosion, a crump that rang the hull of the MBT like a bell.

Evidently the tank didn't suffer debilitating damage, as after a second its laser fired anyway. The sharp crack of superheating air was followed an instant later by an explosion above, right where Hasen's support team had been hunkered down. Enough energy had been imparted to the brickwork and structure of the building that the bricks and steel supports had sublimated explosively. To further seal the team's fate, their supply of spare rockets and ammunition went off, tearing another gaping hole in the side of the building.

He saw some of his men turning to look at the new source of explosions above them. "Return fire!" he bellowed, in his best parade-ground bark. As they returned to the job of repelling the DCMS troops, firing through the sheets of white-hot flame at the troops behind. Hasen clambered into the riven chassis of the Dragon, squeezing into the hole punched through the torso and cockpit by some massive explosion. Jagged edges of steel and armour plate tore at his fatigues.

Inside, he was shielded somewhat from the noise and heat outside. The gunfire sounded almost ethereal, echoing strangely from the concrete walls of the burning building and into the acoustic chamber of the mech's chest. He found his team's explosive charges in the gloom, their fuse tabs still attached to the timers. He looked back towards the opening he'd crawled through, planning his movements. He wouldn't have long to get out and clear once he set the timers.

Looking back, he ripped the tabs from the bundles of explosives, magnesium strips hissing brilliantly bright as he scrambled to get out.

[Arnold J Rimmer]

The jungle teemed with life. Krakes, sauropods with colourful green, yellow and brown scales, clung to branches and creepers, feasting on the lice and insects that lived inside the bark of the canopy trees. The chirping of the local cricket-analogues gave the thick brush an everpresent rasping rattle. Apart from a few two-lane highways cut through the trees, the blanket of forest was unbroken across half the equatorial regions of the continent.

Both sides were thusly avoiding the roads - while they were reasonably well-hidden from aerial or orbital observation by the overhanging canopy, they were still easily watched or ambushed from the ground. Even the usually-regular land trains carrying raw materials out of the mines or the odd finished mech chassis out of the sprawling equatorial mechworks/mine amalgam had almost completely stopped running.

As the sun sets, the jungle's bio-luminescent fungi and fauna begin to glow, a dim turquoise haze that settles on the condensing mist in the humid air. Normally that would make any stealthy movement impossible, silhouetting any thing that occluded the glowing chemicals, but the density of the undergrowth, the warmth of the surrounding environment and the metallic deposits even close to the surface meant that it was possible to hide large metallic objects, like mechs, for instance, from magnetic anomaly detectors, and infantry from thermal and motion sensors. The tireless working of the manufactories in the works made seismic sensors unreliable. Their main defence against covert mech incursion was the soft ground, dense trees and hidden quicksand traps.

"Anything?"

"Same as always. A couple of the krakes farted, but that's about it."

The banter hid the guards' nervousness. All the news from the capital - what little of it they had - was bad. It was only a matter of time until the DCMS came knocking. An almost self-sufficient mechworks was invaluable; whichever side controlled it would have a strategic advantage in the interminable stuggle for Succession.

So guards would swap exaggerated stories and crude jokes during their sentry duties, all the while waiting and watching, and hoping they would survive whatever came.

The sun finally sank below the leafy horizon, the aquamarine bioluminescence taking over from the golden sunlight. A laugh echoed out into the night, swallowed by the jungle and the endless chorus of insects and noturnal predators.

"Did you hear that?"

"What?"

"Like... a thump. From the jungle."

"Probably just a falling log. Hey, you ever heard the one about the mechwarrior, the astech and the tank jockey?"

"I swear to God, man, if this is another one of your bloody puns..."

[Arnold J Rimmer]

"How goes the interrogation?"

The orderly sputtered into his tea, rising to his feet with a start and coming to a hasty attention. "Tai-sa! You were not expected."

The Kuritist colonel merely waited, picking a piece of dirt from under a fingernail, while he waited for his question to be answered. The orderly coughed nervously.

"The Davion agent has been stubborn, Tai-sa. She admitted to sending a message to New Avalon, but we cannot extract the actual contents. It is highly likely that the message was sent to their military intelligence arm."

"Rank? Name?"

"Uh, me? Tai-sa?"

The colonel lightly sighed, not looking at the orderly.

"She... she gave us four names. No ranks. We are still trying to verify which of them is real."

The orderly fought down the urge to squirm as the colonel held his gaze levelly, deadpan.

"Susan Forsythe, Lauren Price, Lily Archibeque, and Nicole Shackleton, Tai-sa."

"I presume those names do not appear in the planet's census database."

"Correct, Tai-sa."

"Is she conscious?"

"No, Tai-sa. The last round was... stressful."

"I will see her."

"Tai-sa-" The orderly's words died in his throat at the glare his near-refusal earned him. "Tai-sa, please follow me."

The colonel was led out of the anteroom and down a short hallway. Within a minute, the orderly was turning a key in the single metal door's heavy manual lock, opening the only entrance to the interrogation chamber.

The woman was shackled to an examination table, canted to a sixty-degree angle under a harsh spotlight. A sheen of sweat gleamed on her skin, making the thin t-shirt and shorts she'd been changed into stick to her figure. They had probably been white once, but were now patchily dyed red and brown with blood stains and yellow with old sweat. Most of her visible skin was covered in bruises and electrical burns. A trail of needle punctures led up the major veins of both arms.

The colonel removed his cap and jacket, leaving just his work shirt underneath, and hung them on a hook by the door. His polished shoes shone under the bright lights of the chamber as he walked to a faucet on the wall, nudging a bucket under the tap. He began to fill the bucket, the noise not affecting the unconscious woman in the least. While he waited, he rolled his sleeves up to his elbows, exposing his powerful forearms.

"Tai-sa..."

The colonel looked round slowly, raising his eyebrows. "Yes, orderly?"

The subordinate swallowed hard, looking between the prisoner and the soldier. "Nothing, Tai-sa."

"Very well. You may wait by the door, if you wish."

The orderly hesitated, confused. The utter lack of inflection or expression in the colonel's words made it difficult to determine if he were dismissed, being told to wait by the door, or being allowed to stand where he was. He settled for moving to the door, standing at attention.

The Tai-sa shut off the water and hefted the bucket, moving to stand in front of the steel examination table. He held it by the handle and the base, bringing it back to slosh the contents over the prisoner.

The water cascaded over the somnolent woman, disappearing through the room's single drain under the table. She gasped and coughed, spluttering, head snapping up, eyes frantically scanning the room. They settled on the two men, the nervous orderly and the broad, rigid stance of the soldier. She saw his rank slides, then looked back to his face. She regarded him with suspicion; he was not the usual team of interrogators, with their needles, electrodes, knuckle dusters, and stinking black cotton hoods. She took a shaky breath, blinking running water out of her eyes.

"Good morning, Colonel."

"It is not the morning," he replied smoothly, in unaccented English. "But I am a Colonel, in charge of the regiment that has taken the capital."

"It's morning for me. I just woke up."

"I concede the point. My men tell me that you maintain that you have no rank; you are a civilian."

"What? You want me to tell you personally?" She tried to roll her eyes back and look skyward, the effect spoiled somewhat by the fact her neck was shackled to the table. "Don't you have better things to do?"

"I have plenty of time. The AFFS defenders are not so competent as House Davion would have you believe."

"Oh, this is that... psychological warfare I hear about, isn't it?"

The colonel looked briefly back at the orderly, a flash of- what? Anger? Disappointment? - in his eyes. She is able to joke with her captors. She is not broken. You have not done your job.

He looked back to the woman on the table,reaching towards her neck. She flinched back, expecting more pain. He hesitated, then continued with slow movements towards her bindings. "You said you have a sister, in one of the shelters. Which one?"

"Ha, as if I'll tell you that."

"Well, it is a dangerous time to be wandering the city. You would be safer if you allowed us to transport you directly to your assigned shelter."

She narrowed her eyes. "You're letting me go?"

He said nothing for a moment, merely undoing the clasp of the wide, padded leather belt that held her head against the table. "You are right that we do not have the time to waste with you."

"But you think I am a spy."

"We cannot prove that you are, and are thus bound by Convention." He turned to the orderly. "Fetch her clothes."

"Tai-sa, they were... we no longer have them."

That just earned another level gaze from the colonel.

"I will... find some more, Tai-sa."

"Thank you." He turned back to the woman, unshackling her wrists. If she were going to attack him, it would be now, while he was crouching at her feet, not watching her face. No attack seemed forthcoming, however. She rubbed her neck, easing the aches and irritation that had built up over the course of her confinement, while he released her ankles. He stood, taking a couple of steps back.

"Well?"

"Well what?" she returned, while stretching, hissing with pain when the movements pulled at her ribcage. "Oh God, I thought I was never going to get off that... that... thing." She inspected the track marks on her arms, prodded at bruises.

"Where is your sister's shelter?"

"Just take me to the hospital. I want to get your drugs out of my system, and I think your... uniformed thugs broke a couple of my ribs."

The colonel offered a cold smile. "The hospital, then." He turned to fetch his jacket and cap, rolling his sleeves back down to his wrists. The orderly returned with a jumpsuit from stores.

"This is all we had, Tai-sa, but-"

"Then give it to her, orderly," he replied, setting his cap on his head. "No use telling me all about it."

"Hai, Tai-sa."

A pair of guards entered the room, flanking the door. "These men will take you to the motor pool, and from there to the hospital."

"Thank you, Colonel. I think."

She was led away, the door clicking closed behind the trio. The Tai-sa removed an envelope out of his jacket pocket, motioning the orderly forward.

"Take this to sho-sa Morimoto. I want her followed."

"Hai, Tai-sa."

[Arnold J Rimmer]

Been a while... Merry New Year!

---

Hasen tore the sleeve of his uniform on a jagged spur of armour plate during his scramble to exit the dead Dragon before the charges went off. He slipped and fell to the ground, rolling over the loose dirt-ash amalgam to regain his feet fastest. He faintly heard the hiss of the first thermite charge igniting as he sprinted away.

"Get down!" he bellowed, sprinting back towards his ragged line of men. Bullet impacts splashed dirt around him, the zip and crack of passing rounds making him flinch. A couple of privates glanced over to him, rifles twitching towards him before they recognised who it was. "Cover! Get down!"

A few of the nearer DCMS soldiers heard his shouts over the noise of the battle, and paused, confused. Hasen dived into a shell crater, alongside a rifleman and grenadier, and clasped his arms around his head.

And waited.

"Uh, corporal..?" the grenadier asked. "What-"

The Dragon exploded.

The air blast alone threw everyone flat, whether they were standing or crouched, even sending those prone tumbling for a few metres. The partially-filled ammunition bins inside the chassis sent shrapnel and wildly ricocheting heavy shells in every direction, even as the hydrogen storage tank threw out a massive gout of flame that gutted the already-abused tenement block. Fresh rubble was thrown across the adjoining street behind the building, smashing into the next row of housing and commercial units, and left a hole blown clear through the residential building. Debris pattered the ground as the fireball rose into the night sky, fading to a ball of oily black smoke that blended into the darkness.

Hasen's ears rang.

He coughed, looking for his dropped rifle, grasping the rifleman by the shoulder and shaking him. The private didn't move. Hasen squinted, finally spotting the twenty-centimetre shard of serrated armour shrapnel buried in his temple. It had split the man's helmet clean in two.

"Cont-" he hacked, his throat feeling as if it were coated with grit. "Continue firing! While they're reeling!"

The Kuritist force had lost a similar proportion of men to his own salvage unit - but they'd arrived with more to begin with. The beleaguered Davion defenders raggedly began to resume fire - but it mostly seemed to come from the end of what he almost humourously called the 'line' furthest from the Dragon, nearer the salvage trucks. He hoped that was merely because they'd been thrown there and not because the remainder were casualties.

The ground thudded against Hasen's feet.

That wasn't sharp enough for artillery... he thought.

Another thud. Another. Rhythmically, maybe three every two seconds. They were getting heavier.

Boom. Boom. Boom.

Oh, no.

He looked to the flaming corpse of the Dragon, trying to peer through the thick column of smoke pouring out of what remained of its structure.

There it was.

The flash of movement, outlined with the flicker of lambent orange flames, glinting off fresh armour plate.

"Incoming 'mech! Incoming battlemech, right flank! Face right! For the love of God, face right!"

He rose to his feet, striding towards his emplaced weapons team, shouting as he went. He had no idea if anyone was actually following his orders, but it was easier to just let his training take over. His rational thoughts were swamped with despair. He'd never seen this chassis before in the flesh - he only ever saw battlemechs at all when there was a big parade on, and even then at a distance. Everything else he knew he'd been taught with a viewscreen, like everyone else in his unit. What is that, a Wasp? No, a Spider. Thirty tonnes, jump-capable, lasers... His mind rattled off the information by rote. There was nothing he could use.

There was no way they could win this now. Infantry versus battlemech forces had always been a joke.

"Grenadiers! Charges on articulation points and armour welds!" He reached his machine-gunners. "You too. Cut this thing down at the knees."

He turned away to carry on rallying the few soldiers still not just sitting, staring at the advancing war machine, but looked back with incredulity. "What are you laughing at?"

"Sorry, boss. But after you threatened to pin me to the front of the gun if I didn't fire every round... We're out. This thing's dead weight now."

Hasen fought the urge to slap the gunner. If only we still had the inferno launchers...

The Spider fired, a sharp crack of ionising air followed by an explosion to Hasen's left as the short-duration beam struck. A soldier exploded in a cloud of brown steam as the sandbags behind him melted to glass. Potshots threw sparks from the composite armour of the Spider, their infantry-calibre rifles totally useless. Hasen even saw one shot glance off the cockpit view port, with nary a scratch left on the tough ceramic-crystal-plastic hybrid.

The machine strode on, leaving deep footprints in the dirt as it went. Its attitude seemed almost casual, Hasen thought, as if the pilot were content to take his time. There was no immediate danger to the 'mech, after all. The salvage unit's 'heavy' weapons were either expended or destroyed.

It raised its right arm, and Hasen's heart sank still further as he saw a thick plasma hose plugged into the back of the 'mech's elbow. A flamer.

The weapon unleashed a jet of blue-yellow fire, sweeping right-to-left. Three Davion troopers were incinerated immediately, with two more falling to the ground, screaming as the fire burrowed into their flesh. The chest-mounted laser claimed another powerless infanteer.

Hasen threw his rifle to the ground, as he found his webbing empty of spare magazines, and drew his sidearm. For one mad moment he considered turning it on the Spider in some last gesture of defiance, before taking aim at the Kuritist line instead and snapping off a couple of shots.

Well, you knew this was a possibility when you signed up...

"Corporal!" one of the few remaining soldiers screamed. "What do we do?"

He took careful aim down the length of his arm, and managed to put a slug into the shoulder of a DCMS officer shouting orders and waving his sword at the sky. "You're doing it, private. Carry on." He couldn't bring himself to meet the man's accusatory gaze.

He could feel the ground shaking again, but to a new rhythm. More 'mechs. Figures.

His growing despair gave way to cautious optimism as the Spider faltered. Its torso traversed fractionally to one side, as if trying to triangulate something out of sight. It took a step back.

A noise close to thunder behind him made him turn, bringing his service pistol to bear. He didn't believe what he was seeing. A Hunchback, painted in the grey-and-orange of the planetary militia, braking to a halt in the courtyard, its heatsinks steaming after its run from... wherever. Hasen didn't care. It outclassed the Spider by a country mile - and its pilot was already bringing the 'mech's iconic, cavernous autocannon to bear. The Hunchback braced its feet not unlike someone standing against a strong wind, and fired.

The report was cataclysmic, the air concussion kicking up the dust and ash around the 'mech's feet as the five-round burst echoed in the confined courtyard. Heavy shells slammed into the lighter 'mech, punching clean through the Spider's right torso and chewing more holes in the abused tenement. The last round tore the 'mech's right arm away at the elbow, the component spinning away and crushing an unfortunate DCMS soldier. Hasen just about heard the spent casings and heavy-duty plastic cassette magazine being ejected from the Hunchback as his head snapped round to see what happened to the enemy scout.

Through the cracked cockpit canopy, he could make out red flashing alert lights and the pilot's silhouetted form trying to keep control of his machine. Then a sparking electrical component finally burned through a pressure seal, and the fuel line feeding the 'mech's flamer ignited. Half the torso of the Spider was engulfed in unquenchable flame as it toppled sideways. Hasen might have heard the pilot's screams as the cockpit began to burn. He found he didn't care.

Behind the Hunchback, infantry and Tiger tracked tanks poured into the square. The enemy Bulldog couldn't bring its main gun to bear, having had its bearing knocked out by the salvage unit, and was shredded in short order by massed autocannon fire from the Davion armour. The DCMS soldiers fled before the fresh troops of the AFFS, the sudden destruction of their 'mech and overwhelming new force completely demoralising them.

The Hunchback snapped off a few shots with its lasers at the retreating backs of the DCMS, then carefully walked forward to cover the gap between the buildings. Davion troops parted before it to allow it to pass.

"Boss?" someone asked. People were looking at him. No, he corrected himself, to him.

"Head-" he mumbled. He cleared his throat. Come on, project. "Headcount. Casualties and ammo status."

The private actually laughed, the harsh sound making Hasen wince. "We're it, boss. Half a dozen fighting men. All walking wounded. We have maybe three magazines left between us." Hasen grimaced. He'd started with thirty people.

"And the techs?"

"Three dead. One psych. The rest are shaken, but intact. Mostly they hid in the trucks; Kuritists ignored them." The private coughed, and nodded over Hasen's shoulder. Someone pressed his (was it his?) discarded rifle into his unprotesting hands as he turned to look. His men moved away to be tended by the relief force's medics.

"You in charge here, ah... corporal?"

He didn't bother trying to come to attention. "Yes, sir. Not much to be in charge of, really. Sir."

The fresh-uniformed lieutenant looked almost taken aback, as running bodies swept past them both. "Not much? Hah, they're going to give you a medal for this. All of you!" he said, gesturing wide. He grasped Hasen's shoulder firmly. "You're bally heroes! Saved one of our 'mechs, denied the enemy a heavy-class, and soundly bloodied the Dragon's nose to boot!"

Hasen had a sudden urge to bury the stock of his rifle in the shiny young officer's teeth. "Eighty percent of my men are dead, sir."

"Yes, yes. Awful, of course. Tragic. Come, you're wanted at HQ."

"What for?"

"Why, your promotion!"

In the end, it took four front-line heavy-infantrymen to pry the screaming salvage unit corporal away from the bloodied and bruised form of the lieutenant, lying flat on his back in the dirt, hands clutching his face as he mewled and rolled over.

Edited by Arnold J Rimmer, 01 January 2014 - 02:29 AM.

[Arnold J Rimmer]

At least whoever he was pursuing was running away from the sound of explosions in the middle distance. He could be thankful for that. On the other hand, his quarry didn't seem to want to stop any time soon, and they were running through the twisting alleyways between the buildings of this residential district in such a way that it was increasingly difficult to keep up.

What are these people, triathletes?

Theo came to a sliding, gasping halt in the middle of a four-way junction. Two of the exits led into short dead-ends, rubbish bags and dumpsters piled up against the walls of the tenements around them. He was pretty sure he hadn't passed whoever-they-were, and the only other route away was to his left. He turned, then froze. There was no reason to assume they'd actually carried on running - and if they were as tired as he was now, they'd want to hide and rest down one of these dead ends. Right?

He looked back to the remaining two alleys, eyes switching between them. They were closer to a street here, and the shorter one - to his right - was dimly lit with the backglow of street lights. Not that one, then. I'll keep an ear out, just in case.

He walked slowly into the cul-de-sac ahead of him, squinting into the gloom. It was getting close to dawn now, and the rising light was killing his night vision without providing adequate illumination to see normally. Everything was a grainy blue-grey blur. He listened carefully, wishing his own breathing would slow and quieten more rapidly. Another stitch burned painfully in his side.

He passed the edge of a dumpster, and faintly heard a hastily-covered cough. His head snapped right as he backed away from the noise - he still didn't know if whoever he'd chased was actually dangerous (Stupid.) - and saw nothing but grimy brickwork. He frowned, confused for a second. The cough was right there!

He looked down.

Two pairs of eyes stared fearfully up at him, crouched as low as they could into the corner between the bottom of the dumpster and the wall. Children!

He crouched down and held his hands out palm-up, to show he wasn't holding anything, that he wasn't going to hurt them. "Hey," he said, trying to inject what he hoped was fatherly concern into his tone. "Come out, I won't hurt you. Where are your parents?"

Nothing, no movement.

"It's okay, you're safe with me." He patted his pockets desperately, before glancing down at his coat. "Are you cold? You must be - it's freezing out. Here." He shucked his jacket, holding it out towards them as if to hold it while they shrugged into it. He tried not to shudder at the sudden change in temperature on his skin.

That got him something. A shuffling noise, an urgent whisper of, "No!" and a young boy came barreling out of the shadows. Theo bundled him in the coat, feeling the child shiver through the thick garment. He rubbed the boy's back. He couldn't have been much more than six or seven years old.

"Let him go!" came a shrill cry, followed shortly after by the other child - a girl this time. She looked older, perhaps nine or ten. She ran up and started hitting Theo on the shoulder, trying to pull his arms away from the boy. "Let my brother go!"

"Hey, hey. I won't hurt you; I promise. Hey, stop hitting me. Come on. Aren't you cold, too? There's room in that coat for you as well, I bet."

The girl stepped back, little fists bunched. She glared suspiciously at Theo, gaze flicking between his face and that of her brother. Her expression went from anger and concern through to longing - for the warmth under the coat, Theo guessed - and back again.

The boy spoke then, his voice shaky. "It's warm in here, Sarah." He pushed at the inside of the coat, making Theo open it. "You said we had to get warm."

"Don't tell him my name, stupid! He's a stranger!" She took half a step forward anyway, before she remembered to glare at Theo some more. "And he should let you go!" She paused for a second. "And let you keep the coat." Theo tried not to smile.

"He's not hurting me, though! I think he's nice!"

"It's true," Theo chimed in. "I am quite nice. And I did promise not to hurt you. But you're cold, look. How about you get a bit warmer, and then we go and find your parents? Does that sound good? Sarah?"

Hesitantly, she started walking closer. Then she ran to grab hold of her brother and hugged him. She looked up to Theo as he gathered the coat back round the children. "People who break promises are bad people. It's okay to hurt bad people if you have to; my dad said so."

He went back to trying to rub some warmth into their backs as he replied, as solemnly as he could in the face of a child threatening an adult, "Then I won't break my promise."

Edited by Arnold J Rimmer, 22 January 2014 - 07:36 AM.

[Arnold J Rimmer]

You cynic, you.

[Kraven Vanhound]

Kraven Demands more,

[Arnold J Rimmer]

The road train crawled through the jungle, twisting down the meandering tarmac, the throaty roar of its engines drowning out the krake-calls and insect chirrups. The bright sunlight pierced the pervasive mist of the rainforest, leaving the air clouded only by heat-haze in the middle distance.

"How much longer until my shift ends, Mitch?"

The man in the second seat of the drivers' cabin nudged the peak of his cap up away from his eyes, pulling his feet off the dashboard. He scrubbed one of his eyes as he checked his wristwatch. "Couple hours. You thirsty? I'll see if there's any coffee on the go."

"Sure."

Mitch clambered out of his seat and into the narrow gangway, stooping to get through the hatch at the back of the cabin. The driver yawned as he hunched over the wheel, trying to work out a burgeoning cramp in his calf. "Come on, Mike," he mumbled to himself, "Just another day or so of this, and you can sleep in a cot that'll let you actually stretch out..."

They were making the freight run from the mechworks along a seldom-used trail towards the mountain fortress - usually, the 'mechs produced in the ancient factory went to New Pontiac's military bases and starport and from there to other garrisons. However, since the DCMS now basically controlled the capital, there was no choice but to divert. The train was carrying a lance of Wolverine chassis to the mountain range to the east, one of which was the last machine to be produced before the factory could be shut down until the Kuritists were driven off. The rest had been stored at the factory's warehouses, their shipping delayed by the sudden attack.

Or they beat us.

He tried to kill the thought.

Mike cleared his throat, hearing Mitch struggling through the narrow hatch with two cups of coffee behind him. He started the train snaking through the next turn, then looked over his shoulder. "Oh man, that smells amazing."

Mitch's eyes widened, staring out the windshield. "Hit the brakes!" he cried.

Mike stamped hard on the relevant pedals, flailing to thrash the gearage down low enough to arrest the train's massive torque, even before he'd snapped his head back towards the road. Mitch fell forwards, the coffee spilling down his front, swearing as it scalded him.

Lying across the road was a huge tree bole, recently felled or fallen. The shaggy green mass of ferns, mosses and vines obscured the tough bark of the canopy tree, but it looked to be a good three metres thick.

Steam issued from vents along the length of the train's engine compartments as Mike climbed down the cab access ladder to the old roadway. God, it feels good to move around. Been sitting in that chair for hours... He swung his arms to mobilise his shoulders a little.

Mitch hung out of the hatch, scratching his brow under the rim of his cap. "Any ideas, Mike?"

"Dupris have access to the arms shipment? We're not dragging this thing out of the way; we'll need to blow it," he called back, reaching through the leafy fronds shrouding the trunk, trying to feel how far back they went.

"Sure, I'll check, but what if he doesn't?"

Mike didn't reply.

"Mike?"

The train's driver-on-duty took three steps back from the tree.

"Mike, man, talk to me."

He raised his hands.

"... Mike?"

Five men in cowls, webbing, and ghillie suits stepped out of the ferns and moss, raising nasty-looking carbines to aim at the two drivers. Two more hopped up on top of the trunk, similarly-dressed. They moved towards the train, taking Mike with them, motioning for Mitch to stay quiet.

He stayed quiet, as a green laser dot played across his chest. He stayed quiet as he could.

Edited by Arnold J Rimmer, 22 December 2015 - 09:23 AM.

[Smokem Jags]

Awesome, and that name, I know that name. That's Red Dwarf! Ace Rimmer is the best!

[Arnold J Rimmer]

The third dawn following the Kuritist landing broke, spilling light over a capital city covered in a haze of smoke and ash. The last Davion defenders had been driven from the suburbs in the early hours of the morning, scattering to fallback positions in the surrounding countryside, hidden in forests and limited underground bunkers. An uneasy relative quiet had fallen over New Pontiac, now that the two militaries weren't competing over the urban areas.

It wasn't however, silent. As the DCMS troops consolidated their positions, reinforcing with fresh soldiers, armour and handfuls of battlemechs from the almost-hourly dropship landings, small outbreaks of gunfire and minor explosions could still be heard dotted around the city. A budding resistance was forming.

Their armament was mainly scavenged rifles and submachineguns, taken from the sites of the many running battles that had taken place in the previous 48 or so hours. A few people had hunting rifles of their own, and those that hadn't taken them with them to the civilian shelters made nests in the high-rise buildings of the capital to suppress and harass the Combine troops. Otherwise, it was all sidearms. This close to the border, people took their right to bear arms seriously, even if only in a token manner.

Broadcasts were played over the city's public address system, dismissed as propaganda by the AFFS observers, that claimed the resumption of essential services and utilities would occur within the week - subject to a 'generous' curfew, of course. Anyone with knowledge of resistance fighters or surviving Davion troops was to come forward (with promises of high rewards and increased rations for informants' families). The civilian shelters were opened again, their inhabitants put through a processing system to take a census of the survivors and missing (and, likely, to root out potential political dissidents before they caused problems later).

DCMS engineer troops were rebuilding one of the city's markets, setting up the tables and canopies as a gesture of the Combine's apparent willingness to return civilian life to normal as fast as possible. The effect was somewhat spoiled by the Jenners on patrol around the city, leading APCs and infantry units. More than once, foolish fighters were obliterated by the 'mechs firing their lasers into windows, before everyone else got the message to camp out further up the largely-unoccupied skyscrapers. In those cases, they merely sent in the infantry.

It seemed as if their unorganised fledgling resistance movement was doomed.

All day long, a series of bombs exploded across the city. Some of them were military-grade landmines that blew deep craters in the ferrocrete roadway and left smoking, bare vehicle chassis in their wake. Some were cruder, improvised fertiliser bombs that did more damage to shop fronts and passing infantry columns than the DCMS motor pool. The latter type of explosives were certainly more common - while the planet was one of the more advanced ones in the Inner Sphere, it was still primarily a breadbasket world and farming formed the basis of its economy.

The battlemechs prowling the streets were not once inconvenienced.

While the chaos of the bombs was being dealt with, few people noticed the gallows being built at one end of the marketplace. By sunset, though, all the propaganda broadcasts were showing it to the entire planet. The gallows, and their bloodied occupant.

"This man was the one who orchestrated the bombing of your capital today!" they declared.

"This man is responsible not only for the deaths of dozens of honourable DCMS soldiers and the wounding of many more, but also the deaths of sixteen of your own citizens!" the continued.

"This man has confessed to his crimes and will be punished accordingly!" they promised.

But first, they would have him say it for himself. An infantry lieutenant in a dress uniform, katana on one hip and sidearm on the other, took the beaten prisoner by the hair and hauled his head back so the camera could see his face in the golden light of dusk. The rope was already around his neck.

The man, whose name marched along the bottom of the broadcast images as 'Neil Boer', groggily stared sullenly into the lens with his one remaining good eye. He mumbled a couple of words; the microphone couldn't pick them up over the breeze and the gunshots in the distance.

"Speak up, prisoner!" spat the lieutenant, shaking him by his hair. "Tell the Combine your crimes, and your last words."

Boer took a couple of deep breaths, his expression changing from one of exhausted defeat, as his eyes took on a new fire. "I said..." he began, a pained smile twisting his bruised face, "Marduk stands!"

The lieutenant screamed in fury at Neil Boer's last act of defiance, taking a couple of hasty steps backward and fumbling to draw his pistol. "You stupid, Davion dog!" he barked, before shooting the prisoner twice - once in the jaw, and once in the throat. Neil died slowly, spraying arterial blood over the platform and choking as his lungs filled. He died poorly, not that hanging would have been much better.

Through it all, the camera rolled, unattended, until finally someone ended the broadcast.

But the world had seen it. The world had seen this one man, an apparent champion of the resistance, by the Dragon's own admission, and he had been defiant to the end. Neil Boer became a symbol.

And 'Marduk Stands' became the battle-cry of the Davion resistance on the planet.