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Part 4: http://mwomercs.com/...-phoenix-fluff/
Part 3: http://mwomercs.com/...-phoenix-fluff/
Part 2: http://mwomercs.com/...-phoenix-fluff/
Part 1: http://mwomercs.com/...-artwork-fluff/
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Part2 - Battlemaster
Jakes knew he was suckered.
He screwed up.
It’s funny how that split instant where the abyss is staring at you that your mind has time to reflect on exactly how you got here and how you screwed up Jakes reflected. Not just his screw up, the entire Op was screwed up from the get go.
Intel pegged this planet as lightly defended and at best a few milita units to defend that would be easily wiped out on touch down. A milk run they said, perfect for a newly minted Lance commander and a green unit to break them in. A cake walk.
What a lie that was.
Intel stepped on their sword big time. From the moment they made planet fall they stepped into a hornets nest as their dropships had to fight though heavy aerospace resistance, resistance that was supposed to be nonexistent.
The good news was that we apparently exhausted the enemies Aerospace assets. The bad news is that we didn’t know that for sure so they were not going to risk their precious dropships to short hop forces to their intended targets or even to help the forces to the north which was heavily engaged.
All of which meant that Jake’s Lance was playing Vanguard to a mechanized battalion hoofing it through these frozen hills on their way to the objective. Uncharted frozen hills full of icy landscapes, destroyed buildings and ruins all with no air cover and nowhere near enough recon to spot an ambush.
Par for the course.
It was almost a relief when the Locust burst from cover opening fire on Jake’s Battlemaster.
Jakes arranged his lance in a standard Line formation putting his Battlemaster in the lead backed up by Amaro’s Hunchback, Kat’s Catapult-K2 and with Scar’s Shadowhawk playing overwatch. The reasoning was that he was the heaviest and the best armored mech in the lance and thus be able to soak the enemies attack and be in a position to counter attack with the Battlemasters impressive weaponry backed up by the Amaro’s massive Kali Yama cannon and though he was expecting an ambush the Locust still caught him by surprise.
“Contact left!” Jakes yelled as he fought his controls trying to get his Battlemaster’s guns around to track
Jakes opened up with two of his medium lasers hoping to swing the lasers around and rake the locust. It looked like Amaro had the same idea but with the same result, doing nothing more than turning ice to steam. The locust caught him with its own medium laser and machinegun fire as it screamed passed doing little more than shaving paint.
Jakes swung back to his original heading looking for more contacts. The rest of the trap must be about to be sprung and Jakes was going to meet it with a flurry of energy weapons.
“Come out, come out!” Jake sneered.
Shells slammed into the back of Jake’s Battlemaster and he saw his right rear armor dip into the yellow band.
“From behind?” he thought “Impossible!”
Jakes turned to confront the attacker.
“Vampire!” Called out Scar over the Tac-Net! Vampire was the code word they worked out on the way out where for when Jake’s Battlemaster was going to be ambushed by a threat he couldn’t see.
A cold surge of adrenaline shot into his heart turning it to ice as he realized what he just did.
Jakes knew he had been suckered.
The universe exploded.
Jakes felt his head slam viciously against the top of the cockpit and his vision began to dim as the Battlemaster heaved as incoming fire washed over his mech like a tsuanami.
“FIGHT!” his mind yelled at him. “MOVE!” Jakes fumbled with his controls.
Warning klaxon’s sounded has is armor was breached.
“Bossman coming up on your left!” his voicecoms said over the hurricane of explosions.
"Amaro, That was Amaro. I am Bossman, My Call sign" his sluggish mind informed him.
Jakes mind was cobwebs; He could hear shells ricocheting around in the mechs internals now. Jake pushed the controls to turn his mech back.
His internal voice was screaming at him now “THINK!”
"…Turning back wasn’t the right answer… "
"…the right answer was to keep moving."
"Mass. Weight. These things were important somehow."
"He needed to keep momentum."
Instead of turning the Battlemaster back, Jakes kept turning the mech the way it was originally turning. That was the right answer his mind informed him.
Every so slowly the Battlemaster turned.
Inch by inch his Battlemaster built upon the initial momentum and began to swing around full circle under the torrent of fire.
“Bossman, Break right and pull back!” came the voice again from his helmet.
“Bossman” thought Jakes. That name seemed to be an island an an ocean of confusion, despair and darkness.
“Locust on me, he’s under my guns!” called Kat from her K2 Catapult.
“I am Bossman” thought Jakes as his head began to clear.
Jakes knew he had been suckered. But he was no sucker.
“I am the Bossman.” Jakes whispered. The darkness and Fog cleared leaving his mind raw.
“Negative!” Jakes yelled his mind now crystal clear “Scar keep the Locust off of us. Amaro, Kat Push in, hammer them. Highlander is primary”
Jakes charged.
Jakes opened up with his 5 remaining medium lasers, twin machineguns, SRM6 and massive Particle Projection Cannon.
“I AM THE BOSSMAN!” Jakes said to himself “Let’s play.”
Edited by Carrioncrows, 21 September 2013 - 04:48 AM.
