TEFAC Chpt 11

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==Chapter 11 - Time Enough For A Cat -- Out in the Fields -==
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====Pains of Growth====
Fort Snowball
Office Block
Panzyr, Aurigan Coalition
March 20th, 3025
"There's no two ways about this," Tam muttered, looking over all the reports we had. "We're gonna need more manpower."
 
"Walk me through this," Kamea responded. "We've got, call it four regiments of foot now, three battalions of armor, the Irukjandi company, the Blackguard company, two companies of my own mechs, your… regiment? Of, well, fucking everything, and Wyrm's… lance?"
 
"I'd really rather call it a company at this point," Wyrm said lightly. "We're drop-limited, not weight-limited." 
 
"Okay, so we should have enough mass to break through on Coromodir. Why can't we take it?" 
 
I tried not to yawn. Since Tam was barred from piloting, that meant while he maintained strategic command (and we'd finally elevated him to Colonel) I was now Major Mersies, which meant commanding the everything we'd crammed into the Iberia: a company of heavy-to-assault weight metal, a lance of armor, two Ballistas for fire support, and a short company of BA; plus Iberia's own weapons locker on the Long Tom. Unhappily, we only had two nukes for it; but what we lacked in nuclear doorknockers we'd made up for in the Castle Nautilus letting us refill the rest of her stores with standard ammunition. 
"Because, Kamea, your house is literally a textbook example of motif taureau, and that means it won't just be one bitch to assault, it will be a steadily increasing line of bitches to assault. Even assuming we have equal mass on the target-"
 
"Which current intel says a sound maybe on since we still have two companies of the Second Battalion, Taurian Lancers floating around like the sword of fucking Damocles," I added
 
"-which we might not, thank you Mersies," Tam muttered. "We still have to fight our way through a known six regiments of militia, two of actually good infantry, three battalions of armor, and two battalions of mechs; all of which are going to be holed up in a series of fortification that are impossible to assault by air and designed to be impenetrable without costing more blood and iron than the Star League is comfortable spending." 
 
Looking over the massive map of Coromodir's capital city, I nodded. "Yeah, it would be… difficult… to take that," I said, grumbling. 
 
The problem was simple. Motif taureau- the informal term for Taurian fortifications- was the best of the old trace italienne schools crossed with aesthetic curvature to increase blast resistance versus nuclear nutcrackers and high-power demolitions shells. What made it deadly though, was the fact they also really liked building ancillary fortifications. That suburb over there? Secretly an outlying ring-fort, which required assault to defeat in detail. That park over there? Secretly part of a tennille system in the moat and the otherside was a scarp for some gun battery or infantry location. That highway? No, it's not mined, that would be gouache. Instead it runs under the guns of four bastions, and is also surrounded by a moat on one side and a counterscarp on the other. Also, the moat is mined. 
 
So, Coromodir's capitol city, Cordia City. Current population is probably a few million. One main urban center, nine major outlying burgs, backed up on a coast with riverine access. Most of the burgs were layered up and down the river, but the coastal burgs had very obvious defenses. We'd need to do a recon pass—maybe build recce pods for our Stukas? Worth considering. The least time least ass route was an apparent highway from the major starport to the city, but that was a trap: ran right through what was bound to be a gauntlet of fires from South Port City 2. 
 
Honestly? Whoever had been the chief urban planner here had done very good work. I couldn't identify any way to breach this that wouldn't cost several battalions of metal unless some of the works were undefended. 
 
"So that's why we need to do this carefully," Tam explained, and I realized I was dozing for a second there. 
 
"I've got a line on a few more mercenary companies," Kamea muttered. "We still have more machines than pilots, though." 
 
"I'll fix that," Tam replied. "Get some dispossessed, offer them landholds and minor titles. They'll eat that shit up." 
 
"I'll hold you to that." 
 
At that point, I just slid out the door, before getting my wireless out to call up to orbit. It only took two rings, but finally Yang picked up from his desk in the Argo. 
 
//"Hey, Mersies. What's up?"\\
 
"Hey, Yang," I said in my mildly-bent Mandarin. I wasn't nearly as fluent as Tam, but a little went a long way in moving Yang's order of operations around. "How's the Cyclops going?" 
 
//"I thought you were fucking nuts when you said to pull the gyro,"\\ he admitted, //"but without doing an engine swap our weight margins are thinner than hell."\\
"Nyan's the oldest of our DNI cohort, and frankly we run our gyros so slow they're mostly deadweight anyway," I explained. "I'd get mine pulled, but then I'd need to fill the tonnage with something." 
 
//"Eh, not my problem. Either way, the gauss rifle is fit in, and we're re-organizing the armor interfacing to take the ferro right now."\\ 
 
"Thanks, Yang. What's your schedule look like for the next month or so?" 
 
//"Mostly working on Wyrm's new Highlander. Girl managed to get a 270 XLFE from somewhere- not one of yours either!- and is using that plus some lightened mountings for the ferro-fiberous in order to squeeze in a Large Pulse laser from the cache in. It's another ton on armor for the same protection, but space in this mech is at a premium!"\\ 
 
"Ambitious!" I said, laughing. "Still, good to talk to you Yang. Don't be afraid to send some metal down to Snowball, our techs are getting bored." 
 
//"I'll think about it. How do we want to run the credit, though?"\\
 
"Call it a one-to-one for man-hours. We're gonna need a lot of work done on Coromodir, and I've got this idea bouncing around," I said, scratching my head lightly. "We can't build a good repair facility there, not without getting bounced around. So I'm thinking: just ferry the mechs up to Argo if they need more work done." 
 
//"Good plan!"\\ Yang said, before someone started yelling in the background. //"Ah hell, I gotta go, Sumire needs me to sort out something with the flyboys- ONE SECOND KID- so that'll be a load of fun."\\ 
 
"See ya, Yang." 
 
With that done, I sighed. Not much else to do today. Ah well- might as well go bug Howler.
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====Ideas on handling rampaging Bulls ====
Fort Snowball
Office Block
Panzyr, Aurigan Coalition
June 5th, 3025
"How in the everloving fuck did we get these recon pictures?" I asked, staring at the pristine aerial views of Corodia City. We had orbital overflight shots, we had low altitude shots, we had medium altitude shots, we had fucking everything. 
 
"Someone on the inside flipped," Kamea said, whistling. "I don't know who, but probably some of the mercs that my idiot uncle wasn't paying. That's how we got the pics, at least: an anonymous source handed them off to the Sableheart Irregulars when they lit out of there citing nonpayment." 
 
"Speaking of 'flipped', we now also know what they have: three fuckloads of militia with rusty Kalashes, and both the remaining companies of the Second Lancers," Tam added. "Which honestly explains a lot: Taurians are piss-poor at managing their troops when they don't own a joint, so someone's kid or friend got on the wrong end of the occupation forces and decided to help give the Bulls a boot." 
 
"Meaning?" Kamea asked. 
 
"Someone's daughter or friend got raped," I said idly, before grabbing a picture of the northern coastal fortified town. "Possibly several, given how many flights this should have taken."
 
"Oh." 
 
"It's the Bulls, shit happens and they're pretty shitty people."
 
"Either way, this answers a lot of questions we had about doing an assault," Tam said, grinning. "Half these fortifications wouldn't stop an UrbanMech, much less us. The casemates are empty, most of these bunkers are toasted, and the Lancers are deployed in the most brain-dead fashion possible. Look at this! Open air' mech parks! In a city!" 
"Sounds like air strikes o'clock," I laughed. "We'll give them hell." 
 
"Good, because this-" Kamea said, pointing to the south, "is really concerning." 
 
Looking at it, I squinted. "That's another Fortress, ain't it?"
 
"Yeah. That's a Fortress. Just like the Iberia." 
 
"So?" 
 
Kamea facepalmed. "The Iberia, that already nuked us once."
 
"So what? They start popping off more nuke shells, they're probably not going to hit anything important…" I said, trailing off as I realized the terrain. "...except for civilians. Fuck." 
 
"Yeah, which is kind of a big fucking problem, because that's my home!" Kamea snapped. "If they've got as many rounds as the Iberia did, that's five warheads they can drop anywhere on the city wherever they damn well please. That's too many casualties." 
 
"So we need to bait the nukes," I muttered. "Fuck. I have a bad idea." 
 
"Tell me," Tam said, giving me a look. 
 
So I did. He didn't like it.
-----
====Knock Knock on the Capitol's Door====
Dropship Argo
High Orbit
Coromidir VI, Aurigan Coalition
June 21st, 3025
Giving Tam a kiss on the cheek, I checked my piloting suit carefully. I was armored to the nines for this, complete with a large coif on my helmet that made up a Faraday shield for my DNI plug. We'd spent the entire trip over trying to EMP harden ourselves, and for poor Tam the answer was to stay up in orbit on the Argo. 
 
"You know I love you, right?" he asked, nervously holding on to me for too long. 
 
I smiled, and kissed him again. "Always." 
 
"Good. Sure them what we can do, then." 
 
"Believe me, that was never in doubt." 
 
With that, we split: I to the shuttle that would take me to the Iberia, and Tam to the command deck. It was a quiet flight over, before getting to the mech bays and saddling up into my Centurion. I'd never named it, as a matter of course, mostly because I never believed it needed it. This was an expression of myself: my name was its name, because it was another part of myself. That didn't mean I wasn't smiling at the change of name stenciled across the right breast, though: MAJ. ANNE GALLOWGLASS. 
 
"All units, this is Argo High Command," Tam's voice came in as I jacked in and brought the Centurion to standby. "All battalions, report in." 
 
"Subaltern Church, First Panzyr Motorized, reporting."
 
"Subaltern Light, First Weldry Motorized, reporting."
 
"Subaltern Koronides, Second Herotitus Mechanized, reporting." 
 
"Subaltern Cholomunga, Third Bringdam Foot, reporting."
 
"Colonel Lamark, First Mercenary Anglamated, reporting." 
 
"Major Mitchell, Dasher Squadron, Harvest Blades: reporting."
 
"Major Horsefeathers, Black Horse Battalion, Harvest Blades: reporting." 
 
That was my cue. "Major Ti Gallowglass," I said, the compromise name singing my tongue as I said it even if it was the best Tam and I could do for this problem on short notice, "Pale Horse Battalion, Harvest Blades: reporting." 
Four more battalions of foot rattled themselves off after that: Second Bringdam, Second Weldry, Third Panzyr, and Fourth Smithton. I couldn't be arsed to care; I was already hip-deep in making sure my boys were good. It was a dead even tie between the Black Horse and Pale Horse battalions who had the worse landing spot- but neither of us had the worst job, which soundly went to the flyboys. Dasher Squadron's job was simple: silence that Fortress. The plan was simple: the light fighters were going to level bomb the shit out of it, then if that didn't get the job done then the Stukas were gonna wingover and nail it themselves in a balls-out dive bombing run.
 
If literally all of that didn't work, well, then the second part of why I had a tied for worst landing spot kicked in. If we couldn't take the Fortress out with airpower, my job was to land near it and explain in very small words that it did not want to play Tactical Nuclear Exchange with someone who had a pre-registered fire on them. 
 
Needless to say: I really didn't want that to happen, and neither did anyone else. To that end, we were handling the issue with a little bit of the old Complete and Total Air Superiority: namely, our entire air wing was gonna hit the Second Lancers' dropship park, consisting of a Fortress, three Unions, two Leopards, and a Triumph. As Dasher Squadron went in, I sent up a little prayer for those boys: that was hell they were sailing into. One by one, the flights conducted wingovers into the atmosphere, I held my breath for a moment, until the reports of hits started coming in.
 
"Dasher-4, hits on the Triumph and one of the Leopards- they're packed in this place like sardines! You can't miss!"
 
"Dasher-5, nailed the Fortress! I think they felt that one!"
 
"Dasher-3, got some good smacks on the Union, otherwise no joy."
 
"Dasher-6, I clipped the Fortress and got some of that stick into a Leopard."
There went the warmup round. Our Tomahawks weren't the fastest or heaviest birds out there, and that was a lot of flak going up over the dropships. That's what the Stukas were for, doing a bombing run straight into that thrice-damned Fortress. 
"Dasher-1, target hit!" Mitchell yelled. "I think I see secondaries!" 
 
"Dasher-2, critical hit! Confirmed fucking secondaries-" the next pilot screamed, before their radio cut out. 
 
"Ulysses, come in," Mitchell said, his voice slowly fading out. "Ulysses… damn. We lost him." 
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As the atmosphere started rattling arround my dropship, I winced. The plasma sheath around us made it hard to communicate, so I went to internal-only comms. "Alright everyone, you know the drill. We're rolling out hot to trot, so get ready to give them hell- we're only about six kilometers out from their dropship zone. All elements, check in."
A moment of silence was given, mostly to let all the subunit commanders make sure their shit was in order. My own command lance was already perfectly set to go: Howler and Sokoloy both giving me two clicks on the mic. 
"Battle Lance, under Tomcat: ready to go."
 
"Assault Lance, under Rads: ready to go."
"Armor platoon with Chopper, engines hot and ready."
 
"BA Company, under Foucault: mounted and good to go."
 
"Fire Support, under Thorn: ready."
 
"Command Lance, under Mersies: ready." 
 
There was another tired half-minute of silence, until the bay lights went red and the alarms started going off. "PREPARE FOR DEPARTURE" was roaring out, and I flexed my hands over the controls. We could do this. We would do this. 
 
Then the landing gear hit the surface of Coromodir VI, and the bay doors opened to drop ramps. "Out and at 'em!" I called out, letting Sokoloy blitz down the ramps. We weren't landing in a suicidally hot area, but I could count the time until there was inbound fire in seconds. As I directed the battalion, though, a pre–recorded little snip of myself came out over the airwaves. 
"Attention, all Taurian legal combatants, you little wilting daisies and white roses you. Anyone wondering where Commodore Ostergaard went may wonder no more: he stumbled into us on this little dump called Artru, and got his ass handed to him on a silver platter. Unfortunately, in doing so, he revealed you may or may not have nuclear weapons in your possession." 
 
Ignoring myself- hah- I started snapping orders. "Armor, BA, get me a picket line to the west. Fire support, clear the splash range of a Long Tom fire on the Iberia and get dug in. Mechs, we're marching north in twenty, shake yourself out into a skirmish line. If everything goes well, we'll be catching the 34th Coromodir Militia in a pincer against the Third Bringdam."
 
"Tomcat to Mersies: you want us to pincer a militia regiment with… a battalion of foot and ourselves?"
 
"Affirmative. They're leg militia, so they can't really hurt us, and we know they're in poor supply and therefore poor morale."
 
"While you might have nuclear weapons in your possession," my recording kept going, "I would like to confirm that I have them. That's right, Taurian Lancers, I have the big sticks that Ostergaard was keeping in his back pocket in case those Periphery Neobarbs got uppity. Not as many as he did, since we had to teach him you can't nuke your way to victory, but oh well. Here's the deal, though: I've got 'em. You probably have 'em. Now, we could prove we're as bad as the Successor Lords, but that wouldn't be very profitable. Instead, I'm going to offer half an olive branch: you don't break out the atomic party favors and neither do I. That being said, if you launch? I launch, and turn your dropships into radioactive slag before sending every prisoner I take on a long dropship ride to sit out the rest of the war in a neutral power. The FedSuns seem like they'd be willing to take care of a few lost Bulls, at least."
 
I had to chuckle- I'd had too much fun recording that. 
 
As we moved out into the inter-suburbs of Coromidir, I kept a weather eye out. We were practically in spitting distance of the enemy dropship park, which meant we were in spitting distance of whatever the enemy had defending their dropships. Tall, spiraling buildings made up most of the local terrain, and I kept my head on a swivel for enemy contacts. 
 
"Argo Actual to Pale Horse Battalion, come in Pale Horse. What's your status?"
"Pale Horse Actual to Argo Actual: we're doing good. No enemy contact yet, everything's deployed in good order."
 
"Good to hear, Pale Horse. Third Bringdom managed to route their assigned target without much difficulty, so we're adjusting your attack vector."
"Are you nuts? It's been twenty minutes since we went ramps-down! How did they win that fast?" 
 
"The Restoration Army is a good unit, and the Third Bringdom is a good unit." 
 
Right, this was getting fishy. Third Bringdom was a foot unit: no way in fuck they'd actually successfully joined battle versus an entire enemy infantry regiment and routed it that fast. "Argo actual, please squawk clearance level." 
 
"Come in again, White Horse?" 
 
"Squawk clearance level, Argo. You fucking heard me."
 
This was a fuckery. Squawking a clearance level was fairly standard radio protocol: it was generally a short alphanumeric string to provide ID and also provide comms standards. The Restoration Army used a six-digit standard squawk code system; three for unit, three for security. Harvest Blades ran nine digits, so we could add in signal quality and current mission tasking.
 
"Argo actual, squawk code 45 India Mike 11."
 
That confirmed it- Argo would use a nine-digit to talk to another member of the company. Setting my broadcast power to maximum, I went to open all-band. "RESTORATION ARMY ALL COMMS HACKED GO TO LOCALS-"
 
At that moment, a harsh burst of static came out, making me grin. If nothing else, that confirmed it: the phone company was playing fucky-wucky games, and now they were trying to jam us like a tin of raspberry preserves in a radar dish. Cutting down to local channels, I grinned. "Pale Horse battalion, be aware we are under EWAR condition three."
 
"Gonna be just like old times, then?"
 
"Absolutely."
-----
====Coordinating a Lively Conflict====
Coromodir City Outskirts
Coromidir VI, Aurigan Coalition
June 21st, 3025
While it took us some time and a few rounds of fire support, it didn't slow us down much when we linked up with the Third Bringdam Foot. As we pressed in on the capitol, weaving our way through fortification lines and unmanned kill zones, it would take a clever eye to realize we were cutting off the routes to exfil to the Taurian pool of droppers. The infantry weren't there to back us up, they were there to get strung out in platoon and company-strength listening posts and blocking positions so we could direct fire off the Ballistas. Finally, we'd completed the encirclement- just in time for a company of ours to start taking major fire. 
 
>>"Come in, White Horse, squawk 554-889,"<< a desperate officer came in. >>"This is Bringdam 3rd, Company Charlie. We've got two lances of battle damaged lights and mediums trying to run, all mechs."<< 
 
"White Horse reads. Armor lance, BA platoon 2, back them up. Charlie company, expect reinforcements in 20 minutes. Until then, get some map coords, and I'll give you a Ballista."
 
>>"Wilco!"<< 
 
"Thorn, get fires on Company Charlie's fire calls. Get squawks every three rounds of fire." 
 
"Understood, preparing to fire." 
 
Breathing in, I sighed. Everything was going fine. Everything was going just fine. We were cutting off the droppers, and- 
 
"Contact, northeast!" Tomcat snapped, his PPCs putting lightning downrange. "That's a lot of metal!" 
 
Oh hell. Tomcat's lance was half a klick up the road from me, and the road wasn't straight. "Whistle," I said to our second Ballista. "Get some fire solutions out of Tomcat's boys, and pave him some cover. BA Platoon one, get in there and back them up." 
 
This was a classic broad front attack to prompt a rupture, executed in miniature. First step, define the zone of battle with attacks to the fore and aft of the formation. Second step, supporting fires- thankfully absent. Whether or not this was an actual inability to provide fires or just them being scared of Long Tom counterbattery fire, though, was open to debate. Third step- overwhelming force straight down the middle. 
"Calypso, going high-" one of the rookies said, jumping up to the top of a building, before popping off their PPC and jumping back. "-shitshitshitshitshitshit!"
Six PPCs, two autocannon slugs, and probably at least a hundred LRMs slammed into the tower she was going to use as a perch. As the building crumpled in on itself, I just sighed. I could really use another LRM boat here. Then the enemy started coming. Three Griffins- the LRMs and PPC fire, natch- an Awesome, a pair of Thuds, and oh. That was a Nightstar (fucking phone company mech suppliers damn it all) and with it, some kind of, I don't know, Royal Stalker? Those were reading as ER Large Laser fires, and I damn well knew we didn't dig any of those up ourselves! Who'd even make a Royal Stalker? Argh! 
 
"Everyone, get down and stay in cover," I snapped. "They outgun us by a shitload, and I don't want to see if they took the gauss rifles out of that Nightstar. I'm calling for Long Tom fires." 
That's about the time I realized I couldn't hail the dropship, or anyone outside maybe a kilometer. The jamming had intensified. Fucking hell, this was a headhunter mission, wasn't it. Just my luck. Just my fucking luck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck how was I supposed to get out of this-
 
"We're not getting fire requests through the jamming," Whistle called to me. "Get us some grid squares, and we'll make 'em pay." 
 
"Don't forget about us either!" the lieutenant of the BA called. 
 
"We're about to make a hell of a name for ourselves today," I said, sighing. "Calypso, you're our Griffin, right?"
 
"Afirm!" 
 
"Right, squawks for Thorn and Whistle are 227-441-915 and 465-553-915. Get those punched in, and go wide. You've got one job kid: get those guns firing, and keep them firing."
 
"Wilco, on it!" she snapped, before running off. 
 
"Rads, sorry to steal your girl, but you're about to get to play slap and tickle with a lot of enemy metal. I need you jumping and shooting: you don't need to hit, but you do need to make those Griffins fear God. Nitya, you're bodyguarding Chopsticks. Chopsticks, make with the Awesome Fight." 
 
"Seriously?" the kid asked.
 
"Seriously." 
 
"YES!" 
 
"Don't get too excited," I warned him. "Sokoloy, Hower, tight run in. I want that Nightstar fucking pasted, read me?" 
 
"We read," Sokoloy said. "You're backstopping the kids?" 
 
"Yeah, they need flank security," I said, feeling my weapons run hotter and hotter. "I'm good at that." 
"Good luck-" Sokoloy said, before Chopsticks rounded the corner on a building and started slapping away with the enemy Awesome. PPC bolts were filling the air to such density I could see them curving and warping away from each other, while Chopsticks danced back and forth to keep himself shadowed in the buildings. Then the whisper-crack of a Gauss Rifle joined the fray, and it was a nightmare around the skies. Beating back south and around, I tried not to gasp- somehow, rads had managed to dome a Griffin right out the gate! The idiot had to have been standing still, I told myself. Then it was a Griffin noticing me, and my battery of Light PPCs and LRMs was dueling his in a parody of his own weapons. Still, the enemy pushed in, bold as brass- until the Thunderbolts crossed the invisible line that Nitya decided to spring into combat at. It only took a single salvo of LRMs to warn them they were about to be in distance to take some serious pain, and then the class-twenty opened up. 
 
I couldn't watch too closely, though: the Ballista shells falling and the Griffin I was gunning down in the street took too much attention. Still, the fool punched out eventually, and then I was moving in again, just in time for Sokoloy to come through a building facade into the back of the Royal Stalker. Royal or not, no blood of Terra could stop the crack of another class-twenty shell into the back, and then the Nightstar was engaged as Sokoloy proved that death did not care from whence the fire flowed. 
As the last Griffin tried to push around and roll me up, I chuckled darkly. Chain-firing my Light PPCs, I caught the idiot Taurian time and time again as he failed to understand the enemy's gun is always cold and ready to fire. Still, Sokoloy and Howler couldn't wade into a mess of Assaults and Heavies without some backup, so I had to roll this guy fast. Pushing up and up again, I winced as my left torso went orange on armor. Not good. Still, I was a hell of a lot more dangerous in close range than a stock -1N Griffin, and it only took two hits of my vibroblade to make that perfectly clear to him. He didn't run, at least. 
 
"This is Chopsticks, I'm getting torn up here!" Our rookie Awesome pilot yelled. 
 
"Rads, moving to cover you. Fall back and move to salvo fire, I'll handle this."
 
Well it looks like the kids knew what they were doing. "Howler, status on those heavies?" 
 
"They just love me to bits right now!" my friend snapped, the last word getting chopped up by PPC static. "Back me up here, the Thuds are turning!" 
 
"Moving to support!" I snapped, re-cocking my gun arm to firing position as I came around a corner. As I brought the long light of my particle cannons to bear, I heard the tell-tale scream of a reactor trying to go critical. Sparing a look over my shoulder, I gulped. "Nitya, status report!" 
 
"Enemy laser shot got internal, sorry ma'am! My engine's redlining, I'm barely holding it together!" 
 
"Fall back then-" 
 
Just then, their damn Nighthawk let out a pair of shots, and I hissed. Those weren't Gauss rifles, those were LBX-10 autocannons firing case shot! As the projectiles blossomed into shotgun spreads of flechettes, it was enough to put Nitya on her ass. Covering the injury with her left arm, she tried futilely to return fire, but it wasn't enough. 
 
"Nitya, shutting down!" she yelled. As her mech went dead, I glared. We'd taught the kids about shutting down to prevent a reactor meltdown at least, but that meant she was a sitting duck for anyone who wanted a snack or free salvage and hostages. 
 
"Rads, BA, get on Nitya and keep her covered," I snapped, switching fire to the Thud that had managed to get Nitya down and grounded. "Howler, you're gonna need to wait a minute-"
 
Then a pair of autocannon slugs took me in the left arm mid-step, forcing my gyro to ramp to max. I'd nearly gotten it under control, right before a PPC bolt got me in the leg, turning my ankle and sending me on my ass. "Fuck!" I snarled, rolling over in time to watch Sokoloy lase and blaze the Nighthawk into re-orienting, before Hooker barreled into it. As I got back to my feet, I sighed. That was- was that all of them? 
 
"Calypso, is that all of 'em?" I asked, huffing." 
 
"Yeah, that's all of 'em," she said, having re-taken her point on top of a local building. "So, uh, how are we getting Nitya home?" 
 
"Fucking Nitya, was how I planned to get any of you lot home," I grumbled. "We're still getting jammed, so go up to the battle lance and get… Fierro, the Archer pilot. They've got two hands, so between her and you that can get the Atlas home if you're careful." 
"Nitya, here!" a tinny voice chirped in, from the aforementioned downed Atlas. She'd at least gotten her APU active. "Permission to dump ammo here, Major? My core is critically fucked!" 
 
"How fucked is critically fucked?" I asked.
 
"You know what a 'primary accelerator containment failure' is? Because that's my error message and it's doing a primary and secondary boot lockout." 
 
I didn't, as a point of order, know what that was. However, a primary boot lockout meant that the reactor control module thought the engine was going to fry itself in under a minute if it wasn't babied very carefully, while the secondary boot lockout meant the RCM thought that it couldn't successfully boot the engine without causing secondary damage leading to a catastrophic reactor failure. Since I didn't want Nitya and my shiny Atlas to get Stackpole'd (the name of one of the early safety designers on the RCM who managed to once detonate sixty mech cores inside a week) the answer was obvious: don't boot the mech up! 
 
"Yeah you keep that mech cold," I said, sighing. "Calypso, can you read me?" 
 
"Barely!" a deep-fried Calypso called back. "I got Fierro, though, and we're all coming back!"
 
"Alright!" I called back, letting my gun arm droop down to 'mostly safe' position. Just then, an ASF swooped overhead, before dropping something. Blinking, I watched it start beeping, before a pre-recorded message came out. 
 
"This is a message pod from Argo, squawk code 645-485-999," the pod said. "Copy this message and destroy this pod. Message starts:"
 
Nyan's voice came out of the pod, in clipped radio-speak. "Harvest Blades or Restoration Army unit: this is Argo. Currently the electronic warfare environment is too thick for us to be able to operate with central command and control from orbit. As such, we're going to be dropping message pods with pre-recorded orders. Units on the north side of Coromodir City, gather up around grid 45-Charlie-Upsilion, and get into contact with Black Horse battalion. Units on the south side of Coromodir City, fall back to the Dropship Capture Cordon, secure the enemy dropper park, and get in contact with Pale Horse battalion. Kamea, one of these pods is bound to find you: Victoria is trying to challenge you to a duel. Don't let her get your goat, stick with Wyrm and don't go wildcat on us. Argo out." 
 
A moment passed, and the pod began to repeat its message before I blasted it to smithereens with my lasers. "Right, new marching orders," I muttered. "Calypso, Tomcat, how copy?"
 
"Three by four," Calypso said, coming in much better.
 
"Two by four," Tomcat replied, still almost as much static as voice. 
 
I sighed. "Tomcat, if you're reading me as badly as I'm reading you, that's really more of a one by four." 
 
"Sorry.", Tom meakly replied.
 
"Not a big deal, we're not in a hurry right now," I said, sighing. "Get closer, we'll do this face-to-face." 
 
It took about ten more minutes for the battle lance to get to us, at which point I blinked. Their armor was decently charred up, and Cypher's Warhammer had its left PPC clearly burned out. 
 
"Battle lance, status report?"
 
"Most of us are high yellow on armor, and Cypher's down a PPC," Tomcat reported clearly. "Fierro's dry on ammo, I'm at about half, and Tourniquet is at two-thirds. We fought off a lance of Bugmechs backed up by an armor lance and some infantry trying to make a break for the droppers." 
 
"Lot of damage for a bugmech lance," I said lightly. 
 
"Their armor was good, and we underestimated their Wasp," Cypher said, sighing. "That's how they got my peeper." 
 
"Well, you're all mostly battle-ready, so you're working with the Assault Lance now. Fierro, Calypso: to repeat, you're getting Nitya back to the dropper. While you're there, load up on ammo and get back here. Assault Lance, how are you doing?"
 
"Down," Nitya said, which earned her a reproachful stare. 
 
"About yellow all around, half ammo on Gauss and LRMs," Rads called out. "I can keep going." 
 
"Orange and red across the front, and I think I might be stripped on the right leg," Chopsticks said with a little grin in his voice. "Your call on keeping me in, ma'am." 
 
"We'll keep you around a little more," I decided, breathing deeply. "Calypso?" 
 
"Shot off most of my ammo, ma'am, but I'm green through and through." 
 
"Good. Once you're back, link up with the armor lance and make sure they get our memo. We're gonna secure this line, and once I have another infantry brigade backing it up we're taking the droppers."
-----
====How you measure success====
Coromodir City Outskirts
I'd slowly managed to pocket monster my way up to almost a full regiment holding the No Run Away Chicken-Bull line (as the mechwarriors were calling it), so it was probably time to actually run the guns and grab those droppers. We knew they were in bad shape from getting bombed, but that didn't mean squat when it came time for the battlemechs to march. Just as I'd started getting everyone to form up, though, new orders came in. 
 
"Argo message pod to Pale Horse: rescind previous orders. IRST flights and observation have found a minimum resistance pathway into Coromodir City, and the militia formations are routing faster than we can ID them. You need to move fast and break things, though: the Taurian Lancers armor park is forming up in the Coromodir Castle. Enemy dropship park is conducting negotiated surrender right now- do not interrupt. Enemy jamming should be down by 1400 hours: current objective is to have you in Coromodir Central district by then to block militia retreat. Argo, out." 
 
"You bloody fuckwit, I need the map to get there!" I snapped, before a second message pod thunked to the earth, about thirty meters from the first one. 
 
"Argo message pod to Pale Horse: route enclosed."
 
Ah. Nyan was just putting the memo in two different pods. I see. 
 
"Pale Horse, on me!" I snapped. "We've got to do a fast march into the town square to kick some ass, any questions?" 
 
"Yeah, when's lunch?" Chopsticks yelled. 
 
"Not soon, that's for damn sure," I replied. "Grab a ration bar out of your cockpit stash. We've got to do a fast road march into the city center, because it looks like Argo's found out the enemy militia are about as hard as play-doh. We need to move in and block their fallback lines or the Lancers will give them a handful of buckshot to stiffen their lines with." 
 
"Looks like I'm out, then," Chopsticks laughed. 
 
"Yep. You, the artillery, and the armor are sticking behind to stiffen up the infantry." 
 
"Aye, ma'am. No fun for me."
 
"Everyone else- let's move."
 
Taking off at a fast march, the battle lance and assault lance started moving with me. Rads could barely keep up, frequently 'hopping' with his jumpjets to keep a good view on everything, while Calypso ranged wide to keep tracking everything. Battle damage was starting to add up- everywhere I looked, stray missile impacts and laser scorches were in the buildings, and in the distance I could hear chattering autocannon fire as some poor shmucks tried to drive off the ASF flights that were constantly bombing anything and everything they found. Stick after stick of cluster bombs were getting used, and I just knew that Nyan had been ordering minefields deployed on strategic areas. 
 
Half the reason he still let Kamea play around in a mech, I think, was so she didn't know he was treating her city like Focht did Tukayyid. 
 
Still, for all that we were doing a fast march through an active battle, it was surprisingly quiet. There were only a few situations we needed to throw some light at problems, and the total air superiority meant any sort of organized position of enemy resistance was blasted away before we reached it. It still took the better part of an hour to get to the Coromodir City Central Plaza, though, and once we were there I could see a finger-four of Meteors go screaming over, glued to the deck towards some unexpected hotspot. Looks like we got the Marston Mats down, as well as the CV Leopard and the Mule then. 
 
"Mission update would be really nice about now," Tomcat muttered as his class-five autocannon pivoted nervously. 
 
"Spread out, and get ready," I just growled. "We're a heavyweight company, they're bound to have something incoming for us." 
 
That 'something' was the jamming coming down. "All units, this is Lt. Blender, Dasher Squadron!" a voice snapped. "We bagged the EWAR post, comms are clear!" 
 
"Holy shit, fucking finally," I muttered, before keying over to 'orbital' frequencies. "Major Mersies to Argo, come in Argo." 
 
"Mersies!" Nyan said. "Where are you?" 
 
"Coromodir Central Plaza."
 
"Good- Kamea and Wyrm just went radio silent, I think there's a mobile EWAR station they haven't taken out yet. They've got Lucifer with them, but she can't pilot and run her ECM suite in countermeasure mode at the same time. I'll keep trying to make contact, but it's hell keeping all our separate commands together. Expect a Taurian sally out of the west but- ah shit! 2-Herotitus is getting clobbered again, be back soon!" 
 
A Taurian sally out of the west? We were west of the castle where they were supposedly forming up, though! What would they have west of us?
 
A pair of autocannon rounds zipped through the square into backstop of the palace wall, and I blinked. Turning, another one caught me right on the cockpit, cracking the outer layer of protective screen and leaving a massive crack right in the middle of my viewport and slamming me back in my chair. Ah. Looks like they regrouped, then were gonna go for the castle. Okay. 
 
"Everyone, move!" Rads yelled, as a Gauss round zipped out to slam into a Bulldog. As I got out of the way of massive autocannon fires and tried to get the ringing out of my ears from the headslap I'd gotten, a brave Vedette tried to charge inn. Key word, tried, because the minute it got too close Cypher just lased the shit out of it and it exploded. The fighting was fast and frantic- most of the armor knew it needed to get past us, and just as much knew I we couldn't stop all of it. As my right torso went red, the first leakers started trying to sneak around us before a string of cluster bombs nailed them. 
 
"How many fucking tanks-" I snarled, my LPPC chain fire getting thrown off by one of the guns overheating and blowing out catastrophically. Damn local replacements! "Do they have!" 
 
"There's militia tanks in here too, kill them last!" Rads shouted back, his SRM pack spitting death at something I couldn't identify. Grumbling, I just lased it and kept shooting, before blinking. When did I run out of LRMs? Don't know, fuck it, go to lasers. As my right arm went bingo on armor, I tried not to groan. Really fuck it now, go to vibroblade. It might take a little stooping to hit some of the tanks, but they deserved it really if I couldn't just football kick them into a building. 
 
That's about when my engine started screaming at me and oh fuck oh shit something went internal. 
 
"Mersies!" someone was yelling. "Fall back, ma'am!" 
 
Urg, lancemates. I wasn't fine, but I could handle a concussion and a cooling failure. Snapping my arm out, I dumped all three- no, two now- LPPCs into a Manticore trying to cross the square, right before it nailed me back and oh that was a gyro hit that wasn't good. Falling flat on my ass as the SRMs pattered around me, I hissed as that cooling failure worsened and oh that's why there was a cooling failure, I'd had a main branch system leak. Right, fuck, gotta get some space to fix that. 
 
Trying to walk out of the fight, I tried not to ignore the yelling behind me, but I needed space. Main branch system leaks meant my heat wasn't getting to my sinks, and while I could get it under control it would mean locking my weapons out of the main engine sink loop which would be problematic to say the least- and oh I was falling over again. 
 
"Fucking- I'll cover her!" Rads was yelling. "Tomcat stay in there- shit!" 
 
"Ammo dry. Again." Fierro noted. 
 
"I've got no bloody arms left!" Tourniquet was screaming. 
 
Could they please all shut up for a minute? I was trying to patch my cooling system here. 
 
"Fucking Christ," Tomcat muttered. "Sound off everyone."
 
Grumbles and mutters and status pings and oh, they'd figured out how to use emotional telepathy! Great! Now I could just vaguely blare annoyance at them. 
 
"Right, Mersies is obviously concussed. I'm taking command," Rads said, trying to focus. "Let me just dial up Argo… uh… Pale Horse, Assault Lance to Argo, come in Argo." 
 
"Argo to Pale Horse Assault Lance, over," one of the call center dispatchers said. "What's the matter?" 
 
"We're uh, pretty beat to shit and in position at the Coromodir Central Square. Major Gallowglass is incapacitated, and we don't know where Sokoloy and Howler are." 
 
Y'know, that was a good question. Where were Sokoloy and Howler? 
 
"Sorry about that- we split them off to handle an emergent situation."
 
"Coulda used the metal, boss," Rads said, very tired. 
 
"We read you. We're vectoring infantry to your location now to fortify. The Taurians are surrendering, though, and we've captured Lord Espinosa. The battle's winding down, and we'll get recovery units to you soon. Just sit tight, okay?"
 
"My Thunderbolt is down both her arms, everyone's dry on ammo, and my commanding officer has a bad concussion. Not much else I can do." 
 
"Yeah we're putting a flight on covering you, sounds nasty." 
 
"It was." 
 
Well. Not the most glorious end to a battle, but I'd take it. Any fight you could walk away from was a win, anyway.
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