TOW60

Chapter 60 - The Other War
Kirin
Kirin Star System
Kerensky Cluster
January, 3063
Kufahl Bloodname Trials
Rebekah watched the light towers power up in the distance back lighting the other fifteen Mechs competing for a Kufahl bloodname, each sponsored by one that carried it. Their menacing silhouettes moved like participants dancing a war dance around a bonfire. Without a moon they fought beneath the Veil of the Protector and Milky Way. Her own Battlemech, a Masauwu, came up to full combat power. The ancient machine was one of the lucky survivors from an era before Omnimechs. Due to a shortage of new machines it had been pulled from a long neglected cache on Babylon's moon Ur.
Her long range vision focused on one of the combatants across the way. He utilized a prototype Tomahawk, the Coyote counter for the Adder Blood Asp that was proving so deadly in their hands. It was modeled after the ancient Marauder modernized with some Timber Wolf features but heavier. However, most of its capabilities were still unknown and inside was the House Master's Champion.
“Just need to outlast him.” She conducted a thermal scan to determine who she should attack first. Combatants were scattered over a nearly five square kilometer range providing just enough room for maneuver while maintaining excitement in observers throughout Kirin's cities. Nearest to her was a Stalking Spider, a quad hunter killer which skittered over the grasslands like a monstrous half-arachnid. Its weapon turret skewed in her direction, its four legs climbing over monolith stones in its way without breaking stride.
Already the plains were illuminated with bright contrails from missiles between the combatants, their explosions threw up dirt and filled the windswept plains with orange flashes and loud noises. Rebekah's cockpit armor slid down protecting the ferroglass below its exterior displayed a skull mirrored on the engine shield below as it detected dangerous conditions. Already her mech was in motion skewing its main weapons toward her slightly faster and lower profile foe.
She fired her PPC and autocannon but was unable to track the spider which engaged its MASC system to suddenly sprint away leaving deep footprints in the coarse grass. The sudden acceleration threw off its aim, instead a particle beam arced over her mech's right shoulder into the dark sky. It used momentum and a well timed burst from jump jets to execute something akin to a backbend kickover changing a retreat to an aggressive frontal posture.
After witnessing such a feat of agility she was stunned, “Is there an Aerofighter pilot gymnast in that mech, I didn't know that was possible.” She leaning back against the padded surface of her chair, “I doubt I have that much flexibility Unaugmented.”
Continuing the pursuit was frustrating, even running at full speed she was losing ground against the backpedaling quad using its superior agility to best effect. Her foe skirted the edge of the Circle of Equals using its turret's full range of motion while trying to deny her the same. High speed particles shredded the Masauwu's armor but she returned the favor, the heavy mech's armor density prevailed and the lighter machine suffered critical damage to its primary weapon.
The turret sparked before being ejected from the Stalking Spider whose DI computer acted in defense of the machine. About twenty meters above the PPC's capacitors catastrophically discharged releasing megajoules of energy in an instant with a thunderous explosions and discharge of lightning. Even the polarized cameras providing Rebekah's HUD were filled with a blue-white afterimage of the explosion before they shut down. “Savashri!” Rebekah raised the front of her neurohelmet visor to look through the manual backups and let out a breath when she saw that the Stalking Spider had experienced a minor shutdown as well from the EMP.
“You expected this might happen. Even a Battlemech can't spend a century in an orbiting cache without gaining some quirks.” Rebekah frenetically keyed the complex and precise code sequence written down on a notecard taped to her interface console in her chief tech's surprisingly elegant handwriting. As an older machine hastily refurbished the Masauwu was not as radiation hardened as a modern one.
An intense battle raged nearby between Jeremi's Tomahawk and a Star of lighter machines, the assault mech reenacting King of the Hillock and daring his foes to face the Master's Champion. Magnesium bright flashes from his Gauss rifle scrubbed any attempts at night vision on the field. His rounds seemed to home in on vulnerable locations shattering mech limbs while forcing their Mechwarriors to power down or flee.
Her computer processed the command line with a beep before turning black and restarting. Once more her helmet visor showed vital information as a ghostly blue mark on the glass. Even though she had evaded some of the spider's PPCs her armor integrity was orange-yellow throughout. She worked down the weapons systems and adjusted her comm feed, satellite reception out here was unreliable and her telemetry had blacked out during the EMP shutdown. The Stalking Spider had skittered away to the far end of the Circle of Equals unwilling to face the still potent heavy mech at close range, “Bitch. I am going to find you later.”
Sensing opportunity a heavily damaged Lupus was limping her way disengaging from the King of the Hill to take on the youngest and least experienced foe. As it approached she saw the white mask with black tentacles that she had seen on Delios and felt a chill run down her spine. The inhuman locomotion and broken state of the machine made it seem even more frightful and worth of destruction.
She steeled herself and charged forward toward the source of her fears. This time she was in an actual Battlemech and ready for a fight and avenge her brother. Once more her adrenaline was pumping, “Cycle cluster shot.” The LBX autocannon opened its bolt drawing from the attached magazines.
Missiles flew toward her and the computer controlled AMSes on her shoulders activated throwing out a screen of flak that detonated the laser guided ordnance. Still the Masauwu took scattered damage reaching dangerous levels by the time she closed the distance. With its mobility compromised she was able to press the advantage, a cluster of submunitions ripped into the myomer of its damaged leg.
Unable to stand the Lupus fell in the dirt its extended forward section rested on the right side. She fired a flight of streak missiles into it. One of the explosion found a missile magazine causing a chain reaction that KOed the pilot from the feedback and initiated the ejection sequence that sent the unconscious pilot away from danger.
A quick burst from her small pulse laser stitched holes in the ground around the fallen pilot. Rebekah hardly noticed as she continued her attack. In the half-light she found half a Conjurer in the way, its pilot was talking gibberish and fired its medium lasers at her, in the light she recognized the frame number as Rex's.
“You monster!” She fired low with the streaks and LBX munitions, explosions peppered the enemy finding the gyro and dropping the machine on its back. “Where is my brother!” The Masauwu leaned over the machine firing the PPC directly through the rear armor to find the fusion power plant. Plasma vented quickly from the containment cell which went dark as its structure was compromised.
The Stalking Spider from before drew her attention, sticking close to her left cannon side, its smaller ball turret with its medium lasers lancing that side. Heavy short range missiles corkscrewed from it but were intercepted by her AMS, interceptor flechettes and shrapnel fell on the grass below setting off a minor fire. Cluster shot and her own SRMs tore into the legs which the pilot closed to protect her cockpit from the explosives. Upper actuators took the brunt of the impact and her own arm was critical,
<<“Detach magazine one.”>>
Within the DI computer the message was conveyed to the appropriate mechanism and one of the large magazines fell to the ground with a muted thump. Another round of canister shot tore into the front legs and forward structure of the Stalking Spider disabling its front right leg. Slowed the Spider attempted to disengage but was run down and finished off with a particle beam to its rear left leg. Its Mechwarrior powered down as the Mechwarrior admitted her defeat.
A thunderous crash and sonic boom tore the Masauwu's left arm off, its autocannon landed barrel first into the sod. Her radio crackled with a man's dark voice identified as 'Captain Jeremi, 7th Assault.' “You are doing very well for a rookie that earned your sponsorship in her Commander's bed but, I grow weary of you. This ends here.”
Rebekah turned to face the Tomahawk, which had absorbed an incredible amount of damage, however it did not seemed to have lost any capability during the entire fight. One of its bird like feet stood atop a fallen Man o War, the only other assault mech in this challenge which had been dominated by secondline machines due to a dearth of new ones. Grand Melees were devastating for readiness and the Coyotes could not afford to lose front line machines even for a major Trial.
Her cheeks burned, what Jeremi said was partially true. She had coupled with Leo several times during their transit from the Pentagon Worlds back to the Kerensky Cluster. More importantly there was nothing wrong with that, he was handsome, they were drunk, and space is cold and boring. However, the real reason the Khan had called in a favor to Shogi for his sponsor slot was that she wanted to test if her new Sibko system could surpass the old ways. Concealing an insult to Loremaster and Galaxy Commander Jerricho as well as House Master Sancia was merely a bonus.
She now suspected that the Jerrichos and House Master had their own plans while they had initially protested they had not hesitated to show off their own champion. All three made no secret of the disdain they carried or support they still wielded despite the Khan's attempts to minimize it. Indeed the fact that the Scientist Caste had allowed Jeremi to use the machine in public was no coincidence. She intended to not be so easy to bring down.
Her machine was already in motion shielding the vulnerable left side from the still fully functional Tomahawk. “Jealous? Perhaps Nathaniel is not to your fancy or he does not fancy you.”
The bird like foot crushed a portion of the fallen Man o War as his mech moved incredibly fast over the plains in pursuit. “MASC?” Many Clan assaults used the myomer circuit for an extra boost at lower cost in engine size but none could have survived taking on a Binary of 'mechs even if they were acting. Yet the Tomahawk had done just that.
She had three kills two were partials but he had dropped ten and was still fighting at one hundred percent his beginning strength. Obviously their weapons had an effect but not even a Dire Wolf could take on so many in an open field without losing at least one limb. Her PPC impacted its chest which looked so bare that it should have gutted even an assault mech yet the Tomahawk walked forward firing its heavy weapons completely unphased.
Rebekah struggled to maintain control under the onslaught just barely keeping her Masauwu upright nursing critical damage. His voice filled her ear, dripping with menace. “If you want to keep that relic in any kind of condition Rebekah I recommend you power it down now.” She ran another quick diagnostic, she had a PPC hanging by a thread but it had not been enough before.
He had three times the firepower and an unknown amount of endurance remaining. Finding this Masauwu had been a challenge she wasn't sure how long it would be before she would be in a Mech again if it was destroyed.
A cold pit formed in her stomach as her finger lingered over the shutdown command while looking at the Tomahawk less than six hundred meters away.
It shook as she pressed the button and powered her mech down.
“I yield, Star Captain.”
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