CHS2-6

==Chapter 6 - Book 2 – Chappy's Howling Siegers==
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Foothills 30 miles from Militia Base
Ingress, Terran Hegemony
September 30th, 2786
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Twenty-Eight BattleMechs from the Siegers were lying in wait off in a gorge. In the while, Lt. Colonel Chapman, Major Bruce, and Major Tournier were up on top of the hill hiding in some underbrush looking down at the enemy’s camp through their rangefinder binocular. Zooming to 100x magnification Matthew was able to see the eyes of the enemy along with whatever equipment they might have. 
Major Bruce broke out his IR Scanner to verify the troops strength by counting the heat signatures throughout the camp. He then put down the scanner, “I count about 40 people down there.” Lt. Col Chapman turned to him. “I show about 8 mechs, 10 heavy tracked tanks. Let us get back to our mechs and move out we must take care of them before we can look for the DropShip.” 
Once in his cockpit Chapman switch to the BattleNet so that all can hear the plan. “Siegers, listen up! I want Alpha Company to circle around the left flank and then Beta Company to circle around the right flank. My command lance will push forward in the middle, with any luck they will move all their forces against the command lance and then they will be out in the open instead of hiding in the trees.”
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A few minutes later…
Sao-wei Tung commander of the Capellan scouting party was bored. He hated scouting, especially when there was nothing out here but mountains and trees. He kept racking his brain trying to figure out why he was put on this detail, the real battle, the real enemy was 30 clicks away. Why were not they not attacking the enemy, from the last intel report he received, the planet’s military was all but destroyed, his commander had sent a force to wipe them out but then they lost communication with HQ. His communication specialist said that ever since what looked like an asteroid broke through the outer layers of the atmosphere the other day that radiation was causing natural jamming. Tung did not think that was an asteroid, even so he was bored, Tung had opened his cockpit and was just chunking rocks he had collected trying to hit the barrel about 20 meters away, when a message came in from his picket line. “Sao-wei, we are under a……”
What the F, Tung thought he looked toward the picket line only to see a bright laser coming straight to him, which cut his head off, and destroyed the mech’s cockpit.
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Command Lance
Lt. Col Chapman and his lance mates broke through to the clearing and steamed rolled over the pathetic picket line, Chapman saw at his maximum range of his PPC a MechWarrior with his cockpit open, so he took that guy out. Chaos was throughout the Capellan’s camp by the time Alpha and Beta Company out flanked them several enemy mechs were already destroyed. 
The enemy tanks tried to form up and put up some resistance and was successful in damaging several mechs in Alpha company, but every mech survived and no pilot seriously hurt. At the end of the day the Capellans were not ready, they were undisciplined and were easy prey for the Siegers, this time. After the last mech was dispatch with prejudice, Chapman took stock of the mountain range. There was no noticeable area that a dropship could have been, up till now his father’s information had been correct, why was he doubting his father’s intentions the minute something does not go right. His thoughts then turned to his wife, what was she doing, why was she behaving so strangely toward him? So many emotions were going through him and stomping around in a mech is probably not the best time to think about personal stuff. “Ok Siegers, since there is no enemy contact, we will split into lance formation and do a grid-by-grid search. We know the Dropship is here thanks to the intel from orbit now we must find a way to the Dropship.” Thirty minutes later after stomping around Charlie Lance broke the silence. “Colonel this is Charlie Lance I think we have found something over here.”
“Roger we will be over in eight micks.” Chapman replied.
When the Command Lance arrived at the location Matthew took stock at what he was looking at. Charlie Lance was at the foot of a cliff but what was more interesting was those two cockpits where open with the pilots nowhere to be found. So, he looked at the sensors and notice an anomaly sitting in between the Charlie lance. When he looked with his eyes all he saw was a cliff with some type of ivy climbing it. Matthew opened his cockpit and rummage through his footlocker to the left of his controls, to find his IR Scanner, only because in the last battle his IR Radar on his mech was damage. When he turned it on, he noticed a cooler indication right where the anomaly was identify in his other sensors.“Lieutenant Coultrip what’s your location.” Lt. Col Chapman said in the radio. “Lieutenant, where are you?”
“Sir, her and the Warrant Officer went into the divide that is covered by the ivy. We have not heard anything from them since, that was about three micks ago.” Command Sergeant Moa announced.
“TOC, this is the CO, Charlie CO has entered a no comm area. I am following her be advise.” Chapman said of the unit comm channel.
“Roger that CO, we will monitor.”
Matthew opened his cockpit, took off his helmet, and checked his handgun (Nambu Pistol) for ammo. He was about to leave the cockpit when he had a second thought and grabbed his Ebony Assault Rifle. “Command Sergeant if I am not back in ten micks or you don’t hear from me notify TOC, set a picket line and bring in the Tactical unit.”“Yes, Commander.” Sergeant Dionsio said.
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Climbing down the 'mech he took a straight path toward the opening moving the ivy to the side he turned his flashlight on and saw that it was a very long and narrow passage, slowly he walked keeping his senses at their highest alert. Three micks had passed when he thought he saw the light at the end of the tunnel, turning his flashlight off for a second, he confirmed that there was a light whether it was the end or one of his troopers’ flashlights he did not know, the closer he got he was sure it was an opening. When he finally made it to the end, he almost fell, the opening open all right, right into a 3-foot ledge with the cliff dropping another 3000 meters. Matthew looked up and saw the cliff continue up for maybe a good three to four thousand meters. Looking left to right he noticed a slight curve, so this had to be a volcano type of natural phenomena. What was the real surprise was a Colossus Dropship right in the middle with some external damage. Matthew looked closer and saw a personal hatch open with rope leading from it to the ledge of the cliff some 30 meters away. He also was able to establish contact with his missing personnel.
“Commander, almost all systems are intact, it looks like we will just need to do some minor repair according to the ships logs.”“Thanks, Lieutenant, let’s get out of this place and bring in the techs.”
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Command Information Center (CIC)
Colossus Class Dropship, Wolves Trap
Ingress, Terran Hegemony
'October 5th, 2786
Lietenant Nimeiri commander of the Wolves Trap sat in his chair waiting for an update. A few days ago, Lt. Col Chapman order him to send his whole tech team to some unknown location to fix some stupid DropShip, he also sent Nimeiri second in command there along with a few flight deck personnel. His second in command was going to be given command of that dropship, a ship that had been derelict for several years. According to the Howlers BattleNet most repairs were finish and they were going to move it to here, so that the rest of repairs can be accomplished in the open and not have the constraints of the volcano walls or the steam from the heat. They were supposed to of been here fifteen minutes ago, no word, no radio chatter, nothing. Was it wrong of him to hope that it blew up? He had been the only dropship since the creation of the Siegers that carry Lt. Col. Chapman so he was a little jealous that the unit wanted a second dropship. He then saw the ship; it was coming straight down like it had come from orbit and not across the mountain range.
<<“Wolves Trap, come in Wolves Trap this is the newly christen Conquering Wolves on vector for landing how copy?”>>
“Conquering Wolves, this is Wolves Trap we read you loud and clear and you are cleared to land at the designated coordinates.”
Damn Nimeiri, thought, Well now the competition of who will get the command staff begins. 
Nimeiri turned to his new XO and said. “Lieutenant Levada, we will need to do a complete make over on the command deck level that includes the conference room and the living quarters asap.”
He then watched as another Colossus touched down about 1000 meters from his Colossus. Great he thought, Now we will be known as the twins.
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Conference Room
Colossus Class Dropship, Wolves Trap
October 6th, 2786
Local Time 0700GST
The Senior staff sat around the table waiting for their commander to enter the room, Major Bruce thought to himself if he did not know better the commander did this on purpose to get people to jump at his will. He thought about the conversation he had with the commander’s wife the night before. With the ground battles going on it was still unsafe for the civilians; therefore, they were still in their luxury dropship attached to the Warship orbiting the planet. The conversation was via Sat Link.
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Last night
Local Time: 2300
Major Bruce was almost asleep when his intercom started buzzing, half asleep he pick up and was surprise by the person on the other side of the Sat Link.
“Ethan, its Diana don’t hang up I need to talk to you.”
“Diana why is the commander’s wife calling me at this hour”
“I am worried about Matthew and since you are his best friend I wanted to talk to you.”“Actually Diana I am a good friend his best and closest friend is Haleigh I am sure she is awake.”
“Ethan, I don’t want to talk to that woman she is an enabler. I think the power has gone to Matthew’s head and I think that he thinks he is god now.”
Ethan just stared at the Sat Link not believing this, that she would be so bold as to try and this, not knowing what was going on he had to play it cool.
“What do you mean, Diana, what’s going on?”
“He is different, Ethan he is not talking to me about the missions, about what is going on in the unit, he has shut me out completely. Then there is this whole demanding to go to certain planets making a path to somewhere on the other side of the universe, why? What is he planning? Does he require you to worship him now?” Major Bruce just looked at her and shook his head.
“Mrs. Chapman, I don’t know what the hell you are talking about. He is our commander if he decided to invade Terra, we would do it. He is not god nor does he think he is, if he has not told you the mission then I am not going to. 
You as the wife have no clearance until he gives you clearance.” He tried to put the sternness voice he could muster on that last statement then continued. “I do not know what is going on between you two, but you better fix it before the divide hurts him, you, the children, and our unit.” 
With that he severed the link and went to bed. Diana though was furious she threw the monitor across the room, waking up the oldest child Frank. “What’s wrong mommy?” 
Diana got up and started to walk out of the quarters she had to clear her mind. When she opened the door one of the biggest soldiers, she had ever seen towered over her.
“Ma’am, due to some safety concerns over the engines the captain has order a guard to protect you and the children. Please stay in your quarters until I receive the all clear.” 
With that he shut the door on her, she stood there stunned and then she started to worry what was truly going on. She looked at her destroyed terminal, realizing that now she was stuck here with no way to message anyone.
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Conference Room, Wolves Trap
October 6th, 2786
Local Time: 0750GST
Lt. Col. Chapman walked into the conference room the chief was about to call the room to attention, but Matthew put a stop to that telling everyone that it was not necessary because they were truly all equals in the room. Then Matthew pulled out a white noise generator and turned it on. 
“Ok let’s get down to business, I have re-vetted all of you and now I can share the complete plan, strategy, and future operations of this unit, as the unit grows, we will add to this core group, right now the nine of you will be the main families that will hold all the secrets of this unit, with 3 more families that will be added later. Of course, we will have generations of other families but only the core will know everything about this unit, its history, and any other endeavor we set in motion. So, let’s start with why I had to re-vetted ya’ll…”
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Duster Pass
50 miles west of Capital
October 17th, 2786
Lt. Col. Chapman sat under a tree drinking water, this tree was huge and provided ample shading, one of many in this Pass between two mountain ranges, this will be the last stop before his unit moved against the First Liao Lancers' fortress which was built in the capital’s city limits so he was putting the shade to good use by reading intel reports. He started to think about his oldest kid, 
Frank the boy turned 14 yesterday and will be starting the simulators next month to assess his natural ability in the cockpit of a 'mech, tank, and plane whichever one Frank excels at will be his path in this unit if Frank decided to follow in his dads footsteps, deep in thought he did not hear his closest friend approach from behind.
“Hey boss, what’s going on in that head of yours?” Major Pople said.
“Matthew turned around. “Kids, thinking about my kids. Frank starts simulations tomorrow, and I am down here. Looking over intel reports of the Lancers and background info on my wife that I never knew about.”
Major Pople looked at her commander and best friend with pity in her eyes. “I know this is difficult I just cannot believe it, is there a way to verify before you make any rash decisions?”
Matthew looked at her, “Yes, I am already planning on a test, two test actually.”
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Capital City
Outskirts
October 17, 2786
Local Time: 1600 GST
The Siegers were here in full force, all three Companies, the Command Lance, and a squadron of Aerospace fighters. 
The enemy had a strong showing too, in fact the enemy commander had pulled all their units back into the Capital in a last-ditch effort to stop the Siegers. 
Five tank Lances, three Battlemech lances, two companies of infantry, a lance of Industrialmechs, and ten-gun turrets. 
Most of the civilians had left the city already so the streets were deserted. Matthew split the unit into four groups Alpha Company under the command of Major Bruce was supposed to feint the east of the town. Beta Company under the command of Major Tournier was supposed to do an Indirect approach moving south on the east side of the city engaging in a running battle then penetrating on the south side. Charlie Company under the command of Major Pople was supposed to do a Turning movement by flanking the city on the west side and then cutting back into the city to meet up with the Command Lance. 
Speaking of the Command Lance Matthew was going to take his lance through the city starting in the northwest side and move into the middle where the capital building was. The lance had air support and with any luck they would only have to deal with the turrets. At least that was the plan. Plans sometime go wrong.
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Book 2 - 06