The airborne dust seemed to linger forever, even though Archer was sure that it was just a minute or two. He relied on his sensors to tell him what was out there, if anything. The collapsing of the buildings wasn’t the only trick he had up his sleeve, it was just the most spectacular. He was also counting on the fact that the enemy would keep coming at him. They want us out of here. In their minds, we are the only threat on this island.
The Nightskys were history, but he picked up the faint magnetic reading of the assault-class ’Mechs moving on the far side of the debris-filled street. He tried to get a lock on them but the intervening mountain of building rubble blocked a clear shot. Archer watched the tactical display and saw they were moving around, attempting to turn his position. Their move was obvious—if the path to him was blocked, they were angling to get down the street that Katya faced.
“Specter One to Brain,” he beamed over on the direct channel. “You’re going to have company shortly.”
“Tracking that already,” she said. Archer moved his Penetrator off to her side.
“Let them come,” he added. There was good reason. His street was not the only avenue that had been booby-trapped.
Archer didn’t have a clear line of sight yet, but he knew they had come into range. Katya’s Daishi, painted identically to that of the Prince, rocked under a wave of 40 long-range missiles. The General reeled for a moment. Yes, the Daishi was a huge ’Mech, but for a moment he was unsure how anything could have survived such an attack. Smoke enveloped Katya, black, churning, sick smoke. Red and yellow flames lapped through the smoke. Archer waited. If she was out, he’d feel the grind of her ’Mech falling onto the street.
The fall didn’t come.
Instead, through the smoke, he watched her side-step towards him. She fired, her weapons pod fitted with a Gauss rifle. The slug was so fast that it looked like a bolt of silver light, firing down the street where the missiles had come from. The arm recoiled slightly from the launch. Archer didn’t see the results of the shot. He moved his Penetrator even closer to Katya’s side.
The pair of assault ’Mechs were two blocks away, rushing forward like a tidal wave. Katya fired another nickel slug down range into the Gunslinger, hitting it in the right arm. The arm of the Gunslinger twisted backward under the impact, tossing armor plates. The Loyalist ’Mech didn’t stop. In fact, its stride only slowed slightly, as if it was hesitating, but only for a second.
As they charged forward, they fired. The shots came down the corridor of buildings with full force and fury. One Gauss rifle slug burrowed deep into Archer’s left side with such force that he rocked back in his seat and felt his ribs ache under the restraining straps. A burst of lasers slashed across Katya’s chest, splattering globs of melted armor, like drops of mercury, into the air.
Archer dropped his sights on the Gunslinger and locked on. He fired, first the Clan-made lasers, then half of his pulse lasers. They hit the Gunslinger square on, most in the torso and legs. Armor popped off and danced down the street. The ’Mech came on.
The Salamander didn’t wait. Another wave of missiles fired, a literal wall of warheads. Katya started to move the massive Daishi as if to dodge them, but it was to no avail. A few missed, racing past her ’Mech and further down the street. The vast majority hit her, blasting at her cockpit, torso, and legs. The flames seemed to linger, to hang on to the ’Mech. Archer sucked in a breath and hesitated like he had never done in combat before. No…not her.
The Daishi started to topple. She fired a gauss slug down range into the Salamander, a snap-shot, one that seemed to be on target. It struck the Salamander at the right knee so hard that the Loyalist ’Mech contorted to the side and glanced into the side of a building. Glass shattered and rained down onto the street from the running blow. The Salamander was still charging.
Right into the mines.
The mines had been hastily hidden, concealed in hovercars on the street with trip lines carefully laid. Most were not even mines but ad hoc booby-traps, explosive laden cars. They went off, first one, then another. The Salamander was lifted by the concussion of the blast, tossed in the air slightly but appreciably. Its footing slipped mid-stride and the MechWarrior was obviously struggling to keep upright. It was a losing battle. Archer could see that the armor on its left leg was all but gone. Myomer strands, severed in the blast, snapped and hung outside like torn muscle tissues. The Salamander hit the ground at almost the same time as Katya’s ’Mech.
Her Daishi dropped face forward, grinding into the pavement with a sickening metallic moan. Archer winced. Katya was down. Smoke billowed from half a dozen holes from the missile hits.
“Specter One to all commands, Brain is down. Send backup,” he said as he locked onto the closing Gunslinger. Its six lasers lashed and pulsed out at him, a lightshow of green beams and brilliant red bursts of light reached out at his Penetrator. Several shots missed, but not nearly enough of them. His Penetrator seemed to scream from the impacts as armor melted and cut free from internal supports. A ripple of heat, suffocating, wrapped his body. Damn you!Damn you all to hell.
He fired. Not just one target interlock, but all of
