Part 322: Political Vote 13
Political Vote 13Star Captain Kyl’s Cougar landed with hardly a sound, its clawlike feet tearing deep divots in the soil. The twelve nearly identical `Mechs in his short Trinary kept pace easily, matching his every jump as they probed the distant defensive line with their long-range weapons. Return fire was sporadic at best, but still far heavier than Kyl had expected. Several of the enemy `Mechs had to be mounting Star League-era extended-range lasers. The Draconis Combine was pulling out all the stops.
His thin lips curled into a mirthless smile. Now that House Kurita’s forces had stopped responding to honorable batchalls, he’d wondered whether their hearts had been cut out by the loss of their capitol. He was glad to see they still had some fight left in them.
The enemy Battalion’s red-white-blue-white-red camouflage was new. From Kyl’s experience, the Kuritans tended to favor local camouflage or a muted copper-red that reminded him of drying blood. This enemy still bore parade colors, he decided, which meant they were likely recent arrivals here on Darius. Perhaps they were even reinforcements from the Draconis Combine’s border with the Federated Suns. One jump from Arkab, Kyl had been expecting to face one of the Arkab legions. He didn’t know what to expect from this new formation, but they’d already made the classic Kurita mistake.
The enemy unit had lined up practically shoulder to shoulder in a defensive line between the Clans and Darius’s capital city. Their formations were spread thin, suited to a slugging match or a series of single combats and ill-prepared for the Jade Falcons. Kyl’s radio crackled as Star Colonel Tyren Malthus spoke but a single word.
“Begin.”
Kyl’s brought his `Mech about with a graceful pirouette. Pride swelled in his breast as his Trinary followed in almost perfect unison as they charged the Kuritan lines. Somewhere behind him, Mechwarrior Hal’s Cougar stumbled then fell to the unforgiving earth as a lucky hit from a Gauss Rifle smashed the little `Mech’s gyro. Kyl feathered his jets, taking first a short hop then leaping boldly over the line of enemy `Mechs.
In a normal battle, such a maneuver would’ve been suicidal; but with the bulk of the enemy Battalion spread out in anticipation of a frontal assault; none were in a good position to counter his `Mechs; and any that tried would be forced to turn their backs to the rest of Tyren Malthus’s forces. Kyl knew such tactics tended to draw the ire of the Widowmakers, but he was a Jade Falcon, and every Jade Falcon knew the victory was more important than the path taken to achieve it.
As Kyl touched down, he brought his crosshairs in line with a Battlemaster’s thin rear armor. The enemy pilot didn’t turn, though his `Mech’s battle computer would have been screaming warnings in the pilot’s ear. Kyl’s own computer signaled a lock with a cheerful tone. Kyl’s fingers tightened on the trigger—
His `Mech staggered and fell as a pair of heavy autocannons smashed into the Cougar’s knees, his pulse lasers discharging harmlessly into the dirt at his feet. A lance of agony split Kyl’s skull as his gyro tumbled, but even his consummate skill with his lightweight machine wasn’t enough to keep it from plowing face-first into the soft ground below.
The young mechwarrior shook his head, then regretted it as his vision swam. His Cougar’s clawlike hands curled, seizing a fistful of topsoil in response to some instinctive command Kyl didn’t remember giving. As his head cleared, he stretched his `Mech’s arm out to give him a little more leverage as he stood back up.
The heavy treads of a Demolisher tank in the drab mottled browns and greens of the Arkab legions crushed his Cougar’s outstretched arm and pinned his machine firmly to the ground. The machine’s turret spun with slow deliberation, the barrels of its two massive autocannons whining in protest as they struggled to depress far enough to hit his prone machine. Kyl stared in silence, not at the stylized dragon on the machine’s heavily armored sides, but at the sword around which it now appeared to be wrapped.
Kyl closed his eyes as he thumbed the transmit button on his left joystick. “Star Colonel,” he said calmly. “House Kurita has joined forces with House Davion.”
If there was a reply, Kyl didn’t hear it over the roar of the Demolisher’s autocannons and the sound of shattering Transplex.
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The tip of a pen rapped an uneven rhythm against the surface of a vast conference table. The wood wasn’t naturally the deep chestnut color it now possessed, but careful treatment had leant the light pine a resemblance to Terran mahogany. Protector Calderon quite liked the table; he felt it was a good match for the deep burgundy carpets and the severe, militaristic decor.
“There has been no response? No sanction, no threats, not even an acknowledgement?”
“None, Protector,” Marshal Doru admitted. “There have been no troop movements, they’re not reinforcing even a single world.”
The rhythmic tapping came to a sudden sharp stop as Edward Calderon’s hand stilled. Steel-gray eyes stared from beneath his heavy brow as the young Protector drew the obvious conclusions. The Taurian Concordat wasn’t a threat, a little raiding wasn’t unusual and other wars—more important wars—had drawn everyone’s attention elsewhere. He felt like laughing, the situation was far too perfect. He may even have done so had his vision not at that moment been filled with the smiling face of his late father.
Edward pressed a handkerchief to his brow as though wiping away a nervous sweat; using the motion to cover the rage that contorted his face into a painful grimace. There had been inquests and executions after a terrorist bomb had destroyed his father’s dropship; but the seventeen year old leader of the Taurian Concordat wasn’t satisfied with the deaths of home-grown dissidents when the real perpetrators of the attack sat safe and unpunished in palaces they considered far beyond reprisals. Operation: Flint, the testing of his enemy’s defenses had proven beyond the shadow of a doubt how little his enemies thought of him.
Dabbing at his brow, Protector Calderon let his hand settle back to the tabletop. His features were calm and devoid of emotion as he signed the executive order he’d been considering for the past three hours. “Operation: Steel has been approved, Marshall. You may proceed with your invasion.”
Marshall Haji Doru bowed his head as he accepted the signed document. “And my other request, Protector? What of the Vendetta?”
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“—to pass through the Free Worlds League unmolested. We seek only the death of Stefan Amaris. If you grant us passage, we will bother neither you nor your people. If you wish to oppose us, we will win the right to pass unmolested in combat and shall await you here on the planet Castor, which has already surrendered to us. Be warned: should you ignore this Batchall, let it be known that we shall not hesitate to engage in orbital bombardments against any world that raises arms against us. We will not tolerate delay.”
The message ended then, abruptly and without fanfare. With a button-press Duncan Marik rewound the message to the beginning, and paused the recording. His eyes twitched back and forth like those of a hunting lizard as he committed the faces of the leaders of Clan Sea Fox, Snow Raven, and Ghost Bear to memory. A deep sigh shook Duncan Marik then. The Clans had come, and the stability of the Free Worlds League was already as fragile as an egg.
If he allowed them to pass, his people would undoubtedly revolt unless the Clan passage was carefully disguised. If he resisted—well, he’d seen the last images from Castor as her aerospace wing was cut down one by one in suicidal attack runs against dozens of kilometer-long vessels not seen since the deadliest days of the First Succession War. The Free Worlds League wouldn’t survive the devastation of so many worlds. Irian was in their path, its loss alone would cripple the League for centuries. Holt too, where his son Carlos had gone missing in a daring attack on the Capellan Confederation. His loss would be less devastating to the League itself, but not to Duncan Marik. Perhaps.
Duncan couldn’t believe the Clans would simply turn around and leave if he won their confusing “trial.” He didn’t understand the rules of this little game they seemed to play; and without knowing the rules he couldn’t possibly win. He squeezed his eyes shut, and thumbed the play button again. Perhaps he’d missed something he could use in the dozen times he’d already viewed the short message.
“Captain-General of the Free Worlds League, listen to our Batchall and tremble in your boots. You face the combined forces of Clan Sea Fox and Snow Raven, and a cluster of warriors from Clan Ghost Bear. We seek to pass through the Free Worlds League Unmolested. We seek—”
Political Vote 13:
Taurian Concordat:
A) Deploy the TCS Vendetta.
B) Hold the TCS Vendetta in reserve.
C) The Warship is too important, do not deploy the TCS Vendetta.
Free Worlds League
A) Allow the Clans to pass unmolested.
B) Agree to the Clan Batchall.
C) Attempt to stall for time by asking the Clans what a Batchall is.
D) Damn the consequences, ignore the Clan Batchall and oppose them every step of the way!