Twilight of the clans III: the hunters

by Thomas S. Gressman

  Ge spared the long-range sensor display a fleeting glance.

  At less than one hundred kilometers, the Bisan's scanners had enough resolution to pick out the angular, brick-like mass of a third DropShip, still clamped securely to the Invader's spindle-shaped hull.

  "I don't know, Rick. Right now, I think we should be glad they're holding her back."

  * * *

  The blood staining Star Captain Hector's close-cropped blond hair had nearly stopped flowing from the ugly gash opened in his scalp by the edge of the command console. Moments before, a blast from the unknown enemy frigate had shaken the Winter Wind like a child's toy. The impact had hurled Hector to the deck, his skull grazing the corner of the control panel.

  "Say that again?" Hector's voice held a note of challenge and threat.

  "Star Captain, the Ice Dart failed to launch. Damage control crews are working on her right now, but they do not believe they will be able to free her in time. They say that the docking collar was warped by that last hit."

  "Freebirth." Hector muttered the word between clenched teeth.

  "Star Captain, without the Ice Dart to help screen this ship, I am afraid there is little we can do to prevent the enemy from boarding us, or destroying us at his leisure." Had he not been a trueborn, the Wind's executive officer would have cringed at the idea of bringing Hector such a report.

  "So shall it be," was the Star Captain's only reply.

  * * *

  "Watch it. They're splitting up, trying to flank us."

  "I see them, Lieutenant," Maeda Ge replied to Sule's warning cry.

  Faster than their shape and size would suggest, the big Union Class DropShips bore down on the Bisan. In a one-on-one fight, a Union's armor and heavy weapons load would make it more than a match for an Achilles Class, but for the assault ship's superior speed and maneuverability. Facing a pair of the big spherical vessels left the Bisan at a disadvantage.

  "Captain has the for'ard guns." Cutting in an override, Ge routed the firing controls for all of the DropShip's forward-facing weapons through his panel. Making delicate adjustmerits to the Bisaris helm, she worked to bring the vessel's devastating forward weapons to bear on the leading Clan vessel.

  The Clanner was coming straight and hot, bearing down on the Bisan as though he intended to run the DropShip down. In response, Ge twitched the stick and throttle, swinging the narrow aerodyne ship into a long shallow arc across the leading Union's path, and away from his partner. The Union tried to follow the maneuver, but the nimble Bisan evaded him easily. Autocannon bursts and laser bolts dug small pits in the Bisan's wings as she ran past the Clanner's nose.

  Suddenly, Ge flung the Bisan into a tight pirouette. The ship's spaceframe groaned as she came around like a dog chasing her tail. There, before him, loomed the spherical bulk of the Clan Union. Ge laid the pad of his right forefinger on the control yoke's firing stud. An adjustment down and left brought the targeting pipper to bear on the big DropShip's center of mass.

  Four strokes of silent lightning blazed into the Union's armored flanks. Armor shattered and spalled away under the intense impact of heavy Gauss slugs. Autocannon shells and missile warheads combined to finish the devastation. The Union staggered, thin vapor streaming from deep cracks in her armor.

  "All right, launch the fighters," Ge ordered. "Maybe they can take some of the heat off us for a while."

  Second later, in response to Ge's order, the Bisan's forty-five-hundred-ton bulk thrummed sharply as a pair of updated SL-15R Slayer fighters rocketed clear of their launch bays. Turning abruptly, the eighty-ton delta-winged attack ships raced across the void between the Bisan and the damaged Union.

  "Major Ryan." Ge's voice crackled from the commline. "Get ready. We're going to swing around for another pass. As soon as we're in position, we're going to kick your taxis loose." The line went dead before Ryan had a chance to say anything.

  As the Bisan rolled onto an approach vector, a pair of dark gray Turk fighters blasted free of the damaged Union's cratered hull. Maeda Ge watched in horrified fascination as a black and red F-700A Riever, launched from the Haruna to support the Bisan's approach to the Clan JumpShip, cut directly across the lead Clan fighter's nose. The Ghost Bear wouldn't even have to maneuver to line up his shot.

  Paired flights of corkscrewing missiles lashed across the Riever's fuselage, followed by a flickering lance of laser fire. The Kurita pilot tried to maneuver away, but a gleaming ball of nickel iron blasted into the F-700's tail, ripping the starboard rudder free of its moorings. Ordinarily, the loss of the tail element would not have affected an aerospace fighter, as long as it did not attempt to enter a planet's atmosphere. In any ship other than the Riever, this would have been the case. The Marik engineers who designed the upgraded F-700R version had replaced the old exhaust ports on the Riever's engines with a specially designed steerable nozzle. This nozzle linked to the same controls that moved the ship's stabilizer, rudders, and other control surfaces during operation within a planet's atmosphere. The control linkage, not destroyed by the Turk-A"s volley, refused to acknowledge that the ship was operating in freefall, and that the second rudder was still there and functional. The balky electronics package also refused to allow either the pilot or the flight computer to alter the angle of steerable nozzles.

  Ge could imagine the Combine fighter pilot cursing the Marik technicians who'd refitted the Riever, when a second volley of missiles and Gauss slugs tore the heart out of his shot-up fighter. As the ship broke up around him, the Riever's pilot ejected. Ge prayed against hope that his tiny escape capsule would be found in the vast, empty darkness.

  * * *

  "Star Captain, there is an Achilles Class DropShip bearing down on us, at three-two-zero, mark one."

  Hector, who had run out of curses, stared balefully at the tiny, dagger-like icon speeding silently toward his crippled JumpShip. The Wind's PPCs were doing their best to slow or turn the enemy craft, but the Achilles shrugged off the damage as if the charged-particle streams were nothing more than a spray of water.

  The assault ship's icon seemed to merge with the Wind's as the smaller vessel darted past the JumpShip. Scant moments later, the Invader's hull rang with a deep, hollow boom. A freeborn crewrnan let out a yelp of surprise as Hector's second-in-command reported that a pair of small combat transports had grappled with the Winter Wind. A few heartbeats later, the exec reported that Inner Sphere marines were storming aboard.

  Hector merely nodded and recited the old proverb: "It is a good day to die."

  * * *

  "Here we go, Major!" Maeda Ge shouted over the commline.

  Ryan was cut off in mid-acknowledgement.

  At more than six hundred kilometers per hour, the Bisan streaked directly toward the bulbous nose and bridge section of the Clan Invader. When the Bisan's navigation computer told him he was in the optimum position, Ge ordered the NL-42 battle taxis, which were nestled in the DropShip's small craft bay, to be launched.

  As bumpy a ride as the Bisan's breakaway from the Haruna had been, there was no comparison to the buffeting Ryan and his team suffered when the tiny steel ball of a battle taxi was kicked out of the Bisan's armored launch bay.

  "Hang on, Major!" Yacob Grimm shouted from the command deck. With gut-wrenching speed, the little taxi swung through a ninety-degree arc, until it was literally flying backward. Grimm fired the ship's maneuvering drive, chopping its speed dramatically. The two-hundred-ton craft shuddered as the powerful engines strove to override the momentum imparted by the Bisan's highspeed dash along the Clan JumpShip's needle-like spine. In seconds, the tiny craft had slowed almost to a stop. Grimm yanked the throttle back, cutting the NL-42's thrust to almost zero as he worked to line the taxi up with the Clan ship's forward pressure hatch.

  "Fire the grapples."

  A thump, more felt than heard, marked the launch of a pair of large rocket-driven cylinders. Though they weren't weapons, the projectiles carried a payload as dangerous to the Winter
Wind as any explosive warhead. A few meters from the hull of the Clan Invader, a tiny radar set triggered the grappling unit's powerful electromagnetic grapples.

  "Grapples set. Reels turning." Gunner's Mate Erin Hoey looked up from her weapon panel. The magnetic hooks were tethered to the NL-42 by fifty meters of high-tensile strength steel tow cable. As powerful winches mounted in the taxi's lower structure began reeling in the cables, the transport pod began to settle against the Invader's hull. Grimm fed a little more fuel to the ship's attitude controls to cushion the jarring stop, which, in the first training exercise he had flown with DEST Team Six, had sent the commandos tumbling to the deck of the DropShip's bay. This time—the result of long practice at Defiance, and while the fleet was recharging its jump engines at dozens of star systems since—Grimm brought the little taxi to rest with only the mildest of bumps.

  "Lock the winches," Grimm ordered, then switched to Ryan's channel. "We're down and locked. Go!"

  26

  NL-42 Battle Taxi

  Unnamed Star System

  Deep Periphery

  15 December 3059 1850 Hours

  Even before the pilot had begun his excited shout, Peter Wu yanked open the taxi's aft hatch and leapt out onto the Invader's hull. Privates Nakamura and Akida followed quickly, the latter carrying a large ballistic nylon satchel. Seconds later, the taxi's superstructure thrummed as the shock wave generated by five kilos of pentaglycerine cast into a highly efficient shaped charge smashed the pressure hatch's lock. As the portal cycled open, Ryan felt a second and third explosion through the soles of his feet. Through the NL-42's open hatch, he saw Wu launch himself feet first into the open pressure hatch.

  "Hatchway clear." The young commando's voice was tight with adrenaline and the joy of battle.

  "All right! Go! Go! Go! Ronin One is going in." The rest of the assault party had already joined Wu inside the airlock before Ryan's armored feet touched the Invader's hull. There, the troopers could use more subtle methods for opening the hatch. Leaving his bag of explosive tricks alone, Akida simply yanked open a circuit panel, grateful for the Kage suit's enhanced strength, and hot-wired the hatch override.

  The DEST team swarmed out of the lock and into the corridor beyond, where they were met by laser fire. A detachment of the Clan ship's security force had assembled in the crew's common area adjacent to the pressure lock. Five armored Elementals launched an attack on the invading commandos.

  "Chiksho!" Ryan cursed as a burst of automatic weapon fire stitched a line of shallow divots in his Kage suit's breastplate. The suddenness and intensity of the Elemental's onslaught caught him by surprise. He had expected resistance, but the Qanners seemed driven more by rage than by a desire to defend their ship.

  Kashira Raiko desperately pumped a half dozen shots into a charging Elemental before the hulking warrior pitched over onto the deck. The Clan warrior fell less than a meter from Raiko's position. Charlotte Sior and Ralph Carter, acting, as always, like a single pair of hands, laced the torso armor of a second Clanner with highly accurate laser fire. Only the combined assault of two Blazer rifles, firing in rapid volleys, dropped the massive trooper before he could fire his third shot. When they checked the downed warriors, the DEST troopers saw the thick black sludge that characterized the Elemental suit's reaction to severe trauma, flowing into the wounds. The Elemental which Raiko believed he had killed, or at least incapacitated, was struggling to rise. He finished the Clanner off with a point-blank laser blast to the head.

  In the face of the sudden, unexpected ferocity of the strike team's response, the remaining Elementals took shelter in the open doorways of the crew quarters. Ryan's men were forced to root them out. Twice, laser bolts flashed uncomfortably close as he directed the assault. The scientists who had developed the Kage suits had tried to assure him that the armor could not be damaged by most anti-personnel weapons, but Ryan knew better. There was no body armor that was absolute proof against all small arms. The desperate street fighting in Imperial City during the Smoke Jaguar invasion of Luthien had proved that. It was proved again, right in front of him, when another Elemental was hurled back against a bulkhead, his armor shattered by a high-explosive armor-piercing grenade from the launcher carried by Teji Nakamura.

  Ryan was grateful that the Elementals were limited to using light anti-personnel weapons rather than the more powerful 'Mech-killers their suits had been designed to carry. Small lasers, heavy machine guns, or flamers stood a good chance of damaging one or more of the JumpShip's vital systems. The short-range missiles normally carried in the twin triangular shoulder mounts were likewise useless. Their big, armor-piercing warheads might penetrate the ship's thin armor, opening a breach in the hull.

  The DEST troopers were similarly limited in their choice of weapons. Teji Nakamura had, rather vocally, expressed his desire to carry one of the new, man-portable Gauss rifles, until Ryan pointed out the effects of explosive decompression.

  The last Elemental threw himself into an insane, berserker-like charge. Talon Sergeant Raiko showed why he had lived long enough to become one of the most senior noncommissioned officers in the DEST program. Even encumbered by the Kage suit's bulk, Raiko spun like a top. A sharp hum filled the air, followed by an unpleasant screech. The decapitated Elemental collapsed in a heap. The sergeant ended his graceful, almost dance-like movement in an en garde position, with his faintly glowing vibrokatana held above his head, the blade parallel to the deck.

  "Are you finished, Sergeant?"

  Seeing that his opponent was down, Raiko relaxed out of his jodan posture, nodded at his commander, smoothly returning the weapon to its sheath.

  "Finished."

  Ryan grinned behind his armored mask. "All right, move out."

  Quickly, following the deck plan mapped out on their suits' navigational systems, the strike team set off for the JumpShip's bridge. Once, during that short trip, they were engaged by Clan security troops.

  The attack left private Ralph Carter nursing a right leg lacerated by shell fragments and splinters of his armor. An unarmored crewman had opened fire on the team from the cover of a half-closed access hatch. Careless of what damage he might inflict on his own ship, the Clansman loosed a five-shot burst from a gyroslug carbine at the advancing commandos. Three of the mini-rockets impacted on Carter's Kage suit. Though the battle armor was designed to stop all but the heaviest of small-arms attacks, the laminated steel, plastic, and ceramic armor failed to completely deflect the high-velocity explosive-tipped slugs.

  Carter let out a yelp of surprise and pain as his leg collapsed under him. Peter Wu, the team's advance guard, snapped off a burst of Blazer fire, but the ambusher had already dodged behind the heavy steel hatch cover. When Wu and Corporal Hollis darted forward to engage the Clanner at close range, he slammed the hatch in their armored faces.

  "Dammit! He locked it," Wu growled, tugging with all of his suit-amplified strength.

  "Don't worry, Pete," Kenichi Akida said, chuckling as he extracted a pre-packaged breaching charge from his carryall. "I remembered to bring the keys."

  Carlotta Sior gave no attention to the vignette being played out at the hatch. She was kneeling beside Carter's damaged suit.

  "Genki des, Lo," Carter snarled, more embarrassed than hurt. "I'm all right. He just peppered me, that's all."

  "He more than just peppered you, boy," Sior gazed in shocked horror at the miniature craters in Carter's leg armor. "You got a couple of good-size holes in your suit. Thank God the whole ship isn't decompressed, or you'd be painted all over the inside of your armor by now."

  "I tell you I'm fine, Lo." Carter slapped his partner's claw-hands away and struggled to his feet. "The medi-pack is taking care of the wound, and if you'll slap an armor patch over those holes, I'll be fine."

  Before Sior could reply, the cry "Fire in the hole," sounded from her commline.

  Three seconds later, a sharp bang, loud enough to be heard plainly through the suit's thick helmet, resounded in
the passageway. Wu and Hollis dove through the shattered hatch, rolling to their feet in the area beyond. Sweeping the room, their weapons following their eyes, the troopers saw no sign of the Clanner, alive or dead.

  Carter spat out a torrent of invective, calling down curses on his assailant and his family, forgetting that the ambusher, like all trueborn Clansmen, had no real parents or family, except for his or her sibkin all derived from the same eugenics program. Winding down, Carter's voice dropped to a wicked hiss.

  "Good, that just means I get a chance to kill the beggar."

  Sior paused in her efforts to apply the self-adhesive patch to Carter's suit.

  "Ralph, I've never seen you like this."

  "You've never seen me shot before. When someone puts a bullet in me, I take it kind of personally. It's one of my faults."

  "Carter, you okay to stay with us?" Ryan's voice held a note of concern, both for the condition of his injured man and for the status of his mission.

  "Yeah, boss. I'll be fine." Carter gestured at the new, black square of high-strength composite his partner had affixed to his suit. "Just as long as the bad guys don't take this patch as a mark to shoot at."

  Ryan nodded, forgetting for a moment that his helmet and faceplate masked the gesture.

  "Okay, move out. Wu, take the point."

  The DEST team had only gone a couple of dozen meters when Ryan's helmet commline buzzed with an incoming message.

  "Ronin One, this is Ronin Two. Primary objective secured. Casualties light. Ronin Two is moving against secondary objective."

  The brief, cryptic message meant that Ronin Two, consisting of DEST Teams Four and Five, had managed to attack and seize the Invader's engineering spaces without sustaining any serious casualties, and were now on their way to assault the JumpShip's docking bays. Ryan acknowledged the report, adding that he and his team were two decks below the bridge, their primary objective.