A Silence in the Heavens

by Unknown

  Envelop them. I want attacks from the rear. I want attacks wherever you can find them. Forward, guide on me!”

  She set the Ryoken II in motion toward the enemy lines, reveling Tassa Kay–like in the knowledge that she was about to do something which few in the Inner Sphere could do better. She was a Kerensky, and for those of her Bloodname, fighting in a BattleMech went gene-code deep. The ’Mech’s skeleton was her skeleton, its armored skin, her skin. After a lifetime’s practice, she needed no more thought to guide seventy-five tons of deadly metal than she needed to walk in boots and leather through the dark streets of Tigress or Dieron or Achernar.

  “Galaxy Commander.” The words sounded in her ear. “We are picking up a signal from the Northwind troops. They have it on all frequencies.”

  “Patch it through,” she said. Now a smattering of fire was coming her way. Ahead, a tank destroyer behind a camouflage net spouted fire. She targeted it, without pausing to calculate, and sent a Streak in its direction.

  They would have to move or die.

  A babble of rising and falling voices sounded over the cockpit’s speakers.

  “What is that?” Anastasia demanded.

  “The Highlanders’ signal, Galaxy Commander. They are singing.”

  Now that she was listening, she could make out words in the babble. “ . . . if you’ve never been laid on a Saturday night, you’ve never been laid at all!”

  “So they are,” she said. “And badly.” Though Tassa Kay remembered that chorus very well, and a Highlander on a boring DropShip transit who had claimed that the song had over five-hundred and fifty-six verses, though he himself could only recall forty-two of them.

  He had been wrong. Tassa Kay had counted them one night, and he knew forty-seven, at least when he was drunk. Anastasia wondered if he was out there singing again today.

  “The Highlanders are making their location known for us,” she said. “Target them.”

  Beside her, a Demon tank stopped abruptly, lurching sidewise on melted and deflating tires as the ammo in its rotary autocannon arced and sparked. The Demon’s hatch sprang open and its crew ran for cover—any second now, the tank’s flamers would catch, and anyone left inside would be caught in the fireball. Anastasia traced back the probable trajectory of the barrage of missiles that had taken out the tank, and put a burst of pulse particles onto the location.

  Forward, she thought. Do not outrun the troops, but lead them. The Highlanders have nothing, no hope of resistance, or they would not have been seeking delay.

  A line of fire stitched up the Ryoken II ’s leg, chewing at the surface layers of metal and myomer—an autocannon, tracking and ranging her. She spun toward the enemy and engaged the Ryoken II ’s jump jets, in order to ruin the autocannon’s firing solution.

  Hitting the ground running, she sprinted toward the autocannon emplacement—past lasers to left and right, their light scattered by the rain but still burning through; past the mud . . . no, into the mud that was churning up. She was wading in mud. They’d drawn her into a bog.

  She deployed the Ryoken II ’s jump jets again, desperately seeking higher ground. Resistance as strong as this could not go on forever. The Highlanders were expending troops at a reckless rate.

  “Star Colonel Darwin!” she demanded over the command circuit. “Darwin, report!”

  “We are taking heavy fire,” came the reply. “And there is a ’Mech over here . . . we have not made the ID

  yet. But we know it is fast, and the engineer says that it must have hell’s own power plant . . . coordinates twelve-thirty-five-one.”

  “I am on my way,” Anastasia said. A ’Mech like that had to belong to the Paladin. “If we are in open rebellion against The Republic, then so be it. Paladins will just have to take their chances.”

  48

  Plains north of Tara

  Northwind

  June, 3133; local summer

  “That’s something you don’t see every day,” murmured Lexa McIntosh in Will’s ear.

  The two of them were sharing a hastily dug foxhole that threatened to fill up with rain before many more hours had passed. The drizzle that had come down intermittently all night was now a steady driving downpour, lashed into sideways sheets by the driving wind. Visibility wasn’t much better than it had been during the night, except when the flashes of lightning lit up the open, rolling landscape.

  “What is it?” Will asked.

  “One—no, make that three—’Mechs. Crossing the ridge line.”

  “I don’t see them.”

  “Wait for the next lightning flash . . . there.”

  Will squinted out through the rain. Yes, she was right. Three dark, lumbering shapes were moving out onto the battlefield and toward the Highlander lines.

  “Identification,” he said. “We need identification.”

  Lexa fumbled in the cargo pocket of her fatigue trousers and pulled out a waterproof flip chart of silhouettes.

  “Give me a moment to look ’em up, all right?”

  “You mean you don’t have them all memorized yet?”

  Lexa sneered. “I don’t see you calling out their marks and mods either.”

  Will looked over her shoulder as she riffled through the pages of the chart, then looked back toward the Steel Wolf lines. “These look like ForestryMechs,” he said. “Maybe a MiningMech. Look at that big-ass saw.”

  “Not too dangerous, then,” Lexa said.

  “That’s like saying a rabid bulldog isn’t too dangerous just because it isn’t a rabid lion,” Will said. “And there’s no telling what some of those retrofit jobs might have bolted on them. We ought to report them in.”

  Tara Campbell, in the cockpit of her Hatchetman BattleMech, held her position in the center of the Highlanders’ battle line. Her work here would be command and control—and protecting the center of the line against the tanks, heavy artillery, and ’Mechs that Anastasia Kerensky would undoubtedly send against them. Meanwhile, Ezekiel Crow, in his lighter, faster Blade, would be roving the battle from hot spot to hot spot, applying force and speed quickly where it was most needed.

  A volley of smoke cylinders from the Highlander artillery discharged their white puffs of smoke in front of the battle line. The smoke was not as effective in the rain and wind as it would have been on a fair-weather battlefield, but every obscuring wisp was a small added advantage for the defenders, increasing the fog of war and making their numbers harder to guess and to target.

  “Report,” she said to the command talker over the Hatchetman ’s comms. “I want the position of the nearest enemy ’Mechs.”

  “Word just in puts three Industrials out by gridposit twenty-one-twenty-three-eight,” the command talker said.

  She checked her cockpit map display. Gridposit 21–23–8 was close enough to be a direct threat to the center of the Northwind line. It looked like Anastasia Kerensky wasn’t intending to do things the slow and careful way.

  “Put a tank with medium-range missiles onto them,” Tara ordered by way of the command talker. “I’ll be along shortly.”

  She brought the Hatchetman striding out through the Highlander lines, heading for 21–23–8 at a steady, moderate pace. No need to build up too much heat in the opening of what promised to be a brisk and energetic dance. As she went, she looked about for the IndustrialMechs—and there they were, a trio of dark shapes looming up out of the fog and rain, ugly blocky things that lacked the clean, designed-to-kill lines of a true BattleMech. Nevertheless, the Schmitt tank engaging them was outclassed and clearly knew it, though it pressed its attack boldly, dashing in close to fire a volley and retreating rapidly out of range.

  “These are mine,” she said to the tank. “Get clear.”

  The Schmitt pulled away through the rain at top speed, waves of muddy water flying up from under its wheels as it ran. Lightning flashed overhead, and thunder rumbled as Tara Campbell engaged her prey.

  Ezekiel Crow was hunting. The Blade BattleMech strode quickly
through the fray, not pausing to expend its ammo on lesser targets than other ’Mechs. An all-day slugging match would not help the people of Tara.

  Even with all of the region’s noncombatant public services put to work in the evacuation, no army could buy enough time for everyone in the city to reach safety. If the Highlander line broke—or even if the Highlanders did not break, but stood and died to the last man and the last woman—when the battle-maddened Steel Wolves poured into the streets of the capital, buildings would burn and people would die.

  The only sure salvation lay in forcing the Wolves to retreat. And for that, he needed to engage the modified Ryoken II that battlefield intelligence reported as the mount of Anastasia Kerensky. Engage it, and kill it.

  Without their leader, the Steel Wolves would turn and run like the dogs they at heart remained.

  “Do you have a location yet on the Wolves’ commander?” he asked the command talker over the Blade ’s cockpit comms.

  “We’re showing a big mass of iron five klicks on your left flank, at about the right speed constraints. That could be her.”

  “I’m going over to take a look.” Crow moved from a trot to a run.

  “Who is it rides the Blade ?” Anastasia Kerensky demanded of the Steel Wolves’ battlefield intelligence officer. “And who the Hatchetman ?”

  She could see both of the ’Mechs from where she was advancing toward the Highlander lines in her Ryoken II . The Hatchetman loomed over the infantry in the Northwind center—a hunch-shouldered, broad-chested brute, its right arm terminating in a huge, depleted-uranium-edged ax. There was nothing at all subtle about a Hatchetman; it was a brawler and a thug, a ’Mech for someone who liked close-in, dirty fighting.

  The Blade, now, that roamed back and forth along the Northwind front—if any ’Mech could be described as elegant (besides, of course, her own beloved and specially modified Ryoken II ), it was a Blade . Tall, fast-moving, and lightly armored, the Blade was a fencer’s ’Mech, or a sprinter’s.

  Anastasia Kerensky was willing to bet that the delicate, yellow-haired Countess of Northwind piloted a Blade .

  “Battlefield intelligence here,” a voice said over the Ryoken II ’s cockpit comms. “As of last report, Galaxy Commander, Paladin of the Sphere Ezekiel Crow uses a Blade BattleMech.”

  And I would have lost my bet, Anastasia thought. “So the Hatchetman belongs to the pretty little Countess.”

  “That is strongly probable.”

  “Who would have thought it?” Anastasia said. “Someday she and I will have to try one another—but not today, I think.”

  She looked out over the rainswept battlefield, and saw the tall, lean shape of the Blade coming toward her at a lope.

  “Today I have a Paladin to kill.”

  Three ’Mechs against her one, and all the IndustrialMechs were sluggers—Tara Campbell brought her Hatchetman into action at a ground-shaking run, wondering as she did so whether the Wolves had modified the ’Mechs to be more suitable for battle.

  As if in answer, the nearest of the three—a ForestryMech, by the huge chainsaw that formed its right arm—turned toward her and raised the other arm. An autocannon chittered, spouting bright flashes of light.

  Whirlwind series autocannon, said her memory of intelligence reports and battles past. The Hatchetman ’s armor could take it. A Whirlwind was a light weapon, suitable for impressing other Industrials. Let him see what a real BattleMech could do. She let her targeting computer handle the job of aiming, and fired the Imperator Automatic Ultra 10 autocannon in the Hatchetman ’s right torso.

  The Imperator spat out hot flame and metal, forcing the modified ForestryMech to dodge, even as Tara sighted in on the one next nearest—a MiningMech, this time, probably with a bolt-on weapons package of its own. She targeted the MiningMech with her laser, vaporizing the pouring rain into a fog bank burned through with dazzling red light. The laser wouldn’t do as much damage today as it could under better conditions—its beam was diffracted and dispersed and reflected by the sheets of falling rain—but the MechWarrior Tara was facing would still know that he’d been in a fight.

  Sweat started beading on her forehead as the heat buildup in the Hatchetman ’s cockpit ramped up. Firing two weapons at once, while attacking at a dead run—it was a damned good thing that her ’Mech had superior heat dissipation, and that she was fighting in an icy rainstorm on top of it.

  Missiles flashed out ahead of her. She checked her cockpit displays, looking for the source. Not the ForestryMech—he was away to her left and going for position. The missiles came from the two remaining—they were both modified MiningMechs, all right, firing short-range missiles, in clusters, inbound.

  Tara spun right to take the hits on the Hatchetman ’s left torso. If she had to sacrifice a weapon, the autocannon would be the one to let go, because she was going to need the capabilities the hatchet gave her.

  The struggle with the three ’Mechs would be a knock-down hand-to-hand ’Mech fight, and a knock-down, hand-to-hand weapon was what she had—the great crushing ax at the end of her ’Mech’s right arm.

  49

  Plains north of Tara

  Northwind

  June, 3133; local summer

  Anastasia Kerensky turned her Ryoken II to face the onrushing Blade . The light ’Mech had nothing for armor, its lasers couldn’t match her own heavier weapons, and she outweighed it by forty tons. This ought to be an easy kill, but she knew better than to make assumptions. A Paladin of the Sphere did not achieve that position by being an incompetent MechWarrior, and if Ezekiel Crow preferred to use a Blade, he must have learned years ago how to compensate for its disadvantages and make the most of its advantages.

  The Blade was still coming at her, moving faster than before. The streaming rain blurred its outline in her view. Lightning flashed, dazzling her briefly—the fast-moving storm had to be almost directly above the battlefield by now, just as the Paladin’s Blade was almost on top of her. She activated the Ryoken II ’s jump jets and launched herself into the air.

  The Blade raised its right arm, the Mydron Model RC Rotary autocannon tracking Anastasia as she leapt, the high-explosive, armor-piercing shells striking her legs and lower torso as she descended and brought her

  ’Mech’s arms smashing down against the lighter Blade —and struck only air as the Blade spun away, using its greater speed and agility to twist and burn her with a medium-range laser all the way down.

  She landed the Ryoken II unharmed on its feet, then buffeted the Paladin’s Blade with one massive metal arm and laughed to see him fall, roll, and come back to his feet.

  “That had to have hurt,” she said, and powered up the twin lasers on the Ryoken II . “Now see how you like this.”

  The Blade turned and ran, heading back uphill toward the Highlander lines. The strokes of lightning that played across the sky illuminated its progress with a jerky, strobe-like light. The Ryoken II ’s hammer blow and the Blade ’s resulting fall had crippled the lighter ’Mech, and its normally graceful gait was clumsy and wavering.

  Anastasia let out a whoop of savage delight, and gave chase.

  Lightning flashed and zigzagged over the battlefield as Ezekiel Crow took his Blade up the long slope at a deliberately stumbling pace, with Anastasia Kerensky’s Ryoken II close at its heels. He gave ironic thanks to the deity he had not believed in since Chang-an burned that the Clans professed to be above deception and subterfuge.

  They weren’t, of course—in Crow’s judgment, there was no man or woman living who was above deceit—but their disdain for the use of such tactics tended to make them exceptionally bad at recognizing deception in action. In her zeal to follow and finish off what she perceived as a damaged and failing ’Mech, Anastasia Kerensky gave no sign of realizing that his Blade, for all its tantalizing closeness and limping gait, nevertheless managed to stay ahead of her pursuing Ryoken II all the way up the hill.

  Crow reached the crest line of the hill with a safe lead on the R
yoken II, and as soon as he was over the top and out of Anastasia’s sight he put the Blade into a fast sprint. For what he was going to try next, he wanted to put plenty of downhill distance between himself and Kerensky.

  Lightning flashed again overhead, multiple strokes coming close together, turning the Ryoken II into a stark picture in black and white as it strode inexorably into view on the crest line. Another blaze of lightning. Crow lifted his right arm and shot the Blade ’s extended-range medium laser into the air over the Ryoken II ’s shoulder. Lightning flashed again overhead—and the stroke followed the laser’s trail of ionized air back down toward the nearest high target: Anastasia Kerensky’s ’Mech.

  Trails of electricity crawled over the Ryoken II ’s armored surface like blue and purple worms. It took one step downhill, then another—slower and more awkward—before its systems seized up completely and it stiffened, toppled, and fell.

  Tara Campbell felt the impact of the MiningMechs’ short-range missiles as a series of explosions rippling up the Hatchetman ’s left side, staggering her and driving her sideways. The Warrior in the ForestryMech saw his opportunity and charged, his ’Mech’s huge chainsaw roaring.

  That chainsaw could slice right through the Hatchetman ’s light Durallex armor. He’d be going for her ax, Tara thought, and she didn’t dare lose her primary weapon. The displays from her left side sensors were flickering, and the Imperator autocannon on that side was definitely jammed—all she had left there was the left arm itself. In a pinch it would make a good club, but nothing more than that.

  She turned to face the onrushing ForestryMech, lit it up with her Defiance extended-range medium laser, then started the Hatchetman pacing into its charge in long, ground-eating strides, following the laser beam in.

  She was peripherally aware of the two MiningMechs to her right, both of them running toward her with the peculiar lumbering gait of Industrials.