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Trial by Fire
The tales of the Angry Targets continues
by Commander Truestar |
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In the Home Corner...
The Angry Targets were tired, battered, cramped and ready for a rest. Many of them had not seen their home since they had left Solaris under the command of Crazy Al and his 44th. Al had died on Small during the raid the "Irregular Lancers" had performed on that world. It was even while they were out-bound that "Katrina" Steiner-Davion had been asked, by her then ruling sister Yvonne Steiner-Davion, to assume the throne of the Federated Commonwealth. And it was early in their transport that the Lancer's new "boss" had made fateful choices regarding the Lancer's future. Those had brought them to grief, and to Warlock. Responding with words of fire, guaranteed to inflame hatred, New Lancer Commander John Kupski had earned the anger of the Princess-Archon as well as better contract terms. And thus was the Regiment's fate worsened. Now, short the company plus of captured St. Ives mechs, and short a company of the mechs they started with as well as all air and artillery assets, they faced yet another foe. Reduced to a short regiment until they could reach Solaris again, no one was sure if they were up to the test at hand...
And in the Challenger's Corner....
Colonel Sir Krispen Romanov had considered all the facts since being placed in charge of the Lancer's detention at first, housing after the general amnesty. He knew he did not like them but he also knew that the proof needed to convict them had not come to light yet. Like many, he was frustrated when the planned trial was dropped. Honor prevented him from leaping to judgment or acting to punish, honor stemming both from not having evidence as well as obeying orders. But honor also called that these people not go unpunished if they were in fact guilty.
Of course the camera video from the FedCom dropships was damning, but this would not be the first time that Feddies were lying about someone. Nor just the Feddies as Sir Krispen remembered from his earlier days and the fight against the Grey Death Legion on Helm.(1) But all that was left in Sir Krispen's power was a mock battle and an "unofficial" trial by combat. There he could offer the newly re-named "Angry Targets" a rope to hang themselves with. If they invited the fires of hell then such would be granted them, and if they were truely innocent then perhaps that would show through the dust too. But Krispen only knew that someone had to at least try to pay back the blood of innocents and his were the only hands to which that task might fall.
The First Shock of Light and Fire:
Romanov had control of the excersize and had enough leeway to make it a mandatory party for the "Targets". But Sir Krispen wanted to make sure that they had all the rope they needed to hang without the Crusaders help. He did not want anyone turning this into mud splattered on his people, just justice. The simulator was laid out in the form of a three by two kilometer plot of rolling hills with complexes of civilian buildings, production and warehouse facilities and a lakeside resort. Criss-crossed by long-running highways it would favor the ranged combat that suited the Targets main power as well as the heavier of his First and Second battalion mechs. It would also lure the Targets to use their remaining artillery so Sir Krispen could see just how careless they would be with it.
Sir Krispen took the center of the line as well as arraying his First Battalion to either side. He was the challenger and would make his deployment the first test. In a staggered line of fire support behind a combat line of strikers filled with cavalry and scout mechs, he took the center field with his Second battalion arrayed similarly on his north front. The Cavalry mechs of the Third battalion were arrayed on the South flank intermixed with the buildings of a cluster of "virtual" suburbs. There the weaker but faster mechs would have the cover of buildings to add strength to their lines. If the "new Commander" of these Angry Targets were a man of true honor, he would face the center, face Krispen..and fight openly. Sir Krispen then sat back and waited for the Targets to assume the field and the initial test....
A test they failed.
The Joining of Battle
With only sixty eight combat units vs the Crusader's ninety six, it was obvious to Targets Commander Haas that a head on confrontation was not the answer. Hell, he thought, none of this was the answer...that was packing up and going home. But that answer was not permitted the Angry Targets. They had been briefed on the low weapons setting "excersize" and the things they might do to have Colonel Sir Romanov turn the energy weapons up to full. Of course, those were breaches of honor that Sir Krispen expected, and acts that Haas was determined would not come to pass. But the Angry Targets were not the Grey Death or the Wolf's Dragoons. So in his determination to make this "spanking" at least less than 100% one-sided Haas chose his plan of action. The Crusader's Third Battalion was the weakest and he saw the building cluster they deployed in as the chance to dominate in small groups of heavy mechs supported by cavalry mech clusters. While keeping the fire AWAY from the buildings, and thus the "virtual civilians", he could claim small patches of the field at a time rather than being forced to fight for it all. Then he could fortify the area and let the Crusader's First and Second march onto his guns to dig him out. Sir Krispen was not surprised that the Targets would take a tactical solution over the "most" honorable path, but the tactic was at least a smart and valid one. But heaven help the Targets if they dared risk killing civvies or intentionally shooting up the buildings.
Krispen's XO had set up a tactical feed to keep track of the Lone air command, a 60 ton Stingray and a 50 ton gunship converted from a Planetlifter. The design idea, apparently pulled from the wars of the late 20th century of Terra, was to stick an artillery piece out the side door of the craft and fire arty from the skies. A fittingly brutal and vile weapon from a bloody and vicious age, fitting for the time and for the Targets. And as the Targets mechs began to light his main tactical display he saw the charge they were making at third Battalion and started issuing orders.
Full of Sound and Fury
Now the battle was joined. The Crusader's Second Battalion was forced to settle for filling the sky with fire once the arty-mounted Gunship fired its first round. Sir Krispen would have paid good M-Bills to have a camera mounted in that gunship cockpit. Their faces would be a sight in the surprise and panic of the moment. His review of their history showed that those pilots had never faced the light gauss rifles mounted in his four new Perseus Omnimechs. Given that, it must have been a real surprise to find themselves under fire when they expected to be hanging out of range. Added to that was the storm of ERPPC fire at extreme ranges that the pilots of the Second Battalion put up. The fire was not likely connect or do damage but Romanov counted on rattling them more than shooting them out of the sky. And as the battle would rage on, that tactic worked as the panic pilots quickly dropped to landing altitude behind some of the rolling hills west of the Crusader line.
As for the ground battle, The First Crusaders would have to move hard to join the battle quickly but there would be long moments past before the Second would be able to even make their shots felt at extreme range. That left it to the Third as the Angry Targets took full advantage of the ground they had been allowed to deploy on to try to get up close and personal. True to Romanov's orders, The Commander of Third "batt" held his pilots to spreading the fire around. He wanted all the Targets to get a feel for what was coming their way. The Targets, for their part concentrated their fire. First Lieutenant VonFeilitzschn of the Urban assault held his troops to a standing volley as they tried to cut into the left torso of a Crusader Orion-1M. While most of the pilots did not have the skill to make their called shots strike, some did. Added to that was the heavy flow of fire that washed over the entire mech as aim points missed the left torso to strike other sections of the mech. Soon the mech blossomed into a fiery ball as enemy fire met internal ammunition racks and ripped the computer image of the machine apart! The Angry Targets massed fire had claimed first blood as the other groups of standing or mobile targets mechs chose a target and burned away at it.
Having claimed a victim, the Targets line began to boil forward as the Third Crusaders mechs moved back into the cover of buildings. Vying to use skill and experience over big guns and luck, the Third had unleashed a vicious attack of its own. Several Targets mechs had been hammered and Second Lieutenant Helice was not the only pilot hanging in his harness as he fought to stand his 100 ton King Crab up after the loss of over six tons of armor! In addition, the first rush to position had the 40th Jelly's Jaguars anchoring the north flank of the Targets line in a stand of heavy woods. Having no other enemies in range, the gunners of the First Battalion fired on that position as they moved up. Lawrence Jelal felt the brunt of the wave against his command in his 65 ton Catapult. Secure in his cover, he was surprised by a wave of fire from the unexpectedly skilled pilots of the Crusader's Command Lance as well as other Crusader unit commanders. In addition to that first wave of fire came the completely unexpected assault on their position by a lance of Crusaders light mechs!
The two 25 ton Tarantulas, 35 ton Jenner and 30 ton Spider were too light for the real battle but they rushed forward to strike at the fading Jaguars as they abandoned their positions as well as firing on the trees to reduce the cover afforded the Angry Targets mechs. Damaged, the Jelly's Jaguars began to fall back and, also similarly damaged, the Crusaders Lights passed through and turned north to escape the battle.
Now the battle was at "knife fighting range" as lighter mechs of the Third struggled with the main force of the Angry Targets. Another two mechs of the Third fell as the Targets poured it on with several lances on both sides being forced back from the heat of the fire. Mitch Trencher, commander of the Crusader's Third, knew he had to fall back and at least redress his line. Giving ground would give the Targets the center core of apartment complex but there was little option there except to loose more mechs. While his people had crippled a number of Targets mechs, the Targets had them in numbers dropped.
Finally, after the first wave of heavy fire from the north, Warrant Officer Adora Lucilla made the presence of her Stingray Aerospace fighter felt. She knew it was a stupid move when she committed to it. She knew that below her would be elite and veteran pilots, and she knew she had no support at all. But accepting that no one lived forever and also knowing this was a simulator so it would not be real she called the ball and dove for a strafe that would cover almost all the mechs of The Romanov's Crusader's First Battalion. And one hell of a ride it was as she held on thought the buffeting of more fire than she had ever seen in any one piece of sky ever! She was actually amazed she still had any weapons left to fire or power to fire them with as she came over what her computer informed her was the strafe zone. And even as the fighter began to fly apart she laid down a lace of deadly fire that ripped into many mechs...including that driven by Colonel Sir Krispen Romanov! But Haas and his ground pounders had no time for the fireworks display of the strafe or the rending explosion as the the computer painted ruined fragments of wing and the tumbling engine mount as the fighter came apart. They were locked in a lightning battle of autocannons, missiles and lasers bound by the almost instant death of blue-white PPC fire.
The Angry Targets had definatly won the early stages of the battle but the weight of the Crusaders had yet to be felt.
Commander Truestar
Starlight Strike Team, Team Banzai |
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