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Foothills Battle, The
A 'real life' battle between Mercs and forces from House Liao
by Commander Truestar |
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The Battle of Mountain's Foot
Part Two
Date of Game: June 2000
(Warning: This report is based on the opinions that would have been held by the characters involved and do not reflect the opinions of the Game Master or the players)
Sooo One minute ago...
Only ten days were granted the Liao survivors before The Angry Targets were after them once more. Sang-Shao Quan Teng had made his decisions and so had Targets Commander Haas. That road was now littered with broken armor, shattered mech limbs and burning combat units. Teng had called to his people to withdraw at their best ability but to keep organized, less the Angry Targets Stingray controlling the skies come sweeping down on them. Lieutenant Deva Bartley had come to his senses hanging from his control chair in his downed mech as Warrant Officer Washington Piper barked orders and prepared to withdraw the Pale Horses from combat. Lieutenant Frank Clyburn was now considering the future actions of both his 19th Ghostriders and 31st mechanized Infantry. And Commander Gustav Haas was urging his people forward to bring down any of the fleeing Liao machines. What had threatened to be a battle was now a road race without a road. And with Liao Sao-Wei Nicchan's lance in the center of the cauldron, combat could only get hotter or sputter out all together.
Inside a the pinball machine:
For the first time since this latest engagement had begun, Sao-Wei Harris thought it might just be possible for him to get out of this alive. The Raven, detached from Alpha Battalion, first company's scout lance, stood tall on the hill where it had seemed to have fallen but did not [NOTE: correction of the previous AAR]. Harris had not been able to watch the crippling of the enemy Jenner by laser guided missiles as he had been just a bit busy. But now that Raven stood, despite its wounds, ready to stop the downgraded Wolfhounds of the second enemy lance as it had the three Jenners. Harris' commander was not so sure of his Junior officer's escape though. But sure or not, he had teamed the remainder of his lance with Sao-Wei Ghousa's to take down the on-rushing Ghostriders if they could. But even as he readied for success, Nicchan ordered his lance to give ground to integrate with Ghousa.
For his part, Deva Bartley got his ride up to its feet as gently as he could and still get the hell out. The gyro hit he had taken was not going to make that easy though. Warrant Officer Aleron Galton teamed up with Washington Piper to cover Bartley's retreat even as they pulled back themselves. From his Marauder, First Lieutenant Patrick Harrigan had plans for Galton though as his Scythes flowed with Commander Haas and the rest of the Targets. And as Bartley's people pulled back, First Lieutenant Frank Clyburn considered his options.......Options that is.
Full of sound and fury:
And as the battle prepared to spiral one way or the other, much hinged on the seconds that followed. Clyburn and his people knew their job, and likely the survival of one of their pilots, hanged on taking the 35 ton Raven down and doing it NOW! Sao-Wei Billie, piloting the Raven had cursed at not having killed the Jenner outright even as he fought the waves of fire that had almost pushed him off his perch. Laughing at the idiots who poured twice the fire into Harris' crippled Blackjack than they had leveled at his Raven, Billie chose to dare the fire once more...He did not choose wisely....Nicchan and Ghousa's people took their positions and Harris pulled as far back as his crippled mech could. Clyburn led his Ghostriders up to fire on the Liao Raven as Harris raised the remaining arm on his Blackjack to lock up the on-rushing Angry Targets mechs. And as the two forces moved to fire, the Raven lowered the targeting reticule for his TAG and pulled the trigger..........And lit up a rock.
Signifying nothing:
The physics of laser guided munitions are very simplistic, often in many ways like the pilots that spot for them. Lighting up a rock did nothing for the supposedly smart munitions that looked for a specific heat signature. And as the laser-seeking rounds flew by, they took the hopes of the defending Liao troopers with them. Nicchan and Ghousa knew that the enemy line was going to fall on them and it was time to get out. Harris knew he was in for a huge world of hurt and he could not get out of its path. Sang-Shao Quan Teng knew it was time to get the rest of his ragged regiment moving and NOW!
At the same time that Clyburn dodged the bullet, he rallied his people and ordered them to unload on the Raven. Angry Targets Commander Haas could hardly fight both the elation of the moment with the frustration he felt. He watched the secondary monitors as his people ripped the Raven down and poured even more fire into the beliegered Blackjack. Yes, the 45 ton Blackjack still stood...barely. Haas was frustrated at the terrain. The very broken nature of it holding his people back from sweeping down and trapping the Liao formations, preventing him from making any profit at all under the harsh terms of the contract. Yes, his people had even taken a few scratches, but the door was now only held by a lone crippled mech and the artillery was suddenly much less bothersome. Moving up on the east, the heavier assets of the Angry Targets were dodging artillery shots as both the Targets and the Liao were less successful at hurting their enemies. Only the Liao gunners had more success with their random drops as the Targets now moved in easily predictable patterns.
Through the Open Gates:
"Move Move Move!!!", Haas shouted into his mike. It was not nessesarily the fault of his people as they moved cautiously to safeguard against terrain or artillery, but when the line was paced by a 100 ton King Crab... And as he urged them, the Angry Targets began to really surge forward. Liao commander Teng knew it was over and hoped he could get the balance of the stragglers out.....he doubted it but he hoped. Sao-Wei Nicchan knew he was not getting Harris out and knew he had to get the rest of his lance out or loose them too. Harris backed his mech up against a twelve meter cliff, leaning back against it to keep his mech up as the Angry Targets came on. And Clyburn ordered his people up to finish this once and for all while Warrant Officer Galton finished escorting Piper and Bartley to the rear and turned to re-join the battle.
More fire, More artillery, this time dropping in on the Angry Targets Command Company and bounding off the cockpit of Warrant Officer Hurlbert Caroline's 65 ton Catapult. Yet still they moved forward. On the Liao side, firing as they withdrew, heavy fire was poured out against the closing Wolfhounds that led the way. Heavy fire which Clyburn and Nevada both mostly dodged as they closed their Wolfhounds in on Harris' stubborn Blackjack. And as they poured in fire, as Haas moved other forces up under the whip of his voice, Harris leveled the one remaining arm to fire into his attackers. It was during this almost point blank engagement that Harris felt something slip, even as the alerts lit his cockpit with yet more red. The slip was just an instant, but different than the hellish buffet of fire that Harris was fighting to keep his mech standing. But there is a point at which every dam must be washed away by a torrent so devastating. That slip was Harris' "point break" as the battered and torn mech stopped responding to his commands to its left leg. Weapons fire from the light autocannon mounted in the Ghostrider Clint piloted by Warrant Officer Anatola Anwell had cut into the upper leg control electronics of the Blackjack. Rocked by fire, the damage shorted the leg's control circuits for a split second and in that moment the damage being done pushed the Blackjack beyond any hope of recovery. As if that was not bad enough, Sao-Wei Thornton was a new voice of panic in Sang-Shao Quan Teng's ocean of despair. The warrior drove a 70 ton Cataphract attached to what remained of Third Battalion's First Company. The undamaged mech was being well driven throughout the engagement and Thornton was getting it out as ordered. In his attempts to move closer to "escaping the bag", Thornton had activated the mech's MASC myomar acceleration system. The rarely problematic system was a source of concern, but usually not unless it is pressed.
Unfortunately, while Thornton had not used the system in some time, the regiment was on the run. As a result, now as he pressed the activation and tried to move his ride, bad maintenance caught up with him. As the circuit failed, the power that its capacitors were designed to hold pumped that power into the unprotected myomer bundles of the mech's legs. As the tender myomer burned away, the warning lights lit up on Thornton's control panel and emergency interlocks snapped into place to lock the legs of the mech and prevent its outright collapse. In horror, Sao-Wei Thornton realized he was now atop a 70 ton gun turret with a 270 degree arc of fire which was facing directly AWAY from the closing enemy!
The last few steps:
As soon as the Blackjack went down Haas had people on it. Moving her lance of LAMs up to push retreating Liao units back and clear the zone around the fallen mech, Haas had Warrant Officer Sigfreda Penthea trying to raise the downed Liao pilot on open channel. And as they tried to reach him and opened the door for him to surrender, Harris realized that while Nicchan had come to grips with Harris' death, Harris had not. Even as the Ghostriders charged passed him to take to the more open ground through which the Liao forces had retreated, Harris signaled his surrender and began the shutdown of his mech's fusion engine. And even as they passed beyond the bluff against which Harris had leaned his Blackjack, they came under fire from the remote rear-guard units of the enemy regiment. One lance strong, the Angry Targets lead elements stepped out over 180 meters away from their closest firm support and under 600 meters away from the Huron Warrior piloted by Sao-Wei Pharanos Prieg. And as they turned their guns on the Liao rear guard, Warrant Officer Anwell lost out on his chance to celebrate his crippling attack on the Blackjack behind him. His was the lead mech out into the open. His was the first mech to target by a rear guard waiting to be chased. And as he saw the slight electric and chrome flicker, his was the mech targeted by the Gauss rifle mounted on Pharanos Prieg's Huron Warrior. Anwell was suddenly in a fight with his own mech's weight as he lost a full ton of armor to the striking gauss slug as well as more to the laser and missile fire directed at and around his mech. Anwell's fellow mechwarriors, feeling their bruises, also held up rather than charging down the breach.
On the hills, The Liao jumpers half retreated, half dared the LAM pilots to follow too close as they would have to make short slow jumps to stay engaged. Haas knew there were some mechs that would fall but not enough to make the contract pay...and too many might be the mechs driven by his people. Knowing that no one could accuse his people of not making it a good try, Haas knew that the contract had been satisfied and the battle was done. So with Anwell down but his mech still operational, he ordered his people to secure the Cataphract, the Blackjack and the wreckage of the two supply trucks, it was time to clean up and go home.
The Aftermath
Now all that was left was for Haas to march his people back to their pick-up point. As the St. Ives forces moved up to take control, the Targets had begun exploring the wreckage of the trucks. There they had found one more pair of losses to add to Warlock's butcher bill...There they found Warrant Officers Blythe Nicole and Axel Calypso. Not having anywhere to hold their prisoners, the Liao had placed them, one each, aboard their supply trucks. Not using them as human shields, it just happened that each of the two trucks had a captured Angry Targets mechwarrior in it. Blythe Nicole had never had a chance. Her body had been ripped apart by the artillery shrapnel that had destroyed the truck she had been placed in. Calypso had surprisingly come through it without a scratch! In addition, they recovered one of the truck drivers, but he died shortly after of his wounds. Tired and sorely disappointed, Warlock had recalibrated his expectations of The Angry Targets and their employers. And now it was on to Atreus in the Free Worlds League.
Haas had gotten St. Ives to allow his free troops to ride along with the captives who had surrendered to St. Ives at the Airfield battle. And Haas knew that if the regiment was to survive the coming trial, he had to make himself directly a part of those proceedings. He had to make the SLJC Judges see that his troops were not guilty of crimes so much as they were guilty of being badly lead and inexperienced in real war situations. And if he had to do that, he had to count on the testimony of former Irregular Lancers Commander John Kupski to do so. That and his second in command, maintained in her rank by Haas, Lieutenant Commander Yvonne Sutherland. Sutherland he was sure of, but he was to receive yet another setback as the Targets returned to their transport dropships.
Final and Desperate Acts
Gordon Chambers did not want the Angry Targets prisoners in his cells any more than they wanted to be there. Were it up to him they already would have been led out and shot as the criminal murderers they were. But until now they were his problem to keep alive, and to protect even from his own men. He had worked hard to keep his own men from going rogue and gunning down the prisoners in their cells. Up til now...
That was because they were now to be transferred to Star League custody and placed aboard the FWL dropship "Tennyson's Ode". And all Chambers could think of was good riddance! He had lived through almost constant hell from the start of this madness until now, and hoped things would settle down so that at least Warlock could begin to rebuild. With his hopes beaten to exhaustion, Chambers had signed the transfer orders and the non-combat Targets personnel were even-now being chained for their short trip to the holding cells aboard the dropship. Reports had their combat assets returning from the field to be added to the "gang". He was just now feeling the first full night's sleep in months reaching for him.
Suddenly he was on the floor, crouched behind the metal service desk with his sidearm in hand! Gunshots had rung out and the harsh call of the emergency klaxon was beginning to wail. Everyone had a weapon in hand and all had suddenly shifted from calm to chaos as Chambers called into his radio. He ordered a sitrep, and for all those not engaged to shut the hell up. "Block 5 high security, Sir!", the call came back...Damn! Kupski's cell.
"Sir, we don't know what happened but we heard shots and moved in. As soon as we could see the cell we came under small arms fire and we can see at least one of ours down...Hard Sir."
Down Hard. That meant dead.
"Copy", Chambers replied. "Bring up more guns to close the section off. Have cold gear brought up and prepare to cut off heating and power in Block 5. Sargent Barnes, notify the HQ of our situation and inform them we do NOT need assistance." All he needed was more vengeance-happy troops ready to open up on anything or anyone that moved. Chambers did not wait for acknowledgments, he knew his people were trained right, Questions swam in his head as to how the prisoners had gotten weapons...prisoner that is. Block 5 had been closed off all except for that one man. That one murdering bastard who had ordered his troops to fire on innocents. Kupski.
"All other blocks report secure, Sir.", that from Sargent Nestor who had begun getting sitreps by the roster as soon as Chambers began dealing with Block 5. Chambers nodded as he pulled out a floor plan. Speaking quickly, Chambers posted his sargents and their teams at key points to keep this from spreading. He also ordered Sargent Nestor to form up a team to prepare an attack, if needed, on Kupski's cell. Soon Nestor's team was in place and the men there had been filled in. As well, Chambers had moved his command point up, with more of his men, to a secondary choke point in the cell block. The rest of the facility was in lock-down and all other prisoners secure. Now they would wait for the air to cool down and force the prisoner out.
"HQ, pick up?", a weak voice came over the radio. "HQ, pick up please".
It was Corporal Jennowski of the prisoner detail for block 5. "Talk to me Jennowski!", Chambers barked. "Where are you and what the hell happened in there?"
"It was an accident, Sir..." The guard told the tale of how they had cuffed their prisoner. How, as they stood there shocked, the cuffs had fallen apart while they lifted the prisoner to his feet. Kupski had been convinced that he was being taken to be executed for his "supposed crimes" and had recovered just a bit quicker than Stuart, Jennowski's partner. In a flash Kupski had Stuart's weapon, Stuart was dead and Jennowski had been hit once in the chest and once in the left leg. He had gotten away just as others had close in and pinned Kupski in his cell... "Please Sir. It is very cold and I can hardly breath...", Jennowski finished.
"Hold tight Corporal, we'll be in there as soon as we can", Chambers released the mike on his radio and swore. He was just about to call for a temperature reading when all hell broke loose again!
Sargent Nestor had taken control of the situation outside the cell and had provided reports back to Chambers as other sargents had from their control points. Suddenly, as he and his men watched, a shambling form broke from the cover of the prisoner's cell.
"MEET YOU IN HELL!", the figure angrily shouted as it rushed forward. The words were slurred and he fired a shaking handgun from two frost covered hands. The cold had gotten to be too much for Kupski and he was rushing them. Nestor barked an order for stopping fire only but a hail of return fire had already been loosed. And as the desperate Kupski fired at their cover, the first volley of the St. Ives troopers cut him down.
Two troopers rushed forward and Nestor followed as soon as one of them kicked the weapon away and the other secured Kupski's fallen form. Disgusted at how things had played out, Sargent Nestor looked down at the body of the mercenary as he lifted his radio to report the situation. Just then Kupski raised his eyes one last time.
"Cheated your damn hangman, didn't I?" he half coughed, half snarled. It looked as if he would spit at Nestor too, but that froze to his lips as the light of life slipped from Kupski's eyes.
The rest of the transfer of the Angry Targets went more carefully and without incident. Chambers and his sargent would later report this incident to their C/O as well as to Lancer Commander Haas of The Angry Targets. A statement would be taken from Jennowski. But as The Angry Targets finally left Warlock, neither Chambers nor his people would shed a tear for Kupski.
Commander Truestar
Starlight Strike Team, Team Banzai
www.geocities.com/truestar_tech |
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