-- Attached file included as plaintext by Listar --
-- File: TSG-18.txt
Part Eighteen of "The Saotome Gambit" is dedicated to the
officers and men of the Russian Northern Fleet SSGN _Kursk,_
who were brothers to all those who have sailed beneath cold dark seas,
and who now humbly endure the loneliness of the Eternal Patrol.
Kyushu Plateau
The Moon of Oni, orbiting Shounetsu Jigoku
Capella System, the Nerima Confederation
14 April 3025
Nerima Confederation Marine Corps Gunnery Sergeant Tran Minh Ky
raised his blazer rifle over a dusty grey boulder, allowing his gun
camera a look at the Combine defenses around the hastily constructed
earthwork fortification that housed the 11th Sword of Thunder regiment.
The small muzzle-mounted video camera projected a grainy green-scale
image onto his helmet display of two Combine Marines in pressurized
Battle Dress Armor guarding the airlock to the base interior.
A fence of monofilament wire was strung in a deadly cat's cradle
around the approaches to the airlock, and he noted the tell-tale bulges
of command-detonated mines buried in the sandy grey soil. The defenses
were sloppy, reflecting the haste with which the 11th Sword of Thunder
had set up camp, but they would make his job no easier to accomplish.
The airlock was one of the few that Confederation fighters had been able
to spot from high orbit before they were chased away, and that was his
first objective.
Ky knew that his team of commandos could breach both airlock doors
within seconds of each other, and depressurize a good chunk of the
makeshift belowground base in one shot. Lady Kasumi knew that as well,
and had specifically forbidden any such attack. She wanted live captives
from the 11th Sword of Thunder and its auxiliary units, not a cavern full
of corpses.
The plan involved a hard-hitting surprise attack with commandos,
who would use gas grenades to incapacitate the Combine troops before they
could get to their combat stations. Of course, that meant the commandos
would have to cycle through the airlock a handful at a time while the
Combine defenders rushed to repulse them. The Combine forces outside the
base would be attacked by the fast-moving LAM Light Cavalry unit that
Colonel Mukaida had put together, while the main force of battlemechs
commanded by General Tendo moved in to mop up, and to deal with the
Combine heavies. It was lauded by the officers as a brilliant plan.
Gunny Ky had his own opinion on the matter.
Lady Kasumi's plan was all well and fine when you were sitting on
top of a hundred tons of walking death machine, he mused, but when you
were a squad leader with a scant twenty kilos of ceramic armor plating
to cover your entire body, and whose job it was to penetrate the airlock
and wage a close-quarters battle while heavily outnumbered, a certain
pragmatism was in order. He was thirty-four, which was a ripe old age
for a Confederation Marine, and he intended on living to make retirement.
That meant he wasn't going to screw this up, and he sure as hell
wasn't going to let anyone else screw it up for him. He patted the sheath
of the fighting knife on his hip, knowing that it would have more than
enough work to do today. If you wanted a job done right, you just had
to do it yourself...
___________________________________________________________________________
J. Austin Wilde and Fission Park Press proudly present:
BATTLETECH: THE SAOTOME GAMBIT
PART EIGHTEEN
by J. Austin Wilde
Safety Control Rod Axe Man,
Fission Park Press
wildeman@psn.net
http://www.psn.net/~wildeman/
The characters and situations of Ranma 1/2 are the
creation and property of Rumiko Takahashi and
Shogakukan/KITTY/Viz Video. Battletech and its
related materials are the property of FASA, inc.
No infringement of copyright is intended nor
should be inferred by this work of fanfiction.
___________________________________________________________________________
Chapter One
The cold steel knife blade plunged soundlessly into the Combine
Marine's throat, slipping inside his ceramic armor gorget and carving
open his larynx before he could muster more than a grunt of surprise.
Blood streamed into his lungs, making his dying cry little more than
a muted gurgle over the commo net - which was lost in a crackle of
static. His body, taut with shock and sudden terror, went limp as he
expired, and he was eased to the dusty grey sand by Gunny Ky with a
tenderness that was in stark contrast to the brutal method used to
dispatch him.
Ky observed the second Combine Marine slumping over into the sand
two meters away. The Marine's helmet visor was splashed with dark red
blood that completely obscured the face within. His squadmate, Corporal
Pennington, had slaughtered his man with equally silent efficiency.
Satisfied that his own victim was dead, he carefully withdrew his
knife just enough to slowly bleed the air out of the pressurized suit.
A plume of rapidly escaping air was like a camera flash in the darkness
to a trained eye, as Ky well knew. He watched for a moment as tiny red
crystals of flash-frozen blood misted his armored gauntlet before
returning to his observation of the area around him.
The rest of the squad would be following him through the maze of
monofilament wire, burning it down with spray cans of highly corrosive
acid foam. The wire itself was easy to spot with UV lamps which, used
sparingly, would allow them to pass without drawing attention to
themselves. Ky himself had opted for a less direct route to the
airlock, needing to take advantage of every bit of cover in the week-
long semi-darkness of the Oni night to approach without being seen by
the hostile eyes of the guards.
He checked the airlock seals and found that they weren't wired to
anything. The airlock itself was a portable unit used in the mining
industry, set into the glassy lava rock that lay beneath a thin layer
of sandy soil. The temptation to simply plant a block of plastex on the
door and then take cover came over him.
He checked himself. He was a Marine, and Marines followed orders,
no matter how dangerous or stupid.
His squad came hopping boulder by boulder up to the airlock to
avoid the mines. There was always the chance that at least one of them
would have a pressure plate or a tripwire. Communication with them was
by hand signals to avoid detection. There were twelve of them, counting
himself, and every other man slung his blazer and readied a brace of
gas grenades. Each grenadier counted on the knife work and quick trigger
finger of his comrades to keep him alive.
He signalled for the first group of four to enter the airlock. Four
was all that could fit inside at one time, due to the bulk of their own
Battle Dress Armor. It would take sixty seconds to cycle the airlock,
meaning six long minutes before the entire squad was inside. If they
could help it, they would avoid combat until all twelve of them were
inside the base.
Ky was in the first group. As the inner door slid open, he realized
that for once the Intelligence estimations of the Combine base were
correct. Given the fact that the Furinkan Combine engineers had little
time with which to construct the base, it was little more than a massive
cavern hollowed out of the glassy rock and pressurized. Row after row
of cots filled the cavern, along with large circulation fans and hastily
strung lights. Self-contained air scrubbers hummed away above the din of
fans and men. Crates of supplies and ammunition were stacked haphazardly
about, creating a labyrinthine nightmare for a dozen men to try to secure.
The base's only conceit to safety in the event of a depressurization
accident were a dozen rescue shelters - little more than pressurized tent
domes that could hold perhaps twenty people apiece.
But the most urgent thing Ky noted about the place was that they were
surrounded by over a hundred Combine troops, most of whom were armed in
some fashion or another.
In that first moment of contact, the Confederation troops had the
element of surprise going for them. Sizzling pulses of laser light from
blazers cut down those most immediate to the airlock chamber, and the
dull *pop* of the gas grenades quickly obscured their surroundings in a
sickly ochre haze. Shouts of surprise and warning gave way to screams of
agony as the lasers did their terrible work, and then the effects of the
gas began to be heard.
Those who were not immediately slain by the lasers or flashing knives
of the Confederation Marines began to retch uncontrollably after breathing
in clouds of vomit gas spewing from the grenades. Ky engaged his suit's
ultrasonic sensor, and its high pitched chirps were joined by chirps from
the rest of his men in a mad chorus.
Using the ultrasonics, he could see filmy images through the gas of
his surroundings projected onto his helmet visor. He shot at anything that
moved in front of him, his blazer's over-under twin beams crackling through
the fouled air and scattering shards of intense light as they struck random
molecules of gas. He ordered his three companions to take up defensive
positions and hold back the Combine forces as the rest of the squad cycled
through.
Gunny Ky knew that those troops on the other end of the cavern were
just now getting the alarm, and would be grabbing weapons to counterattack
them. He needed more gas to flood the cavern before that happened, and he
needed to destroy a few of the air scrubbers before they cleaned the air
of what little gas he had.
He and Pennington took cover behind a crate whose contents were
hopefully not explosive. From there he began sniping at anyone foolish
enough to present themselves, while the corporal threw the last of his
gas grenades as far as he could down the cavern. The sizzle of laser
fire sounded around them as more and more troops shrugged off the surprise
of the attack and began to fight back. The sound of Combine soldiers
puking miserably around them seemed absurd under the dire circumstances
of the battle, and the veteran gunnery sergeant tried to keep a straight
face as he fired.
* * *
Kasumi noted the positions of her troops on her tactical display as
she advanced her Atlas across the airless plateau. The commando units
were encountering heavy resistance at the three Combine bases, and it
looked like the 'mech forces might have more than just a few patrols
to engage. Her LAM units, formed up into two cavalry troops, had not
been able to effect a link up with the Marines, as they were currently
entangled with the Combine Combat Air Patrol that her regular fighter
assets had somehow missed.
It was the fatigue, she knew, that was responsible for this debacle.
They had been fighting for ten days now with little respite, and the
exhaustion and having to cope with heavy casualties was putting a strain
on everyone. She wanted to turn back, but knew that there could be no
easy retreat from this battle. They had to press on.
"Enemy battlemechs in lance strength approaching from the southeast
at ten kilometers," one of her Recon Lance commanders reported over the
command channel.
"Three-Bravo Company moving to engage," one of her brevet-captains
in the Third Battalion responded. He had been at mechwarrior rank before
this campaign, but the loss of every officer in the company had sped up
his advancement considerably.
"Don't let them draw you in, Three-Bravo," the major commanding
Third Battalion advised his inexperienced company commander. "You don't
know what's out there, so engage at no closer than medium range."
"Copy that, Big Three."
Kasumi let the exchange go at that. She had an intense desire to
mother her troops sometimes, and she knew that she could not watch over
every single one of them and still fight a regimental-level battle.
Her priority command channel came to life as she decided against
adding to the major's warning. It was Colonel Mukaida. She could tell
by his taciturn expression that he didn't have good news.
"Mother, this is Rockstar with FLASH priority traffic," he addressed
her.
Kasumi nodded to herself. FLASH was the highest message priority.
"Go ahead, Rockstar."
"I'm getting reports from our 2nd Attack Squadron of enemy GunShips
approaching your positions from high orbit," he said to her. "They are
escorted by fighters."
It was definitely not good news. The Furinkan Combine was throwing
in their GunShip assets to guarantee victory against her forces. A squadron
of converted Leopards could do serious damage to her regiment while they
were scattered out in the open.
"Can you do anything about it?" she asked him.
"I'm doing my best, but we only have so many fighters to send against
them," he returned.
"I understand, Colonel."
She continued her forward march as the word was passed on the tac-net
to watch for the GunShips. Her troops, all bloodied veterans by now, began
to space themselves at the proper anti-aircraft defense intervals without
needing any prompts from their officers. It was a risky to keep your radar
on all the time in battle, but Kasumi did so, knowing that the sensors on
her Atlas were second only to the Garret D2j units found on dedicated air
defense 'mechs like the Rifleman and the Jagermech. She wanted to have
plenty of warning when the Combine GunShips arrived.
She was occupied with the data from her radar when an autocannon shell
slammed dead-center into her Atlas' torso. The 210mm depleted-uranium
armor-piercer disintegrated against the thick slabs of Durallex Special
Heavy armor, gouging a meter wide crater in the battlemech's chest plate.
The blow rocked Kasumi in her ejector seat, her head almost pitching
against the cockpit console.
As she fought for control of her battlemech, she could hear the
hissing noise of slowly escaping atmosphere from her cockpit windows. The
shock of the impact had wrenched them nearly from their seals, and now she
was depressurizing. Another good hit could pop them out completely.
Warning shouts over the tac-net provided her with an idea of the
location of her foe. A Furinkan Combine Cyclops had somehow avoided her
advanced units and had lain low among the scattered rock formations on the
plateau until it was well within the main body of her regiment. The 90 ton
'mech had apparently spotted the Ducal pennant flying from her Atlas and
chosen her to be his suicide target.
It was suicide for the Combine mechwarrior because he was completely
surrounded. Once he had broken concealment, he had sealed his own fate.
But if he could slay the commander of the Confederation's forces before he
himself fell, he would be a hero to his country.
The words of General George S. Patton came to Kasumi as she charged
at the hideously ugly Combine battlemech. It was Patton who said that wars
were not won by dying for your country, but by making the other poor dumb
so-and-so (not Patton's words, of course) die for *his* country. Kasumi
thought Patton was a rude, crude, and otherwise socially irredeemable man,
but he knew what he was talking about when it came to warfighting.
She returned fire with her main gun, giving the Combine Cyclops a
taste of its own medicine. The shell careened off a shard of volcanic
glass in front of the Cyclops before slamming into the 'mech's left arm.
Kasumi watched as the arm's protective sheath of armor and hull shattered
from the wrist to above the elbow, obliterating the left arm laser and
exposing the bright pink myomer bundles of the actuators.
The Cyclops was obscured for a moment both from radar and visual
identification as bits of machinery and armor plate scattered from the
impact point, and gouts of liberated coolant gas fountained from the
circulating system before automated shut-off valves isolated the damaged
sections of limb. Kasumi watched as four Short Range Missiles volleyed
crazily into the air in a wild return shot from the Cyclops.
She thundered on, mindful of the leaks in her viewport, and wanting
to keep the Cyclops occupied with her rather than with a 'mech in her
regiment that could not weather a hit from the enemy's autocannon as well
as her own. The Atlas was lumbering at a full tilt now, not very swift by
battlemech standards, but with a hundred tons of mass behind her she could
ram with devastating effect.
Lasers from her Support Lance lit up the rock around the Cyclops'
position, giving her something to steer by as she closed the range. The
90 ton Combine 'mech appeared from the clouds of gas and debris even as
her HUD weapon status turned green for her autocannon.
Both 'mechs fired at once, their armor-piercing shells leaping across
the furious battlefield in airless silence. Hers scored on the left torso,
slamming the Cyclops's mangled arm and shoulder back with sledgehammer
force. His struck low, crashing through the armored knee guard of her
right leg and striking the upper portion of the limb in a shower of
molten uranium sparks. The armor held, though another couple of hits
from the autocannon would likely tear the leg off.
Both battlemechs fought to remain upright from the tremendous impacts.
Kasumi could see that the Cyclops' left torso was laid wide open, the
launch tubes of the 10-rack LRM practically begging for her to put a shot
into them. He was in medium laser range, and her slender fingers tensed on
the triggers. The beams sprayed wide of the mark, cutting into the already
damaged left arm actuators and grazing the retrofitted 'helmet' on the
'mech's head.
They were within a hundred meters now, the Cyclops running towards her
to meet her charge head on. Both huge and ponderous war machines, each
scarred with the weapon hits they had visited upon each other, resembled
angry metalshod gladiators closing for a lethal pass of swords. Kasumi
noted the streams of inert long range missiles being dumped from the back
of the enemy 'mech as it closed the gap between them, and knew that she
wouldn't get a lucky ammunition hit before they met.
They traded yet another autocannon salvo, his shell slamming into her
right torso with tooth-jarring force and hers blasting apart most of the
center torso armor above the SRM launcher. Each battlemech stumbled in
its run across the uneven lava plain as bits of shattered aligned-crystal
steel showered behind them. Kasumi felt her ears pop as the seals on her
viewports flexed open for a moment, and the vacuum of space sucked at her
precious cockpit atmosphere. The hissing was stronger now, almost beyond
the capacity of the life-support system to make up.
The two were now less than forty meters apart, and she could make out
the green and brown pineapple of the Furinkan Combine against the Cyclops'
blackened torso. Kasumi gripped her controls tightly, praying for her feed
system to load the main gun before her enemy could fire another round. The
straining actuators of her Atlas as it stomped across the plateau screeched
like distant banshees in the pit of her stomach. They were playing a game
of chicken with nearly two hundred thousand kilograms of heavy metal
between them.
Out of instinct, she squeezed the trigger on her main gun before the
HUD indicated it was ready. As the signal to fire the 210mm autocannon left
the fire control computer and reached the electronic ignitor in the breech,
the weapon finished its return to battery and cleared its interlocks.
The distant slamming sound of the feed mechanism went unnoticed by her
as the Cyclops took a second shell into the center torso. The left torso
flew apart from exploding shrapnel bursting deep within the battlemech,
and severing the mauled limb attached to it. Flames leaped from the SRM
launcher below the double impact craters.
Still, the Cyclops staggered on at her.
"Long live General Prince Kuno and the Furinkan Combine!" she heard
the fanatical mechwarrior shout over the Confederation tac-net.
The two battlemechs crashed headlong into each other, with Kasumi
throwing her Atlas' arms out in a double palm-strike that flung the
shattered Cyclops backwards and away. It exploded at a safe distance
from her with a fatal reactor crash-out, washing the lava plain in waves
of star-hot plasma. The Combine 'mech rained down in millions of glowing
bits each no larger than a fifty yen coin.
Their duel was ended.
It was only then that she turned to deal with her remaining problem.
Taking a pressurized can of spray foam sealant, she liberally applied it
to the joints around her viewports. The hissing stopped as she used up the
last of the can, and she knew that at least for the moment, her troubles
were over.
Her relief was very short-lived.
"Combine GunShip at five o'clock low!" someone cried over the tac-net.
She turned her battlemech's head to see a Leopard Class GunShip race across
the lava plain, its weapons blazing strafing fire at her lines. Two
Confederation fighters nipped at its sides before being driven off by the
Leopard's point defense guns.
They were in serious trouble without GunShip support of their own.
Short of ramming one, her fighters would be hard pressed to shoot a GunShip
down.
"Rockstar, this is Mother," she called over the command channel. As
she opened the channel she was assaulted by the loud warbling of radio
jamming. She wondered if they would receive her transmission. "An enemy
GunShip is engaging our forces with heavy effect. I need Close Air,
everything you have, including the LAMs."
Colonel Mukaida was barely audible over a blast of radio jamming
from the Combine GunShip.
"We can't reach them over this jamming," he replied. At least that
was what it sounded like he had said. "I'm afraid you're on your own."
"Keep trying, Colonel," she advised. There wasn't much hope for the
attack now.
I'm sorry, Father...
Chapter Two
The Kyushu Plateau
Kasumi trained her weapons at the GunShip as it made a wide circle
over the battlefield for another murderous strafing run. Only her LRM
launcher and her arm-mounted lasers could hope to reach the Combine
GunShip; her hip-mounted main gun could not elevate sufficiently to
engage close aerial targets.
The Combine GunShip came back at her lines, its nose-mounted lasers
and autocannon blazing away at the 1st Nerima Guards. Shards of glassy
lava were blown into the starry black sky as shells exploded in her midst,
and a haze of dust and rock splinters obscured her vision for a moment.
The sound of her targeting system registering a weapon lock hummed in her
ears as she squeezed the trigger on her LRM launcher.
The first five missiles had hardly cleared the tubes before the
Gunship suddenly trembled with a massive impact and began to break apart.
She watched in astonishment as the Furinkan Combine GunShip was ripped
into tiny glowing shreds by a massive and utterly miraculous explosion.
The brilliant plasma fireball of the converted Leopard Class GunShip
cast an electric silver glow upon the rocky grey battlefield of the
Kyushu Plateau before fading away to darkness. Whoops of triumph sounded
over the Confederation commo channels as the fearsome Gunship disintegrated
above them.
She looked elsewhere in the sky for Confederation fighters, but there
were none close enough to have done such a thing.
"Did anybody see what just happened?" she asked over the tac-net.
"Torpedo impact!" Fire Control announced. "Echo Four-Eight destroyed!"
Captain Hauptmann confirmed the data on his repeater display. The
Combine GunShip was a rain of metal splinters falling towards the surface
of Oni.
"Conn, Sensory; new contact Echo Four-Nine bearing one-eight-three,
plus seven-five! Echo Four-Nine is painting us with gun directing radar.
Range to Echo Four-Nine: three-five thousand kilometers!"
"Bring us hard about," Hauptmann ordered the Officer of the Deck.
It was time to destroy another Furinkan Combine GunShip. "Fire Control--"
The Sensory Supervisor interrupted him over the 27MC intercomm - fear
was strident in his voice.
"Conn, Sensory; incoming torpedo bearing one-eight-three, plus seven-
five! Echo Four-Nine classified as Dunkerque Class Torpedo Escort!"
Hauptmann's reaction was borne of long years of training.
"Fire a Snapshot from tube three at Echo Four-Nine!" he ordered Fire
Control. "Helm; All-Ahead Flank, fifty degrees negative pitch! Chief of
the Watch; sound Torpedo Evasion!"
"Fire Control, aye!"
"Helm, aye! Maneuvering answers All-Ahead Flank!"
_Tang's_ plasma drives came to immediate life, propelling the Balao
Class corvette towards the surface of Oni. Hauptmann held tight against
the sudden thrust, knowing that others throughout the ship were probably
taken by surprise. The crash of dishes from the Galley below confirmed
this as Sensory called out data on the incoming Barracuda.
The 1MC sounded over his head as he pored over the Sensory and
Astrogation plots for a way out of their predicament. If the jamming and
the countermeasures didn't work, their chances were grim.
"TORPEDO EVASION! SNAPSHOT: TUBE THREE!"
"Prepare to launch countermeasures!" he ordered. "Energize radar and
laser jamming systems!" _Tang_ still had working models of these vital
lostech devices, for which Hauptmann was grateful.
It had just been a matter of time, he knew, before the Furinkan
Combine called in assets capable of countering the threat posed by the
Terrible T's. The Nerima Confederation was by no means the only Successor
State with Barracudas and the ships to launch them. The Combine Torpedo
Escort must have been lying in ambush well above the battlefield, waiting
for one of the 777th to pop a GunShip so that it could fire one of its
own torpedoes at them in return.
"Bring us as close as you can to the surface," he ordered the Helm.
"Within one thousand meters if possible." They were fighting the effects
of a steady three-gee burn, and it was showing in the strained faces of
his crew. They needed to approach the moon at as steep an angle as they
could, and get as close as possible for the radar return of the moon's
rocky surface to add to the confusion of their jamming, and, at the last
moment, the confusion added by the volley of countermeasures he was about
to order released.
"Yessir," the Helmsman replied tautly. She did not look back to the
conn to address Captain Hauptmann. Even if she hadn't been under three
gees of acceleration at the time, which made turning one's head a difficult
proposition, her attention was fixed upon her instruments.
"Remember how you once told me you could outfly a Sparrowhawk with
the _Tang_?" Hauptmann asked her. He had to shout to make his voice heard.
"Yessir."
"Outfly this torp, and you'll never have to prove another thing to me
ever again."
"I'll hold you to that sir. Oni Closest Point of Approach is eight
hundred meters, in three-zero seconds, mark."
The sound of the Barracuda in tube three being ejected from the ship
was lost within the controlled cacophony of voices and instrumentality on
the Bridge, as the _Tang_ strove to evade the incoming torpedo. Hauptmann
noted the data from his outgoing torpedo streaming down his Fire Control
repeater, and knew at that even if they lost this struggle with survival,
they were going to take one more Combine ship with them.
Kasumi observed a sudden flare of light in the darkness, growing
brighter and closer with each moment, and watched with fascination as the
light resolved itself into a massive black shape that soared soundlessly
overhead at low altitude. It was the sharklike form of a Balao Class
corvette, and she could make out the subdued dark grey fishcake of the
Nerima Confederation and three 7's crossed against a giant capital 'T'
upon the patchwork black of its armored hull. This had been what her
father had meant by sending her assistance, and she was grateful for
the daring crew above.
There was something bearing down on the corvette from above, a
hellish flare of brilliant blue-white light that could only have been
a torpedo. A torpedo which was heading straight for them.
"Oh my, no..."
"Torpedo impact in ten seconds," Sensory called out.
"Launch countermeasures fore and aft! ...Helm, fifty degrees starboard
yaw!" Hauptmann ordered.
Brilliant fingers of red light lanced out of _Tang's_ upper hull
from the bow and stern in a spread that arced across the Oni sky to the
left and to the right. Each was an anti-missile countermeasure.
The dozen devices seeded thumbnail sized prizms in their wake as
beams of laser light crazed the void around _Tang_ to spoof the Barracuda's
active laser guidance system. The buzzsaw roar of the radar jammers across
the microwave bands canceled even the battlemech radars on the surface of
the moon. Plasma blooms from the corvette's ventral reaction control
thrusters suffused the warship and the surrounding void in a soft thermal
glow. With the main engines shut down and the ship hurtling into a
massively elliptical orbit around the airless moon, the torpedo could
not rely on is sensors to home. It had only its tremendous speed and a
logic system that could make an educated guess on where its path would
intersect with the _Tang._
It did remarkably well in spite of these handicaps.
The Barracuda exploded into the _Tang_ at a void space between the
dorsal superstructure and the pressure hull forward of the drive section.
The thousand-kilo high explosive warhead blew out most of the panels of
stealthed superstructure on both sides of the void space before ripping
apart the aft dorsal Naval Laser turret, and forcing a jet of superheated
gases into the centerline compartment where the Jump Core had once been
housed. The pressurized tanks of reserve reaction mass now housed there
ruptured almost immediately, though their exceptionally cautious design
and construction meant that most of the energy of the explosion vented
itself through blow-away ducts amidships.
The _Tang_ was engulfed in flames along the entire aft third of the
ship as it lost altitude and began a shallow dive for the moon. Kasumi
watched in horror as it hurtled nearly out of control towards the Furinkan
Combine bases.
Captain Hauptmann could do nothing but watch helplessly as his ship
dove for the surface of Oni. Power was interrupted following the hit,
knocking out the Main Computer, and there was no word from his Helmsman
that she had any control over the thirty thousand ton warship's fall.
"Sound Collision!" he ordered. It was just about the only useful
thing he *could* do.
The Chief of the Watch swiped at the Collision Alarm before returning
to his white knuckled grip on his acceleration couch. The strident *whoop*
of the alarm howled in the dim red emergency lighting of the Bridge.
"Port Centerline and Starboard Outboard Main Engines indicate All
Back Emergency!" the Helmsman yelped over the wail of the alarms. Hauptmann
could feel the rumble of the plasma drives as they fired full reverse
thrust to slow their forward velocity. Would it be enough?
"Fires spreading to frame two-four-zero," the Assistant Engineer
updated from aft of the conn. Hauptman paid the report no mind. If they
were going to die by crashing into the moon, the fires hardly mattered.
"Reaction Control System marginal," Helm updated. Hauptmann could
see over her shoulder the artificial horizon begin a slow advance towards
level flight. She was flying on electro-hydraulic manual override: the
photonic control system had crashed with the Main Computer. One motor-
generator set and an intact run of pressurized hydraulic piping was all
that was keeping them from cartwheeling into flaming wreckage across the
surface of the moon.
"Can you pull us out?" he shouted at her.
"No, goddammit!" she replied angrily, as if his question was somehow
an insult to her skill. "But maybe we won't hit as hard!"
* * *
"Get your asses back!" Gunny Ky called to Pennington and his surviving
handful of commandos as they fought for the airlock. The Furinkan Combine
base they had hit was supposed to have been the mechwarrior base. Instead,
they had walked straight into a Combine Marine battalion. He was surprised
to have lasted as long as he had.
They jammed into the airlock, six in a space that should have only
fit four, but it couldn't be helped. Leaving two behind to cover the lock
was asking those two to die. The airlock simply couldn't cycle through for
them in time.
He only hoped that the hundred Combine Marines wearing Battle Dress
inside the base would remember their less fortunate comrades, and not blow
the airlock with their enemy still inside. Sure a bunch of his enemies
would die as well when the cavern depressurized, but then he wouldn't be
making his retirement, either.
They didn't blow the airlock. Ky decided to return the favor and leave
it intact.
"Move it, you sorry apes!" he called to his men. They had to get the
hell out of here and back to their own lines.
He looked out across the lava plain, and saw the flaming black mass
of the Balao Class corvette _Tang_ hurtling straight towards them on a
crash course with disaster. It was going to land right on the base, with
them standing next to it.
"...Fuck me..." Ky moaned. Then, turning to his men, he thumped his
corporal, Pennington, on the helmet. "What are you apes waiting for?
MOVE IT, MARINES!"
They commenced to hauling ass.
"Three hundred meters," the Helmsman called out. The _Tang's_ bow
was edging slightly above level flight, but they didn't have enough
maneuver thrust available to check their steep rate of descent.
"Two-five-zero meters."
Captain Hauptmann lay in his acceleration couch, waiting for an
impact that would probably kill them. This wasn't the end he had expected,
to crash into a moon when space was so vast and empty.
"Two hundred meters."
He wondered how the rest of the squadron was doing. _Tautog_ would
be the next senior ship, then the _Tarpin._ Hopefully they were having an
easier time of things than he was.
"One-five-zero meters."
The ship trembled as another explosion aft was vented through the
hull. The tech at Astrogation shrieked briefly, thinking it was their
impact with the moon coming sooner than expected. A harsh look from the
Chief of the Watch cowed him instantly, and shut him up.
"One hundred meters."
Hauptmann spared a few thoughts for his wife. Had she taken his advice
and moved down to the planet from their quarters on the orbital fortress?
How long would she have to wait to learn that her husband wasn't coming
home?
He closed his eyes, finding a sudden peace in the realization that
none of this would matter in a few more seconds.
"Five-zero meters... Reaction Control System in Normal! Helm in
Normal!" the Helmsman cried out in surprise. "All Main Engines indicate
All-Back Emergency!"
"Belay that!" Hauptmann shouted, wriggling out of his seat straps
in his rush to countermand the ordered bell. "All-Ahead Flank!"
"Aye sir," she responded, understanding what he wanted her to try
for. "Maneuvering answers All-Ahead Flank!"
Hauptmann buckled up once more, knowing that this was going to be
too close to call.
_Tang_ crashed into the mound of lava and dirt that was the Furinkan
Combine Marine base, armored belly first, as its main engines blowtorched
a niagara of high-energy plasma. The ventral superstructure was ripped
open to reveal the pressure hull, and long gouges ran through the lower
compartments as sheets of sparks and flame from the burning interior
storage sections rained down upon the makeshift installation. The battered
corvette skipped across the hard and glassy lava rock, its engines roaring
defiantly, as it clawed its way spaceborne once more.
Gunnery Sergeant Tran Minh Ky pulled his short bruised body out of
a gully and brushed at his Battle Dress. With thirty thousand tons of
flaming metal mere seconds from crushing him like a bug, his time for
the fifty meter dash was the lowest it had been since the end of Boot
Camp. The rest of his surviving squad mates popped up like prairie dogs
around him, their eyes blinking in shock from their narrow escape.
In the distance he could see that the base was completely caved-in
from the impact. If there were any survivors, they wouldn't last long.
The rest of the compound was scorched from the Corvette's drives,
rendering much of the enemy's support gear and supplies useless. It
looked like the Furinkan Combine was going to have to withdraw from
Oni for awhile.
"So much for prisoners," he grunted. "Everything here is blown up,
burned down, or broken: our work is done... Now let's get the hell out
of here before an officer shows up and starts pitching a bitch about the
mess. You know how I hate watching you guys while you work."
* * *
Firebase LIBERTY
16 April 3025
"Captain Hauptmann, you and your crew have my deepest gratitude,"
Acting General Kasumi Tendo said to the weary corvette commander. "Between
your direct efforts, and the actions of your squadron, we have secured this
moon for continuing operations against the Furinkan Combine."
Hauptmann bowed graciously.
"Just doing what they pay me for, ma'am," he replied.
Kasumi could see how tired he was, and was prepared to let him
return to his ship, but she had to ask him one more question.
"Is there anything I or my staff can do for you?"
Hauptmann ran his fingers through thinning hair.
"I don't think so, ma'am," he replied. "About all I can do is limp
what's left of the _Tang_ back to Nerima for repairs, but I'm afraid her
days of sneaking and peeking are over. All that superstructure damage we
took makes us light up like a neon sign on radar sets now. Without the
right manufacturing knowledge and capability, we can't replace the hull
stealthing that we lost."
That worried Kasumi. They were taking a great risk returning to Nerima
in their near-crippled condition, and to lose such heroes on the way home
was unthinkable.
"Perhaps I can detach a GunShip to you for an escort," she offered.
"No need, ma'am, but thanks," Hauptmann returned. "The _Trepang_ is
going to babysit us on the way home. Most of her torps are malfunctioning,
and as soon as we make it back to the _Mare Island_ for repairs, they're
going to relieve us of the weapons we have left, and then go back out."
Kasumi nodded. "Well then, Captain. Thank you for sparing a moment
of your time to come down here to speak with me. I wish you the best of
luck."
She offered her hand. He shook it warmly, then saluted her.
"I request to return to my vessel, General."
"Granted, Captain," she said with a weary but heartfelt smile.
When Hauptmann had left, she returned to her desk to work on the
latest action report. They had driven the Furinkan Combine from Oni,
though they had only taken a handful of prisoners in the process. The
rest were either buried in the rock and sand or else had escaped into
space on the 11th Sword of Thunder's DropShip fleet. The 777th Squadron,
save the crippled _Tang_ and her escort _Trepang,_ would be hunting them
down all the way to the Jump Point.
Their victory could not have come at a better time. Her entire
force was below minimum combat effectiveness. Most of the fighters and
the battlemechs were in need of heavy repair, work that couldn't be done
here, even if they had the parts and the expertise. Her troops were also
absolutely exhausted.
She looked over the conclusion to her report. In it she requested her
father to grant permission for the immediate relief of her forces at
LIBERTY, with replacements from the Nerima garrison to take custody of the
base until such time as the 1st Nerima Guards and the 3rd Tomobiki Hussars
- plus regimental assets - could rest, repair, and reorganize. If permission
to withdraw was not given, she concluded, she did not feel that her forces
could repel a second invasion of Oni.
She added that as long as the main Furinkan Combine army was occupied
elsewhere, her forces' chances of safely evacuating and quickly regaining
their strength were as good as they were ever going to get.
Colonel Mukaida entered as she was putting the finishing touches
on her report.
"Here we go," Kasumi said to him by way of greeting. "If my Father
doesn't grant permission for us to withdraw, I don't know what we're
going to do."
Mukaida nodded with a grunt of understanding.
"Stay here until we rot or get driven out," he concluded.
"He has to understand our position," Kasumi added. "I can't see how
he wouldn't."
"We don't know what else is going on in the Inner Sphere," Mukaida
pointed out.
Kasumi closed her eyes and sank into her chair. Her eyes and ears
still ached from the pressure transients she had suffered in her leaky
Atlas cockpit. Her body was weary beyond measure, and her spirit drained
of nearly all her vitality. She simply didn't know how much else she
could possibly give of herself to this war.
Chapter Three
Brigade Headquarters
Planet Tiber, Palatine System
The Federated Shiratori
15 April 3025
"What exactly did you think you were doing, Brigadier Kuonji?"
Ukyou faced off against General Mikado Sanzenin in the confrontation
she had known would take place from the time she had left the exercise
field. She wasn't going to give up any ground to him.
"Sir?" she asked him in a mock-innocent tone.
Mikado narrowed his gorgeous eyes at her with the practiced ease of
a man who spent a lot of time rehearsing his expressions in front of a
mirror.
"Don't play dumb with me," he replied. "I want to know what made you
think you could simply leave your post at the exercise field and take
liberty."
Ukyou remained firm in the face of his accusation. Her green eyes
flashed with challenge. "The exercises were complete. My brigade was one
of the units granted liberty. Sir."
Mikado stiffened. He expected a little surliness from his subordinate,
but Ukyou's seething hostility towards him was unexpected. "You call that
an excuse?" he asked her, self-doubt creeping into his voice.
Ukyou continued to glare. In the silence that followed the general's
question, the sound of dust motes settling against the window sills seemed
deafening to her. She could feel the tension within her body as she replied.
"It's no excuse, sir. It happens to be the truth."
Mikado, hoping that she would submit as she usually did, was now at
a loss, and settled on what he hoped was an authoritative frown to regain
his momentum.
"But what about the reports?" he demanded finally.
She could tell that he was astonished by the particularly virulent
tone she had adopted with him, and that he wasn't quite sure how to
proceed. "I have a staff to take care of them," she returned. "They're
working on them now."
Top *that* one, asshole...
"I don't care about your staff," Mikado replied gruffly. He had either
found his spine or else he was bluffing, she decided. Probably bluffing.
Mikado continued. "From now on, all reports come directly from you, not
your precious staff. Now get back out to the Mobile Headquarters and finish
your job, Kuonji, or I'll have you busted down to platoon leader in the
brigade infantry so fast you won't have time to blink."
Damn... Ukyou cursed to herself. Maybe he *isn't* bluffing...
Still, just to show him up, she blinked at him as deliberately as
possible.
He let it pass, content with his victory over her.
"Move, it, Brigadier. Your time is MY time."
She couldn't take his smarmy attitude another moment, and sensed the
uncomfortable shifting of Konatsu, who was probably preparing to stop her
from killing the general.
"You're really starting to piss me off, Mikado," she told him sharply.
The general's expression became one of amazement and just a little fear.
She liked seeing genuine fear in him, having never witnessed it before,
and pressed on. "Ever since I said that I wasn't interested in a cheap and
tawdry affair with you, you've been going out of your way to make my life
miserable."
She looked him over as if sizing him up for a body bag. The healthy
golden tone of Mikado's skin began to pale, and tiny beads of perspiration
congregated at his temples.
"I've put up with it so far," she continued. "But so help me, you
slimy sack of shit, if you push me one step farther, I'm going to tear
your goddamn head off." She took a menacing step towards him and brandished
a fist. "_Comprendez vous,_ bucko!?"
Mikado opened his mouth to speak. Ukyou didn't let him.
"Now I'm going back out to the exercise fields to do your busy work.
THIS time," she said to him. "Consider yourself lucky that I'm in a good
mood."
Mikado blinked at her a few times.
"B-Brigadier," he said, trying to sound tough and failing.
"Yes, sir?" she asked him with a mocking grin, her voice all sweetness
and light.
He looked at her, then to Konatsu.
"It can wait," he said, then took his leave of them, utterly cowed.
When he was gone, Ukyou turned to her adjutant.
"Wow..." she gushed. "If I had known that he would crumble like that,
I would have gotten tough with him a long time ago."
Konatsu wasn't as amused.
"Sir, I really think that was a bad idea."
"I don't know about that," she returned. "I really castrated him."
"No sir, I don't think you understand," the former kunoichi pleaded,
wringing his immaculate white-gloved hands. "The General has the biggest
ego in the entire universe. You just wounded that ego, and badly. As soon
as he gets hold of himself, he is going to have his revenge on you."
Ukyou thought about this. Perhaps she *had* laid it on a bit thick...
"I'm serious, sir," Konatsu continued. "You've threatened a superior
officer. That's a serious offense."
"It's his word against yours and mine," Ukyou countered. Her eyes
burned into Konatsu. "RIGHT, Konatsu, honey?"
"Of course, dearest Ukyou, sir," he demurred. "But that does not
change the fact that he can do plenty of things to make your life even
worse than it already is under him."
She had to agree with him there. Why had she told him off like that?
There was no reason to pour gasoline on her already adversarial relationship
with Mikado. Was it because of her wonderful night with Ranma that she
didn't care about minding her P's and Q's around her despised superior?
"Well," she said softly. "I guess that makes up my mind about
resigning. It seems I just burned my last bridge."
Konatsu nodded ruefully. His was the truly uncertain future, no matter
what assurances she had given him that he would remain in her life.
"Pack my things, sugar" she told him at length. "We're leaving."
"Everything, sir?" Konatsu asked her hesitantly. "It's only going to
be a few more days out at the exercise field."
She raised an eyebrow at him.
"We aren't going to the exercise field, honey."
The former kunoichi didn't like where this was going.
"We aren't?"
"Nope. We're going to Genevieve. As soon as we're both packed, notify
my personal DropShip of our imminent departure. Meanwhile, I'll get busy
drafting some bogus travel orders. For once, the fact that I do all of
Mikado's paperwork is finally paying off. I can sign his name to orders
better than he can."
Konatsu nodded nervously.
"Are you sure we can leave the system before he finds out?"
"Trust me, sugar. There's a JumpShip scheduled to depart for the
capitol in four days, which will give us just enough time to transit out
to the Jump Point. Now that the exercises are over, that playboy will want
to spend the next few days with his latest piece of ass." She shook her
head at how quickly Mikado's previous flame had been quenched, and was glad
that she had never accepted his advances. "By the time he figures out that
we aren't where we're supposed to be, it will be too late to stop us."
"Yes, sir," Konatsu replied, accepting his fate with grim stoicism.
He left the room to begin packing.
Ukyou sighed wearily. She had not expected matters to come to a head
so soon with Mikado, but looking back on that moment, she had no regrets.
There could be no happiness or satisfaction serving in an army with a
sleazeball like him in command.
Her only regret, in fact, was that she was going to have to leave
Ranma for the moment. It was only temporary, she knew, for he had told
her of their need to travel to Genevieve to get a decryption key from
the Empress. She had offered to help him, after all, and so while she
was there trying to get an audience with Azusa before Mikado could catch
up with her, she would also lay the groundwork for their arrival.
She wanted to go see him one more time before she left, but realized
that she might have too much to do in too little time, and so she might
have to settle for a phone call or a note before she lifted off.
* * *
The DropShip _Palomino_
"How do you feel this morning?"
Akane looked up from her cup of herbal tea and gave Yuka a wan smile.
Yuka and Sayuri had joined her in the Crew's Mess. Breakfast was over, and
the only other people present were a few techs avoiding work by lingering
near the bug juice dispenser. Petty Officer Howard - Tad - was busy washing
dishes in the scullery as part of the disciplinary action against him for
losing track of her in town.
"Terrible," she replied, thinking of how poor sweet Tad was getting
the shaft for something that wasn't his fault. At least he wasn't going to
lose a stripe over it. "My head is killing me."
"That's what happens when a man makes you drink too much," Sayuri
scolded.
"No one made me drink too much," Akane returned softly, and wondered
why Sayuri had come across so outright hostile over her relationship with
Ranma. "I was the one who should have known better."
"Who can blame you after the crap Saotome pulled?" Yuka returned.
Akane sighed. She did not need any reminders about last night. All
things considered, she would be very happy if the subject never came up
again.
"Let's not talk about it, okay?" she asked them both.
"Akane, we've known each other since we were kids," Yuka said to her.
"If our skills hadn't lent us towards flying fighters over battlemech
piloting, we'd probably have been lancemates, too. We want to help you
get through this."
"More like get over him," Sayuri broke in.
"I don't want to talk about Ranma," Akane replied, her voice full of
anger and hurt. "I don't even want his name mentioned."
"Does that mean the engagement is off?" Yuka asked hopefully.
Akane looked away for a moment before answering.
"As far as I'm concerned, it was never on."
"What about this expedition?" Sayuri pressed. "Are you going to take
over command from Saotome?"
Akane hadn't thought that far ahead. It showed in her troubled
expression. "I don't know. I want to talk to Captain Ninomiya first, and
see what she thinks about going home."
"You can order her to do it, you know," Sayuri said.
She gave her friend a troubled look. What was she getting at?
"I know that," she replied. "But it would be wrong for me to do
something so presumptuous."
"Wrong?" Sayuri protested. "Presumptuous? You're the Grand Duke's
Heir! Captain Ninomiya takes orders from the Tendo family. If you ordered
her to set a course for Capella, she'd do it."
"I know that!" Akane shouted, and instantly regretting it as her
temples throbbed. "What is it with you two?" she demanded. "I know things
are bad at home, and that they could use our help, but this is turning
into some kind of crusade with you."
Yuka and Sayuri looked sheepishly at each other for a moment.
"Akane, you're being used," Yuka said softly. "I hate to say this,
but your father is too. The faster you get away from the Saotomes, the
better. This crazy hunt for Ryuugenzawa is just a hoax. We're your friends,
Akane, and we're tired of seeing you get hurt."
Akane closed her eyes.
"I know that," she said. "I know what they're doing to us."
Do I? she asked herself bitterly. Genma, certainly, was using us,
but what about Ranma?
Forget him, another part of her snarled. Even if he wasn't consciously
using us, he does whatever his father tells him to do.
"Then why don't you stand up to them?" Yuka asked her.
Akane clenched her fists tightly. The pressure in her head rose to
the point where she could feel her pulse throbbing through her ears.
"Why does it have to be me!?" she cried.
The two pilots were taken aback.
"Well," Sayuri said softly. "Who else can it be?"
Akane gulped down the rest of her tea. "We only need one more crypto
key," she said, her voice barely audible. "We are so close."
"That's only if Commander Saotome was telling us the truth about
Ryuugenzawa," Yuka pointed out. "After all this, do you really still
believe in him?"
She didn't know. The fifth key had been where Genma Saotome had
claimed it was. Why shouldn't the sixth? Why shouldn't Ryuugenzawa exist?
The terrible truth, she knew, was that Genma Saotome was a liar, a
cheat, and a thief. He had raised his son to be a liar, a cheat, and a
thief. How could she trust either of them?
The Confederation's odds of surviving the year were grim. She knew
that. In spite of this, she was wanted to go back and die if necessary to
protect it from Prince Kuno. Even if Ryuugenzawa existed, could it really
offer up anything to them which could prevent that?
She remembered the day before yesterday, and the afternoon she had
spent with Ranma at the park. She had made a stupid confession that she
needed him - to help her find Ryuugenzawa, of course - so that even if
the Confederation fell, she could raise an army strong enough to get it
back.
Ranma... Hadn't said anything to that. Not yes. Not no. Did he know
something about the expedition? Is that why he wouldn't answer her? Did he
know that this whole mess was just some kind of cruel scam concocted by his
father to gain access to Confederation assets before the end? Is that why
he kept protesting his disbelief in Ryuugenzawa, as a kind of warning to
her not to believe in them? If so, why hadn't he just come out and said
it!?
She could feel her throat starting to sting. She wasn't going to
cry. Not in front of her friends. They had seen her in enough pain already.
Could Ranma betray her like this? she asked herself. If the answer was
yes, then why? After all that he had done for her, after every sacrifice
for her sake, why would he do something so terrible to her?
More importantly, why did she let all of this hurt her so badly?
Deep within her heart and soul, she knew the answer, and knowing only
made it worse for her.
She was in love with Ranma.
It was the only explanation, and even then it defied belief. How
could she love a thoughtless jerk like him? The universe was a cruel,
cruel, place when sick jokes like that were played on women.
The object of her affection and the cause of her heartache appeared
on the Crew's Mess even as she questioned her feelings for him. He moved
stiffly, confirming the rumors she had heard concerning his brawl with
Ryouga after she was put to bed. His skittish eyes fell upon her for just
a moment before noting that Yuka and Sayuri were with her, and flicked
away in discomfort.
She expected him to make a hasty exit from the room, but he surprised
her. Trying to look cool and failing, he approached her table. She didn't
want to deal with him, and decided to lay into him and see how he reacted
to it. He would probably leave, knowing him for the spineless emotional
cripple that he was.
"What do you want, Ranma?"
Ranma cringed at her icy tone of voice. It pleased her to think she
could make him so uncomfortable. It was payback for last night.
"I just wanted to see if you were feeling better," he muttered, his
eyes darting to and fro as if searching for an easy escape route. The
hateful looks he was getting from Yuka and Sayuri were probably not making
him feel any more at ease.
She had to stifle a bitter laugh. Feeling better? She was miserable.
Absolutely miserable. This idiot, whom against all good judgement she had
somehow fallen in love with, was asking her if she was feeling better after
having discovered that he was two-timing her!
"What does it look like?" she asked him sharply.
"It looks like 'no,'" he replied.
"Way to go, Saotome," Yuka added in an acid tone. "He can be taught."
Ranma favored her with an acid look in return. "Butt out," he barked
at her.
Yuka shot back a look that shouted 'drop dead!', but was cut off from
a verbal rebuke by Akane.
"You don't tell my friends to 'butt out!'" she snarled.
Ranma rolled his eyes at them. "Some friends," he grunted. "I came
here to apologize and to explain what happened last night, but I guess as
long as they're here to poison anything I say, there ain't no point."
"Spare us the theatrics, Saotome," Sayuri said to him. "She's not
going to listen to your crap anymore."
Ranma looked to Akane to say something. She was troubled by Sayuri
putting words into her mouth, but remained silent.
"I guess not," he replied at length.
"There's nothing to explain, Ranma," she said bitterly. She did not
want to hear an apology from him. He wasn't getting off the hook with a
simple 'I'm sorry.' "As far as I'm concerned, the engagement is off."
The shocked and even *hurt* look in his eyes stabbed at her resolve,
and she called up every reserve of anger with him to keep from breaking
down.
Damn you, Ranma! That was only supposed to hurt you, not me as well!
"But, Akane...?" his mouth seemed to hang open.
She continued her fusilade with the ammunition at hand. There was
no way he was going to walk away from this intact!
"Since you love Ukyou so much, Ranma, maybe you should marry HER!"
Ranma was flabbergasted by her declaration.
"Love Ukyou?!" he cried, coming back to his senses. "Akane, you got
it all wrong. How many times do I gotta say this? Ucchan is my friend,
okay? Nothing more."
Akane's lower lip began to tremble. She bit down on it, and fought
back the stinging in her throat. How could this lying, cheating... *fraud*
say something like that to her face?
"I didn't know friends kissed each other like you and Ukyou did last
night," she said, her voice dripping with accusation. She picked up Yuka's
glass of ice water and threw it in Ranma's face. "You call yourself a man?!
I hate you, and I want you out of my life!"
Ranma flinched at her words more than she did at the icy water that
dripped down her face. She blinked away the discomfort as if shaking off
a jab to the nose, and fired back with his own barb.
"I thought you and I were friends once," she replied, thinking back
to the minutes before _Dragonfly_ Jumped to this damned star system. "And
it didn't stop *you* from kissing me."
The thought of it wounded her even as she said it, and she fled the
Mess Decks before Akane could try to hit her back.
"Stupid macho chick," she growled while grabbing a pot of hot water
from the top of the coffee mess on her way out. "I shoulda known better
than to apologize. To hell with her!"
Akane watched Ranma go. She could sense the relief in her friends upon
his departure, and wondered what might have happened if he hadn't run away
as usual. Most of all she wondered if the things he had said about Ukyou
were true. Had she been overreacting this whole time because of her
feelings for him?
She felt more hurt and confused than ever, and longed to be back in
a 'mech cockpit, directing the 1st Nerima Guards once again. This fool's
errand, even if Ryuugenzawa were real, was no place for her. It was time
to call Captain Ninomiya up in orbit and talk to her about going home.
* * *
Ranma, still female, stepped through the airtight door and into the
'Mech Bay, still growling curses under her breath when she ran into her
father - almost literally. Some of the hot water from the pot sloshed
onto the deck at their feet.
"Watch it, Pop!" she barked at her father.
"Look here, boy," Genma returned, checking Ranma's advance with a
firm hand on his son's arm. "I'm in no mood for your lip."
Ranma looked her father up and down.
"Ask me why I should care?" she said with a sneer.
Genma's eyes narrowed for a moment, as if contemplating the idea of
giving Ranma a knuckle sandwich for his surliness. He decided against it.
There were times when even a sound thrashing wouldn't get through to his
son, and this looked like one of those times.
"I'm going to let that go, boy," he said to Ranma. "Now did you
apologize to Akane yet?"
Ranma looked away silently.
"Based on the fact that you're currently a girl: apparently not,"
Genma observed.
Ranma looked back at her father. "It ain't like I didn't try!" she
snapped. She folded her arms across her buxom chest, a gesture she knew
her father despised, because it called attention to her cursed female
body. "It don't matter anyhow," she continued. "'Cause she broke off our
lame-o engagement."
Genma's eyes bulged out of their sockets.
"SHE DID WHAT!?"
Ranma remained aloof. "You heard me, Pop. Akane broke off the
engagement." She looked away once more. "Hell, I'm glad she did. Who could
possibly marry a chick as crazy and violent as her?"
"You, that's who," Genma countered. "This isn't entirely unexpected
after your foolish fling with that Ukyou girl, but that's not important
right now. What's important is continuing the expedition."
"You gotta be kidding me!" Ranma said angrily. "Who gives a rat's ass
about that goddamn myth!? And besides that, I didn't have a fling with
Ukyou!" She threw up her hands in disgust. "Don't try to put the blame on
me, Pop! In case you hadn't figured it out by now, this whole mess would
never have happened if you hadn't made that phony engagement promise to
Ucchan's folks!"
Genma gave his son a dark look, choosing to ignore any mention of
a girl he had thought long forgotten. "I never joke about Ryuugenzawa, boy.
You know that."
Ranma remained standing still, though her hands flexed into and out
of fists as her father looked at her in silent contemplation.
"Perhaps you had best lay low around Akane for awhile," he said at
length to his son. "She's a spirited girl, and she needs a little breathing
room to calm down and come to her senses."
"You think so, Pop?" Ranma responded in spite of herself. She didn't
think Akane had much sense to begin with, but then again, her Old Man was
the more experienced one when it came to dealing with women. After all,
he had somehow managed to marry Mom and have a son, right?
Genma was looking at her as if she had grown another head. "I know so,
boy! Now get a hotel room in town - away from the one we're already using
for the crew - and stay there until I call you. If I'm right, and I'm
always right, she'll be begging to reconcile with you inside of a week."
"Maybe I don't wanna be reconciled with her," Ranma retorted. "It
sounds too much like being engaged again."
"You're still engaged, boy," Genma countered. "Akane has no more
choice in this than you do."
Ranma dumped the pot of hot water on her head and raised an eyebrow
at him. "We'll see about that, Old Man."
* * *
Pansuto Tarou opened his yellow eyes to face his guard, and weighed
once again his chances of escaping. Doctor Ono had misjudged the dosage
of sedatives used to keep him under control in his monstrous Jusenkyo
body, leaving him sluggish, but not incapacitated. Tofu had erred on the
side of caution, not wanting to kill him with an overdose, and consequently
he had been underdosing him for over two weeks.
For the moment he had been playing a waiting game, carefully adjusting
to the effects of the sedatives so that he could act without hindrance
when the time came to make his break. In that time he had been a fly on
the wall for numerous conversations in the 'Mech Bay, and weighed the
implications of each according to its merits. They were talking about
selling his battlemech for one thing, though with the Consulate refusing
to take custody of him, that was not an immediate concern.
Ryouga had certainly turned on him quickly enough. Now that he had
that sweet little dish of a technician to follow around like a lovesick
puppy, to hell with Tarou, right?! He had watched as his one-time comrade
assisted Akari Unryuu in the preparation of his battlemech for the auction
block. Some friend!
He had learned of Happousai's survival as well. That alone was nearly
enough to send him on a murderous rampage, but his will and the soporific
effect of the drugs had stilled that urge in time. As his ill-fated attempt
to kill him had proved, he would have to be both careful and ruthless around
Happousai if he was to have his revenge.
On a less important note to him was the blowout he had witnessed
between the younger Saotome and his fiancee. Tarou had little regard for
the girl named Akane, and even less for the pig-tailed mechwarrior, but
found it amusing to watch them tear each other apart over some bimbo
named Ucchan. It had been even more fun to watch Ryouga pummel Saotome
shortly after the blowup.
During that confrontation, however, he had heard something which he
now wished he had not, something which dredged up memories he had tried
for far too long to bury. The very idea of facing HER again was enough to
drive him into the stupor Doctor Ono's drugs had failed to achieve.
Ranma Saotome passed by him on his way off the ship. He watched the
pig-tailed mechwarrior walk down the ramp and grunted his disdain for
him. Ranma didn't seem to notice him.
As Ranma left the ship, and idea came to Tarou. Perhaps there was a
way to get himself out of this predicament with a little less risk. It
would mean going with them to Genevieve, and maybe even... facing HER...
But if he could learn the location of Ryuugenzawa, he would have one hell
of a bargaining chip with the Furinkan Combine when he went to join them.
The only question remaining was whether or not the damn fool Saotomes
were going to be able to continue with the expedition.
* * *
"Hiya, Ranchan!"
Ukyou was standing outside her staff car, dressed in her brigadier's
uniform. Several of the _Palomino_ crew looked on from the staging around
Tarou's Hunchback, hoping for a repeat of last night's craziness.
"Hiya, Ucchan," he replied. He was glad to see her, but it didn't
show in his voice.
She registered his less than enthusiastic tone and frowned.
"What's the matter, honey? Aren't you glad to see me? And while I'm
asking all these questions, why are you all wet?"
"Sure I am," Ranma replied, brightening a bit. It's just that everyone
else can see us, too... "The wet part's a long story." A *really* long
story. "Don't worry about it."
Ukyou cut to the heart of the matter.
"Things must have gotten pretty ugly after I left," she observed.
Ranma rubbed at his sore jaw from the fight with Ryouga. "You don't
know the half of it. Look, can we talk somewhere else?"
Ukyou shook her head sadly. "I'm afraid not, sugar. I'm leaving the
planet for Genevieve, remember?"
Ranma nodded. "Oh yeah. So you're gonna help us out when we get
there?"
She gave him a sly smile. "I'm sure we can work something out between
us. You're not gonna keep me waiting too long, are you?"
"That depends," he replied uneasily. When she looked at him like that,
he felt all mushy and nervous inside. It bothered him to think that someone
- especially a girl - could do that to him. Even Akane could do it to him,
when she wasn't being a crabby battleaxe. "We can't go anywhere until we
get our JumpShip fixed. We're waiting on parts."
Ukyou turned up the heat on her smile.
"Too bad. Just think of the next time you'll get some of this."
She gestured to the car. A rather cute and demure girl of major rank
stepped out, gingerly holding a flat square-shaped box in her white-gloved
hands. The girl shyly presented the box to him before returning to the car.
"Open it," Ukyou told him.
Ranma could already tell by the heat and the smell that it was food.
He flipped open the box to reveal a piping hot okonomiyaki resting upon a
sheet of rice paper. There were characters written in sauce on the pancake-
like food - something mushy, he was sure - but Ranma wolfed the thing down
before he could read all of them.
Ukyou judged by the speed at which he had devoured the okonomiyaki
that he had missed her cute love note, but upon seeing him happily eating
some of her lovingly prepared handiwork, she was content to let it go at
that.
"It's good," he mumbled, his mouth still full with the last bite.
"Thank you."
"You're quite welcome, Ranchan," she replied, leaning forward to kiss
his cheek.
His face burned at her show of affection.
"Remember, sugar," she continued. "The faster you get to Genevieve,
the sooner you can eat all the okonomiyaki you want."
"I'd flap my arms and fly there if it meant I could get some more of
this!" he gushed.
Ukyou beamed. She wished that she didn't have to go, but the sooner
she boarded her DropShip, the better. Mikado could discover her plans at
any time, and if Konatsu was correct in his assessment of the general,
his vengeance would be terrible.
"I have to go now, Ranchan," she told him. "Of course, you could
always come with me!"
Ranma blanched. "I can't," he replied. "Pop would kill me. We'll be
there soon, I promise."
Her eyes fell. At least he hadn't mentioned anything about Akane...
"Oh. Well, I guess it can't be helped." She gave him a wave, then
stepped back into the car.
Ranma waved good bye as it drove down the service road towards the
military side of the starport. A Union Class DropShip waited at the end
of the road, probably Ucchan's. It was weird thinking of her as a high
ranking mechwarrior in the Federated Shiratori Army, and only the sight
of her in her uniform had made it real for him.
He needed to blow off some steam first, before taking Pop's advice
and moving into town for a week or so. How long did girls usually stay
mad at someone, anyway? Akane seemed to have a lot of stamina when it
came to being pissed off.
He looked up at the weathered hull of the _Palomino_ and got an
idea. Perhaps it was time to take Duke Tendo's loaner out for a spin.
"What is it, Konatsu?" Ukyou asked her adjutant. Though he had not
said a word, his silence spoke volumes.
"Sir?" he asked innocently.
"I've waited a long time for Ranma to come back into my life," Ukyou
told him. "It's only natural for me to show a little affection towards him."
"As you say, sir," Konatsu replied uncomfortably.
Ukyou decided to let it go at that. The poor guy was going to have to
get used to the fact that Ranma was an important part of her life.
Chapter Four
Captain Hinako Ninomiya trudged sluggishly up the jetway from the
shuttle to the passenger terminal, mindful under the oppressive pull of
Tiber's gravity that she had been spending too much time in the free-fall
of the drydock while overseeing the repairs to the _Dragonfly._ There were
only a handful of passengers with her, most of them yardbirds on furlough,
and all were similarly impaired. The acrid smell of welding fumes clung to
her tight-fitting clothes, and she longed to step out into air that had
not endured endless recycling. It had been months since the last time
she had set foot on a planet.
Akane Tendo waited for her at the top of the jetway. Hinako noted
the grave look on her face and wondered what exactly the girl had on her
mind to call her from orbit. She had other business on Tiber, so the trip
was necessary no matter what the daughter of the Grand Duke's was upset
about, but she was nonetheless concerned.
"Thank you for coming, Captain Ninomiya," Akane said by way of
greeting.
Hinako bowed slightly for the Confederation Heir. There was no need
for anything more formal between them in a place like this.
"I *did* have other business dirtside," she replied in her husky
voice. She gave Akane a penetrating look that made the Tendo girl wish
Hinako had arrived in her child-body. "You were less than clear on the
reasons why you needed to speak with me in person. Perhaps we can discuss
the matter over lunch?"
Akane nodded in agreement. "That's fine with me," she said calmly.
Hinako took a sip of her iced tea before responding to Akane's
request. "You are asking me, in effect, to mutiny against Commander
Saotome," she said to Akane.
"Mutiny?" Akane chirped worriedly. The word 'mutiny' occupied a
place in the military lexicon similar to the one occupied by 'cowardice,'
except that 'mutiny' was a far graver offense. Fear was a fact of war,
and sometimes the struggle against one's fear was lost, but mutiny was
a crime against the very fabric of martial society. An army or fleet
could not function if it were permissable to usurp the command of higher
authority.
Hinako explained her response from her own unique perspective.
"Lady Akane, as an officer of the Confederation Navy, I swore an oath
of fealty to the Tendos, and to the Grand Duke specifically. Your father
has placed Genma Saotome in command of this expedition, and granted him,
by a letter of marque, a rank commensurate with his position. I cannot
simply ignore that fact because you wish to exercise the authority granted
to you by your birthright."
"I only wanted your opinion on the matter," Akane said, her voice
surprisingly meek.
"And now you have it," Hinako replied sharply. "Now would you mind
telling me what made you even consider such a thing?"
Akane wasn't sure if she should proceed. Captain Ninomiya had made
it clear that to return home against Genma Saotome's wishes would be the
equivalent of mutiny against her own father. She could not do that, even
if her father was dead wrong about the Saotomes.
Worse, her true motivation for wanting to return home was due to the
shattered engagement with Ranma. How do you rationalize something like
that to an outsider like Captain Ninomiya, she wondered, much less explain
it?
Hinako took her silence as a cue to speak.
"Is this about the Combine's siege of Capella?" she asked Akane.
"Even if we returned, one ship and a handful of battlemechs would not
make any more difference in the outcome," she continued. "Furthermore,
you would only be placing yourself in Prince Kuno's hands. Is that what
you really want?"
Akane looked away. Had she really been that stupid? Her anger with
Ranma was making her brain rot.
"No," she replied. "Of course not."
"Then why would you even consider such a thing?"
Akane remained silent.
"There's something more to this, isn't there," Hinako observed.
Akane's head bobbed slightly in agreement. It was hard to imagine a
women who spent half her time trapped in the body of an eight-year-old
actually possessing that kind of perception. How old was Captain Ninomiya,
anyway? Sitting across from her at the table, with her enviable body
shoehorned into an outfit so short and tight that it made mens' heads
turn and tongues wag, she looked about thirty.
"It's complicated," she replied.
"I'm sure it is," Hinako returned. She steepled her fingers together.
"If you don't want to talk about it, that's your business."
Akane decided that she did not want to talk about it. The more she
thought about the situation, the more foolish her chosen course of action
made her look. It was bad enough that she was defying her father by
breaking off the engagement with Ranma. Did she really want to add mutiny
to the list? All because of her idiotic, two-timing, ex-fiance?
* * *
The DropShip _Palomino_
"I'm not sure this is such a great idea."
Yuka looked her friend over. She had expected Sayuri to get cold feet
a little sooner than this.
"Do you want to go home or don't you?"
"Of course I want to go home," Sayuri replied. "But not in chains."
"We aren't going to kill him," Yuka assured her friend. "We're just
going to scare him a little. Put him in his place, as it were."
"But a duel?" Sayuri protested. "Just because we're not out to kill
him doesn't mean he'll feel the same way. This could get out of hand
before we know it."
Yuka gestured to their CSR-V8 Corsair fighters. Akari's Tech Shed had
just craned them out of their launch bays in the DropShip's bow section,
and set them on the tarmac for takeoff. "Come on," she returned. "What can
a LAM do to one of these things? We have twice the armor and firepower, and
we're faster than him too."
"I'm still not convinced that this is the best way to go about getting
rid of the Saotomes," Sayuri said to her. "If we kill him, we're in big
trouble. We know that Akane's angry with Ranma, but what if she still
loves him?"
Yuka pursed her lips in thought. It was not her intention to kill the
worthless piece of crap, but it was possible that it could happen. Akane
might not take it well at first, but she would get over the loser in time.
As for any legal problems they might have, she had an angle for that.
"If we kill him, then so be it. We have the right as aerospace pilots
to challenge others to duels the same way mechwarriors can."
Sayuri wasn't so sure. While the Succession Wars had conferred upon
mechwarriors and aerospace pilots a status approaching that of the Chivalry
in the feudal periods of pre-Jump Earth, dueling wasn't exactly condoned by
the Nerima Confederation the way it was in the Furinkan Combine or the
Jusenkyo Commonwealth. They simply couldn't afford to waste their fighting
resources the way the larger, richer Successor States could. She didn't
like Ranma any more than Yuka did, but was this really the only way?
"Are you with me or aren't you?" Yuka pressed.
Sayuri closed her eyes in dread of the next few hours. Yuka would go
whether she did or not, and by herself, she could get killed. Neither of
them had ever fought a LAM before, and in the hands of a skilled pilot,
LAMs were known to be as unpredictable as enemies came. Ranma was a total
asshole for the way he treated Akane, and he also had every reason to hate
both Yuka and herself.
"I'm in."
"Good. Let's get cracking then."
* * *
Phoenix Hawk LAM T-507
5000 meters MSL above the Sea of Aquila
Ranma opened the throttle wide on his fusion-heated scramjets,
letting the Phoenix Hawk settle into the comfortable velocity of Mach Two.
The silence to be had in traveling faster than the sound of your passing
was a welcome relief to him. He had way too much to think about without a
lot of outside distractions getting in his way.
Flying out over the ocean helped clear his mind as well. Out here there
was nothing but open sky and endless sea. Blue against blue, with only the
clouds to tell them apart. Out here thoughts of Akane could be put in their
proper perspective.
He wished.
It would have helped his cause if he knew exactly why she was so
pissed at him. He knew that Ukyou was a big part of it, but there seemed
to be much more involved. He just didn't have any clue as to what it might
have been...
Yuka and Sayuri weren't helping matters. Maybe he had gone a bit
overboard by calling them dykes, but who made it their business to go
butting in?
A tingling in the back of his mind brought him to rapt attention.
There were two sets of airborne search radar dead aft of him, at the limits
of his detection gear's sensitivity. There wasn't supposed to be anyone out
here, which was why he had chosen this stretch of water to fly over.
He decided to play it cool for the moment. His transponder was on,
and as a non-allied mercenary in F-S territory, he had filed a verbal
flight plan with the authorities for this jaunt. If Tiber COAC wanted to
say something about it, they would. If not, well, he'd play his cards as
they were dealt.
The two sets of radar resolved themselves on his main display as
they closed with him to a distance of one hundred kilometers. The Warbook
established them as Ranker TA800 air-search and acquisition gear. Rankers
were found on only one class of fighter, the Corsair. That meant that his
pursuers were probably part of the F-S Garrison, since they used most of
the Corsairs to be found in the Inner Sphere.
Unless...
On a whim, he set his commo set to the _Palomino's_ preferred channels.
He had set his radio to ignore any broadcasts on those frequencies when he
left, so his father couldn't try to order him home before he was ready. He
had his answer almost immediately.
"--down, Saotome," Yuka's voice said over the commo. "Do you hear me?"
He shook his head in disgust. They were hounding him even out here.
"What if I hear you and just don't care?" he asked her.
Her face appeared unbidden on his display. She looked severe in her
pressure suit and neurohelmet, and her eyes had the glint of anger in them.
"What's your problem, Saotome?" Sayuri chimed in.
"I dunno," he shot back. "What's *your* problem?"
The two V8-model Corsairs accelerated to catch up with him. Ranma
casually eased back his throttle and dropped below supersonic velocity.
Within minutes the two fighters had taken up positions on either wing.
"Hey, what do you know?" he chirped. "You two really *can* fly in
formation? I guess Pop wins the bet..."
Yuka took his barb as expected. "Asshole."
She hit her overthrust and rocketed ahead of him, snap-rolling
precariously close to his radome and making him eat her slipstream. The
effects were almost immediate, throwing Ranma into a sharp dive as the
airflow over his fighter was disrupted and he lost lift.
He squeeze the burn studs on his throttle, dumping raw plasma from
the reactor into the engines' HEPLAR coils for the thrust he would need
to regain control over his stall. Yuka's laughter over the radio was
infuriating.
"What the hell was that for, you crazy bitch!?" he demanded.
Sayuri accelerated away to join up with Yuka.
"We're here to challenge you to a duel."
"Both of you at once?" he barked, hastily snapping master safety
switches to arm his weapons. They seriously wanted to kill him? "That's
real sporting."
"You can always back down," Yuka offered contemptuously. "Only keep
in mind that the condition for forfeiting the duel is that you and your
father renounce the expedition, and then stay on Tiber while we return to
the Confederation."
"Think of it this way, Saotome," Sayuri added. Yuka's show of bravado
had her courage up. "At least on Tiber you'll have your little cupcake to
keep you company."
Ranma grit his teeth. They were trying to get rid of him all right,
one way or another. He was outgunned, outnumbered, and flew a fighter that
was slower and less armored than their Corsairs. He would have been smart
to fly away, whether he intended to do as they said or not.
But that just wouldn't have been Ranma Saotome.
"I sure hope you chicks know how to swim," he growled. 'Cause it's a
long way back to shore... he added mentally. His undercarriage heavy laser
was energized. Unless he retracted the aerodynamic housing for his twin
medium lasers in the starboard engine pod, it was all he had to fight with
in Fighter Mode. He intended to keep this fight at subsonic velocities if
at all possible, where he actually had a chance of winning. He was mindful
of the fact that most of the Corsair's kills came while low and slow, but
then, so did a Phoenix Hawk LAM's.
Yuka and Sayuri goosed their boosters and pulled snap rolls in
opposite directions. They were trying to get him to make a choice between
which one to go after, knowing that the other one would come up behind him.
He decided instead to let them come to him.
"What's the matter, Saotome?" Yuka chided him as she made a wide turn
back towards his direction.
Ranma let her eat static. He focused his attention instead on the data
streaming into his head from the neurohelmet, and on their capabilities.
They had two heavy lasers to his one, the same number of medium lasers,
plus twin light lasers just forward of the cockpit for close-in work, and
a set facing aft to keep chasers off their backs. The only thing going for
him in this equation was that they didn't have the heat sinks to fire their
heavy guns at the same time as their others.
That meant that they'd save their heavy lasers for times where they
were outside light laser range, like when they were closing for an attack,
and once they got close, they'd probably hit him with both lights and
mediums, plus maybe a parting shot with their aft guns as they passed him.
He could offer a heavy laser blast in return while in Fighter Mode,
which was a decent amount of firepower because of its range and punch, but
considering their thick armor belts, it was a losing proposition to simply
trade fire shot-for-shot with the two of them. If he jumped on their tails,
he'd have the aft guns to contend with - a nuisance, but distracting when
beams are flying at you - and with their powerful GM 200ATF engines, they
could easily accelerate away from him in level flight.
Simply put, there was no way he could beat both of them at once in
Fighter Mode. Unfortunately for him, that was the mode he was currently
using. He needed to find out how serious they were about shooting him
down, and the best way to do that was to give them a seemingly perfect
opportunity.
Sayuri felt the gee forces pushing her into her ejector seat as she
made a banking turn onto her attack vector. Ranma was staying in level
flight, and subsonic. He was practically a sitting duck for them.
She could see Yuka well beyond and slightly above him, her own turn
to attack completed. Was Yuka really going to open up on him?
Yuka's radar held the Phoenix Hawk LAM firmly in track as she
energized her lasers. He was flying level and slow, which didn't make
much sense from a combat standpoint. Why wasn't he doing something, like
chasing one of them, or making a run for it?
"Last chance to back out," she informed him, hoping that he would,
and prepared to act if he didn't.
His reply was brief and to the point.
"Bite me."
You had your chance, Saotome, she thought angrily. This is for Akane!
She squeezed her trigger.
Yuka's heavy lasers burned through the air in bright orange streaks.
The beams crazed the upper hull of the Phoenix Hawk LAM, and cut through
the leading edge of the port engine pod nacelle in a flash of smoke and
sparks. Ranma shoved the throttles to the stops and pushed over into a
death dive as the lasers struck, his wings adjusting for high-speed flight.
With an eye on his airspeed indicator, he juked and banked as he dove,
trying to draw them down with him while spoiling their aim. The damage to
his fighter was minimal at this point, and was ignored. It was a calculated
risk, knowing that his armor was more than good for what little contact she
could achieve at extreme range.
It also went against basic aerial combat tactics to give up your
altitude as fast as he was shedding his, but then, as a LAM pilot, his
playbook and maneuver capabilities were a little different from the average
fighter pilot's. He was counting on Yuka and Sayuri to follow their lessons
from aerial combat school if he was going to beat them.
Sayuri watched as heavy laser beams grazed the LAM, and realized that
Yuka wasn't playing around. She fired her own weapons half-heartedly,
wanting to keep up the show more than to kill the stupid jerk. Yuka was
going too far with this.
Sayuri was the weak link, Ranma realized. She's the one who wasn't
serious about this duel. That was a relief, knowing that he had only one
dedicated opponent, and so was the fact that Yuka was taking the bait.
More laser beams sizzled around him from her Corsair as she followed him
down at high speed. He could almost feel her sighting him in for her
close-in spread of lasers as he pushed his LAM through the sound barrier.
The sonic boom he generated would change air density behind him just enough
to spoof Yuka's targeting system for a moment.
"Is that the best shooting you can do?" he mocked. "I've seen repple-
depple scrubs who could shoot straighter than you!"
She didn't rise to his taunt, preferring instead to blaze away with
her heavy lasers. Her Corsair had to be getting toasty with all of the
heat that was building up.
He continued his dive, pushing for more speed until he reached the
point - where he knew from his test runs on Nerima - that the Phoenix Hawk
could take no more without breaking up. His fusion-heated turbojets
shrieked in the base of his spine through his ejector seat as the
altimeter swam dizzyingly towards sea level.
Yuka followed him down, her Corsair's long swept wings knifing
through the air and trailing streams of condensed moisture behind them.
Her nose-mounted heavy lasers shot lines of radiant death at him that
criss-crossed around his LAM in a glowing web of ionized air. Sayuri
trailed well behind her compatriot, content to keep watch over the battle.
"Hey, Sayuri," Ranma heard Yuka grunting with the strain of her dive
over the tac-net. "A little help here!"
A smile crossed his lips at that. You ain't seen nothing yet!
They were running out of sky at over two-thousand kilometers per hour
as they continued their dives. Ranma watched the altimeter, knowing that
his reaction would make or break him at the bottom of the dive. He wasn't
going to lose to Yuka and Sayuri.
"Pull up," Sayuri found herself saying to Ranma, whose fighter was
in a twisting power dive so steep that there seemed to be no way he could
recover from it.
What's he up to? Yuka wondered, her guns still trying to draw a bead
on the slippery LAM. That's it! she cried in her mind. He's gonna transform!
Gotcha!
At two-hundred meters above sea level, Ranma tugged at his Phoenix
Hawk's transformation lever. The LAM spiralled into its bird of prey
Airmech Mode as the legs dropped out of the undercarriage and fired braking
thrust. For a moment he was a sitting duck for Yuka's guns, and beams of
laser light burned into his upper fuselage armor.
The LAM sprang clear with an unexpected lateral thrust burn from the
legs that pitched it violently to the right. The Phoenix Hawk's engines
screamed above the wavetops as Ranma scooted clear by using the surface
effect of the water to convert the energy of his dive into forward motion
that kept him moving at high speed. Once clear, he fired his plasma drives,
catapulting him straight up in Airmech Mode on a column of starflame and
clouds of steam from the boiling ocean beneath him, and taking his Phoenix
Hawk out of Yuka's effective plane of attack.
Yuka had to pull out of her own dive now, and in that moment she must
have realized how he had used her Corsair's design characteristics against
her.
The fighter could turn and roll in the atmosphere beautifully, but
its narrow, straked wings and its too-far-forward center of gravity gave
it a less than sterling pitch rate. The best she could hope for was to try
and roll as she pulled out of her dive to stay with him. He could almost
hear her frustrated scream at him as he escaped her fusilade and rose on
a leg thruster-generated thermal to attack the dawdling Sayuri.
She was the weak link, the easiest target. Yuka was already out for
blood against him no matter what he did, so he considered it better to
take out Sayuri before she got herself motivated against him as well.
She wasn't prepared for his rapidly climbing attack, and tried a snap
roll while diving to evade him. His Airmech Mode could roll better any day
of the week than most fighters - including the Corsair. He continued his
vertical ascent, the Phoenix Hawk's metalshod fingers splaying out like
angry talons, and the aerodynamic housing over the starboard engine pod
retracting to reveal the twin medium lasers.
He hosed fire from the medium lasers at her as he climbed on a near
collision course. There was too little separation, and too much speed
between them for her to get away. Ranma dropped into the receptive state
necessary for the most minute control over his Phoenix Hawk LAM, feeling
the microwaves from his radar bouncing back from Sayuri's Corsair as they
tickled the phased array receivers. He knew the distance that separated
them down to the centimeter, their closure rate to the tenth of a second,
and how close they would come before passing within half a meter. He
projected that data onto the ballistics set for his forearm-mounted SRM
launcher.
At a precise launch distance his missiles would be exactly one point
eight meters apart in a horizontal salvo when they reached the target. That
was all he needed to know. He then trained his LAM's left arm on the diving
Corsair, and spat a pair of SRMs that slammed into the engine intake ducts
on either side of the cockpit.
He passed underneath her a moment later, his LAM's fingers gouging
deep rents into her wingroots. He cut his thrust a moment later, rising on
his stored momentum and unslinging the heavy laser to continue the attack
if his calculations failed. As the Phoenix Hawk stalled at the top of its
climb, he pushed over, rolling and adding thrust as he dove once more.
He saw that his SRMs had destroyed Sayuri's jet turbines and probably
raised a little hell with her plasma drive. Black streams of smoke and
bright flecks of burning metal gushed from her thrusters. She needed her
turbines at low velocity and altitude to stay airborne - only when boosting
for space at hypersonic velocity and at high altitude did the fighter shift
over to the scramjets, otherwise they were almost useless for thrust. She
was effectively crippled, but in a pinch she could use the plasma drive
directly to get her home.
"Sayuri!" Yuka cried over the tac-net.
"You've got two choices, Sayuri," Ranma tersely informed her. "Crank
up your HEPLAR drive right now and pray you've got enough reaction mass to
reach the mainland, or else punch out right now."
The Corsair pulled out of its dive, but he could see that she hadn't
fired the plasma drive. She was going to stall if she lost any more speed.
"Fire your drive or punch out!" he shouted at her. How hard could it
be?
"Sayuri!" Yuka cried once more. Ranma kept an eye on her from twenty
klicks out as she raced back into the fight. "Do something!"
"My drive's malfunctioning!" Sayuri protested abruptly.
"Punch out!" Ranma ordered her.
"I can't just abandon my ship!" she shouted, anger and panic seeping
into her voice. "You're the one who did this to me!"
"Screw the fighter!" Ranma shot back. "Do you want to die? Punch out!"
"Do it!" Yuka ordered. Then, her voice meek, she added, "Sayuri, I'm
sorry..."
Sayuri ejected as the crippled Corsair stalled, then tumbled into
a death dive for the sea. Ranma watched her until she separated from her
ejector seat, her olive drab parachute opening and filling with air. Once
he was satisfied that she was going to make it, he clicked the 'talk'
button on his HOTAS to address Yuka.
"What's it gonna be, Yuka?" he asked her. Her Corsair was within
ten kilometers now, the radar threat indicator warning him that he was
being painted. His Phoenix Hawk was scarred by laser fire - a few more
heavy laser hits from her were going to do him in. "Do you wanna join
Sayuri in the drink?"
END OF PART EIGHTEEN