Fan-fiction: Tomiko and Goro

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Hellbringer
11/19/07 07:44 AM
200.2.168.198

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Chapter 1

Dearest Tomiko, my little Kitsune,

I have missed you so these eight weeks. My heart aches to imagine the troubles that you may face in this new life you have chosen. Although I wish for your safe and immediate return, I will not ask for it. I know that you would not want me to.
These two months have been filled with difficulties between your father and me, as you and I knew they would be. He has disowned you, as we knew he must do to save face. You will never again share the Konoda name or be his heir. Though this is what we foresaw over a year ago, I am still saddened that I must be the one to inform you.

Please stay safe and keep my Goro in good repair. I know that he will protect you, as he did me so many years ago. I will pray for you everyday and please do not worry about me. Know that while your father’s anger is great, he does still love you.

Please Remember Our Love,
Grandmother


The nineteen year-old girl carefully refolded the small piece of flimsy-plast and slid it back into its envelope. Stowing the Comstar-stamped parcel in an inner-pocket of her jacket, Tomiko slowly tilted back her head. First, she took in a pair of huge metal feet. The second set of mechanisms she gazed upon was two reverse articulated knees. The legs met at a huge hip and seated upon it was a wide body that jutted forward, balanced over its feet. Two arms grew out from its sides and swept forward, each one ending in closed claw-like manipulators. In battle, they opened wide to reveal the gaping barrels of heavy autocannons. They heaviest weapons a battlemech could carry.

From her vantage point, she could barely see the cockpit windows that sat to either side of the body’s nose like dark eyes. Instead, she focused on the stubby laser barrel that extended from the underside of the machine’s right torso and imagined the destruction it could bring. As her eyes wandered back down the battlemech she grinned crookedly, appreciating the charcoal black base coat and red-orange tiger stripe highlights.

“Well, Goro,” she whispered as she patted the letter through the fabric of her coat. “We’ve had her blessing for a while. Now it’s time to make good. I will treat you with the honor and respect any warrior shows her sword. Now I ask you to serve me as you served my grandmother. Cut hard and true and we will win glory.”

With that, the petite warrior took several steps forward and laid her hand on the King Crab’s left foot. She stood for a minute in absolute stillness. It was as if it took this contact with the war machine to fully inherit him from his previous owner, even though Goro had been hers on paper for over two months. Finally, she took a deep breath and removed her hand. Turning, she headed out of the dropship’s gloomy cargo hold; each step propelling her further out of her old life and into her next.


Tomiko Minowara, as she had been to thinking of herself since leaving home, presented her identification to the Outreach customs authority. She had been waiting in a queue on the tarmac of the Mercenary World’s primary landing zone for several minutes, planning on heading into the capital city of Harlech to find a place to stay. It would be a few days before Goro would join her on planet. The dropship she had ridden on was a passenger ship, not a military transport, and there was plenty of other cargo to offload before the hold was open enough to admit the passage of an assault-class battlemech. There was also the issue of port authority paperwork. In her research prior to running away, Tomiko had learned that governments were usually very particular about letting ‘mech owning individuals onto their world. She knew that Wolf’s Dragoons, mercenary masters of the planet, would be quite used to such traffic which may speed up the process, but it did not mean that they would be any less careful about people running around their domain in weapons capable of leveling city blocks with a pull of a trigger.

The port authority clerk, actually a tall Dragoon mercenary wearing the uniform of an infantry lieutenant complete with holstered laser pistol, scanned her identity card with his handheld computer, and then took a closer look at her face, comparing it with the picture that showed up on the computer’s screen. Most of her customs paperwork had been handled the day before from the comfort of her cabin aboard ship. This last stage was merely matching her with the information she had submitted and making sure the correct people were getting off of the ship. Fortunately the weather was quite pleasant and the wait had not been too much of a chore. Tomiko was expecting a quick scan and then receiving permission to board the shuttle bus that would take her and her fellow passengers to the spaceport terminal. She was surprised when the lieutenant spoke up instead of handing back her card.

“Mechwarrior, huh?” he asked, scanning the information on his computer. “What’s your ride?”

“King Crab,” she responded evenly as she turned to look up at the man. He had at least thirty centimeters on her.

He whistled, “Hundred tonner with some big guns. Quite a machine for a lady of your,” he paused and looked her over, “stature”.

Great, it was some stupid male dominance performance. This would never have happened to her at home in the Combine. On the other hand, she thought, home in the Combine I would not have a ‘mech at all. I guess having to play this little game is worth it. Tomiko gave him a half-grin. “What have you got there?” she asked, gesturing at his sidearm.

“Blackwell Mk. VII,” he said proudly. “Pulse laser pistol. You like it?”

“It’s a fine weapon,” Tomiko replied, still grinning. “I was just wondering why a man of your impressive stature feels the need to carry such a big gun.”

She had caught the soldier off-guard and for a moment his expression darkened. She heard a few soft chuckles from people waiting behind her in line and wondered if his anger would inspire him to use some bureaucratic loophole to send her back off-planet. After another moment his grimace broke into an easy smile as he realized he had deserved the joke at his expense.

“Seems like you’ll do fine here,” he said as he handed back her credentials. “Enjoy your stay, ‘mechwarrior.”

Feeling very good about herself, Tomiko slid her card back into her pocket and boarded the waiting shuttle bus. One trial was down and she was sure she could handle anything else that reared its head.
Hellbringer
11/19/07 08:25 AM
200.2.168.198

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With an inner flourish that she only let reach as far as her lips, Tomiko finished typing a few final words into the computer terminal. With a definitive jab of the enter key she stood and pushed in her chair. Turning around, she left the small terminal alcove and headed for the main entrance of the great Dragoon’s Hiring Hall. The building was immense, the largest she had ever seen, and she knew that it was one of the largest in the entire Inner Sphere. Just leaving the registry area and getting to the main hall took several minutes.

The main hall was a concourse of gigantic proportions. Moving walkways were built into the floor near the walls, conveying people to their destinations quickly and smoothly. Tomiko could have shaved a few minute off of her exit by taking the people mover, but she chose instead to walk under her own power. As she made her way the young ‘mechwarrior basked in the atmosphere of the Hiring Hall. The very air seemed charged with energy and she eagerly tapped into it, knowing that it was the spirit of opportunity that permeated this place. She willed it to permeate her.

One needed no better example of the business side of the mercenary trade than to walk through the Wolf’s Dragoons Hiring Hall. The entire giant structure was focused on facilitating the hiring and directing of warriors and their machines of destruction. Tomiko did not know exactly all of what the Hiring Hall contained and she suspected no one except its Dragoons masters knew either. The registry department she had just left was only a small part of the whole. The information she had entered into the terminal, for a sizable fee, would be entered into the registry database. Once there, it could be accessed by perspective employers, who were also billed for the convenience as well as for contact information, should they wish to speak or meet with her.

Tomiko wondered if she would ever be contacted. She reviewed the data she had entered, data any future employer would be basing their hiring decision on. First was her name and a few vital statistics. The new identity had been provided by her grandmother with the assurance that it would stand up under the closest scrutiny. She rolled the name around in her mind, Minowara Tomiko. It seemed to fit her, both parts being similar to her old name. She knew that her grandmother had contacts high in the Combine Government, contacts left over from her old days in the DCMS. Still, the forged identity had amazed her with its thoroughness and once again she wondered how many favors her beloved grandmother had needed to burn in order to produce the paperwork.

Second, was information regarding what type of equipment she brought with her. Very few mercenaries possessed their own battlemechs; the cost was far too great. Mercenary units often used their greater resources to purchase machines or made them part of their contract offers. This way they could grant dispossessed ‘mechwarriors a ride, further enhancing their loyalty to the unit. Tomiko had been very proud to list Goro as being hers. According to the details of her new identity and the paperwork she carried, it had been inherited from her grandmother. King Crab, Model KGC-0000, 100 Tons, Standard Armament, Tech Support: None. Although she knew that this part of her dossier was her greatest selling point, there were still a couple areas of it that she was unhappy with. The universe had changed a lot since Goro had been walked off of the assembly line. Even in the last seven years since the invasion of the Clans, battlemech technology and weapons development had jumped light years ahead. Many of her ‘mech’s weapons and support systems needed to be upgraded. Also, Tomiko knew that having a dedicated personal technician was very important. She would need someone who could not only keep Goro in repair and optimal performance, but also liaise with mercenary quartermasters to make sure Goro was always supplied with armor, munitions, and replacement parts. Ah well, both of those issues would be taken care of when she had the C-Bills to spare.

The third and final area of the registry information she had entered was also her weakest. It started nicely, with detailed summaries of training exercises she had participated in as well as her scores from various simulator runs. While the details of dates and locations had been altered to match her new identity, all of the scores remained untouched, and they were fairly high. For someone so young, she had logged a remarkable amount of hours in both the simulator and the actual cockpit. As she had entered the information, Tomiko had silently thanked her grandmother for fostering the dreams that her father had tried so hard to suppress and, in the end, to crush.

Unfortunately, after those bright spots at the beginning there was only darkness. What she had absolutely none of was real combat experience. There was no string her grandmother could pull or favor she could call in to get Tomiko that. Combat experience is what really counted and even half an hour of kill or be killed fighting could totally wipe out her substantial amount of training and simulator time. Possible employers perusing the registry would be stopped by her assault class battlemech, her training record, maybe even just to wonder about how a nineteen year old had gotten onto the registry with her own 100 ton war machine in the first place, but as soon as they saw that gaping hole towards the end of her dossier, they would write her off and move on.

In her heart Tomiko hoped for an offer from a prestigious mercenary unit such as the Northwind Highlanders, or even Wolf’s Dragoons themselves, but in her mind she knew that she would likely have to settle for some small, third-rate unit that no one had heard from before. Of course, her lack of experience also shrank the size of the contract that she could demand, so she could only guess what type of employer that bargain might attract.

Coming out of her thoughts, Tomiko found herself close to the Hiring Hall’s main entrance. It had taken nearly half an hour to stroll there from the registry department located roughly in the center of the building. For a moment she stood and watched the masses of people passing each other as they entered and exited by the hundreds. There were business people carrying briefcases and wearing suits that ranged in quality from “wageslave” to C.E.O. There were military men, officers in impeccable uniforms as well as dog soldiers and mercenaries who looked uneasy without a weapon or control stick to clutch. All of them were essential to the operation of the mercenary trade.

To describe the people who passed by her as “bustling” would be the master of understatements. It was more of a controlled frenzy. The mercenary industry never slowed or stopped. Even in the relative peace since the halt of the Clan Invasion and the lack of military action in the sundering of the Federated Commonwealth and the creation of the Lyran Alliance, there was still a great deal of money to be made in the waging of war. In the immensity of the Hiring Hall, the crowd seemed thin and flowed easily. Tomiko was quite surprised when someone suddenly slammed into her from behind.

The unexpected blow put her on her hands and knees. Before her initial shock could give way to anger or fear, Tomiko’s ears picked up a deep yet jovial sounding voice that she could not understand.

“Es tun mir leid, frauline!” There was a momentary pause and then the voice returned. This time it was in German accented English, but at least she could understand it. “I’m sorry about that. I’ve been speaking German all day and I just forgot to switch gears. Please let me help you up.”

Tomiko turned as she pushed herself up into a crouch. Standing before her and offering her his hand was a broad-shouldered man with close-cropped reddish-brown hair and mutton chop sideburns. He wore military fatigues absent of insignia other than “ C. SILK” which was stitched in black block letters above his left breast pocket.

“I’m so sorry,” he repeated. “I really did not see you there. Please, let me help you up.”

Tomiko took his hand and, with no visible effort on his part, hauled her to her feet. Now standing before him she could better gauge his height, which was at least seventy centimeters greater than hers. The man was a bear, a Lyran bear by the sound of his voice.

“Are you all right, fraulein?” he asked, the language of his homeland once again creeping into his speech.

“Yes, I’m fine, thank you,” she replied as she pulled on the hem of her jacket, settling it back into place.

“I swear I did not see you there.”

“Obviously not,” she said, “But it’s all right. We all make mistakes.” She paused for a moment, “I’ll be on my way now.”

“Of course,” Silk replied with a nod that could be interpreted as a slight bow. “Sorry to have troubled you.” He waited until she had turned to go and then continued on his way, heading the opposite direction, further into the Hiring Hall.
Hellbringer
11/20/07 06:39 AM
200.2.168.198

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Chapter 2

It had been two weeks since Tomiko had registered and so far no one had contacted her. She had known from the start that it could take a while, but she was growing tired of the waiting. The novelty of being on a totally new world had worn off after about a week and a half. She had visited all of the places she had cared to go and a few that she had not. Outreach was Spartan. Its entire purpose was to serve the mercenary industry, a purpose that had little room for recreation and no room whatsoever for tourist attractions. Tomiko occupied herself by spending time with Goro, perusing catalogues of the newest battlemechs, weapons, and technology, and working her way through the various bars, restaurants, and ramen shops in the Draconis Combine area of the city. She had gone back to the Hiring Hall a few times to participate in simulator sessions and would like to do more, but her life was budgeted now and the simulators could eat C-Bills. What she would really have liked to do was get her ‘mech out onto one of the Dragoon’s proving grounds and run wild for a few hours, but paying for that required sponsorship. Tomiko had left home with a good deal of money, and she still had quite a bit left after the expenses she had incurred so far, but that was no reason to be wasteful.

She was halfway finished with a bowl of hot miso ramen and watching a recorded Solaris VII match on the noodle shop’s holovid player when her personal comlink alerted her. Tomiko had synched the unit to the communications terminal in her rented room the day she had moved in and set it to let her know whenever she was called, messaged, or otherwise contacted. Other than a wrong number on her fourth day of residency this was the only time the comlink had gone off.

Tomiko fished it out of her pocket and read its small display. Someone had sent her an electronic message. Flipping open the unit’s display screen to read the message, Tomiko let out a soft gasp of surprise when she read the sent-by line at the top: C. Silk. Her eyes narrowed as she scrolled down through the text to read what had been written.

Miss Minowara,

I hope that you will remember me. At the risk of a horrible pun I will remind you that we ran into each other at the Hiring Hall many days ago. Some associates and I will be meeting at the address listed below. I believe that this meeting could be financially beneficial for you. I look forward to learning more about you and your King Crab. Please come at your convenience any time between 2000 and 2300 tonight.

Thank you for your time,
Compton Silk

Tomiko closed the comlink after reading the address listed after the signature. She did not recognize it, but that did not mean much. She sat still and finished her ramen as she considered what Silk’s message could mean. She doubted that he represented any major mercenary company or unit. If he did why would he not have said so? The whole thing was very mysterious and not at all what she had expected. How had he gotten her contact information? If Silk had used the registry database that probably meant he had resources and gave his message and the meeting a chance of legitimacy. If he had not used the registry then his information would have had to come through other means. Her gut tightened in fear as she contemplated the possibility that Compton Silk had been stalking her. Surely she would have noticed him had that been the case she told herself, loosening her tension-constricted abdomen. She could go or she could not go. The decision was a simple one, but that did not make it easy.



The address the taxi dropped Tomiko off at was in a middle-class area of Harlech. The area was clean and had a good amount of pedestrian traffic outside, even at nine in the evening. It definitely did not seem to be the kind of place someone would stage a kidnapping or other criminal act, which immediately put her more at ease. She was also glad that she had left her sidearm at her residence. Guns were certainly not an uncommon site on the Mercenary Planet, but as Tomiko surveyed her surroundings she had a feeling that a holstered pistol would have marked her as out of place. Of course, she was far from defenseless. In a concealed sheath at her back she carried a tanto knife that her grandmother had given her, and, like many citizens of the Draconis Combine, she had been trained in martial arts since childhood. Tomiko was confident that she could handle herself in a fight, even without her battlemech.

The bar she walked into was typical of that kind of establishment. There was nothing to distinguish it from the countless other bars across the galaxy. As she looked it over, Tomiko saw that the place was about half full of patrons, most of them sitting at the bar. She looked them over and quickly spotted Compton Silk’s formidable figure. He had just accepted a mug of beer from the bartender and was taking a deep drink of it when he saw Tomiko near the door. He lowered the mug as he waved her over and some of the creamy foam stuck to his upper lip. He took a moment to wipe it off before speaking.

“Koban wan, Miss Minowara,” he said, his Japanese badly accented. “It is good to see you again.”

“Good evening, Mr. Silk,” Tomiko returned. She did not say anything else. She wished to remain formal and wanted the big Lyran to make the next move.

“I wondered whether or not you would respond to my message,” Silk continued.

“It was unorthodox,” Tomiko admitted. “But it was intriguing and I am interested in business.” Tomiko hoped that she was not being too forward. This entire meeting was a new experience for her, but something inside was urging her to cut to the chase.

Compton grinned at her and nodded, seeming to understand what she wanted. “If business is what interests you, then we shall get on with the meeting.” He gestured toward the bartender, “Would you care for a drink before joining my associates?”

Tomiko decided she was thirsty and ordered a glass of fruit juice. She had never enjoyed alcohol and tonight was not the time to start. Glass in hand; she followed Silk across the establishment towards a seating area with several round tables. As she walked behind him, Tomiko noticed that Silk moved quite gracefully for a man of his size. She had not marked him as a mechwarrior before, but this gave it away. One needed complete and total control of his body to handle the complicated controls of one of the massive war machines. She supposed that he could also be an aerospace pilot, but counted that out because of his size. Silk would barely fit into the pilot couch in a ‘mech and aerospace cockpits were much tighter.

Silk stopped at a table occupied by two men. One was young, not much older than Tomiko, and had distinct Asian features. The other was slim and bald with a blond goatee. Tomiko put him around forty. Compton pointed to each of them as he gave introductions starting with the older man.

“This is Sean McLeod and Zhang Houjin,” he gestured back to Tomiko, “Gentlemen, this is Miss Tomiko Minowara.”

“Good evening,” Tomiko greeted them with a short bow.

Zhang returned her bow with a deep nod of his head. McLeod rose out of his seat and extended his hand.

“Pleased to meet you,” he said. His voice carried a carried a light Scottish burr.

Tomiko shook his hand and then sat in the chair that Compton had pulled out for her. She was placed across from Zhang and she studied the man. Now that she saw him more closely, she could see that he was older than she had first thought. Now she would say that he was in his middle-to-late twenties. From his features and his name, she placed him as Capellan. People of Chinese ancestry from outside of the Confederation tended to give their children Anglicized names. Houjin nodded to her slightly and Tomiko realized with a start that she was impolitely staring. She averted her gaze and refocused on Compton, who had just begun to speak.

“To state the obvious, the three of us are mercenaries,” he started. “We do not represent any larger organization, only ourselves. We specialize in short-term, high-risk contracts. Objective raids, point defense, that sort of thing.”

“Don’t forget orbital combat drops and behind-the-lines officer hunting,” McLeod broke in.

Silk continued, “Yes, plenty of action and moving about. We’re never on one planet for long, but you know we’ve been there.”

Sean grinned as he interrupted again, “And no bloody garrison duty.” After he was through, the Scottish mercenary raised his tumbler of alcohol and drained a good amount of it.

“Sean does not like being stuck in the same place for long,” Silk said. “I think that is part of what makes him a good reconnaissance pilot.”

Tomiko was feeling overwhelmed. She had thought it a good thing that Silk had gotten right down to business, but now she was not so certain. It was a lot of new information to take in all at once.

Determined not to sit there silently, she turned to the bald man with a question, “So you are a scout?”

“Sometimes,” Sean answered, smiling.

Silk broke in, seeing confusion on her face, “Sean pilots a Stealth. It’s not exactly a recon ‘mech, but it’s lighter and faster than Huojin’s Catapult and my Thug.”

“I can range ahead and use my active probe to hunt down opposition,” McLeod continued for his associate, “but I’ve also got enough weapons, armor, and speed to fight with the big boys if I have to.”

“You three have an interesting mix of machines,” Tomiko commented. She was a little pleased with herself after hearing that Zhang piloted a Catapult. The missile-boat battlemech was a traditional Capellan design, which confirmed his nationality in her mind.

“It works for us,” Compton supplied. “Besides Sean, speed is not usually an issue we have to deal with. Our biggest concern is hitting hard and surviving when we get hit back.”

Tomiko was very interested. She had no idea that there were mercenary groups that operated this way. “Conducting business this way is profitable?”

Silk answered, “It can be. With only a lance of battlemechs our upkeep costs are low. Also, we rarely make salvage rights part of our contract demands. Our employers like this because they can profit off of what we kill and keep their connection to us very liquid. Working for cash also makes it easier to move around, buying anything we need along the way.”

“And you are not connected to any larger mercenary company?”

“My parents were with the Northwind Highlanders back during the Fourth Succession War,” McLeod supplied.

“But other than that,” Silk finished, “No we are not.”

“It sounds risky,” Tomiko said, speaking her mind. They would have to be pulling down a lot of C-bills to keep their machines running if they did not take in salvage. Without some larger parent organization to fall back on, any sort of major defeat would leave them too poor to repair and rearm. Either they were new to the job, which did not seem to be the case from they way they talked, or they were very skilled.

“It is challenging,” Silk admitted. “That is why we have to be very good at what we do.”

Compton and McLeod were throwing a lot at Tomiko all at once. If they were doing it just to throw her off balance, she thought that she was holding her own, being professional, but her head was swimming nonetheless. She was full of questions, but was not certain which would be proper to ask. If these mercenaries were so elite, why did they need her? She decided to stick her neck out.

“A lance is made up of four ‘mechs. Why are there only three of you?” She addressed Compton, but still noticed Zhang’s expression darken. The man had not said a word the entire meeting, but had suddenly reacted. When his glower was accompanied by a brief pause from Silk before answering her, Tomiko wondered if she had stuck her neck out too far.

“We are good,” Silk finally responded, some of the usual exuberance gone from his voice. “Chase was also good, very good. But that does not mean that the opposition can’t get lucky. A gauss rifle slug ripped open her Champion’s torso and she lost engine containment. She ejected, but lost her leg and got some nasty burns.”

“I am sorry,” Tomiko said. She meant it too as she looked from Compton to Zhang and then Sean. Houjin was looking away and would not meet her gaze. Chase had obviously meant more to him than just a lancemate.

McLeod spoke next. Like Silk, he had lost some of his liveliness. “It’s all right that you asked, lass. You should know that kind of thing can happen when you live this kind of life,” he paused for a few seconds and then a small smile crept onto his face. “It’s not all bad though. Chase was smart with her money. When she recovered she just called it ‘retirement’ and took off for Solaris VII. She’ll spend the rest of her days watching the ‘mech fights from box seats at the stadium.”

From Houjin’s reaction, Tomiko had expected him a Chase to be lovers, or at least more than friends. Now, the way Sean talked about her, made her seem like an older woman. It was clear that Compton and Sean respected her. Something else McLeod had said also caught her attention. If she was going to live the mercenary life, she had to be prepared for the worst. Death, grievous injury, the destruction of her prized battlemech, all were possibilities. Of course, she had thought of all of this before, but the story of Chase certainly hammered them home.

Before her brain could get cluttered again with thoughts and questions, Tomiko stuck her neck out, this time with a question that she felt had less chance of offending anyone. “Did you invite me here to become your new fourth lance member?

“Perhaps,” Silk answered. “Think of this meeting as the first stage of the interview process. We have seen your registry dossier, but we wanted to see you in person too.” He pulled a business card from his breast pocket and handed it across the table to her. “The user-number and pass code printed here will give you one day’s access to the mercenary registry. Our names and file numbers are printed on the other side. Feel free to download our files.”

“Then what?” Tomiko asked, pocketing the card after glancing at it.

“If you are still interested in the possibility of working with us,” Compton went on, “Meet us in simulator room twenty-seven at the hiring hall at oh-eight-thirty the day after tomorrow. Be ready to fight.”

Zhang fixed Tomiko with a stare from across the table and spoke for the first time that night, “Then we will see if you’re really as good as your records say you are.”
Hellbringer
11/20/07 06:45 AM
200.2.168.198

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Chapter 3

Tomiko pushed her throttle stick forward until it stopped and pumped her foot pedals to get her battlemech’s legs moving up to speed. One hundred ton ‘mechs were notoriously a chore to get running, and her King Crab was no exception. Still, it was not long before she was going at her top speed of fifty-four kilometers per hour. Her battlemech’s wide feet kicked up large clouds of dust as they pounded the dry, rocky soil.

Sean McLeod’s voice sounded in her ears from the speakers mounted inside her neurohelmet, “Are you guys coming or what?” He sounded stressed.

“We got your signal, Sean,” Tomiko heard Compton say, calm and cool. “You know how it is with the rest of us. We take it slow and steady.”

As he finished speaking, Silk’s ‘mech ran out in front of Tomiko’s, kicking up similar clouds of red-orange dust. His Thug was lighter than Tomiko’s ride and could move about ten kilometers per hour faster. His lead would gradually extend the longer they kept up this flat out race.

“Start pulling back, Sean,” Compton ordered. “See if you can get their guy to chase you.”

“Can do, Compton,” McLeod replied. “I’ll see you in-,” his transmission was cut off by a burst of interference, but he was back a moment later. “Damn Eriksson and his PPC! All right, I’m coming to you. See you soon.”

As the radio went blank Tomiko peered through her heads-up-display at Silk’s ‘mach and the world on the other side of her cockpit canopy. Though she knew that everything she was seeing was a simulation cooked-up by a powerful computer system, she could not help being drawn in by it. The Dragoon’s simulators were more advanced than anything she had ever experienced. It was not just the picture that was perfect. Hydraulics outside the simulator pod were rocking it to perfectly match the gait of a King Crab. Tomiko knew that once combat began, hot air would be pumped into the simulator’s controlled environment, raising the cockpit temperature in response the strain that real weapons fire put on a real battlemech’s fusion engine. It was not exactly Goro, but it was close enough for practice.

“You two heard him,” Compton said over the radio link to Tomiko and Zhang. “He’s found the enemy’s outward element. The problem is that he’s been spotted too. Now if he can lead their scout back to us we’ll meet up over the next few hills in about twelve minutes. At that time, Eriksson will probably cut and run, his Clint is barely a match for Sean and his Stealth, there’s no way he’ll try to fight us. When he runs, we’ll follow him. We’ll run into the rest of his lance and keep them occupied while Sean makes a run for the target and destroys it.”

“Seems to be playing out like you planned,” Tomiko remarked, thinking back to the pre-mission briefing Compton had given.

“Yes it does. It should keep going like I said it would unless Toby is smart enough not to let his lance get drawn out. It depends on whether or not he wants to play it safe or go for a flashy victory,” Compton paused. “Close it up, Houjin. I want you with us when we link up with Sean.”

“Roger, Compton,” Zhang acknowledged.

Tomiko glanced at her rear display and spotted Houjin’s bird-legged Catapult loping along about three hundred meters behind her and Compton. As she watched, Zhang kicked in his battlemech’s jump jets. The Catapult leapt into the air on flares of ion exhaust vented from its engine. A few moments later, Houjin landed his machine only two hundred meters behind the larger ‘mechs. He immediately resumed running, closing the remaining distance at nearly seventy kilometers per hour. Tomiko still did not know what to make of Zhang. Despite his challenge to her at the end of their initial meeting, he had remained as taciturn as ever during their brief time together before the simulator session began. Tomiko knew that he would be watching her, looking for the slightest mistake.

Changing the train of her thoughts, Tomiko looked back to Silk’s battlemech as it lumbered along in front of her. He had slowed down a little from his top speed to avoid leaving her too far behind. For a moment, Tomiko felt bad for slowing everyone down, but then she reminded herself that Compton had known the limitations of her machine when he invited her along on this practice mission. As Tomiko watched the Thug’s hulking wide-shouldered form, she concluded that it fit its pilot perfectly.

Killing time as they slowly, but surely made their way across the undulating landscape, Tomiko mentally compared Compton’s battlemech to hers. The Thug and the King Crab had been designed for basically the same reasons, dealing out and absorbing massive amounts of damage. Some battlemechs were built for reconnaissance, some for rapid-response, and some for fire support like the Catapult, but there was no mistaking the King Crab and the Thug were brawlers. They went about their roles in very different ways. Both were assault class machines, among the heaviest of battlemechs. Their massive sizes allowed them to each carry about a light ‘mech’s worth of armor, protecting them very well.

Silk’s Thug weighed in at eighty tons. It packed twin particle projection cannons, one in each arm, as well as two six-pack short range missile launchers. Thug pilots usually spent time pounding on targets at range with their powerful energy cannons and then, when the enemy battlemech was soft enough, Thugs moved in to finish them off with their SRMs and physical attacks with their heavy fists and feet. Thug pilots relied on their thick armor and higher than average speed to keep them safe and at optimal ranges while they did their work.

For a one hundred ton King Crab, long ranges were a liability. The design had a long range missile launcher that fired fifteen warheads at a time as well as a large laser. The problems were that there were only enough missiles for eight shots and that enemy ‘mechs could mount plenty of weapons with longer ranges than the laser. The King Crab design’s real power was its double large bore autocannons. The massive guns, one mounted in each of the battlemech’s arms, fired twelve centimeter slugs with depleted uranium cores. The AC-20s could do roughly double the damage of a Thug’s PPCs, but only at half the range. They also had a very limited ammunition supply. The true challenge of piloting a King Crab was to close with the opposition despite the ‘mech’s slow speed and make the autocannon shots count.

Even allowing her mind to wander did not make the time pass any faster for Tomiko. Her battlemech handled the run without trouble. When Compton had informed the rest of the lance that they would be operating in an arid environment, Tomiko had worried that high temperatures might impair the efficiency of her heat sinks. So far, they had functioned properly, staying in the green. The world outside of her cockpit, thought up by the Dragoon’s simulator programmers, was dry, but had moderate temperatures. Everywhere that Tomiko looked, she saw dusty, red-orange soil covering rock. A few scrub bushes and cacti dotted the land, none large enough to conceal more than rodents or lizards. Though the day was clear with a bright blue sky and wispy clouds, she could rarely see more than a kilometer in any direction. The steppe rose and fell with such frequency that her King Crab was always either ascending or descending a slope.

Zhang broke into her thoughts, speaking over the radio, “Do you want me to move ahead, Compton? I’ll link up with Sean a couple minutes before you two get there in case he needs help.” Tomiko smiled. It seemed that she was not the only one the monotony was getting to.

Silk immediately shot the proposal down, “Negative, Jin. Eriksson may have added a PPC to his ‘mech since the last time we saw him, but Sean can still handle things. If anything else unexpected had come up, he would have reported it. Besides, we need Eriksson to run and lead us back to his friends, which he will do when we show up in our big bad assault machines. If it was just you, he might try to fight and then you and Sean would put him down. That would spoil my great plan. Keep it tight, six minutes to go.”
"But it SHOULD be a spectacle! It should be grand and exciting to us all! I'd hate to think that we've become so jaded that we find even our greatest tiumph, resurrecting the Star League, simply one more obligation."
-General Victor Steiner-Davion (First Prince and Archon in exile) 3064
Nahte
01/24/08 10:07 AM
71.29.222.157

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Wow thats really good!
A will gets more than a gun.

A hero is only a man who is brave five minutes longer.

"Death solves all problems. No man, no problem." Joseph Stalin
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