6. Backstab

"Alright, you're mine, pretty boy!" Wildcat called out over an open frequency as he turned his Mauler towards the Stalker harassing Laz. Floating his crosshairs over the sleek-looking assault mech, he waited until he heard the tone from his console speakers that told him the Artemis fire control system had locked on. Thumbing the pickle button on his joystick, Justin felt the Mauler shudder as thirty long-range missiles left the shoulder-mounted launch racks and homed in on their target. They peppered the Stalker's left torso and leg, blasting fragments from the heavy armour plating. He thumbed one of the alternate-fire buttons and the dual AC5 autocannon mounted in the torso spat fire. The high explosive rounds blasted apart the weakened armour plating, exposing areas of the chassis.

Lazarus, who had been retreating under the onslaught from the larger mech, saw his opportunity. Throttling his Lao-Hu up to full speed. He moved out from behind the rocky outcropping he'd been using for cover, darted behind Wildcat's mech and, as he emerged from behind the Mauler, trained his crosshairs on the Stalker's damaged flank. Getting missile lock, he sent a volley of LRMs at his tormentor. They exploded along the mercenary mech's already damaged torso and leg joint. It stumbled as its pilot tried to turn away to protect its vulnerable side, but Laz was able to turn faster. He followed up with a shot from the Lao-Hu's extended range large laser. The ruby beam of coherent light lanced into the Stalker's weakened left leg. As the pilot took his next step and brought the mech's full weight to bear on the damaged limb, the ferro-titanium femur distorted before snapping completely. The 85-ton war machine sagged to its left, before taking an ungainly dive and crashing to the ground.

"Woo-hoo! Way to go Laz!" hooted Wildcat, admiring his colleague's handiwork.

Before he could return his concentration to the battle, his Mauler was rocked by the impact of, what felt like, dozens of missiles, detonating on mech's back and ravaging the relatively light armour. The mech stumbled as Wildcat fought to regain his balance. "What the hell was that?" he yelled.

Glancing at his radar display, he saw four red dots roughly 800 metres behind him, advancing slowly. "Oh, crap!", he muttered. He sensed, rather than felt, the impact of a pair of lasers, removing the remaining armour over a portion of his rear torso. The corresponding segment on his damage display began flashing red. "Oh, for cryin' out loud!"

"Gato - you got four bandits on your six, eight hundred and closing!" The voice of Richard "Swindle" Lewis, piloting a Catapult with Enforcer Lance, cut him off in mid curse.

"No kidding!" snapped Wildcat, working his controls furiously to pivot the 90-ton mech as fast as it would go. Unable to run for cover, the only thing he could do was bring his weapons to bear on the new threat, also presenting his more heavily armed front torso. Seeing the four mechs heading towards him for the first time, he recognised two as a Catapult and an Axeman. His computer's War Book listed the other two as a Rakshasa and a Bandersnatch. All heavy designs and all well armed. "What the hell kind of a name is Bandersnatch?" he wondered, bracketing the machine in his crosshairs.

Just then his target and the Rakshasa unleashed another storm of LRMs. Wildcat deftly turned the Mauler side-on and the Rakshasa's missiles went streaking past. The Bander's volley, however, peppered his right arm and torso. Torso-twisting to face forwards, he paused just long enough to get missile lock and launched a return salvo. The swifter Rakshasa dodged left and just a handful of missiles impacted on its right torso. The Bandersnatch caught a full volley in its centre torso, causing it to stagger in mid-run. A volley of thirty Artemis-guided LRMs from Swindle's Catapult knocked it sideways and sent it skidding into the ground, creating a mini sandstorm as it ploughed into the soft desert surface. It made no further movement, the pilot having been knocked unconscious by the impact.

The Vanquishers' heavy lance also had one of the Capellan-designed missile carriers and its pilot unloaded both racks at Wildcat. The Mauler took the full brunt of the assault in its centre torso, which destroyed one of the AC5 autocannon. Although most of the force of the resulting ammo explosion was vented by the CASE system, the savage missile attack was enough to damage the delicate gyroscope that helped keep the massive machine upright. Wildcat could only brace himself as he felt his mech begin to slowly topple backwards. It crashed to the ground several seconds later, raising a massive cloud of dust and sand. Justin almost passed out as he was thrown around in his command couch like a rag doll. He managed to stay conscious, though his limbs all felt like jelly and his chest felt as though it had been stomped on repeatedly. Worst of all was the ringing in his ears that seemed to go right into the centre of his brain.

When he felt able to move again, he tried working his controls to bring the mech upright once more, but without the gyro to impart his own sense of balance to the machine, his movements were jerky and lacked control. As he slowly brought the giant war machine to its feet, he felt it begin to topple backwards again. He thrust the Mauler's huge twin-barrelled arms backward to break the fall, the momentum burying them several feet into the compacted sand. It looked like his battle was over.

Letting off a steady stream of curses, Wildcat yanked off his neurohelmet, uncoupled the tube that supplied his cooling vest with fluid, ripped off the biomed patches on his arms and legs and unfastened his harness. He retrieved his survival pack and clothes from the locker behind the command couch, before opening the access hatch in the rear of the cockpit, deploying the rope ladder and making a hasty exit, before anyone decided to use his downed mech for target practice.

Meanwhile Sergeant Ian Sharpe and Mechwarrior Richard Lewis set about avenging their comrade. The Rakshasa had become lost in the melee that had now developed so both instinctively trained their weapons on the Axeman. It was firing its large pulse laser into the back of Baker's Flashman and would soon be in range to use its deadly AC20 autocannon. Its pilot was totally unprepared for the volley of LRMs and gauss rifle slug that smashed into its right flank. The impact of over forty missiles, combined with the hammer blow of the quarter ton nickel ferrous gauss slug sent the Axeman reeling. It fell heavily onto its left side, the huge battleaxe it carried in that hand flew from its grasp. Amazingly, the pilot was able to retain some vestige of control and used the damaged axe arm to lever the mech back to its feet.

Richard glanced out of his cockpit across at Ian. "Mac...shall we?"

Ian grinned back. "Aye laddie - lets go for it".

Both pilots lit their jump jets and sailed across the battlefield towards the stricken merc, landing in almost perfect unison, although Ian's heavier, humanoid Highlander, could not match the grace of the lighter, bird-legged Catapult.

Confronted with this pair of mechs, in their menacing black and silver livery, the Axeman's pilot panicked and tried to flee. As he turned his machine around, both Mac and Swindle could see its right leg dragging - an obvious sign of actuator damage.

"Time to put this lame duck down for good", said Swindle, floating his targeting reticule over the damaged leg. His finger tightened around the joystick's primary trigger and the four medium lasers mounted in the Catapult's torso flashed ruby beams of destruction, vaporising the remaining armour protection around the Axeman's hip joint. Ian joined the attack, firing his Highlander's paired medium lasers and Streak SRM launcher. The damage inflicted was sufficient that the Axeman's next step tore the hip joint apart, sending the mech crashing down on its right side.

"Nice work Mac", commented Richard.

"Nae bad yerself for a sassenach", replied Ian.

They had little time to savour their victory however, as Swindle's mech was rocked by a volley of missiles from the remaining merc Catapult. He fought for control as it staggered sideways under the barrage. Ian heard a stream of obscenities over their private comm. channel that made him wince.

Targeting the bandit, he let loose with his own missile volley that rocked the red and grey machine backwards. Ian followed up with a shot from his Highlander's gauss rifle, which found one of the Catapult's big boxy launchers and detonated the missiles racked there. The explosion unbalanced the mech and, with its pilot unable to compensate, it crashed to the ground in a cloud of sand. The fall apparently damaged one of its leg actuators, for despite the pilot's best efforts to rise again, it remained grounded.

Swindle, who'd managed to stop swearing by now, offered grudging thanks. "Looks like I owe you one Ian".