7. Hollow Victory

Sweating profusely in the oven-like confines of his Lancelot's cockpit, Chum Slikk silently congratulated himself for having got a handle on his bigger adversary. The big-engined heavy mech was able to run rings around the much slower Nightstar and he'd used his speed to full advantage, turning and weaving to deny the merc a clean shot. His growing confidence was also due to the fact he'd been able to land a few shots of his own - even if they'd not done much damage to the heavily armoured assault mech. The downside was that his PPC and large lasers - the Lancelot's primary weapons - were causing his heat levels to hover almost continuously in the yellow band.

Suddenly, his mech was struck from behind by multiple hammer blows, as a volley of missiles slammed into the rear torso, stripping away most of its light armour protection. The acrid stink of burning metal and electronics, carried through the mech's air recycling system, told him critical damage had been done somewhere. Flashing lights made him glance at his console and the computer's cold, emotionless voice told him, "Warning, life support system damaged. Oxygen level in cockpit at 70% and falling".

"Great! If I don't get cooked in here, I'll suffocate", Nathan groused to himself. He selected the new target that had appeared on his radar display, about five hundred metres to his rear. His targeting computer identified it as a Rakshasa.

Just then he felt a heat wave wash over him. The computer chirped, "Warning, damage critical". To confirm this, his damage display showed two red flashing segments on his rear torso.

"Oh, shut up!" He wondered idly if there was a way to deactivate the computer's voice as he turned to face his new opponent. His crosshairs floated over the mercenary mech and he fired his PPC and both large lasers at it. He gave a vicious snarl of satisfaction as all three weapons found their mark, scarring the Rakshasa's torso and right arm. The snarl turned into a gasp as the heat level in the cockpit threatened to overwhelm him.

"Warning, heat level critical, shutdown imminent", came the computer's automatic response. Chum slapped the coolant button, flushing the remaining liquid nitrogen through the Lancelot's heat sinks.

However, he'd ignored the Nightstar to his cost. The Lancelot shuddered and lurched forward as a gauss slug smashed into its left torso. Smoke began billowing out of the mangled chassis, obscuring his view of the battlefield. The mercenary then unleashed the Nightstar's PPC and second gauss rifle, smashing the left arm shoulder joint and rendering his two large lasers useless. Enough was enough.

"Taxi for Chum Slikk!" he called out over the company's open channel, as he hit the eject button. The cockpit canopy was blasted loose and seconds later the rockets underneath the command couch ignited, sending Nathan soaring skyward. After overcoming the dizziness and nausea that usually accompanied a successful punch-out (unsuccessful ones tended to end with the pilot unconscious, injured or dead), he opened his eyes and was rewarded with a bird's eye view of the battle. Scanning the terrain, he spotted a flat sandy area behind some large sandstone pillars that looked safe and pulled the cords on his aerofoil to steer himself towards it.

From over half a kilometre away, Captain Tyler spotted Nathan's ejection. Bringing his mech to a stop, he dropped his crosshairs over the enemy Nightstar and again fired all three of his Awesome's PPCs. This time his aim was much truer and all three particle beams struck the mercenary's left shoulder, destroying armour and myomer. The arm sagged limply at its side, denying the pilot the use of one gauss rifle and the medium pulse laser that hung underneath the main weapon.

While Piece tried to stop his overheating mech from shutting down, Lazarus took advantage of the Nightstar pilot's momentary confusion at the loss of the arm and fired a salvo of LRMs, which struck the merc squarely in the centre torso. Sprinting to close the range, he followed up with a shot from his arm-mounted laser, which burned through the damaged frontal armour. Closing at the Lao-Hu's top speed of over 80kph, Laz delivered the coup de gracé, firing the mech's devastating LB 20-X autocannon as soon as he was within range. The cluster munitions ravaged the Nightstar's right torso armour and destroyed the PPC housed there. The particle cannon's power coils exploded, tearing a jagged hole in the assault mech's torso and shattering the gyroscope. With the grace of a tree under a lumberjack's chainsaw, the 95-ton mech fell to the ground, raising a sandstorm that temporarily blinded the other mechs nearby.

Kurt Voller cursed as the Flashman caught him with another strike from its trio of large lasers and his Emperor's left arm large laser exploded in a shower of sparks and black smoke. 'Whoever's piloting that thing must have sold their soul to the devil to pull off moves like that!' he thought.

He grappled with his controls, trying to manoeuvre fast enough to get a clean shot at his tormentor. So far he'd only managed a couple of hits with his lasers and had done no more than graze the smaller mech's armour with the Emperor's usually devastating twin autocannon. In contrast, his own mech was covered with scars and holes from the Flashman's lasers. As yet, nothing vital had been damaged, but it was probably only a matter of time, unless he could manage to deliver one big, knockout punch.

As he turned, he caught sight of Andreas Herzog's Nightstar going down under a combined assault from the Awesome he'd spotted earlier and a smaller, boxy-looking mech he did not recognise. It suddenly occurred to him that Elan Kirchner's Banshee and Marius Thyssen's Rakshasa were the only friendlies on his radar display. He'd had no contact with his scout lance for nearly quarter of an hour. Suddenly, two more red dots appeared on his scope. He highlighted them and the computer marked them as a Catapult and a Highlander. In the blink of an eye, an unfavourable situation had suddenly turned into an un-winnable one. Two to one were not odds he was prepared to gamble on when the stakes were this high.

Cursing all Clanners to hell and back, he toggled his radio and set it to the company frequency. "This is King Snake to all Vanquishers, stand down immediately...these intruders have the better of us".

He next set his radio to an open frequency that anyone could pick up. "This is Captain Kurt Voller of the Voller's Vanquishers mercenary company, to the commander of the unidentified mech force. We offer our unconditional surrender and are powering down immediately".

High up in the cockpit of his Awesome, Piecemaker listened to the transmission with barely concealed glee, before activating his radio. "This is Captain Steven Tyler of Shadow Company, Second Battalion of the Third Cameron Guards. I acknowledge your surrender. Direct your men to dismount their mechs and await pickup by our infantry".

Looking out across the smoky, wreckage-strewn battleground, he could see his men already disengaging, moving back to form a perimeter from where they could keep watch over their beaten foe. Now there was just one more call to make.

"Colonel McKinlay, this is Captain Tyler. Enemy forces have surrendered - request infantry assistance with prisoners".

"Acknowledged, Captain - infantry is rolling. I trust there were no serious problems?"

Piece could hear the amusement in his CO's voice, but kept his reply formal. "Negative, sir. The opposition proved to be a little tougher than we expected, but nothing my men couldn't handle". He then voiced his next question. "Uh, what are we going to do with the prisoners, sir?"