14

The Show

Sonora Plateau

Achernar

4 March 3133

Achernar’s sun hid behind a thick gray shroud. Sharp, westerly gusts pushed around a few heavier, lower thunderheads, swirled dust up off the Sonora Plateau, and tugged at Raul’s dark curls as the MechWarrior jogged a short distance from the mobile command vehicle to The Republic’s ad-hoc staging grounds.

Kyle Powers stood in conference with Tassa Kay and Colonel Blaire at the foot of his Jupiter. He wore the same stripped-down uniform as Raul—combat boots and shorts, a cooling vest worn over a light T-shirt—ready for the heat of a BattleMech cockpit. As in the briefing rooms and command centers, the Sphere Knight drew the eye, focusing himself at the center of all around him. It was the confident set of his shoulders, and his encouraging gaze. It was the way he seemed simply to exude a stronger physical presence.

Powers glanced over, as if feeling Raul’s gaze on him, then nodded once, decisively, and continued his conversation.

Swinging a wide berth around the assembled news reporters, Raul also veered away from the other officers, looking for a moment alone. He couldn’t help being pulled toward the impressive Jupiter, though. Thirteen meters tall and weighing one hundred tons, the titan easily overshadowed his nearby Legionnaire. Raul saw the ’Mech’s origins as a Clan design in the narrow, turret-style waist and the modular-looking weapon ports. Heavy LRM racks at each shoulder, two PPCs riding low on either side of the slender cockpit canopy and a quad of fifty millimeter autocannons mounted in pairs on the lower arm, the Jupiter could deliver ’Mech-shredding damage at long or short ranges. For some reason, Kyle Powers had not painted the BattleMech in standard camouflage, instead opting for bands of tans, yellows and faded reds with one great red spot swirling in a storm over the Jupiter’s left chest. Unconventional, but not wholly inappropriate for the plateau’s high-desert terrain.

It possessed a commanding presence, much like its master.

“So what do you think of Jove?” Powers asked, stepping over to Raul’s side.

“Magnificent,” was all that Raul could think to say at first. “I’m surprised that Star Colonel Torrent didn’t balk at facing you in his Tundra Wolf.” He gazed across the plateau, toward the Steel Wolves who readied themselves for the challenge. At four kilometers, only the bulky outline of Torrent’s Tundra Wolf was clearly distinguished. The other silhouettes belonged to a pair of converted IndustrialMechs, Raul knew, and a low-profile Marksman.

Powers followed Raul’s gaze across the plateau. “That’s one of several reasons why we are fighting in combined-arms lance strength. The star colonel made up the difference in armor and infantry. Make no mistake, Raul, Torrent is out for blood. This battle is everything he wants.”

“If he wants it, then why should we give it to him?”

“First and foremost, it’s something the people of Achernar can see.” Powers nodded toward a line of journalists and camera-toting news hounds, held back behind a rope barricade and by several sentries in Purifier battle armor. During the actual challenge, a select few would be allowed to board noncombatant VTOLs for shooting live footage.

“Until now, Legate Stempres has allowed them to get by on rumor and second-hand reports. Now we’re getting news from Ronel, and the Steel Wolf forces landing there. They need to know that we are doing all that we can. They need hope, and we can provide it.”

“Unless we lose,” Raul said, only half in jest. It fell very flat.

Fortunately, Tassa was there to pick it up and dust it back off. “You won’t,” she said, joining the pair. “You can’t. This is what it is all about, Raul.” She surveyed the open plateau, a hint of excitement shining in emerald eyes. “A call to arms. Trial by combat.”

“That’s the Steel Wolf position. Now we need to convince them that they didn’t bring enough to do the job right.” Kyle Powers nodded to both of them and traded grips with Raul, each of them clasping the other’s wrist. “Strength and honor,” he offered a Knight’s salute. Turning for his Jupiter, Powers eschewed a nearby hoist and used the roll-down chain link ladder to ascend to his cockpit.

“You know,” Raul said, watching the Knight climb and then salute the cameras before ducking through an access hatch, “you really don’t appreciate the weight behind the term ‘civic obligation’ until it comes rolling over you like a Behemoth.”

“Why let it worry you? Today is about battle and victory. What else matters to a MechWarrior?”

A very good question, and one Raul had been attempting to answer for himself for two days. At first, being chosen over Captain Diago and Tassa to fight alongside Kyle Powers in the challenge, what Star Colonel Torrent called a Trial of Grievance, had felt like an award of validation to Raul. He had arrived. Then the young Mech Warrior had recognized the false sense of superiority for exactly what it was—no different than being chosen first for dodge ball in the third grade or making varsity on the swim team in college. His ego out of the way, Raul was left shouldering only the obligation for holding up his end of the coming battle. What else mattered?

“Responsibility?” he finally offered. “Why else do we fight, except for the hope of not fighting in the future?”

Tassa shrugged. “Some people might say that the glory of battle is its own reason for being.”

He stared at her, shook his head. “Torrent might. And maybe you would, Tassa. But that’s not me.” He laughed, at himself more than her. “Sometimes I wonder if we have anything in common.”

Tassa grinned, reached out to grab Raul under his chin. “And again I ask, why let it worry you?” Then she pulled him in, planting a firm and lasting kiss on Raul’s mouth.

Despite the attraction and the flashes of heat that had passed between them, Raul was caught completely off his guard. So much so that it took a moment for his brain to catch up, only to realize that he had wrapped a hand around the back of Tassa’s head, pulling her in stronger, tasting her. The MechWarrior did not melt away before him, holding her own, challenging. He broke away first, though reluctantly. A sharp intake of breath nearly drowned him in her lavender scent.

“Luck,” she said in a husky whisper.

“Funny.” Raul shook his head lightly. “I wouldn’t have thought that you believe in luck.”

“A little good luck never hurt anyone. Neither did a morale boost.” She made a show of looking coy. “So, are you boosted?”

Tassa’s grin was infectious, spreading from her mouth to his. “The Wolves aren’t going to know what hit them,” he said, then turned away for his nearby Legionnaire, securing the last word for once.

He felt the hot caress of Tassa’s gaze follow him as he walked around to the side of his BattleMech’s foot and took hold of the chain link ladder. Remembering Kyle Powers’ ascension Raul swarmed up the ladder to his access hatch, and then threw a jaunty salute back toward the waiting cameras and a second one to Tassa. Fifty meters away, a pair of JES tactical carriers fired up their lift fans, blowing out twin halos of dust and debris. A Saxon personnel carrier also fired up as a squad of Purifiers finished loading, the APC and infantry filling out the Republic’s augmented “lance.”

A warm raindrop splashed Raul’s ear and he glanced up into the heavy skies just in time to catch another pregnant drop against his face. Licking the gritty taste of desert rainfall from his upper lip, he ducked inside his cockpit before the skies truly opened up. Local storms, like Achernar’s usual heat, were often severe.

Settling into his command couch, Raul fastened himself into the five-point harness and then reached up to a shelf to draw down his neurohelmet. He pulled it over his head, shifted it about to make certain the sensors made decent contact with his scalp. A coil of metal braided hose and another cord of flexible nylon sat between his feet. Raul threaded the metal-braided hose into a restraining ring on the hem of his coolant vest, then snapped the lock-tite fastener into the vest plug. The initial coolant charge jolted him, standing gooseflesh out on his bared arms and legs. He shivered, then set about fastening the nylon cord with its socket plug into some velcro straps on the vest front, finally threading it up to connect into the chin of his helmet.

The neural connection complete, Raul released the dampening field on his Legionnaire’s fusion engine and fired the massive furnace to life. Up through the cockpit deckplates came the massive thrum of barely-controlled power, massaging his lower legs with radiated warmth and subsonic vibrations. The Legionnaire’s computer brain ran through several systems checks on an auxiliary screen, returning all-green indicators and a final prompt for MechWarrior identification.

“Raul Ortega,” he identified himself. “Captain, Republic Standing Guard.”

“Identity confirmed.” The computer’s synthesized voice was only slightly more feminine than masculine, devoid of any real inflection or feeling. Just enough, Raul guessed, to make a MechWarrior feel comfortable with the disembodied voice without paying it too much attention. “Proceed to secondary security protocol.”

Because voiceprints could be faked, and there was a very real threat in having a BattleMech captured and put back into service against you, security systems used a second line of defense that stopped all but the best-trained code breakers from making the attempt. A simple quotation, created by and known only to the MechWarrior, which would be checked for accuracy using voiceprint and neural wave patterns. A personal key.

Raul looked out through his cockpit’s ferroglass, past the streaks of broken rain that trickled down the transparent shield to the now-animated Jupiter which moved to take its place at the head of the Republic formation. “To be all that we are,” he dredged up his quotation from an ancient Terran author, “to become all that we are capable of becoming, is the only end of life.”

“Lockouts released,” the computer responded. “Legionnaire is now weapons-able.”

And with a live BattleMech at his command, and the memory of Tassa’s lips still warm on his mouth, Raul was finally ready for battle.

He hoped.