Hey, couple of really good responses. Awesome to see, though I now have the creeping dread that I'm becoming the M Night Shyamalan of BattleTech fan fiction (Are you famous, they ask me. Why yes, I reply, I'm the M Night Shyamalan of BattleTech fan fiction. Then they give me a wedgie and steal my girlfriend.) I can only hope I'm the Sixth Sense era M.N.S., not The Happening or Last Airbender era.
@DOC: Right on all counts. Four points to you, which I think means you won the Internet. The only thing I'd add is that Yojimbo itself was remade as
Fistful of Dollars, so there's an even more direct connection. The ronin not having a name is also a tip of the hat to the spaghetti westerns.
Re: Karen and what's really going on, I think (hope?) this next chapter explores that more. Through the story I wanted the main character to have an arc or journey, where she starts out as competitive, patriotic, a little distant but a quote-unquote good soldier, and then starts to see hints all is not well but at first ignores them precisely because she has that good soldier/it's-not-my-problem mentality. She gets pushed further, and I wanted her to have a change/turning point in her attitude to the situation, but for it to be driven (at least at first...) by her established personality, i.e. by her competitiveness, not by idealism.
Sorry, but I love talking about crap like this. On with the story.
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SIX
Training Grounds, Fort HebronThe Gunslinger school on Aphros did not teach mumbo-jumbo. They taught you to read your opponent, know what they’d do before they even knew themselves, anticipate. Use that knowledge to press them, never leave them room to breathe, cut off their air supply. Make them react, on instinct, blindly. And then hit them: speed, accuracy, movement.
Wallach was an open book. Overconfident in his machine’s capabilities, absorbing her fire rather than trying to avoid it. Her first salvo hit high on his left shoulder, then she twisted away as a quartet of simulated lasers carved the air to her right.
Karen jumped left, firing as she went, registering hits across both the
Executioner’s shoulders. Wallach held his ground, unmoving, trying to track her as she moved. Lasers chasing her shadow. She rushed forward, as though to close the range, took a salvo of hits to Blondie’s chest, then hit her jets, leaping straight over the
Exterminator’s head, twisting in the air, coming down right behind it. The perfect shot. Gold crosshairs right over the reactor.
Too easy.
The
Exterminator vanished from her sensors. She stared out the cockpit glass. The ’Mech was gone, like a ghost.
“What the—”
Laser fire boiled out of the blankness, battering the
Phoenix Hawk. Karen hit the reverse throttle, twisting left and right, searching for Wallach’s ’Mech. Nothing. Another fusillade slammed into Blondie, the training mode registering armor-penetrating hits.
Wallach’s voice, taunting now: “Enough of a challenge for you, Lieutenant?”
Karen fired back blindly, then hit the jump pedals, trying to get some distance. Wallach’s lasers struck, red lights spreading like a wine stain across the armor wireframe in Karen’s cockpit. Blondie touched down, knees flexing, but had barely straightened when laser shots smacked into its chest again.
The HUD flashed: Critical Gyro Hit Sustained. ’Mech combat-inoperable. Restart Simulation? [Y/N]
She stared at it, disbelieving, her breath whistling through clenched teeth. Beaten. In less than two minutes. Shock sublimated into anger. He’d tricked her. Somehow, she didn’t know how, jammed her sensors, maybe. But then why couldn’t she see his ’Mech?
A flicker and the
Executioner seemed to materialize out of thin air. “You were right, Lieutenant. Not much of a challenge.”
Karen fought to keep her voice level. “Some might call that cheating, sir.”
The
Executioner turned and began walking back to the bays, Wallach’s laughter lingering after it. “No such thing as cheating in war, Lieutenant. That’s the mistake of the Gunslinger program. Any challenge should be met with overwhelming technological and military force, not coddled and humored. No offense, but you’re an anachronism, Lieutenant.”
“Honor never goes out of style, Major—” she began to retort, but Wallach had already cut the channel.
Captain Vaughn was waiting when she parked Blondie back in the ’Mech bay.
“What the hell was that?” She snapped at him as soon as she stepped out the cockpit hatch. “Sir?”
“Chameleon Shield,” he said, leaning close, voice dropping to a whisper. “The latest stealth tech. Shouldn’t even be telling you this. A bunch of
Executioners have been outfitted with it, plus a null signature ECM system. Invisible to sensors, visual scanning, the works. Been out for a couple of years now, but the SLDF’s been keeping it very hush-hush, need-to-know. PR division knows about it, of course, so we can release a couple of well-timed leaks to keep the Houses on their toes. Surprised Wallach would flaunt it. Wonder if he got clearance? Shame. Now I can’t use any video from your little practice duel.”
“He deliberately tried to humiliate me.” Karen, half-listening, began climbing down the ladder to ground level, noticed her hands were shaking on the metal rungs. She slammed her feet down as hard as she could on each step. Ladder ringing like sheet metal hit with a hammer. “Unity, he
did humiliate me. Knew he was pissed about the Rooster, but what’s he got against the Gunslingers?”
Vaughn was climbing down after, his voice coming floating down from above her head. “Ah, office politics, you know? Headhunters like Wallach used to be the golden boys, now it’s the Gunslingers. Guess you kind of stole his sunshine.”
Karen reached the bottom, frowning a little to herself. It sounded plausible, but she had a nagging feeling there was more to it than that. Why was the man so eager to order a hit on the Rooster, for example? Well, the Major would just have to get used to the idea—after the SLDF transferred her here, Steinfeld would have to let her face the Rooster. Vaughn reached the bottom of the ladder, and immediately brought out his holocamera.
“So, Lieutenant Graham, after your loss to Major … Oh damn, no, can’t mention that. Start again. Lieutenant Graham, tomorrow you’ll be facing one of your greatest challenges yet: A MechWarrior who has already fought and killed six men. Can you tell the folks at home how you’re feeling? What are you thinking?”
Karen felt whatever tiny thread of patience she had been hanging by snap.
“Put that away,” she said irritably, swatting the holocamera aside and forcing Vaughn back a step. “You want to know what I’m thinking? I’ll tell you what I’m thinking: Major Wallach is a short-sighted idiot and a bully. The Gunslinger program gives us an honorable way to prove ourselves to the Combine. You know what else I think? I think you publicists are parasites, feeding on the blood of real soldiers. Six men are dead. Dead, meanwhile Wallach’s treating it like a pissing contest, and you, like a holo-drama. Well, what’s happening here is
real, Vaughn; it’s not some tri-vid.”
Vaughn lowered the holocam slowly.
“Isn’t it?” he said, a hard edge to his voice she hadn’t heard before. “Then what exactly do you think is happening here, Lieutenant Graham? Image
matters, Lieutenant, public opinion
matters. That’s why the SLDF is investing billions in you and the other Gunslingers. Every time you win, ten thousand more people volunteer for the SLDF at recruitment centers across the Sphere. Public support for the Cameron regime goes up two percent. That’s what you’re doing here, Lieutenant. Not avenging the honor of some dead nobodies on some insignificant dirt ball nobody gives the tiniest fruit fly fart about. Pretty pictures,
blonde, blue-eyed Karen Graham. Sound bites,
tough-talking Karen Graham. Fulfilling fantasies,
brash, brave Karen Graham. That is what is happening here.”
That was it, wasn’t it? The reason she was so enraged right now: image mattered, and hers had been tarnished. Beyond that, too, was Wallach’s anger. Somehow, the man felt his image was threatened, and he was lashing out to protect it. But why? One way to find out, but not here, not at Fort Hebron.
“Damn,” she said at last. “You’re right, aren’t you?”
“It’s been known to happen.”
Karen blew out a long sigh, ran a gloved hand through her sweaty hair. “Alright then. Well, what tough-talking Karen Graham needs right now is some quick-drinking alcohol.”
Vaughn smiled apologetically. “No bar on the base and no passes issued for the city. Ever since the, uh—” he hesitated, seemed to change his mind. “Ever since the Rooster showed up.”
She gave him a measured look. “And you’re sure you have no idea where we could get one.”
A helpless shrug. “Wish I could help.”
Hands on her hips. “Gotta be something you PR types are good for.”
“Sorry, Lieutenant.”
“Two words: Exclusive interview.”
“Meet me back here, ten o’clock.”