When we took the contract with the FWLM to wipe out the Sanguine
Reapers, I was hoping for a quick and easy job. In an ideal world, we'd be able
to hit Andiron, eliminate the Reapers on the ground and then be off in a day or
two. Clearly I was being incredible naive.
Getting out here was easy enough, and we made planetfall without
opposition. Our forward base is inside an abandoned industrial complex, which
provides both a solid landing field for our dropships as well as allowing us to
fortify the remaining buildings to add an extra layer of protection. That much
went well, but it would be about the only thing that actually wound up going to
plan.
Once we were down, our recon forces worked with the intel provided to
us by the Eagles as well as Nikola's own research to scope out several
locations where we believed the Reapers were based. From that, we found two
probable locations based on both their location and some activity that we were
able to discretely observe.
The first was an abandoned mining facility that had a number of good
points going for it. It was a secure and defensible location; the buildings and
equipment could act as shelter and be used to service BattleMechs; it had a
large, open paved area that could be used as a dropship park and, potentially,
underground shelters for storing valuables or equipment.
Conversely, the second wasn't so obvious, but our recon confirmed at
least one BattleMech on-site, which was a good indicator. It was an abandoned
fishing town on what had been the shores of a large inland sea. For various
reasons, that sea had since retreated, killing the local industry and causing
the town be abandoned and fall into ruin. But it also again had plenty of
places to park a dropship and buildings that could be used as shelter.
I chose to hit both places at once, hoping that speed, superior
equipment and the element of surprise would be on our side. Unfortunately,
neither site worked out as expected
My Command Lance (with some of Recon Lance's elements) hit the mine,
since our 'Mech were both slightly faster and more of them possessed jump jets.
We were met by a complete lack of resistance, but not because we caught the
Reapers by surprise. Unfortunately, it turned out that the mine was almost
entirely abandoned; the 'activity' our recon elements detected was actually a
group of nomads who had taken shelter and had been stripping down an old
MiningMech. After we questioned them (they didn't know where the Reapers were
but didn’t want to run into them anyway) we let them be and pulled back.
Assault Lance's luck was different, but not necessarily any better. The
port turned out to be occupied by a lance of rather tattered 'Mechs who were
rather immediately hostile. Their opening fire without warning was enough of a confirmation
to Takahashi that they were the Reapers so he ordered his lance to take them
out.
Unfortunately, the pirates were ready for an attack, and had hidden
several hovertanks inside the hulks of several abandoned, rusting ships. While
Assault lance were briefly threatened, they managed to turn it around by
quickly immobilizing all thee hovercraft, leaving them as little more than a
distraction. After popping them up, they were able to return to the main threat
with very little actual damage.
Concentrated firepower bought down the pirate leader in a Warhammer, as well as crippling a Hunchback. Two more 'Mechs, a Cronus and a Yeoman, as well as a Phalanx Tank, were able to
escape, but all of them were badly damaged (the Phalanx had lost its main gun,
for starters). And so while the battle was over rather quickly with the pirate
forces seemingly crushed and the Assault Lance only suffering armour damage,
there was a problem.
This force wasn't the Sanguine Reapers. They were actually the remnants
of the Newcastle Chasseurs, a mercenary unit that had broken contract and gone rogue
about seven or eight years ago and had been missing ever since. The Knights had
arrived on-planet, and almost immediately been set upon by the Reapers who had
'encouraged' them to join forces. They'd managed to keep their freedom from the
Reapers by hiding out in the fringes of the world, entertaining pipe-dreams of
one day getting off planet and returning to legitimacy.
No way that was ever going to happen. This is the stage in a Mercenary’s
career when the only way left to go is further down. In a sad way, we were
probably doing them a favour.
The only good to come out of this mess was some information we gained
from the surviving Chasseurs. The Reapers are the effective 'rulers' of
Andiron. While there is a semblance of a civilian government, anyone in charge
is affiliated with them either through choice or coercion. The Reapers don't
operate out of the planetary capitol; rather the location of their base is a
well-kept secret to ensure their safety from, well, people like us. So while we
don’t know where they are, we do have a good place to start.
And given that we have a skilled investigator, a journalist, a man with
a wide array of odd skills and a master of sawing people in half with a
Vibrokatana at our disposal, I figure that it’s only a matter of time before we
find their location. And, as always it's probably best if I don't ask what they
do to get there.
Takahashi rounded up the Chasseurs leader, Raymond Terrace, and the
other survivors of their force. Odd are that they're wanted by the MRBC or even
their last contractor for desertion, so if nothing else, we might make some
money off that. And to be fair, a life in a Galatean prison is probably better than
they were getting here on Andiron.
No comments:
Post a Comment