Jasek rarely minded being second-guessed by his colonels, and gave Vandel more latitude than most because of his ties back to the Lyran Commonwealth, and Lohengrin. The first judge of a man was the company he kept.

Just so long as they kept it on private channels.

“This isn’t about slaughter,” he reminded his senior officer as the Gyrfalcon prodded at him with its ultra-ACs.

A hail of fifty-millimeter caseless rang into his shoulder, with a few ricochets spang ing into the side of his head. He cast one stream of particle energy across the blacktop, slashing at the Gyrfalcon’s leg.

The Kelswas launched a double-Gauss broadside, pushing the Jade Falcon back as Anastasia Kerensky’s Ryoken II led a double Star of Steel Wolf survivors in from the southwest.

“These warriors have to acknowledge us as fair and worthwhile enemies for this to work.”

“Doesn’t matter how you take a world,” Vandel said.

But it did if you didn’t want to waste valuable resources in a garrison.

The Kelswas’ broadside had pummeled a Skanda into scrap and finally cracked the Falcon reserve. Now the Clanners rolled forward with smooth coordination. Not charging in an all-or-nothing gamble nor showing doubt in a hesitant march. Textbook maneuvers, with ’Mechs leading and vehicles flanking and infantry protected in the pocket behind.

Did Noritomo Helmer practice that on a daily basis? It was parade ground perfect.

“Pick them up and push them back,” Jasek ordered, throttling into a sidelong march that left the river to his salvaged Ocelot and angled his own Templar toward the center of the allied line.

More autocannon fire converged on his position, and missiles arced up and fell in well-spaced waves from the Falcon JES carriers dug in near one of the huge sawdust piles. Fireballs blossomed in a line across his Maxim heavy hover transports, cracking one open like an egg and spilling out several Gnome battlesuit troops.

The VTOLs pounced, augering in with their nose-mounted cannon spitting fire and lethal metal. Two slid across the spoiled infantry line and rained destruction on one of the Kelswa assault tanks. But too close, too close.

Anastasia lit off her Ryoken II’s jump jets, rising one hundred meters over the waterfront blacktop on streamers of glowing plasma. Torso-mounted particle cannon smashed out with their lightning-style streams of energy, gutting one VTOL as it tried to bank away. The second craft turned inward, maybe thinking to beat the minimum effective range of the PPCs. Anastasia swatted it out of the sky with one backhand chop into its main rotor.

She landed in a ready crouch, lasers and cannon alternating in perfect rhythm.

The two VTOLs landed in explosive wreckage.

“Worthy of your namesake,” Jasek said, toggling for an open frequency.

“Wish I could say the same,” the commander of the Steel Wolves shot back as a Gauss slug opened a new crack in Jasek’s armor, right over his fusion engine. Still, her tone sounded more pleased than put off by his comment.

Whatever it took, Jasek intended to keep Kerensky’s attention, and her cooperation, for as long as possible.

The Jade Falcon center flagged, slowed by the ponderous gait of the SalvageMechs and the crawling speeds of JES II carriers and M1 Marksman tanks. As the flanks bent around, they welcomed the encroaching Stormhammers in a hot embrace. Jasek saw the encirclement beginning but did not worry about it yet. Especially with his aerospace fighters finally blipping onto long-range sensors far behind the allied forces. He welcomed the chance to chew the middle out of Helmer’s line, especially as the solid centerline force also protected the Clan’s command vehicle—an older Praetorian. Though smart money put Star Colonel Helmer in the Gyrfalcon, not some behind-the-lines armchair. No disrespect to Joss Vandel intended.

Especially when the Lyran colonel saved Jasek’s ass not thirty seconds later.

“Toads! Toads!”

A nameless warrior alerted the field to the problem only a few seconds after the giant sawdust pile erupted in a fury of motion, smoke, and laser fire. Elementals leaped clear from where they had been buried, leapfrogging by groups of five. Ten battlesuit troopers.

Then fifteen. Then twenty.

With the five infantrymen from before, that was the full Star accounted for! Their thick-necked profile and the ninety-meter hops that first gave them the “toad” nickname more than eighty years ago were real attention getters. Most Inner Sphere battlesuit designs were based on the Clan originals, and were never quite as deadly as the real thing.

Getting battlesuit soldiers into reach of their short-range weapons was the usual trick. Helmer had managed it by burrowing them into the soft sawdust, masking their presence until Jasek closed to a good range. But for a few seconds, the Elemental warriors were also grouped together in a vulnerable pack. With some artillery, if Jasek had been willing to use the Paladin defense system near a city (he wasn’t), the Elementals could have been chewed into so many walking wounded.

Bombing runs could accomplish much the same thing. And there were four fighter craft already arrowing down on their attack runs.

“Stormhammers,” Vandel called out on command override. “Ground and hold!”

It was a risky call, ordering the assault force to give up their maneuverability. Few of them realized yet the danger facing Jasek and the Stormhammer center. So it was a good indication of unit discipline that not one ’Mech took another step after that order, and all vehicles killed their forward momentum. For five desperate heartbeats, the offensive push ground to a standstill, tempting the Jade Falcons with easy targets.

Then artificial thunder shattered the waterfront as a pair of Stingrays slashed from backfield to fore, strafing with lasers and missiles as they ignored the remaining VTOLs in favor of the thick cluster of Elementals.

Eisensturm followed, the heavy fighter craft again shaking the ground in a high-speed nape-of-the-earth run that blistered a fiery trail through the Elemental wall and made the Stingray run look kind.

Knowing that four fighters were all he’d called forward, Jasek preempted Joss Vandel by yelling, “Go, go, go!” and spearheading a new drive into the midst of the momentarily stunned Jade Falcons.

He heard metal-suited infantry land on his legs, his sides, clambering around for purchase. A pair of Scimitar hovercraft skated in quickly, dancing around their commander, using their missiles like marksman pistols to carefully pick off the Elementals one by one.

Two converging lines. One busted trap. The battlefield quickly dissolved into a free-for-all slugging match as vehicles tried to re-form on their ’Mech leads and infantry regrouped to use combined-arms force. A pack of Gnomes cracked open the crew quarters on a Falcon Skanda, letting in a hunter-seeker engineering team who quickly took control of the crew and vehicle. Elementals ran roughshod over their smaller cousins, driving them away from two other targets and unseating a pair of Steel Wolf hoverbike drivers at the same time.

Back near the waterfront, the Stormhammers’ Ocelot traded on its superior speed and one heavy laser to slice armor from the Stinger. JES tactical carriers slipped up to the wounded BattleMech and peppered it with short-range missiles; a lean wolf brought down by hounds.

Then the Gyrfalcon abandoned its place at the river for a direct run at Jasek’s Templar. Autocannon and large lasers cycled in alternating salvos, chewing through armor and splashing away more of the same in fiery mists of molten composite. Jasek let Helmer worry his left side a moment as he tried to finish off one of the troublesome SalvageMechs, which kept clawing for purchase with its salvage arm.