36 hours later Sector C,
somewhere close Nav Iota
The earth trembled under the heavy steps of the giant mech. BuffoutBoy
steered his favourite mech, a madcat d, over a hill and looked over the
valley with the river at the other side. Although his mech ran with medium
speed the cockpit temperature was unbelievably high. The sun stood straight
above the mech in this hot area of the planet. The belligerent sparkels
heated the madcat up even more and let the sweat run down BuffoutBoy's
naked breast in the cockpit. "We wont be the only ones troubled by the
heat" he thought and remembered that part of the stratgey the Major and him
worked out for the sector.
He stopped the mech to orientate, searching for the deep in the caves of
the mountain hidden mech base. He knew it must be somewhere close. The
whole stormtrooper lance hided there to ambush any enemy forces on course
to the landing zone at Nav Iota.
"Dont you want to get in the shadow, Captain?" he heard the ironic
voice
of 2nd lieutnant rot5 over the headset of his neuro helmet while a
camouflage curtain lifted up just 20 metres before his mech and showed the
entrance to the base in the caves. "Rot, rot, rot close to insubordination
as always. 50 sit ups when i am in" he answered in the same ironic manner.
BuffoutBoy shut down his mech close next to rot5's "Lucy".
And the waiting started.
In the meantime Sector A, somewhere close Nav Gamma
" At least, it is not hot here" ColonelTorturedSol thought. His eyes
followed a blue fish swimming around the cockpit of his mech, standing 10 m
under the water surface of a river close to Nav Gamma. Next to him stood
the mech of Captain Asmodeus. Asmodeus was like his former wing Captain
Reaper once a Comguard soldier at Comstar. Wiresurge and Mr.Rosz were their
names there, TorturedSol recalled. During an intruege of Comstar to
undermine Dev's presence at an old Davion planet, both had been defeated by
Major Darkelf and Captain Gnostferatu. But they fought well and transformed
one of the "dream teams" of Dev in walking rubbish. Major Darkelf and
Captain Gnostferatu granted them their lives and offered a passage back to
Comstar on their costs, so impressed had they been their skill. But a true
warrior knows when he meets one of his kind and Asmodeus and Reaper asked
to join Dev's mech forces. The permission had been immediately given.
Focusing his minds back to the present, he checked his radar. Just 2 k
away, he saw the huge assemblage of metal built on his order. It had been
hard work to bring all the metal, mine prepared rubbish mechs and old
automatic cannon on the hill and make it look like a massive defence
position. His mass detector displayed the movements of two heavy mech
patroling the fake base - Captain Elreth and the young Corporal Destroyer.
The only open question was if the clanners would be aggressive enough to
land in between the river and the base to use dropship as backup fire.
And the waiting held on....
In the meantime, Secotor B, somewhere close Nav Omega
"Colonel, Sir, the camouflage linnen is in place" the young recruit
reported out of breath, still impressed by the battle record of the silent
Colonel Blodlust. It was a tremendous effort to create a linnen camouflage
of 2k x 2k size and transport it into the mashes of the wasteland area.
Without the civilians, it couldnt have been done, Blodlust knew. "The
prices for clothes and sand colour will explode in the next months" the
Colonel thought ironically. He saluted to the young recruit and climbed the
ladder ten metres high up into the cockpit of his mech.
He put the neuro helmet on and opened the channel to the other Lucifer
Lancers. "All remember:" the Colonel said urgently "Watch your
radar. The
signal barks will activate once the enemy dropships land and will send a
sign only we are able to receive. Dont leave the path of the barks or you
will be stuck." The confirmations of Captain Gnostferatu, Corporal Saint
George and Corporal Redrock came immediatly in tense voices. "Yeah, the
mights are nervous, the waiting is nerve-racking" the Colonel thought in
the Australian dialect his family carefully cultivated.
Dev command at Nav Epsilon
"We have bandits in A, B an C landing. They are massing in C. Heavy fighter
coverage." the young communications techs excited voice echoed over the
battle frequence of all Dev forces. "Order Dustbowl", Brig.Gen. Fang
said
quietly. "Dust Bowl, I repeat DUST BOWL" the tech repeated over the
main
Dev com-frequence.
The rests of Dev's airforce started from their hidden underground bunkers
and raced to the landing zone. Five minutes later, they reached the
stratosphere of the assigned sectors while 50% of the chk fighter tried to
intercept them in defence of their dropships. While the enemy dropships
started to land, the Dev fighter squadron dropped its special cargo. Each
fighter had 12 tons highly compressed dust combined with 1000 kilo TNT on
board. The DEV-techs had needed one week to collect the dust with special
equipment from the deserts of Devils Domain. Seconds after the fighter
dropped their bombs, a huge explosion shaked the air of the landing zones
and a dust rain spread over all sectors. Brig. Gen. Fang knew, that the dev
forces must act quickly. The meterologist and the weapons developers had
only assured, that the dust would stay in the air for two hours.
The Chk fighters had been totally surprised by the darkness of the
artificial sand storm they flew in. Now it paid out, that the fighter
squadron had trained the maneuver the whole last week and could fly it
blind. The Dev squadron retreated without a single loss through the
coverage of the dust towards their bases with heavy sam sites.
And then, Brig.Gen.Fang did something unusal. He pushed carefully the
comtech aside and took the headset and said "Our hopes and fate lies on
your shoulders, Devils"
..............to be continued
~author Buffoutboy