Battletech: a Rock and a Hard Place (A Gray Death Legion Novel) by William H. Keith Jr

Author:William H. Keith, Jr.
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Catalyst Game Labs

13

OVERLORD-CLASS DROPSHIP JUNO

OUTSIDE RED ALPHA

VALDIS I

1705 HOURS, 8 AUGUST 3028

“No, Major,” the anonymous voice on the other end of the radio link told her. “We will not open our doors. Why should we?”

Lori Kalmar had been considering her options. The fact of the matter was there were no good options here…but at least she’d come up with a plan of action.

More or less.

“As you can see,” she replied, keeping her voice even, “we’ve moved our DropShip close to your cargo gate…close enough to turn our lasers and particle cannons on it. I don’t think those doors will last long against that. However…it would be bad for business if your facility suffered extensive damage. I’m giving you the opportunity to avoid that.”

The Juno was sitting on the plain outside Red Alpha now, less than three hundred meters from the gate. The Reapers had made extensive flyovers of the entire base, mapping the layout, and Kalmar was fairly sure now of what she was dealing with.

Red Alpha consisted of four connected domes, a huge one at the center a kilometer across, the other three smaller, like encircling satellites, tucked in next to their primary. The dome Juno now faced—the one from which the various Kurita ’Mechs had emerged during the battle—would be cargo processing and warehousing. DropShips touched down on the broad plains outside to offload their cargo and take on ore from the mining facility.

That meant there would be tanked water inside—reaction mass for the DropShips, which would be near-dry after the run in from Wheel Station.

And water was what Juno would need to get back to Wheel.

But they appeared to be at an impasse.

“Major,” the voice said, “need I remind you of the Ares Convention? Article V in particular. ‘No attack may be made against any civilian target, for any reason.’”

“After that dust-up out here,” Kalmar replied, “I have serious questions about just how civilian a target your base actually might be. Still, I don’t intend to breach your main city dome.” She paused for dramatic effect. “Not unless I have to…”

“You wouldn’t dare!”

“Try me.”

“Look…the big dome is our city center…a target explicitly off-limits according to the Convention!”

“Permit me, sir, to refresh your memory concerning the Ares Convention…may I? ‘No battle shall be waged in an urban area except under extreme circumstances.’ That means I’m allowed to attack if I feel I have to. But the fact of the matter is that I don’t intend to enter your city center at all…unless you force me to do so. ‘Extreme circumstances’ would seem to offer me a loophole. And there’s more. The next sentence talks about causing as little collateral damage as possible, ‘if the military objective lies in a city center.’”

“All of Red Alpha is a civilian target! You may not—”

“‘Civilian targets shall be deemed to include such life-supporting equipment as water and air purifiers, agricultural assets, or any other item that enables a planet’s population to continue their existence,’ she continued. Do you need this outlaying dome to continue

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