TEXT: BATTLECORPS
  DECISION 
  AT ACAMAR
  by Kevin Killiany
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 2
  Badlands, Marsa Plateau  
  Acamar 
  Chaos March 
  10 October 3066
  Jake slammed against the harness as his whole world lurched to 
  the right. Damage alarms he could do nothing about shrilled for 
  attention. PPC to the leg—not enough to bring his Grasshopper 
  down, but enough to give him a limp.
  Some long range missiles would be good about now.
  He checked the magazine. Still empty.
  Something clipped his left knee actuator, hard, and he almost 
  went down. Would have gone down if that had been the right 
  again.
  The acrid/sweet scent of coolant teased the edge of his senses. 
  He hoped that was his imagination. Otherwise there was a leak 
  somewhere not showing up on his damage schematics. Could be 
  nothing. Could blow at the next big heat spike.
  I’m the biggest thing out here and they’re picking me to shreds.
  Whoever they were.
  Sensor readings showed a lance of medium ’Mechs. Half ge-
  neric, since he couldn’t get hard data. There must be metal filings 
  of some sort in the purple smoke their guests had filled the valley 
  with.
  Good tone on a Vindicator dead ahead almost caught Jake by 
  surprise. He took the shot full torso, his large laser and the brace 
  of mediums flash-burning their way through the haze. Solid hits, 
  all three. The forty-five ton ’Mech staggered under the sudden 
  loss of armor and—yes!—the right arm hung by myomer cables, 
  its PPC dangling harmlessly.
  Jake’s momentary flush of victory evaporated in the staccato 
  clang of AC fire along the left torso of his machine. He snapped 
  off a return shot with his left arm’s medium laser, but if he hit any-
  thing other than smoke and hillside there was no sign.
  “Smoke’s clearing,” Clint’s voice crackled over Jake’s head-
  phones. “I’m getting some sensors back.”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 3
  “Copy that,” Jake replied. His own sensors were showing increas-
  ingly accurate reads. But not, for some reason, one hundred percent. 
  Whatever the metal was in that smoke it must have done some sort 
  of damage to the sensor array. However, even impaired they gave 
  good numbers on the bogie ’Mechs—showed them moving off.
  Six moving off, he amended, including the Vindicator whose 
  arm he’d severed. One, an Enforcer, moved at a shuffle that indi-
  cated a damaged knee actuator. An enemy Centurion and another 
  Vindicator were salvage. 
  “Form up people.”
  His machines were all moving, though some, like his, had new 
  limps. 
  Two lances of mediums had come against his mixed company 
  and not only hurt them, had gotten away with only two—two-and-
  a-half if you counted the walking wounded—casualties. 
  Yeah, we’re out of missiles, but purple smoke or no we should 
  have had those guys.
  Worse, the bogies were pulling back to resupply, maybe even 
  meet up with reinforcements, while his guys... 
  They were going to make it—he was fairly sure they’d almost 
  flanked the enemy’s position outside the city—but it was costing 
  them. Maybe too much. Part of that was his fault... 
  No, all of that was his fault. He’d given the order to give up their 
  strong point and try to meet up with the government forces in 
  Kalskag. 
  But the situation, the predicament that caused Jake to give that 
  order, that had been Sorenson’s fault. And the planetary militia. 
  And the Rebels. And the Stones. And Peregrine and his precious 
  Hussars. 
  With a name like Peregrine he didn’t have the two cents to 
  call them the Falcons? Man with no imagination shouldn’t be in 
  command.
  None of the other merc units had been any good.
  When the invaders had hit, Sorensen had called them all in. The 
  mountains above Kalskag were a natural strong point. They could 
  have held the mines for weeks, made it too expensive for the en-
  emy to hold Acamar. But none of the other merc units had come. 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 4
  And a week ago Sorensen had forgotten his own plan. Let him-
  self be lured into hunting an enemy that seemed oblivious.
  Kinda like you let yourself get lured into making a break for the 
  capital.
  Jake shook away the phantoms and focused on his sensors. No 
  point in wasting energy on the dead. He had nine men left, and his 
  job was to get them to the government militia’s stronghold in one 
  piece. Right now all his screens gave him were ghosts, but that 
  didn’t matter. The enemy was out there. He just had to be sure he 
  saw them in time to do some good.
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 5
  Peregrine’s Hussars Command Center 
  Flat, Acamar 
  Chaos March 
  02 October 3066
  Captain Ariel Peregrine looked across the tarmac at her 
  BattleMech gleaming in the watery winter sunlight of Acamar and 
  thought of her father. 
  She couldn’t not think of her father whenever she saw it from 
  a distance. The Huron Warrior had been a special order, a new 
  variant straight from Hollis. A HUR-W0-R4O, it carried twenty-four 
  rounds for its massive Grizzard 210 Gauss rifle. Her father had 
  traded a double heat sink for that extra ton of ammunition, but the 
  ten that remained were enough for almost any situation.
  He’d been proud of that BattleMech, with its stately fan of highly 
  sensitive sensors spreading from shoulder to shoulder behind the 
  cockpit. And he’d been pleased the quartermaster had painted its 
  broad shoulders with his colonel’s epaulets. 
  “The Colonel”—that’s how she thought of her ’Mech.
  Because it was her ’Mech. Her father had never piloted it. A stroke 
  had robbed her father of the ability to ever pilot a ’Mech again be-
  fore he’d taken final delivery.
  So she, a lieutenant then, had been the first to impress her mind 
  to the neurocircuits of the new green and gold BattleMech with 
  the colonel’s epaulets. With her father looking on from his motor-
  ized chair and the solemn approval of the assembled Peregrine’s 
  Hussars, she’d taken it through its paces. On a sunny day not un-
  like this one, on a world orbiting a star you couldn’t see from here, 
  proud and excited and grieving.
  Ariel blinked fiercely until the sting left her eyes.
  Turning back to the Command Center entrance, she checked her 
  reflection in the glass before opening the door. No redness to her 
  eyes and her dark complexion masked the hot flush she felt in 
  her cheeks. As she stepped across the threshold, she returned the 
  duty sergeant’s salute before doffing her cap and entering the in-
  ner door.
  The ops room wasn’t dark, but the subdued light after the bright 
  sun made her pause by the door while her eyes adjusted. There 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 6
  were a half dozen techs in the room, manning stations around the 
  wall that monitored radio traffic and distant sensor arrays—the 
  tie-ins to planetary defense had been provided by the Acamar 
  Planetary Militia, their clients.
  The center of the room was dominated by a holodisplay table 
  around which a few officers were now gathered, greenly illumi-
  nated by the projected map.
  “Captain,” Major Dixon glanced up from the holodisplay table. 
  “We may have a situation.”
  Ariel nodded to Captain Carter as she took her place by the table. 
  Carter commanded Charlie Company, an exercise in alliteration 
  if ever there was one, while she commanded Baker. Major Dixon, 
  who had refused to assume the rank of colonel when her father 
  had passed away, commanded Able Company and the regiment 
  as a whole. 
  Dixon had made it clear, privately, after her father’s funeral that 
  he considered himself her regent, guiding the Hussars until she 
  was ready to assume command. He’d also made it clear that she 
  was being held to the highest standard and that command would 
  not devolve to her until she had demonstrated she was ready and 
  able to continue the tradition her father had established.
  Ariel glanced at the map, expecting to see some movement of 
  the various mercenary forces diagramed. Instead, the west coast 
  of Katenga from Flat north past the spaceport to the planetary 
  capital of Kalskag was laid out. East of the coastal plain were the 
  “badlands,” more properly the Marsa Plateau, thousands of square 
  kilometers that looked at this scale like a crumpled paper maze of 
  arroyos and canyons. Beyond the badlands, at the eastern edge of 
  the display, were the Marsa Mountains, source of Acamar’s min-
  eral wealth.
  “Three DropShips are in final approach to Acamar,” Major Dixon 
  said, startling Ariel out of her study of the terrain. “They had 
  friendly transponder codes, but they’ve had apparent difficulty un-
  derstanding traffic control’s instructions and are coming straight 
  in rather than taking their place in the orbital queue.
  “APM pickets, those sensor platforms they have stashed in the as-
  teroid belt, gave those three a careful going over at range,” Dixon 
  cocked an eyebrow. “Got readings on an Overlord and two Unions 
  where the transponders said three Mules should be.”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 7
  “Pirates?” Carter asked.
  “Let’s hope so.”
  Dixon adjusted the controls and the strongholds of each of the 
  mining families, with their private mercenary forces indicated, 
  were illuminated.
  “Problem is...” the major let his voice trail off.
  “No single target big enough for such a force,” Ariel provided. 
  “And the wrong sort of DropShips for transporting spoils.”
  “Invasion,” Carter said.
  “Looks like it,” Dixon agreed. “We’re going with defense plan 
  alpha. The Footmen and ’Mech companies Baker and Charlie are 
  tasked with defending Flat.”
  The Footmen don’t have armor, much less anti-’Mech weapons.
  As captain of Baker, the city’s defense would fall to Ariel. She’d 
  be sure the Hussar’s infantry didn’t find themselves facing any-
  thing they weren’t equipped to handle. 
  “Able remains mobile to attack as needed,” Dixon concluded. 
  “Detail your people. I’ll coordinate the various company merce-
  nary groups.”
  “Sir,” Ariel said, unable to keep this objection to herself. “They’ve 
  never responded well in the past. Shouldn’t we focus all three 
  companies on defending the city we’re contracted to and allow 
  the private armies to defend their various holdings?”
  “They haven’t responded, Captain, because it’s important to a cer-
  tain type of mercenary to appear independent,” Dixon answered. 
  “In the face of a real emergency, they’ll do the right thing.”
  “Yes, sir,” Ariel’s tone was doubtful.
  “Go get your people deployed,” Dixon said. “I’ll round up the 
  cowboys.”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 8
  Landon Industries Refinery Complex 
  Marsa Mountains, Acamar 
  Chaos March 
  06 October 3066
  With a final blast of static, the radio died.
  Jake toggled the switches, but every light showed green. The 
  problem wasn’t the equipment here in the command center. Force 
  Commander Sorensen had stopped transmitting.
  Abruptly. 
  In the middle of a firefight.
  Jake glanced about the command center, not really seeing it. 
  Around him noncoms and techs were busy loading consoles and 
  computers into padded cases. Only the radio was untouched and 
  that only because he was using it. In less than an hour this room 
  would go back to being a commissary.
  Baker Company was positioned to defend the sprawling ore 
  refinery complex. Normally an installation like this would not be 
  a primary target, but the mines were what made Acamar desir-
  able. Their financial clout had made it independent for decades, 
  in fact. 
  But now the rules were being broken by someone willing to use 
  force to take the great mining and refining complexes. Mercenaries, 
  though he didn’t recognize their name, working for someone with 
  deep enough pockets to rebuild the infrastructure once they had 
  the world. A government. He’d bet the Feds, with some holy ra-
  tionalization about why it was for their own good, but it could as 
  easily be the Cappies or even the League.
  Didn’t really matter.
  Sorensen’s Strikers had been hired to protect Landon Industries. 
  And from the silence of the radio, it was beginning to look like 
  Able Company had been lost doing just that.
  Well, technically, the Force Commander had made a foray in 
  strength, not really a defensive move. But he’d thought he’d seen 
  an opportunity to hit the enemy in their support infrastructure, 
  tear out a piece of their ability to wage war. That might have come 
  more under the heading of defending Acamar as a whole rather 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 9
  than the interests of their client, but it had been too good an op-
  portunity to pass up.
  Way too good. Jake had told the boss it looked too easy; rec-
  ommended a scout lance check it out. But Sorensen said all that 
  would do was tip off the enemy that their drawers were down.
  He had taken a recon lance with him. Reema—Sergeant Chowla—
  had been his forward eyes. But he’d gone in force with the best 
  they had and—Jake toggled the switches again—apparently fallen 
  right into a trap.
  Stepping away from the radio, Jake gestured for the techs to 
  pack it up.
  He followed two troopers guiding a dolly into the courtyard as 
  he considered his options.
  The sky was grey and overcast with patches of scud chasing each 
  other just above the refinery’s cooling towers. Jake hunched his 
  shoulders more against the lowering ceiling of lead than the cold. 
  The wind was damp, a contrast to the dry, crackling cold that had 
  blown streamers of dust-like snow into every crack and crevice of 
  the complex for the last few weeks. He didn’t need the weather re-
  ports to know a different sort of storm was coming. Winter going 
  out with one last ice storm.
  He glanced about at the men and women loading the last of the 
  Strikers’ equipment into vehicles. Sergeant Major Pauls, a pillar 
  of calm in the center of apparent chaos, directed traffic, not once 
  looking at the noteputer tucked under his arm. He’d been doing 
  his job for longer than Jake had been breathing; he needed no 
  advice from his XO.
  A couple of hover tanks would be nice. 
  Then again, probably not. Against ’Mechs they’d only give the 
  convoy a false sense of security.
  Jake glanced around the bustling yard. Reema had told him that 
  was a tell with him. Some people frowned when they thought; he 
  boxed the compass like he was scanning for bogies. He’d won-
  dered if that made him look indecisive, but she told him it let the 
  men know he was weighing all the options before he moved.
  Right now in his mind he was seeing beyond the walls of the 
  refinery complex. To the west the tableland dropped off in a se-
  ries of hills and ravines toward Kalskag, the planetary capital. If 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 10
  Acamar could be said to have a planetary capital. The central gov-
  ernment was so weak they’d had to hire mercenaries to bolster 
  their militia. Just like the major families had hired mercs to protect 
  their companies.
  To the south, directly ahead of him, was a straight shot to the 
  DropShip field. The spaceport was centrally located for the refin-
  eries rather than the city—minerals, not tourists, being Acamar’s 
  primary concern. 
  That’s where the enemy was, to the west and south. And where 
  Sorensen had gone, following the ravines down to an “unguard-
  ed” supply nexus, hoping to hit them hard before they turned their 
  attention from the capital to the refineries and mines and towns of 
  the hill country.
  Sorensen had reported solid readings on sixteen ’Mechs, and 
  ghosts on maybe a dozen more. Something had been jamming his 
  scanners. Reema would have been able to cut through whatever it 
  was, but she hadn’t made a sound. Either something had blocked 
  her transmissions, possible in these metal-heavy hills, or she’d 
  gone down in the first volley.
  Jake shook his head, bringing his thoughts back to the situation 
  at hand.
  When Sorensen’s Strikers had signed on with Landon Industries, 
  the only thing they’d been led to expect was trouble from the oth-
  er houses on Acamar and maybe a little pirate activity. That had 
  to be all their employers were expecting, or they’d have hired an 
  outfit a lot bigger than the Strikers. Which meant good faith. Even 
  though a planetary invasion was nothing like they’d expected, the 
  contract was valid. And it didn’t say anything about the Strikers 
  packing up and going home if big boys came to play.
  It didn’t say anything about sitting like lumps and waiting to be 
  demolished, either.
  Hugging the perimeter of the refinery complex close to his left, 
  the steep west face of the mountains jutted an abrupt kilometer 
  into the sky, while behind him the ore road followed a more grad-
  ual grade up to the mines. That was their fallback position, the 
  first hole Landon Industries had dug into Acamar. A played-out 
  mine, the cavern was defensible, immune to air attack and practi-
  cally undetectable through meters of metal ore deposits too thin 
  to mine but thick enough to block most sensors.
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 11
  Most sensors.
  Jake glanced around again—not seeing through the walls this 
  time, actually looking at the activity swarming the courtyard. 
  Techs and soldiers, very few soldiers and a lot of techs, dodged 
  round him as they carried crates and cases to waiting vehicles.
  The road to the spaceport passed by Landontown, the not overly 
  imaginative name for the worker’s community. A few thousand 
  dwellings, a dozen shopping centers, restaurants, and entertain-
  ment complexes; it wasn’t a military target. Nor was the Agrodome, 
  the series of enclosed and covered fields and orchards that 
  stretched from the town’s eastern limit to the base of the moun-
  tains. The only way to grow crops on this frozen world.
  What he wanted to do was go get Sorensen and Reema and the 
  rest. But that wasn’t possible. Not with what they had left.
  A company, a light company with Reema out there, wasn’t 
  going to hold this position against the battalion that was likely 
  heading this way. If they tried, the attackers would flatten the 
  complex. That would cost their employer billions even if all the 
  workers escaped.
  It felt like a rationalization, but it was sound tactics. The best way 
  to defend the place was to move off. Fight, but take the fight away 
  from here. 
  And what was true about defending a refinery was true about 
  defending his support personnel.
  “Pauls,” Jake called the Sergeant Major over. “Everything loaded 
  up tight?”
  “Ready to bug out when you give the word,” the older man an-
  swered. “Though I don’t think we can make the hills before that 
  blow hits.”
  “You’re not going to the hills,” Jake said. “Take everything—and 
  that means everything and everyone not driving a ’Mech—to the 
  Landontown Agrodome.”
  “What the hell are we supposed to do there?”
  “Get inside,” Jake said. “It’s big enough for twenty times what 
  we have.”
  “But those things are off limits, Jake,” Pauls protested. “These 
  people need their food.”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 12
  He was right, of course. On a barren world like Acamar, 
  agrodomes were as inviolate as space habitats. The civilian work-
  ers lived off their produce, wouldn’t survive without them. Turning 
  an agrodome into a strong point was unthinkable.
  “Get inside,” he repeated. “Keep off the crops. Spread out so 
  you’re not one big lump. Power down everything. Not even a 
  campfire. It’s warm enough to keep you alive and you’ve got MREs 
  to last until doomsday.”
  “But Cap—”
  “As of right now I’m officially making you noncombatants,” Jake 
  cut him off. “I want all weapons broken down and secured. If the 
  enemy discovers you, surrender immediately. Do not try to es-
  cape, do not fight.”
  Pauls’ mouth snapped shut. He stared at Jake in mute betrayal.
  “Look,” Jake said more gently. “It’s the only way I can think of to 
  get our people out of this in one piece. If you get in there before 
  the storm hits, the ice will cover your tracks and the agrodome will 
  mask your body heat. Monitor the radios, see how things fall out. 
  If we’re not around when the dust settles...”
  He shrugged. If the Strikers weren’t around—and they both knew 
  Jake’s orders meant he didn’t expect them to be—it was going to 
  be up to Pauls to figure the next move.
  “You firing us, Jake?”
  “What? And give you a loophole for disobeying orders?” Jake 
  shook his head. “Right now the right thing to do is save our peo-
  ple. They deserve it. That’s an order, Sergeant Major.”
  Pauls stood for another frozen moment, then pulled himself to 
  attention. Ramrod tall he brought his hand up, blade straight, fin-
  gertips to brow.
  Jake hadn’t seen that since... Never. Coming to attention, he sol-
  emnly returned Pauls’ salute.
  With a final nod and a glance at the making storm, Pauls turned 
  to organize the retreat.
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 13
  Badlands, Marsa Plateau 
  Acamar 
  Chaos March 
  11 October 3066
  The attack had come as Ariel’s company entered a narrow valley. 
  Sensors had shown the way ahead clear. Or, rather, as clear as they 
  could tell through the echoes and shadows of the ore-rich hills. 
  The badlands surrounding Kalskag were a maze of arroyos and 
  canyons with occasional open valleys. Easily—and usually—tra-
  versed by air. However, Baker Company of Peregrine’s Hussars 
  didn’t have a planetmover to lift them over. And they avoided the 
  open valleys for the same reason they eschewed the roads that 
  followed the high ground of this eroded tableland: Navigating the 
  washes, no matter how frustrating, was better than being an easy 
  target for the battalion that was hunting them.
  Baker Company had been at the northern perimeter of Flat, dug 
  in to block what scouts and intel said was the Ranger’s planned 
  attack route into the city. Whether intel had been wrong or Olson 
  had changed his mind at the last moment didn’t matter. Either way, 
  they’d been thirteen klicks out of position when Charlie Company 
  had been overrun from the east and Central Command fell.
  Now two battalions of the invading force were between her sin-
  gle company and the city they had been hired to defend. Not to 
  mention any repair and resupply. 
  A couple of probing forays had proven the straight way home 
  would get them killed, so Ariel had led Baker Company out into 
  the foothills. There were several hundred kilometers of these 
  badlands, soft stone and clay filled with traces of iron and other 
  metals, stretching between the mountains and the coastal plain. If 
  they could find their way through, they might be able to join forces 
  with the Acamar Planetary Militia at Kalskag.
  The mercenary units hired by the various corporations had been 
  useless. They’d refused to obey orders from the government, de-
  nying the state of emergency superceded their contracts. Standing 
  alone, refusing to even help each other, the private armies had 
  fallen one by one to Olson’s Rangers defending property precious 
  to their masters.
  Stupidity like that gave mercenaries a bad name.
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 14
  But what could you expect from hired help who called them-
  selves marauders and strikers and raiders? More like pirates than 
  professional soldiers. Or children playing at trivid adventures.
  Ariel shook her head.
  United, even a bunch of hired guns acting out childhood fan-
  tasies could have turned back the invasion. Taken all together, 
  the private mercenary forces, the government’s militia and her 
  father’s Peregrine Hussars outnumbered Olson’s Rangers nearly 
  three to one.
  Instead, Olson had taken down the commercial units piecemeal.
  Major Dixon and Able Company had been lost trying to co-
  ordinate with the Rebel Raiders protecting the Brynd Industrial 
  Complex. It had been a straightforward move, tactically sound, for 
  him to hit Olson’s rear as they focused on their assault. But when 
  the two battalions of Olson’s Rangers turned to meet the Hussars, 
  the Rebels had stayed put behind their walls. Instead of helping, 
  they’d taken a breather to rearm and repair, getting ready for the 
  moment Olson turned his attention back to them. 
  Lot of good it did them. Scuttlebutt was no survivors.
  Now the Hussars, what was left of them, were scattered. Unless 
  something changed soon, they were about to suffer the same fate 
  as the commercial hired guns. But as professional soldiers, they 
  were giving a better account of themselves.
  Or they were before Olson and his Rangers outflanked them at 
  Flat. Now, as nearly as she could tell from the frantic radio traffic 
  before the tac channels went silent, Carter and Charlie Company 
  were gone, the Footmen were scattered, squads fighting for indi-
  vidual survival, and all of the Hussars’ support personnel were in 
  enemy hands.
  Which had left her and one company working their way up the 
  foothills toward Kalskag, on the lookout for any surviving merce-
  nary units that might want to rethink their earlier non-cooperation 
  along the way. They might not be able to mount a viable planetary 
  defense, but if the Hussars could hook up with the government’s 
  forces, she was willing to bet they put together a force big enough 
  to stay alive until relief arrived.
  Though where relief was going to come from in the Chaos March 
  was anyone’s guess.
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 15
  Her own hope was the FedCom, or more properly, as her father 
  would say, the FedSuns. Olson’s Rangers were in the employ of 
  either the Capellans or the Free Worlds League. Perhaps both. 
  Neither state would hesitate to repeat their treachery of attack-
  ing while Prince Victor was fighting to protect the realm. Either 
  way, an invasion like this was bound to bring some response. 
  The trick was staying alive for the weeks or months it might take 
  for them to get here.
  Of course, Olson and his Rangers had to be just as aware they 
  only had that short operations window for totally crushing all 
  planetary forces. Not just for strategic reasons. 
  If they could present themselves as solely in charge of Acamar, 
  they’d have grounds—shaky grounds, but grounds—for present-
  ing themselves as defending the world against Prince Victor’s 
  aggression. It would be a sham, of course, but it could cloud things 
  politically and, if she was any judge of Liao’s and Marik’s conniv-
  ing, give them a pretext for sending in their regular forces.
  Perhaps it had been her speculations that distracted her; her 
  mind on the past and future when it should have been hyper-fo-
  cused on the here and now. Or perhaps the Rangers were just that 
  good at stealth.
  In either case, the first warning the Hussars had was a barrage 
  of smoke canisters. 
  Ariel’s impression, admittedly clouded by surprise, was of a doz-
  en volleys falling only seconds apart. Perhaps a hundred smoke 
  bombs all told, delivered in less than a minute, filling the valley 
  with a metallic purple haze that robbed them of their eyes and 
  their sensors.
  Then the shallow valley had filled with Ranger ’Mechs.
  A company, perhaps more, of medium ’Mechs had seemed to 
  rise up out of the ground. Not jumping, though they were jump ca-
  pable; the dense fog made landing too uncertain. But they moved 
  with a speed and surety that told Ariel they could see much better 
  than the Hussars.
  Sensors calibrated to ignore the smoke?
  Whatever the reason, only the Hussar’s discipline kept the attack 
  from becoming a rout. The lances formed in open fours protecting 
  each others’ backs as they returned fire.
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 16
  For all their mobility, the Rangers didn’t seem anxious to press 
  the attack. Their tactic of choice seemed to be for individuals and 
  pairs to dodge in quickly, fire a few salvoes and fade back.
  And their fire wasn’t effective. Though they scored a half dozen 
  hits for every one the Hussar’s landed, they never concentrated 
  their fire on a single target. It was as though they were spreading 
  the damage as widely as possible throughout her company.
  Ariel had the impression they were acting as picadors in a bull 
  fight, keeping the quarry occupied and wearing it down until the 
  toreador was ready to strike the killing blow. Well, she wasn’t going 
  to hold still while the Rangers’ reinforcements got into position.
  “Any pattern?” she asked her lance leaders. “Any thin side to the 
  circle?”
  “West-northwest,” Davis replied. “I’m making out a defile they 
  don’t seem to have covered.”
  “Baker Company,” Ariel said over all-call, “Rotate formation left 
  sixty degrees. Alpha lance taking point, we’re moving west-north-
  west.”
  A series of acknowledging clicks and the twelve ’Mechs moved 
  as one. Ariel felt a small surge of pride at their discipline under 
  fire.
  Relying on her Huron Warrior’s superior sensors even in this soup—
  particularly in this soup—Ariel took the lead, pulling a little ahead of 
  her lance as she probed the opening in the valley wall ahead.
  A communication light flashed on her radio. Someone was 
  broadcasting on one of the Hussars’ frequencies. Not unheard of, 
  there were only so many to go around. That’s why all transmis-
  sions were encrypted. She dialed over to the active channel.
  “—Huron Warrior, Huron Warrior,” an unfamiliar voice crackled in 
  her headphones. 
  Status board said the message was broadcasting in the clear. 
  Someone who didn’t know their codes was trying to contact her. 
  The Rangers? That didn’t seem likely. 
  Whoever it was must be searching the spectrum, trying each 
  frequency in an effort to find one she’d respond to. If they’d inter-
  cepted any of her traffic, the call would have been coming over 
  one of the channels she’d been using. 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 17
  If I just stay quiet, they’ll move on.
  “Go ahead,” she said aloud, hoping it wasn’t a mistake.
  “Be advised,” the strange voice was female, with an accent Ariel 
  couldn’t place, “Three medium bogies at one-twenty meters bear-
  ing three-four-oh.”
  Ariel scanned in the indicated direction, her sensors fighting 
  their way through the metalized fog. An outcrop of iron-rich rock. 
  Anything could be behind it. Was her mysterious informant saving 
  her from a trap or tricking her into not taking an open door?
  “Identify,” she ordered.
  “Tally one standard-issue Blackjack and two Vindicators, one AC-
  equipped,” came the instant reply.
  “I meant,” Ariel made no effort to keep the edge out of her voice. 
  “Identify yourself.”
  “On your three!” 
  The urgent voice had Ariel rotating right, her Gauss rifle tracking 
  before the words fully registered. 
  An Enforcer.
  She had a momentary impression of one beam of watery sun-
  light somehow piercing the artificial fog bank to glitter off its 
  canopy before it fired.
  A hammer-blow clang deafened her as her Huron Warrior rocked 
  under the impact. Her sensors flickered dark then rebooted imme-
  diately, though it would be precious seconds before she could use 
  them. Ariel realized the left side of her sensor array had taken a 
  direct hit. If she’d still been facing forward, that would have been 
  her cockpit.
  She shuffle stepped-right, a snap shot from her torso-mounted 
  medium pulse laser buying time as she brought her left arm’s la-
  ser to bear. Trying to use the Gauss rifle before the sensor array 
  was fully back would only waste a round she didn’t want to spare.
  Luck gave her a hit, low on the Enforcer’s torso. No real damage, 
  but enough to send his second cannon shot wide.
  Her large laser’s beam went high, but by then her sensor array 
  was back online. Status board showed the damaged section had 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 18
  been cut out of the cir-
  cuit; what remained was 
  reading sixty percent 
  operational. Enough for 
  the targeting system.
  Heat 
  spiked 
  and 
  alarms sounded as the 
  Enforcer’s large laser hit 
  her solidly in the chest. 
  Ignoring 
  both, 
  she 
  brought her Gauss rifle 
  to bear. 
  Fresh alarms warned 
  her belatedly of the enemy’s weapons lock as her own targeting 
  sensors gave her good tone.
  “Aim high.”
  Ariel hesitated a half-heartbeat at the stranger’s voice.
  From her left, just beyond her target, an unfamiliar ’Mech, barely 
  half the mass of the Enforcer, streaked down the slope. Facing an 
  enemy with both main weapons trained on her, she wished the 
  newcomer luck and pressed the trigger.
  The stranger didn’t break stride. Even as Ariel’s Gauss slug tore 
  into the Enforcer’s left shoulder and her large laser melted armor 
  across its chest, the light ’Mech fired. Two laser beams, a medium 
  from the torso and a small from the head, converged on the un-
  derside of the enemy’s right shoulder joint.
  At a full run.
  A glance at her sensors confirmed the mystery ’Mech was mak-
  ing sixty-seven kilometers per hour over broken ground when 
  it double-tapped the ammo feed for the Enforcer’s autocannon. 
  Ariel felt her jaw loosen as the computer IDed the machine. She 
  glanced back to her viewscreen in time to see it twist at the tor-
  so and repeat the trick, firing sideways up into the larger ’Mech’s 
  armpit as it passed only a few dozen meters behind.
  The Enforcer dropped its right arm, the autocannon useless. 
  Turning, it broke into a shuffling run—her computer indicated an 
  eighty percent likelihood of a damaged knee actuator—as it put as 
  much distance as it could between itself and the Huron Warrior.
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 19
  Ignoring the fleeing enemy, Ariel keyed her radio to all call.
  “Baker Company, be advised we have a Mongoose, repeat, 
  Mongoose on the field,” she broadcast. “I get no TFF and suspect 
  radio damage, but she is a friendly.”
  “That’s what that was,” said someone.
  Ariel felt her lips twitch at the MechWarrior’s tone. She’d never 
  seen a Mongoose outside a museum herself; there could not be 
  many still in service.
  “Keep an ear on tac-com-seven,” she said. “If she gives you tar-
  geting info, trust it.”
  “She can see in this soup?” That was Davis.
  “Apparently.”
  Well enough to save me.
  “Think she’s got some sort of old school sensors?” Davis cut 
  through her thoughts. 
  “Speculate later, Leftenant,” Ariel replied, pulling her own mind 
  back to the moment.
  Pulling up the rest of her lance, Ariel flushed the mediums wait-
  ing in ambush. The Ranger ’Mechs faded away rather than slug 
  it out. With only a few shots that looked more like cover fire than 
  anything else to Ariel, they jumped for higher ground.
  “Do we follow?”
  “Negative. That looks like what they want us to do,” Ariel an-
  swered. “We’ll take the route they were blocking. There’s got to be 
  a reason they don’t want us going that way.”
  “Unless that is what they want us to think.”
  “You’re overthinking the problem, Davis.”
  Twice pilots relayed intel on enemy movements preceded by 
  “Mongoose says” but except for a few ghost sightings, she was ap-
  parently staying out of direct combat as much as possible. Sound 
  tactics for a damaged museum piece.
  Not that there was much combat now that the haze was set-
  tling out. Once the Hussars broke through the arroyo they’d been 
  blocking into an open valley, the Rangers seemed content to pull 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 20
  back out of range and wait for the next chance to use their smoke-
  screen attack.
  The only way Ariel could see to avoid that sensor-blinding haze 
  was to either move out onto the flat coastal plain or up into the 
  mountains. Both options would take her farther from Kalskag and 
  leave her people exposed. Neither choice was good with an unde-
  termined number of enemy ’Mechs hunting them. Best to keep her 
  forces in the relative safety of the arroyos and try to stay one step 
  ahead of the Rangers.
  However, that wasn’t what the Mongoose was doing, Ariel real-
  ized. It had run downhill to attack the Enforcer. The small ’Mech 
  must be keeping to the high ground, running the ridges and stay-
  ing above the smoke to act as spotter. 
  Only... 
  That didn’t make sense. The haze blocked sensors. It should 
  block from above as effectively as it did at ground level. It might 
  just be the ancient ’Mech’s superior tech, but Ariel couldn’t shake 
  the feeling she was missing something.
  On the heels of her thought, the Mongoose broke cover, coming 
  towards her down a rubble-strewn slope about half a klick ahead. 
  The purple-grey dust coating the small ’Mech gave it a level of 
  concealment the generic camouflage paint scheme underneath 
  never could have. For the most part it looked as though it had 
  been carved from the rocks around them.
  What were those creatures formed from earth? Golems?
  The effect was ruined by sunlight glinting off an area of shiny 
  metal that spread across the right side of the ’Mech’s head and ex-
  tended down to the shoulder. As though the Mongoose had been 
  struck by a water cannon that blasted the dust away.
  Ariel could see the snapped radio mast, bent back double on it-
  self, in the center of the splash zone. She tried to assess the extent 
  of the older machine’s damage, but her sensors refused to give 
  her more than approximate readings.
  “Friends ahead,” the Mongoose pilot’s voice crackled faintly in 
  her headphones when the ’Mech was about two hundred meters 
  distant. “I’ve got them on sensors, but I can’t hear them and they 
  can’t hear me.”
  “Who are they?”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 21
  “Sorensen’s Strikers.”
  Sounds like a disgruntled labor union.
  “Two companies ’Mechs, light company infantry,” Davis supplied. 
  “Protecting Landon Industries refinery and mines above Kalskag.”
  “One company of ’Mechs now,” the Mongoose pilot’s voice was 
  flat. “Force Commander Sorensen and Able Company were lost 
  five days ago.”
  “How do I call the ones up ahead?” Ariel asked, keeping her voice 
  business crisp. 
  If they were between Kalskag and the Landon refinery, they were 
  too far north. Not by much, but still too far. She didn’t like not be-
  ing where she thought she was.
  Switching to the frequency the Mongoose pilot provided, she 
  broadcast a narrow beam up valley: “Sorensen’s Strikers, this is 
  Peregrine’s Hussars. We have one of your number with us, but her 
  radio is out. Suggest we meet to coordinate efforts.”
  “Our position is defensible,” a man’s voice, rough with fatigue, 
  answered. “Why don’t you join us?”
  More ’Mechs carved from stone.
  Three dust-covered heavy ’Mechs, a Grasshopper and a pair of 
  Quickdraws, one with a brace of medium lasers where its long 
  range missile launcher should have been, were ranged against the 
  side of a box canyon that opened off the valley. The late afternoon 
  sun, striking them almost horizontally, cast their shadows back 
  against the rock face as though they were physically connected to, 
  growing out of, the eroded stone.
  Five other ’Mechs—her clouded sensors refused to identify them 
  beyond another light and four mediums—held positions farther 
  down the valley, apparently guarding another approach.
  Setting her own pickets, Ariel led Davis and the Mongoose into 
  the box canyon. As she drew close she saw the hatches open on 
  the Grasshopper and laser-equipped Quickdraw, their chain lad-
  ders dangling.
  Then she saw the fourth ’Mech, a Ranger Vindicator with one 
  arm dangling by a few myomer cables, backed into a narrow 
  crevasse. It was far enough in that the sunlight struck only its dan-
  gling arm covered in grime and reflected bright highlights off its 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 22
  gleaming head. The rest was hidden in shadow. An hour later and 
  the abandoned ’Mech—for it clearly was abandoned—would have 
  been invisible.
  “Let’s get out and meet our new friends,” she said to Davis on 
  their secure channel.
  “I don’t like it, Captain.”
  “Neither do I, Leftenant,” Ariel replied as she undid her five-point 
  harness and twisted to reach the snow parka in its storage com-
  partment. “But I’m not going to sit in here to talk to people on the 
  ground.”
  Ariel hadn’t realized how much the cockpit of her Huron Warrior 
  had come to stink over the last four days until the first blast of cold 
  fresh air hit her. She was tempted to open her parka and let the 
  chill breeze blow over her body as well, but she knew frigid air on 
  sweat was a quick road to hypothermia. Or worse.
  She decided to follow the example of the Striker MechWarriors 
  and leave the hatch opened wide to air the cockpit out in her ab-
  sence.
  As she lowered her ladder, she saw the Mongoose pilot, already 
  on the ground, running to the figures standing at the feet of the 
  abandoned Vindicator. The taller—a man with the blonde build of 
  a trivid Viking, Ariel saw as he swept back his parka hood—took a 
  few steps toward the running pilot and stopped. 
  She expected the two to embrace, but the pilot stopped, perhaps 
  a hand’s breadth closer than protocol would dictate. Ariel couldn’t 
  hear what they were saying, of course, but from the blonde giant’s 
  expression and the tension in their body language, it was clear 
  this was not a simple subordinate reporting to her superior.
  She glanced across at Davis securing his ladder and saw him 
  shake his head. Her leftenant was as disgusted as she at the lack 
  of professionalism.
  The climb down stretched muscles cramped from too long in the 
  couch and she was grateful for every ache and pain. The freshen-
  ing breeze at ground level and the crunch of the gritty, granular 
  snow beneath her feet seemed to revitalize her as she and Davis 
  approached the blonde giant. 
  The trivid Viking effect was heightened up close by his too long 
  hair blowing in the breeze and the week-old stubble of beard. She 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 23
  didn’t need to glance at Davis to know his brown hair was neatly 
  trimmed, his mustache razor straight. 
  Showers may be hard to come by in a BattleMech, but there 
  was no trick to staying well groomed. In her own case it was only 
  a matter of tightly braided cornrows gathered at the nape of her 
  neck. As for Davis, the electric shaver predated space flight. 
  Very few people—and from what she’d seen it was clear 
  Sorensen’s Strikers were not among that few—appreciated the 
  importance of a professional warrior appearing, well, professional 
  at all times. A professional appearance assured the client he had 
  hired the best available, let potential adversaries know they were 
  serious in their commitment and made a difference in how the 
  warrior saw himself.
  It was also clear from the trivid Viking’s weary expression that 
  the message of professionalism was completely lost on him.
  “Captain Jacoam, Sorensen’s Strikers,” he introduced himself 
  when they were within comfortable earshot. Then he nodded to the 
  sharp featured MechWarrior still near the Vindicator. “Lieutenant 
  Clint. You’ve met Sergeant Reema Chowla.”
  For the first time Ariel took a close look at the Mongoose pi-
  lot and saw a young woman perhaps half a meter shorter than 
  her captain with skin a few shades lighter than her own. Taking 
  in her brown eyes and dark hair worn in a thick braid, Ariel real-
  ized the accent she hadn’t been able to place was Hindi. As the 
  Strikers clearly used Free World League ranking, Chowla’s master 
  sergeant’s stripes made her roughly equal to a leftenant.
  “Captain Peregrine, Leftenant Davis, Peregrine’s Hussars,” Ariel 
  responded.
  “Any relation to the Peregrine of Peregrine’s Hussars?”
  Always the first question.
  “He was my father,” she said. “He passed away four years ago.”
  “That explains it.”
  “Explains what?” Ariel asked, knowing the answer. Always the 
  first assumption.
  “How a girl of—what? twenty-five?—ended up being a captain 
  and driving a beautiful new ’Mech.”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 24
  Ariel was aware of Davis beside her, balanced in case trouble 
  ensued, but unsurprised and unworried. He’d been witness to this 
  conversation a dozen times over.
  “I have the ’Mech because it was my father’s,” she said evenly. “I 
  have my rank because I earned it.”
  Captain Jacoam did not actually shrug.
  “You in command of the Hussars now?” he asked.
  “No. Major Dixon has overall command—” Ariel stopped abruptly.
  Jacoam nodded. 
  “I’m in pretty much the same position myself.” He made a sketchy 
  gesture that indicated the whole valley. “I currently have overall 
  command of the Strikers which, as a fighting force, consists of 
  eight—nine ’Mechs, now. We’ve also got two crippled ’Mechs and 
  assorted noncombatants stashed in various hidey-holes.”
  “There may be other assets elsewhere,” Ariel replied. “But at the 
  moment the Hussars have one full company that I know of.”
  Jacoam nodded again.
  “Reema here tells me you can fight.”
  Ariel glanced at the sergeant who met her gaze levelly.
  “I can say unequivocally that Master Sergeant Chowla can also 
  fight.”
  “Good,” said Jacoam. “We like each other. What do you make of 
  this?” He indicated the abandoned Vindicator.
  “Any idea why it was abandoned?” Ariel asked, looking up at the 
  medium ’Mech.
  “Two ruptured heat sinks and badly fractured reactor insula-
  tion,” Jacoam said, pointing. “No hard radiation, of course, but 
  the thing’s a furnace.”
  Once he pointed it out, Ariel realized the warmth she’d thought 
  was the sun reflecting off the cliff face was in fact radiating from 
  the machine.
  “It hasn’t been here long.”
  “No,” Jacoam agreed. “I was wondering if it looked familiar to you.”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 25
  “It’s a Vindicator,” Ariel said. “Perhaps the most common sin-
  gle design in Capellan space. Certainly not a rarity in the Chaos 
  March.”
  “Yeah, but look at this one.”
  Ariel did, for several seconds, taking in every detail.
  “It has no identifying marks,” she said at last. “And its armor has 
  been field patched, more than once, recently and hastily.”
  “That’s what I was thinking,” Jacoam cocked his head in her di-
  rection. “Does that suggest anything to you?”
  “That it’s a front line medium ’Mech engaged in the invasion of 
  Acamar,” she said, weary of his posturing. “Why don’t you just 
  lay out whatever it is you’re thinking and stop playing guessing 
  games?”
  “Because I want to see if another commander, using logic, comes 
  to the same conclusion,” Jacoam’s tone matched hers. “It’s not a 
  guessing game, it’s a parity check.”
  Ariel stood her ground. She was aware of the air getting colder, 
  though it was still just over an hour until sunset. Either the breeze 
  had shifted or the Vindicator was cooling.
  “Okay,” Jacoam said at last. “Do you know anything about this 
  outfit we’re fighting? How big they are?”
  “Olson’s Rangers are a regiment, maybe a reinforced regiment,” 
  Davis answered. “They field light and medium ’Mechs, mostly of 
  Capellan manufacture, and are known for hit-and-run tactics.”
  “How many of these Rangers hit Flat?”
  “Two battalions.”
  “There you go,” said Jacoam, nodding. “That’s what it is.”
  “That’s what what is?” Ariel asked.
  “Two battalions hit Flat and one hit Kalskag,” Jacoam said. “So 
  who are we fighting?”
  Ariel and Davis exchanged glances.
  “If they are in fact a reinforced regiment,” Davis answered, “We 
  could be dealing with the fourth battalion.”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 26
  “Maybe, maybe,” said Jacoam. “That’s been what I was thinking. 
  Only I wasn’t thinking, I was reacting.”
  He paused for a moment, obviously expecting the two of them 
  to follow along. Glancing at Master Sergeant Chowla, Ariel saw 
  she was equally puzzled by her captain’s logic.
  “Our tactics—and I’m betting yours, too—have been based on 
  the assumption we’re evading and circumventing a larger force,” 
  Jacoam said. “But look at their tactics: They lob smoke bombs on 
  us, hit us fast, then withdraw. What does that look like?”
  The light dawned.
  “A smaller force harrying a larger one,” Ariel said.
  “These guys don’t have a whole extra battalion,” Jacoam said. 
  “They sent a company—maybe sixteen ’Mechs, tops—of mobile 
  mediums out here to keep us busy. They’re all unmarked so we 
  don’t realize we’re seeing the same ones over and over.”
  “Definitely heavy support vehicles,” Davis added. “So they can 
  reload and repair quickly.”
  “Maybe some artillery to lob the smoke,” Jacoam said. “Though 
  I’m guessing infantry mortars or they’d be hitting us with some-
  thing heavier than smoke.”
  “How do the support vehicles get around so quickly?” Ariel asked.
  “Roads,” Chowla answered. “We’re avoiding them, but there’s 
  no reason they’d have to.”
  Ariel nodded, the pieces of the last four days falling into place.
  “They wouldn’t have to know where we are all the time,” she 
  said. “Just place pickets along the routes to Kalskag. If we head 
  the right way, all they have to do is hit us to turn us around, then 
  leave us alone to wander in circles.”
  “Right,” Jacoam agreed. “They’ve got Kalskag bottled, but they 
  can’t take it with one battalion. They just need to keep us from 
  hooking up with the government militia while their main force fin-
  ishes off Flat and works its way up the coast to Kalskag.”
  “What do you recommend?” Ariel asked.
  “Find a road; get to Kalskag,” Jacoam said. “Capturing that resup-
  ply convoy of theirs would be nice, but don’t waste time looking 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 27
  for it. We’ve given them four days they don’t deserve and we need 
  to get them back.”
  “One problem,” said Davis. “They’ve damaged our sensors—
  some of us are nearly blind—we may not be able to navigate or 
  defend ourselves effectively.”
  “But their ’Mechs can see,” Jacoam said. “There has to be a rea-
  son they can shoot better and move faster than we can in that 
  soup. We just need to figure that out.”
  “Not just in the soup,” Davis countered. “Our sensors are seri-
  ously degraded. Something in that smoke, probably the metal 
  filings, have somehow damaged our sensor arrays. If we’re going 
  to take the battle to them, we’re going to need better eyes.”
  “Wipers don’t do much against the dust,” Jacoam said. “But if 
  we get our viewscreens clear, we can rely on our own eyes for the 
  close in work. Sensors will be enough to tell us something’s out 
  there, even if they can’t be sure what.”
  “In that case, we’ll have to wait until daylight,” Ariel pointed out. 
  “It will be dark in about an hour.”
  “We can’t afford another night.”
  “We don’t have a choice,” Ariel snapped. “This isn’t some trivid 
  adventure where your ’Mechs gain special powers because your 
  cause is just. These are machines and they are damaged and tak-
  ing them into combat without sensors in the dark is suicide.”
  “I have sensors,” Sergeant Chowla spoke up in the ensuing si-
  lence.
  “I meant to ask,” said Davis quickly, pulling the conversation 
  farther away from confrontation. “Your Beagle Probe is still work-
  ing?”
  “The full suite,” Chowla shrugged. “A near miss with an AC took 
  out my radio, nearly took my head, but I never lost my sensors.”
  Ariel looked up at the Mongoose. From this angle the broken 
  antenna was just apparent, and she could see the shiny area that 
  had been washed clean. The Mongoose must have been under 
  an overhang when the cannon missed her. The concussion could 
  have knocked loose a small avalanche to wash away the dust.
  But...
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 28
  “Jake!” an unfamiliar voice broke her thought. “I’ve got it!”
  Clint, the Striker lieutenant who hadn’t spoken, brushed past 
  Ariel to stride purposefully toward his Quickdraw. Pulling off his 
  gauntlet, he looked back at the group, his hatchet face split with a 
  grin of triumph.
  “Watch,” he said, and extended his bare hand to the metal.
  Pop!
  Ariel’s laser hand twitched reflexively. 
  Clint hopped back from the ’Mech, flapping his bare hand.
  “Should have thought that through,” he said at last.
  No one had to ask him what he meant, Ariel knew the others 
  were as transfixed as she by the half-meter circle of shiny metal 
  on the side of the Quickdraw’s foot.
  “Static electricity,” she said.
  “And radioactive dust,” Davis finished. “Our sensors aren’t dam-
  aged, they’re blinded by radiation.”
  “How did you figure that out?” Jacoam asked.
  “The Vindicator’s head is shiny,” Clint answered. “Reema’s ma-
  chine is shiny where the broken antenna feed is hitting the armor. 
  Both have sensors.”
  “A trickle charge to cancel the static,” Davis said. “That would 
  keep their sensor arrays clear.”
  “Any mention of Olson’s outfit pulling this particular stunt in their 
  dossier?” Jacoam asked.
  “No, but I doubt they’ve ever done it before,” Davis said. “You’d need 
  the arid cold of a place like Acamar to build up enough static charge. 
  They probably discovered the effect completely by accident.”
  “You tell your people, I’ll tell mine,” Jacoam said to Ariel. “It’s 
  what? A five minute job to run a line from some peanut light they 
  don’t need to the base of their sensor array?”
  “At most,” Ariel agreed. 
  If my system hadn’t automatically cut power to the damaged 
  sensors ... 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 29
  She let the thought drop.
  “The main Landontown/Kalskag highway bridges the other end 
  of this valley, about four klicks north,” Jacoam was saying. “As 
  soon as you’re ready to roll, my heavies will take point and we’ll 
  blast a straight shot into the city.”
  “That’s assuming their other two battalions haven’t arrived from 
  Flat,” Ariel said. “And that all they have really are lights and medi-
  ums, and that they are not already massed at one place—like the 
  most probable approach—ready to meet you.”
  “You’ve got a better idea?”
  “Several,” Ariel assured him. “But in the interests of saving time, 
  I suggest we take the main highway only as far as the first inter-
  change—I take it you have a map?”
  Jacoam didn’t bother to answer, his mouth a hard line.
  “From that point we should take secondary roads, working our 
  way around to the north, the side opposite the reinforcements’ 
  probable route, and make our way into the city from there.”
  “If we attack from the outside while the militia attacks from the 
  city—”
  “We don’t have the reserves,” 
  Ariel pointed out. “We will do 
  the government troops—and 
  the people of Acamar—the 
  most good if we arrive in one 
  piece and ready to be a help 
  instead of a burden.”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 30
  Jacoam let out a long breath. For a moment he glanced about, 
  as though counting insects. Sergeant Chowla, on the other hand, 
  regarded Ariel with eyes like twin lasers.
  Better not make any sudden moves.
  “You’re right,” Jacoam said at last. “We’ll do it your way. Heavies 
  still take lead.”
  “Of course.”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 31
  Kalskag, Acamar 
  Chaos March 
  12 October 3066
  Four days of running battle. Or maybe a dozen skirmishes. It 
  depended on whether you counted the two ends of a lull as two 
  separate fights. That’s what listening to Peregrine had gotten 
  him.
  Only not Peregrine. According to his daughter, Peregrine’d been 
  dead for years. The guy he’d been calling Peregrine had been the 
  old man’s former XO.
  He and Baker Company had waited out the ice storm in the 
  mouth of the mines just as they’d planned. But waiting meant 
  thinking, and the more he’d thought, the more hiding out didn’t 
  make sense.
  If these guys—Olson’s Raiders, Peregrine Junior’s answer man 
  had called them—were the first wave of an invasion, waiting for 
  the dust to settle just meant waiting until whoever the new own-
  ers were got good and established. So when the ice storm ended, 
  not knowing Peregrine was dead and not knowing who it was they 
  were fighting, Jake had lead his boys down out of the mountains 
  to try and link up with the planetary militia.
  And had been wandering around the badlands ever since.
  Since his missiles had run out the second day, he’d had plenty of 
  time to wonder if perhaps he should have brought along at least 
  one ammo carrier. But the same rationale that guided his choice at 
  the refinery complex still held. Nothing that couldn’t defend itself 
  needed to be out here.
  It didn’t help to know abandoning the refinery hadn’t done any 
  good. The invaders had taken it out anyway, defenders or no. 
  Apparently raw ore was good enough for their masters, and civil-
  ian losses an acceptable price for taking the planet.
  Fortunately, from all he could tell from the few civilian radio 
  broadcasts he’d picked up, Landontown and the agrodomes had 
  been spared. Apparently, whoever was coming wanted the work-
  ers alive and needed to eat as much as the natives did.
  And whoever was coming was about to find out Acamar wasn’t 
  going to be the walk-through they’d expected.
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 32
  His Grasshopper’s sensors raked through the night, separating 
  the chaff of background noise from the grains of information in 
  the predawn darkness.
  Metal ahead, and heat, a lot of it, at extreme range.
  “We may have their field repair operation up ahead,” he broad-
  cast back to Peregrine Junior.
  “Confirmed,” was all she said.
  Even though she was behind him and half of them were out of 
  commission, the sensors on her Huron Warrior had a lot longer 
  reach than his Grasshopper.
  “Suggest we barrel right into them,” he said. “They don’t know 
  we’re coming, they don’t know we can see, and they don’t know 
  we’ve teamed up.”
  Peregrine Junior surprised him.
  “Agreed,” she said. Then reverted: “But remember the goal is to 
  break through and join up with the planetary militia. Don’t waste 
  time chasing down secondary targets.”
  “Do tell,” he replied before switching to Baker Company’s all call. 
  “At the run. Attack.”
  In a dozen strides his Grasshopper was charging down the 
  broad highway at sixty kilometers an hour. Clint and Garner held 
  their Quickdraws back, matching speed as the rest of the company 
  surged behind them.
  The Rangers saw them coming. The heat readings dropped 
  abruptly as they turned off their welding arcs. Other heat sources, 
  ’Mechs coming to life, vehicle engines moving low to the ground...
  “Move left,” Peregrine Junior ordered.
  Without a word, Jake shifted to the left side of the causeway, 
  Clint and Garner following suit.
  The Huron Warrior pulled even with them, then ahead, its Gauss 
  rifle extended before it.
  “Stick with her,” Jake said, and the two Quickdraws sped up to 
  pace the smaller machine.
  Suddenly the road ahead blossomed in a false dawn, a column 
  of fiery smoke boiling into the sky.
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 33
  “Munitions truck,” Jake said, not caring his microphone picked 
  up his words. “I got empty missile racks and she blows up the 
  munitions truck.”
  Clint laughed.
  Then the battle was joined. Jake’s restored sensors told him five 
  Vindicators, two Blackjacks and an Enforcer with a ruined right 
  knee actuator were all that stood in the way of twenty-three charg-
  ing ’Mechs.
  Stomping down hard, he fired his jump jets, leaping through the 
  oily smoke of the burning munitions truck to land only a few me-
  ters behind the fleeing Enforcer. Not waiting for good tone, he 
  fired his full torso, his large laser and two mediums gouging into 
  the lower back of the smaller machine.
  The Enforcer fell forward, flailing wildly as its gyroscope assem-
  bly tore itself apart.
  Scanning for his second target, Jake found none. The broken 
  bodies of ’Mechs and three burning trucks were all that remained 
  of the Ranger force that had harried his men across the badlands.
  “Think they got a message off?” Peregrine Junior asked.
  “Of course they got a message off,” Jake replied. “We’re fast, but 
  we’re not that fast.” 
  “Secondary roads, then.”
  “As per plan,” Jake agreed. “Two klicks up, take a right.”
  Content to let the smaller machine take point, Jake took up sta-
  tion in the center of the line, probing ahead and to the right. Odds 
  were long he’d see anything on the side road at this range, but he 
  was feeling lucky.
  Three hours later, he still felt lucky. Of course, he also felt bone 
  weary, and gritty, and the taste in his mouth was more than his 
  lukewarm water supply could wash away.
  The first rays of dawn were lighting the sky over the Marsa range 
  and they hadn’t seen hide nor hair of Olson’s Rangers since their 
  one-minute fire fight. 
  What they could see, looking south from the edge of the Marsa 
  tablelands, was Kalskag. Or, more precisely, the collection of lav-
  ender and grey shadows that would resolve itself into Kalskag as 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 34
  soon as the sun cleared the mountains. They planned on being 
  well on their way into the city by then.
  “Straight across the plain won’t work,” Peregrine Junior was say-
  ing.
  “We’d be bugs on a plate,” he agreed. “Which leaves either cut-
  ting back and following the bed of the Antituck River or pushing 
  on and coming in along the coast.”
  He knew which he’d do, but he didn’t voice it. He was curious 
  to see if Peregrine Junior would make the opposite choice before 
  she knew what his was.
  “The beach,” she cost him his bet with himself by picking the 
  option he liked. “They won’t expect us to go that far past the city 
  before doubling back.”
  “Sounds good to—”
  “Captain!” a voice he didn’t recognize cut him off.
  “What?” he and Peregrine Junior asked as one.
  Looking up, Jake saw four points of light, blinding against the 
  cobalt of the pre-dawn western sky. DropShips coming in low, at 
  an angle that would bring them down on the coastal plain outside 
  Kalskag, not the spaceport.
  “Cavalry,” he said. “We finally get our act together and the cav-
  alry arrives. Where were you guys when we needed you?”
  “Captain Jacoam,” Peregrine Junior said. “You’re broadcasting.”
  Jake bit back his retort. Did she really think he didn’t realize their 
  people could hear him? One more thing she could file under “con-
  duct unbecoming,” he guessed.
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 35
  Field Command Center 
  First Cunningham’s Commandos 
  Kalskag, Acamar 
  Chaos March 
  14 October 3066
  “The long and the short of it is we don’t want you here,” Major 
  Arsinius Foyer said flatly.
  Ariel couldn’t fault him there. Any objective account of either the 
  Hussars’ or the Strikers’ actions from the moment the invasion 
  began made both units look like bumbling amateurs.
  Which, compared to this group, we are.
  Captain Jacoam’s “cavalry” had turned out to be the First 
  Regiment of Cunningham’s Commandos. The crack mercenary 
  unit had been dispatched from Zurich by Duke Michael Hasek him-
  self. Their response time had been phenomenal. Though it wasn’t 
  discussed, Ariel suspected they’d used a close-orbit pirate point 
  to get here so quickly.
  The dawn attack they’d witnessed had landed squarely in the 
  center of Olson’s entire regiment, minus the lances they’d left 
  searching what was left of Flat for Hussar survivors and the com-
  pany she and Jacoam had dispatched in the badlands. Nearly half 
  the Rangers had died or been captured in the first few hours. The 
  rest had scattered. Some, Ariel didn’t know how many, had made 
  it to the spaceport and gotten off planet in one of their DropShips. 
  Whether they’d make it to the jump point or not was still open to 
  conjecture.
  The Commandos had been able to confirm that all of the Strikers’ 
  ’Mechs, save those with Captain Jacoam, had been destroyed. 
  Their noncommittal response to the discovery Strikers’ support 
  personnel had survived the invasion unscathed spoke volumes 
  about their opinion of Jacoam’s methods.
  Two weeks ago, Ariel might have agreed with them. Now she 
  was not so sure. She certainly would have traded the Commandos’ 
  disapproval for the lives of her people. 
  All of the Hussars’ technical and support personnel, nearly one 
  hundred people, were MIA. Whether killed or captured wasn’t 
  clear, but Olson’s treatment of Flat was regarded as a war crime 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 36
  by the Commandos; Ariel wasn’t holding out much hope. Enough 
  Footmen had survived, hiding and sniping from cover, to form 
  a platoon. But nearly sixty good men and women were con-
  firmed dead. Of Charlie Company only two ’Mechs remained, and 
  then only because extensive damage had caused each to go to 
  ground. 
  Factor in lost vehicles, equipment and supplies, and the Hussars 
  had lost eighty percent of their assets, eighty percent of their peo-
  ple, to a series of blunders and bad decisions.
  When the messenger from the Commandos’ commander had 
  come, requesting the presence of both her and her XO, she’d 
  had to fight down the dread they were going to commandeer the 
  Hussar’s ’Mechs and leave her and her people dispossessed and 
  stranded on Acamar. Colonel Longstreet certainly had that au-
  thority and, given the mess he’d found, could very well have the 
  inclination.
  Jacoam and Chowla had joined Ariel and Davis as they were es-
  corted through unfamiliar streets to the Commandos’ command 
  center. The Striker Captain was wearing an open duty jacket with 
  sleeves removed over an olive drab tee shirt and an infantry troop-
  er’s field pants. Only the captain’s bars pinned incorrectly at his 
  field jacket’s collar identified him as anything other than a refugee 
  from a surplus store. The sergeant wore a field jacket of ancient cut 
  decorated with service bars from a dozen campaigns she could not 
  possibly have been involved with over a similar shirt and pants.
  Aren’t these people ever out of costume? Ariel had wondered, 
  absently tugging the hem of her own neatly pressed field jacket to 
  be sure it hung straight. And to bring a sergeant as his XO?
  The two captains had exchanged nods before being led through 
  the last series of turns and corridors to this windowless meeting 
  room. Beyond the simple oval table and a dozen straight backed 
  chairs, there were no furnishings.
  “Might as well get comfortable,” Captain Jacoam said, taking the 
  central seat along one long side of the oval. “Priorities the way 
  they are, we might be in for a long wait.”
  Sergeant Chowla had, of course, sat down immediately. 
  Ariel took a long moment to decide Jacoam’s logic made sense 
  and that no good was served by not sitting while they waited. She 
  sat opposite Jacoam. Davis followed suit.
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 37
  The hour they’d waited had passed in near silence. Beyond initial 
  inquiries about the condition of the other’s command and brief 
  expressions of satisfaction with their own people, neither captain 
  had anything to say.
  The carpet was a medium grey with flecks of reddish brown. The 
  same reddish brown was used in the woodwork that accented the 
  pale blue walls. Ariel decided the Commandos had appropriated 
  the office complex of one of Acamar’s corporate giants. She just 
  couldn’t see anything to indicate which one.
  At last the door had opened and Ariel had moved smoothly to 
  her feet, not too hasty, and come to attention, confident that Davis 
  mirrored her position.
  She was surprised to see Jacoam and Chowla rise as quickly on 
  their side of the table. Not attention, exactly, but clearly a show of 
  respect.
  The Commandos’ officer, Major Foyer, had told them to take their 
  seats, reviewed with them their respective rosters and materiel in-
  ventories, then told them they were being deported. 
  With their ’Mechs.
  Ariel had almost whooped.
  “There is a captured Ranger DropShip at the space port,” Major 
  Foyer was saying as Ariel came down off her initial rush at not 
  being dispossessed. “Wait here while orders are cut. Once you 
  have your hold and berth assignments, you’ll have until 0900 local 
  tomorrow morning to get aboard and squared away.”
  “Where are you sending us?” Jacoam asked.
  “You’ll be transported to Outreach,” the Major said. “The Colonel 
  wants you out of our area of operation, but he knows you’ll need 
  to find work.”
  “Yes, sir,” Jacoam grinned. “Thank you, sir.”
  So he was as scared as I was.
  Ariel rose with the others as the major took his leave and prom-
  ised along with Jacoam to stay put until a corporal returned with 
  their marching orders. She even grinned back at Chowla as the 
  four took their seats. 
  The tension was definitely out of the room.
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 38
  To be replaced almost immediately by concerns of a different 
  sort as Ariel began sorting through her father’s old friends, won-
  dering who she could contact. Her people were going to need 
  work, and soon.
  “Well?” Jacoam asked after a long minute’s silence.
  Ariel wasn’t in the mood for one of his guessing games.
  “Well what?”
  The big man paused, as if trying to figure out if she was joking 
  or not, then glanced over at his sergeant. Chowla shrugged elo-
  quently and nodded toward Ariel, prompting her commander to 
  continue.
  “The way I see it,” Jacoam said, “We can let these guys haul us 
  back to Outreach as is. But then what? We knock on doors, hang 
  out in bars and generally waste our time until somebody decides 
  to hire us on. Then we have to work our way back up through the 
  ranks of some new outfit.”
  Ariel nodded. Though she evidently had better contacts, or at 
  least a more organized plan for finding a new unit willing to take 
  her and her people on, Jacoam’s assessment of their future was 
  accurate.
  “Or...”
  Ariel sat up straighter as she suddenly realized where the other 
  mercenary was going. She was aware of Davis looking at her in 
  surprise, a beat or two slow on the uptake.
  “We combine assets,” Jacoam spread his hands. “Present our-
  selves as a new outfit, and go looking for our own contracts.”
  Ariel stared blankly at his vacuous grin for a moment as she 
  gathered her wits.
  “Outfit?” she said at last, anger boiling through. “My people may 
  form a viable fighting force, but your ragtag group of clowns al-
  most got us all killed.”
  “What almost got us killed, Captain, was your commander—” the 
  flat of an upraised hand blocked her response “—and mine acting 
  like asses. If they’d worked together, these bully boys would never 
  have had to come in and save our butts.”
  “If Sorensen had followed orders—”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 39
  “Stow it.”
  For a moment their glares locked. If Ariel hadn’t promised Foyer 
  she’d wait here for orders, she would have left; returned to her 
  command. 
  As it was, she sat, rigid. And thought.
  “Neither one of us is responsible for the mess we found ourselves 
  in,” Jacoam said, surprising her with how closely his thoughts shad-
  owed hers. “Only how we played the game we were handed.”
  Almost despite herself, Ariel nodded; once. 
  “All things considered, your people weren’t half bad out there,” 
  Jacoam added.
  “I was surprised by your performance as well, Captain Jacoam.”
  “First, I’m going to let that slide,” Jacoam said, “Because I didn’t 
  expect your pretty boys to be worth a piss, either. Second, call me 
  Jake.”
  “All right, Jake,” from the corner of her eye she could see Davis 
  match her pose as she leaned back. Unified front. 
  The pair across from them presented a different image. Jacoam—
  Jake—smiling grimly, in his element making a deal. But his Sergeant 
  Chowla shifted her bright eyes from Ariel to Davis and back, ready 
  to pounce at the first wrong move. Terrier personality.
  Or a mongoose.
  “Just so we’re clear,” she said to Jake. “Why don’t you spell out 
  what you’re proposing?”
  “You’ve got fourteen BattleMechs, we’ve got eleven,” he said. 
  “Combined, that’s a pretty potent force.”
  “Not all of ours—or yours, as I understand it—are ready for com-
  bat,” Ariel pointed out. “For whatever reason, we’ve both taken 
  some heavy damage.”
  “That’s true now,” Jake answered, “But with our techs on it, we’ll 
  be battle ready before the first contract comes in.”
  Ariel exchanged glances with Davis. 
  “So figure between us,” Jake was saying, “We’ve got twenty-five 
  ’Mechs and a plane...”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 40
  “Wait,” Ariel broke in. “You had aerospace assets and didn’t use 
  them?”
  “No,” Jake said. “We have a plane, singular. A ’Mechbuster Sorensen 
  bought surplus. It’s old, but in good shape; everything works.”
  “Why didn’t you use it?” Ariel pressed. “Granted, one ’Mechbuster 
  isn’t much, but you could have—”
  “No pilot.”
  “What?”
  “No pilot,” Jake repeated. “Sorensen got the plane, fixed it up, 
  then took this gig,” He shrugged expansively. “It’s in storage on 
  Outreach.”
  Typical. I can’t believe I almost considered going into business 
  with these people.
  “Along with that hardware,” Jake was saying, “We have enough 
  security and tech people to support a heavy battalion, along with 
  more vehicles and spare parts than we need,” Jake paused. “Now 
  there’s something I never thought I’d hear myself say.”
  This time Ariel did not look at Davis. Their lack of technical per-
  sonnel and support assets would put them at the mercy of whoever 
  employed them for repair and resupply. Not a good bargaining 
  position.
   “As I understand it,” she said, testing Jake’s argument, “many 
  of those parts are for ’Mechs you no longer have. And I doubt you 
  have supplies for our machines.”
  “Barter,” said Jake. “We’re going to Outreach.”
  Ariel nodded, conceding the point. 
  Against her will she found herself again considering the other 
  mercenary’s words. 
  All that was left of her father’s Hussars was little more than a 
  company of badly mauled BattleMechs. Even with the people she 
  knew, the contacts her father had made over the years, finding 
  work—good work at a price her people deserved—was going to 
  be hard.
  True, there was a war on and war always meant work for mer-
  cenaries. But it also meant dozens, if not hundreds, of bloody 
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 41
  remnants like her own competing for those jobs. Bidding wars 
  that would lead to dead ends like Acamar all over again.
  As much as she hated it, Jake’s offer was beginning to look like 
  the best deal she’d be able to make for her people.
  “Saying we take you on...” she began.
  “Oh, no,” Jake cut her off. “We don’t work for you and you don’t 
  work for us. There’s no Hussars and no Strikers. This is going to 
  have to be a new outfit. We’re not going to carry the stink of this 
  place with us.”
  Ariel started to protest, then stopped herself. She wasn’t so sure 
  a name change would rid them of the stigma of Acamar, but she 
  could see his point. Until her father’s Hussars were again a force to 
  be respected, it might be a good idea for them to remain incognito.
  “All right,” she said. “This new group, whatever we call it, who’s 
  in command?”
  “We are.”
  “Shared command? That’s nonsense.”
  “Maybe,” Jake conceded. “But maybe after we’ve done this 
  awhile things will shake themselves out. In the meantime, it’s a 
  sure bet you won’t take orders form me and you’re smart enough 
  not to try and issue your own.”
  “Okay,” Ariel challenged. “But in this meantime of yours, how do 
  you propose we divide command?”
  Jake shrugged. “Sixty-sixty?”
  Ariel snorted. 
  “You trust your man Davis, or he wouldn’t be here,” Jake said. 
  “Sergeant Chowla keeps a clear head when hell is breaking loose. 
  We both know what we’re doing, but there’re bound to be things 
  we do different.” 
  There’s an understatement.
  “When that happens, we meet, we work things out,” Jake was 
  saying. “If we still don’t see eye to eye, Davis tells you if you’re be-
  ing a prig, Chowla tells me if I’ve got my head up my ass. We get 
  all this hammered out before we get into combat.”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 42
  Despite herself she started to see how this might work. Not in 
  the long term, of course, unless Jake and his ragtag band of trivid 
  characters was willing to come up to anything like professional 
  standards. But in the short run, it might just be the best way to get 
  her MechWarriors’ machines back into fighting trim and maybe 
  hire on a few technical specialists and security personnel along 
  the way. 
  Not that she’d ever break contract, or leave without offering 
  the former Strikers a chance to serve under her command. But 
  whatever deal was struck here was strictly for the short term. Her 
  father’s Hussars—her Hussars—would see action again.
  In the meantime...
  “So what do you propose we call this new unit we’re forming?’
  Jake took a breath.
  “Wait.” This time it was her palm cutting him off. “Before you say a 
  word, nothing with renegades, or raiders, or crusaders, or any other 
  colorful appellation. Something professional that lets our employ-
  ers and our adversaries know exactly what they’re getting into.”
  “We’re supposed to be mercenaries,” Jake protested. “Not a law 
  firm. We need a name that shows we mean business.”
  “Precisely.”
  “Twenty-five ’Mechs, mostly mediums and lights,” Davis spoke 
  for the first time since Foyer had left. “A light regiment, hussar 
  class. We could build on that.”
  “Build what?” Jake demanded. “We’re not using ‘hussar’ and no 
  one is going to take a fighting force with ‘light’ in its name seri-
  ously.”
  “Sword of Light,” said Davis instantly. “Deneb Light Cavalry.”
  “Elite RCTs,” Jake said. “No one is going to mistake us for one of 
  them.”
  “Point taken,” Ariel conceded. “As long as you take the point that 
  a professional combat force does not rely on catchy nicknames. A 
  no-nonsense declaration of who and what we are tells everyone 
  we’re all business and can back it up.”
  “Maybe,” Jake’s tone was doubtful. “But what exactly are we?”
  
  BATTLECORPS
  Decision at Acamar • Page 43
  Ariel thought for a moment, toting their combined assets. Only 
  one came to mind.
  “We’re irregulars,” she said.
  “Okay,” Jake drew out the word, his eyes moving about the 
  room. 
  You can almost hear the wheels turning. What does he see? 
  Cockroaches?
  Suddenly the little sergeant laughed, a single bell-like “ha!”
  For a giddy second Ariel thought Chowla had overheard the 
  cockroach remark.
  I’ve got to stop that.
  “Where are we?” Chowla asked.
  “Acamar,” Jake answered. “But we don’t want...”
  “And where is Acamar?”
  “The Chaos March,” Davis answered.
  “So it’s a no-brainer,” the woman’s grin was radiant.
  “I’m afraid you’ve lost me, Sergeant,” Ariel said, knowing she 
  spoke for the other two.
  “We’re an irregular unit born in the Chaos March,” Sergeant 
  Chowla spread her hands, palms up, revealing the obvious.
  “We’re the Chaos Irregulars.”
  The End… 
  (for now)
  For more information on the  
  Chaos Irregulars, click here.
  
SOURCE: textdata/thevault/BattleTech [multi]/EXTRA/Novels/Battlecorps Novels/Decision at Acamar.pdf