Chapter 6:
Baiting the Jaguar
(cont...)

Connor considered it, just for a moment. In a way it would be satisfying, rubbing his enemy’s nose in the fact that the desperate tactic had not only been of questionable merit, but that it had failed utterly. Then he lined up his first shot against the factory complex. A communications facility, his computer identified it. Obviously empty since no one had told Osis of the failure. "No," the lieutenant said, squeezing into his shot.

"Let him wonder."

* * *

The holographic map stretched from floor to ceiling in Ratache Osis’ planning room, the projector humming a soft contrast to the growls rumbling in the star colonel’s chest and throat. The holo-image currently displayed a two-dimensional colored map of the peninsula, decorated with small pinpricks of white light to represent Smoke Jaguar forces and red flags where reports confirmed enemy troops. Near the base of the peninsula, in the shadow of the Cascade Mountain range which cut the northern stretch off from the main continent, a single shining star showed his position in Durghan City. A dim light moved around further north, tracking intermittent contact with the enemy ’Mech company deployed by the second Inner Sphere DropShip.

That dim light was Galaxy Commander-- and likely future Khan -- Brendon Corbett, relegated to insignificant status by his subordinate as the galaxy commander ignored the greater danger of the small teams loose in the southern reaches. On the inside of the peninsula’s hook, rounding up to the headland where the decoy factory site had been, a red swath told of the damage already done. Now on the southern coast a mirror image of that destruction was unfolding, heading arrow-straight at the Smoke Jaguar’s hidden mining venture and the real OmniMech production site. Other flags showed a few sporadic contacts along the peninsula’s eastern coast, but nothing so important as the threat to the OmniMech factory.

Galaxy Commander Corbett did not realize the true scope of the damage already done to the Smoke Jaguar’s very limited resources. Osis only hinted at it in his reports. Tell Brendon Corbett outright that he, a member Lincoln Osis’ sibko, could not handle a few rogue freebirth? Neg! The galaxy commander could not appreciate the difficulty in tracking down a few determined warriors who fade away as fast as they hit. It took time to shift forces around. And the Inner Sphere vermin struck only when at the advantage. In the star colonel’s opinion, Brendon Corbett had taken a far easier -- and therefore less glorious -- task for himself in standing against the company pushing through the Cascades.

Previous Page | Next Page
or jump to page: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11
12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22
23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33
34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 | 43 | 44
45 | 46 | 47 | 48 | 49 | 50 | 51 | 52 | 53