“One thing that the Stevedore has in excess is power,” Zayd said, continuing his briefing. “That led to the development of a custom ion cannon attachment for the Stevedore. The rate of fire on the ion cannon isn’t very high, about once every thirty ticks, however, a skilled operator can juggle between the left and right cannon to sustain a more rapid rate of fire if he’s willing to subject the power system of the mech to additional strain. This is a purpose-built weapon system intended to repel boarders and pirates, essentially, people like us who have come to raid the station for refined materials. You can expect that anyone armed with one of these systems will head directly toward our shuttles and that they’ll target propulsion systems in an attempt to capture our shuttles rather than destroy them. Braxis-Quan pays out significant bonuses to employees who capture enemy equipment in working or repairable condition,” he explained.
“How many of these do we have to worry about?” Broll asked, examining the schematics of the Stevedore and looking for places he could shut down one of them with a well-placed shot or series of shots.
“Not many,” Zayd reassured the Fae sniper. “The ion cannons are incredibly expensive both to construct and maintain. According to the inventory logs, at most, they can equip eight mechs with them, but it’s likely less than that due to routine maintenance. Moreover, these should be distributed at multiple loading bays so we should only have to take down one or two of them in the latter part of the landing assault. If they’re able to get their act together, they may fetch the other available cannon from other loading bays so the team at the shuttles will need to keep an eye out for sudden arrivals. The worst-case scenario is that someone manages to stage several of them before committing them to a heavy assault. I recommend deploying sensors on all approaches to see if any priority targets like these are approaching and engage them in the corridors rather than allowing them to enter the open bays.”
“Noted,” Wing Leader Tael said, ensuring that the other members of his team had taken Zayd’s recommendation to heart. “What else do we need to worry about?”
“The Enforcer is intended to restrain industrial mechs and the Stevedore is a convertible industrial mech that can suppress infantry and do heavy damage to a limited number of mechs or shuttles,” Zayd said, resuming his briefing. “The last two mechs we need to worry about are dedicated military models intended to confront enemy mechs. There are between fifteen and twenty of each of these premium mechs and they’re stationed centrally to be deployed wherever they might be needed. First up, the BQ 8440 Parapet,” he said, bringing up a projection of a heavily armored mech that stood just over ten meters tall. The mech carried a massive tower shield along with an eight-barrelled laser carbine that was attached to a backpack module with short, thick cable.
“The Parapet isn’t just a mobile defensive mech,” Zayd explained as he manipulated the projection to place multiple Parapet mechs next to each other. Quickly, they triggered modules on their tower shields to lock them together into a fixed barricade with multiple ‘firing ports’ that would accommodate the laser carbines. “Third thing to know about Braxis-Quan is that their managers are willing to go to extraordinary lengths to preserve their own lives. The Parapet is intended to create mobile bunkers that can protect important managers and executives while producing a tremendous weight of fire to eliminate anything that threatens the lives of ‘important’ employees. If the managers are experienced in military tactics, they may also deploy Parapets to defend key locations like power stations, control rooms, or data archives. The Parapets are very heavily armored and their laser carbines are optimized for sustained firing so expect that once they start firing they won’t stop until they run themselves dry.”
“How would you suggest we deal with them, Champion?” Fist Leader Sioban asked, looking concerned for the first time since Zayd’s briefing started. The mechs intended to suppress their own employees didn’t concern her very much, but when she looked at the firepower possessed by her own squad, she was much less confident of breaching their layered defenses.
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“Overcoming a deployed Parapet team is incredibly difficult, but I do have one idea,” Zayd said with a dark grin. “The key to defeating a Parapet is to attack it while it’s moving between positions. We have complete repair manuals for the Parapet, including its communication system and we have a former Braxis-Quan contractor on our team,” he said, pointing his thumb at his chest. “If we can compromise their communication systems and mask my voice as the voice of one of their managers, I’m confident that I can issue convincing ‘orders’ to re-deploy away from our immediate target to reinforce a protective detail guarding an important manager. It isn’t perfect, they still have thick shells to crack, but we may not have to fight them head-on in order to take out some of our priority targets.”
“Don’t they have authentication procedures to verify that the orders are legitimate?” one of the Fae from the other shuttle asked. “Will they really accept your fake orders?”
Rather than answer directly, Zayd pulled up a recording of Sergeant Dane’s orders to Zayd and the other miners when they attacked the Spear of Destiny. From the horrified looks on the faces of the Fae when the pilot of the Enforcer mentioned taking action against their families if they refused to fight, he knew that the recording had the effect he was looking for. “Despite the fact that these are military mechs, this is an operation fun by the Mineral Extraction Division. The employees aren’t dedicated soldiers, they’re clock punchers who are collecting a paycheck. Given the right motivation, they’ll ignore procedures because they’re more afraid of their boss abusing them than the things that could result from failing to follow a ‘pointless bureaucratic procedure.’ If the mech is strong, target its pilot,” Zayd said.
“Now, there’s one other mech we need to be worried about,” Zayd said, clearing the projections of the Parapet and replacing it with a much leaner mech that stood nearly ten meters tall and carried both a small shield and a heavy mace. “This is a BQ 955 Subjugator. It looks like a fairly standard take on a light infantry mech that can pummel foes into submission while warding off counter-attack with its shield but don’t let the simple appearance fool you,” he continued, manipulating the projection to rotate the shield arm and expose the hand hidden behind the shield. “The Subjugator is a can opener. The mace isn’t intended to batter an enemy into submission, it’s intended to create a weak spot in enemy armor that the claw behind the shield can exploit. Once there’s a weakness to leverage, this oversized claw will attempt to tear away armor plating, control circuits, or anything else it can get its hand on. Pilots are likely trained to attack the cockpits of enemy mechs to crush pilots though that’s less relevant in our case. These mechs are light, can deploy rapidly, and if it manages to grab hold of anyone, it possess plenty of crushing strength to destroy a suit of Saighdear combat armor.”
“That shield looks like it’s intended to ward off attacks from other melee mechs,” Lady Haelith observed. “It only provides coverage for the torso, cockpit, and other parts of the upper body. How viable is it to take the legs out from underneath it?”
“The joints of the legs are heavily armored against just this sort of thinking,” Zayd said, highlighting several elements of the schematic. “But there are limits. Rather than attacking joints, we may be able to trip it up with focused fire on the limb itself. Additionally, in order to remain light and mobile, most of the armor is on the front of the mech, leaving it vulnerable to attacks from the rear. Unfortunately, there are at least fifty to sixty of these in active service on Bad Penny Station so it’s likely that they can deploy in large enough groups to defend each other from a flanking attack but mobility continues to be one of our greatest advantages against Braxis-Quan mechs.”
“Thank you Champion,” Tael said with genuine respect. While he’d studied the schematics himself and shared many of Zayd’s opinions about their combat capabilities, there were a number of points he’d never considered that made him grateful to have the human Champion’s support. “Everyone,” he said, turning his attention to the assembled Fae. “We have a small team and a heavy objective but remember, these unevolved money-grubbing thugs are the only thing between us and a triumphant return to civilized space. Are we going to let a bunch of unmodified primitives stop us from taking what we need?”
“No Wing Leader!”
“Good. You all have time to get a real meal before we deploy, I suggest everyone does so. In two hours, report to action stations and prepare to show these primitives who the superior species is. Until the Apex!”
“Until the Apex!”