FSE

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Fortune Favors the Bold

Written By: Spudz

"Here they come!"

A line of heavy smoke wafted into existence at the bottom of the hill, punctuating the exclamation over the comm channel. Up on the berm above, Dirk angled his shield downrange and prepared for the coming onslaught.

Only two Hellhounds and four Mark IIs stood between the critical railgun emplacement and an untold number of eukan mechs. Dirk himself was useless offensively with his sword and shield, and the other units were all running low on ammo. There was no telling when reinforcements would arrive to bolster the defenses. For now, they were on their own. This was going to be one hell of a fight.

"Hold your lines," Jamie commanded. Her Hellhound sidled up behind the wolf's crouching mech and leveled its rifle over his shoulder toward the rapidly expanding veil of smoke. "Don't let them overwhelm us. We need to stop those bastards right here and now!"

The other Mark IIs acknowledged over the comm.

Dirk's eyes scanned his heads-up-display for any trace of the enemy, trying to pick out movement within the expanding shroud before him. Between the thermal obstruction of the smoke screen and the jamming that continued playing havoc with his sensors, he was blind beyond what he could visually see with his own eyes. The enemy would be no better off though. What was about to happen equated to a full on fist fight between two blind opponents, and no punches were going to be pulled.

An alarm blared within the cockpit. Mortars!

The wolf looked up to catch the incoming volley of explosive shells arching up skyward toward his position, each projectile marked by a flashing red icon on his HUD.

The base defensive grid responded in kind, meeting the cascade of shells with weaving lances of plasma, resulting in a series of what looked like tiny harmless explosions against the cloudless sky. Dirk knew better though. Each of those exploding shells was packed full of deadly flak, which was designed to kill infantry and cripple mechs. The eukan were trying to soften up the defenses before they made their move.

His thoughts were cut off by a stray mortar impacting into the hillside two hundred meters away, shredding several trees in a shower of lethal shrapnel.

"Damnit, these guys brought some fuck'n firepower to the fight," Jamie swore.

Dirk kept his eyes on the smoke, watching intently, waiting for them to make their move. Come on you bastards... hurry up and get on with it.

"Contact!"

All across the wolf's view, a solid mass of eukan mechs exploded forth through the protective shroud of smoke in a single unified front, charging up the hillside toward his position reckless abandon. With their lack of arms, and giant armored chassis supported by large bipedal legs, it looked almost like a herd of giant ostriches galloping through the trees toward him, each brandishing massive weapons on either flank. Only a few kilometers separated the two opposing sides, far too close for comfort.

The captain's voice boomed over the comm. "Weapons free!"

The thunderous report of her MAR8 echoed across the landscape as the rifle discharged an armor-piercing slug downrange toward an unfortunate target, the opening salvo of the skirmish. Chaos quickly ensued, with the Mark IIs following her lead.

A string of mechs fell victim to the canid fire, collapsing into crumpled heaps mid stride. The advancing enemy opened up with everything they had in return, shooting on the run, trying to suppress the defenders.

Several rounds pinged off Dirk's shield, draining the emitter charge a few percent. He held steady though, allowing Jamie to continue firing over his shoulder with deadly effect. The captain was making every shot count, aiming quick, but with pure meticulous precision.

They were inflicting heavy losses, but the damage just wasn't enough. For every eukan mech that was destroyed or crippled, another four continued forward up the slope. The defenders needed some help, and quick.

"Dirk, get on the horn and find us some artillery!" Jamie barked, never relenting in her rate of fire.

"Right!" The wolf tore his focus away from the battle, and addressed the cockpit voice interface. "Command; comm frequency, artillery!" At his directive, a list of frequencies materialized on the HUD, detailing the available artillery detachments that weren't already engaged in fire mission support. After a quick scan of the data, he selected a unit with another voice input and waited for the link to be established.

"Steel Rain Fire Control, ready to copy fire mission," a feminine voice spoke curtly.

Dirk didn't waste any time. "Steel Rain, this is Reaper 3; fire mission direct link support." He paused to allow the operator on the other end to connect directly to his platoon's data feed.

"Link acquired, Reaper 3."

With the controller now being fed data from the platoon's sensors, the wolf called up a map on his HUD via the twitch of a finger in his interface glove. "Zero set at point Reaper 3; unknown number of enemy mechanized contacts, sweep bearing three four zero by zero four five; distance two kilometers, parallel front. Fire for effect, danger close."

The voice on the other end faltered for the briefest of moments. "Co... copy, fire mission confirmed. Hold on to your tails, this is gonna be rough."

The comm link terminated, bringing Dirk back onto the platoon frequency. "Fire mission set, captain. Rounds on the way."

"Hopefully their aim is good," Jamie spoke through gritted teeth. Her rifle recoiled back with another precisely aimed shot, dropping a distant target. "I have six rounds left. They better be quick about it."

An audible warning began sounding in Dirk's cockpit. The shield emitters were starting to get low on their charge after all the hits he had sustained. They couldn't keep this up much longer whether she ran out of ammo or not.

There was almost no warning. Over the cockpit speakers, a distinctive piercing wail cut through the chaos of high caliber gunfire, drawing Dirk's attention skyward just as the first artillery shell bore in on the target zone.

The hillside below was rocked by a devastating explosion, as the proximity fuse of the shell triggered a hundred meters above the ground. The detonation enveloped the scene in a concussive shockwave, sending lethal shrapnel piercing downward onto the hapless eukan forces below. A half dozen mechs were cut down instantly by the deadly hail.

The eukan advance faltered for the briefest instant, but the enemy pressed on, still trying to scale the increasingly steep slope. Their progress was slowing with the difficult terrain; all the better for the canid defenders.

A second artillery round hit home with savage results. Amid the splintering wood of shattered tree trunks and exploded dirt, another grouping of enemy mechs fell.

Dirk toggled his comm back to the artillery controller. "No target corrections; maintain fire mission."

"Acknowledged. Switching to self-homing shells."

He changed back over to the platoon channel. "Captain, artillery is switching to self-homing."

"Make sure IFF is configured!"

The Mark IIs confirmed her order, as did Dirk. They all knew the importance of IFF. The self-homing technology of the incoming shells identified the metallic and thermal signatures of mechanized units, and directed fin-stabilized rounds individually onto each target as they flew overhead. If the canid mechs weren't squawking the proper IFF code, there was a good chance a stray round might be directed onto their position.

Several excruciating seconds passed. Dirk waited with bated breath. Were the incoming rounds going to hit their target? They were slowing the eukan advance well enough, but there was no telling just how many still remained. Surely the enemy had something more up their sleeve, he just knew it. This full on charge up the hill right into canid fire wasn't exactly a cunning strategy.

His ears perked up at the hollow metallic click that emanated from just over his shoulder. With the disturbing sound, Jamie's gun fell silent.

"Fuck! I'm outa ammo." The captain's Hellhound moved back further behind Dirk, allowing him to take better cover behind the berm. "Where the hell are the others? Could really use some more firepower right about now!"

One of the Mark IIs took a direct hit just then. The bulky mech spun awkwardly onto the ground, kicking up dirt and uprooting several nearby trees. The pilot's curse over the comm quickly followed. "Damnit, I'm disabled!"

"Can you move at all?" Jamie inquired hastily.

There was a moment's pause. "No, primary and secondary hydraulics are shot. I'm out of the fight."

The captain's frustrated reply was cut off by the first self-guiding artillery shell sailing toward the battlefield. There was no explosion that marked the shell's arrival, just a clear high-pitched wail as it passed overhead, discharging precisely aimed sabot rounds at any targets that happened to be in range.

Another sizeable cluster of eukan mechs disappeared from Dirk's sensors.

"They're pulling back!" one of the Mark II pilots exclaimed.

As Dirk continued to crouch behind the berm, the incoming fire dwindled rapidly, until the battlefield lapsed into relative silence. He chanced a look over the top edge of his protection, only to be greeted with several new plumes of billowing smoke. The remaining enemy units on his HUD were indeed falling back; the eukan advance had stalled.

"Thank god for artillery," Jamie breathed, the relief quite evident in her words.

Dirk shared in her relief with an inward sigh. They couldn't have held out much longer, that much was certain. Collectively, the canid mechs probably had less than ten rounds of ammo between them.

Several more artillery shells exploded overhead to chase the retreating enemy back into the thicker tree line, catching a few stragglers before they could reach safety. The wolf watched on his HUD as the remaining red outlines of enemy mechs moved away, until the electronic jamming and thick smoke obscured their signatures from his Hellhound's sensors.

The skirmish had been quick, and decidedly one-sided. But even so, the canids had paid a heavy price. They were now down to five mechs, and had no real means of defending themselves without a resupply. If the eukan tried to mount the hill again, things wouldn't end well at all.

In the intervening lull, the shield's emitters were already recharging themselves back to full. The added load on the Hellhound's power cell was consuming more fuel than Dirk had initially predicted. It was a troubling development, but something that wasn't an immediate concern. Out on a mission, the issue had the potential to seriously hinder his Hellhound's range. But at least for now, this close to the base, he wasn't far from a refueling station.

"Alright, the others are a few minutes away," Jamie spoke up, breaking Dirk from his thoughts. "Lynne's got enough ammo to get me back into action, and the other Hellhounds are loaded for bear."

He looked over his shoulder to nod at the captain's Hellhound. "Good. I wouldn't mind having Goose's ears at our disposal to help sort through this jamming."

"Damned straight."

The wolf turned back toward the fallen Mark II. The support truck attached to the damaged mech's squadron had arrived to begin hasty field repairs. Already a trail of sparks was spewing out from the unit's midsection, the result of a mechanic frantically cutting away at damaged armor plating to access the vital components within. The task was beyond perilous given how hot the battlefield still was, but a necessary evil.

It was a shame that the support vehicle wasn't equipped with sonar equipment like Goose's truck. Having that data available in the beginning might've saved the disabled Mark II from harm...

Whatever else might've crossed Dirk's mind was suddenly, and ruthlessly loss amidst the violence that enveloped his Hellhound. In a mere instant, the berm before his crouching mech simply disappeared. What was solid earth exploded into millions of fragmented particles, scattering brush and all manner of landscape high into the clear afternoon sky.

His Hellhound was thrown back violently by the powerful blast, causing the pilot to yelp in horror as he lost his balance and fell backward in a jumbled heap. The piloting interface momentarily lost sync, coinciding with the metallic snap of several fuses tripping on the panel behind him. The view through Dirk's visor HUD went dark as a result, until the computer switched over to backup systems, allowing him to once more glimpse the outside world through a haze of shock and confusion.

"What the fuck was that?" Jamie shouted over the comm.

Inside his cockpit, the wolf blinked deliberately. He was looking up toward the sky, which was filled with dirt and debris raining back down to the ground. It took a second for him to spatially orientate himself. There was an alarm blaring in the cockpit. No... wait, that was the circuit breaker warning...

With a shake of the head, Dirk fell back on his training. "Command; system emergency reset."

A series of faults on the HUD answered his command, indicating a failure with the piloting interface primary system. The backups had already kicked on, keeping him linked to the Hellhound for the moment.

Even with the inertia damper isolating him from the outside world, the wolf could still vaguely sense that he was lying on his back, though he was technically standing inside the cockpit. The nanofiber mesh of the interface suit simulated the feel of solid earth as he quickly rolled himself onto hands and knees, and brought his Hellhound into a crouching stance.

Jamie's mech hadn't fared much better. She too was in the process of righting herself just behind him, several telltale scratches marring her Hellhound's ebony paint where they had collided. "You ok, Dirk?"

"Yeah, a little worse for wear though."

He turned his attention back to where the protective berm had once been. There was nothing now but open air, with a clear line of sight down the slope of the hillside. A perfectly circular scar now shaped the ground just before where the wolf knelt. Fuck... that was a close one.

"That was a railgun!" Jamie exclaimed in alarm, having glimpsed the same crater. "Keep your guard up. They have tanks somewhere fucking down there!"

Artillery shells continued to rain down on the hidden eukan forces below as Dirk swept his eyes across the dense foliage. This was starting to get very dangerous.

Everything suddenly happened all at once.

A shrill, very startling alarm blared inside the cockpit. His breath caught, the wolf's mind quickly recognizing the worst warning his Hellhound could possibly give him. Someone was painting his mech with a laser.

The Hellhound's sensors swung into action, identifying and localizing the source of the targeting beam. A red flashing outline of a tank appeared on his HUD, showing him where the threat was. The damned jamming had let the fucker close to within three kilometers, way too close!

Countermeasures worked immediately to scatter and deflect the laser energy away from the intended target, eliminating the return signal that allowed the eukan to rangefind. The defensive systems performed their job flawlessly, but it all was still ineffective against a lucky visual shot.

The impact was unlike anything Dirk had ever experienced before. The raw energy of the sabot round slamming directly into the Aegis shield sent his Hellhound reeling. On reflex, he dug his paws into the ground, trying to counteract the punishing force that seemed to punch him squarely in the gut.

The Hellhound did its best to stay upright, mechanical claws carving deep grooves into the dirt. He must've skidded back about twenty meters before Dirk managed to bring his mech to a standstill, only just avoiding getting tangled up with Jamie once more. Warnings sounded ominously in the cockpit. Error messages flashed angrily on his HUD. He tried to assess the overload of information that bombarded him, and quickly realized just how bad off he was.

The Aegis's emitters had been drained down to a mere twenty percent with the single hit! He couldn't take another; the shield simply couldn't withstand such a force without overloading.

"We need to pull back!" the wolf almost shouted over the comm.

"I can't move! My interface overloaded."

Dirk cursed under his breath. The captain's mech was immobilized right behind him. He couldn't reposition, not without leaving her exposed to enemy fire.

He frantically called out to the artillery controller. Not even giving her time to respond, the wolf gave the exact coordinates of the enemy tanks down to the meter. Even though he couldn't see them visually, the Hellhound's sensors painted the eukan units on his HUD clear as day. There were three of them, all fixed in place with their legs and a supporting strut anchoring the mechs to the ground in a tripod configuration. They couldn't move without first transforming back into a mobile configuration, presenting three easy targets. Just three pin-point accurate artillery rounds; that was all he was asking...

The artillery controller copied Dirk's rapid-fire coordinates without missing a beat. "Hang on! We're bringing the rain."

The Aegis's low charge warning continued to drone ominously in his ear as sabot rounds hurtled by Dirk's mech at nearly four times the speed of sound. Without laser guidance, the eukan tanks were shooting visually. Their aim wasn't good, but it was only a matter of time before they managed to land another lucky hit.

He tried his best to maintain a cool head, but his growing fear was beginning to overtake him. "How's it coming!"

"Hang on! Hang on... I'm resetting the circuits." Some rustling around could be heard over the comm as Jamie presumably had herself twisted about in the cockpit to reengage the blown breaker panels. "Just another... there! Ok, I'm back in business!"

It took about thirty seconds for the Hellhound's interface to reboot. That's all the time Dirk needed before they could pull back to a safer position. God, just let his luck hold out a little longer.

Each second felt like an hour, slowly dragging itself by. He could do nothing but stand there holding his shield at the ready, silently praying for a miracle.

A plume of dirt erupted out of the ground just before his Hellhound, a shot falling short of the intended target. Others continued zinging by him within what felt like mere centimeters to the cringing pilot.

And then the terrifying inevitable.

There was no recollection of Dirk's mech taking a direct hit, or of the wolf being flung brutally forward against the cockpit bulkhead. With violence suddenly overwhelming him, he was mercifully knocked unconscious.

***************

"Dirk!"

A vague feeling of a hand brushing against his cheek registered through the confusion.

"Goddamnit Dirk, wake up!"

He managed to open one eye, and was immediately rewarded with a stab of crippling pain. What the hell... had happened?

The world around him slowly came into focus, allowing him to grasp the fact that he was lying on his back. And he wasn't alone; looming over the wolf was a shadowy figure, backlit by the vibrant sky.

"Oh... I've gone and gotten myself killed," he stammered, unsure if this was the waking world or some surreal afterlife.

The shadowy figure chuckled mirthlessly. "You should be so lucky."

He recognized that voice. "Jamie?"

The jackal made a shushing noise and held him motionless with a hand to the chest. She tried to maintain a professional air, but he could see the relief in her eyes. "You had me worried there for a bit. Don't move too much." A bright light appeared out of nowhere, shining directly into one of his eyes, and then the other. "You're pretty banged up."

It took every ounce of strength for Dirk just to keep his eyes open. The pen light she was using wasn't helping.

The captain, he vaguely realized, was still wearing her pilot suit, which contoured tightly around her feminine figure. But wait... he was in his cockpit. Or was he? What was she doing here?

Jamie seemed to understand his confusion. "We pulled you off the front line. You took a direct hit from a railgun."

Dirk tried to process what she had just said, but the searing pain made thinking difficult. It felt like his skull was being squeezed in a vise. Bringing a hand up to feel his forehead, he was surprised to see it come away covered in blood.

"Hold on." The jackal produced a medkit as she spoke and set it down before her. After opening the lid, she procured a small spray bottle and moved to almost straddle his prone form. "This should help."

She applied a liberal amount of biofoam to the nasty gash on his forehead, allowing the painkilling element of the foam to dull the pain almost immediately to Dirk's sigh of relief. Several seconds later, when the spray's clotting agents had stopped the bleeding, the captain affixed a dermal regenerative bandage to the wound. In only a few minutes, the gash would be fully healed, leaving no trace save for the missing swath of fur where his forehead had smashed into the bulkhead.

"That's better," Jamie spoke in a soothing tone. Still looming over him, she turned her attention back to the medical kit, and began digging around inside. "You probably have a concussion, so let me give you something to counteract the swelling. Is anything broken?"

Dirk tried very hard to ignore the growing discomfort at having his superior literally sitting in his lap, and instead concentrated on moving his arms and legs. Nothing felt broken or out of shape. It looked like he had absorbed the brunt of the impact with his face. Typical bad luck.

"I think... I'm ok," he replied slowly. Even with the painkillers the throbbing pain was still very noticeable. Maybe he wasn't so ok after all.

The captain wasted no time removing a cartridge from the medkit, and rammed it into a jet spray injector. She then leaned over to give him an injection on the side of his neck. "This will stop the swelling from the concussion." The depleted cartridge was ejected and replaced with another, before she injected him again. "And this is a stimulant to help get you back on your paws."

"Wha... what's happening with the battle?" Dirk managed to stammer, still trying to shake off the cobwebs.

She stole a quick glance out the opened cockpit hatch toward the distant sounds of gunfire that he only now had begun to notice. "Your artillery strike was spot on. All three tanks were knocked out. The others arrived just as you took that nasty hit, and are holding the lines now."

Realizing the need for haste, Dirk ignored his discomfort and tried to sit up, only to find himself restrained by the pilot interface. With a grimace he reached over and hit the emergency release, severing the suit's connections to the cockpit itself, allowing the wolf to move about freely while still wearing the nanofiber mesh. "How bad is it?"

"You're actually one lucky bastard. The Aegis absorbed the full brunt of the hit. It's toast, but your mech seems to be in one piece."

Dirk took a moment to assess things. The cockpit was completely dark, which was probably a result of the fuel cell scramming when the Aegis was destroyed. The resulting surge must've overwhelmed the Hellhound's systems to the point that it safed itself to avoid permanent damage.

Jamie patted him on the shoulder. "Well, your mech is out of action, but at least you don't look like you're gonna puke anymore."

She was right. He did feel much better all of the sudden. He must've been knocked out for a good few minutes or so, and now here he was back raring to go once more. Whatever the jackal had injected him with was working wonders at the moment. "I didn't know you were a medic?"

"Trained for several years in the med corps before I decided to become a pilot." She replaced all the medical instruments back into the kit and closed the lid with an audible click. "Long story. I can tell ya about it later. For now though, keep in mind that the stimulant is going to last for two hours or so. After that, you will probably pass out."

Dirk nodded in understanding. He was living on borrowed time now.

Satisfied that her patient was recovered, the captain extricated herself from the cockpit, medkit in hand. Dirk followed in her wake, crawling his way through the opened hatch on hands and knees. The stale humid air of the mech's interior was becoming too much for him to bear.

The emergence out into daylight forced him to squint painfully for a moment, before his eyes managed to adjust. Judging by the scene around him, he was no longer where the defensive berm had once been, that much was obvious given the distinct lack of enemy fire. The large trail of disturbed dirt leading down the slope from where the wolf's fallen Hellhound rested told the tale. He had been drug backwards away from the lines several hundred meters, probably by the captain's mech.

Jamie's own Hellhound knelt nearby with the platoon's support truck parked alongside. Lynne was busy hotloading the captain's ammo pack with fresh rounds, while Goose was probably inside the vehicle feeding tactical data to the nearby defenders through the deployed sonar probes.

"Sahir and Coots are holding the line for now," Jamie spoke, raising her voice to be heard over the chaos around them. "We've also got two squads of Mark IIs as reinforcements. I've deferred command to one of their captains."

"Have the eukan made another push?"

Her pointed ears splayed back slightly. "Nothing since we took those tanks out. Hope it stays that way. Not sure we can hold them off if they have another trick up their sleeves."

Dirk turned his attention back to his lifeless Hellhound. "I've dealt with this problem before during training. We need to purge the auxiliary computer core, and swap out the primary and backup fuse panels for the motive couplings."

"Shouldn't take more than a few minutes?" Jamie reasoned with a slight tilt of the head.

"If we're lucky. I'll handle the fuse swap out. Can you take care of the core purge?"

She eyed him with a raised eyebrow. "Giving me the easy fix, huh?"

"Of course. What kind'a gentlemen would I be if I let you do the hard manual labor?" In all honestly though, he was the only one, besides Goose and Lynne, that could actually change out the shorted electronics. That was only because he had literally helped build the Mark IV in the first place. Component replacement wasn't part of typical pilot training.

"If we weren't in the middle of a firefight, I'd disagree. But have it your way." She gave him a roguish look that said they would continue this conversation later, and then vaulted herself back up onto the Hellhound to enter the cockpit.

Dirk smiled wanly to himself and moved to tackle his own fix. On the mech's exterior flank, a small compartment was located with the spare fuses he needed. After opening the access panel, it took a minute of rooting around for him to locate said parts, two simple looking circuit boards that were each built into a heat sink chassis. It was these humble little devices that had saved the Hellhound from a total electronic meltdown of all its key systems.

Circuit boards in hand, the wolf pulled himself up onto the chassis of his mech. The maintenance panel he needed to access was located on the abdomen. First though, he had to find the hidden release, which was tucked up underneath an overlapping armor plate.

The renewed sounds of high caliber gunfire put new haste in Dirk's efforts as he felt blindly about for the recessed switch. When his fingers finally did brush up against the release, an audible hiss of pressurized air escaped as the armor plating popped outward several centimeters. The hatch now released, he then had to wrestle it the rest of the way, until the protective plate rested fully open on its hinge.

All of the Hellhound's vital systems came into view. The fuel cell and all its supporting components dominated the majority of the interior space, while various hydraulic and electrical systems snaked about in chaotic order. To the unfamiliar eye, it was an overwhelming jumble of metal and circuitry. But to Dirk, everything had form and function.

It didn't take him long to recall where the motive coupling bus was located. The fuse panels weren't easy to get to, requiring the wolf to bend his upper body down into the recesses of the compartment while hooking his paws underneath a plating overlap to keep from falling all the way in.

The panels Dirk was looking for came into view. To the quick observation, it was clear the primary and secondary had shorted out completely, evidenced by the overpowering smell of burnt electronics, and the fault indicator on the heat sink chassis of both units. Thank God we built these into the system.

Without the two fuses acting as a buffer, the resulting surge from the Aegis shield's destruction would've reverberated back through all of the mech's electronics, shorting out practically every system. Careful planning and oversight on part of the build team had saved his Hellhound from a lengthy repair stint.

The two burned out panels popped out easily enough, and Dirk wasted no time simply chucking them out the opened hatch to land in the dirt somewhere nearby. Just as he finished installing the first replacement, someone joined the wolf on top of his mech.

"Need a hand down there?" Lynne called out from above.

"No, just about done actually."

The dingo's head suddenly appeared inside the hatch alongside him. "Ya sure? Jamie said ya needed some fuse panels swapped."

Dirk snapped the second of said panels into place. "I got it covered."

"So I see." She took a second to inspect his work. "Looks good. Thanks for taking care of that."

Her head disappeared just as suddenly as it had appeared, allowing Dirk to extract himself once the job was done. By the time he managed to lock the armor plating back into place, Lynne was already helping Jamie in the cockpit, the dingo's bushy tail poking out the opened hatch.

The sounds of gunfire had died off once more. Only the sporadic report of eukan and canid rifles caught Dirk's ears, but nothing too close to warrant alarm. The occasional far-off thud of artillery added to the ambience. It seemed that things had calmed down somewhat. The lull before the next coming storm?

He vaulted himself up to join the others. Inside the cockpit, he found Jamie jacked into the aux port with a datapad, scrolling through error codes while Lynne observed with a scrutinizing regard. "Do you know what happened to my Aegis?"

The jackal looked up from her datapad at his question. "It's still out there on the hillside where you took the hit." Her ears then folded back. "It's torn all to hell. You really were lucky, Dirk. I dunno how that thing managed to protect you so well."

"Don't worry," Lynne chimed in. "I brought the spare with the truck. Figured you would be in a bad way when we got here."

Dirk drew a heavy breath and let it out with a sigh. A part of him was devastated that the shield had been destroyed. It was something that he had worked so hard to develop and build. And yet, he also felt a sense of satisfaction, knowing that even as the Aegis was pushed beyond its limit, it had still performed its primary role without fail; to protect pilot and mech from harm. "Thanks, Lynne. That will come in handy."

One last data entry on the pad allowed Jamie to clear the hung code within the computer core. To Dirk's relief, the satisfying hum of electronics warming back up greeted his keen ears, accompanied by the gentle glow of sensor displays and status readouts powering on. His Hellhound was coming back to life.

"You're back in business," Jamie proclaimed with a grin. "Bout time we take the fight back to these bastards."

He hesitated, but then nodded in agreement. "Right, although I'm not much use unless we get up close and personal."

The jackal's cheeks puffed out. "True. We'll see how things play out." She extracted herself from Dirk's seat with a groan of effort. "Is my ammo good to go?"

"Fully loaded and ready to bring the hurt to the eukan," Lynne answered proudly.

"Good, then let's get back into the fight."

The nanofiber mesh contorted tantalizingly tight around the captain's otherwise nude form as she removed herself from the cockpit. Dirk's eyes lingered just a moment too long, before he forcefully quelled the errant thoughts that suddenly popped into his head. There was a time and a place for that... and now wasn't that time.

The wolf thought he saw just the slightest trace of a smirk touch the corner of Jamie's muzzle. Did she catch his wandering gaze? He had to get a handle on that.

If the captain had noticed, she made no mention of it. Instead, she wasted no time vaulting herself down off the Hellhound's chassis to make her way back toward her own waiting mech.

Lynne paused on the verge of following the captain, and then favored Dirk with a meaningful look. She seemed to consider saying something, and then thought better of it. "Good luck out there, Knight. Me and Goose got your back."

With those words, and a subtle smirk, she was gone, leaving Dirk alone next to the opened cockpit of his mech. Goddamnit, was he really that transparent?

The act of linking his interface suit back up to the cockpit proved to be quite difficult. Given that his Hellhound was lying on its back, trying to hook his boots into the proper slots on the floor, while also fitting the gloves and spine of the mesh into their respective connections, required a good deal of trial and error.

When Dirk finally did manage to get himself connected back up, the cockpit came fully alive. There was just one thing that was missing. The interface halo that normally rested atop his head lay in several shattered pieces on the nearby floor. The fragile device had been completely destroyed by the force of his face meeting the bulkhead in a not so friendly fashion from the earlier incident. For now, the wolf would have to do things the old fashioned way without the use of his HUD, which meant relying on the cockpit's panoramic display for his eyes.

He ran a quick diagnostic of the Hellhound's systems and then carefully brought his mech to its paws. By now, the battlefield had gone completely silent. No one was firing; it was eerily quiet. "Reaper 3, reporting in, mostly in one piece."

"Ah, welcome back to the fight," Coots spoke up with mock jubilation. "You're just in time for the eukan's next attack."

Jamie's mech came to stand alongside Dirk. "Reaper 1, reporting. How we doing, Sahir?"

The coyote's reply was cool and collected. "They've been probing our lines. It looks like they're trying to find a weakness. Slider has been keeping them at bay though."

Dirk scanned his map display briefly, and located the Mark II squadron with the Slider label affixed to their icons. Slider 1 was currently in command of the entire defending element.

"Reaper 1, deploy on the northwest slope opposite Reaper 2," the Mark II captain ordered promptly, leaving no doubt who was in charge. "Provide suppressive fire for Rhino 3 and 4 on your left flank. We're going to bait those bastards into that narrow gorge and hammer em hard."

Jamie acknowledged his command and moved to take up position. Technically, the jackal was higher in rank, but since she had deferred leadership to him, Slider 1 was running the show for now, until he deemed otherwise. Not that anyone seemed to mind. His strategy looked air tight, judging from the positioning of the various mech squads at his command.

It was a classic ploy, leaving a subtle gap in the defensive lines that was just too inviting for an enemy to pass up. When they advanced to break through, you closed the snare from behind, and hit the entrapped forces from both sides. With terrain on the canids' side, they had the advantage. The eukan would have to play into the defender's hand.

Dirk moved his Hellhound over toward the nearby support truck, and procured the spare Aegis shield from the weapon rack next to the aft ammo compartment. He had to be cautious now. With the first shield now resting somewhere on the nearby hillside in a tangled mess of metal and mangled electronics, this was the last one he had. If he damaged or destroyed it, that was all she wrote. There were no more spares to be had.

"Reaper 3, take up position..."

Slider 1's instructions were cut off by an audible chime, which announced a new connection to the comm link. However, instead of another mechanized unit joining the group, the display in Dirk's cockpit indicated that a command element had joined the channel.

"This is 2nd Armored Command, priority traffic for Reaper Element."

Jamie didn't hesitate to reply. "Captain Reilly, acting command for Reaper Element, standing by to copy."

"Acknowledged. Hold for link transfer."

A new chime announced the handoff, and moments later a gruff older voice replaced the first. "Captain Reilly, this is General Hankly. Give me a status update on your squad."

Jamie wasn't fazed one bit by the unexpected change of events. Her reply came quick and crisp. "Sir, squad strength is four Hellhound Mark IVs, all units mission capable, full combat loadouts per modified echo configuration."

The general on the other end went quiet for a pregnant pause, and then his heavy sigh carried over the comm. "Look, I'm going to dispense with all the formal bullshit, captain. We're in a bad way here, and things are looking to get worse. We need to turn the tables on these eukan bastards quick, and I'm calling on you directly for that very reason."

Hankly's candor caught the jackal off guard. "Sir?"

"You're the only Hellhound squad I have at my disposal. I'm reassigning you directly under my command as of this moment."

Inside his cockpit, Dirk raised an eyebrow. That was something new. He had never heard of a general taking direct command of a single mech squad.

"I have a mission I need you to carry out," Hankly continued. "The base's sensor grids have detected what appears to be the eukan command element that is heading up this paradrop operation. Your mission is to seek out and eliminate this target by whatever means possible. This is your only objective."

Jamie hesitated for only an instant. "S... sir, understood."

"Coordinates for your target are being uplinked to your support truck as I speak. Their anti-air is defeating any artillery we fire, and there are no direct energy assets on hand for a precision strike. Do whatever it takes, captain. You're our best option for turning the tide. Full autonomy is granted on emergency action guidelines per my directive... give em hell."

The connection to the base HQ went dead abruptly, leaving Reaper squad and the handful of Mark II platoons to share in the silence that followed. All of the pilots understood what the general had just asked. They had no idea how many enemy mechs were still out there skulking around, but there had to be at least a brigade's worth. It was a fool's errand.

Dirk wasn't kidding himself any longer. They could set up all the defensive lines they wanted, and it would probably be futile in the end. With a smart and mobile enemy, it would only be a matter of time before the eukan managed to break through and take out the orbital guns. Desperate times called for desperate measures it seemed.

"So what's the plan capt'n?" Sahir inquired.

After a lengthy pause, Jamie drew a deep breath. "Alright, I'm breaking the squad off from the main channel."

"Fuck those bastards up for us," Slider 1 growled. "We'll hold the lines as long as we can."

"Count on it." The captain severed the channel, leaving 1st Platoon on its own. "We're going to split into two groups. Coots and Sahir will stay here with the support truck. Me and Dirk will carry out the mission."

"What? Why?" Sahir blurted out in surprise. "Why not take the whole platoon?"

"It'll be much easier to slip through their lines with only two mechs to worry about. I also don't want to sacrifice too much protection here on the defensive perimeter."

This still didn't sit well with the coyote. "Two Hellhounds against an unknown number of eukan mechs. Captain, why are you taking such a huge risk?"

"Sahir, I don't need you second guessing my orders."

The sudden force in her tone was followed by a tense silence.

"You know I trust your judgment," the coyote finally managed. "I just don't want to see you get killed, not now after everything we've been through."

"I don't plan on throwing my life away. That's why I'm bringing Dirk along."

The wolf in question felt his ears perk up at the mention of his name. "How does my presence help?"

Jamie's Hellhound turned and extended a finger toward Dirk. "That shield of yours is perfect for the plan I have in mind. We're gonna kick down the enemy's front door, and I need you up front in case anyone is waiting for us. "

It only took a moment for Dirk to catch on. "Oh... oh, damn. That's... not what I was expecting."

"If we're going to turn this in our favor, we gotta catch the eukan by surprise. They've already done as much to us. Now it's our turn."

Dirk reached a hand back over his shoulder, until the interface glove mimicked the feel of a hilt sliding into his grip. With a smooth motion, he removed the beam sword from the magnetic clamp affixed to the back of his Hellhound, and gave the hefty longsword a few graceful swings to loosen up his wrist. When he had grown comfortable with the added weight of the weapon in his hand, he then brought the semi-cylindrical bulk of his Aegis to bear in the other arm, and favored the captain with a look through his mech's eyes. "Well, I'm already running on borrowed time. Let's get this over with." ...before I lose my nerve.

A humorless chuckle emanated from the other end of the comm link. "Don't worry your fuzzy butt, wolfy. We'll get out of this in one piece. Just do what you do best." The captain's mech pulled back her rifle's bolt to prime a fresh round. "How much fuel you got?"

Dirk stole a quick look at his readouts. "Got a full load of thruster propellant. Probably just enough for this crazy idea of yours."

"Good, let's not waste any more time."

Dirk took his cue and moved toward the nearby ridge that loomed large before him. When he was about one hundred meters distant, he paused. Am I really about to do this?

"Sahir, you're in command here," Jamie added as she took up position behind the wolf. "Monitor Slider's frequency and lend assistance if the shit hits the fan."

"Ten-four. Be safe, and keep Knight in one piece. He's already busted up as is."

"Of course."

Now the ball was in Dirk's court. He had to get this as close to perfect as possible, else they were both dead. This was an all or nothing gamble where both their lives depended on his accuracy.

The data supplied by command had already been pushed to his displays. On the topographic map, a small open circle marked the possible location of his target. It was well outside his range, so the best he could do was aim in that general direction.

It took a few seconds of careful math to get the profile he needed. "I'd say plus four point five; five second burn. Anything more and we won't have enough for a return trip."

"Plus four point five for five second burn," Jamie agreed, after probably doing some calculations of her own. "Ready to go on your mark."

Inside his cockpit, Dirk steeled himself. God, please don't let me fuck up... not now. Especially not now.

He took one last look at his displays. Everything was functioning normally. No faults or errors were detected. His mech was ready, but was he?

"Ok... going in three." One last moment to consider just what he was about to do, and then...

"Three..."

"Two..."

"One... mark!"

Dirk exploded into a full run toward the ridge, knowing there was no going back now. When the precipice loomed just before his sprinting Hellhound, he leapt with all his strength, propelling the mech fully into the air as he simultaneously curled his toes to activate the jump jets.

There was a brief sickening moment, where he could feel himself falling, even through the cockpit's inertial dampers. And then the rockets mercifully ignited.

The Hellhound's initial downward descent was quickly overcome by the massive surge of thrust, lifting the war machine skyward on a torrent of flame. He was probably lit up like a Christmas tree on eukan sensors, but there was nothing he could do about that.

As the ground rapidly fell away, the wolf counted the seconds in his head, trying his best to keep focused. He felt so naked up here, an easy target for anything that happened to be looking up. Don't overshoot, don't think about the enemy below; don't get yourself killed.

His toes uncurled as he reached the predetermined mark, cutting off the jets.

The upward momentum of the Hellhound bled off almost instantly, until the mech began to fall toward the sprawling jungle landscape below. Dirk had no time to take in the scenery; his focus quickly shifted to his descent vector.

The ground came up hurriedly to meet him. Not too early. Don't fuck this up... Now! The wolf held his breath and curled his toes to ignite the boosters once more, keeping his shield held at the ready before him. In response, the Hellhound automatically calculated its trajectory and adjusted the nozzle orientation of the jets to counteract the speed that had built up... but it wasn't quite enough to arrest his free-fall; it never was.

"Oh... fu!"

Dirk's curse was cut off by the jarring crash of his Hellhound slamming into a dense stand of trees, kicking up an enormous spray of dirt and mud upon impact. He tried to dig his claws into the ground, succeeding marginally as tree trunks disintegrated into a hail of shattered wood and leaves all around him, the mech shuddering under the immense strain of the landing, trying its best to stay upright.

Dirk rode out the violence with clenched teeth, praying inwardly that his Hellhound would remain in one piece. It felt like it was going to tear itself apart. He was but a helpless passenger.

Finally, the torturous ride came to a stop, and not a moment too soon. Inside his cockpit, he held perfectly still, trying to collect himself. On the cockpit screens, a literal pile of trees obscured his line of sight. It looked like he had uprooted nearly half of the jungle.

A distinct thud came from behind the wolf, announcing the arrival of Jamie's mech to his rear. All manner of chaotic noise followed suit, until her Hellhound came to a stop just over his shoulder, adding another pile of trees to the heap he had already built up.

"Status check," Jamie barked. There was no time for formalities now.

A quick scan of his displays yielded no warnings or errors. "All green."

"Take point. Let's get in and out before they know what hit them."

Dirk nodded and assessed his map. Already the Hellhound's sensors were burning through the jamming to acquire multiple targets, each painting itself on his display with a red outline wherever he looked. They had landed behind the bulk of the eukan mechs, leaving only sporadic contacts between them and the target. Still, this wasn't going to be a walk in the park.

"Moving out!" Dirk angled himself toward the icon on his map and broke into a dead sprint, shield held out before him to knock down trees in his path. They couldn't afford to take things slow, not after that stunt they had just pulled. The eukan had probably already dispatched patrols to engage the two intruding Hellhounds.

The dense foliage was no match for the wolf's shield as he plowed onward. His progress was causing all manner of noise, making the two of them easy targets for any sonar operator that happened to be listening. No, don't think about that... concentrate on the objective. Don't lose sight of the goal.

A warning signal blared, coinciding with the sudden alarming appearance of a mech silhouette directly in front of Dirk. He never even slowed his pace.

With brutal savagery, the wolf's Hellhound exploded through a cluster of trees directly into the unsuspecting enemy. In that instant, his beam sword found its mark, slicing cleanly through the mech's chassis in a single cut.

Dirk's stride only stumbled briefly as he pressed on, not even looking back to see his handiwork. That enemy was no longer a threat, and that was all that mattered.

Jamie continued to keep pace behind his advancing Hellhound, covering their flanks as best she could. The target was only three kilometers away. They just had to make it there in one piece.

Two new targets materialized before Dirk. Instead of staying on his present course, he changed his direction mid stride, angling himself between them. They didn't even see their impending death coming.

The foliage gave way to the hulking bulks of his targets right as he anticipated. His right arm swung out low, catching the first squarely in the legs with the beam sword. The Aegis added to the devastation as he brutally rammed it into the other, throwing the mech off balance to tumble awkwardly onto its side.

Jamie was quick to follow his lead. A hair's breadth behind Dirk, her rifle came up and emptied several rounds into the felled eukan, finishing what his sword and shield had started. Before the enemy even knew what had hit them, the two Hellhounds had passed them by, leaving one divested of its legs, and both with several high caliber bullet holes in their chassis.

At a full sprint, the distance to their target closed rapidly. No more sudden surprises greeted Dirk the further on they pushed. The two Hellhounds were now truly behind enemy lines.

When they were only four hundred meters away, Dirk slowed to a halt, and ducked inside a freshly made impact crater that had scarred the jungle undergrowth. From this distance he could see what they were after clear as day.

Through the trees, a small clearing existed according to his minimap. The Hellhound was picking up numerous contacts all concentrated in that one area, all situated in a protective ring around a single target in the middle, what appeared to be some sort of wheeled vehicle. This had to be the command station for the eukan paradrops.

"You picking up the target?" Dirk asked quietly over the comm.

Jamie's reply was equally hushed. "Affirm, looks like a lot of anti-air vehicles and a handful of mechs guarding a command truck."

"I agree." Dirk's screen was almost completely covered in red outlines now. They were hopelessly outnumbered.

The captain outlined her plan. "We'll implement a precision strike on the target, dogleg charlie, two unit, single front and cover. Withdraw immediately to the west after execution, standard countermeasures."

"Understood."

Dirk crept his way slowly up the side of the crater. None of the enemy units had changed position. They weren't actively searching for anything from the looks of it. Did they even know the Hellhounds were lurking nearby? How in the hell could they not detect something eighteen meters tall plowing its way through a tropical forest? Were they too busy concentrating on the front?

"Take the mech front and left on your initial strike," Jamie instructed. "I'll plug his friend to the right while you take out the truck. Make sure you completely destroy it."

Dirk took a deep breath to steady his nerves. "Ok... moving to take up position."

The wolf stood his Hellhound up, and pulled himself up out of the crater as quietly as he could. After Jamie did the same, he took one last sweep of his surroundings and then advanced at a much slower pace toward the clearing.

Still the enemy made no move that indicated they had detected the Hellhounds. Dirk's luck was holding so far.

Just stay blind and dumb a little longer you bastards...

After a few perilous seconds of tense sneaking, the clearing came into visual sight. The Hellhound's sensors hadn't lied. The wheeled truck in the center sat with numerous antennas and communication gear adorning its frame, while all around defensive elements guarded against outside attack. In addition to the armored units that he had previously detected, a ring of infantry surrounded the command vehicle in a protective perimeter, further bolstering the lines.

It was Dirk's first time seeing eukan in person. Their furless skin was generally pale from what he could observe through the Hellhound's eyes, although several soldiers were of a darker skin tone. They just looked so... so feeble, what with not having a muzzle, tail and all. There was nothing predatory about their appearance whatsoever, an observation that momentarily brought him back to his earlier conversation with Jamie in the hangar. How could these frail looking aliens be such a formidable enemy?

Dirk mentally reproached himself. Concentrate... all that mattered was eliminating the target. Don't lose focus.

The wolf sat back and assessed the situation carefully. The dismounted soldiers were hurriedly preparing defensive positions all across the open ground. Several groups were excavating trenches and bunkers, while others worked to erect a handful of fixed anti-mech gun emplacements. They were trying to dig in for the long haul. He wasn't going to give them the chance.

Inside his cockpit, he toggled the countermeasures with a careful twitch of a finger in the interface glove. On the display that resulted, Dirk selected therm-optic smoke from the list of options, and set the dispersal radius to the appropriate setting.

When everything was set, he turned back toward Jamie's crouching mech behind him. "Ok, executing in ten seconds."

The captain's mech nodded in understanding, giving Dirk the go ahead.

He counted down the time as he zeroed in on his first target. Everything seemed to slow to a standstill all around him, leaving only the silently ticking seconds in his head, and the heavy feel of the sword hilt and shield in each hand. Let my strike be quick and true. I am the master of my own fate.

There was no more time to hesitate, no more time to consider his own mortality. It was do or die...

All hell broke loose.

Shouting at the top of his lungs, Dirk exploded forth from his concealed position, sword and shield ready to impart their divine wrath. His Hellhound came down upon the enemy like a shadowy demon of hell, its blade harsh and unforgiving to the victims it met in unholy judgment.

With no remorse, the wolf's beam sword pierced the closest eukan mech, and mercilessly gutted his hapless victim in one powerful twist of the hilt. He pushed onward, crossing out into the open space toward the next unsuspecting mech.

A shot rang out from behind as Jamie engaged another unit off to Dirk's side. He didn't have time to see if her aim had been accurate.

The second eukan was only just beginning to react to his presence. But it was too little, far too late.

A surgical strike severed the legs from right underneath the target's chassis, removing it as a threat. Another slice to the crew compartment made sure of that.

A gun emplacement and its team met their fate next, succumbing to their deaths in a fiery explosion ignited by his sword tearing through an ammo cache. Another mech followed suit, unable to defend itself before being cut down with two precise strikes.

And just that suddenly, the wolf was directly upon the command truck.

All of the infantry around him were running now, trying to find cover. They were fully exposed and completely at the mercy of Dirk. He was judge, jury, and executioner. There would be no leniency.

A twitch of his index finger sealed the eukans' fate as he toggled the anti-personnel armament of his mech. Back on the Hellhound's fully articulated tail, an armored segment popped open and fired a small rocket-propelled cylinder skyward. When the canister reached a sufficient height, the high-yield microwave weapon contained within discharged, emitting a deadly conical wave of intense energy that radiated downward at the speed of light, flooding the area surrounding Dirk.

The eukan infantry caught up in the pulse's blast radius had no chance. They all simply crumpled to the ground in lifeless heaps. The energy wave literally cooked their bodies from the inside out.

Dirk didn't give the remaining enemy time to react as he twitched another finger inside his interface glove, toggling the Hellhound's therm-optic smoke.

Another countermeasure pod flipped open on the mech's tail as a result, giving way to a powerful burst of thick choking smoke, which saturated the immediate area, obscuring his position from the eukan units that were nearby.

Bedlam reigned all around. Enemies fired blindly into the veil, panicking at the sudden attack. In the confusion, friendly fire took its toll.

The wolf ignored the chaos, and turned his attention to the now defenseless command truck. His justice was swift and pitiless.

His beam sword carved effortlessly through the thin armor of the truck, bisecting it perfectly right in two. He sliced once more lengthwise, and was rewarded with a satisfying secondary explosion, which peeled back the frame in an eruption of gratifying flame. No one inside could survive that.

His mission accomplished, Dirk backpedaled away from the ensuing carnage and turned to rejoin Jamie. Now they had to get the hell out of here...

"Dirk, help!"

The captain's cry made his fur stand on end. Without thinking, he broke into a full sprint.

His Hellhound burst out of the smoke back into clear air. What he saw made his blood run cold.

There before him was the captain's mech hurriedly maneuvering away from the clearing, her right arm conspicuously empty of the rifle she had been firing moments ago. There were two eukan mechs, one on either side of her, both aiming directly at her retreating Hellhound.

He didn't even think.

Still in a full sprint, the wolf brought up his beam sword, and threw it directly at one of his two targets. The enormous blade careened through the air, spinning wickedly toward the doomed enemy that had no chance of dodging in time.

Dirk kicked in his jump jets and surged toward the other unit in that same instant, willing himself forward with all the speed he could muster. His only priority was defending the captain.

Shield met armor in a collision of epic magnitude, sending the eukan mech stumbling backward. But somehow, it kept its footing.

With his sword gone, Dirk reacted on pure instinct, lunging with his free hand toward the reeling enemy. The Hellhound's claws latched onto the mech's lone eyeball and pulled back with brutal force, ripping the giant orb completely off the chassis, electrical wiring and all. There was a surge of primal satisfaction as he then brought a paw up to deliver a punishing kick to the blinded enemy, finally toppling the ungainly machine onto the ground.

With the threat neutralized, he threw the severed eye to the ground, and spun about to face the remaining eukan, only to find that his previous attack had hit home with savage results.

The first target had collapsed onto its knees with the hilt of his beam sword jutting out from the armored chassis at an awkward angle, the mech somehow remaining upright. Molten steel marked the blade's passage after it had impacted at a slanted angle, almost bisecting the walker right down the middle before the weapon had lodged itself deep into the crew compartment.

Dirk had never thrown his sword like that, not even in training simulations. Whether the kill had been luck or skill, he didn't care. He could look at the recordings later.

Without pause the wolf bounded over to the felled target and extracted his beam sword from the smoldering carcass, allowing the weapon to draw power from the node built into the palm of his Hellhound's hand once more. The battery located in the hilt was only good for a minute or so at best, before an outside power source was needed to keep the energy hungry sword active.

The captain paused only long enough to let him catch up. Her voice over the comm was clearly shaken. "Thanks, Dirk. They came outa nowhere... took out my rifle with a single shot."

The two Hellhounds set off in a run back toward friendly lines, with Dirk lagging behind slightly to assess the condition of her mech. "You ok?"

"They only nicked my weapon. I'm still in one piece. Way too close for comfort." Her mech looked back over its shoulder. "We are both lucky as all hell."

"Not out of danger yet."

His sensors were coming alive with enemy units all around him. But their movements were chaotic, disorganized. He followed the captain's lead as she picked her way through several jumbled patrols. Without her rifle, she was defenseless. They had to get out of the area before this lucky streak they were on ran out.

"Almost in range," Jamie called out.

The sounds of battle began erupting all around.

Dirk kept his eyes on the way ahead. Just a few hundred more meters... and then safety.

Suddenly, two figures emerged out of the trees directly ahead; eukan mechs, and they were looking right at him!

"Punch it!" Jamie shouted.

Dirk didn't hesitate. It was now or never.

The jump jets activated with a powerful kick, bleeding through the inertia dampers as he leapt with all his strength, trying to gain as much altitude as he possibly could. The jungle floor fell away in an instant, giving way to open sky and the distant hill that was his target. Just in front of him, Jamie's Hellhound road skyward on a pillar of brilliant flame, joining Dirk in his quest to reach the heavens.

The wolf grimaced. His boosters were burning through what fuel he still had left at an alarming rate. They were just outside the Hellhound's maximum range. There was a very real possibility that they would miss the hillside completely.

Warnings blared inside the cockpit, and a moment later, the jets cut out completely. All he had now was an emergency reserve, which was his only means of slowing his descent.

The sound of rushing air was all Dirk could hear as gravity regained control of his mech. Down below, the ridgeline rushed up to greet him. This was going to be bad...

At the very last instant, he kicked on the emergency reserve, resulting in a brief surge that only slowed him down marginally. He was still going far too fast.

The Hellhound landed with vicious force just over the crest of the hill. His legs compressed fully with the mech absorbing all the momentum of the impact, causing him to actually bounce back into the air for the briefest moment.

Earth and sky tumbled end over end in a sickening dance, becoming a frenzied blur of motion. Dirk could do nothing but hang on for dear life.

It seemed to go on forever... until everything thankfully stopped.

The wolf blinked, trying to regain his senses. On his cockpit display, the sky greeted his vision, cloudless and vibrantly blue. He was lying on his back just like before; that much was clear. However, he had no idea where he was.

His worry was put at ease by the distinct sight of a Hellhound appearing above, looking down at him. "You alright there, Dirk?" Coots called out.

The relief that washed over the wolf was exhilarating. He had made it. "Yeah... still in one piece," he managed weakly.

"Welcome back, mate. That was quite a landing."

Before Dirk could muster a reply, the captain cut in. "Awesome job. I can't believe we pulled that off."

"Did you eliminate the command truck?" Sahir asked with no shortage of surprise.

"Couldn't have done it without Dirk's help. He really saved my tail back there."

Coots's reply was playfully mocking. "The vaunted Reaper, admitting she was saved by another pilot. Now I have heard it all."

"There's a reason I brought him along. Without Dirk, I don't think we could've held off the eukan's first advance."

"Simply amazing," Sahir breathed.

Jamie grunted in agreement. "That damned blade of his can slice through mechs like butter. It's scary watching him go to work on the eukan."

The wolf in question couldn't work up the effort to find words. With the danger now past, the exhaustion that had been slowly creeping up on him suddenly hit with a vengeance.

The platoon's conversation drifted into background noise as Dirk fought against the haze that clouded his mind. Why couldn't he concentrate? Thoughts just simply slipped away...

"Hey Dirk, you alright?"

The unanswered question over the comm was his last fragmented recollection, before everything well and truly faded to black.