The Cobalt Coil isn't the hottest night spot on Solaris but then, it isn't the priciest either. We let places like Valhalla, Chez Juan, or the Gilded Flair vie for that distinction. We'll let them cater to the "in crowd". You know, Hot-shot 'Mech pilots, exiled big wig politicals, groupies, spies and that sort. We don't go for flashy decor, watered drinks, and hidden micro-electronic ears. The Coil offers a safe retreat (ie, we pay off the local gangs to keep their gripes outside), where you can park your cooling vest and side arm at the door, then down a few of your favorite drinks and enjoy a convivial atmosphere. Everyone's welcome at the Coil, as long as they keep the peace and pay their bills. With a name like the Cobalt Coil, you might assume that we specialize in PPCs; which we do, although there's a little concoction of mine called the Flaming Coolant that has its legion of devout followers. There are some who say you measure its potency not in proof but in horsepower. The secret of its formula is just that, a secret. It'll die with me, though its legend will linger on. Funny, after twenty-three years with the regiment along the Kurita border, old Jansfield will be remembered only for the pale green drink he invented. Back to the PPC, a drink not for the unwary. Every second Terran Standard Friday when I come on duty, the PPCs go for half price. (Yes, the management knows, bless her flinty little heart. The number of drinks sold in a night more than make up for the reduced profit per drink. Aside from being the chief bartender, I also do the books.) This brings out two types of customers, the young hot shots, usually MechWarriors or Techs with something to prove; and the old hands, veterans of countless battles across the Inner Sphere. Come twenty hundred hours, the lightweights ("recons" we call them) are either out cold on the floor or out back punching out the mostly liquid contents of each other's much abused stomachs. Then the veterans ("assaults") get down to the true business of the night, story telling. Yeah, the half price night is always interesting. Blake's Blood, even most of the off duty staff come in to listen. But every now and then something, well, different happens. Kind of like going out on a routine patrol and stumbling over a cache of LosTech. Last week, for example... Someone had gotten us started on inexplicable happenings. After a few hours we'd heard some fairly good tales of ghost DropShips, haunted planets and radio messages from long lost 'mech legions that warned of impending disasters. A cold, sulfur-laced wind was shipping past outside, making the vitron panes rattle like dice. It lent a perfect spooky air for ghost stories, though it kept reminding me to tell Len, the main day man, to recaulk the windows. I was just setting down a new round of drinks as an aerospace fighter jock finished her tale. Once she'd fought five glowing spheres in the upper atmosphere of Kingwheel. They didn't show on radar, vanished when struck by missiles but were unaffected by lasers, and turned her wingman into airborne rubble. I suspected that "They" were ball lightning attracted to the ionization trails of the fighter exhaust, but far be it from me to break the mood. The bar drank a toast to her dead wingman and all the companions we'd each lost. Then it got quiet for a moment as we remembered our dead and waited for the next story. Shadak spoke up. Shadak had been a regular since, before I made planetfall. Until that night I'd have sworn he was incapable of speaking more than two dozen words in a. night, including his drink orders (New Avalon ale with rye chasers)., The only way we knew his name was from the ID strip on his jacket, a tattered and much repaired Davion Home Guards regular issue. We all assumed it was issued to him; few people are fools enough to wear a Home Guard jacket they didn't earn. You could see where the officer's insignia had been removed. Shadak's face was something mothers could have used to frighten uncooperative children; it was deeply etched with a web of scars and burn pits. I'd seen wounds that made that sort of scarring once before. A man's 'Mech overheated, blowing most of the cockpit instrumentation. The force of the blast shattered the face plate of his neuro helmet, driving the fragments back into the pilot. That one died before we could pry him out of his machine. I guess Shadak was tougher. "My last assignment as a pilot trainee took me to Svenson's Drift," he said as he set down his mug. "You haven't heard of it. It's a desolate little place out towards the Periphery in Davion Space. I had been attending the Templar Academy; it was a privately run 'Mech academy that funded and trained promising pilots from families that didn't own BattleMechs. It was kept solvent by private grants and a generous government subsidy with the understanding that Davion regiments got first crack at graduates. The academy in turn got a few salvaged 'Mechs from AFFS operations. They were not top line combat machines but they were serviceable and go lots of maintenance. I learned in them. As part of our last year of study, all cadets got to participate in an off-planet patrol. Svenson's Drift was about eight light years from the academy right along a regularjump ship route, so it was cheap to get there and back; the Templar Academy needed cheap. There was not much on the Drift, just a few academy buildings, a "Starport" that was no more than a ferrocrete slab and two maintenance bays, and a Davion Science Foundation remote monitoring station that watched a nearby trinary star system. We used the Drift as field camp. We would run maintenance on the station, bring its collected data back with us, and spend the rest of the time on planet drill in our 'Mechs where we could notdo significant damage to the locals. The Drift was about the size of Mars in the old Terran system; cold, dry, and lifeless. The atmosphere was thin, about ninety percent nitrogen with a smattering of noble gases to make up the rest. Five of us went out for a three week' Mech camp; four last term cadets, Hotchkins, Sanchez, kamcon, and myself, along with old Master Sergeant Sinclair. Sarge was a veteran of the Davion House Guard. Just under two meters tall and almost a meter and a half across at the shoulder, he looked rather like a scaled-down shabby 'Mech. He acted the part of the tough sergeant, but it had not taken us long to tag the soft core inside. You see,' Master Sergeant Sinclair really cared about his cadets. I can't remember how many times I saw him spending late hours helping one of us with a nasty engineering problem, giving personal tips on weapons targeting, or just offering a sympathetic ear to a teenage clod farmer who suddenly realized he was light years from home. I suspect that was why he'd left the Guards; he hated to watch the bodies of people he cared about being pulled from the shattered wreckage of destroyed 'Mechs. As an instructor he could arm us for war, then send us out while telling himself we would all survive. Sinclair was at best an average MechWarrior but I do not think I've ever met a more compassionate man. So five of us were left on Svenson's Drift for three weeks of exercises. We spent our days practicing in academy 'Mechs during simulated drills. For the cadets there were two pair of reconditioned Stingers and Locusts, while Sarge had his old battleworn Jenner. Ammo was in short supply (the almighty Cb making its power known again), so we did not do a lot of live fire drills with ballistic weapons, but in all it was a well run training system. We practiced jump manuevers, field maintenance, organized tactics, and such. Blake's Fire, we even had an obstacle course complete with full sized computer controlled 'Mech mockups. The only real danger was that atmosphere. It was cold enough to allow us to put out 'Mechs through their paces without much heat buildup, but if your cockpit leaked you would quickly suffocate or freeze, if decompression didn't kill you first. If you ventured outside without an environment suit, you wouldn't last a pair of minutes. It added that razor touch of danger to remind you that it was not all a game. Things went as planned until the end of the second week. Then that damned remote station cut off without warning. Sarge decided to use this as another drill. We would head out in formation, suit up in our 'Mechs, fix the blasted data collector, and then head back. The whole exercise was to be conducted as if we were behind enemy lines in a free fire zone. Off we went. By shortly after noon, we had covered the twenty klicks to the plateau where the station was set; an ugly red rock protuberance with flanks cut by hundreds of wind carved canyons that from a distance looked like a giant tomb. A narrow switchback ramp had been bulldozed into the side of the plateau by the original construction crew, so in deference to the non-jump capable Locusts, we gathered at the base so we could climb together. That was a mistake. The first warning we had that something was wrong was a slight shudder of the ground. Then Sanchez screamed "Look right!" It was a Marauder painted flat black. As it unleashed its fire on Sarge's Jenner, the flair of its energy weapons revealed an electric blue tombstone emblazoned on each armmounted weapon pod. Two crimson laser beams carved armor from the Jenner's right arm and torso while autocannon rounds stitched a line across the 'Mech's head. Then a single blazing spear lanced from one PPC, cutting through the Jenner's left side in a shower of molten armor. We all watched the infra reds on our instrument panels show the Marauder spiking into the yellow zone as it stepped toward us. Sarge tottered for a moment, then toppled forwards, crashing into the rocky ground. In moments the Marauder had cooled to blue level and was less than thirty meters away. We stared down the barrels of those twin Particle Projection Cannons and lasers as a sardonic, faintly accented voice came over the com. "I think you children had best surrender," it said, the contempt so thick it could've reflected a laser bolt; "I'll give you two minutes to abandon your 'Mechs. If you don't, I'll be happy to reduce all four of you to slag!" You all may not remember Jared Curto, but in our day he was infamous. The third son of a minor baron from House Kurita, Jared wished to improve his prospects of inheritance. His two brothers died in an orchestrated accident. Unfortunately for Jered, his father deduced what had happened and took exception. The disinherited and outlawed Jered decided to evacuate. He stole a 'Mech, hijacked the family DropShip, and with a few loyal (or opportunistic) followers, headed into space. He became a part-time bounty hunter and full-time scavenger of the Inner Sphere. His favored tactic was to ambush smaller 'Mechs, then sell whatever survived the lopsided battle. He knew we were on the Drift, so he came in, shut down the station (probably intending to strip it later), then waited for the lambs. And here we were. We'd just about decided that panic was the one logical alternative when we heard that mocking voice again. "Grow tired of waiting, children. Do you wish to fight?" With that, a bolt of manmade lightning lashed from the right pod, blasting the left leg of Ramcon's Stinger into scrap. Ramcon tumbled backwards and the rest of us began to disconnect from our 'Mechs. Then another voice came over the com which froze us in place. "Not with my cadets you don't!" it hissed through waves of static. And the Jenner clambered to its feet. Curto's Marauder turned as the Jenner's four lasers stabbed out at it. Two missed, searing holes into the red cliffs. The other two cut patches of black armor from the heavy 'Mech's right arm and center torso. And the duel began. Actually, it was more like a lethal ballet. Curto was a damn good 'Mech pilot, no Justin Xiang, but good; even beating up weaker opponents is bound to teach you something. His Marauder was in near peak condition with massive fire power and armor advantage, compared to a Jenner. Sarge had already taken some solid hits. As I mentioned, he was not one of the great pilots of his day, even when it was still his day. Even with the advantages of speed and jump capability on the side of the Jenner, it should've been a onesided battle. It was, but not the way you would expect. Something seemed to inspire the Sarge, for his 'Mech moved like a thing alive. Countless times I watched in stunned silence as it nimbly danced aside or ducked out form under a barrage of destructive energy that would've destroyed it. It kept close, under the normal range of a PPC, but too far away for the Marauder to land a crushing punch or kick. And Sarge's lasers kept licking out like a brace of knives in the hands of a vivisectionist, cutting away armor; probing for weaknesses. He used his short range missiles sparingly, more for diversion than attack and kept looping about with his jets. At first Curto was verbally disdainful of 'the bouncing flea', but as his Marauder began to run hot and all he could land were occasional glancing shots on the battered Jenner, he got quiet. As breaches began to open in his armor he began to curse. And still the Jenner stayed beyond his reach. In the span of a few minutes, the awesome black monster was a flayed and lurching hulk. The Jenner was not doing much better; I do not care HOW good you are, you can't stand toe to toe with seventy-five tons of first rate BattleMech and walk away with the shine still on your armor! But ... Sarge was still fighting, while Curto was screaming incoherently. Then Sarge pulled the single most elegant combat maneuver I've ever seen. He spun his machine counter-clockwise while Curto was trying to turn clockwise. The SRMs peppered the rear torso of the Marauder while all four lasers sawed into the right leg. Great curls of armor like giant springs peeled back from the assaulted limb. Suddenly the armor was gone, and the hungry read light slashed through myomer bundles and into the titanium "bone" just below the knee. With a harsh splintering crack, the leg gave way and the Marauder, or what was left of it, settled to one knee. It looked like it was kneeling to accept some great honor. Sarge's 'Mech stood there for a moment, pale sunlight fracturing from his canopy in a prismatic rainbow display. Then he turned toward us. "Think you could lend your old Sergeant a hand?" that so-familiar voice asked. That broke our trance. As one we all fired our weapons into the back of the stricken Marauder. I don not know whose laser or missile did the job, but by our second volley, something touched off the Marauder's unspent autocannon ammunition. That 'Mech came apart like a cheap toy smashed by a willful child. All the while there was no sound from the Sarge. Only our voices came over the com. A few of the larger Marauder chunks pelted the Jenner. Slowly Sarge's 'Mech tipped over onto its right side, hitting the ground in an explosion of sand and rock chips. In an instant, we were in our environment suits and outside our 'Mechs, trying to get to him. We blew the emergency bolts to the cockpit and scrambled in. But we were too late. We found him in his command chair, helmet in place, with frozen blood crusting his mouth. His eyes and the inside of his crack-webbed canopy were frosted with ice crystals that painted the cockpit with tiny rainbows. The vitron of his canopy must have been damaged during the battle and given way when he fell that final time. Sergeant Sinclair was given a commendation and a posthumous promotion, then buried with full military honors. A surprisingly large number of Davion brass attended the ceremony. We four cadets were congratulated on surviving the battle. We were allowed to split the reward money for Curto even though none of us felt we had earned it. After graduation we were all snapped up by waiting AFFS units. The Jenner was judged a complete loss so it was stripped for parts and the hulk scrapped. I've never been back to Svenson's Drift." Shadak paused to sip from his tankard. The bar was still. We could tell Shadak had a final salvo to fire. His epilogue was yet to come. "It was not until some week later, after all the hoopla had died out, that it hit me. The only times the Jenner took head hits were from the opening autocannon salvo and, possibly, when it fell forward right after that. The head was untouched during the duel; the second fall put it down on its right side. When Sarge turned to face us that final time we saw sunlight reflecting from his cockpit. Blake's Blood, the sun was just past the zenith; it was shining near straight down. The sun was reflecting off the ice that had already formed inside the canopy. That meant the Sarge was already dead. The way I reconstruct it, the opening barrage from the autocannon hits weakened the vitron canopy and may've knocked Sarge out. The first fall did the rest, the jar of the impact splitting open the cracks, letting in that thin, achingly cold, lethal atmosphere. Sarge died while Curto was threatening us . Shadak drained his drink, tossed a some crumpled Steiner Five-C notes on the bar and started for the door, fastening his weathered jacket as he went. He opened the door, then paused as the cold air hit him. As if addressing the wind, he said, "You know, a 'Mech is not that different from a human body. Myomers serve as muscles, armor as skin, and miles of optic fibers and wire as nerves. Is it possible that the spirit of a man might abandon one body for another? Suppose there was some great cause, like friendship or duty driving the man into the machine? I've wondered every time I've made that miraculous jump, had my weapons lock on an instant before my opponent's did, or whenever it felt as if my 'Mech was actively helping me. I've wondered ... was there some part of that dismembered Jenner patched into my machine? Or maybe a part of some other guardian angel's old BattleMech?" With that final question, and with all the implications it raised, hanging in the air, Shadak vanished into the night. For a few moments we were all silent as we thought of the fusion of'Mechs and men, or the friends we'd lost and the machines destroyed. Then a voice called for a Steiner PPC. I reached for the grain alcohol and the peppermint schnapps. Slowly conversation seeped back into the bar while outside, night winds tormented the window panes. 'Jansfield' may in fact be Captain Sigfred Jansfield, late of Winfield's Brigade, one of the crack units in service to the Lyran Commonwealth. Physical descriptions of the two are quite close, and their apparent ages match. As our readers will remember, Capt Jansfield took a forced retirement from Winfield's Brigade in 3017 after twenty-three years of distinguished service, after a minor House Steiner military debacle on the much-contested world of Severn. Fortyfive Terran Standard years at that time, Capt Jansfield was highly decorated and well respected by his command. In the aforementioned action, the Captain was wounded. Many think that he was also made the scapegoat for the entire affair. The decision to retire the Captain was not a popular one among those that knew him. The question of how he may have found his way to a tavern on Solaris is an interesting one. If this should prove to be the same man, BattleTechnology may at last be able to shed some light on the many questions that surround the end of Capt Jansfield's distinguished career. Back to BattleTechnology 8 Table of Contents Back to BattleTechnology List of Issues Back to MagWeb Magazine List © Copyright 1989 by Pacific Rim Publishing. 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