The pilot retorted with a shot, putting a laser into 16 and missiles toward 18. They sliced through chest armor, relieving the Wasp of much of its armoring. Said Wasp was capable of taking a few laser hits, but not three. They formed a simple line and Mark directed targets for them, as quickly as he could, all while his crosshairs hovered over the form of an approaching Wasp. '-follow my lead.' He waited to see if they would, and while 20 seemed a little uninterested, he gradually gravitated toward Mark's Stinger. ' Piss off you Arcadian wanker,' an accented voice growled, and Triarii 17 cut the line. He dodged incoming missile fire while keying his tac-com to just five other machines. He was a walk-on, and in the pecking order he was last place. Isn't this supposed to be unit on unit? Shouldn't we be fighting in more organized fashion? He went to turn on the tac-comm, but stopped himself from issuing orders. It was all chaos, and Mark's training revolted at it. The fight called for a company commander, at minimum, but none presented themselves. Some stray fire truck the inner dome or the protective refractors for the crowd, or spread outward into the open sky. A few pilots on both sides turned to jumping, trying to get clear of the fusillade of light, but that simply led to even more shots stabbing upward in attempts to hit them. One laser might have struck Mark had it not first sheared most of the armor off the left side of the machine slightly in front of him.

The fight started in effective range of the laser weapons, and immediately the sky was lit up with various shades of red, blue, and green, with an occasional yellow, stabbed out across the space. It was made for short-range fights like the one he was facing, and complicated by the dense packing of forty machines in the space. The arena was large, an oval that was about six hundred meters across at its widest point and only three hundred at the narrowest. The remote systems lock on his weapons was off. The voice came over his comm system and moments later the light on his display turned green. While the announcer provided the names of the contestants, Mark finished a final equipment check of his machine. Grandfather William and Great-Grandmother Sara fought like this, he reminded himself. Aside from a cooling vest all he had were cotton shorts and a tank top, not one of the cooling suits he'd gotten used to in the service. Makes me miss the Cavalry, he thought, given the weight of the old over-the-shoulders neurohelmet that kept him from being able to turn his neck. This gave them a slight edge at range, but the machines' qualities were close enough it wouldn't be decisive, necessarily. The same speed, roughly similar protection as well, medium-rated laser for a main weapon, the only major difference besides structure was his 'Mech had a pair of machine guns while his opponents' 'Mechs mounted SRM-2s on their left legs. The two 'bug' light 'Mechs shared similar profiles. Mark, designated as Triarii 18, found himself envious of his opponents, as the Stinger's cramped cockpit was living up to its wretched reputation. Triarii 'Battle of the Bugs', with the former piloting Wasp 'Mechs against the latter's Stingers. The-house-that-jack-built ( 393 ⭐ ) 100.The Golden Arena was the chosen venue for the White Horses vs.

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