While the winds around the Union taper off (allowing salvage operations to take place) and Delta-One gives a substantial Combine force the runaround, Gamma-One moves to secure a chokepoint. It's an industrial complex surrounded on both sides by jagged, rocky, impassable terrain, so it's the only place for ground-bound units to cross for kilometers.
So, it basically is stationary defence. The liaison deploys alongside Gamma-One, having gotten himself a Hunchback 4G. This gives us a good close-in punch in addition to a healthy mix of long-range firepower, with Hyena and Scrub's PPCs, plus Cylus and Xwraith with their LRMs and ER laser.
The incoming force is on the heavy side, with a couple of lances of tanks backing up almost a company of mechs. Including three Thunderbolts. It's going to be a tough fight for sure.
Round 1:
We make our presence known with a flurry of long range weapons fire. Cylus is the only one who hits anything though, dragging the Grasshopper's large laser beam across the front of a Saladin.
Round 2:
Xwraith makes good use of the ER laser's long range to target a distant Saladin, severely damaging its air ducts to slow it down. Scrub punches through the right side of a Jenner with PPCs, taking out two jump jets. Cylus takes a few hits, but nearly removes the head from the nearby Ostscout. Hyena whiffs with all weapons against a J. Edgar light tank trying to zip by, but then sticks his foot out, causing the hovertank to flip over.
Round 3:
One of the enemy Dragons runs a little too fast along the road and skids, falling over in the middle of the street. Since we haven't actually seen too many Dragons before: it's a Kurita design, featuring an AC/5, a pair of medium lasers (only one facing forward) and an LRM/10 rack. Same ground speed as a Griffin or a Quickdraw, but pretty undergunned for its mass.
There's also a Grand Dragon on the field, which replaces the dubious AC/5 with a PPC, extra laser and extra heat sinks. Now we're cooking with gas! Unfortunately, this one chooses to expose itself to fire from our liaison and Cylus. Well, not that unfortunate, the liaison's gunnery is exceedingly poor. Cylus scores a couple of hits and lands a kick, taking a punch in return, but is unable to knock the enemy mech over.
Hyena backs up into a building, which absorbs some of the fire from the nearby Saladin as it zips in, then opens up a counterattack, cutting through the hovertank's left side with lasers to take it down.
Scrub finishes off the Jenner's left torso by blasting it with two more PPC shots, and the lighter enemy mech peels off, looking for safety. Her left leg takes an AC/20 hit and a bunch of laser fire, the armor flashing yellow.
Round 4:
Despite taking a full AC/20 to the center of mass, the Kurita Panther basically shrugs it off as it casually walks by the liaison's camping spot. Cylus jumps in behind it, but is unable to breach its rear armor. Our Grasshopper does step on an SRM Carrier though, breaking through the front armor and causing the tank to seek shelter elsewhere.
Alpha-Three manages to run off a small Kurita patrol poking around our landing zone, destroying a Saladin and disabling a Galleon, along with a Scorpion.
Round 5:
Xwraith and Hyena both crash through heavy-duty buildings, taking shelter in there. Xwraith takes the armor off one of the nearby Scorpion mech's legs, but we're probably going to have to let it go.
Hyena opens up on a passing Prowler, raking it with the AC/10. The building absorbs the return fire gamely, but the Prowler remains more or less intact.
Cylus continues chasing the Panther, hoping to finish it off. This time, a large laser disables the smaller mech's left leg, forcing it to the ground even as it fires back and hits with a PPC shot to the left arm. The mechwarrior bails out pretty quickly.
Scrub exchanges PPC fire with the Grand Dragon, the enemy mech coming away worse off, but it's not quite enough to stop the larger mech.
Round 6:
These guys are basically getting away from us, we're just not able to apply enough firepower. Cylus takes an armor breach in the left torso as a Thunderbolt gets the drop on our Grasshopper. Our mechwarrior fires back with lasers and even dodges a kick while hitting the larger enemy mech in the head with a fist. Hyena does manage to knock one of the Thunderbolts over with an almost alpha strike, then stomps on the right leg to take off most of the armor there.
Round 7:
The liaison's Hunchback shudders as the enemy Thunderbolt unloads with every short range weapon it has, but armor holds, even as the Rifleman adds some fire. His leg nearly comes off as the enemy mech gives him a solid kick, but he does manage to crunch through the nearby Manticore's armor and destroy the engine.
Cylus jumps in and manages to slice some armor off the front of the Prowler to the west, the send a few LRMs that way, with a few stray missiles blowing through the weakened armor and injuring the driver. The all-terrain transport peels off.
The Thunderbolt that Hyena knocked down gets up and runs out of line of sight, right into Scrub's PPC firing lane. The two PPC shots impact the Thunderbolt's right leg, which simply comes off. The enemy mechwarrior wastes no time in bailing out.
Xwraith goes chasing after the Scorpion, scoring a few hits but failing to disable it, and takes an LRM salvo to the rear from an opportunistic Thunderbolt, knocking out one of the medium lasers.
Round 8:
Cylus gets the drop on the enemy Thunderbolt as it makes its way north. The Grasshopper's right torso flashes red as the last of the armor there evaporates under laser fire, but its in perfect position for a rear shot. The large laser melts through the rear armor to get at the internals, then all four lasers fire off, one hitting the already-damaged head section. The 65-ton mech slumps, then tilts over.
Hyena wipes out an SRM Carrier as it drives by, breaching armor with the AC/10, then torching the fuel tank with a laser. That wraps up the tail section of the enemy column.
The Grand Dragon and Scrub exchange PPC shots, but the enemy mech is able to escape.
Round 9:
Cylus attempts to chase down the Rifleman, taking a hit to the left arm while stripping the enemy mech's armor with lasers.
Xwraith is was unable to disable the Thunderbolt that ran by, but takes a deadly accurate shot, center of mass, at the Panther coming after. The ER laser blasts through the weakened armor and dings the gyro, dropping the smaller mech to the ground.
Round 10:
The Panther can't get up due to gyro damage, so we bypass it for now and continue chasing down the rest of the enemy mechs. Its weapons fire is pretty ineffective also.
Hyena blasts the last of the retreating Thunderbolts with long range weapons, as the Dragon that tripped earlier ducks around a corner.
Cylus continues the duel with the Rifleman, taking another hit to the right torso but breaching the left leg armor with the large laser. Scrub helps out by bursting through a building and hitting with two PPC shots. Cylus uses the distraction to strip the last armor off the other leg with a kick while dodging the enemy mech's distracted melee counterattack.
The liaison attempts to engage the Goblin but the enemy tank zaps him in the leg, knocking it off, effectively putting him out of the fight.
Round 11:
The Goblin does its best to resume its route north, but skids along the pavement and crashes into a nearby building.
Credit for the kill on the Rifleman is somewhat disputable, as both Cylus and Scrub scored hits that would have knocked the mech down on their own - Cylus to the gyro, Scrub to the left arm. Between the two of them, the enemy mech falls over on its back, at which point the ammo detonates. We credit it to Cylus, since, without the gyro hit, the mech would have probably remained upright.
The Panther continues being unable to get up.
Round 12:
At this point, Scrub just needs to finish off the Goblin, while Xwraith and Hyena move to finish off the Panther, whose mechwarrior has conveniently blacked out after trying to get up a few too many times with a dinged gyro. Xwraith zaps the head with the ER laser and calls it a day.
Round 13:
Scrub is unable to finish the Goblin herself, but Hyena is on the job, within a few seconds, detonating the tank's on-board SRM ammo (this was the Goblin SRM variant, with three SRM/6 launchers instead of a large laser).
Since most of the enemy force's meaningful heavies didn't make it past Gamma-One, and Delta-One distracted their opposition for quite a while, the local Kurita forces are unable to bring enough force to bear to threaten the Union. As soon as the weather clears and salvage operations are complete, our mechs pile on and the Union lifts off, meeting up with the Jumbo and Davion dropships at the main landing zone, while the Davion guys catch a ride of their own.
Salvage is a pretty good haul. Two standard Thunderbolts, two Panthers and a Manticore, with Cylus getting a mech hat trick. The Grasshopper's left arm will need a full rebuild, but between us and the Davion forces, we've got the spare parts for it, it'll just take time. We hand over the crappy hovertank wrecks, and put the more beat-up Thunderbolt and Panther into storage. We use the parts from the beat-up Panther to replace the leg on the less beat-up one, while the other Thunderbolt can actually be put back together without any replacement parts. It'll be useful to have a pair of spare mechs on hand.
With all dropships present and all mechs accounted for, our landing zone and base of operations are secure (once Alpha-Three runs off a Kurita patrol, destroying a lance of tanks in the process). A pair of captured Kurita mechwarriors are interrogated (nicely, politely, perhaps over tea and biscuits) to confirm our estimates of their force disposition. One of them offers said information freely, nothing terribly conflicting with what we've seen so far - a mix of light hovercraft backed up by a small number of heavy tanks, while mechs are mostly lights and lower-end heavies (especially after we put a significant dent in their Thunderbolt population). Current count is a little under a regiment's worth of combat units. We're in for a scrap, that's for sure.
After consultation with the liaison, we begin reconnaissance operations, attempting to identify and track nearby enemy forces and facilities. Mostly low-key recon stuff, and the the planetary militia don't oppose our movements for the most part. Once we figure out where they're keeping their mechs and tanks, we'll hit them hard.