"Dusty, can't you do anything to make this guy shut up?!" he yelled. "Sorry boss" the techs voice came back slightly amplified over the alien signal "it's on all frequencies and channels -I've got all I can spare who aren't fixing Mechs on it but..." he left the remainder unsaid. "Okay, I'll live with it. How are the others?" "Sharryl and 'Blaze' took down a Squad of Dreadnoughts- Ray C. and CHCHZSCHH are holding the line but the pressure on them is heavy, the Newbies are shaping up fine -some are a little eager and taking more damage than normal but so far we are giving as good as we get" As he received the reports the Old Man nodded and smiled inwardly -The Phoenix's were flying into the flames of battle again who knew what they would be reborn as. He moved his 90 tonner, lovingly named 'Behemoth,' toward the fight .
"Ok tell Ray I am on my way to him." "Sir, your Damage monitor is reporting you are down to 50% effectiveness" Dusty's concern showed through, and why not, the 'Old Man' had fostered these kids when their parents had died in Mecha combat all those years ago, and with Dusty's former attachment to the Old Man's daughter, Sharryl, he was as near to a son as the Old Man had -if only the Old Mans wife, Alison, were still alive he was sure she would be just as proud-but a drunken kid driving on the wrong side of a Freeway had seen to that. After the funeral, he had thrown himself into building the Phoenixes from the 4 Mecha 20 tonners into something formidable -Now? now he was tired. Behemoth lumbered towards a bend in the road. Suddenly all the proximity alarms sounded 1, no... 3, no......5 enemy mecha's ahead, all of them nothing less than 70 tons. If they proceeded, they would catch Ray.C's force in a flanking maneuver.
"Great" he muttered to himself "this day just gets better and better " Maneuvering Behemoth onto a lumbering run, he began to 'spool up' his weapons, ready to fire the lead enemy mecha - a 70 ton Freon lit up his weapons and the Old Man felt his armor began to slough off his mech. "Good but not good enough" thought the Old Man -His reply fire tore into the Freon, which looked for all the world as if it was being taken apart by the hand of some enormous invisible child, it's final act of destruction was to spontaneously ignite like a giant torch incinerating the Alien pilot inside. The Freon fell to the earth never to rise again. As Behemoth ran past the fallen foe, the other enemy mecha seemed to give pause - perhaps uncertain of the foe they faced, and the Old Man began to laugh. Perhaps it was the adrenaline kicking in but he no longer felt tired......
Submitted by Philip Power # 568566