As requested by a couple of folks, I give you the Prequel to Tank-Borne.

Upon the Shoulders of Giants.

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Another warp-lane, another contested planetary system.

Another battlefield.

New Terra is far from a new battlefield. It isn’t even a new planet. What New Terra is, however, what it represents, is the a renewed cradle for humanity in an uncaring universe. One of precious few planets with no intelligent indigenous species to lay claim, no alien civilizations with an interest in what would, to them, be yet another deathworld.

But to the fleet belonging to the Imperium in low orbit above the planet’s surface, it was just another Consortium world that they didn’t have the strength to hold.

Alarm claxons rang out in what Imperium soldiers not-so-affectionately called ‘The Pit.’ Battlemechs in various states of disassembly were being repaired and reassembled, armaments being swapped out for more field-appropriate gear. Tanks bearing the barely-human bodies of the pilots having their slurry flushed and refilled. Chemical stimulant and maintenance packs to keep the pilots operating for what was sure to be a lengthy siege, rather than the quick hostile takeover that command had implied during the mission briefings.

The final hour of their approach to Hot-Drop saw hundreds of ‘mechs assembled, their pilots slotted into the central core of the titans of steel. Compared to the pilots themselves, the ‘mechs had a tendency to look far more animatedly human with their pilots slotted rather than the hulking colossi they truly were.

Frontline variants were armed with up-scaled rifles similar to their human counterparts, albeit scaled up to fit the between thirty and fifty foot armored frames of the massive bipedal models.

Smaller quadrupedal scout models bore racks of missiles across their backs along with advanced sensor and communication suites along with target designation hardware that would allow them to call battlefield support, provide enhanced radar and map coverage, and, ultimately, call in orbital support for surgical strikes upon hardened targets.

Rather than a heavier loadout as the name would imply, Assault variants with their heavier power plants carried every manner of electronic warfare and countermeasure imaginable. They had, by now, become the Imperium’s calling card, because when the Assault ‘mechs hit the ground, the blackouts would roll, plunging enemy forces into chaos when their communications suddenly ceased to exist.

And finally, the Trenchman variants; quickly becoming the relic of a bygone age. Operated almost exclusively by convicts and social undesirables, they were the bulk of the ‘footsoldier’ mechs. Heavy shocktroopers with piledriver shields, forty millimeter explosive chain-gun, and ammunition reserves enough to make even the most hardened veteran blush.

Lines were assembled on the drop floor. Pilots; those still able to think and feel for themselves began to shift their mechs from side to side in an eager show of pre-drop jitters. But, as before any operation such as this, the fleet Admiral made his appearance on the gargantuan holo-projector at the back of the bay. Always, the same four words.

“The Flesh is weak…” Soft spoken. A prayer, at least the first half of one.

The answering call of every man, woman, and battlemech was loud enough to shake the decks of the carrier as the drop-floor began to lower.

"BUT THE SPIRIT IS WILLING!"

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Spitfire’s inertial dampeners fired perfectly. She was on target. The chemical cocktail coursing through her veins produced a simulacrum of manic glee that, had she a face within her pod, would be showing a rictus of teeth and bloodshot eyes. The last few hundred feet of her descent was little more than a spray of explosive rounds to clear and flatten her landing zone before her hundred-ton battlemech hit the ground.

Soften the ground, soften the landing.

Somewhere in the back of her consciousness, she ‘heard’ the scouts picking targets, the arm of the massive battlemech swinging in a wide arc and spraying ammunition without a care in the world for what- or more importantly, who she hit. Armored targets resisted the spray, but once she could get on the ground-

She ‘felt’ something smack into the dampener sled under her feet. Time seemed to slow even has her ‘mech began to pick up speed.

Hard earth shattered under her frame, the sled not so much shattering as crumpling, holes opening under her feet as she fell into a makeshift set of manacles binding her feet together. Around swings the pneumatic Pile concealed by her shield, jackhammering the twisted metal away from the feet of her battlemech.

The next impact she felt on her armored form landed squarely at the junction in her back and shoulder. A lucky shot that detonated her reserve ammunition.

Cassandra’s world was engulfed in flame. Her subsystems initiated a reactor dump to prevent an overload, flushed her system of the combat stimulants to simulate a crude hibernation, and her mech was put into recovery mode.

Her final lucid thought as her systems began a cascade of failures, and the first of it’s kind since she underwent indoctrination. Without eyes to cry, a mouth to scream, and control of her ‘mech wrenched away from her, she wondered if she’d finally be allowed to die.