Mecha Action Excerpt From HARM (Military SF)

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His mecha crouched behind the weathered and rust streaked wall of a raw materials silo. From his concealed location, he launched a small drone or RPV to hover within a grove of trees in the area to monitor the approach of the of the two spider-mechs. The spider machines were huge with flattened and segmented bodies that were twelve metres long. They stood nine metres high on six legs, three per side, a few short for an arachnid, but the name had stuck anyhow. They scuttled up to 70 kph, and could jump over low obstacles. They were almost black in color with dots of red light covering their armoured shells. A vertically elongated, weapons blister on their back contained their primary beam weapon. This particular spider type had been code-named Black Widow as they were a very lethal, heavy combat mech.

This was the second time Joshua had seen one up close, even if it was through his RPV's sensors. The first time had been as a close air support pilot who had run out of missiles. He had pulled a crazy, aerial maneuver to close in and kill an alien mech with a long, sustained burst of tank-killing cannon rounds, but had been shot down in the process. While recovering in the hospital, Dr. Chan had dragooned him into the HARM program as extra medical tests indicated he had a high synchronization rate with the experimental mental cybernetics she was developing. He had resisted at first, as he was a pilot, not some robot jockey, but potential of the HARM series mechas grew on him over time.

"Drone has been detected, beginning evasive manoeuvres." After issuing the notice, the HARM's AI immediately began retreating and jinking the RPV. Laser flashes from the spider-mech's secondary lasers indicated multiple shots against the RPV. Several seconds later, the feed from the drone went dead. "Drone destroyed," reported the AI.

That blew it. The Newts knew someone was around and he was blind now. He extended a tiny camera on his mecha’s head above the silo to see again. He could see the spider-mechs were advancing more slowly and had their primary guns pointed in the direction of the factory, but the wrong part of the factory. Readying his coilgun he aimed past the silo to where the first spider-mech would appear. Safety off. Coilgun in single mode, he thought. “Safety off. Single mode, acknowledged,” replied the AI. Single shot mode was the most powerful mode for the gun, but it would take 10 seconds before the capacitors would recharge for the next shot.

He was nervous, his hands felt a little damp, but he remained steady. The front of the first mech appeared and he waited until a third of it entered his line of sight. He sighted on the center of mass in front and below it’s primary gun, the targeting programs automatically adjusting for range and other parameters. A squeeze of the virtual trigger in his right hand caused the coilgun to kick back. One hypersonic, depleted uranium penetrator fired out of the coilgun with a loud bang. A moment later, the slug hit with devastating power. The full power shot punched clean through the side of the spider-mech in a small explosion, with most of the kinetic energy from the projectile focused on a tiny surface of armour that was blasted apart. Inside the mech, the penetrator and spalled pieces of armour ricocheted through machinery, interior walls, bodies, and the main power plant. All the stored energy inside the power plant instantaneously burst out and the resulting explosion tore the mech in two.

“Target destroyed,” the AI called out.

The coilgun was highly effective – a vast reversal from the early encounters where 120 mm sabot rounds from the M3A1 battle tanks had proven less than effective against the alien’s molecular armour. Better weapons like the coilgun had been developed since, but they required a great deal of power for their superconducting magnetic coils to propel their projectiles at 3 km/second. Because of this only heavy tanks and the new HARMs were equipped with them.

The second spider-mech’s sensors had noted the source of the shot and targeted the old silos. The powerful beam weapon on the mech flashed and beams punched four holes clean through the steel silos. However, Joshua wasn’t there anymore. He had already rolled and was shifting to a new position.
 
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