Austin jerked as a laser blast sawed off his ’Mech’s left arm. Then more of his right vanished in a mist of molten armor. He tried again to fire his torso-mounted laser but produced only tiny sparks as debris in front of him vaporized, hardly enough for Dale to register on his threat assessment readout.

The Centurion was ready for the scrap heap, but Austin refused to surrender. He spun away as if to run, then slowed, bent over to give a smaller targeting cross section, and waited. Time ticked by, a dozen heartbeats for every second, but he did nothing. Austin tracked the Enforcer’s approach with his still functional rear sensors. Sweat soaked the front of his vest as the cooling system threatened to die completely, although the persistent, sluggish coolant flow gave him hope. Small, faint hope. Austin made certain his rear laser was fully charged.

By instinct, Austin straightened the Centurion to its full height, no longer trying to present as small a target as possible. In a single huge gulp of information, he took in every detail of the rugged battlefield. Austin fired his rear laser into the Enforcer’s torso. Dale had not expected to find a fighting, firing Centurion when it appeared that Austin was disabled and trying to escape.

Austin’s vision blurred as the heat in the cockpit blasted upward. He felt as if he had been popped into an oven like a loaf of bread. But he saw the firing assessment show that he had speared the Enforcer dead in the center of the torso and had killed it. He waited to see if Dale ejected. The other pilot stayed with his ’Mech. Austin’s rear laser had destroyed Dale’s emergency pod capability along with the rest of the BattleMech.

Then the out-of-control Enforcer smashed into the Centurion, knocking both to the ground. Austin fired his rearward laser again as he crashed forward. His control panel flared red when his LRM magazine exploded under him. Everything went black.

“Double kill,” Dale Ortega said, slapping his brother, Austin, on the shoulder. “You’re getting better with that old Centurion. You didn’t let me beat up on you as much this time.”

“Why’d you choose an Enforcer?” Austin asked, leaning back in the command couch of the BattleMech simulator. It took him a few minutes to shake free of the virtual experience of piloting a ’Mech and come to the reality of the simulator cockpit. He unfastened the cooling unit and pushed back, swinging his legs off the command couch to get circulation back in them after being tensed for so long.

“I knew you’d go with the Centurion, that’s why. I figured an Enforcer would end the fight fast. I hadn’t counted on the terrain. Is it for real?”

“I don’t know,” Austin said. “That was a surprise for me, too.” He bent over and brought up a debriefing report on the simulator control screen. “It’s a real place, all right, and we’ve practiced on that template once before, which is why it struck me as familiar. But the computer sim added the open pit mines and mounds of slag. We need to study our own geography more.”

“You can do the studying, little brother,” Dale said airily. “I’ll concentrate on the fun.”

“Was it more fun when I got first blood?” Austin felt a small glow of triumph at this. He usually played it too conservatively, even in the simulator, and took the first hit.

“You’re learning from me,” Dale said. His face lit up, gray eyes sparkling and even teeth showing through his broad, cheerful grin. A well-trimmed black mustache twitched just a little. It was impossible for Austin to grow a mustache that looked half as dashing. He had tried. But then, his brother was the one with the good looks and bright, open manner that drew attention.

Both of them had broken their noses in hand-to-hand training a year ago. Dale’s had mended perfectly straight while Austin’s had kept a small lump to remind him of the encounter. It had always been that way between him and his older brother.

“I wish the sim wouldn’t give me so many equipment failures, even before battle. My forward laser went out.” Austin regretted the words the instant they left his mouth. He sounded as if he were whining. The simulation computer randomly chose which equipment to damage and fail, just as it sometimes altered the terrain. It only seemed that Dale came out ahead on this score each time. Austin reluctantly admitted to himself Dale won more often because he had better combat instincts.

“Don’t pick such a clunker next time,” Dale said. “All my armament worked fine, though the computer tried to give me an intermittent power surge. I fiddled with it and got the fusion plant settling down into the black. Easy as …taking you down!” Dale’s pale gray eyes glowed with amusement, taunting Austin. Austin refused to rise to the fight. “Let’s get out of here. We’ve got places to go and things to do.”

With an agile twist, Dale ducked out the hatch at the rear of the simulator and went to stow his gear in a bank of lockers.

Austin powered down the simulator equipment and stretched his long legs. He stood 180 centimeters but was still 15 centimeters shorter than his older brother. Both had close-cropped black hair, but Dale’s was thicker, hinting that Austin would eventually end up balding like their father. He left the sim and put his gear into his storage locker.

He and Dale faced off in computer simulators at least once a week, sometimes more, in spite of their father’s scorn for such practice. Baron Sergio Ortega was Governor of Mirach and had been since the days of Devlin Stone. Sergio had fought for Stone and had been one of the best MechWarriors in the field. Although he played down his role, Sergio had been granted both his title and the governorship of Mirach because of valor in combat.

Austin wished his father wouldn’t dismiss that aspect of his life so much. These days, Sergio concentrated on his philosophical side.

“I want to see it again,” Austin said suddenly. He didn’t have to tell his brother what he meant. Dale knew.

“Why? It hasn’t moved,” Dale replied. Then he grinned condescendingly. “Sure, why not? You deserve a reward for a draw.”

“Draw!” cried Austin. “I beat you.”

“Double kill is a draw. Those are the sim rules.”

Arguing, the brothers threaded their way through the training structure and across the broad lawn outside to a parking lot. In their simulation it had been twilight and the ruddy sun had cast a faint, deceptive glow. In reality, the huge red disk was rising in the east and growing warmer, hinting at a hotter-than-usual spring morning. Two of Mirach’s four moons, the smaller Arit and Batn, transited its face.

Austin swung into the car and started the engine. Dale joined him on the passenger side. The sim training facility was at the far north of Governor’s Park, the thousand-hectare expanse holding most of what Austin held dearest. Their destination required a drive.

Both he and Dale were officers in the First Cossack Lancers, an elite Republic Militia unit that had been placed under the Baron’s command to honor his service with Devlin Stone. Their barracks shone in the morning sun a kilometer away from the training center at the northernmost boundary of the park, but Austin headed elsewhere now. Surging upward through the wooded areas in the center of the park were major governmental office buildings and the Governor’s office and residence, the Palace of Facets. Before joining the First Cossack Lancers as a lieutenant, junior grade, Austin had lived there. But his father had usually been occupied with planetary governance, and all too often, Austin had not been included in his older brother’s plans.

Austin had come to prefer exploring the vast, well-maintained museum, located at the southwestern corner of the park, near the major roads leading to Mirach’s capital city, Cingulum, ten kilometers away. Austin turned onto the road leading around the perimeter of the park while Dale rattled on and on about the fight, claiming moral victory if not computer-granted triumph. The manicured meadows and carefully cultivated forests rushed past unnoticed, as did traffic on the road. Austin was focused on reaching the museum.