ON THE EDGE OF DESTRUCTION...

The Tiger Shrikes mercenary unit is the very definition of "down on their luck." Out of ammunition for their battered 'Mechs, they're stuck in a binding agreement with the Capellan Confederation that barely keeps them alive. And when he's not putting off his daughter's desire to become a MechWarrior, Sergeant Jon Spry is busy holding his own lance together any way he can.

Their latest assignment, on the desert planet of Dalian, should be a simple one: target and destroy a cache of weapons to cripple the local insurgency. But there are other forces working against the Shrikes, powerful forces that will do anything to ensure that this mission is not completed.

Now, ambushed by a superior force on unfamiliar ground, with their 'Mechs threatening to fall apart around them, Spry must make the hardest choices he's ever been confronted with...or the Shrikes will become the latest set of bones littered across the dusty desert...