Battletech: The Ghost Who Walks (Battletech Isekai)

Imperator Pax · Jul 21, 2022

WHOOPS, an Alternate timeline

II Battle of Dieron 3018.

They had never had the opportunity at Elidere to do this... and they'd been on the offense at First Dieron so not a priority. Not when they had gone in reasonably assuming that ComStar was probably at least somewhat beholden to host nation sentiment of some stripe, and that presumably they would beam word out as soon as the invasion was identified as an invasion. He wasn't sure if Precentor Dieron had beamed word out or not during the invasion of Dieron a couple of months earlier, but it didn't matter.

A minute passed.

... and he contemplated whether or not the Capellans might have actually had the sense to go through their JumpShip fleet and rebuilt the computer systems to not have included the Star League era security back doors that allowed them to be turned off remotely. Remotely was still something of a misnomer, but you had a window where you could beam a signal in and the computers were for 'safety' lock down to authenticate it was receiving an authentic command and the crew could... if they knew how and had the right keys over ride the lock down.

It didn't look like that was the case though. The Capellan JumpShips went dark, and broadcasted a complying message from the computer as they did so, on a frequency that no one used anymore. "Secure those JumpShips." He ordered to marines via the video link.

Small craft moved into the black.

That still left their other problem. The real problem. The actual invasion of Dieron by the Capellan Confederation. A light turned green as another line opened, but instead of a human face an icon, shield, appeared "Boot successful. All systems nominal."

"Hedwig is detached," Someone announced from one of the Titan's consoles.

"Separation complete, and away." Exterior camera feeds of the JumpShip showed the flare of a drive as the Spheroid accelerated. This was going to be the chancy part. The Capellans had air coverage, and they had limited air assets of their own.

A moment later another channel connected to CIC, and the process repeated, as Braunfels followed suit laying in a parallel course. A second near identical four thousand ton DropShip separated from the Colorado, and accelerated towards the Capellan force.

"Helm lay course."

The CIC threw up addition images from tracking systems. The holographic globe estimating range, the measure of horizontal, and distance, the height differential an important characteristic for the Titan-class designed role as dedicated aircraft carrier. It made an ideal command and control platform for the unit.

Baffins would be able to make the descent to the surface under its own power in theory alongside Hidalgo and Presidio, but they needed to secure orbital control first. The hologlobe projected the force spreading out. They had to assume that nothing had changed. The HPG network was down, and that word hadn't gotten out.

... that made getting here right now something of dumb fucking luck. That was part of the reason he was here, and not aboard a mech carrier that would be in the first wave going to the surface. They didn't know enough about the Capellan incursion, and it wasn't a feint. The initial landing site was south west of the capital of San martin in the northern foothills of Mount Shanyu. That was intended to be two fold.

If they could attain air superiority the plan was to drop down to the planet's surface land at Fortress Dieron's port facility and then turn the Fortress's guns on, and achieve, lever orbital supremacy that way... also the electronics would be useful there for other reasons. That was why he was aboard the Eisenhower, and not commanding BattleMechs from the frontline.

Orbital supremacy regardless of how it was achieved would then let them bring San Saba and their armor assets down deploying, and that would allow them also to reinforce the Magunac forces that would be in the first wave.

This was not a knife fight... he didn't know what the Capellans were thinking. Invading Dieron to try and steal it from the Davions was lunacy... and almost certainly they had to know that even if they took it somehow they'd have to fight the Combine coming. Whatever insanity it was, it was not some periphery world where you could lay claim to it by landing a couple lances and declaring yourself, or your overlord to be in charge and so forth.

Dieron had been a part of the Lone Star Province. It had been a Hegemony world.

He tapped his foot at the thought, maybe that was it.

He looked at the blue holographic globe. The small craft moving to impound the now blackout dark capellan JumpShips. Tiny dots whose labels were bigger than they were on the astrograph. The lead and trailing four thousand ton dropships accelerating.

Did the Capellans have telemetry? Surely they had to have some kind of sensors pointed towards the JumpPoints. But did they realize what they were looking at. The two four thousand tonners would be crossing six Gees of thrust. They were already above the maximum thrust of the slightly smaller Unions.

"Start a clock, once Hedgwig starts her attack run, I want the wasps standing by to launch." He ordered leaning against the console, and against the restraints. The Eisenhower was fast but she wouldn't be able to catch them... but then that wasn't the point. She'd launch her air wing to assist the initial attack, because regardless of how fast the attackers could turn, they were probably going to overshoot the enemy in the pass and then turn to make a second rear pass. He himself couldn't be entirely sure how they were going to handle this.
--
It was over quickly... not that there had been much for him to direct.

The actual fighting phase of a naval engagement was usually minutes, if that. In the time it had taken for the Capellans to realize they were under attack it had already been too late. Awareness was king of the battlefield and the zoom and boom of the two four thousand ton DropShips had done enough damage as to degrade the invader's ability to get back into the loop. They were stuck trying to respond to things that had already happened.

They hadn't been ready for the second wave. Or the third. Eisenhower's safe thrust was far less than the first wave ships a third her mass, and the Drosts massing each fifty three hundred tons were in the same acceleration profile as the larger DropShip. It was a pity that they only carried two fighters apiece, but that didn't matter with the Eisenhower's own complement.

Looking at one expanding cloud of debris in the upper reaches of Dieron's orbitals, and another which was descending into the moon of Nebulous's gravity well they were now into the next phase of the operation. Recovery of their fighters and standing by to make planetfall.

Hedwig and Braunfelds, her trailing consort, would have to remain on station. He wasn't about to risk the two DropSHips bringing them down and back up through the atmosphere. The three DroSTs would descend first.

Dieron was a lovely world, highly mountainous topography meant that while over half the planet's surface was covered in ocean it was prone to swathes of savannah and steppe as arid and semi arid zones were abounded by the rising mountain heights.

This was the second time he was getting to visit... and the second time he'd been here for work rather than pleasure.

Gene highlighted the landing zone displays. "Once our ground forces land to establish our beachhead we will hail the planetary governor, and then once San Saba begins offload we will offer the Capellans the opportunity to surrender."

He had a speech written for the occasion... well speech was probably stretching it.... and written was an exageration... it was more of a statement.. and some of it was a little boilerplate and old fashioned.

There was a flicker of static from Baffin's connection. "Do you think they'll take it?"

Gene shrugged, "We have established orbital supremacy and impounded their JumpShips, but we will have a better picture of the situation once we make planetfall." They had feed from the ongoing situation where the Davion forces were defending against the attack... but they'd only been in place on the world for a couple of months and there was no planetary militia to support them.

It was Dieron, that was the world that had cemented their reputation. From a regional perspective, and in terms of opposition faced, Elidere would be more impressive to the denizens and patriots of the Draconis March, but the he supposed First Battle of Dieron of 3018 had flipped a world, and now in this second one they would need to insure it remained as a part of the Federated Suns.

He tapped manipulating the complex communications suit as it transmitted collated battle group data. The Kazakh river highlighted to his subordinate commands, specifically projecting a compiled landing and attack corridor that they hadn't used.

... during first battle he had been perhaps near paranoid about the prospect of Fortress Dieron's surface to orbital systems ... or really anything else associated with the facility coming online so they had avoided approaching it until later There was also the fact that the combined invasion had required striking multiple combine targets so they had landed well north of the river, and other Davion troops had landed originally to their west.

Bardiche, and Claymore's landing zones were almost exactly opposite of where they had landed in terms of which side of the lake to which the Kharkiv river flowed into. More useful was that the river flowed into the lake's southern portions and so the two delivering Overlord dropships would have a greater degree of geographic protection as they offloaded the two Mech Battalions

"The capellan dragoons are probably," well were, he supposed. "The exact opposite of what we fought against in the Sword of Light. They have supporting ASF and combined arms," San Saba would need to offload the AAA as soon as possible, but more than that they needed to be prepared to face enemy armor rather than just Mech Jocks... not that he phrased it like that, "We're looking at a combination of light and medium mechs."

"A whole lot of vindicators down there." Septim quipped in return. True, but not limited to those. Firestarters, Javelins, Clints, Cicadas were all present. Out of the two battalions there were a few Catapults and Victors but that was the extent to heavier machines. "Seriously its like these assholes were sent on a suicide mission."

Gene blinked, Septim blanched at the profanity laden outburst over the regiment staff wide comment. The Lyran seemed to realize that they weren't the tiny scratch company any more.

That wasn't why he was surprised... "You may be on to something." Why would the capellans make this gamble... unless they were rolling the dice to see what the davions would do... and of course the capellans had had no idea that they'd just stumble into their invasion either.."

--
Whoops is an ... alternate timeline, well its an alternate future of the primary canon timeline where the HPG network dies early.

Also as I have been reminded before their destruction during the Hegemony campaign Robinson was host to the 100th BattleMech Division, interestingly their garrison doesn't seem to be mentioned on Robinson's page which is odd. Or I missed it.)253rd Mechanized Infantry Division was based on Kestrel.

Somewhat annoyingly, the 101st Jump Infantry Division was based on Armington on the border with the Taurians. [They'll come up later in the main timeline, besides just having been referenced on Aquagea.]

Dieron hosted the 138th BMD, and Nirasaki hosted the 26th MID. (Which is odd because the provincial capital of Lone Star doesn't at this time (the 2760s) have any major postings, and Outreach on the other side of Terra is hosting the 56th Royal JID.)

Anyway, as I've mentioned this week's planned update, including Sunday are a break from the usual schedule, we should return to something approaching normal ... ish Monday. So Sunday this 'alternate timeline' / alternate future will resume, and actually on that note, I should point out that originally this was not going to be the next segment of Whoops to go up, as this jumps from the New Kyoto's departure (part four) to the arrival to Dieron.

And anyway so this is an alternate timeline, this portion of Whoops establishes well 'modern dieron', and the eventual Lone Star March of the Federated Commonwealth, early compared to its investment and development in the main timeline. Next time Gene doesn't actually expect the Capellans to surrender but offers them the chance anyway, and we also might introduce a crazy person before they show up in the main timeline. More to the point Dieron II marks a transitional in Whoops of more sedate well not slice of life per se, but more of an established we're staying here for a while series of snippets. /disclaimer / excuses out of the way.

Imperator Pax · Jul 24, 2022

Whoops II Dieron

Fortress Dieron occupied... at least two thirds of the internal volume of Mount Shanyu... and the mountain was not small by Dieron standards... which was a planet famous for its mountains. There was room for four regiments of battlemech troops plus their support. This meant it did not technically count as a Castle Brian. It was technically a variant of an Outpost Castle.... of course as a part of Lone Star Province Dieron in the Hegemony era had already played host to a number of full scale castle brians.

Fortress Dieron was ... unique for reasons other than its size... certainly there was little unique by hegemony and DOME standards of its construction... but it was still a comfortable place to be... better than the garish abomination the combine had turned one of the SLDF redoubts up north into...

He shook his head and placed his hand on the screen authorizing the access into the facility's heart, much as he had to authorize access to the Northwind castle. That reminded him of hte details of the castle. In 2841 the apparent surviving hegemony admiral ... or at least CID naval officer had access the facility ahead of the Davion conquest of Northwind... and he had done so with a body of picked men.

At the time it hadn't stood out. He'd earmarked their files for future reading... but it hadn't immediately jumped out that a Major Hallis had to have been born after the Exodus, especially given his 331st Division credentials. It had taken him longer to process that, and that same, then a captain, had been with Clancy accessing Dieron a decade earlier.

"Greetings commander." The AI remarked amicably as the great doors sealed behind him. "I admit, I did not predict your return this quickly." For whatever reason Fortress Dieron... actually now that he thought about it basing the planet's CID main building separate from the larger castles and in a facility with its own surface to orbit batteries was precisely in line with the Hegemony's thinking... but unlike the facilities manned by regular league troops the castle had had an AI, while the Brians had not... well excepting their SDS connection...

He nodded, presumably the AI had cameras and could intuit the response, but more on reflex, and listened as the machine spirit told him what he could about the development of the situation... apparently the surprise third party attack by the capellans had caught the AI as off guard. Apparently no one had mounted a really credible threat to Dieron in at least recent memory, nothing since maybe even the second succession war.

"I need you to make copies of the database, and then evaluate the incoming information from it." Gene stated, "We will start tasking for dealing with the capellans." ... but the database was more than just CID files... the files that they had originally gone to get. There was more now, even without countenancing the clusterfuck of the HPG network... and he needed the AI to number crunch the diagnostics for that as well.
--
With security of the system in hand the enemy JumpShips secured, and orbital dominance in place it was time to move on to the next stage. He tapped the console and initiated the Regimental Combat Management System. Had he been expected to do more he'd have considered using the Devestator, or one of the other hundred tonners, but the truth was he needed access to his command mech, and the Marauder II lacked the League era complex electronics suite and software.

... and he had a speech to given, even if technically it would be reverberating planet wide through a combination of orbital transmission and the planetary data net. A signal strength indicator turned green, and the AI signaled optimal broadcast... they should be able to override basically any receiver on the planet, and make the invading Capellans listen. "Capellan Forces, This is Colonel Gene Shepherd," It was actually a plus the Capellans didn't have generals anymore otherwise they might have considered it odd to have a force of this size, in this configuration under a single colonel... or not. "I command the Davion relief forces that have arrived on planet. My fleet assets have impounded your JumpShips, and achieved orbital supremacy. You are outnumbered, and outgunned, surrender now and you will be accorded the full status and rights enshrined under the Ares Conventions."

He ignored the AI pointing out that the Ares Conventions had been formally renounced by the successor states at the onset of the first succession war. He made a point of at least offering the enemy the chance to surrender.

... but if they didn't well.

A grizzled looking scottsman appeared. "The bastards will never take it. The Cappellans would sooner kill their wives and young 'uns and then themselves than surrender to us round eyed devils." He grunted.

"That may be, but I'm obliged to offer them the chance."

The bearded twenty stone highlander pilot shrugged. "Claymore is in position, and standing by." Bardiche's staff officer relayed similar readiness. That tracked with the indicators on the holographic globe within his Marauder, and the projected readiness estimates.

What the enemy were unlikely to suspect were the mobility through the Hegemony era transportation grids under the surface. The Hegemony in its vanity had alternated between surface rails for 'scenic' purposes and travel... and larger bulk transport and ... pedestrian transit out of sight and out of mind. With as significant as Dieron's mountains were underground tunnels were expansive, and would have been cost prohibitive on a newer colonized world, but not for an original colony so close to Terra.

As a Terran based castle outpost Fortress Dieron not only had the GCV complement but wings of addition Mk 39 Voidseeker variants... and he was counting on that element of surprise to strike hard and fast before they moved to catch the capellan dragoons in the fields north of the river, and south of San Martin.

Projected data tables estimated how long the Capellans could potentially remain in the field as combat effective units, estimates on how long they could last, projected maneuvers. At the end of the day though the plan was simple, deploy and envelop the capellans into a pocket or ideally pockets between their forces and the Davion garrison at San Martin

The first stage would be a prepatory bombardment relying on orbital telemetry provided by Hedwig and Braunfels up high. He wondered if the capellans would realize that that dropships in orbit were spotting for on call artillery.

"I've identified the remaining enemy dropships." The AI remarked highlight the targets. The goal was to use artillery to break up the enemy's force strength into more manageable penny packets, and then attack, cutting the enemy from their dropships would be part and parcel for that.
--
It was a miracle.

The Governor General had no other way to describe it outside of providential terms, and the MIIO officer had to concur. Mitchell had no reason to, no evidence to suggest ComStar was lying about their status... they could have been, but it seemed very unlikely that they would have beamed a message out and not told them...

... though perhaps if they weren't sure it had gotten through that might have explained not admitting to it... but even then. Mitchell spared a glance to his DMI equivalent, Alexei Cherenkov. The two competing at times federated suns intelligence services had both been caught flat foot by the collapse of the HPG network, it was true that there were courier networks to ferry information via DropShip but they hadn't sent word.

"He'd have to have been a jump away."

Mitchell nodded, "And with drives ready to jump." To the best of his knowledge the mercenaries weren't under contraction with House Davion either... though, if someone had managed to jump system they could have retained them he supposed. It was all speculation. Mitchell wondered idly if this wasn't his boss's doing, had the prince's champion had contingencies in place... not hinging on the HPG network failing of course, that was absurd, but to defend Dieron if it was counter invaded by the Combine, and the Capellans were close enough. "Either way, the Capellans have refused to surrender." And now were enduring a similar withering barrage of artillery as the Galedon regulars had suffered at Elidere, or the Sun Zhang cadets had faced further west before facing Shepherd's highlanders on the lakeshore.

As it was those same highlanders were now sweeping wide right towards the capellan dragoons probably looking to catch the enemy company that had been split off before it could rejoin its fellows. The CMM troops defending the capital city of San Martin.

"I would say this is exactly like Elidere,' Cherenkov remarked. "Not that we are outnumbered, but that the regiment is maneuvering independent of planetary leadership. The Governor General's face twisted up a little at the bluntness of the statement. "In addition of course to the body of armor and artillery supporting the BattleMech offensive." The BattleMech was the dominant combat arm, regardless of the need for infantry to hold ground the BattleMech as a single unit provided the blend of speed and firepower to dominate the battlefield.

Of all of the Successor States this accepted wisdom that you needed a battlemech to beat a battlemech was most strongly, the 'cult of the mechwarrior', the Capellans had been the ones to codify the Lorix Creed celebrating the Mechwarrior and battlemech as the pinnacle of warfare. If that were true the clashing battalions of walking warmachines were demonstrating another truism as well bigger was usually better.

... and that it helped to have friends regardless of how big you were, Mitchell mused.

"yes well," The Governor General humphed, "At least the citizenry is remaining calm after the initial scare." There had been some concerns about how the populous would react if the Combine attacked, but the prospect of a Capellan really had not been planned. There were four, Capellan, worlds that the Capellans could have made the jump from to attack Dieron... so not thinking about it had in hindsight been an oversight. "Still he seems to have arrived with substantial reinforcements. The armor veterans from Elidere, do you think?"

"He was planning to hire in Lyran space." Cherenkov replied. "But it is possible, or he just went and opened another star league cache." The DMI officer remarked.

It could easily have been all of them. The bulk of the armor force that had fought at Elidere and Ander's Moon had just disappeared seemingly into the Aether after, most likely travelling with the IE expedition for security... but if that were the case they hadn't followed them to Bristol from the reports he'd seen... and it seemed unlikely they would have been missed there. Had they reunited in Lyran space... or were these Lyran hires... or

... what exactly?
--

Notes: So leaving aside this is actually shorter than I originally planned, thats due to weighin how much I wanted to reference for the up coming main timeline:

Bardiche, and Claymore are mech Battalions drawn from Rasalhague (and other combine dissidents/ unproductives) and Northwind Highlander pops respectively. The Maguanac Corp is also a battalion level formation though in square configuration being one battlemech company and three vehicle company in a rapid roll on roll off dropship package, and also with significant infantry in its deployment. Then in theory you have Baffins, and San Saba forming a similar square battalion but without that infantry being a BattleMech Company with the Triumph class's vehicle complement, but in a much more conventionally mercenary package.

The first three units all basically have as battalions unique ethnic cultural identies.

Space Swede-ish sort ofs, Highlanders, Azami

and in the Alter context, in the Context of Whoops as a timeline this is relatively important in the political / noble / feudal hiearchy sense down the road. That applies to the main timeline as well. Notably we are leaving units out because spoilers for the main timeline, even though I think Ive mentioned it related for

Also cookie to anyone who has figured out Naval naming conventions that Gene is using to name things in general. There are specific conventions for JumpShips, Carrier dropship classes (that will / should become apparent later), Standard DropShips, and Assault DropShips.

We will return to regular timeline updates Sunday.

Imperator Pax · Jul 29, 2022

Whoops
II Dieron

The Magunac Tactical Groups were petite battalions derived from Star League era organizational systems, combined arms and reliability. They were small combined arms battalion level units, Company Task Force would have been an equally valid description except for the DropShips vital involvement in each TG. The DroST IIA variant was at its heart an old venerable and well understood design. The core of the Tactical Group was its Vehicle Company of two light vehicle platoons, and one heavy. Ten platoons of infantry could offload from the DropShip or mount in the light vehicles. A lance of mechs, and two ASF rounded out.

The DroST and its complement were something that could be sustained even if the Combine logistics were feeling particularly scroogish in supporting Azami raiders. It could similarly be maintained where battlemech parts were lacking, far out in the periphery.

Specialist units he had detached out of the main command after they had added seventy new mechwarriors on Northwind. Bardiche and Claymore represented the main offensive power of the company, and both Mech Battalions were going to need to undergo refit after this... or at least after they'd secured a landhold and permanent employment with House Davion. The fire support lances from both battalions were a mix of archers and catapults, who were now entering the range to engage effectively.

They would assist 'Hawks in the vanguard from both battalions, and give hunchbacks time to trundle forward. In between forming the core of both battalions were Dervishes and Centurions. The two primary mechs forming the battle line companies respectively had different engagement and logistical ends. The Davions and their love of auto cannons created tail requirements.

Gene navigated the displays with his mind, but he only needed to command the Battalion level formations, who could then dispatch the companies, who would direct lances into final position before the breakthrough.

He wasn't all together surprised that the Dragoons hadn't accepted the surrender. Intercepted comms traffic suggested they didn't quite believe his statement about having destroyed their naval assets... there were still a series of signals being shot into orbit near the moons looking for their dropships...

His map refreshed. Bardiche in Blue had executed its leapfrog, and were now swinging into the flank. The Highlanders of Claymore painted in the Gray White terran indicator colors had moved to their bingo way point for the maneuver, and that should from their orbital telemetry mean he could order the Maguanac's to execute their breakthrough operation.
--
San Martin was the original Terran name of the capital. That it remained was a demonstration of how little investment Dieron had in the Combine despite how good the planet had had its living conditions relative to tea plantation on another world.

The capital based and thus largest planetary news network had had no trouble at all in the change of leadership, and was providing live reports from the front, with more aplomb about supporting House Davion over the invading Liao troops. Students from the University of Dieron crowded to watch the holographic projectors as new footage piped in.

"B-roll" somebody muttered in Terran derivative english.

The date was hours, several days really, old showing arriving dropships moving past shattered debris hulks of ASF, and opposing Capellan dropships. Painted in what someone from the History department of the University of Dieron would later tell her was the Lone Star Ensign, and in Terran Hegemony Colors were two Pentagon-class Assault DropShips moving to greet a Titan-class DropShip that bore the name Eisenhower along its prow. It was new footage to her however, B roll or not.

The speech which followed was not. She had heard it over the radio before.

She already knew from broadcasts ongoing that the Capellans hadn't accepted the extended offer to surrender. The Davion newscasters of course had mad sure that everyone listening knew that these were the same 'mercenaries' who had liberated the planet from the combine.
--
Gene had taken one of the Hegemony rail lines abandoned laying dormant for centuries but still functional thanks to ragnarok proofing, ferrocrete supports, and organic super lubricants to join the front. The Mag tube had actually deposited him, and the force of Mechs, and armor north of the Kazakh river, and more importantly to the east of San Martin.

A position that it was unlikely the Capellans expected to face significant resistance. The Davion garrison wasn't minimal but it was also defending... no doubt hoping that the occupation forces dug in, largely Mechanized Infantry would deter a head on assault, or at least blunt a full frontal assault enough to let their limited mech forces destroy the attackers as they were bogged down.

He cued the mike, and confirmed pairing to the Davion Tactical Net. Apparently the Davions hadn't expected him to finish encircling the attacking Capellans either. Confident that the Davions weren't going to start shooting at his armor, or his fellow BattleMechs he maneuvered the GCV hovercraft into the nest of foot hills... and for the set piece battle which would settle this.

TAG relayed active data of Vindicators approaching their possition their jumpjets a blinking beacon on termals as they crested small hills, and bounded up rises. ... not yet though. He wanted them closer, to make the most of that first volley, before they swung in to finish this wing of the enemy.

A sudden packet of traffic flashed through the network all at once, and then it was on. The Capellans had been acting odd for the last two days anyway... as if when their momentum had broken ... breaking the loop had caught them somewhere between orienting to the new threat and actually deciding what to do, and that preventing them from acting in a concentrated formation wide maneuver.

... Davion reinforcements shouldn't have been that much of a such. Even accounting the limits of FtL travel he would have assumed that the Capellans should have been able to make a regiment wide decision, even if it wasn't to surrender. It would have been better if they had surrendered, but neither the Combine, nor the Capellans now seemed to give much lip service to the rules of war.

Gene had been told more than once, by more than that was just how things had been... but there was a difference between academically knowing something.

... and watching yet another banzai charge into machine guns and inferno SRMs.

Was their high command really that much more scary?

--
Really the maneuvering to battle had taken longer than the actual engagements. The fact of it all, was that the second battle of Dieron of the year 3018, in the autumn of that year had come just before the rainy season had begun and for all intents and purposes was less climactic than the battle in the spring. The newscasters were claiming it showed that Dieron was now a Federated Suns planet, that it would be defended against aggressors, predators of the other successor states.

For Gene they had achieved the Operation objectives, and thus they needed to move on to Strategic level ones. "MacIntyre I need you to go with Pasha," It shouldn't have come as a surprise to anyone on the staff that he was sending the Highlander along.

The HPG network was still reported to be non functional, which the AI deep within Fortress Dieron now considered unlikely. Dieron's HPG hadn't burned itself out, though the ones on Terra had apparently... which meant the network's problems were probably at a management level. Surely ComStar could make their own ticket to fame and power, right? Whatever the case it seemed as if the HPG network probably wasn't working because something in the first circuit was broken and they were trying to get Terra at least back up and running.

... they must not have succeeded since the last jumpship from Terra had been ferrying mail.

Which was what Pasha was going to be doing. They had impounded the Capellan JumpShips as well, and Pasha would be leading the little flotilla back to Northwind, but it would still take three months to get to New Avalon. Robinson was closer, but not by much. Not close enough really to warrant that. The Fax Machines would help them stay in touch.... but those were limited to a hundred light years in range transmission and took time to cross that. Not Ideal, but it was what they had. After it was how they new that Rasalhague and the Aazami, along with other disaffected groups in the Combine had risen in revolt.

They needed to get ahold of the First Prince, or more likely his delegate the prince's Champion. Sending what amounted to a feudal mission to New Avalon was really their best option.
--
Notes: This is the shorter conclusion sans well most of the shooting, but really what I cut was Mydno and Mori's prescence from all but entirely except for the tiny snippet at University at Dieron's quad as a spacer.

Sunday we will resume the standard timeline, and next week hopefully settle into a regular schedule of updates.

Imperator Pax · Dec 8, 2022

Scrap Highland Faire Alternate

[NON CANON, ALTERNATE ft Wolf Dragoons]

He had barely gotten the announcement of the arriving drop ships when time seemed to slow. He didn't see the muzzle flash.

The round cracked high, but not so off that he didn't realize that it had been aimed in his general direction. The report of the gun discharging wasn't all that missed by any one else either, because people immediately started making noise and scuffling. Gene did the only option readily available to him. His hand reaching over to grab and pull the countess of Kestrell into the cockpit so he could button the Marauder up as a second round pinged on the hangar ceiling.

A thought through his neuro helmet the Hegemony built 'circlet' he wore brought pneumatic hiss as the cockpit ceiled and the hundred ton Marauder's running lights initiated on the machine. There was obviously a scuffle ongoing in the crowd... even if this had been his other mech he wouldn't have had the resources to get involved.

Being able to maybe bring a hand in and gently brush people out of the way sounded easy up until you actually tried to do it in real life with a hundred ton warmachine.

Alexandria Cunningham huffed. Then composing herself as best she could posed the question, "A saboteur? Assassin?"

"Either or." He replied. He was a little alarmed at the thoroughness Dante had penetrated the planet wide data nets, but then he supposed he really shouldn't have been. Especially since they were within the castle's above ground 'facade'... the zone of defense on the surface.

"one of the Highlanders?"

That was denonynm of choice. Northwind was the planet, and apparently as part of the scots & irish diaspora it had at some point become the popular opinion that all scots were highlanders. There were highland units in every successor state, and probably all or nearly so all of the periphery nations worth naming, even the Canopians had a Highland Regiment during the star league, and presumably still did. Not that he'd seen them when they'd been there

He blinked rewinding the machine's forward camera's footage because he surely couldnt' figure out what was going on in the now completely insane melee going on twenty feet from the exterior of the mech. "No, I don't think so. One of the suits." Which told him nothing. Well it told him that it probably wasn't a highlander they were all in kilts... but the shock alert of sudden jump traffic. "Campbell," He growled keying the mike with pressure, "Get to a mech. Cameron, Chang, Mechs Now."

It was doubtful that there were hostile mechs in bound... but it wasn't impossible there were several full size regiments on the planet. Never mind much smaller merc units visiting and rubbing elbows... it wouldn't be impossible... but it was doubtful... but better safe than sorry. That was why he needed Campbell in a mech. The highlander had local credentials, and had valid Hegemony credentials he knew about Dante, and while they could play the AI off as another Highlander he wanted to be careful about that in general... but someone had just taken a shot at him after announcing the arriving JumpShips.

"Commander I am still resolving telemetry." He could almost imagine Dante grumbling about how slow response times must have seemed... whether that was in comparison to real hegemony era times, or simply an illusion of the suddenness of the potential of the attack dropping in on them. "Resolving." The AI repeated mechanically. "Track. Projecting." He ticked off.

Holographic displays altered as DropShips were confirmed to be separating from the JumpShips.

--
The would be combine spy slash assassin who had botched his shot had assumed, apparently, just from the read off of two star lords and a host of others ... well he had simply assumed that any such incursion had to have been his own home state. He had ended up with a concussion and had been taken into custody by Davion authorities... and no Combine invasion manifested.

... this was honestly probably worse.

Gene cracked his neck to the side and pulled the noteputer out.

"Yeah," He replied.

"So is there a cache here?"

Given the situation, "Its a hegemony world, I would assume that every Cameron who ever ruled stockpiled materiel at some point during their reign." Love that Military Industrial Complex, and the appropriations budget. "We're already hitting manpower problems, but I'd be astonished if there wasn't something here. It would take time." He trailed off.

"And we are already on a schedule, and facing enough trouble keeping it." Yvonne remarked shutting the door at the opposite end of the room sealing what should have been a 'secure' room. Of course they shouldn't have let him keep the noteputer either if they were going to claim it was a secure meeting, but this had been a part of the planetary governor's office in the era of the Hegemony. It wasn't properly, didn't neatly fit in the SLDF roster of things... and that was before you added the two centuries of rule.

He looked at the holographic tracks... "There is something else you should know." The holographic globe in the room wobbled, for lack of a better description. Dante making corrections and updates to the telemetry, or maybe the AI assumed he was about to disclose his existence to the Davions, which was something apparently that the last hegemony officer hadn't done.

"Something else?"

Gene glanced towards the Brevet General, who slid the noteputer over, "From the Regiments Historical Archives, Field Marshal."

"We've discussed this but given the situation we need to contend with the fact that's as they are that the Wolfs Dragoons are not simply descendants of Kerensky's Exodus, but also only a portion of them. Given their demonstrated ability to rearm and repair the units with trips out into the black, I would assume they likely never lost the ability to manufacture JumpShips, or suffered a reduction in rate." ... not the least of which was that was likely to be the case because they'd probably folded up the black box automated shipyards that came on SLDF fleet tenders that allowed them to rebuild warship drives in the field... but that was neither here nor there... not time for that... one thing at a time... "Tara is looking at five mech regiments coming down."

"Yes, which is why I wanted to know if there are caches here. If we need to rebuild combat losses quickly."

The holographic globe bubbled again. "Northwind castle is N001." He paused, and realized that that meant nothing, "Given Rim World bombardment of the planet, and weather changes we would need time to excavate."

"Labor isn't a problem."

He would have felt so much better if that had been a Highlander official volunteering the planet's work force rather than the Prince's Champion... but given the situation they didn't have the option to be picky. Even if his next meeting was probably with the Highlander clan elders

In the history books, and the news casts, and the official stories that would be told about the Battle of Northwind House Marik's decision to attack the planet, was just a typical successor state strategic blunder. It was a raid in force aimed at making house Davion look back, it was a raid aimed at potentially rustling valuable materiel from the planet. It, so much like the Elidere campaign, had been aimed officially at simply continuing the succession wars in the way the third had settled out.

That drew comparisons to the unofficial story. The rumors. That like Elidere was rumored to be that the raid on Elidere IV, like errai and other worlds the Galedon Regulars had been raiding was aimed at more than just modern stockpiles of materiel. The rumor became that House Marik suspected that House Davion had planned to excavate Star League depots on Northwind like they had done on Robinson, and on Elidere. It assigned a prescient forethought to House Marik based on things 'known' after.

The centerpiece of the invasion looked set on putting Alpha of the Wolf Dragoons up against the Davion Heavy Guards, Delta up against the New Avalon Hussars, Gamma facing the Blue Star Irregulars, and Epsilon as the regiment facing the 3rd Regimental Combat team.

That created a problem, as the Dragoons were coming down with additional dropships that while likely included armor and infantry was also likely including additional Mech assets. This was not, as history would prove, be a short battle... and on a scale that was unusual for the third succession war.
--
The big regiments, and regimental combat teams were going to fight one another. No complaints there. It did create other problems in that if this went bad it would make carrying out an invasion of Dieron much much dicier... but for the moment they had their own invasion to fight off. Or at least their part in the defense.

"Shouldn't we have more time?"

"No, the dragoons are going to have a very narrow window to safely decelerate," And as it was what they were doing was extremely risky anyway, "I suspect we will see a significant combat force launch orbital drops and try and directly engage units near or at their landing zones," before they could bring anything to bear at any one landing.

The next things to land would most likely be Union-class Dropships. The problem with that was that said unions seemed to have been the sort that managed to cram fifteen mechs, three groups of five, into them...which probably made the Unions even worse, but would mean disgorging a larger force than the average expectation.

Not that three extra mechs should have been a real difference but if you had ten unions disgorging three extra mechs a piece that was two and a half companies extra... and unfortunately the Dragoons were precisely the sort of people who had those kind of numbers... which gave him a headache just thinking about it.

If this was as it appeared five mech regiments, plus at least another battalion of mechs, that was a birgade by itself, never mind whatever armor they were bringing to this dance. "I mean on the bright side the Dragoons are really good about not involving civilians." Beau added from within his Dervish.

Gene blew out a breath, "Yeah, so I've been told." He was sitting inside of the cockpit of the Devestator, painfully aware that he was in a mech in Royal parade colors, and cognizant of how limited his Gauss rifles had ammunition .. but there were ppcs to back them up when he ran out of ammo.

"You didn't say what we're digging out." Beau remarked.

"Its a Terran Hegemony ready reserve facility. Its a Port type facility that contains an embark and local command post."

"So like Robinson."

"No. Well, yes... but no." He replied checking his scopes. "That was Brian Cache, this is a port," He could see even through the Fishbowl that the Free Worlds League native's eyebrows were moving, "... this facility will contain deployment ports for Hegemony ground combat support assets, GCVs that I will be bringing on line and forming the defensive embankment to protect the academy." The Military Academy on Northwind, "That should slow down any Dragoon advance that makes planet fall in this area."

He was stopped from having to explain drones, by Cameron interjecting that the DMM troops were settling into their positions. "Plan to drop artillery on their landing positions?"

... he thought about the chaparrals and their limited reserves of Arrow IV missiles.... "If the opportunity presents itself yes." Dante updated orbital traffic. "Orbital drop pods confirmed, stand by for relay of projected course." His hands rested back on the yokes as his connection to the machine synched against the mental engram, "ICH DIEN." He intoned and brought the machine to active from standby, there was a hum as the VLAR 300 XL spun up and transferred motive power, and to the capacitors. Reds turned to green on his heads up display

The Devastator had unfortunately not been designed to carry the complex regimental command and control software of a dedicated Command BattleMech, which was a pity. The truth was the Dalban HiRez was sort of spoiling of a pilot in terms of the information it provided a capable user. He reached up and took the Norse Storm produced Gauss Rifles off of safe.

"Commander I can confirm descent by assault, and heavy BattleMechs consistent with Dragoon formations. I bringing the remainder of active surface defense batteries online and relaying trajectory to defense units." What on the display were being cross painted in Terran Militia, and House Davion colors. "Fury interlinks are online and standing by."

Unlike with Tristan Dante had lost almost his entire complement of drones against the invading rimworld forces. There were still drones in hangars but most were small anti personnel or surveillance systems. The simple reality was that the Rim World's Orbital strikes had large obliterated Hegemony positions when it was clear that ground fighting wasn't going to be effective at dislodging them.

... which he supposed was another small mercy... at least the Dragoons hadn't started this show by nuking them from orbit... that was a plus.

He swapped out from command line to his personnel frequency with the AI. "Any of the Brian Caches yet?"

"Still cross checking returns." What that really meant was having drones physically inspect caches that were known to exist. Unfortunately that ran into a problem... rather obviously while Northwind had such caches the highlanders had opened them to fight Amaris, the SLDF had used them to restock in the liberation campaign, and Admiral Clancy had probably dipped into them as well, coupled with likely the Highlanders themselves using some of the reserves over the intervening century as the third succession war had dragged on. "Harlaw," Modern Harlaugh, "Looks to be the most promising in terms of proximity."

More distantly facilities on other continents might still be operational, and less touched, but accessing them right now was out of the question. They needed material that could be brought up and replace combat losses against the invaders... and well the reason other continents would have had been less touched were the consequences of how thorough Amaris's attacks on the civilian population centers had been.

Field Marshal Davion within Northwind Castle came over the line. "They're here."

"Yes ma'am." He replied, and unfortunately it looked as if this wave of Dragoons were going to came straight through rockridge and through Harlaugh aiming probably for N001 and preumably a decapitation strike. ... the irony being of course that that would have been his preferred strike against Dieron .. and he supposed if he'd been in their position.
--
Notes: So this is one of the non canon alternate versions of the end of Higland 9 (b), so basically Highland 10 (a) alternate this is non canon, this based off of the Dragoons get sent to invade. If of course this were the canonical route this would be itself roughly comparable in length to Elidere (and thus much longer than the three segments I have for it).

There is this, which is the abridged contact in this segment there the next one (b) which deals with Zeta, and Kerensky, and then (c) would conclude with consequences with the lead out / fade to black of putting things back on track for the invasion of dieron.

Imperator Pax · Dec 9, 2022

Scrap Highland Faire Alternate

[NON CANON, ALTERNATE ft Wolf Dragoons]
Scrap Highland Faire Dragoons (b)

Gene tapped his foot within the cockpit of the hundred ton battlemech, "Fascam?" He inquired resisting the urge to adjust temperature control.

Standing for Field Artillery Scatterable Mines were cluster munitions deployed from air bursting artillery shells typically in the 155mm, range and upwards. They were ancient weapons... but now were the long forgotten relics somehow of time of the Terran Hegemony ... and thus it was unlikely that the enemy would expect them. Whatever the case they were part of a strategy to force the enemy to attack through known paths, prepared defenses, or force them to attrit themselves before even contacting with Davion defenders.

... and when the history books would be written, when stories told of one of the last great battles of the late third succession war by the official historians like those members of House Auburn of the Commonwealth... they were the sort of operational, and tactical measures and means that would be glossed over, forgotten about in favor of lurid and sometimes apocryphal accounts of the exchanges between great sweeping formations.

Those apocryphal stories, those were better suited to propaganda, to trivid blockbusters that would define popular memory of the battle of Northwind.

"Deployed. Minefields active." The AI replied. Dante was keeping track of the Unions preparing to breach the atmosphere. A glaring digital countdown filled a corner. Estimates plots Overlord-class, and other dropships were also included. Highlighted among those plots were what had at one point been SLDF Lion-class DropShips but seemed to have been modified, and then modified again in such a way that was returning a slew of computer errors in drive registry. The overlords, and unions weren't nearly as butchered so it was possible that whatever the Dragoons had had to do to the Lions were a byproduct of an issue with the original SLDF lions... or not... there was no way to be sure. "I tally four Hostile BattleMech companies."

"Four?"

He received confirmation... and then identification of two separate Command level elements. Unusual... but given the situation what could you really hope to call normal? The first was obviously delineated into an assault weighted battalion command, they were identifying a colonel commanding the unit then three companies under. The second line of command contacts was a reinforced company and its command structure.

It was data.

He suspected that Beta regiment was being held in reserve. It was supposed to be similar in composition to Jaime Wolf's alpha regiment, a jack of all trades line unit... and most likely they were being kept a little further back in order to reinforce any potential break through. The other possibility is that Beta was going to be kept in reserve until the others deployed and attempt to execute and exploit while the large regular formations were committed.

If, and when they deployed the plan was to commit Highland regiments being held in reserve, marked on their maps as Terran Hegemony Militia... but that was going to be chancy. The clans of Northwinds home guards were well armed by Inner Sphere standards but it was still a dicey proposition. The Wolfs Dragoons reputation was also in play as while many small and medium merc companies were on planet few if any had the resources or the structure to be meaningfully folded into a coherent defensive command on such short notice.
--
Jaime Wolf was not happy per se about the situation they found themselves. He could definitely see where Janos Marik was related to his brother beyond the physical resemblance... the problem was not as pronounced in the carrion lord as the younger brother, and would be usurper had been but the whisperings of sycophants had quickly inflated the 'captain general' of the Free Worlds League opinion of the 'brilliance' of a stray thought.

So that was why they were attacking Northwind.

Attacking Northwind in a sudden pivot from where they had previously been raiding the Lyran Commonwealth... he supposed the other alternative would have been the Free World's League directing them to attack the massive factories of Hesperus.

At least they would be respecting a respecting opposition. As a clan warrior Jaime looked forward to accepting challenge from the defenders... and indeed on both sides descendants of the Star League Defense Forces stood arrayed. This would be worthy of remembrance. He would surely include the data here to the next... and likely need to be very soon... report to the clans and their khans.

--
The radio crackled and echoed over the thunder storm.

"Battlecry. Battlecry."

And with that contact sounded across the line. IT was about three thirty in the morning and that had further degraded their visibility beyond the already poor conditions from the growing thunderstorm inundating Tara.

How that was going to effect the Regimental Combat Teams engagement he wasn't sure. The problem was that despite no longer being in organization Light Horse units they were still closer to that than was probably ideal to face an attacking Dragoon formation. The entire dragoon concept had after all the independent version of the main breakthrough element... Kerston had organic assets hopefully that would help.

Gene confirmed the returns indicating where the Dragoons under a Colonel Jamison had started their attack. They had depth to defend along and through mountains to an extent... he didn't want to use that but realistically that was how things were. They needed to be able to use the river crossings and fords that had made the region of Tara ideal for colonization. His map identified a red line on it... where if they had to break and fall back from that it was time to signal 'Broken Arrow', and call pre sighted artillery into play against the area to allow them regroup... but that was an emergency, a contingency that was better put in place and not needed than scrambling to find a way to plug a gap before assault mechs came plowing through.

The tram system only being partially operational was part of that. The rush from the JumpPoint had been reckless. Or would have been to anyone who didn't know how to maintain supposedly impossible to replace, or near enough, los tech or out of production fusion drives , never mind the simple physics of dangerously fast acceleration then flip and break to deploy.

They'd moved to dig in tanks in initial firing positions, but not all of their tanks had as well defined secondary ones. That was also a facet of the terrain. The idea was to mass as much gauss fire as possible at the main road intersection. The Fury were going to run dry first, and they were to pull back, potentially being sent all the way to the rear to rearm and wait at the final line of defense if necessary even if that ran the potential issue of weakening the command and control abilities that those tanks were facilitating with their Nirasaki computers.
The alacorns had more ammunition. A combat load of forty rounds sounded impressive... up until you realized that was split across three gauss rifles so it was a bakers dozen a gun. They wouldn't shoot their entire load. The plan for the heavier tanks was to pull them back and disengage from the line of battle after about the fourth or fifth volley depending on exact conditions, and preferably while the invaders were the better part of a kilometer away... but again terrain depending.

Gene cast a look at the illuminated armor and structural integrity display, and the status of the massive XL fusion engine powering his hundred ton mech. This machine had never been intended for brawling, and he had a Marauder on standby to swap machines rather than try and facilitate reloading the gauss rifles in the field once he exhausted the ammo for them.

The Gauss rifle was one of the principle advantages they had. The Dragoons were bringing Stalkers, and BattleMasters in. They had identified those. The irony was while they lacked Highlanders the Dragoons had brought some, admittedly more heat efficient version, Shoguns....

"Identifying Marauder II BattleMechs on scope."

No surprise there.

"Acknowledged." He replied.

The dragoons hadn't shot down the drone yet... which didn't mean they didn't know it was there... but so far so good. They had thermals supplementing that as well. The fourth company they had identified... still stood out. The identified the enemy battalion commander as driving a Stalker from intercepted comms traffic between the two command lances. They had not ascertained whether or not this was the same alleged Stalker pilot who had allegedly stepped on some bailed out Wasp pilot ten years earlier.

"Tentative returns. Identifying as Imp." He suspected the annihilators were simply too slow to keep up with the formation. They were on the look out for any high mass anomaly running a Nissan 200 engine but thus far nothing. He suspected it was only a matter of time... daylight was a ways off though... especially if the rain held, or worse turned to fog.

He'd looked at the geography maps and for the lower elevations there was a potential flood risk. There were mudslides but that was less likely. The temperature could always drop precipitously and they could get snow.

There was frost of ghost like returns, "Are those the lighter mechs?" He questioned the AI.

"Yes, the fourth company we've identified." Lighter was something of a truth, but might be misunderstood. Discounting what appeared to be a Star League recon lance the other units clearly appeared to be predominantly mechs. They'd identified at least one Marauder certainly, and a Warhammer along with unsurprisingly Archers. Quite a few actually.

What was more interesting was that they appeared understrength, and more akin to a typical inner sphere organization or league era organization he supposed. The fourth company was however understandably faster as a result of less massive mechs, so their... dipping in and out of sensor contact was a point of concern.

He adjusted his communications system, "Campbell." He hailed the Highlander, "How are things on your end?"

"We're as ready as it is, Colonel."

It was cold and wet outside, and they'd been buttoned up in their mechs for more than a day now. "From signals returns the Imp appears to be some kind of command mech."

"They have a lot of those."

Yeah, so it seemed. The Marauder II had the ability... and the reasoning was because this assault force was intended to mount a head on attack. He had no idea what Jamison's command looked like, history wise, but there was a potentially steep turnover if they were being used as establishing a foothold on hostile forces. "Artillery is standing by to go out." They were going to put flares over the enemy's position, but there was no guarantee that was going to be exceptionally effective... but even if all it did was help with artillery spotting then that was fine... and of course there was the possibility that if they got worried about being boxed in by artillery they'd rush forward... go straight into the mind fields.

"What about the other plan?" ... Gene pursed his lips .... "Do you think-"

"I have no idea how they would respond to SLDF credentials, or if they'd be able to accurately read them..."

Dante had wanted to see how they responded to a Hegemony broadcast ordering them to stand down, but that was probably just an excuse that when Wolf refused the AI wouldn't have any objections to more extreme measures... his somewhat other idea was... an attempt at parley to get them to change sides and fight against the combine using the broadcast as leverage... but he wasn't sure how that would work either.

"And there is the fact that their Alpha Regiment is on course to contact with the 3rd RCT," And the Eridani were upfront about their SLDF heritage, and credentials... so were the Light Horse units of the Blue Star Irregulars.

There was no easy out.

--
Initial contact had occurred on the expected line of approach. 'Zeta' Battalion was almost entirely assault mechs unless one counted the probably independent attached recon company on their flank... if it was a reconnaissance company it wasn't being used as such. Jamison's Zeta had hit the tripwire attempted to force his way through and driven and right into the gap.

He watched as one of the Fury tanks fed him the data as the mines began to explode, "Gott mitt Uns, they walked right into it." Septim all but shouted as if he was fighting the rain storm outside in order to be heard.

"Maintain radio discipline," Gene ordered over lascomm chaining to the units, chaining to the others down the line.

Dragoon. Star League Independent BattleMech Regiment classification. Heavy and Assaults. A Star League regiment would have screened their advance... not blundered into an all too convenient less well protected gap in the lines regardless of how incompetent lyran commanders were supposed to be... regardless of how successful the dragoons had been in raiding Lyran they should not have been this reckless in pushing a gap especially in the present conditions.

Gene reached across his dim red cockpit and adjusted the laser communication handler. "Hammer Actual, Showtime."

"Affirmative commander," The Fury lead's response was mirrored as the eighty ton vehicle and its platoon mates' signature began to illuminate as their fusion engines powered up to active. Not that it mattered from his end, as the Nisaraki was filtering through the datalink to parse targeting data.

Tungsten slugs from Gauss rifles opened into the river crossing. The zoom magnified into the enemy battalion. Stupid, sloppy, this whole terrain was basically ideal for mines and tanks in a defensive engagement... and if he had had the artillery available he'd have flattened the whole west bank on their approach... but he didn't have the Arrow IV for that... and the ammunition they had found replacements but they were in the port's magazine... and Abner's people hadn't gotten that main entrance open yet. They said they needed another two hours of digging if they were lucky in this weather.

Thirty seconds.

...Gauss rifles were excellent in terms of efficiency even more so than Autocannons in terms of thermal returns... which admittedly was a process of the capacitors that unfortunately weren't the safest things in the world.

Hammer's Fury tanks threw themselves into reverse back down the hillside and out of the line of any potential return fire. There were secondary fighting positions prepared for them to fall back. The Fury were a battlefield asset he was un willing to risk, and even under Star League doctrine had been intended as multipliers not as front line units. They just didn't have the ammunition to act in a stand up fight, and three rounds from a single position was risking a lot.

He flipped signals to the magnuanacs in Alacorns received confirmation, that was all but obliterated in the sound of fury as each of the massive tanks fired trip Gauss rifles... but by that point Mechs with Gauss rifles were already moving to the firing line. Most were Highlanders, save for his solitary Devastator looking down from the upper ridge as rain plastered his cockpit.

... which would have meant something if he was relying on his eyes, and not the machine's feed... The Fury's had given him range data and a view of enemy deployment. The mines had thrown the enemy left flank into a mess... a clock told him it was almost four in the morning local time.

A ferric tungsten alloy slung lanced out from one of the mech's Norse storm M7D Gauss Rifles its report signature might depending on how good Dragoon sensors might b e, might be mistaken for a different unit entirely... but he wasn't counting on it.

DMM Mechs, or mechs provided to the Draconis March Militia pilots, drawn from teh Robinson cache were spread out. Thugs forming a second not quite close protective detail but where they could use their PPCs, and if the assault mechs of Zeta tried to break through they'd have to get in SRM range.

They had the high ground defending the pass through the rocky ridge, the dragoons were trying to cross the river ford and... he blinked, "They're attempting to execute a break through, mass LRM fire." The last was something of an obvious, this battle was predominantly determined by geography. It was obvious the Dragoons were attempting to hit castle northwind, so it wasn't a surprise, though when lighter mechs literally moved around ... effectively using the assault mechs as mech sized shields to surge through the gap was ... surprising.

"Did you see that?"

"Yes." He acknowledged, not even bothering to chide the break in radio silence. "Let the Archers and Thugs handle it." He replied to the Highlander, swapping channels, "Ali, Imps, Marauder II, all other command mechs."

"acknowledged." The tank platoon commander replied.

By this point the Fury tanks had relocated to their secondary firing positions a somewhat less protected position along the MSR but one where they would be able to fire effectively from the open as well as fall back up the road and then disengage cleanly once their ammo was spent... which wouldn't be long.

Gene adjusted his targeting system and fired.

And fired.

All center mass. The weather was so abysmal he wasn't going to try for headshots in this mess it wasn't worth attempting to be fancy and waste ammo even given his positional advantage. That was about the time Zeta's own attached artillery started hitting the area. It was ineffective but it forced their own artillery to go counter battery which meant they didn't have it in reserve.
--
By the time that daylight had gotten to them, of the sixty odd dragoon mechs engaged fifty had either suffered damage or been outright destroyed. Dragoon Bandits, and Badgers committed to support Zeta's push had also largely been forced to quit the field. Unfortunately the same was true for most of their own tanks.

It was true that they had the advantage of pulling back to their last defensive line in before the MSR opened up to take traffic to the Highlander military academy or to Castle Northwind, or access the capital of Tara in general. The dragoons still had Beta Regiment in reserve giving ground and allowing them to put Beta in place to offload wasn't desirable... not now that the Eridani were being pressed by Alpha.

The difference more broadly was that weather be damned the Davions in particular had more armor, and more infantry dug in and prepared to hold a defensive line. The Dragoons were battering themselves against a numerically superior defensive bulwark in attacks that were doing damage but were not achieving breakthrough.

Gene watched as the tram withdrew the hundred ton mech down the deep dark tunnel.

"What do you think?"

"I assume its a gamble."

Given the situation it was a pretty obvious one. The Dragoons ... in a ridiculous conceit of arrogance had attempted to change strategies during the early morning pause in hostilities to try and justify switching to personal combat. Single Mechs by officers.

There was a clank from within as the machine connected to a gantry lift, and pulled up.

"are we gonna take it?" Campbell asked a little more pressing this time...

He was tempted to say no. Buy for time, resupply and rearm their mechs then execute a riposte and hit the dragoons with as heavy a blow as they could, and either drive Zeta back to the initial starting position or destroy them in detail... "How do you feel about your original idea, has your opinion chanced regarding SLDF credentials?"

Campbell frowned, and straightened. "I... we ghosts of black watch, are descendants of men who died on Terra. Some of the Watch made it off Terra, and some of our kinsmen went with Kerensky... I'd at least like to know what became of them."
--
Notes: and we will finish with (c) of this spin off branch sunday and go back to normal updates in a week. If this were going to be canon, despite the time frame involved we would be covering more perspectives, this would be longer and in particular we'd be focusing more on the dragoons and house davion's side...

Imperator Pax · Dec 11, 2022

Scrap Highland Faire Alternate

[NON CANON, ALTERNATE ft Wolf Dragoons]
Scrap Highland Faire Dragoons (c)

He had considered switching mechs, but the break in action had given them time to resupply ammunition. Gene understood the machine had been built to Kerensky's impatient specificaitons given concerns about the Titan. He'd read the data packets, and that this was a prototype intended for testing, but he had reservations about the ammunition loads the machine carried... he had to weigh things

Thus, given the situation they had time to reload, and so it made sense to retain the greater striking power. Once they were through this, it would be different. They work out better solutions from battlefield data... or that's what he was telling himself silently while they stood their waiting for a response to their response to the Dragoons officers challenge to single combat.

They had eyes already on the watch to make sure none of the black and red mechs attempted to breakout and bypass them... but Gene doubted they'd try, supplementary minefields had been deployed, and then those were covered by emplaced highlander infantry with SRM launchers themselves covered by other teams with support PPCs. They had their bases covered as best as was possible.

If the black and red mechs attempted a breakout ... that would have been simpler.

He brought machine online and watched as it booted. The Highlander was broadcasting a Royal Highland Regiment signature ... which meant Campbell had taken the option. Whether it would change anything he didn't know... but he doubted it... it might mean something with regards to the parley that might come after this...

but for the time being there were other matters.

The Devastator stepped out into the morning air.

He looked at his console, and then sighed in relief as no Dragoon machine attempted to handshake his hundred ton machine. He had no idea how the Black Watch descent would resonate with the dragoons... but he could ask, "Dante?"

The AI approximated a gruff exhale, "They're stalling still. Running through their comms traffic now, their pushing things up the chain." The AI would have ordinarily been able to facilitate data traffic through a dalban but this machine lacked the more comprehensive computer systems and particularly the software, but it was kind of growing on him. "You need to secure this front, the Eridani losses are approaching ten percent." Which was steep in terms of sustainable side losses... but that wasn't the only reason, "Rotating units to fill in, and bringing the trams online should allow units to be pulled inside Northwind, and refit with units from Harlaw's depot."

"I understand." He replied to the machine spirit. "Similar situation for the other units?"

"Roughly comparable. The Heavy Guards are doing a commendable job," He was given to understand that cache material from Elidere and Robinson had been marked towards going to potentially reconstituting an Avalon Hussar to actual SLDF Hussar formation patterns... but that hadn't been completed yet. The Eridani would be the first units in the roster for rearming, barring having to rearm native 'militia' units as Dante chose to refer to Highland units that were not credentialled to HAF forces like the Black Watch. "Given their defensive position and reserves I estimate that once we have secured this front, and resupplied the Third Regimental Combat team, that we can potentially turn the entire attacking front." That went into the fact that despite probably having a qualitative edge in materiel, and possibly even a slight one in individual mechwarriors It was one Mech Regiment versus an intact RCT.

That sounded appealing. "One thing at a time Dante."

"I have TAG units on standby, and missiles on ready release."

"Good." He eased the machine into a trot. One thing at a time though. Once they counter attacked they would like be moving on direct command aiming to encircle, and destroy units quickly, or otherwise neutralize them. Find the chinks in the enemy ranks and exploit those cracks with overwhelming firepower.

Campbell's highlander reestablished contact as he decoupled from the tight beam with the AI. The Highlander's pilot seemedenthused at prospects.

The ... neutral space ... was out exposde on all sides. It was still on the river bank. The Dragoons hadn't fallen back completely, but the devestated turnpike and bridge was flat and open enough that two mechs could duel with nothing really obstructing their view of one another. As a nominal gesture of good faith both sides were keeping their armored vehicles outside of visual contact, or at least far enough back that they wouldn't be able to immediately engage.

Technically speaking there were a company of Fury and Alacorns on the MSR on ramp two klicks back just waiting for directions to drive up and deploy if this went sideways... and he expected the Dragoons had their own hovercraft in reserve waiting to do the same.

His focus turned to the mechs. The 'corner' where his presumable opponent would enter the area from had an Archer and Crusader waiting on their side of the ring. The Archer was the Wolf Dragoons version, but it was no surprise the Crusader, according to Campbell's Highlander, was an SLDF machine.

Minutes ticked by.

He turned the comms on, and issued almost word for word the challenge formulated by Hegemony Command for getting Ronins to come out and play. The formula wasn't perfect, and even in the 27th century hadn't been a perfect solution to getting Combine ronin to come out, but it at least got the Dragoons attention.

There was a palpable tension that seemed to shift through their ranks.

Dante's laser comm paired as Campbell swallowed on the other line, "Think you just poked the bear."

"That challenge went across their comms, Colonel." Dante remarked, suggesting that the Dragoons were actively dickering across their chain of command, or at least in conference.

There was a snippet of intercepted feed piped through as a fusion signature bloomed on his display as a warhammer powered up. The seventy tonner should have been in a museum it was a painstakingly pristine machine that could very well have just come out of the cache in Harlaw behind their own lines. The black machine's pilot continued to snap irritably in russian at her fellows, and Gene blinked.

"Data suggests the machine is stock."

So barring a custom job of paint nothing stood out... right down to the ammunition storage lacking safeties that was to say cell based reactive armor storage. Gene bit his tongue to avoid questioning her choice of bringing that mech as the red head's face filled the screen to accept the challenge and make introductions.

He was not going to suggest she switch something heavier, and her certainly was not going to offer to swap over to his Marauder. Though it was a tempting taunt all the same... he wasn't going to do it.

"We are agreed." There was about a half klick between them. A roundabout with shattere centotaph in the space of the road. He stopped the mech and waited at his end as the Warhammer moved past the shuffling corner mates. Gene looked at the other mechs on the dragoon side.

He would have preferred if they had killed the Stalker but well it was fine, he understood that visibility had been more and that they'd had other priorities to hit. They would see how this went, and find out how this day was going to go.

Warning lights flashed on as the Warhammer's TTS went active, and probably in the red head's cockpit similar warnings flashed as the Star League era and long discontinued TTS of the Devastator came online. Gene breathed as the data resolved. He was beyond effective medium range, they'd disperse too much to effectively burn through the already suberb ablative qualities of armor... but he didn't need them. He stacked the ferric tungsten slugs within a foot of one another in the hostile mech's center torso just as it started to move lateral, her Donal PPCs firing, his own of the same model fired a hair after and nearly finished the job of nearly coring out the Warhammer's internal structure as the sparks radiated like spiderwebs across the structure.

Kerensky for her credit actually managed to keep the machine from swan diving out of control as well as staying upright, but it should have been obvious from just the feel impact never mind whatever her hud was telling her was that this was over. The engine was gone, or if it wasn't was barely sputtering.

He flipped the comms to system wide, "MechWarrior saf-." He didn't get to finish the instructions to turn the reactor off.

Targetting systems alarms went active again, and that was all he got as the two annhilators in Zeta colors plastered the area around him with fire from their AC 10s. If these had been League armed Annhilators firing cluster the LBX probably would have delivered some damage home. His face set eyes reflecting almost amber mead in the cockpit lights across the frequency as the actuators on the Devastor moved independent of one another. The arms adjusted.

The vaguely dinosaur like heads exploded as gauss rifles roared.

Dante had already taken the initiative, he could somewhat make out over the pounding of blood in his ears, to issue roll forward orders to the armor company and the fury's to start painting off targets by the numbers.

Target 1 the Zeta Stalker still missing an arm from this morning.

Gauss rifles snarled and hundreds of lrms cycled into the air from Highlander BattleMechs.

--
Brevet General Kerston had ordered men to their deaths before. He sat forward in his headquarters hands folded watching the holographic display. Here in his headquarters clutching rosary esque the starleague starburst on a chain, here and not in his mech.

For the moment they were waiting to see what was going to happen.

Waiting for the feeds to pipe in... and when the screen changed the exchange was brief. Kerston had seen a mech core another one something like that before. Assault Autocannons were of course a known thing. He was sure that at close range a King Crab or the Marauder II... instead of being engaged fighting an invasion right now... should still have been the subject of the argument to call Stormlord or Stormsword since there was already a stormhammer

Then everything went wrong, and right.

The Warhammer did go silent on scopes. Whether because the pilot had shut it off, or if the engine had simply given up... but the firing by Zeta into the now concluded duel kicked up a massive of debris and dirt, and mud. The subsequent return fire silenced the two interjecting mechs, but a general free for all had already resumed as tartan painted mechs opened and Marauder IIs from both parties surged fowrad to meet.

Kerston stood up and put his hand on the table pressing the starburst deep into his palm, "All units, to action." The 3rd Regimental Combat Team of the Star League Defense Forces, the vaunted Eridani light horse obeyed the relayed command and resumed the battle that had paused a few hours earlier to allow both sides time to stop and collect their wounded, and dead.
--
Field Marshal Yvonne Davion, the Prince's Champion stood surounded by Davion officials, statesmen and nobility from Crucis, and Draconis Marches. This was not hte battle they had prepared for. Those damned purple birds had managed to nearly cock everything up, if only by sheer bumbling incompetence... this very well had the potential to be disaster.

At least if that lunatic from the snakes had been right about thinking that the sudden traffic was from the Combine they would have been harming the real enemy. Instead they had taken, fought a pointless battle in defense against House Mariks, and it was against mercenaries so it wasn't as if the Free Worlds League had lost precious regular troops in this.

"Your grace we have Colonel Wolf on the line."

"Thank you Jeffries." She replied nodding... but didn't immediately move to take the line. Disccusions had been carried out through back channels. Through the MRB. If the Dragoons had been normal mercenaries she might have considered that it wsa just them covering their ass so to speak against any potential backlash. She wasn't sure though that was really the case that they were dealing with.

The hologram connected. "Field Marshal Davion." She had always thought Jaime Wolf had been a little young for his position, she had thought that when the Dragoons had first appeared over Delos with their immense volume... the great number of fully laden JumpShips, it was one more incongruity to add to the long list of the mystery that was the wolf dragoons appearing out of no where.

"Colonel Wolf." She returned evenly. She was cognizant of course that the Dragoons had a regiment in reserve. She also suspected that the Highlanders and Eridani and their other incongruity had some ace of their own... beyond mechwarrior skills... that was a thought... seeing if they couldn't manage to set up Yorinaga Kurita to die... but she pushed that idea away. "You've created something of a mess of things."

The accusation rolled off his back like water off a duck. Jaime Wolf wasn't the least bit bothered by the perils of his profession, and frankly she was annoyed, but this was House Marik's fault, the Dragoons were simply the instrument. "We can avoid wasting more lives."

Field Marshal Yvonne Davion glanced to the haggard old kilted man. He was well into his eighties, "Yes, we can do that. I am prepared to offer you a general cessation of battle, and permit your withdrawl, terms to be discussed in person. You are to keep your current positions, and take no further offensive action, and you and a select party may advance to meet with us."

ComStar was going to mediate the legal side of things... but the Dragoons origins... the Highlanders wanted words, the blue star irregulars wanted words, and well... talking would be preferable to further wasting their strength. She'd be damned if they didn't get to salvage some replacement equipment... seeing as she doubted the Dragoons would do the sensible thing and switch sides and volunteer to go charging off against House Kurita.
--
Scotts Cursassiers, Highlander Mech Infantry in this case, stood in the background of the other end of the screen processing thelast of the debris from what had been Zeta battalion. They were also cataloging POWs, taking names and rendering medical aid as well.

Abner heartily smacked his shoulder, "Yes, that was splendidly done. I shall, I cannot wait to show Mister Ford the footage. Yes, a very impressive showing, I cannot imagine a finer demonstration." Not the least of which was because Abner hoped that the devastator ould be put into production at long last.

... he wondered if ... given Kersenky's involvement in the program if the Dragoons... if the Clans of Kerensky had taken Devastators with them, if they had the technical data package for the machines... either way the Dragoons hadn't demonstrated them.

"There is still work to be done."

They needed to go ahead, just as a precaution pull Eridani units out of the line, rearm them just in case talks fell through and the Dragoons went back on the offensive. He knew Kerston wanted the Light Horses of the Blue Star Irregulars refit as well, since the brevet general expected they could be trusted and of course given the situation.

A full rearmanent of entire units would mean opening up an intact cache for a BattleMech Division... and they hadn't found one of those. They had Mechanized Infantry Division resources which included Hegemony battlemechs and that was what they were going to make do without of Harlaw. They didn't have the time to repair using spare parts or refit with new weapons.

"And speaking of that," Campbell said glancing around, "we're gonna be late if we don't get moving." The Highlander added unnecessarily... statement of the obvious... especially since they were supposed to be carting Dragoon officers captured along to Northwind, which he wasn't especially thrilled with.

Soldiers obeyed orders, lawful ones, from higher command. Field Marshal Davion said to bring them along... probably they were going to be exchanged but she hadn't explicitly said that. Given the succession wars it was probable they might be ransomed in a knightly fashion, but he didn't know.

It didn't help that by the time they had arrived at Northwind castle it had started raining again, and on top of Dante informing him he had anti personnel drones standing by the AI's radar forecast was calling for snow and high winds. The temperature certainly didn't seem to agree with the countess of Kestrel even in spite of being seated by one of the castles roaring fireplaces.

Gene shrugged off the dress coat as quickly as he could. The castle was well past warm by his standards. "Now what?"

Campbell shrugged, "The clan elders hope to speak with Colonel wolf... but on the other hand they did invade the planet...what did she call it a blood house?" He trailed off, and to be fair the post adrenaline dump come down probably wasn't easy

... Gene had cheated and wolfed down a high caffeine ration packet to ward off that crash, "Blood Name. Kerensky."

True Born. Words that meant very little other than some idea of descent to Campbell. He doubted that Kerensky's boasting had ultimately been intentional, or at least not done with forethought behind it, but it was something else.

The words didn't come as Alexandria Cunningham made her way over. "Well that's another victory," She remarked sipping at glass of mulled wine.

"Its a little early for laurel wreaths and victory arches." He rejoined,

She scoffed and snorted, "I believe I'm supposed to be the cynic colonel... certainly with all this chattering from the media people clamoring about spurs, and blackguards as if this were a holo drama."

The dramatization very likely was intentional though to coax a specific reaction from the public, or he hoped the talk was for propaganda sake. They had other things to deal with than the talking heads in the media. They had their part to play and he had his. They danced around the conversation's edge, but the truth was there wasn't much new. Alexandria knew something was going on, and that there were more Eridani troopers around Castle Northwind but she didn't ask.

Of course if they started redeploying with Star League equipment... there were going to be questions asked... but they would only have to do that if the Dragoons attacked... and he considered that unlikely while the Dragoon leadership were here.

He paused to pet the one of the clan wolf hounds that was wandering around, which allowed him to survey the gallery landing as the Dragoon delegation arrived. "Alright they're here."

Campbell shifted, and excused himself, presumably to go harry his eldest kinsmen over their wanting explanations about whatever far flung stars out in the black Kerensky had fled to. He doubted Campbell was going to get it... he hadn't missed that as soon as Zeta had failed in their gambit's contingency... that was to say trying to bushwhack him once it was clear a duel wasn't going to go do it and opened up... they'd also tried to hit Campbell's highlander.

Of course they had only tried after the free for all had opened... admittedly Colonel Jamison probably hadn't expected to lose two Assault mechs in the first seconds of the engagement, and those Annihilators going down had probably wrecked the firing order. Then couple that with firing into superior numbers, and armor moving to where they could engage and paint them over the lakeside had probably been hard to plan around or for. He hadn't actually questioned Jamison, the Zeta Colonel's jaw had been broken during his punch out from his stalker... and frankly the man was lucky he hadn't drowned even in the relatively shallow river. Some dragoon pilots hadn't been as lucky when they'd been knocked out of action in the before dawn portion of today's action.
--
Field Marshal Davion didn't come to collect them in person. There were groomsmen for that sort of thing, but eventually the red jackets had come around to collect them. There was still the possibility whoever was in charge of Beta could order an attack but that would have been kind of obvious... and Beta still hadn't deployed to the planet yet... and it was a little late for that since unlike the others they hadn't hard burned to the planet.

If the Dragoons did try something the commanding officers of the Davion Heavy Guards, New Avalon Hussars, and Blue Star Irregulars were all still with their units. They would in theory be able to respond.

As the meeting began though that seemed unlikely. Wolf, and his fellow officers had been allowed to congregate... because gentlemen ... Jamison apparently could communicate via sign language... but Kerensky was the one who was filling them in on intelligence. It was frustrating but not really surprising.

He hoped that the Field Marshal was right that this more finalization of details. Gene wasn't entirely thrilled that the immediate priority wasn't to get the dragoons off world as quickly as possible... preferably sans if not all of their mechs sans enough war materiel to make them combat ineffective in the short term

They wanted till the MRB representative had been shown out, and then they dropped the bombshell...the Field Marshall was probably exaggerating her own certainty... she certainly made it seem like they had more proof. "And we have it on good authority that Star League protocol wouldn't have had Army depots store, what is it three Starlords, two monoliths, and how many other JumpShips registered to your command?" After all the Dragoons had first shown up over Delos in 3005, shown up first in the Federated Suns. It didn't matter that the rest of the Dragoon space lift wasn't here... that presumably there were units stationed on whatever garrison world the Mariks had provided along with that block box space station.

Gene didn't know how stupid the Dragoons ... the clans must have assumed the successor states were but really it was a little insulting. Especially given Wolf's visual tell that flitted there as the game seemed to be up.

"Because we were told about the first of your succession wars... we were told about Kentares."

There was a harsh silence that fell at the Colonel of Gamma Regiment. Gene wasn't sure if she was lying or not... did it matter? It was entirely possible the clans during that period could have captured fleeing jumpships trying to get out before the great die of interstellar travel as the nukes flew.

There was a thump beside him, and Gene whirred in his seat as Brevet General Kerston slammed his hands on the table having risen from his seat "And you did nothing, just left the Inner Sphere to fight house Kurita in spite of knowing he collaborated with Amaris? That the combine fed SLDF positions to the enemy!" All eyees fell on the towering font of rage the old general had become.

If Wilhelmina Korsht had expected her knowledge of the Inner Sphere tearing itself apart and the decision to stay away then to get them out of it... well that had well and truly backfired on them. Gene slowly slid his seat back, and managed to keep from blurting out an expletive... because the room had for a second time in under a minute turned deathly quiet.

The thing was... from their expressions the Dragoons hadn't known... but then that wasn't a surprise... Kerensky hadn't killed Kurita on Terra, hadn't used the Fleet to burn the Combine to ash and ruin... and he might not have even taken a copy of the recording with him... but

... Jerome Blake's copy had likely remained in ComStar's archive after they replaced the ministry of communication... and wasn't that another lovely can of worms to potentially have to deal with down the road.

... then the silence broke as demands for explanations exploded all around the room. Idly looking into his cup, Gene was regretting not having accepted a scotch from the highlanders in favor of hot tea.
--
Notes: Obviously again to reiterate despite taking place over a span of less than three days in this draft if this were cannon instead of being roughly ten K this would be roughly thirty thousand words with actual scenes dealing with the company's regular officers on top of others. We would actually be covering the other Davion Units more focused expanded dragoon scenes, an actual expounding that Zeta's normal strategy is what it is in canon. Clan shit. Other stuff... and probably among that the reiteration is that Kerston by the time of the conference is mentally and physically drained, because well in the course of January 3018 he's been put through a lot, and Kerston has been Brevet General of the Eridani for almost twenty years.

Anyway... we will resume the main canon timeline with the Combine rebels arrival next week.

Imperator Pax · Nov 11, 2022

Extras Nominally Canon Extras

House Arano introduction 3019
[Part 1]

It hadn't been the original plan, but there were some things you just couldn't avoid. It would come out later of course that naturally there was more to everything... but there always was. It didn't excuse any of the atrocities that had been committed. Black Jack McGirk had been a criminal his whole life... that there was more to his story didn't change the fact he'd been a pirate for a lifetime before ... well things had happened.

Black Jack McGirk had been the name in the headlines when they'd left the Periphery for the Federated Suns... and he'd been able to continue his rampage largely unimpeded in what the history books as rather ridiculously as 'the Pirate Wars'. What should have been an opportunity to foster good will and common security in the periphery proved little different to the political squabbles between the successor states of the Inner Sphere and for the ruling houses of the Periphery's nations to point the finger and blame each other of either facilitating such attacks, or at least directly benefiting from them.

Whether Black Jack McGirk cared about any of that was doubtful in the summer of 3018 he launched an attack in the exception to how he had been operating previously. The target had been over the border in Davion space... the target had been an HPG station naturally operated by ComStar.

By the time things had been wrapping up, and they'd been preparing to depart Davion space... it was a good time to leave even without the timetable they needed in order to escort out the Azami refugees slash colonists heading into the deep that the Precentor New Avalon had reached out. Not that it'd been any secret they'd been preparing to leave the Inner Sphere again.

It was money. A bounty for something they would have likely done anyway.. and it wasn't news ComStar had been paying bounties on pirates, but particularly Black Jack before they had left, and the notion that the notoriety had been driving the bounties on Black Jack's pirates had been sound enough. There wasn't a reason to really ask questions at the time. So they had left the Inner Sphere, and moved rimward for a months long interstellar journey.

Gene hadn't been able to stir himself from his quarters during the week they'd spent in New Vandenburg's system leaving things to Pasha, and preparing for the jump over the border into a state which had not existed in the Star League's era. The jump over the border into Aurigan space should have been uneventful except that the tiny little world of Aea had been savaged by Black Jack's pirates earlier in the month... and one thing had lead to another. It wasn't Black Jack's first raid into the reach, the Aurgians had been having pirate problems the same as everyone else the last couple of years but relative to overall population the Aea's damage was extreme... and had involved hordes of captives apparently being crammed into cargo holds at gunpoint by Black Jack's pirates.

Aea had been a point of contention between the Aurgians and the Taurians and the devastation might very well mean the end of the planet if not necessarily the argument, but that same devastation set them on course for deeper into Aurigan space with news of the attack... but it would be another month to Coromidir.

He flipped the switch bathing the cockpit in low visibility red. "What do we know Pasha? What's happening on the surface?"

There wasa crack over the speakers of static from the surface, "It is not good," The old JumpShip Captain remarked unnecessarily as his line adjusted to the Titan-class DropShip Eisenhower. "The ambassador from the Magistracy of Canopus has just accused her Taurian counterpart of providing aid to the attacking pirates."

He nodded, "What about Markham's Marauders?"

"Colonel Markham does not believe the Magistracy is correct." he replied evenly to the inquiry, "But he is also currently penned down in Cormodir city, near the star port. I am sure you're computer is receiving the coordinates from other sources."

Within the lethal warmachine under the red night vision preserving lights his computer screens were filled with incoming regimental wide data. The assault DropShips Hedwig and Braunfelds were presently clearing high orbit airspace ahead of the moving formation. They'd be landing in nominally speaking three waves. The airwaves were overwhelmed with distress calls from anyone with a transmitter it seemed. The Aurigans were doing their best, but besides their government, and merchants, and and civilians ComStar and the local MRB office was screaming for help.

They meant to oblige. "Bardiche, comms check?" At confirmation that the Battalion aboard the overlord Presidio were prepared for hitting the atmosphere in several minutes, he switched channels to ring the Highlanders 'Mech battalion aboard Hidalgo and confirmed their readiness. The two large Dropships would be following down with San Saba. He switched channels again. The DroSTs and the Baffins would beat them down, with Baffins lighting a secure guide beacon to guide the larger ships down... but they would be feet first into hell.

The final checks came with the tingling of an adrenaline spike the likes of which he hadn't felt in what seemed like a life time. Then the gantries shuffled the pod to the door and it was out.

The Azami Exodus fleet comprised enough of an airwing that there was a combined CAP patrol, including their own, of over a hundred ASF... if the Aurigans hadn't already been under attack the wave of the nominally identified '588th Air Regiment' probably have been heart attack inducing by itself as the 85 ton Star League era Rapier comprising the core of one of the reigment's wings started making contact with the remaining dropships and pirate asf still floating around.

The drop pod showed an augmented feed, a cluster of stars nearby as small maneuvering thrusters pushed the pods into formation preparing for the edge of the atmosphere as a display counted down. He was grateful for the air cover even if it was a largely temporary volume of air power, the Azami had one whole wing guarding the fleet of Jumpships and there was a good chance their small craft were going to drive off or capture via marines the remaining pirate JumpShips at the Nadir JumpPoint.

Laser Comms fluttered. He might have expected Bahar or one of the other pilots in the detachment but Hedgwig started uploading inbound data transits. The movements, and communications of units that she had observed from where the assault DropShip was and what would be relevant in a Hegemony Orbital Insertion drop looking to achieve a foothold.

He acknowledged the machine spirit's data and rested his hands against the yoke as the first plaentary forces of gravity and air resistance began to be felt. Hedwig wasn't happy about the enemy having SLDF mechs...

... he could agree... but he had to watch the temperature and other gauges indicated condition, and they were starting to pick up. In a couple of seconds he'd lose most of his external communications entering a communications blackout while he navigated the atmosphere. About fifteen minutes where the descending mechs would be crossing the upper atmosphere until they deployed their shoots, or fired jump jets to slow and land on terra firma.

... and of course in that same time period the first portion of their own air wing would be following down with them. It was a less of a just in case thing, and more to clear any remaining enemy air assets or failing that keeping them disorganized enough that when the rest of the wing descended from orbit they'd have air superiority.

For Cormodir this was probably the first orbital drop the planet had seen since Cordia City had been retaken from Amaris's 'secret army' two and a half centuries earlier. It looked like things had been rebuilt significantly sometime in the 29th century, but Gene paid little mind to that anomaly as the interference picked up and the gee forces acting on the pod descending picked up.
--
Red streaks with dark cores exploded in the sky too high up still for ground observers to visibly confirm that they were battlemechs without mechanic or electronic assistance but it was undeniable that that was what they were. Cormordir VI was a temperate world and as the capital of the Aurigan Coalition had largely been sheltered from the strife of the periphery frontier. It was a display of military force that its residents weren't used to seeing... but they weren't used to seeing pirates up close and possible.

The JumpJets started a series of pulses to adjust trim and altitude to bring him down along the river bank with the rest of the lance, and thus the broader company. He adjusted the Dalban's handling and brought up the Lance director to relay orders. "Sasha cut the MSR and hold that line south," That way when the DroSTs touched down they could start offload Magunac combined arms units to just roll straight forward. The Union behind them would take longer but once Baffins was on the ground they could secure for San Saba's mixed Mechs and Vehicles.

He started ticking down. They needed air superiority, in order to run strike missions to prevent any further pirate DropShips trying to break for orbit. He wasn't sure if slaving was Black Jack's new side hustle but after seeing the damage and footage of Aea keeping the pirates ground side was preferable. A couple of pirates had already made a break for it, and there had been one or two JumpShips that had either had charged drives or had jumped risky to leave early.

It didn't matter they had the names from breaching the pirates comms... if they showed up they could chase them later, or pass the word along to the appropriate authorities.

The problem was that while not a proper military force, a lack of discipline they were fielding League 'Mechs. Instead of cludged together franken mechs or a mix of light and mediums Black Jack's people were based around a core of medium and heavy weight mechs backed up by star league era tanks like manticores and hovercraft.

It certainly lent credence to the story Black Jack had lucked out finding a cache.

Gene pushed his sticks forward Jump jets making the final corrections and a moment later he was on the ground with the rest of the two dozen mechs operating a single large company. As soon as the last mechs were on the ground, a pair of Marauder IIs lumbered forward their PPCs replaced with Assault Auto Cannons to provide close element security.

Not that there was anything for them to shoot at, but it never hurt to be careful. The muddy red banks of the river's shore churned as a thousand tons of armor and guns cranked up the banks and into centuries old roadways to begin diverging with the intention of securing a beachhead for the arriving forces. Harry Callahan's lead assault mech parked on the on ramp of the MSR and stood there as they moved past. The Marauder II design, and its variants were the only machines in this element that were not explicitly Star League based machines. They had brought Catapults in place of archers specifically because the former carried jumpjets as an added mobility feature. The Archers would roll off of the DroSTs to reinforce LRM carriers and and provide their long range missiles to the second wave of arrivals.

They were getting their first ground side look at what was going on on the surface of the planet. The local nobility were scrambling with their mechs to defend against the vastly larger attacking force. The local great houses, and their vassals scrambling to sally forth from manor homes with their mechs supported by locally produced combat vehicles and infantry in support.

There were a range of vehicles of indigenous designs, but the mechs were predominantly league mediums and heavy. Blackjacks, ironically, Kintaro, Catapult, Rifleman, and Marauders returned pings on long range magnameters sensors looking at their fusions engines and substantiated by their transmitted IFFs. Of course it wasn't just the local elite, and their personal guards there were other mercenaries trying to hold out, which cluttered up signal returns even more.

Gene turned his machine north up the highway as the two Highlander Assault Mechs joined him, and rearguard provided in the form of missile support from an Azami pilot in a Catapult. The Lance peeled north separating out as the company moved into the outer sprawl of Cordia city's market and residential zones.

--
Notes, This is Extras content for the future, Part 2 of this what should be another ~ 3k words will follow on sunday in place of the regular update most likely given scheduling effects from IRL. Hopefully the Arano segments and glimpse forward into the pirate wars will be interesting.

Imperator Pax · Nov 13, 2022

Extras Nominally Canon Extras

House Arano Introduction Part 2
3019

Cormordir or at least the capital region was more topographically excited than Luxen but they had broad similarities... but then that was typical of most planets choosing to settle near the coast or in River valleys, or both.

He parsed through the incoming data of what they knew. They were already sure McGirk wasn't here in person but all the same it was a very brazen attack to launch on an actual periphery state that could actually be called a state. The Aurigans had emerged after the fall of the League and built themselves into a reasonbly sized periphery power... and maybe that was the reason either McGirk or one of his lieutenants was thinking maybe it was time to follow the example of the Marian Hegemony...

... but whatever their motives there was no indication of the bandit king being here in person...

Even if Black Jack had been here... he wasn't sure that it would have solved the problem. It was clear this was only a fragment of the horde ravaging the frontier of human space, and if Black Jack died here there would be be less ... and if history was anything to go on.... guidance and the groups would splinter and in the short term there would be chaotic unpredictable spikes in violence. That wasn't to say they wouldn't have gone after him... just that cutting the head off the snake wasn't a sure shot to fixing the problem. It wouldn't magic away the danger that he posed or that his supporters posed to people living out here.

... and among those his Dalban was already flagged. There was a running gun battle north of a cut, where the road pushed up into the hillside. He was glad that even though they had done painfully little to change any of the electronics signatures put out by their mechs, Black Jack's band of cutthroats had at least painted their stolen machines.

The MMI finished inputting the map's terrain data into the navigation system, and the jump jets fired taking him down off the embankment and into the roundabout below.

Even if they had still been painted in SLDF camouflage he doubted it would have stopped him from dropping down behind the sixty ton Champion and delivering his opening alpha strike into the machine, and also the BattleMaster beside it. His Dalban processed the other jumpjet signatures of the others even as the Marauder stepped over the shattered cockpit of the LosTech warmachine.

Gauss rifles cycled hitting a nearby seventy ton pirate Guillotine, and an already mangled Sentinel exploded as it met incoming missiles from one of the Aurgian Catapults that wasn't above taking advantage of the situation. "Suppress those vehicles." He ordered finally keying his mike.

A Highlander wasn't exactly the fastest thing, the standard Hegemony design topped out at fifty four KPH, but when a ninety ton LosTech Command mech decides to floor it in the direction of your tanks and hovercraft... very few people responded with the poise and dignity that they might. One of the former SLDF Manticores managed to reverse before Hanzo brought the Highlander's foot up, which only served to cause him to kick the offending treadhead rather than stomp on the tracked warmachine.

The added leverage pushed the already backpedalling eighty ton tank through a safety barrier onto the red muddy shoulder of the road and where it promptly peeled through and slid down the hundred foot embankment sending the several hundred year old tank to rest on its side at the bottom of the hill. There were a variety of reasons they were deploying the beachhead force without Inferno missiles loaded in the hoppers for their SRMs but the principle reason was the close contact nature of contest Cordia City and thus the civilian population caught in the open by the pirates.

... otherwise Gene would have been perfectly happy cooking the slavers in their tin cans and calling it a day, but preventing pointless civilian death even accidental civilian casualties outweighed the tactical utility of incindery weapons against often under cooled designs.

Still Bahar's Highlander wasted little time

His Dalban had a holographic progress bar up as it unpacked the navigation. The Starport was under attack... obviously, the local salvage and mech works was defended but was facing less in the way of a challenge than he would have expected from normal pirates... but then Black Jack seemed anything but normal.

The other question that appeared wasn't so much why VI, it was the capital after all, but why not V which housed a significant chunk of the planet's industry? It did appear as if Black Jack was prioritizing the HPG station. In order to reach the old ministry of communications facility they would need to clear the blocking force out from the starport... the downside of course was Markam's Marauders probably couldn't stop them. Not if the Demons his Dalban was identifying as rolling down the coastal road were in fact armed with Gauss rifles.

Their furies and alacorns were en route but it was going to take time for them to roll off even with the speedy deployment capabilities of the DroSTs. A handful of digital count downs tracked the estimated time for the waves to get through the atmosphere and touch down... but that would only be estimations on how soon they could touch down. It was more likely to be a minimum threshold of long it was going to take, and certainly not the maximum.

A chime sounded an incoming Mech with a Lyran pilot at the helm. The IFF resolved as Aurigan, though the computer didn't exactly know what an Aurigan was. The Dalban quickly resolved the Lyran's mech as customized Centurion, probably rebuilt in the Periphery to be as close to factory spec as was practical. A second Aurigan mech, a Wolverine, following along the Cormorant road.

Those mechs were coming north, but wouldn't have gotten close enough to have made contact with Callahan or Sasha's screen lances along the MSR. They'd probably already been in the city, or in the urban outskirts of the planetary capital.

... and then the come chatter started, even as the sky was streaked with an increasing number of meteors descending from orbit that as they descended resolved into the aerodyne dropships, with spheroids of heavier mass becoming more apparent as they descended.

Apparently the Lyran was the head of the local Royal Guard, if he were going to guess from just the colors the mechs were painted given his Centurion matched the paint scheme of Kintaro, while the Wolverine matched the paint job of the Catapult the local noble houses were either directly related from a common ancestor or intermarried... or both.

Bahar's highlander initiated a Laser Comm connection separate from the radio channels. "The Wolverine, and Kintaro are both registering SLDF era codecs."

"I noticed the Kintaro." He admitted, but even if it meant something it wasn't a priority at the moment... this whole place raised too many questions as it was, but the first priority was dealing with the invaders. They could figure out why there were anomalous mech signatures when people weren't shooting at them. As it was his Dalban was cataloging a list of anomalies that was already proving to be a headache in itself... but they had more pressing issues "Incoming." He intoned flagging another inbound champion tearing down one of the market district's street.

He didn't respond to the Azami piloting the Catapult making the quip that Black Jack had the devils own luck when it came to cache finds. Now wasn't the time, but he wasn't wrong... and it certainly seemed like McGirk had no shortage of men he could throw into the fray.
--
Overhead dozens of ASF had moved off, to turn and burn away from the Aurigan Reach's capital city of Cordia City, the underside of their wings featuring either a symmetrical starburst roundel in gray and white or with an asymmetrical starburst with crossed sabers. The descending dropships, the final wave coming with medical relief and additional personnel, mirrored the divide with gray and green paint schemes.

The Marauder's Ferro fibrous was coated in a fine sheen of plaster dust, and ash, but outside of some minor SRM contacts his systems returned positive system checks. Gene wasn't particularly worried, but he had taken note that the Aurigans seemed to have a lot of Mechs and Vehicles for a minor Periphery kingdom... unless of course that was because they were all defending the capital... which might have explained the defenses.

He resisted the urge to simply mute the particularly swear happy pirate captain currently cursing up a storm to anyone who was listening to the open channel. And it was an open channel, it may as well have been planet wide even anyone with even the most basic receiver system could probably pick up the snarling bastard swearing... but the pirate was also backed into a corner.

Whether the ones who had escaped had gotten what they came for before leaving the others to their fate was up in the air, but the ones still on the ground weren't going to be leaving.

"Commander!"

Gene enshrined inside of his seventy five ton marauder as one of the other popsicles in the unit apparently had had enough and started over the line and was bad mouthing the honor less bandit mongrel. They didn't need this.

He hit a switch on the upper console initiating a broadcast override. Regimental Command systems linked into the other command mechs on the ground, including hte offloaded Fury tanks. The holographic map began to change as data flowed into Star League era battle network systems ground side as well as in orbit.

There was a supersonic boom, and then a second as wing of eighty ton Rapier in slate gray colors turned back into a supersonic attack run barreling down on the transmitting mech's coordinates, and going for guns. Guided in by a live transmission and carefully measured trace by dozens of command units multiple assault autocannon rounds and PPCs blasted the already damaged BattleMaster into little more than a smoking crater and scrap on a hillside near the starport.

The FedSun natives banked high and wobbled their wings as the computer updated their ammo situation and they jetted off again. He looked at the data feed that pegged the destroyed BattleMaster as a -1C... just another question they didn't have answers to.

A brian cache shouldn't have had access to the kind of, the volume of specific machines that Black Jack had demonstrated... the only plausible explanation would have been he had found a castle brian that had been fully stocked...

It wasn't impossible that such existed, not even impossible in the periphery but if he had found one in the periphery why wouldn't he have just used it as his permanent lair, why had he come all the way around the reach of known space from Lyran, the Combine, Davion, the Concordant and here, why had he also sent a probe at Luxen? It didn't make sense.

A handshake signaled, and Yusuf's image appeared in a hologram, "Commander, I have informed the local ComStar adept that the Precentor New Avalon sends his regards, and also what we know of the situation on Aea. I have also begun the process of confirming our initial list of the pirates we suspect managed to successfully flee, however that is also why I'm calling."

An image appeared. A jumpship with a familiar icon... one he hadn't seen recently, but still one he was unlikely to forget. A blue shark breaching. "We have identified with some certainty the number of pirates involved and can say with certainty that Black Jack must be collaborating with the Tortuga dominions either as member of the pirate kingdom or at least as an associate or ally."

Gene nodded slowly, wondering if the Tortugas had willingly decided to use Rim World iconography... but then remembered their current leader was some one who had declared herself 'Dame murderess extraordinaire' so maybe it was a style choice for fear points.

Yusuf threw in a couple of orbital telemetry pictures of House Arano's seat complete with enhanced images of the defunct surface to orbital emplacements that had been destroyed during the fallout of New Vandenburg... which was certainly a relief that such installations weren't around. "Is there anything else?"

"I am afraid not."

Then it was time to meet the locals.
--
Even a dozen parked mechs the rotunda had plenty of space more as if they expected an entire company of mechs to watch the local theater put on Othello, or maybe something by Garibaldi.

The Marauder crouched hull down in front of the massive edifice of an era long gone. It was mostly fine but still covered in the grime of war, of the orbital drop, of buildings burning and blown up, and some sandblasting from SRMs that had gotten close. The most obvious standouts were the mechwarriors. The aurigan tankers wore coveralls in the style of SLDF units assigned to the Periphery command c.2765 for a temperate climate as the coalition capital was. They were obvious modern manufacture markets, but any MRB shop carried close enough all one needed to do was add the appropriate local patches, and it was a match. The infantry wore temperate SLDF style uniforms of recent manufacture as well. The specific camo pattern was different than their own but didn't raise really any eyebrows.

The Mechwarriors though. It was emblematic of feudal trappings especially the ones not wearing neural helmets. There was a clear pronouncement of whose mechwarriors were whose. The local houses had their own colors, their own heraldry, and that heraldry was reflected in the Aurgian leadership present.

Markham, who Gene hadn't seen in person for a few years, and his XO Darius Olivera were both dressed basically the same as they had been on Detroite. The Marauders mercenary company seemed to have been doing well. "If you hadn't held them off there would have been a lot more civilian losses," The pirates had been aiming to both take the star port and hit the ComStar bureau at the same time, and Gene wasn't going to pretend that that tactical mistake hadn't been a boon to Markham's command.

"Well we had already signed with Tamati about fighting pirates for him." Darius remarked.

"Lord Tamati believes there is some kind of pirate base on Fjaldr, and even though she didn't stick around Grim Sybil was rumored to be operating out of it, and then she showed up to attack us here... I'd say its more than just one Pirate clan there."

Probably so. Lord Tamati was at the podium speaking now, the usual noble spiel. If you had heard it from one noble you had heard from all of them talking about the losses to predators from beyond their borders. It was Tamati Arano's brother in law who was the more striking figure. Tamati didn't fail in any particular respect and as a civilian leader, and administrator, and general cat herder for however the Aurigans organized their government since he kept bringing up the found houses quite frequently he was probably fine.

There was an undercurrent though that something about this speech was all too familiar to the nobles of the room, not necessarily the pirates, and not the extent of the pirates, but Lord Tamati was not Hanse Davion. His brother in law Lord Espinosa clearly was unhappy about the state of the military readiness of the Aurigan Coalition. He didn't need to say anything he just exuded that sort of vibe.

... and of course waiting in the wings were the ambassadors from the taurian concodant and the magistracy of canopus... both of whom were clearly at a heighted state of animosity with one another.

"Why do I not like that look?"

"The Magistracy has already extended feelers out through the MRB." Was the reply he received as Tamati turned the floor over to another member of the Aurigan government. Gene glanced sideways to Bahar, even as he did the mental math regarding how far they were from the modern Canopian border with that in mind it was most likely the local ambassador... even so it risked creating problems. This whole mess was complicating their travel itinerary.

The Rasalhagian contingent knew that the Azami had managed to carve out 'colonies out there in the black' but they weren't up on the details. The original plan, back before Dieron, and the extent of ISF reprisals had been to leave directly from the Aurigan reach, but plans changed even before other things had come up. There might have been something on Ur Cruinne after all. The two stay behinds might well end up in a shock... well on top of everything else.

The speeches went on for another hour a painful procession of the usual politicking that increasingly circled into government and the wealthy feeling out positions. A feeling out that felt like they were going to be dancing around for a while.

Septim had found a pillar to lean against and had grabbed a pilsner to pass the time with, "This place reminds me of the Archon's palace on Tharkad."

"Yes, they did a good job repairing it." He replied looking around and then pointing to the ceiling, "You can there where the DOME replaced a structural support," Where an industrial mech had spider walked across the floor and installed a structural support. The remodeling of the original Taurian architecture to cover up where... most likely SLDF warmachines had breached the fortress and taken out Amaris's local leadership two hundred years earlier.

"Why didn't they fix the guns then?"

"Even discounting having the parts, most likely because the Taurians were in open revolt and fighting for Amaris." And with the situation in 2766 being as bad as it seemed why install replacement guns if you were afraid the rebels might turn those guns against you... still the Cordia city palace was an amazing blend of polished and transparent metals and ceramics built in an already picturesque countryside. It was a fairy tale castle, and in significantly better condition than the residences of the various dukes of the Elidere system.

Septim had landed with the Baffins and had been tasked with securing their landing zone foothold. The pirates hadn't done much contesting of their landing though, and by the time they had probably realized the scale of the offload it was too late not with Septim guarding for the two overlords and the triumph coming in, and with the last wave on the ground they completely numerical superiority over the battlespace.

"Looks like your wanted upstairs," The Lyran observed lifting his glass.

"So it seems," but it was also expected, "I expect the Magistracy ambassador is going to reach out to you, past employment history,"

"Ah so be on my guard, gotcha boss, have fun."

He grunted an acknowledgement and took the spiral staircase up past the maybe not so ceremonial guards. Apparently Houses Espinosa and Arano both called the system home. The other 'founders' were from other systems but espinosa ruled V, and Arano ruled VI and had since the late 28th century had ruled the 'Aurigan space' independent in practice of any historical claims by the Taurain concordant.

... the SLDF style icongraphy wouldn't have been out of place on Kimi, or on Elidere or on any of hte other worlds where the legacy of the camerons had attained a near cult like following. That placed him in a room with the two lords, the councilors and the ones who had heirs apparent present... and one of the Azami elders was in hushed tones with a man later introduced as Lord Karosas.

Apparently Espinosa's Catapult driving daughter hadn't been told where Black Jack had gotten his mech cache, given her apparent, and shared disgust with Lady Arano over grave robbing. Lord Espinosa cleared his throat, "Its more likely that they found a large storage depot that had been sealed away, Victoria." The graying statesman remarked, "But regardless they have very dangerous weapons." And you needed mechs to fight mechs, LosTech against LosTech certainly helped even things up,

"We were very fortunate to have outside intervention." Tamati agreed with his brother in law, "And that you were both able to make it out of the battle unharmed."
--
Notes This is again nominally canon, and doesn't include some of the material from the I Cormordir arc including stuff from Victoria and Kamea during and after the battle for the capital.

Also, while I'm sure most people have seen this:

Imperator Pax · Dec 28, 2022

House Arano Introduction Part 3
(a)

It wasn't that the Federated Suns didn't have a bureaucracy, but that for what little bit of time he'd been in the Reach the Aurigan Coalition seemed to do an awful lot of politicking and committees over tea... at least in his opinion for a place that had just had their capital invaded by pirates. He recognized that some degree of after action was needed... but Black Jack was an out of context problem in the modern era. The degree of SLDF hardware that the pirate king had was enough that he could have been expected to menace garrisons on Inner Sphere worlds.... but so far as he could tell the Aurigans just held committee meetings between their great houses for the sake of having meetings. Everyone on founder's council wanted to talk too...

It was too soon to make a call on whether or not Black Jack's people take a shot at tangling with them any time soon. He suspected the answer was no. That the pirates were too strung out to present a single easy target but that also meant if Black Jack wanted to do something he needed to knock heads together to get it done... but he was speculating. The only information they did have was that this Grim Sybil person was one of several pirate underlings who'd come in from tortuga space with the benefit of Black Jack's apparent patronage.

A detail of note, but not an exceptionally alarming one.

He put the noteputer down the picture of the Rim Worlds marked JumpShip and its dependents frozen in feed. It could be nothing. Black Jack McGirk to the best of his knowledge had never publicly avowed any sympathies for Amaris... there was no reason to assume this wasn't anything more than posturing... but while that was logical he also needed to contend with a collection of subordinates who had a tendency to see blue shark icons akin to waving a red cape was to a bull.

The door chimed. "Enter." He ordered.

The trooper at the door saluted. "Colonel. The Ambassador for the Magistracy of Canopus."

Lady Ana Marie Centrella, was Gene guessed was probably Raventhir's age... mid thirties maybe... blue eyes dark hair and complexion, there was little resemblance between the presumable main branch and the Raventhir Cadet line... but he wasn't really surprised either. "Given the forces under your command, I suppose a promotion must have been warranted." The ambassador remarked, which was the sort of comment that could have easily been taken the wrong way. He could guess why Lady Ana Marie and her Taurian counterpart didn't get along... especially if there had been existing tensions between the two nations previously.

And yet for all of that, taking a chance fighting Black Jack was preferable than being put in a position where the Azami had to contend with having the Combine try and wipe them out for the sake of their bruised pride. As things went though it wasn't any of the Centrella's business even though he was sure she could probably get the JumpShip traffic through legal enough channels, but legal discussions also tended to get public attention...

... and the azami were a colony fleet with a lot of JumpShips, a lot of everything. While he was certainly privy to things, whether he was or wasn't. "I'm not at liberty to discuss my employers' particulars, Lady Centrella."

That didn't' stop her from trying to wheedle details out of him, the fact was he might have been shocked if the Taurians didn't make at least a perfunctory appearance just given the volume and the situation. Both greater periphery states would be more capable of settling an exodus of colonists out of the Inner Sphere if they were just looking to get out, but the Azami had at least one world they were already working on, and potentially more than one. He suspected, certainly the more he considered what he would have done in their position, gone back to various worlds along the path.

What Centrella couldn't know was the presence of the Black Boxes, which of course could send 200kb of text which could be quite a lot ten light years a day. Having a Chain if not one built by the Azami who had gone out and founded Alamut last trip, then at least this one probably could put one in place in a year or two.

He also knew that Pasha had sent at least one secure courier back to Alamut before they had left for Davion space... and probably another after they'd reached Robinson or New Avalon and almost certainly after Northwind and possibly ahead of any staging following Dieron.

Gene wasn't sure how much of the events of the Inner Sphere's border gore had filtered into the periphery, but where Dieron might not have hit the news networks yet he was reasonably sure that given the time frame the Territorial states... former Territorial states had probably heard about the destruction of the 19th Galedon Regulars.

--
He hadn't agreed to anything more than an admission that they would be making a swing through Canopian space. Thankfully he'd been helpfully interupted with JumpShip routes based off of the maps from the 2760s that showed where all the pirates could be engaged from... but Fjaldr did stand out. Centrella had hinted that there had been other changes but she hadn't wanted to spoil any positive surprises... also that there were pirate problems that really might be of interests to any significant Mercenary commands.

Speaking of periphery significant Mercenary commands as soon as they'd adjourned he'd moved to go find Markham, or at least settle for Olivera if the other Marauder pilot was tied up. Cormorodir was warm, especially today, enough to warrant summer garrison dress of cap and short jacket. It seemed a better option than remaining in a pilot suit.

It was probably a little overshadowed by the current state of the capital.... maybe even the state of the Aurigan Reach as a whole. In a wide range of different uniforms patterned ultimately on the service, and utility of the SLDF he didn't stand out overly much. .. or at least not as neo feudal in appaerance as the Aurigan mechwarriors.

Even their outfits, and equipment showed SLDF influences, including the neurohelmets. The bigger tell was in the local industry. The Sleipnr was clearly based off the indigenous Vargr tank, lightened up, but given what they had been told the Vargr was indigenous and had debuted seventy odd years earlier. That didn't raise any red flags per se the Aurigans had founded their state the century previous to that, and given the situation in the wider galaxy it made sense for them to pursue a domestic vehicle that didn't require an expensive fusion engine. Each one cost about roughly double of a J Edgar of succession wars vintage but the sixty five ton tank also carried an infantry complement to battle.

The Mechs in service to each of the Aurigan great houses was telling. There wasn't anything obviously royal ... or even standard Star League configuration that couldn't have still be found in the Inner Sphere, but it was the break down. Coupled with the lack of fishbowl neurohelmets. At the time the Taurians had rebelled with Amaris's support there had a been a dozen BattleMech divisions, never mind the mech complements of other non Mech Divisions in the periphery.

Most likely the Aurigans were settled SLDF troopers descendants... it explained the positive opinion of the Star League inspite of being largely league – era Canopian and Taurain worlds. That was still speculation and it was only important because it might go to explaining hte motivation of the pirates to attack. If they were wrong about the Aurigans origins it didn't matter per se. How would you go about convincing the pirates of such a mistaken case, if they thought there were potential SLDF goodies somewhere. To that end it seemed likely that at some point down the road given the Aurigans mounting pirate problems there would be a follow on. He had to assume the Aurigans knew that and that Azami probably had recognized that... but it was the latter's elders he'd need to consult in the context of conducting operations against Black Jack.

Markham would potentially be able to provide details on what they were looking at without directly approaching the Aurigans before he moved any details up the chain to the Azami elders. He consulted the noteputer for berthing arrangements for the Marauder's understrength combined arms battalion before being interrupted by a shout out.

"There you are."

"Bubbles." He returned before allowing the urban brawler pilot introduce, again, the systems heiresses. She'd apparently been there point of contact showing the two around all morning. The unified command had both Kintaros and Catapults in stock. Truthfully even without the Azami temporarily bolstering the Company's strength they were slanted more towards a Dragoon weight with so many assaults than they were the original Hussar displacement he'd been 'aiming' for. The Azami complement favored something akin to the Light Horse regiments of the SLDF.

"I was telling the princess," there was a frown, "Lady Arano, that the Federated Suns produces new production Kintaros. I also showed them that Catapult you rebuilt after Detroit." She bit down a snicker at the memory.

Gene nodded, but didn't go so far as to remark he was glad they had been having fun. He suspected that Lady Arano probably was overly conscientious of attempts at coddling here, and didn't want to be treated that way. Especially since it seemed like the pair had actually ditched their royal guard chaperones.

--
Notes: This will pick up with b on Thursday or Sunday depending on factors presently beyond my control

Imperator Pax · Dec 29, 2022

[Nominally canon, 3019 Branch]

House Arano Introduction
Part 3 (b)

Gene watched the sabre complete its over watch flight and start its descent, then turned back as Chang reiterated her question, "We're going to do something right? That's kind of our thing, as a company. We might as well be called like Paladins of St Cameron or something."

Gene blinked expansively at the sudden comment... "Ideally yes I would like nothing better than to drop a highland burial on any pirate nest I could put hands on." He headed off any talk about the discussions with Precentor New Avalon, and the bounties that existed on Black Jack's pirates and never mind the potential salvage. "However we have at the moment a significant volume of dependents, and retasking the unit requires a bit more than a simple executive decision."

Chang had been a mercenary long enough that she had known that, but on the other hand what had been the planet of Aea and the enslavement and marching off into captivity of most of its population by Black Jack's pirates was a pretty hard thing to just swallow. "But,"

This was not the conversation he wanted to have with two foreign ... local? Nobles in tow, because it would have been insane for them not to tell their parents... but given what Black Jack was up to, that the pirate king had been running rampant for .... not just years, but decades now... and that he was probably coming back. "I am going to address the elders if there is the possibility that we can come to terms. There are over forty thousand civilians up that I am responsible for." He pointed up.

The truth was he suspected that the Azami had been planning something like this for years, maybe decades before they had discovered the JumpShip that was the Cairo. They hadn't been willing to commit without a sure world or worlds to settle out in the black but the specialist 'ark' dropships had to come from somewhere they were too new, and too ... 'modern' to be anything other than contemporary to the succession wars. Its size was probably also the reason that the Davions were willing to let him just go back out in the black ... not the least of which was the Azami would be taking JumpShips out of the Combine's borders and not coming back ... getting while the getting was good. It would hurt the combine's already weak trade, which was surely a plus for the Federated Suns.

Ultimately it was going to come down to whether or not the Azami were willing to hold on the next leg of the journey, they were almost four hundred light years out from their final destination, and if the Aurigans were willing to let the colonization fleet stick around without any kind of games.
--
The holographic globe which dominated the table, swam with a twisting pattern of lights as the LosTech processed the data. Lord Tamati knew he was in a bind. There was no questioning his popularity as first among equals, but he needed to weigh the opinions of his fellow founding houses. The threat of pirate attacks was the sort of thing that made the Aurican Coalition Military ... most generally react by withdrawing to protect their respective noble lords and homes it made it difficult to root out the problem at its source...

... and there was the potential solution to that of using mercenaries. He had hoped that a combination of the Royal Guard and trustworthy Mercenaries, like those under Commander Markham's banner would be enough to cleanse the bandits from Fjaldr... but then Aea had happened, which had been horrifying news

... even though his brother in law had opined that it also settle for the time being any disputes over the world with the Taurians. No one would be pressing a claim over a ravaged basically abandoned world especially with the HPG network, one of the major items of value destroyed.

The coalition had been frantic over just normal pirate threats, that Black Jack McGirk had turned his attention here had been a surprise... and there had been nothing to do but stand and fight.....

Fight and die most likely. If not for Commander Markham being present, if not for that extra battalion then they would have been in more dire straits. What they had not expected was the arrival of a terrifyingly large, especially by the standards of the succession wars and the periphery. There shouldn't have been any fleets that large in the periphery but news travelled slow in the Periphery and it just hadn't reached them.

It was the realities of that and needing to source information that had gathered the council together. To which they had turned to the only sources they had who could speak of such things. ComStar, and the perhaps slightly more biased source of the Magistracy Ambassador. They had of course asked the Taurian ambassador but he had known nothing.

A holographic image of a young man, probably only a few years older than his daughter Kamea stood in dark black pilot suit. Enough heavy metal had descended from orbit in just drop pods to seriously threat Cormordir city's ordinary defenses never mind the DropShips that had followed. A daunting enough prospect.

ComStar's MRB even as unimportant as their small periphery kingdom was had been able to provide the most current, to the office in any event, when the 'Shepherd's Company' had departed officially from Davion service.

"You realize that is more mechs than in the whole army." His brother in law commented to the High Lady of the Aurigan Reach Serena Arano nee Espinosa. What Santiago was referring to was the list of confirmed 'Mech kills, and his brother in law had been fastidious in reviewing the avaialable battle footage of the relief of their nation's capital. Even so the numbers were so... if not for the battle roms from somewhere called Elidere in the Federated Suns ... the MRB office did not have footage from the more recent battle of Dieron... he might have questioned their accuracy. Instead he watched as BattleMechs were sliced down with daring tenacity that stood out. "Leaving aside that and of course it much justifying a moniker as the walking death," Santiago clicked the chart.

The table of organization was obviously out of date. There was certainly no ' 588th ASF Regiment' listed in the organization. There was a 'ground aerospace wing' a term he had only used perhaps once or twice in his lessons with Kamea when speaking of ancient history. A term that his father had only used in those same lessons without much use. 'Bardiche' was listed as a Battalion of Regular experience and reliable. Claymore, appended with an also known as Shepherd's Highlanders, was also battalion strength but had warranted the notation of Veteran unit by the MRB showing significant tallies of hostile forces on Dieron. There were other tactical sub units... but he had seen those in action as they had finished destroying the pirates invading his homeworld.

"Lord Karosas." Serena addressed the old achaeo-technologist, "Do you have something you wish to add?"

"My colleagues vouch for their conduct," Not that there was any need for such vouching, duplicity would have been completely unnecessary. "I have no reason to doubt their story, what other explanation would there be?"

Tamati chuffed slightly louder than he meant to as he considered things. "I. If I recall correctly didn't you have a number of Azami make a visit a few years ago."

"They did." Lord Karosas replied. "I suspect that that venture was the beginning of whatever colony they've established... but they have not confirmed that."

Lord Tamati could easily gauge the turning in his brother in law's head. He had likely been weighing if the Coalition might not have benefitted from having such an exodus settle on their existing worlds and if it was worth any potential complications with other interstellar nations.

"It is an issue distinct." Santiago remarked with velvet care, as he began to count off, "We have the pirates, who must be killed." He glared across the table, at the holdouts against committing to military action, mood changing like ocean tides, "We have a powerful military force whose intentions we must be sure of but certainly their friendship would extraordinarily valuable to the Reach, and of course then we have the matter of their dependents whom if such is the case," He made a wide sweeping gesture towards a star map, "Are in fact to be our neighbors then it is imperative we remain on cordial terms."

He was correct, and one of the other founders quickly agreed suggesting they think of the added jumpship traffic they could potentially bring and the effect that that would have to trade in this part of the periphery.
--
Notes: To reiterated this is nominally canon to the first aurigan introduction, which will happen some time next year in full, after we get through Dieron. The potential big hang up, as I've mentioned is that frankly the original draft of this story was intended to be a novelization of Shepherd's Company putting Kamea back on the throne (a campaign play through) for the canopians, but also in the interest of bolstering the interests of the Federated Suns in the region, thereby it assumed a civil war following the death of Tamati and Serena as per canon in the JumpShip accident.

I think it has been generally agreed that Santiago had some good ideas, but to that end his lack of patience and rush to seize power ultimately weakened the reach. His pursuit of a sunk cost fallacy very much risked outright destroying the reach if any of his schemes in particular attracted the ire of his neighbors. [I mean yes its battletech, and HBS campaign makes more sense than, fuck anything post clan invasion basically]

So in the future there is another 'branch' extra currently nominally 3023 dealing with Helm that I've mentioned and then there are two other branches one with Aquagea's residences and some 'experimental tech' from a table top age of war game that will be showing up here, and also probably in Essence whenever I et around it [basically a medium laser version of a blazer but it ended up being a little more OP than originally intended because the GM accepted it making way less heat than it probably should have for the weight] and also the previously mentioned Terran mad science project introducing some other unit members.

Imperator Pax · Jan 26, 2023

Scrap: Semi-Canonical Status
Timeframe The Pirate Wars 3019

There were far less debutantes, and pillars of society this time around. The high end holographics though were the same, and made this presentation, would make this presentation easier.

Lady Raventhir gestured for him, bluntly, to get on with it. "Most of you will be aware of the base six, and square six organizational table." Four units of six mech icons each appeared in the projector, "This is in ideal terms to provide fielding a company scale force operating in roughly the same bracket of movement. On Luxen this main line of battle were two sixes, platoons, of Vindicator Medium mechs, supported by a Recon Six and another six units forming a headquarters and reinforcing section." He changed 'slides' projecting the familiar aerodyne shapes sitting on a tarmac at the spacestation. "These are four canopian built, canopian pattern PPC carrier leopards with six mech bays each. It provides the lift capacity to deploy such a company," Meaning you would need two Merchant-class DropShips to deploy such a unit. Or a Star Lord that could then carry two more DropShips. Raventhir owned a Star Lord.

The image changed. A single aerodyne dropship icon appeared. Then delineated to infantry, light and heavy vehicles, ASF, and finally a mech lance.

"This will probably unfamiliar to you. This is a Maganac Corp Tactical Group. It is designed to answer a different operational question than the Six pattern and organization. While not employed on Luxen in this full configuration a light version was employed at Luxen sans jump Infantry and ASF assets."

The table broke away into an image of the DropShip Sam Houston on Luxen in 3016. Traditionally the Azami were light raiders, or cavalry specialists, but they were best known for the prior while the agenda was to emphasize the latter.

"A tactical group is a combined arms element." Effectively a battalion level unit at full strength when with infantry and counting the dropship , deploying an ASF lance, two fighters, a mech lance and armor as its main force of advance. "Its intended application is to be rapidly mobile and emphatic on operational art. In its intended role, to arrive, roll off the group push to an objective if necessary without exterior support, fight secure it ahead of relief by a larger more typical force."

A map changed projecting the river valley, and winding course near Luxen's capital and the mountains to the north, simulating the fly in of Sam Houston at the final drill context... sans torrential rainstorm.

"On Luxen this created a nice overlap." It was true that, "65 KpH is enough to outpace the LRM carriers of a Tactical Group's heavy vehicle unit, but the Tokugawa can keep up with the Vindicator just fine." Images to that effect appeared in midair.

The use of the vindicator while not ideal perhaps as a mech, had been ideal in a logistical situation in terms of having on hand spare parts and a manageable set of ammo requirements as longas there was political. The Vindicators had only the LRMs that needed to be kept fed.

65 KpH was the basically minimum speed. The floor. You didn't want to go slower than that for medium and heavy units. The LRM carriers were something of an exception because they were intended to be kept at range and behind the main line of engagement...

The map of Luxen reflected the original company deployment of Easy and the Maganac Corp units before contact had messed up all the nice planned arrangement.

"Obviously the six works best when you have equivalency as best as possible. Six or Twelve Vidicators can be divided into pairs, in groups of three, or in three more conventional lances, or they can mass as a unit or fire a whole twelve,"

... and of course you could do the same thing with six or twelve Merlins. Centurions, Dervishes, etc... which they could demonstrate. He didn't question how Abner had arranged the Merlins that had beaten them to the Periphery by months.

"The real world being what is, its hard to field a logistical end unit of all the same designs, and there are tactical situations where mixed lances of specialists are both useful, as well as at an operational level easier to keep in the field based on supply situations." The image shifted displaying the two units side by side, "These two formations are different. They're designed to answer different questions, which means that adroitly they serve complimentary roles in battle, and in the course of a campaign."

Raventhir looked over the MAF personnel, "Thank you colonel." She took the flipper and moved it to the next slide, a map of the periphery. "The pirate incursions of late have become more and more frequent." There were static images taken from a variety of news broadcasts

He didn't respond to the comment immediately... after all that was part of the reason that they had returned to Luxen... that was part of the reason they were here in a division of force the way they were. There were other reasons. The Highlander contingent of officers had a point that, Black Jack's antics ... well there questions about how exactly he'd made the leap from some pirate on the Lyran Combine fringe to then making a pervasive habit of just going around blowing up HPGs for... now almost two decades.

The Rim Wolrds iconography of late could still be nothing more than shock value but it plenty of reason to side eye a guy. Why the continuing escalation against HPGs in the periphery, he almost seemed to be going out of his way to hit worlds with ComStar outposts.
--
Gene watched as the Star League era chargers were set on the gantries, and the techs directed the pulling of the LTV 400 out. The Magistracy was in such a situation that any mech would have been used... which of course kept to him raising questions about where exactly some of the Battle of Luxen machines had ended up... but he wasn't a detective, and frankly it was too late now to be asking those questions... at the time there had just been other things to worry about....

... and frankly if this had been the Inner Sphere those salvaged machines may well have just ended up pushed into a warehouse of the ruling house for a time when there were techs, parts and money to rebuild... but if that had been the case then Magestrix needed to get on it.

The 320 was not only lighter, and cheaper it was also more common. These had actually been coming out of factory configured Cicadas... which were themselves getting smaller engines. Replacing the LTV 400 freed up space, very valuale space. What to do with the LTVs after? That wasn't his problem.

He did not expect the Magistracy to try and produce Chargers, or Cicadas for that matter. This was a field expedient refit program designed to use chassis they had and weapons and components that the Magistracy produced themselves. The Charger was still an assault mech... even if it was kind of a crappy one. It made more sense to use it refit it and use it than just store them away

The Magistracy produced Leopard variant utilized PPCs in place of Large Lasers, because the Magistracy could produce the PPCs to meet that demand, thus the corner stone of long range offensive power was a locally manufactured PPC.

If they could have they would have put other things in, and frankly as mediocre as the eighty ton scout mech was in its base configuration he expected they'd potentially get the chance to follow Chang's idea of putting an assault cannon into the machine for close in support... but for they had PPCs in inventory and while the machine would be a touch too hot to use an alpha strike repeatedly the firepower they could cram into the freed space in exchange for a slightly lower speed should be enough.

"Projected Pitban motive power should let it keep up with Vindicators." Which was a nice plus, especially with fifteen tons of armor to back up the medium mechs. "What about the jump jets?"

He glanced sideways at the Majesty Metals liaison responsible for supplying them with locally manufactured, well manufactured on Canopus, jump jets, LRM launchers, as well as the Medium lasers... for this whole broader project "Once we are sure the gyros will work, and the machine will run." Right now the two test beds getting their factory engines ripped out would be getting PPCs, but given heat being potentially prohibitive they'd potentially follow the example of the Vindicator and Merlin and go down to only one... they'd talked about that, and rely on the Cicada's to provide outrider SRM support if anyone got cocky and tried to close in. That they already knew what they were doing with the cicadas as far as the refit work played a part in that.

Azami techs were already fitting out those nominal medium mechs, and getting them ready for Luxen volunteer pilots of the new Mech Platoon so they were actually ahead of schedule. The chargers were a newer project, and they'd experiment a bit more once the basic engine work was done.

Would it be enough?

To reliably build up a single battalion regiment to full strength?

No. It would help, and it would bolster the defenses of the planet, but what really the Canopians needed were additional mercenaries. Black Jack was probably going to make a further attempt, at least that was the concern of the Canopian government, and it was a concern that hadn't gone away in the last couple of years so it was something the federal government was having to spend money on.

In the mean time they could afford to let the Luxen Volunteers practice in the Crocket BattleMechs while medium mechs were being prepared. There was a pervasive current, a nervous energy permeating Luxen's capital. This would strengthen the Luxen Volunteers.
--
Notes: This scrap is technically semi or Pseudo-canon given what will occur in the Luxen Contracts thread (covering the events of the 2nd Luxen Contract period). I will put the rest in spoilers below.

On Chargers

So the charger, kind of a crappy assault mech, but it is one that the Rim World built... for some reason. I would guess because it wouldn't raise questions. And I had considered making a Weigel A&M line for the banshee being on Pioche hidden away in storage, but the Charger is the first option on the RAT table, and I certainly wasn't going to give the Canopians a king crab line [even though yes in hindsight that would make so much more sense for why the rim jobs rocked pioche as a fail safe.]

Pioche found a rimworld base found a bunch of crappy assault mechs waiting to be shipped off, tripped an alarm, rock slams into planet. People die.

Fast forward excavation get into the storage shelter Raventhir finds some mechs she can use initially and suggestions of a larger base.

In any event there are at least two more scraps that will probably go up in the next month, and indeed its possible that much of Thursday updates for February may be GWW Scraps. I am also looking at once I finish the events of SAM Book 1 going back and making revisions to that content's earlier chapters, finishing that, I am also looking at updating Out of the Dark (the Drow CYOA story), and also resuming updates for Essence Wielding Social General. Thats all nominal though.

Imperator Pax · Feb 8, 2023

Nominal Canon [Pre revision] [Short]

The Elders

In the age of the Star League House Cameron had managed to largely keep peace between the other great houses, perhaps even had been too generous and cautious in brokering peace between the great houses. It had been during this that an unparralled golden age for humanity had existed under Cameronian stewardship. An age which had ended with the betrayal of trust and hospitality.

Admittedly, for those who had lived in that time, probably well especially for a young man, the Star League and the stewards of Terra, and rulers of the Hegemony must have seemed like just any other government and any other rulers. The distinction between living in that age, versus this modern and more fraught era surely seemed different, but... well that could be understood, couldn't it?

Such a young man simply did not grasp how far mankind had fallen from the benevolence of the Star League. It was impossible to adequately reciprocate the generosity of the pricelessness of the secrets of Star League era medicine. Not when it came in the format of instruction and documentation from a star league, a university long lost to the predations of the Dragon's unquenchable appetite.

Volgadon had been lost for the dragon's avarice.

So thus they had come out here to the periphery to begin anew when they could no longer bear the hardship of the Dragon's whims... and starting a new colony had only increased the value of such wisdom.

The news of things from the Inner Sphere was slow going. They could not rely on the HPG network it was not secure. The limitations of the 'fax machines' simply made it impractical there was no way to string such a chain out there... so the arrival of word was as in ancient days couriers. The arrival of new colonists required many months journey but even so they arrived largely unannounced. The news that they carried was even more of a surprise.

The elders responsible for the Alamut colony had expected there to be trouble. The Azami were like all people a gathering of individuals and there were differences of opinion, Alamut was a fine example of this break, but they had not expected such a change to ccur in the inner sphere.

"Your arrival is very fortuitous brother." The elder with a promeniently henna treated beard remarked. "And what you have told us of events gives us even more to discuss than I could have scarcely imagined."

"It is more than you know brother." The newly arrived elder remarked, "there have been many changes but it only effects the details, rather than our own service. We come to insure that a forge may produce swords." He stated more formally trailing into an archaic literari dialect, "That is to say that while it is only the beginning we have brought the machinery to see to it that we are able to establish weapons for warriors. Real weapons."

It was now, in the waning months of 3019 that Alamut began to take its first steps to build up its own domestic military industry. The first item of production to be the engines necessary to power the Dervish BattleMech, and of course any of the mechs that shared it. It would take time of course, but they would work hard.

These 'retro tech' machines would take time, and would help shape the future of the Rimward Periphery. As machines that would have been considered vintage before the Amaris crisis these machines would begin to enter the periphery market with little fanfare. Only the eventual notice of the Gladiator , built using machines smuggled out of the combine that should have been destroyed centuries earlier really attracted attention. However even that was quickly dismissed by observers as irrelevant the 'gladiator' was a mech but it had a reputation, and of course it was just likely that these machines were simply rim world salvage and so they too were taken note of and dismissed as irrelevant.

"You must allow me to show you around brother."

Alamut was a mix of varied architecture. Prefabricated buildings used for military, or in the Star League era, scientific structures sprawled across one side of the river. They included of course the community hospital, and many of the places a man could go and eat, or have coffee.. however it had not taken them long after sowing the first fields to begin to construct large classical buildings for more comfortable living.

"You have built a university?" The new arrival seemed surprised, skeptical even "Pardon my question but while learning is of course the gift of the creator that seems extravagant."

The elder showing him around laughed good naturedly, and stroked his henna streaked beard before replying, "Ah, it is in our good fortune that we were gifted a copy of the medical college of New Volgadon in the Terra Hegemony as it was at the end of the Star League's golden age. That is why we do this thing."

"It is a noble endeavor." He agreed, "To be trusted with such a gift. It has been a long journey." There was a pause. Then a continuance as a pair of me npassed them by, "You must understand, the Federated Suns have struck a powerful blow against the dragon, and his greed. They have lost Dieron and Altair, but even I could scarcely believe the footage that came from Dieron, even knowing with certainty that it was unmodified because it came from Azami machines. I watched much a battalion of the sword of light be cut down before they could even hope to reach a single MechWarrior upon a hill, and many of the others fell as they reached range to fight. Another battalion fell to the beserkers from northwind as their Thugs and Highlanders closed ranks."

"The swords forged by Ancient Terra were formidable there is no question to this." That the Azami painstakingly maintained star league era machines like the mongoose were a testament to this. It was one of the great hidden strengths of the Arkab legions.

"No you do not understand... after you left, it is to say that these were not the first great defeats of the dragon's servants. On Elidere, and entire regiment was destroyed. It died to a man, with many of its DropShips. The 19th Galedon Regulars were destroyed in total. The same man responsible is the architect of the destruction wrought upon the sword of light at Dieron."

It was fair to say that he was skeptical. Understandably so. The prupose of this tour was to assure the newly arrived elder that things were wlel in hand and that they could handle the expansion of the colony to accomdate the new arrivals and the following ones... it had not been intended to discus the wars and ravages of the conflicts of the great houses. "If the battles you speak of are so significant... this walk is somewhat premature, I fear we should have addressed such losses to the dragon-"

"No, the dragon has been injured, but what you build here is more important. Medicine and healing are priceless... and we must build up our defenses. We must grow in strength, and arm our warriors for the inevitable conflict to come against the Dragon's servants, because we will have to liberate our cousins we will have to fight in the Inner Sphere, but we must have the ability to provide safe harbor, and goods with which to trade that cannot be sabotaged by those avaricious or duplicitious agents of chaos."

"If what you say of Elidere, and Dieron and Altair are true then the Dragon has been more than just injured we must take this to the others, and we must see this footage. It must be shown."

--
Notes: obviously rather obviously we are detailing the founding of the Sword of the Prophet Industries in the periphery here.

This was not originally planned for today, but Luxen II's update is not ready so rather than push that to tomorrow I'm pushing it a week, and posting this short extra now. Tomorrow I will post the 'Smoke Jaguar intro/1' teaser that leads into the mid 3020s 'you want to do what with my genes' series of snippets.

Obviously: The Azami here have a fairly rosy view of the Star League era and House Cameron as both the descendants of a memberstate population and indeed some being descendants of SLDF troops and so on.

and now a joke of sorts

The FIeld Marshal looks at the man who says this is their fault, "What did you do?" She asks.

The Azami man looks sheepish. "It is a funny story. We had thought to tell a man that the Dragon had collaborated with the Satan Amaris, and that this was the reason for which the Dragon's servants pursued us so." He paused, "We did not realize the sword we had unsheathed against the Dragon."

Imperator Pax · Mar 25, 2023

Teaser: Aquagea 3019 The Pirate Wars

... The centurion was in surprisingly good condition. The only immediate oddity was in the torso where... something had replaced the two medium lasers... they looked like medium lasers but rather than just singular weapons it was... putting off more heat, but that was understandable. It was like someone had mated together two Medium lasers without including any kind of extra internal cooling. Twice the punch twice the heat, in a single ton weapon system.

Ordinarily a centurion's two PhosTec Medium Lasers were split front and back instead the locals had some how cobbled the two weapons together. Two third of a ton of standard grade armor could be blasted through ... it was true it didn't have the range of a PPC but Darryl's cobbling had generated a weapon that didn't produce anywhere near the waste heat of a PPC either.

No one would have thought that this development would become the defining weapon of new brawler mechs used by what would become the Via Caballero rangers.

"They're pretty cool aren't they?" The pimply faced tech asked in the local twang of english, a twang that he couldn't particularly say he missed.

"I don't have this model Medium laser." But he could provide Martel and certainly Magna equivalents, "If you think this could be replicated."

When one got down to it there were differences in individual weapons. Whether this could be replicated or not of if Darryl had somehow found some magical exploit, they'd have to see. Ultimately Myomer, heat sinks and armor were largely interchangeable. What made a mech a mech was the Chassis. That was the skeleton of the mech and the internal components.

The eventual Canopian Centurions, deeply ironic since the Marians would move to produce a truly retrotech totem mech Centurion, would be built under license from the Federated Commonwealth as part of a technology sharing agreement but would be a variant on the AL. Given existing Magistracy weapons production that variant would carry a PPC in place of a large laser and thus run a bit hotter.

Simply put with no reliable locally built trade options it was easier to field two Holly LRM launchers and standardize the parts used. Even by the time trade with the Duchy of Andurien became feasible it was a simpler more capable solution to product demand. As for Darryl's medium laser combo they would prove remarkably effective though wouldn't enter production until well after the current threat of Black Jack McGirk had been put down.

Aquagea simply didn't have the population base. It could support mech refit yards certainly, but battlemech production was simply beyond the local population's ability to provide for... especially given the focus on supplying germanium to market and the growing agriculture sector with new irrigation and drought resistant plants. It would only be much later, towards the end of the following decade that the Aurgians would begin production of Griffins and Dragons and even these would initially be built largely using imported weapons from the Canopians so the eventual supply of AC 10s and LRM 10s never were readily available in enough numbers to convince the Centurions to switch back to the original version of the Centurion.

This stop was about other things though. Whatever interest a specialist weapon was, lucky, today was more about stopping at Aquagea to deal with problems in the region. Aquagea had already been having problems with its neighbor of Zathras, which wasn't that stable. Gene looked over the scrub country. "If Black Jack is going over the border into the Free Worlds League, we can be reasonably sure he's probably jumping over the Capellan border as well." Given previous attacks on the Fed Sun that seemed pretty likely scenario given what they knew... but it wasn't what he was reallyu concerned about, "If ComStar's footage," That they had picked up from their stopover on Detroit was accurate about what happened. "Was accurate BlackJack has been hiring on... I have to question how much control he really has." Or if the rest of the pirates nests in Tortuga and wherever else the vermin lived were going along with it because he had the biggest big stick of any of them in terms of mech forces at his disposal.

As it was no one hit by the pirates was having a good time. This was no longer about raiding and pillaging. Oh that was going on, but the rate of atrocities being committed was increasing with little rhyme or reason.

Not that they'd been a professional military force to start with but increasingly FireStarter and other mechs had been deployed in a clearly organized terror campaign over the border with the League targeting civilians who clearly weren't a threat before they had bugged out.

That kind of behavior just went beyond the pale.

"That's not all is it?"

He blew a breath out, and glanced to the mongoose pilot, "The attack on," Probably managed by jumping to Viribium first, "Claybrooke showed a Rampage. Eighty Five tons, now to be sure the Rim Worlds republic exported these to the Taurians, and for that matter anyone with interest but certainly all the territorial states had them before 2765. It isn't insane to think that one might have survived... but it was in Amaris colors. That strikes me as very unusual." Admittedly it was the only mech he had seen in 'correct' colors, there had been other mechs using shark iconography but nothing recorded in the roms had been put up that suggested anything some asshole pirate decided hey I'm going to paint my mech in how it would have been the Amaris Fusiliers in the 28th century.

It could be nothing... but it was an outlier that did stand out in the footage. It also broke with Black Jack's known habits... he hadn't repainted of his mechs in that kind of parade job. He didn't seem to have a parade use at all. He seemed to have liked black and red. He liked skeletons and devils, skulls and crossbones but even that wans't uniform.

The mech stood out because atypical compared to everything else in the video.

After a moment of contemplation, Bahar answered, "Somewhere like Pioche perhaps. Many worlds were lost when the Star League fell, and more were abandoned over the long darkness of the succession wars, could he have found another hidden rim world outpost. These could also be the ones who attacked the Aurigans,"

"No, I considered that possibility. The JumpShips are different and the machines, I went back through the Aurigans roms there is no indication of non SLDF mechs. The attack on Cormodir seems to have been core units of McGirks force... these seem different." Whether it was or not, it didn't change the fact that McGirk was rampaging across the rimward frontier.

Whether it was directed or he just let his subordinates run rampant the truth was the pirate wars of the late third succession war era were to effect everyone in the rimward to some degree or another. This was to include the three states of the Inner Sphere, and the major , and minor periphery powers.

McGirk was ultimately a raider, maybe a warlord at best in terms of administration, threatening and extorting whatever world he temporarily occupied, but he wasn't staying anywhere for long periods of time. No one could say where the Orion pilot was, just where he had been, and some times not even then. McGirk attacked with his host and moved on rather. There was no pirate nest to go attack like there had been at Fjladr.

Establishing a landhold on Aquagea put them on a planet where they could deploy forces... and certainly since Aquagea mined Germanium... and the Alamutian Azami needed Germanium, or would need Germanium in the long term it made sense to have a presence here. "We'll see what the thrust into the League yields... if we can catch them on this side of the border, so much the better." As it was the rumor from the League side was the Duchy of Andurien was not happy about the situation and there were concerns that in addition to black jack that the Capellans might try and take advantage of any Marik weakness. "What do we know about what happened on Claybrooke?"

"We know that they didn't destroy the HPG station there." Bahar paused, "That is a break from how McGirk has been acting."

He nodded. That was true. He hadn't considered that, but the survival of the HPG station was a break, previous to this attacks on worlds with an HPG station aimed at hitting COMSTAR so that they couldn't beam word out that delayed knowledge of, or would delay knowledge of pirate activity. Precentor New Avalon had cited the loss of the HPG station on the davion side of the border as reason for his office to issue bounties on the pirates... even though it had been very clear that Huthrin Vandal had wanted to act against McGirk before this.

Financial conservatism within ComStar's higher ups made a certain degree of sense, but had a gnawing suspicion that there was more to it. Where had Black Jack gotten his material in the first place... how had he managed to operate as long as he had?
--
Notes: Again in this timeline Black Jack defeats 1st Division ComsGuard in his battle with them, so he has a substantive amount of material to use after 3005, on top of being able to recruit people with the promise of plunder.

Now at some point I do need to finish the 1st Circuit argues before Tiepolo about the situation with Black Jack to provide some context to the divisive nature of the organization, because in this period ComStar is already pretty divided in opinion.

Anyway I'm currently working on going through my notes, I'm posting this just because its more or less ready to go, but Sunday we will go ahead and start moving to finish up the faire and move on to the conquest of Dieron in April just other things have been coming.

Imperator Pax · Apr 28, 2023

Another Story using essence of mech lab... when I should actually be working updating this.

Initial Draft Version:

A Rabid Fox appears from the Heavens!
Mallory's world, 3013

There is a point in your life where things have settled down, and you realize you're getting older. That maybe its time to hang up the spurs.

... and sometimes the Universe looks at you tells you your fucking stupid, and to hell with slowing down... and then proceeds to kick your ass to another dimension.

My mouth was dry. It was hot, and sandy outside, and humidity ranked up there with Dubai in the peak of summer. The threat of heat advisory was overshadowed by the one for Combine invaders. I would have figured that if I was going to get dropped into BattleTech it would be as some Space Heir shenanigans... at least I hadn't been dropped into the worst parts of the timeline... or in the middle of the clan invasion.

"Fuck." I hissed as the Warhammer I had just said hi hows it going to started to turn, the Warhammer pilot must have been wondering what the fuck was going on. "Fucker." This was supposed to be the rear of the formation I had no idea how some asshole heavy mech had gotten here... and I didn't really know why I was fighting ... I hadn't woken up in the AFFS ...

...on the other hand I was a guy with a mech, on a world being invaded... I knew what the other guy was piloting, but I doubted he knew as much about this thing of mine... but we were both seventy ton mechs.

The armored gauntlet containing the lasers reared back and I punched the Warhammer that didn't want to show up on my scopes. Punching a mech is harder than it looks, never mind that it would make any 'true born of Kerensky's clans weep'... and I was in a clan mech but leaving that aside the battlefist hit the Warhammer's side torso. I had already run into it moments earlier, and I didn't let up, the left arm carrying the same energy weapons load out slammed into the Sword of Light's mech and into about a minute of pummeling I realized that I'd reduced the Warhammer to so much inarticulate scrap... just about the same time as I realized that I was surrounded by a bunch of other combine mechs...

"fuck."

I stepped forward, stepping on the downed Warhammer as I did so and fired the clan large lasers sending blasts of energy into the nearest combine machine as my targeting computer locked on. I couldn't keep that up, I noticed the immediate spike in my display of heat versus the DHS ability to address that kind of build up... and I knew immediately this was going to be bad.

The Clan Large Lasers, what were properly Clan Extended Range Large Lasers just ran too hot for the dual heat sinks to keep up... but not seeing any other options and accounting that I was outnumbered to hell and back... well okay there was a company of Davions around but we were properly hosed to be honest...

"Well guess you guys are earning your pay tonight." I grunted over the open channel as my seventy tonner took another step on top of the warhammer and then fired one arm and then the next hoping to avoid redlining my coolant system as the targeting computer fixed on the nearest mechs first. If they were going to kill me, I was damn going to make sure I took as many of them with me as I had to... never mind I'd been on this planet and in this universe for all of the morning.

... and that I was apparently fourteen again... that sucked too.

Sand kicked up, guns fired on all sides and the ... what the fucking history books would call the 3rd Battle for Mallory's world commenced amongst a wasteland of scrub brush, and dirt. My targeting computer and communications systems telling me all about the different mechs, and making sure I was only shooting at Combine Mechs or in this case mechs from the sword of light... the temperature gauge kept climbing as the cooling system struggled forcing me to pair down to just three of the guns as ferro fibrous armor was sand papered by enemy missiles, and withering fire... I got the feeling that eleven and a half tons really wasn't enough when there was a whole battalion bearing down... and just as soon as the heat would allow it the fourth laser came back into play...

... it would only be later that I remembered I could have routed my machines cooling to each specific gun and that not that I had had time to link the heat sinks into the weapons, and nor could I have pursued that for all four. It was one of those benefit of hindsight things.

So I just kept blasting, and with a preference to getting up close enough firing directly into mech cockpits whenever I could line the reticle up to do that, which was usually any time anyone got close enough to fire a medium laser at me.... which was by the end of it all was too many to count... and it was only after the shooting was done that the rest of the Davions decided to show up, and my armor had been shot to hell.

Nothing had gone internal but the armor was barely there any more.
--
I found myself panting outside the crouching mech... I didn't even remember getting out of the mech. I had unzipped the flight jacket. Post combat shakes. I was coming off the adrenaline dump, I told myself I'd been through this ... I needed to find something with a lot of sugar fight the crash that was going to come after this.

So what if I hadn't ever done in it a giant robot, or with laser cannons. So fucking what.

I stole back into my cockpit and managed to find a water bottle in the supply kit which I greedily drank down half of poured the fruit punch mix into my mouth and swished it around despite the grit and swallowed. Then sat back and panted behind the armored view screen of the closed mech... I don't know why I'd gotten out of the armored war machine...

... that had been stupid. Being in here offered me more protection than being outside of it. I didn't remember getting out, but that was the shakes. I grabbed a towel and wiped the sweat off my face, and shook like a dog... and then looked at the passive camera feeds and the broken war machines around... and the returns of incoming reinforcements.

I fell back into the seat as the Essence window popped up to nag me... maybe I'd just pass out sitting in the cockpit, and wait here.
--

A Rabid Fox Saves the First Prince
Part 2

Ian Davion watched the teenage mercenary mechwarrior retreat back to his cockpit. Any physical weakness after the battle was understandable... his Atlas had also gotten a bit warm as the battle had progressed, and he wasn't running an energy boat. His command company hadn't been expecting combat themselves that Colonel Kurita had managed to waltz his battalion so brazenly onto them was ridiculous.

... but it had been what happened.

With their forces battered, but intact Ian Davion knew that they could succeed in driving the Combine from Mallory's world. "Signal Colonel Kell."

Five football fields away the seventy tonner booted.

"Alright," The teenager grunted looking at the screens, a mix of physical and hard light. "If I slave these here then, these," He muttered to himself... the pips were representational. He was pretty sure if he was reading the output right he couldn't just slave all of his heat sinks to his weapons... not if he wanted to be able to move ... and given how bad off his armor was, he didn't want to be standing there like some kind of sitting duck.

A couple of minutes later the displays greened. The projected heat curve flattened but the computer still projected the machine would risk overheating if he had to fire all four lasers... but he wasn't surprised This was better than nothing in any event.

His index finger hovered extended over the console interface... he had a headache staring at the machine... or that could be the come down from the adrenaline high. Whatever it was he exited out of the diagnostics display without out any further changes. Ten of the mechs 21 DHS were now slaved to two of the Clan Extended Range Large Lasers... it would help manage his heat problem this was so much more of a headache than it was on table top.

Sand swirled around his machine as the wind blew through the wasteland.

He looked at the mech returns... "Man, if I make it through this I am going to fuck off to nowherese-ville... this Inner Sphere succession war stuff is for the dogs." He remarked to the machine, rather to an actual person. The digital display returns showed... well a lot... a lot of signals. There were mech regiments, and non mech regiments... and there were a lot of both... this was a real battle, not some dust up with pirates, or local militia types.

It was about that time his actual computer screens were over laid with some gamer esque display from the essence triggering showing him a bunch of values and options that he didn't have time to deal with. BV, Currency values, the ability to spend for skills and buy items... all sorts of things that he couldn't use right now.... not with a piddling 25 BV 'in the till' so to speak. He 'd work out all of this once he made it through the day.

It would be later on after he had made it through the day that he actually looked at his character sheet... which seemed to be akin to a starter roll up from Age of War the table top RPG that some ideas would occur to him... that and using the recycle button. Today's survival was about making it through the cluster fuck of being dropped into one of the major battles of the late 3rd succession war, even as the details nagged at him.

He paused, and vocally observed "Oh the Kell Hounds are here." The pieces slowly fell into place as he turned his heavily scuffed heavy mech around... and half remembered details from a book he hadn't read or paged through in a couple years slowly came together... well there went the timeline for the rest of the third succession war...

He'd recognized the Second Sword of Light, and the lack of returns from the warhammer that he'd managed to nearly run over... and to tell the truth the Kell Hounds had never been his faction... this was the battle where Yorinaga Kurita was supposed to kill First Prince Ian Davion.

The Davion in the Atlas over there.

Then Yorinaga was supposed to be all emo about not getting to carry off the body to the coordinator when the Combine got run off the planet...

... so yeah, "There goes canon." He took a glance through the semi opaque overlays to squint at the remains of the mechs... and in particular another seventy ton mech... the one that had his Rabid Fox's foot impressions over its battered armor.

That was Yorinaga Kurita's warhammer.

Yorinaga Kurita was dead.

Ian Davion in his Atlas over there wasn't.

... Ian was still First Prince, and thus not getting succeeded by Hanse... which risked potentially derailing the whole battle of Halstead station which risked fucking up the whole NAIS thing... which would be bad whenever the clans came a knocking... that would be bad.

His thoughts were interrupted by a Davion liaison officer intruding on them by handshaking his mech... more or less with an offer he couldn't refuse.

--

He grumbled to himself that he thought this planet was supposed to be a breadbasket world... not that complaining didn't do him any good, but it was something to do while he trudged the heavy mech through. The Combine didn't seem to know what the hell to do, to the point he had to wonder whether they were waiting for Yorinaga to tell them what to do... in which case that sucked for them...

... maybe Yorinaga had been hit by the good idea fairy and had taken his whole battalion without telling anyone or what to do at all? Hadn't the Combine lost Halstead station, he had know that the Kell Hounds had made Yorinaga back off in canon so maybe he hadn't told anyone and the Davion counter attack had found some gap to exploit and now they were backpedalling.

His targeting computer flagged a Panther even before it crested the hill and as it soon as it showed up he slathered it with some love from his large lasers dropping the 35 ton mech into a burning heat...

"Second Sword of Light, 2nd Legion of Vega, 9th Benjamin Regulars, 24th and 36th Dieron." He recited in annoyance.... what a mess, he perked up and started shooting the Jenners as they zoomed in, not wanting them to get close given his armor diagram's abundance of yellow and red indicators... but the Davion liaison was right the Combine was fighting a if we can't have it neither can you.

He put the reticle in line with the mech's head, and squeezed the right trigger, the ER Large Laser with slaved heat sinks in the arm fired, and down went another bug. He tapped his console to send the video footage to the davion hq vehicle... some command call the 'Brigands' of all things attached to the 7th Crucis Lancers and then turned bringing his left arm in line to fire on another slightly heavier BattleMech with shit armor and vestigial arms. It exploded into its own glorious fireball as the lasers ripped through standard armor.

Keep moving and shooting, survive and then figure out what the fuck to do from here.
--
Notes: As I mentioned I should be starting yet another thing, and especially not a BT, but this idea has been nagging me so this is Essence of Mega Mek lab (https://forum.questionablequesting....discussions-thread.4740/page-101#post-5134727) + A Simple Battletech CYOA (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1eden4TNeOBtrhSjClK8eVcJIiaVGEOzKIq02Pc6OMgM/edit) dropping into Mallory's world in 3013

The title is not fixed, its a reference to the Rabid Fox B configuration that is the starting mech. That information can be found: https://www.clanfox.com/downloads in the record sheet document available on this page.

This is currently sitting at about five thousand words ... coming up on an idea that first went to its first draft about twenty hours ago, and I've been doing other things today... some times its like that. I know I should actually be working on updateing the story that uses the essence first as such, but this operates using the same essence with a slightly different plot line... it is fairly Davion aligned, so more like GWW but it uses plot ideas from both. I hope to get an actual update to that story up in May, but in the mean time I'll probably post some more of this in the misc thread.

EDIT: Yes I wasn't paying attention and posted this here, and not in Essence Wielding Social General.

Imperator Pax · May 19, 2023

Scrap Series: Industry
Number 2 in Series (technically there is teaser already up for Number 1 and number 1 is set to occur after the battle of Dieron finishes and there is another one in planning that takes place in between)

Pseudo / Semi canon

--
Arcturan Arms was as its named suggested an arms manufacturer on Arcturus. Inventive. They had made among other things the Mardsen II MBT that surprisingly the Canopians on Luxen had still had in inventory. It had suffered financial problems, and existed as a subsidiary of Arcturus based MacEnroe, the problem was that MacEnroe simply did not have the financial capital or political clout to break out into the market.

It kept its head above water, but it was a middle of the pack Lyran Company who's industrial performance did not do well to distinguish it from others in that bracket. In another successor state maybe it would have been different, but as a consequence of the Commonwealth being the largest economy by GDP in the Inner Sphere MacEnroe was forgettable. It was not a house hold name. It might have once been but that had been in a much earlier era of human prosperity.

The problem was the Davion Pound was weaker than the Lyran Kroner... the C-Bill was weaker than the Lyran Kroner so that made business complicated. It had dragged this out to assemble the capital involved, and then on top of that there was the political posturing on the side of things.

Arcturus was technically three jumps from the Combine border. Eight from Dieron, not exactly a short trip. It was more than a dozen jumps from the coreward periphery fifteen from Buttehold and further still from the von strang's world. Never mind going the opposite direction towards the rimward periphery...

In theory outside of the combine threat the world should be fairly safe, and it was the combine who was seemingly the real threat. The document that established the groundwork of the Federated Commonwealth had been signed.. and thus the investment into Arcturan had been smoothed over somewhat compared to the potential headaches that such an acquisition into a defense contractor might have otherwise run into. So as a result what had begun in 3018 through proxies and intermediaries had taken a couple of years and then time to run through company inventories and contend with other minutiae before the first new production Marsden II MBTs began to roll off the assembly lines.

It took another eighteen months after that before the first Crossbows since the 26th century to roll off, built using VLAR 300 series engines, and a combined Dalban avionics and communications package along with a host of rebalanced weapons. Magna produced Mk2 medium lasers and a Hellstar PPC replaced older designs and integrated a new parts commonality with other machines... what made the crossbow design interesting still was that its missile racks in the 6B was in many ways a direct precursor to the mounting system that would evolve into Mercury a few centuries later, and thus a distant ancestor of the Blackwell industry OmniVehicles... which was the next Arcturan project that they had licensed to produce.

... with Natasha Kerensky's consent of sorts after that whole business in the rimward periphery. The Wolf Captain hadn't seemed especially enthused about merchant things... but the Wolf Dragoons had signed off on it. That was the next project as Arcuturan arms looked forward to in the later end of the decade increasing its production of vital war materiel.

The Azami technician departed having left them with the final report of where they sat with the latest tanks.

As it happened sharing a border ... well for worlds directly on the combine border and those nearby there was big business to be made in the defense industry once you had the ball rolling. Long term prospects of investment were looking good. If they could get the Federated Commonwealth off the ground then Arcturan arms could expand further.

Not that he was involved in day to day operations, but the Azami were sure they could get a Dervish line operational... and there salvaged Hegemony machinery that would eventually go to bringing Archer production online. There were Commando talks, but those would be strictly export. They'd licensed GM's 180 fusion engine, used in the Black Jack, for a Marsden II version with Large Laser, and there was planned test of an upgraded Marsden II with a prototype LBX autocannon also produced by GM.

All of that was in part why Gene was expecting that there were going to be questions, and as long as the Duke of Arcturus was prepared for the truth well ... he should be prepared to face the reality that the bulk of the starting capital on the venture to buy out Arcturan Arms had come from the Davion bounty for killing the Galedon Regulars DropShips during the Elidere Campaign.

The expansions of material, and advantageous licensing processes were built up on the legacy of the Elidere Campaign... but LosTech prospecting could also be credited as well. On the other hand he rather doubted the Duke of Arcturus would make that sort of small talk. The truth was the Lyran establishment hadn't tended to make military related small talk.

... it seemed like after you had a reputation for mulching Combine Regiments and slaughtering pirates with LosTech mechs that Social Generals no longer wanted to talk to you if they could avoid it and especially didn't want to talk shop. Most Lyran gentleman joined the LCAF as a gentleman's club of aspirant mechwarriors ... and well... for the Arcturus yeomanry, if to borrow a Davion term, military service to the Commonwealth was often about a loyalty to House Steiner than their more local politicians so they tended to be the more professional soldiers...

... and it was those professional soldiers utilizing the Marsden II tanks, and other products that were now on the market, because the Combine was a close and belligerent neighbor.

Sensing his probable worries Septim started to reassure him that most likely that Doctor Abner would monopolize the Duke's attention. The years after Dieron had been busy... the times and the Inner Sphere were changing. Their stop over here was really part time after all, in part due to things Abner had brought back from his latest expedition into the periphery

--
Notes: This is a short scrap, largely brain storming stuff I did Monday. So one of the things that I am still weighing is Rasalhague at this point, particularly the questions related to what happens in that neck of space due other factors. The Rasalhague are going to rebel, and while peeling off an entire military district is unlikely the combine is very likely to lose a lot of worlds from that RMD if they weren't careful. So in this scrap, it assumes Orestes is still in Combine hands even though by the time the Aurigan crisis is resolved rasalhague may actually be in existence in the main timeline, but here it is assumed to not be.

If it is though, then by that point there would be significantly more breathing room for Arcuturus in ~3026 or perhaps the Rasalhague are in the process of rebellion concurrently to the Aurigan Civil War wrapping up. In either case, it would likely behoove the Lyrans to insure that the Combine cannot attempt a reconquest of any separtist RMD worlds effectively... and of course that assumes that that the Azami likewise do not rebel in general in the 3020s either. If the Combine starts sloughing provinces to internal rebellion domino effect is possible

Imperator Pax · Apr 16, 2024

Hammers Slammers unite snippet c. 3026 Unit Profile (MRB)

Originally beginning as Hammer Company under the command of a displaced, or disgraced Federated Suns militia armor officer of the planet Friesland, the Slammers are the second armor formation a part of the Shepherd's company. Alois Hammer is a native of the Federated Suns and seems to have left his home planet under a rather dark political cloud following a conflict with the Hereditary Presidential family of Trump.

Hammer Company as it existed following the second battle of Luxen was encapsulated and brought aboard the Shepherds as part of a then hiring cycle. The Slammers did see action during the Elidere campaign alongside the Shepherds original Azami armor units but were overshadowed by the force under St George which spearheaded Shepherd's counter attack against 1st and then 3rd 19th Galedon Regulars. The St George Task Force also was the principle armor unit on Ander's Moon against 2nd Battalion 19th Galedon.

It was following this that the Slammers began to take on their hitherto standard composition. The Slammers received the first run of Badger and Bandit hover vehicles as well as LosTech Fury tanks, and other supplies rendered from Star League Caches of armor. This would continue as the Slammer were expanded to a broader mechanized infantry and armor formation. Among the primary responsibilities of the Slammers during its early years, before 3020, was to serve as the Shepherd's primary artillery even though Shepherd seemed to occasionally reinforce them with other units for large battles i.e. 1st Dieron against the 5th Sword of Light.

Hammer's Slammers reached full nominal strength as a regiment after the Pirate Wars becoming a regiment in its own right in 3025 comprising 2 Battalions of Tank, 1 Battalion of Mechanized infantry and the battalion of Artillery, and the Regimental Support Battalion. The Slammers are slated to receive air power from the Shepherds as it becomes available with the Regiment having already received JumpShips and DropShips from Shepherd's Company.

The Slammers operate exclusively fusion powered tanks with most of their LosTech tanks concentrated under Alois Hammer's Whites (1st Battalion). 2nd Battalion constitutes Shrek and Devastator tanks largely furnished by the Lyran contract at Hespersus.

The Slammers are a dedicated Mechanized Infantry and Tank force rated exceptionally highly by the Draconis March Militia, of whom a portion of the units are veterans of (including graduates from Robinson Battle Academy), and are currently retained by the Prince's Champion Yvonne Davion.
--
Note this is nominally canon but it also chronologically like seven years in the future and is written nominally for ComStar.

Also i.e. notes2: ComStar assumes that Shepherd's company is probably larger than publicly advertised since they, like House Davion after Elidere assume that Tristian St George is a person commanding a lot of tanks, and not an AI with a castle and ground combat Vehicles, and similarly as similar artillery situation occurred during Dieron where Fortress Dieron slammed a bunch of cruise missiles into the sword of light and then of course after that you had or have in contemporary story time the whole Azami great trek out to the periphery and the pirate wars where Shepherd refers to the unit total as an RCT.

Imperator Pax · Jan 2, 2023

Teaser: Son of Sam
Conclusion: Unknown Date
Somewhere in the Rimward Periphery

A bestial roar echoed in his ears over the comms. Metal tearing from metal. The Rampage Assault mech was not the first he had destroyed today. Nor was he the only one who had destroyed the pride of the rim World Republic's indigenous Mech designs. Blue shark adorned mechs lay scattered broken. White gray tanks advanced through a shattered ash strewn urban environment.

Hammer continued to move forward. The Armored Battalion's Fury and Alacorns rolling to drive ferric tungsten alloy gauss slugs into any fusion signatures north of what once had been the MSR running through the city center. Claymore was screening their left flank as they came into position, but Bardiche was a painful eight mikes behind the main thrust of the regiment.

He grit his teeth against the thrum of a supersonic flyby. The ASF wing coming over was low low.

RimWorld ... insane genocidal madmen claiming to be loyal to a long dead baathist regime and to its psychopathic lunatic murderous dynastic heir had shattered a reservoir pouring literally millions of gallons of water down into the city potentially killing tens of thousands, and certainly displacing hundreds of thousands. The action had diverted half of the unit's primary mech strike force putting them behind schedule and creating serious operational headaches that they were trying to address on the fly.

Azami engineers were working now to put bridge laying equipment over still painfully turbulent water water ways churned out by the sudden deluge. Their desperation was put forward by the company's air power executed close air support to drive machines back that had been built to fill the ranks of the hidden army in the 28th century.

The handshake from the Atlas twisted him from link he had with his mind machine interface that was allowing him to dance through the narrow one way streets. There were few things that could do that from his degree of synchronization through the neurohelmet. Very few things. The signal was a data packet relayed through the Atlas of inbound telemetry and a priority HAF flagged packet at that.

It was if it needed to have some description synesthesia like. The importance of the message coded specifically in a pattern that would alert him of incoming critical needs information. Its originating point from Assault DropShip Hedwig as she burned at high Gee in orbit of the planet. Her gun telemetry showing arriving JumpShips at Pirate point in orbit.

They weren't expecting reinforcements.

The idea of reinforcements was kind of laughable.

The Azami of Alamut were too far away. The Azami colony might have received word of course confirm that a descendant of Stefan Amaris had been confirmed, that he was engaged in active actions of attempted conquest and bloodshed, but that news could not have potentially reached them quickly enough for enough time to put a major strike package together.

The Taurians sending aid was laughable. He wasn't expecting Canopian aid , not with a serious potential threat already levelled against their capital and a likely highly probable threat against Luxen. The idea that one of the great houses would be engaged? Highly unlikely.

The Eridani were back in Davion space.

There was no one Shepherd expected to come to help them. Hedwig agreed. The DropShip was banking hard and prepared to launch if need be a frontal assault if these were Rim World reinforcements. If needed to prevent a Rim World nuclear strike aimed at forces that were in all respects to the opinion of the SDS AIs Hegemony forces engaged in a civilian population center... because that was of course the exact thing to expect. That was demonstrated Rim World doctrine in the 28th century, and Stefan Amaris's what ever generation descendant had been stomping around having decided it was war crimes o'clock had done nothing to dissuade such an assessment.

He executed the tactical breathing exercise to decompress and parse the mentally colored data. "Unknowns at pirate point." He said his voice going over the channel to the rest of the unit... he prepared to order all of their air cover to retask, to pull them off the front refuel and rearm and aim towards the new force in the skies above the planet now. "Eyes on primary target." Ordinarily... his headquarters command company would have fielded as a combined arms special warfare unit one that could have neatly been encapsulated and self deployable from the Sam Houston.

Or at least that was the internal company pitch... the truth was while that was the ideal it had proven very very limited in its scope.... that was to say in terms of actual operation use in the field. He had excellent back for the fight at hand, but the HQ unit was split off. The Light vehicles, the absurdly expensive omni vehicles were behind the new river, on the other side of the highway besides, the Fury tanks were paired up with the Chaparrals providing computational firing data for the regimental artillery more broadly. In other words they weren't in the thick of it... of course that was why the chapparals were being employed not LRM carriers that would have needed to be closer to the front.

He swung and brought the PPCs to bear on a target of opportunity. The mech's cockpit in his reticle disappeared as man made ball lightning zipped through it's weakened structure. Not only were they spread out, the extended firefight was taxing even his machine's DHS cooling systems.
--
The Widow Company had dropped from orbit feet first into hell exactly how their noble ancestors of the SLDF would have done. Today would be one of remembrance of Clan Wolf. Of Honor, and Glory. The battle was days old by the time they had arrived, no matter, this battle would be the envy of not just their fellow dragoons but of the homeworlds.

The tide had already turned before their planetfall but it was hard to deny that after facing the pathetic carrion machines of the Inner Sphere coming to battle with the technology the golden age of the star league had not been a welcome potential challenge to warriors of the clans... or rather it should have been... they had hardly expected honorable conduct from the usurpers verminous minions, but their skills at battle even in spite of their superior machines had left much to be desired for her company.

Still she would be able to demonstrated their success to the other dragoons and those born in the clans would be green with envy. Natasha Kerensky powered down here Warhammer and brought it to kneel in order to dismount. The eighty five ton assault mech turned away and continued on. Her warbook identified it as a 'Crockett'. The machine's IFF declared it as attached to a command callsigned 'Claymore', a BattleMech Battalion of Highlanders who could trace unbroken descent back to ancient terra apparently. This was apparently also that the Battalion flashed Terran Hegemony IDC codes which her machine had validated out, they were a long way from home of course... but she could hardly fault their pursuit of Amaris's forces into the periphery.

Beyond a Royal Marauder was hull down. Techs crawling over its recently applied high contrast earth tones that her Warhammer registered as SLDF camo appropriate to the planet's arid environment. Kilted highland soldiers, notably carrying Star League standard issue Mauser Laser Rifles stood careful watch at the perimeters, and were manning secondary lines of defenses.

She had taken careful note of the presence of the Marauder II and Bandit, and Badger vehicles including that of the latter the use of their OmniVehicle configurations were being employed. It would have to be included in her report to Colonel Wolf, but she doubted very much that Joshua's brother would mind. The Dragoons' commanding officer would have greater priorities.

"The Colonel wants those tests confirmed." A brogue voice shouted at a cluster of personnel.

The Company support personnel had volunteered their assistance... at her prodding of course... to assist but more to the point to insure they could confirm the test results themselves using star league era computers.

They would have the results soon, or rather confirmation. They had not quite had to wash the many generation descendant of the usurper out of his cockpit. The PPCs the Marauder had pumped into the heavily armored war machine had tipped the gyro as it had attempted to close the distance with its MASC active and as a result the machine had literally stumbled and rolled off the roadway down a hillside and ejected its cockpit as a result of that damage sending the harnessed tainted unnamable into the water.

The initial report suggested the pilot had been dead prior to hitting the water The first round of blood tests against an apparent sample of the Amaris gene line confirmed for someone named 'Dante' that the bastard 'was a direct descendant of Stefan Amaris of the Rim Worlds Republic'. Exact Quote.

She looked expectedly at the Dragoon science caste assisting, tense with anticipation of that confirmation. Descendant of Amaris. Confirmation of that by itself would need to be sent to the clans immediately if not sooner never mind the little details of his death. There was a shuffling ripple through the assembled force as new orders echoed out.

Apparently enough confirmation of the enemy's destruction had been substantiated that units were being retasked to Emergency Relief of the Civilian Populace. A few more miserable minutes passed, and then a green confirmation. "As much as we can be at this point. I would say with relative certainty that it is not a body double, sir." The swarthy rake thin old man declared to his superior. He would have been positively ancient by clan standards, and wore the fatigues and insignia of the SLDF Medical Command, this was apparently the regiment's chief surgeon.

Orangish brown eyes narrowed, then nodded. "Thank you doctor." The man was dismissed to other duties, and the Marauder pilot swung mechanically to face the Dragoon contingent, "Captain Kerensky, I am Colonel Shepherd," The introduction was like watching a historical clip... even though he had to be much younger than she was he sounded like a positive literally centuries old holovid recording of the league officers of old right down to his accent which wouldn't have been out of place from the officers of Exodus. "Should I expect the rest of the Dragoons?"

Unfortunately a Canopian news crew managed to record the whole exchange so it ended up making its way across the periphery over the next several months, and that in turn lead to Battle Rom footage being witnessed by many more watchers besides. That was not immediately the concern of either Mercenary force.
--
Notes: Archon will update tomorrow, I have some untoward things to say about the holiday season, and specifically travel and what not but moving on I wish everyone a happy new years and that 23 will be an improvement with any luck, but forward.

This is the opposite of the Highland Faire alternate this is the teaser for a 'cordial' dragoons introduction this is a teaser set in the early 3020s with some details scrubbed, and was not originally the update I planned but again holiday SNAFU.

Imperator Pax · Feb 2, 2023

Extras: Preview:
Son of Sam Aftermath

Gene leaned back against the chair looking at the holographic data feed. Dante was right. The numbers still didn't add up. They still didn't make sense even after years of McGirk running around. Someone had to have gone out of their way or someones to put all of this in motion. There was no way that this had all come from a single cache. They had figured that out ... literally years ago, once Black Jack McGirk had started showing off Royal Machines with a completely different serial number range to the ones he had originally fielded. The SLDF 'mechs captured on Luxen in 3016 couldn't possibly have been in the cache of the mechs from battles in 3019.

His door chimed. Bahar entered and he sat up to take the report, "We have already gone ahead and sent out a courier ship with the details that we have on Amaris's forces, and affiliated pirates."

It was a long list. There were still remnants of Black Jack McGirk's people who had joined in the rampaging marauders of Tortuga and other pirate holds, and then there were supposed Amaris forces, which their machines didn't add up. He went down the list asking about one known band or another, "Do we have any idea where they went?"

"The Jumpship of Kelly's Kommandoes destroyed the HPG station on Jansen's hold two months ago, we believe they were withdrawing either to hit targets in the Federated Suns, or returning to the Tortuga dominion."

The image of Christopher Kelly stood there with an image of his customized Warhammer, and its flamers, and a handful of his forces. The image was dated late last year when he'd been rampaging through the inner Concordat area... there was no explanation for what Kelly had been looking to do. "I doubt he's going to punch inward towards the sphere." And he wasn't sure why this was one of the pirates ComStar cared about... there was no denying that Kelly was an accomplished mechwarrior, and a vicious son of bitch to be sure. He'd ingratiated himself with Black Jack and then had apparently been involved in introducing Stefan Amaris to the king of the pirates, and when black jack had died Kelly had been right there to help pull things together... but his status on the most wanted board had gone up when they had still been fighting on Elidere apparently.

That 'red notice' going out didn't have the usual details. Dangerous pirate was kind of a redundant statement. Murderous brigand, so what. Maybe Christopher had already been engaged in arson and targetting ComSTar facilities and it just hadn't reached the level of taking a flamer equipped heavy battlemech through an HPG station.

There was of course the possibility that given where the noticed had been issued maybe Christopher had simply been a a minor pirate in Black Jack's original band and he had been cut off from his patron and then he had risen to command his own pirate band and then decided to go rejoin the much more sucessful pirate. It was a plausible theory, but they had no evidence to support. Only that Black Jack's original pirate stomping ground had been on the lyran and combine border... and at some point he had gotten his hands on a lot of star league metal.

By the time Kelly's Kommandoes had shown up in the rimward periphery Kelly had also had Star League era mechs, and had been targetting ComStar facilities. Though not as it seemed from the facts with the same single mindeded destructiveness as when Black Jack was personally present.

That he had litterally burned a couple of station chiefs at the stake apparently in public didn't make that particularly odd... maybe they just hadn't grovelled enough for the pirate's liking. Still while Kelly's bounty was in the millions of C-Bills... litterally buy a mech money he wasn't their priority. If he ran back to Tortuga then he wasn't their problem.

The truth was while he was interested to hear what the latest word was, what the current situation, the current mess that was the rimward periphery was... they had other priorities. "Tell the Captains," That was the Captains of the JumpShips, so Naval Captains in this case, "That we're going to rotate back to Luxen." They would make plans there, about what they were going to do, about sending ... what were in effect envoys to worlds like Alamut in the Pharos system, to Coromodir in the Aurigan Expanse, to various independent worlds like Detroit's planetary government to Aquagea which held one of their landholds, or the religious conclave on Kimi.

The wreckage, the destruction left behind by black jack and now Amaris had probably had killed millions... and what was worse were the accusations not just by Periphery states now but by House Liao, House Marik, and indeed House Davion that such political rivals had sought to take advantage of such tragedies. It was political posturing of course. Whether or not the ambassadors or local government leaders who readily proclaimed such nationalist rhetoric actually believed it mattered less than whether on or not the citizens believed it.

... and if they believed it was it sufficent that they started a lynch mob, or enough to then feeback into political discourse demand their government 'do something' about it.

From Luxen they would decide eventually to transition to Detroit and on to Cormodir with the intention of informing Lord Tamati in person that in theory the greatest crisis of his life time was over.
--
He'd directed their other medical personnel to do what they could. The Bexar was currently at the limit of what the medical staff could cope for, and he was already mulling requests to keep them on station for humanitarian reasons. It was a request that he was currently weighing, but he had not made a decision at this stage.

They weren't going to be lifting off planet's surface any time soon. He needed to determine where they were going. Returning to Davion Space, the Inner Sphere was a significant travel time, and with that in mind he was astonished that hte Dragoons had been willing to send Kerensky this far out from the Inner Sphere.

The fight was over for now, and he had little idea of what to expect from their prescence. "To the best of our knowledge Stefan Amaris III was a younger cousin, maybe a nephew of the usurper active in the former Rim World as basically a pirate in the late first succession war," The Lyrans had basically annexed a sizable majority of the most prosperous parts of the Amaris patrimony before Kerensky had left the sphere, and gobbled up much of the territory "He seems to have disappeared presumably killed in perhaps 2828, a Stefan Amaris the fourth, an individual claiming to be the grandson of the usurper appears and runs amok on the fringes of the free worlds league, and Lyran commonwealth during the second succession war."

These pretenders though had never wielded anything the likes of which they had had to face. Even though that didn't make sense and indeed given the shortages of material and the distance in time from the Rim World republic logic dictated it should have been the opposite. He didn't interupt as they tried to trace through all of the pretenders to the usurper's lineage.

Someone there existed some apparatus that had helped keep the notion of the Amaris empire alive. The great monstrous ideology the collective demon in the Inner Sphere' conciousness was still being supported by some faction out there. It didn't sit well with Gene, but he did not broach the topic. They had defeated the latest incarnation of the Amaris threat, and if all this was true maybe they had a generation or two before the next inheirtor of the black legacy of Amaris rose to try and make a play.

"We confirmed the tests three times."

"Yes." The doctor replied, "The results are conclusive. Direct patrilineal descent from the satan amaris." The Azami colonel reiterated spreading his hands before him, "I have little explanation for how this came to be, but the test data is quite sure on its results."

The confirmation of the results were something they would pass on to the Magistracy, but it hat was mostly for completeness sake. It was not the same as with, "We'll need make back for Northwind." The Highlander Colonel remarked heavily to his commanding officer as the doctor finished.

Natasha still considered the Colonel an old man, but not nearly as old as the physician, but older than most gathered here. His Highlander had been one of those carrying a massive short ranged autocannon in place of the gauss rifle, and his armor had been scratched and dinted from where the warrior had repeatedly taken his machine into close quarters against the unnamable vermin in their machines.

"I agree, we will have to leave forces here as a safe guard." The Marauder pilot remarked, "Hidalgo, and Presidio will come back. I'm sure given the situation that there is plenty of clean up to handle." They divided off potions of the unit into so called Task Forces carrying DropSHips and JumpSHips to position in the RimWard periphery against the vermin nominally on the behalf of the rulers of the former territorial state of Canopus.

Seeing as that the usurper's spawn was dead, and with no immediate other plans Natasha Kerensky, of the great lineage of the founder decided to accept plans to follow them at least as far as Luxen. She doubted that the 'Duchess' would be much interest to the Dragoons, but she had the gut feeling that there was more going on... and the more senior ranked Dragoon officers were sure to have more questions about why a unit of Highlanders was this far rimward, or what they were doing...
--
Notes: Per the current iteration of the outline Son of Sam is basically put into the end of '21 which if we go through from the original outline.

would mean that tamati dies in his jumpship accident shortly after the great threat had been resolved, and facing the continued intransigence to his proposed reforms inspite of there still being threats to the realm the Directorate is established. That is to say that you would get Espinosa seizing power at the expense of relations with the Canopians and other anti-spinward neighbors during this time frame just as efforts are ramping up to go hunting down the last remnants of the threat.

After which depending on things but most likely the core of the unit would return to the Inner Sphere and potentially go do things like go hit Helm and expand the remaining 'SLDF' light horse units in FedSuns space. It would also contend with other developments in the Inner Sphere like the FedCom discussions.

and yes that is Kerensky totally misreading MacKintyre's preference for an AC 20 through the lens of her own biases. 'Old Warrior clearly is on his death ride' or something.

Also more or less this is an explanation for why in canon Moray declares he is Stefan Amaris VII instead of what not... after all given the Amaris reputation its awfully convenient that they show up, almost as if Rom or the word of blake or whoever wanted a convenient evil dark lord figure to prop up so maybe comstar could save the day after the successor states failed or something zany like that. Anyway, this was not the extra that I had planned to put up today, but the subject of Thursday updates, I will probably switch to updating my ring of fire story in either late half of the month or in Thursday.

Imperator Pax · Dec 30, 2022

[Branch 3023]

"You want to borrow what?"
3023 Helm
ft Blue Star Irregulars and The Eridani Light Horse

--
Everything from the popular media to the history books would go on to speculate, to regurgitate what would become the story in popular culture 'the pop history' view that this was a move undertaken as a response to the Dragoons breaking 'tradition' and going to work for the Draconis Combine. That was how people thought of it. It was the popular conception.

That was complete poppycock of course. The truth was that the raid into the league was a matter of planning. It wasn't as if the Field Marshal could just magically spare the Eridani or the Blue Stars on short notice... it had taken time to put things in order.

... and that the pop history story was aggrandizing to the Dragoons ego probably had meant that they'd spread the story around... for Helm in 3023 there was no explanation as the JumpShips appeared in system using AI derived jump calculations to appear without warning.

Two months of travel time not counting the staging and prep work for what they were doing... but they were on station now... about to change the galaxy... and in more ways than one. Gene hovered over the holographic image... the League era map looked nothing like the modern planet... because in a temp tantrum at being denied SLDF resources Minoru Kurita had nuked the planet's major population centers.

The more and more he saw in the comparisons of what the Star League had looked like side by side with the consequences of the first succession war the more and more damning things became regarding Kerensky's exodus. Combine Nuclear weapons had in 2788 rained down on the city of Freeport and the other settlements of note ... but with the maps side by side... and the processing power available.

"Boss," His thoughts were interrupted. "The Light Horse are deployed outside of the capital."

"You mean Kerston's Eridani or the Blue Stars?" He queried waiting for the feed connections that should start populating his own terminal.

"Right," Septim blinked, "Forgot, General Kerston and the Eridani have the Marik Garrison hemmed in." They had refused to surrender, but it didn't matter in the face of both overwhelming ground and orbital supremacy.

They couldn't hold the planet. That wouldn't have been stupid. But when they left Gene was loath to leave a structurally intact Castle Brian for the League to put into service even if they had time to empty it out... the facility would have drones... but given its relatively late construction, and the base's evolution it was unlikely that it had been constructed with a Hegemony AI in it... it was too far from Hegemony space. Helm was deep in Marik space during the League's era... but in the present day not so much. Two jump to the Lyran world of Solaris if they needed to go that route, or make directly back to the domain of house davion with the cargo.

"I understand, we'll proceed as we have discussed." He hoped that was reassuring.

It would have been better if the Marik units had simply surrendered. Not that that was the sole reason for bringing both units for this. If Minoru had really thrown his genocidal tantrum because he'd been denied the depot, and that depot was still intact and here... then it would settle one part of what had been discussed on Northwind a few years earlier.

They would have the materiel to rebuild the 3rd RCT and the Blue Star Irregulars back to Star League era strength, and to their proper specifications if that was what Kerston and his counterpart decided to do. That would greatly simplify operations against the Draconis Combine in the future... and that much materiel being acquired would also obfuscate the recovery of other materiel from Helm.

Gene knew in his gut that they were gambling... but the rebuilding of the Eridani, and for that matter the Blue Star irregulars... formations who had the manpower to make use of that volume of material, would permit House Davion to press attacks against the Combine. The Federated Suns weren't aiming at destroying the other successor state, but they could keep them off balance, and weaken them strategically... and better secure for the peace and probably the unification that was coming with the Lyran Commonwealth. Not that he'd been officially told that those talks were going on, not in so many words.

Minutes passed. Icons changed in the holographic bubble of the Vermillion river valley. One of Kerston's staff in the regimental command lance was in a ... what was now considered a LosTech BattleMaster relaying data to them. The defenders weren't prepared for this, but they were fighting. The Eridani were feinting, dancing in and out of sensor contact along the front, and pressing probing hovercraft strikes with lrms against the defenders flanks just to be a nuisance.

He was confident that Kerston knew what he was doing the Eridani were aimed at keeping the enemy off balance, and focused on them. The Free Worlds League militia.... which was not to be confused with the Marik Militia which was a command within the FWLM were never going to hold a line against them.

Kerston was only indulging them to allow the Irregulars to swing wide and into their back end aiming at taking the governor and his staff and associated personnel in the modern capital of Helmsdown. Of course if the governor was smart he'd had to have figured that this kind of raid wouldn't have been launched with some kind of reason... especially by nominally Davion troops, mercenaries who by most standards might as well have been Davion house troops at that if they could positively identify the Blue Stars.

To that end they needed to secure planetary leadership and order the populace to stand down. Preferably demobilize any Free worlds military or intelligence apparatus and go from there. In their favor Helm was a tiny world in terms of overall population. The cold bitterly dry planet had a population comparable to a good size city on a proper planet... but again that was that was the combine's fault. Minoru Kurita's fault directly beyond just his starting the succession wars.

There was a treble of white noise and pixels from one of the projectors. "What is it Dante?"

"I have completed securing the HPG via remote. Running diagnostics now."

Gene blinked. He hadn't expected that the AI could do that. "I didn't realize that was an option, you couldn't have optioned that on Northwind?"

"On northwind I did not have the advantage of a naval commsuite and SDS drones to to access unsecured or improperly configured terminals." That both explained it, and raised more questions... Northwind's original HPG had been destroyed during the Amaris crisis and had been rebuilt during the lead up to the first succession as he understood it... Minoru Kurita's nuclear fusillade had probably destroyed the original HPG alongside the capital of the planet of the time. "However that brings us to additional operational matters."

Displays minimized, as the AI literally went and took control of the system, which was mildly annoying... up until Gene realized he was staring at the remote returns for tactical nuclear weapon stockpiles. "God in heaven." He hissed.

They had discussed the possibility that VII Corp hadn't necessarily pulled all of the nukes out of the bunkers... but there was a difference between that theory and that Quartermaster Corp having so many present. "There would seem to have been either an incipient case of stupidity or treason that managed to last the entire crisis. The Nagayan Castle Facility's Commanding officer, and then his successor a Major Keeler refused to authorize release of materiel to VII corp without precise documentation authorizing the release from the emergency stockpile."

.... had to love bureaucracy.

On the other hand if Keeler had prevented Minoru from acquiring those nuclear weapons then he had potentially made it at least that much harder for the coordinator to kill more people. He flipped a switch, and waited for the continuing tally of depot materiel to continue. "General."

"Colonel, is there a problem?"

... "Quiver full. Quiver Full." He replied, then "We are going to be here a while, sir."

Kerston did not immediately reply... and it occurred to him that indicating that a full nuclear complement, or near enough, was present was not something that in the third succession war probably included. Then there was the fact this wasn't some derelict age of war capital ship that happened to have been found fifty sixty years after being lost and just happened to have a full payload of capital missiles sitting aboard. This was an SLDF Castle Brian and the previous era of facilities built on this planet that had been officially known about but not actually disclosed to the general knowledge base.

Emergencies Only indeed.

He blew out a breath and shook his head.

"Beacon is lit."

"Take us in on the guide path," He didn't tell the ship's captain to keep the bird steady as they came in. If there were nukes down there chances were there were drones, and anti aircraft turrets. The last thing he wanted was for some automated system to fling a capital missile at the Sam Houston, nuclear or otherwise.

Once they were ground side they were going to bring the transport system online and light the beacon to bring all core systems online ahead of bringing in the massive cargo transports which would be used to load the contents here.

Imperator Pax · Jan 1, 2023

[3023 Branch]

3023 Helm ft Blue Star Irregulars and The Eridani Light Horse
AKA "You want to borrow what?"
Part 1 (b)

The massive doors hadn't actually creaked, what they were actually hearing was the echo of the speakers through the cavernous chamber, which probably just played right into imagination all the same, "Why are they always creepy like this?"

"Because they've been empty for two hundred years?" Bahar snarked back at Chang's question.

To be fair this was far from the worst, but Bahar had gotten to see New Dallas and a few other complexes over the last three years, and it was hard not to agree with the depressing emptiness these mega structures were without people.

The Mammoth class spheroid Dropship aptly named the Lucrehulk had been the first cargo mover to touch down. There were powered exoskeleton lifters being moved to staging points, but they hadn't brought them further inside.

Gene bent down and inspected the console. There was a fine layer of dust on it, which was atypical, normally the atmospherics and air filters should have created enough air flow that the cleaning cycle should have actually sucked all the dust out like some kind of giant vacuum motor. At the very least it shouldn't have been piling on important systems like consoles. With no people here, that probably meant that there was probably an overgrown hydroponics facility somewhere in the Castle that had left a lot of dead plant matter laying around.

He wondered if they'd find a bunch of squirrels and rotten potatoes further inside the castle. He almost queried Dante if there was anything more to report while he waited for the Terminal to finish booting. He had questions, but it was entirely possible that the Quartermasters corp had been obstinate and a stickler for rules procedure and their possessiveness of their own domain that that they had acted like that to VII Corp for no other reason than they could.

It would have been nice if there had been some higher justification to behold, but he doubted... and if there was some other reason besides stupidity, it could have just as well been treason... which wasn't a great thought. There was no sign of active defenses though. The console accepted his input credentials and confirmed link to a Royal Command directed override that in theory should have bypassed all security measures...

... he worked through the steps in his mind. They needed to get to the command center, insure they had operational control of the facility. Make sure there were no surprises waiting for them. This depot was huge. They didn't need any more surprises besides the nukes. The nukes were plenty. Make sure there were no booby traps, disable any facility contingencies, self destructs, or such, then send eod in to make sure no one could set them off. Double check the fusion reactor... they were going to be here a while.

The main doors opened deeper into the mountain facility going easily another klick deeper underground at a slight incline large tram tracks continuing down the path. The hum of lights brought with it illumination that filled the heavy gray utilitarian transport tunnel. By the time the Nagayan facility had begun construction DOME was no longer the principle party involved, instead it had been constructed by the 42nd Engineering Brigade, and primarily as a supply depot rather than the previous generation of Castles Brian constructed on behalf of the Terran Hegemony. The facility had been less than two decades old at the time of the Amaris crisis, construction having begun in 2743.

Those details had only been paper facts before, but now that he as here, and they were inside the facility and the mainframe he was worried whether that construction might mean the self destruct was different than was typical to older Castles.

A chirp in his suits integrated communications system signaled a channel connection. Helm had definitely had Star League similar transport infrastructure, but that was no surprise. If Elidere then certainly here would have. The underground tunnels were a potential security vulnerability... but once they had the command center they'd check in with Kerston, and also the Blue Stars.

Septim was already moving to join him, and echoed his own silent thoughts "I know you said it was going to be big, but, this place is huge."

Even that was an understatement.

He had to remind himself that Fort ST George had been an outpost. That N001 had been built centuries before Nagayan... and of course Fort St George while newer was a smaller Terran Outpost Castle not a Brian. Whether Tristan's facility could really have been said to have a more narrow mission focus, that was harder...

"Yeah no kidding." Chang agreed, "No wonder the Combine tried to take this place."

Well it wasn't like the Combine wasn't already angry at them.... if this had been the Star League era Gene would have expected that he'd have just had to contend with challenges from Ronin coming from different Dojos looking to make a name... but if this had been the star league there would have been little things like free travel, and the dueling would have been somewhat officially regulated, even as officially both governments would have tsked and wagged their fingers that amounted to 'oh boys will be boys'... never mind that in such a case they were fighting with giant robots.

Mech scale slap fights could be tolerated as long as there was minimum civilian collateral after all.

"Commander I have the facility drones now online." Dante's voice announced over his radio.

He sighed, "Acknowledged." The Hegemony AI didn't elaborate further and they continued to follow the path down from the Nagayan port facility until they found the tram that was marked to take them to the Headquarters. They had to summon a car, which was a little worrying, that took about forty minutes to get one... but it dutifully carried them down a mag tube into the heart of the facility. After that it was a matter of booting up computers and relaying data to the 3rd RCT.

It would be up to the Brevet General whether or not he chose to make use of the transport tunnels to further maneuver around the remains of the Marik 'Mech Battalion or their armored support. Gene unslung the star league era computer and started the process on his end. Within a few minutes they'd have a handle on command and control.

It wasn't what the castle brian had been designed for... ironically they were the invaders and it was a marik world... but they had the castle and the orbital high ground and the mariks didn't. Gene wasn't going to complain about the situation.

The Helmsdown HPG Station had been built after Minoru's temper tantrum, and the security feeds from within the facility showed robed adepts had started running around like chickens with their heads cut off. "What am I looking at Dante?"

"I believe they are attempting to pray away the problem." The AI drawled. "A full diagnostic is currently running." The Terran thinking machine didn't indicate what it had planned beyond that but Dante had consistently evaluated that wide portions of the SLCOMNET, and the Shadow Network had been scuttled intentionally during the Amaris Crisis to prevent as many HPGs as possible from falling into enemy hands. He went so far as to speculate that the Ministry of Communications had probably attempted to spike the manufacturing facilities in the hegemony where possible, or failing that Royal Command had attempted to do so before presumably being countermanded by Kerensky.

At no point had the order been given to simply burn the network out, which meant that the thinking was the Hegemony could have been saved, and the usurper defeated... but then at the same time the Black Watch final orders had been to order Kerensky to attack immediately. To attack release the SDS drones from their restrictions and to destroy the invaders.

Instead Kerensky seemed to have never gotten that message, and eventually the SDS system had been turned to Amaris's ends by the control network to paint SLDF ships as hostile leading to a much longer much more devastating campaign.

... but all of that had very little to do with this facility. "I've got EOD teams sweeping the facility, and a senior fusion tech down in the main reactor making sure its not rigged to blow."

"It would be a simple matter, I've evaluated the structural diagram of the facility, this entire facility is designed to flood after the self destruct goes off, modifications seem to have been made after Kerensky's Exodus but nothing that can't be undone."

"Safety hazard?"

"Designed to prevent exterior meddling, no doubt a last ditch precaution by the remaining command staff." They'd been clearly hoping someone presumably the right someone's would come and employ the facility but couldn't be sure that would be the case... so Keeler had taken precautions. He'd known as much, it was hard to parse the memories some times... he'd known it would have been a bad idea to try and compromise the walls, but he didn't need to do that because he'd had the data needed to turn the beacons on and come in through the port like a civilized person. After all this was a depot designed to move and resupply major League military assets in the event of an emergency the onload off load gantries were designed to make reloading entire brigades possible.

"'Wasps?"

"Online and waiting tasking orders."

"Any anomalies?"

"Diagnostics came back clean." Presumably they hadn't been running then. "Launch, conduct strike packages per General Kerston's request. Once the planet is secure initiate a no fly zone."

"Understood." Gene looked at the sensor feeds, and then to the facility's own data. There was some kind of Geothermal system built in, not a surprise, but also what from the data indicators looked like it was ... flood control.

... right they had bottled up a whole sea. It was visible on the old maps of the planet but none of the modern ones... but people still knew it was a dry sea bed... they just assumed the water... he didn't know what the natives assumed... maybe that it had been diverted by the Kuritan nuclear attack, or natural causes... not the Star League's engineers, but certainly DOME had done that to make Brians, and the engineering brigade had in the 2740s. That was a lot of water... they were going to need to get those pumps active even if just enough to make it safe to work. Two hundred years of b eing left alone...

In the mean time two more Mammoth DropShips had landed at the port. They had a public story to sell after all. The Eridani and Blue Stars would be rebuilt to league standards courtesy of the Quartermaster corps unwillingness to obey VII corp's requisition orders... and well Shepherd was already filling out Royal Command authorization forms to make sure the automated machinery would open all the right doors.

The rest of the material well, he had to take some of it back just for the Davions after all that was the story. Brigades worth of material. They certainly weren't going to advertise the nukes. The Duke of Robinson had mentioned something about wanting to stand up BattleMech lines, and there was an SLDF division that had been based on Kestrel.

"Commander I am inside the base archives, there are earmarked reports, and copies of events leading to the bombardment," One thing at a time... or he wanted to reply, but he could have the techs make copies of the core.

--
Notes: Alright and then there is another one after this I'll probably put up some time in the future with the delivery of the material, both the public offload and then the more valuable core delivery to House Davion and the release to the Lyran commonwealth.

This is a very abridged potentially non canon version of events just a glimpse of sorts special with the follow on detailing some of the public reaction to reinforcing the anti Combine frontline at the end of the 3rd succession war, as well as hinting at the issues on the Capellan front. Again in theory this branch takes place in 3023, and of course to reiterate Dante's official position is that the Hegemony / the star league effectively was at war with the Combine, and that material from league caches should as a priority be employed against the Combine or to support anti combine actions. Thats of course without even knowing how coocoo for coco puffs the clans are.

However next week we will resume main timeline and the Highland Faire

Imperator Pax · Feb 9, 2023

[Pseudo Canon] [Short]
Part of "You want to do what with my genes?"

Damn it Kerensky!! Kerenskys.

The prospect of the Clan Invasion had largely missed him. It remained a nagging detail largely a ghost of a memory, one that Gene thought about if only infrequently at best.... in the face of so much else going on it was understandable. The scramble of looking to find the source of the 295th transmission through the SLCOMNET relay at 1245K3 had been feasible if only because Dieron had had star charts of periphery exploration within the Fortress.

He'd prioritized that, even though he was skeptical that the former royal division had anything to do with the Minnesota tribe. That search, that request to Abner to go run that errand while they went rimward had been undertaken. That there was some periphery nation calling itself the Umayyad, and another calling itself Neuva Castille just made him roll his eyes, except Hallis had started digging through the records.

... and the combination of his data and abner's....

The former popsicle getting more and more frantic as he had gotten deep into the documents... which was how they had ended up in the situation they had. "I am sorry Major, would you run this by me one more time." He needed more caffeine, which apparently was most of the stuffed ward room because a minute later the empty caraffe was replaced with a full one, and they started divvying it out.

The Ummayad were apparently a fragment of the Wolverines who'd gotten splintered off... in fact they might very well have been a a branch that had left the craziness before shit had really hit the fans. Maybe they'd started looking sooner, seeing the writing on the wall... maybe. Whatever the case a tiny splinter had invaded Nuevo Castile, and apparently the two sides had been fighting each other ever since. ICE powered mechs that was a strange one.

Still that was only part of the issue. "In any event, that was what Abner was doing before things changed." The Lion-class DropShip had somehow been travelling with a recording of a news broadcast that couldn't possibly have reached this part of the periphery given ComStar or regular Jump traffic. Hallis had an answer for that one to... and Gene didn't like it.

Apparently the Wolf Dragoons.

... which suggested they had access to if not remnants of the SLCOMNET then perhaps parts of the shadow network, but possibly even both... unless Kerensky's people had had some kind of breakthrough on HPGNET technology. With a deepening frown, he nodded, "Alright tell me what happened."

"They launched an attack on von Strang's world."

That required explaining... and didn't help anything.

"What a mess."

It was an understatement. Baron von Strang was a lunatic preaching holy war against the Inner Sphere and hated the Star League , and he wondered if these... apparent 'Smoke Jaguar' warriors who had managed to get out of the cluster fuck of the attack had the ability to send a message back to the Clans.

They sounded like a collection of blood thirsty lunatics as well.

He thought about what he knew about Nicholai Mason through the MRB records, and also what IE had been able to tell him. He thought about the incident in 3015.. and... and it raised questions had Mason been looking for Amaris descendants, or the Minnesota tribe before he had settled down to be a mercenary? That raised questions... what a mess this whole thing was a mess.

It confirmed what he knew. The Keresnky exodus had ended up somewhere beyond the Caliban nebula... and it was clear that the Smoke Jaguars or at least these ones simply hadn't processed just how large space was, how many jumps they were going to have to make to get to anywhere interesting in the periphery. That was true for that it was a year to get to the other side of the Caliban nebula from von Strang's world... which just brought them back to the matter of communications

There had to have been enough of an intact chain of HPG stations... probably as deployable satellites to facilitate a line back to the Clans. Something well beyond the capacities of modern ComStar. He was willing to assume that Keresnky's descendants had strung that line through the void recently... within the last century even if it wasn't entirely new construction... it was worrying that they'd make that kind of expenditure.

So he was again faced with the situation of that pit in his stomach thinking about an invasion that the Inner Sphere was in no way prepared for. The situation in the Inner Sphere was too tenuous. The nascent alliance of the Federated Suns and the Lyran commonwealth had prompted tensions. Not that the concord had stopped violence between its members. It had not been able to magically undo the bad blood between Marik, Liao and Kurita and of course there were the actions in particular of Kuritan and Liao state actors that had to be contended with in particular.

Then of course there was the potential development of the response. That unlike the Kapteyn Accords, which raised other questions in and of itself regarding the HPG Network, the Federated Commonwealth was a very potential outcome even if only as a personnel union. He thought about the raid on Helm used to resupply the Eridani and Blue Stars Light Horse units to strength.

... the contents of Buffalo Meadows's failed colony came to mind as well. It went beyond that. Dieron had represented a turning point, not because the fortress was intact but because its HPG uplink had survived, and still been running all this time... if they had gone to New Dallas first the results ultimately would have likely been to the same end.

The Buffalo Meadows Transmission and processing ... they had passed that to Abner because he couldn't be involved on Dieron so soon after the Federated Suns had taken control of the planet... and admittedly because they didn't want to advertise the Fortress buried inside the mountains... not as intact as it was. Abner and his IE resources were also much less likely to attract serious scrutiny for going into the periphery so that was what they had done.

He supposed that was only part of what had set them on this path. The decision had lead to Abner investigating other leads in the 'northern' periphery so to speak tying his resources there over a couple of years while the ... 'Pirate Wars' played out in the Rimward Periphery.

That was the problem the Dragoons had to have sent word back, never mind that these Smoke Jaguars had actually complained about Wolves and their lack of action about the whole Amaris business in the rimward... which again spoke of their lack of understanding in just how much distance in space and the limits of the KF drive.

All that did was remind him of how long they'd been engaged in this conflict. Technically... in the academic record there were already arguments over whether the Pirate Wars should have counted actions as early 3001 or 3002, or if the date should count only events after BlackJack had arrived in force in the Tortuga dominions a decade later , and of course then there was the rampage of Stefan Amaris through the Rimward periphery that had followed and the questions of how close the two had been involved with one another and if they had simply had been allies of convenience or something more.

He thought about Castille, even as he prepared to split off all the popsicles who'd ditched Kerensky's kool-aid fun land, and send them to Alamut. He knew there would be protests so he was ready, because this was a mess... "Yeah well after son of sam I'm not taking a chance that this lunatic coreward isn't going to do something stupid. As for these 'smoke jaguars'... I don't want them finding you, but I also have concerns about word of them getting back to anyone else who might ask questions."

... like ComStar... or even just the Combine.
--
Notes: This is short, this is SJ1 or more like the introduction of the smoke jaguars, note this is 'pseudo canon' because it mentions a bunch of stuff and is obviously set after the Aurigan civil war though its before the 4th Succession war erupts. It notably does not touch on the Wolf Dragoons issue, or the changes from OTL with Grieg dying much much earlier. So this more so than any of extras is much more tenuous.

This is post Son of Sam, the Dragoons beamed back a report to the clans, that hey there was a descendant of amaris, he's dead, but there are potentially hidden rim world stockpiles at least if not hidden army facilites left behind but that there is a dead Amaris.

They beam back copies of the dragoon scientist caste people's copy of that report. Some discussion back in clan space happens, some guys from smoke jaguar decide to take this whole thing seriously and head back towards the inner sphere, and find out that there is this place called von Strang's world, and that the baron there Otto is a straight revanchist rim world nut job.

And well they run head long into defenses designed to prevent an attack by the Inner Sphere to invade the planet, and do poorly. So they pull back because they have no choice. And all of that has basically happened.

SJ2 set in the coreward periphery along the Lyran, Combine border and deals with significantly less tenuous details because SJ2 focuses on things that are mostly solid. And one thing to be touched on is Gene s concern over exactly what the dragoon's may have put in their report to the clans and how that pertains to an invasion as at this point in the main timeline he is under the impression that the wolf net has yet to secure a copy of the hpg recording or of other incriminating evicdence by the isf against the sldf

Imperator Pax · Mar 12, 2023

IN the event I have forgotten to post this:

This is what played over combine's comms system when 1st Battalion 19th Galedon Regulars were put down ahead of 3rd Battalion Galedon Regulars coming in.

I'm pretty sure I've posted the Black Fox song, so from the still technically non canon New Kyoto karaoke night

Speaking of non canon, the Whoops there goes the HPG network may get an update at the end of the month we will see.

Imperator Pax · Feb 25, 2025

Pirate Wars
Davion Interlude: Meanwhile on New Avalon
–
Chequers was a tall building with a face of red brick surrounded by walled gardens the ensured the privacy of the property. The country estates of New Avalon followed largely the same lines. They had been laid down and immortalized by traditions in the early years of humanity reaching distant stars from Earth. The capital of the Federated Suns was teeming with celebratory masses congratulating members of the armed forces for the defense of Robinson.

New Avalon's high society, the high society of the Crucis March and the Federated Suns had welcomed her to the capital. With accolades from the campaign on Robinson's fighting, and the thorough beating handed to the combine, Alexandria had some breathing room, but the Prince's Champion had summoned her and so she'd come immediately. War Hero from the Crucis March or not.

Truthfully she wasn't even surprised by the summons. While Davion channels were talking about the shocking proclamation from the petty pirate king it didn't directly effect the war against the Draconis Combine at least not yet. Yes, the Free Worlds league had been embarrassed publicly, but the public at large was ignorant just how damning the pronouncement might be to the Combine. So the summons probably had been forthcoming. This country house, it wasn't lost to here, had belonged to House Davion for four hundred years, though it had been substantially refurbished it was named for some even older home of significance that had once been on Terra.

She had been lead deep inside the sprawling home to a secure room. DMI personnel in a variety of costume patrolled and secured the interior and exterior of the property, but the smoking room she'd entered had only one other occupant. Yvonne Davion the champion of the fire prince. The duchess sat with a holographic projection up her brows knit as she regarded the system that lay before her.

Only a fool wouldn't have known what solar system it was... even nearly a millenium after humanity had left the solar system was it still recognizable.

Sol.

The Solar System that had birthed mankind, the cradle.

The holographic image, still, suddenly resumed.

"Ah good," Lights flashed, warships spewing destructive fire at one another, nukes exploding. The long forgotten memories of the time before the succession wars. She didn't understand, "This is a command McKenna, a variation of the battleship." Yvonne stated gesturing, almost like one of her instructors at Sakhara had, to the warship under fire... and the ordering was wrong. The positions of the ships were wrong... these were star league ships but they moving away from Earth, moving towards the jump points.

This wasn't Kerensky's liberation of sol this, "This is -"

"The unfolding of the massacre on Terra, when Amaris seized power." Yvonne Davion confirmed her hands moved to a control slate and twisted the vantage point of hte image. The battled scarred ship's name read SLS Enterprise, "Only six of these were built, one survived Kerensky's flagship, the other ships apart of the1st and 2nd fleet were destroyed," She stated as the footage unpaused and fire rained. Enterprise endured for now. "This ship, and its battle group were shielding another. The Black Lion class," The footage altered,"Tripitz." She declared.

Yvonne Davion stood and adjust the holographic system. The solar system vanished so quickly into the night that it might have been dust on the wind. It was replaced by brighter images. Familiar images. The work file for Shepherd.

Alexandria felt her eyes turn to the image of a then teenage major with an admiral beside him, "The Colonel's mother was Killed in Action when Amaris seized Terra," Yvonne remarked still standing, and then moving to a decanter with a heavy sigh as she uncorked it and poured a whisky neat, "at first I considered whether or not she might have been aboard... but I reviewed Admiral Clancy's report from the Black Watch. Those records state with confidence Admiral Krennick died during the atomic strikes that came on the 27th of December. So I moved on from there," She took a pull from a tumbler, and indicated files from taken from Dieron, "Colonel Shepherd's father as we can ascertain from the ISF records was aboard THS Allegiance and was Killed in Action when she was destroyed as a result of House Kurita forewarning Amaris of the battlegroup's approach during the Liberation Campaign. I had considered that any survivors, any warship might be a desperate hope but MIIO and DMI have both collected chatter that does not support that theory."

A part of her understood. She understood the logical basis of where the Prince's Champion had begun looking. "Chatter, ma'am?" She pressed.

"The Colonel stated that the Triptiz ran the republican blockade of Sol, which our evidence confirms. SLS Kharkov survived as well, but Shepherd doesn't seem to have made much of it despite the litany of senior Terran officers aboard her. Kharkov carried very senior officials aboard her, admirals among them." She reiterated.

"What became of it?"

"It," SLS Kharkov, "departed with Kerensky's exodus." Yvonne Davion explained, "The Tripitz has a much more interesting fate, it reappeared in the official records when it was scuttled into the gravity of a gas giant by the mysterious Vandenburg White Wings, which seems to have drawn Shepherd's attention and pushed him to reach out to his contacts at IE."

"Another relation perhaps?"

"Doubtful," Yvonne replied lifting her glass again, "Not impossible of course, and so far as we know from Shepherd's service history he was already in the periphery or en route at the time of the coup. He was certainly not on Terra to escape aboard Tripitz which was another theory put forward. What makes the Triptiz interesting is that the Colussus class DropShip docked was sheltered by space assets under command and control from the ground that Clancy's records refer to as the SDS. It immediately burned for Tirpitz, not Kharkov."

It was another mystery, and didn't they already have plenty of those. She felt the immediate need to reiterate the question, "With all due respect Lady Yvonne, what is the significance of this chatter... given the attack on Kalidasa, and Jaime Wolf taking the majority of the dragoons presumably back in the periphery what does this battle mean in the present?"

Yvonne sighed and shook her head, "I don't know, but both DMI and MIIO have intercepts of discussion both from IE, from Northwinders speaking to the Wolfs Dragoons while on Northwind about matters that included references to Triptiz. Unfortunately we don't have the full context of those conversations."

The Highlanders had been eager to discuss survivors that had left with Kerensky, to the point that it was a prevailing concern that they might have told the Dragoons too much. "The Dragoons were reported to have been informed that Amaris was provided information by the Draconis Combine."

"Not only via the HPG recording, but also through the ISF archive. We considered curating the documents, but ultimately we did include the protests and arguments from the Keeper of House Honor that those actions were a mistake, and that they attempted to warn the SLDF of the leaks." The general consensus remained that that had hardly been anything other than self interest, self preservation on the Combine opposition's behalf. "Wolf has copies, which we must assume he is taking to the other descendants of Kerensky's exodus. What MIIO, and DMI do not have are concrete reactions to a living Hegemony Gunslinger. Recordings, and intercepts from the dragoons have isolated words we don't have references or the full scope of, but Amaris, Amaris pretender I should say seemed to have started some kind of bidding within the dragoons. Bloodname, a title of nobility we believe, was mentioned as a possible reward for killing a pretender to Amaris's title, political ideology though for whatever reason Kerensky herself seems more interested in hunting down Kelly, but that doesn't seem to be the same for her company at large."

"Which is what the precentor New Avalon wanted Shepherd to do if he could find him."

"Precisely."

Battletech: The Ghost Who Walks (Battletech Isekai)

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