Battletech: The Ghost Who Walks (Battletech Isekai)

[Imperator Pax]

Pirate Wars II
Part 8​

Fjaldr was an unpleasant, cold world. It was geologically active, and the hot gasses kept the ice at bay in places since the planet was on the edge of the goldilocks zone, but at the same time those volcanoes also pumped more than your average amount of ash in the air a year. As far as habitability, you could live out here in the wilds. The lichen and what not were supposedly edible enough to sustain reindeer herds according to the data packet he'd read... but cold weather gear was recommended for everything but tropical latitudes this time of year. He didn't plan to be out there if he could help it. The truth was he going to be running command and control... and he needed answers.


Gene eased back on the sticks bringing the machine down to the surface with his jump jets. The air space was crowded. Azami DroST weren't in the direct attack run, but their small craft and asf were busy overhead even as their motherships descended occasionally firing LRM bursts at targets in the distance painted electronically by seeker aircraft. The 'Mechs had been dropped from orbit so the lances were already on the ground but the DroSTs needed to touch down so they could roll off their hover craft and then their tanks.

That would give them a foothold on the planet to expand from.


There was a trade off there, when it came to what they could do. The Azami made great raiders, scouts, or cavalry to secure a position until reinforcements could be brought in but the DroST simply could not carry the supplies necessary for sustaining its forces in a prolonged conflict. They would need larger dropships like Triumphs to land with additional supplies to keep weapons like auto cannons fed. They, the DropShips, weren't designed to sustain months of fighting, it was the trade off one got with the ability to do what the DroST did.


On the other hand the DroST was retrotech. The opposite of LosTech, so old and based on principles that even the technological decline of the Succession Wars caused by the devastation in the 28th​ century couldn't even erase...


The ground puffed as he took a step forward as the seventy five ton heavy battlemech swept side to side. Magi had already slated for a drop that would place them in direct confrontation with the enemy units. Their Phoenix Hawks were screaming down from the sky six mikes west of him. They'd land in striking distance of the far edge of the bandits who had been identified wearing Amaris colors.


He hoped that the Charger could be taken intact enough to confirm or deny if it came from Pioche... and if it didn't maybe they could get more information besides... but he also wasn't holding his breath. It wasn't mission critical but it would have been nice to have more information... more information about what the fuck they had waded into.


... but to have as much information as possible once they moved back over the Magistracy's border. Leaving for the Fed Suns a few years ago had gotten them away from the whole... question Pioche... of the underground industrial city that the Rim World had built using machinery they had been able to buy off of the Hegemony in order to use against the Hegemony.


They would need basing options. They would need local support in material, and manpower. They needed to reaffirm ties inside the Magistracy, and have as much information coming in. Black Jack had been moving around back and forth, and he expected that they could move the Azami fleet off into the Rimward periphery ... but that had to be their first priority before they could turn to face the pirates ...

There was a crackle of static over his speakers...

"Command – Actual."


The voice over the radio called choppy as the Aurigan Coalition DropShip , a Union, began its descent. The Aurigans had brought was ASF they could spare. Not a lot but enough to outfit the front line Unions with some air cover. The BattleMech Carrier was painted Green and Black, a rampant Ibex declaring to belong to House Espinosa's Battalion of troops. There had been a lot of chatter from the Ibex about 'true defenders of the reach' as espousing more military funding, but not in the usual 'our national guard is better funding spent than on foreign mercenaries spiel'. Santiago Espinosa supported mercenary hiring programs, he seemed to get along alright with Markham at least, but it was a cudgel for Lord Espinosa to whack the other house lords on the founder's council who he deemed insufficiently patriotic with.


The Fjaldr campaign was an excellent option for this kind of political grandstanding, because in typical neo feudal tradition Espinosa had legal rights to salvage in supporting his brother in law's campaign against the pirates. That was just a fact of life. It was how things worked. What was unusual about their situation was the potential salvage included SLDF hardware.


He clicked through the channels adjusting the Marauder's command software to navigate to his own troops. It took another several minutes to ascertain that the troops in the first wave were either on their correct drop zones or were not too far off course that it was going to be a problem. The Unions would be clear to off load machines that didn't have jumpships, or didn't have pilots qualified for Orbital Insertions... even with pristine SLDF machines of their own they didn't have the qualifications training wise where he wanted to run too aggressively into Fjaldr's defenders.



Some of the pirate JumpShips had made the decision to try and Jump Out, the ones who had been too slow making the decision of what to do had been hit by the shut down command or had their airlocks forced by boarding parties. Turnabout was fair play after all... but still it only answered part of the problem, and Fjaldr was an aurigan world even if a minor one, with a small population, and negligible industry compare to its Star League era prime.


From the intelligence they had from the Aurigans, Black Jack seemed to have sent Kelly here to demonstrate his bonafides to the locals and attempt to rally the clans to fight for him. Fjaldrs clans... even though the Aurigans probably didn't want to admit it were largely Aurigans and natives of the planet who came from the same social and material culture as the reach's broader society. They had divided into clans since the fall of the league and had developed their own local neo feudal traditions.


Fjaldr's lack of outside investment, harsh conditions.... whatever else meant that the clans with available military hardware had at some point in the 29th​ century turned to raiding their neighbors when they had thought they could get away with it. That had just... it seemed just gotten worse as time went on with more clans turning to piracy for an easy buck... and the Aurigans wouldn't weren't going to be able to put up with it especially given the jump to Ward even if that had been Kelly's band showing they had the chutzpah to run a Capellan planet.


He spared another look at the descending, decelerating Union on his scopes. He was relying on the computers to watch it, as it was in the process of braking with its fusion drives. They'd need time to unhook mechs from safety harnesses and offload but the Union was a favorite of the Succession Wars for a reason. He swapped back around towards his ground targeting algorithms waiting for returns... this was probably going to be messy since the clans had built their halls in defensible positions pretty much like every other neo feudal potentate with a recognition that geography could make it harder to kill you.


The Regimental Management software shifted to apprise me of the Triumphs preparing for descent... the artillery vehicles from the Brian Cache on Robinson were going to be something of an ace in the hole. He was banking that if they deploy and set up the artillery park they might be enough of a surprise to bust any pirate concentration that would have otherwise been costly to attack with a frontal attack... but of course that assumed Hammer could hold that position to set up the park without being attacked by fast movers.


Magi flashed an update from one of their own command mechs. The Azami were not actually in combat yet, but they had positive returns on enemy fusion signatures. Gene acknowledged receipt of the message, and eased his mech forward. Markham had said that Tamati had been afraid it would take months to fully suppress the clans and restore Aurigan supremacy over the planet, enough to hire him and his battalion on for a well paying contract, and cover support for the company during the down time. They couldn't stay here for months, that would be time for the pirates to dig in and redouble their own fortifications. The advantage here was going to be able to hit fast, and maximize the numbers advantage, and the tech advantage that they had.
--
Notes: We don't get a whole lot about Fjaldr and while the Reach has been canonized it is still not a lot of information, so Fjaldr has ended up this past year in my table top RPG (we play ATOW) as a semi important focal point so exposition dump on its socio political conditions.

 

[Silverbullet]

Reads real rough man, you have a few words that don't belong, Gene doing his usual jumpy internal monologues that don't tie together well and tell us what's going on rather than showing. At one point you have wouldn't weren't in one sentence where weren't works. Just feels like you need to read this one this edit it some. Still we're getting closer to the return of the Emperor of Humanity Stefan Amaris the Seventh! Also known as Richard Moray lol

 

[Imperator Pax]

Pirate Wars 2 Part 9​

Most of his lance had started to move forward giving him time to sign, and acknowledge the reports coming in. Bahar and Hanzo along with their gauss rifles pushing a few hundred meters to his left. That left him with the Catapult pilot who had joined them for the drop onto Coromdir to sit back and wait for any requested missiles, while still able to provide some rear echelon security if anything did manage to get around the line.


Masses of Fusion Engine returns filled the reports on his head's up display, along the time stamps showing who was on time and who were running late relative to the planned time table. Then there were the enemy returns. That was confirmed by air breathing scout planes that were starting to go aloft confirming orbital reconnaissance assets in place. That was part of the difference that he was counting on. Gene was expecting that he could achieve information dominance, that he would be able to better suppress and divide the enemy's forward operating observers and that the clans probably weren't going to coordinate too closely.


That was why he was hoping Hammer would be able to safeguard the Artillery park, and they could isolate strong points hit them with artillery and not have to force a breakthrough via just raw metal BattleMech thrusts. Still if it came to that, it came to it. A part of him was weighing pushing Kiyone's Light Company, in size if not in weight class, to reinforce the park while it established before sending her up to join Easy Company under Bo... but for the time being she was along with nine other BattleMechs waiting for the first advance elements of the Highland Fusiliers to exit their landing craft.


The Mechanized Infantry were aboard hovercraft though and that would let them rapidly screen and deploy for other assets. It was why he didn't have an issue with the smallest of the company level mech units in his personal battalion ... and the truth was from what he understood they'd have a lot easier time hiring mechwarriors when they returned to Davion space... but on the other hand he expected that would make them look increasingly like, and inclined towards Davion positions. He wasn't, he supposed, opposed to that. He doubted they were going to hire on with any of the other major states... but it ran a potential security risk if Abner wanted them to run security for his IE digs... if they went chasing the Minnesota tribe in order to find them... and that meant someone learning more about Kerensky's exodus.


... those were some of the things he worried about. Right now though there were pirates to deal with... pirates with their own highly suspicious amount of SLDF era metal... but not all of them. Fjaldr's clans were pretty brazen on their own, the raid that Kelly had launched on Ward had been done with SLDF hardware but most of these guys were using pretty typical Succession War fare... but they couldn't let Black Jack's guys who were on the ground get loose. They had too many questions.


He tapped rapidly across the console, watching the friendlies coming in. His tables listed off Markham's marauders and their supporting elements. He'd been preparing to query the older mercenary when a data package unfurled earmarked as a priority, and tagged which implied that Dante must have been read in first.


Gene tasted the copper as he bit his tongue. Septim didn't know what the fuck he was looking at but Gene did... Septim had just been told to look out for machines with rim world markings, and o course the Lyran would recognize the death's head. Humanity's exodus from Sol had happened after the destruction of the soviet union and the nominal unification of the planet under an American western anglosphere alliance in terms of science, technology and culture... it wasn't a second British empire of course those comparisons could have been made later but nostalgia, and historical throwbacks in the forms of neo feudalism and other ideas for how to make a better society had also meant the adopting of costumes and traditions that were anachronistic at best.


The conflicts on Earth from 1914-1945 were basically irrelevant by the 24th​ century, even the cold war that had preceded the western alliance destroying the soviet union had basically faded from memory. The deaths head the grinning skull had probably first reappeared within the likes of the Free Worlds League but there were examples of units proclaiming themselves Hussars by that point and harkening back to the 500 year past if not earlier usage by mobile units of a grinning skull.


The eighty five ton machine was painted black. The vestigial hand where should have been an autocannon of some strip had been replaced by a second Tronel large laser. Probably a field expedient repair, though whether it was recent or not he couldn't tell.


... the Rampage was, in many respects typical of Early BattleMech aesthetics. That first generation of home designs by states before the polishing... maybe even more so because this one lacked or appeared to lack any of the technology that had since become LosTech since the Succession Wars had begun. To that end, he would have guessed that it was probably the Rim World assuming the grinning skull was original owners that had installed the Tronel... but it didn't matter.


... unless it was a Rim World pilot in the cockpit a nasty little voice in the back of his mind whispered... but no, he doubted that. That couldn't be the case... Gene grit his teeth and reached forward to adjust his controls. In theory he was looking for other possible Rim World machines, now as well as former SLDF 'Mechs. He would filter out and task machines that didn't meet criteria to other pilots, to divide them off and engage... but this one. It was running hot enough from those two Tronels and their excess waste heat well enough to be distinguishable against his thermals...

Gene tagged, and filed the identified approach and attack angle back to Dante and to Bahar and Hanzo, and the Catapult driver so that the trio would know what he was doing and expected the AI to pass those back down to the Houston's armor complement.


He pushed the sticks forward throttling the mech into flank speed to push it up the hill. The Marauder was monitoring exterior conditions, and the wind was picking up, the wind chill pushing the temperature below zero. Not the kind of place you wanted to punch out of your mech if you had to... and it was going to diminish the ability of infantry. The weather wasn't all bad, current projections from radar suggested the wind would keep rain and snow off of them... and their sightlines mostly clear. The industry, and mining made this planet susceptible to sulfurous smog just another reason not to get caught out in the open on this planet.


Which was why they couldn't afford to be bogged down. Hit hard, hit fast. He repeated the mantra in his mind. The Aurigans could sustain a campaign here if they had to, but if they could defeat the pirates they could move on, and they had to move on.


He let out a breath allowing the flow of information through the mind machine interface to paint separate targets across his Marauder's targeting software. The Dalban suite cataloged different machines as his neuro link to the BattleMech plotted avenues of attack.


They were not an army of occupation. Engage and destroy the enemy, complete the objective leave local administration and command and control to local authorities. They were only here to restore law and order, not to maintain it. So find the enemy leadership and kill them.


Gene took another breath as the machine came over the snow dusted rice. The navigation calculations bringing up overlooking the miles wide 'crevice' one of several that were massive valleys in the surface of Fjaldr where settlements had been erected by the colonists centuries earlier, and served as the entry point into the mineral rich earth. Fjaldr wasn't a planet subject to rampant vulcanism, but it was pretty active. The Thermal boreholes had drawn the Capellans here, and the sick man of the inner sphere hadn't been able to hold onto things when the league had collapsed.


... but those other details were irrelevant. He had his machine cross cataloging current returns with star league era maps, and more importantly Dante was up there in orbit beaming returns to triangulate any SLDF positions marked. That was the stupid thing there were mechs broadcasting SLDF data patterns on open settings.


"I can see you." He muttered. The ER PPC flashed from the crest of the hill towards an enemy BattleMech that was between him and his target.

 

[Silverbullet]

You need a secondary pov to illustrate just how terrifying it is to see Gene go kill mode on sight of the Rampage and Death's Head. Victoria or Raju would be best. Markham as well. Just someone to stand in

 

[Imperator Pax]

You need a secondary pov to illustrate just how terrifying it is to see Gene go kill mode on sight of the Rampage and Death's Head. Victoria or Raju would be best. Markham as well. Just someone to stand in

Click to shrink...

Its coming.

 

[Bofors40mm]

So is this a early rampage or a later one?

 

[Imperator Pax]

So is this a early rampage or a later one?

Click to shrink...

Its an original Pre-Royal tech version.

 

[Bofors40mm]

Its an original Pre-Royal tech version.

Click to shrink...

Ah a fine design if you messed with the looks and swapped the AC-10 for a PPC among other things if you ask me

 

[Silverbullet]

Ah a fine design if you messed with the looks and swapped the AC-10 for a PPC among other things if you ask me

Click to shrink...

That's essentially what a Zeus is….

 

[Bofors40mm]

That's essentially what a Zeus is….

Click to shrink...

Can get a lot more armor and close up punch if you keep the 3/5 speed even if you also add jumpjets to the mix.
1 LRM-15 with 2 tons of ammo, 1 PPC, 1 Large Laser, 5 medium lasers, 1 flammer, 23 heatsinks and max armor moving 3/5/3.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Pirate Wars II
Part 10​

The Emir folded his hands from where he sat on the command deck of the Samarkand, being an elder did not... did not prohibit him from participating in battle, but being incautious, being conspicuous here would endanger his kinsmen. Lady Florimel had not a choice but to give chase to his absence. He had a duty to reach Alamut with what he carried, to prepare the community as it could... to produce weapons for the struggle to come, and for the the young men would require seasoning.


He had had needed to conceal himself from House Davion as well, best to avoid temptation of course regardless of what good will they felt there was only going to be temptation. A grievous blow was what had occurred on Elidere, a remonstration against the Dragon's Avarice, and the reckless of his officers. Saman Dara expected that even now the DCMS was probably scrambling to explain or make sense of such... but Dieron and also Altair were much more than a strike across the face to pride and hubris.


Generation after generation of House Kurita had served in the Sword of Light, and most have served with honor and distinction. It was a clearing house of sorts, no doubt the intention of the coordinator to season his own heir before they took up a position within the Otomo. Lord Takashi had been brought up that way after all... and while Takashi-sama was a more moderate man than his father... the Dragon's avarice was still unabated.


... and the oaths their ancestors had sworn were heavy... and now conflicted. Saman's ancestors had sworn oaths to Kira-sama in recognition that however much that she had disagreed with her brother's actions... the extent of which had at that point had been unknown the Combine could not afford a civil war. Lady Kira had however eventually committed seppuku in protest, but that had not stopped the coordinator, nor his son from pursuing the succession wars, and eventually Jinjiro's brutality had turned the war against the Dragon.


All of those things were history so far as most of humanity were concerned. Not to him, not to the community... and his ancestors had hoped to avoid a civil war dividing the Combine. If one came though they would have to choose sides... but worse still was if Pasha was right and the descendants of Kerensky's exodus were to return they would make war against the Combine for Minoru's decision to provide aid to the Satan Amaris. He understood that Northwind's clans hoped to reach out to the Dragoons, that they sought answers and they also sought to insure the Dragon grew no more powerful than he already was. It was a natural, a set of natural desires... just as the dream of Alamut was to have a fortress beyond all the strife of civilization.


... and yet as they came out into the periphery god placed in front of them devils, no men outlaws, but still men who willing wore the colors of the Satan Amaris... and thus here they were. "What is the situation?" He questioned a young lieutenant.


The targeting data was relayed from ground command. Magi had been tasked as a whole formation, but Magic as a BattleMech Company were twelve experienced men well acquainted with Phoenix Hawks passed from father to son. Three DroSTs to carry the Company and their supporting element deployed against the far edge concentration of outlaws stupid enough to wear the colors of the Rim World.


They would receive what they deserved.


The holographic image the appeared through the tactical network update nearly forced his heart into his throat. There were of course, always had been policies to identify what command units were going after, footage telemetry, tasking orders. He did not expect the update that took priority over the one he had been waiting for from Colonel MacIntyre's Battalion of Highlanders.


The machine was ungainly, hideous even in its hard lines, and slab like profile. Black as oil, and bearing the death's head... an assault mech. He felt his frown deepen, as a series of force projection orders were distributed from ground leadership and an attack outlined, they were making a push against the enemy of course, attacking in reaction to the development as a series of identified electronic transmissions were highlighted.


--
Victoria watched as a group of small, agile hovercraft darted forward and left comically shooting over snow capped hills dropping down as their air foils compensated.

She'd been impatient to get off the DropShip. Every second seemed to take forever when it came to the bumping and jarring of storm force winds as they had rode down from orbit and then finally letting her disembark. Ser Raju had then lectured her about being careful, and not to be reckless even as she had marched Kaga out into the snow.


Kaga's PPCs were already live, waiting, just waiting for her to find a target, and Victoria could just imagine how anxious her BattleMech was for the chance at battle as the fusion reactor hummed. Her father had of course saddled her with protection. Her presence alone wouldn't have been enough to show the Ibex. Her lance consisted of the best pilots her father could spare from Coromdir's defense... and of course Raju was here as well heading the Royal Guard on uncle Tamati's behalf.


She wasn't surprised when the grizzled old Dragon pilot began to protest her movement forward towards the front. The pilots of the Panther and Wolverine were much closer to her own age, and even though she had nominal command... her father would have expected her to listen to the House's Marshal of Arms. De Rivera was so old he'd been one of her grandfather's knights.


"Victoria, you must be more careful." The old man complained... she had heard it all before he'd been telling her the same thing since she'd been a girl. Any further complaints ceased as there was a sudden thermal bloom on her scopes.


She was well familiar with what a PPC could do. Kaga carried two Lord's Light particle projector cannons, and she knew that they generated significant waste heat. The bloom was significant, especially against the frigid backdrop of the snow covered valley.


The Javelin staggered having no ability to respond at a distance over half a kilometer as the man made lightning struck the machine struck it.


Then it fell into the snow bank like a marionette with its strings cut. Victoria assumed initially that the light mech's electronics had been fried the gyro losing control, and pushing the already front heavy machine forward enough to tip, but Kaga's sensors magnified the smoking hole to about sixty magnification ... the smoking hole where the mech's cockpit should have been.


Ice crept in her veins as a voice came over the radio.


"All elements we are engaging."


The too hot PPC beam flashed a second time as a turning pirate machine became a burning one as the poorly serviced Assassin's ammunition off from the same range. Rising from the crest of a hill far closer to her, tracking the heat bloom, Victoria watched the SLDF painted alpine camouflage heavy battlemech move forward. Superheated steam from falling snowflakes ringed the 'mech's armored gauntlets of its PPCs.

She didn't realize she had already pushing Kaga into a matching vector easing the sticks forward.


The Marauder was followed shadowed by a smaller sixty five ton machine with boxy launcher systems for LRMs. A traditional configuration catapults. To its left two more heat signatures appeared, signatures that her computer resolved as the jumpjets of two Assault Mechs both running cool against the environment.


The blasts continued, most striking home hitting vulnerable places of lived in machines which were over ammunition bins, or others hitting the head's of mechs that were in the wrong place. Targets of opportunity that flared over the OP Com communications and TTS system built during 27th​ century and that had been Kaga's eyes and ears for as long as the mech had been.


Each flash of lightning were scorching beams across her thermals... death from beyond the range her Lord's Light PPCs were capable of. And accurate.


The sudden screech of sensor returns as the rest of the lance began firing LRMs ... the standard Catapult, and the two Highlanders jerked her attention towards her display and away from the falling forty ton mech that was the most recent victim but the flight of seventy missiles was enough to put her machine's avionics suite into surprise. Kaga didn't have advanced command and control software and wasn't tied into the Mercenary Fires Network, she was just watching.


Watching as another mech, a star league era Griffin its IFF sequence still broadcasting a broken and patch codec of an SLDF unit destroyed centuries earlier had its front glass and cockpit boiled away in another bolt of ball lightning. Raju would have told her that she was just taxing her machine, that she was generating waste heat, and that she would have risked overheating her machine before she was in range... something that Kaga couldn't afford.


The OP Com tracked the hits though, even if it was having a hard time processing the incoming data. The avionics suit identified the Highlanders as firing Gauss Rifles, those her computer told her were still in range. She ran the math.


The ballistic computer estimated the head shot fired against the Griffin had been in excess of the Gauss Rifle's long range envelope. Not by much, but the shot had hit the griffin right in the middle of the wide glass of the center of the face while it had been moving.


Her SLDF era OP COM suite shifted as the Marauder moved line abreast to her own House's force even if separated by almost a whole kilometer. The Lance composition in direct broadcast telemetry populated her friendly forces display. Flagging as a Star League Defense Forces SOF component. Lance break down on the screen color coded flags. One White, One Green, Two Red. Two Combine Citizens. One SLDF regular Army.


White.

The color of death. Of a ghost.


A citizen, and officer of the Terran Hegemony.


The computer log system caught up, and she found the signal that didn't match. The target. AN Assault Mech not running some dilapidated broken chain of code, but also not putting out SLDF credentials. A machine broadcasting a rim world republic IFF, and the company of mechs it was a part of were in the direct line of advance.


Or rather its company had been in between the Rampage and the seventy five ton Marauder flagged white in her Friendly Forces HUD. Still outside of the range of a Whirlwind. The auto cannon didn't care, it articulated above the centerline of the hull of the seventy five ton machine, and a burst of 5 inch shells took flight in rapid succession, hurtling towards the larger machine before exploding into a flurry of shrapnel pummeling the the surprised mech as the Rampage's large laser flashed a hundred meters into a snow drift to the Marauder's left. The second shot was closer the torso mounted tronel was ancient and heat inefficient but it was stabilized by being in the Mech's chest scoring forty meters into another drift. The Marauder stopped, the voice came over the unified command network. "Hammer, Fires tasking." Artillery command filtered.


She didn't understand the order.


Didn't until the cruise missiles slammed into the snow bank above the clan hold where some of the pirates were attempting to fall back towards in the face of their numbers. The front face of the mountain slid downward weakened by centuries of mining and dropped thousands of tons of packed snow onto the enemy back line as the communications signatures flared from various tanks, and other mechs, mechs like hers without jump jets, began to sprawl out.


The rampage was illuminated in Kaga's targeting scope sixty power magnification as the bolts of man made lightning flashed towards the advancing mech. The pilot having decided to advance on the realization retreat was not an option. A ton and a half of panzerslab armor dissolved across the leg at five hundred meters...


It wasn't a miss, she realized, the Marauder was intentionally aiming at the limb. Every previous shot at the pirate mech company had been intentionally lethal, so why not the largest battlemech in the company. It didn't make sense.


The incoherent screaming of the Rampage pilot over the open channel made it worse, especially as the limb exploded into a stream of smoke sparks, and steam as the auto cannon rounds went internal pitching it down the embankment before it finish closing.


"Priority battlefield recovery," The voice came again, rattling something off about SSE and intelligence exploitation as a highlander came over the radio and answered immediately. The Marauder's com line in the unified command fell silent as it advanced on the the Rampage, and then at point blank range raised the PPCs and blasted the left leg off of the assault mech. The armored peak like structure of the cockpit swung slightly maybe fifteen degrees to the left facing Kaga, and her within it, before rotating back towards the wall of snow and rock that had fallen on the pirates. "Hammer stand by for BDA, and retasking."


"Roger that Colonel." The crisp reply of a voice that was all business.


Kaga's electronics squawked a notification as a company worth of Pheonix Hawks, identified as Magi began to swing inward towards them. The commo traffic coming encrypted and on a private mercenary frequency... but she knew there was chatter because she was on access to the Royal Guard line, and Raju was in her ear criticizing her own reckless move forward to match the mercenaries pace, and because the mercenaries had made clear they were moving the envelopment forward.

 

[Silverbullet]

It would seem Shepherd's calm has been damaged lol

 

[Chaotic-logic]

It would seem Shepherd's calm has been damaged lol

Click to shrink...

and there is a VERY GOOD reason for it to be damaged.
after all, most people in the inner sphere vehemently REFUSE to use rim world republic mechs and equipment.

 

[Bofors40mm]

Honestly it's a shame the RWR designs got their reputation soiled so badly. The Rampage and Dragoon are fine designs and the Phoenix has seriously potential with some modifications to fix its problems.

Also really weird they get the bad reputation and yet everyone gladly uses the firestarter.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Honestly it's a shame the RWR designs got their reputation soiled so badly. The Rampage and Dragoon are fine designs and the Phoenix has seriously potential with some modifications to fix its problems.

Also really weird they get the bad reputation and yet everyone gladly uses the firststarter.

Click to shrink...

I mean the dragoon is a weird case, even though one will show up later on, but also again ComStar clearly has those in inventory

 

[Bofors40mm]

I mean the dragoon is a weird case, even though one will show up later on, but also again ComStar clearly has those in inventory

Click to shrink...

Honestly I personally think comstar or if not them the WOB restarting dragoon production would totally fit their style.
Especially if they modified it to be a proper omnimech and did some cosmetic mods to pull what the lyrans almost certainly did with the rampage changed into the zeus

 

[Imperator Pax]

Pirate Wars II
Part 11​

Gene watched the connection attenuate as his display populated. Azami units were currently pushing into the enemy back line, relying on speed to encircle, isolate and burn down pockets of resistance. The intention was to create larger and larger gaps in the pirate ranks, keep the pirate clans of Fjaldr from congregating and reinforcing one another.


"It was the correct operational decision Colonel." Dante remarked.


The floating holographic display were numbers. Just numbers for the moment. The pirates had had lots of vehicles... probably a lot of dug in militia as well... but the problem was the rim world returns hadn't stopped. LTV4 and Ignis tanks that could have been hidden army recovered material were still dangerous and had started coming out of the ... woodwork so to speak.


The Capellans had weakened the structural integrity of the surrounding rock face, and centuries of haphazard mining hadn't helped... but that didn't change the fact he'd ordered the strike, and that there had probably been civilians or pirate dependents in the fray... Fjaldr's political situation, and the federated nature of Aurigan politics made ... made the lines blurry.


The problem was that it was rapidly apparent that the Aurigans had under estimated the pirate ground vehicle strength. Their mech strength by itself was concerning with Black Jack running around but given the shape and scope of the valley here, the terrain, hit and run by vehicles and the mine tunnel network... pacifying fjaldr would have taken months if not a full year to be sure it was done if the number of ICE powered tanks coming out to meet them was accurate."Fjaldr was a capellan world at the time of the uprising." He finally stated taking a breath and letting himself decompress. They had pivoted relying on violence of action and the sudden shock to carry them forward against the enemy who had been still bringing up their own forces. The IFF though... still shook him...what the fuck was going on here? "The techs?" He asked.


Currently pulling the computer core from the Rampage. The most likely. Most innocent explanation to this cluster fuck was that the Rim World Hidden Army had seen the writing on the wall and in the late 2760s bugged out hidden stockpiles of equipment and gone to ground to hide from Kerensky, abandoning the fight before the SLDF, or the Taurians decided to break out the truly nasty stuff... that really wasn't great news, but it explained how two centuries later all of this stuff could be dug out... and of course it was also possible that the cache if there had been a cache had just never reached distribution to Hidden Army units.


It didn't matter, he was going to have to explain that to the command. Dante was right though, they were already engaged, and even pulling the downed assault mech to the rear for the techs to scrounge it might take them days to get into the machine... and that would take those techs away from repairing and refitting, rearming machines for the fight.


Gene reached over to admit Colonel MacIntyre to the conversation channel with the AI. "They're pretty well shook sir, giving Hammer all the guns dug out from Robinson," All the artillery, "to make up for having to leave most the heavier armor to defend the local's capital seems to have worked out, sir. We've got them on the run."
--
Raju Montgomery wasn't happy. He'd been reluctant to bring Victoria along at all. She didn't have the experience or the discipline for something this big.. and he'd have been just as worried that Kamea also would have taken unnecessary risks, and wouldn't listen. Especially having to contend with someone their own age with access to the military resources available, and young soldiers had reputations.


Orbital drops were limited to desperate attacks, or elite units. They were reckless with materiel in a time when mechs were nearly unreplaceable, and that one pilot would make an unsupported drop against a numerically superior force was an example of youthful stupidity, damn any success it didn't change that... but try telling the kids that.


On the other hand they had planned for a campaign that would have risked taking them away from Coromdir for months... which at the onset of planning for the campaign had been less of an issue. They had already planned to hire mercenaries, the AMC plan had called for supplementing the royal guard with call ups from noble houses for which House Espinosa had volunteered... but they hadn't expected a threat against Coromdir proper... or the pirates to raid over the border into the Inner Sphere.


It had been watching a switch flip. One minute they'd all still been moving slow and steady, consolidating their landing positions and making sure the roll off from the DropShips was fine, and the next all of a sudden a spearhead was thrusting forward from the mercenary leadership. One moment everything had been fine, and the next the Mercenary... and it was hard to call him senior, but Shepherd had ordered his men into an attack action... which coordinated different arms without any preparatory positions being established.


The rulers or worlds, and generals could all talk about elan vitale, but that wasn't what that was so far as Raju read the situation. One minute the teenage ace had been normal, and then the next he'd found a company of hostile mechs to throw his lance against without explaining anyone what he was doing... then of course had been the retasking of the artillery which had reshaped the battlefield...


Markham's face appeared, his Marauder's LosTech computer pairing to the Centurion through the Royal Guard CP aboard their dropship."That was intense." The unspoken question being self-evident.


"I'm still working on identifying the company in question." To see whether or not the simple explanation was this pirate had happened to do something that warranted the being singled out.... and getting his shit wrecked.


"TTS Warbook and commo were giving all kinds of weird feedback," The grizzled mercenary battalion commander remarked affably, "Never seen it before. They have a lot of old equipment, star league machines I've never seen, my XO says Glitch got tagged by a mech that was from the reunification war." They'd been running into a little bit of everything out here, Raju had known to expect that, just not to the degree that things had actually born out, "What do you think of our situation out here?"


As Captain of the Royal Guard, Raju knew he needed to weigh things out carefully... he knew that realistically it was a question that Tamati would be asking him soon enough, "I think, whatever that was about, its both an indication we're not being told everything, and also that we may be finished here sooner than we planned for," Which was a good thing. The decision to move on Fjaldr had been unpopular in the council, a quick decisive victory here was good news for the Reach. It would bring the Reach's troops back to Coromodir, and ideally with few casualties, and fighting strength largely preserved.


Reading between the lines, Markham nodded from the other end of the connection, "Shepherd has never been the chatty sort, I can't think of any conversation back on Detroit that wasn't basically work related, and since he made it to Coromodir he hasn't shown any instance of that changing." The older mercenary blew out a breath, and waited.


Raju nodded, holding for a moment. His instincts told him that Markham was telling the truth, if Markham knew something he probably would have shared it, if he had an insight into what was going on then it would have, "You said he dropped on Luxen unsupported. "It wasn't really a question, and Markham was quick to point out tha tit had been in the news a couple years earlier after the Battle of Luxen as the Canopians had started to put out their official statements. The Shooting Star, was a dramatization of the battle of Luxen, but from what the MRB recorded... not by much.

"I wasn't there for it of course, but yeah."

They stopped talking long enough as a dozen 85 ton heavy aerospace fighters went back out over the Aurigan lines. He noted that the approaching signature overland of House Espinosa mechs signaling that Victoria had obeyed his order to return to the CP. He couldn't tell if she had really dragged her feet, or if the pace of advance from the Highlanders had simply swept the pirates from the field in such a way that she knew there was no chance of her seeing further action. "I will need to talk to Lord Tamati about our priorities," The pirates had refused to lay down their arms when Tamati had offered, and given the situation he doubted the High Lord of the Reach would be amenable to offering terms at this stage, but he did need to know where they should be concentrating."

"I'll be available." Markham replied accepting the notice that Raju was going to switch channels. Markham's Marauders had vehicle crews operating Aurigan built combat vehicles and those were being brought up to refuel in preparation for solidifying their position so when Tamati selected the next target they'd hopefully be refueled and ready for that stage... but the break would also give the crews time to rest in between, which was always good.
--
Notes: Ok so first and foremost as we move into summer, my schedule becomes somewhat more cluttered, but I am aiming in this coming week to update my HSoD fic, and hopefully resume updating in the coming weeks my Eminence in Shadow fic. This doesn't effect Battletech in anyway, I want to update the Aurigan fic as well in the coming weeks, but Rabid Fox, and this will remain rather standard. Anyway, for whatever reason the swap to XF has resulted in weird instances of when I past stuff it randomly deletes spaces between words. I don't know if I got every one of those but its a known problem.

 

[Bofors40mm]

Never got why the LVT-4 fell out of favor. It's basically a faster panther

 

[Tamarind]

Never got why the LVT-4 fell out of favor. It's basically a faster panther

Click to shrink...

Probably because it's not a mech *shrugs*

 

[Silverbullet]

The Pirate was in a Rampage sporting RWR colors in front of a Gunslinger of the Hegemony. His shit getting pushed back in was a foregone conclusion. Not that Markham and Raju know that lol

 

[Imperator Pax]

Pirate Wars II
Part 12 [Aurigan Branch Conclusion]
The scattered remains of hulks weren't random. Some enemy equipment had to be salvaged in place, or were being left to cool as a safety precaution; Fjaldr was chill but still safety precaution, "Do the Aurigans have the ability to produce their own PPCs?" He knew the Canopians did... and there was still the Chargers Magi had been sent after as well in the first round of the battle... but those would require complex electronic sleuthing that would take the techs time... and so for the moment there were the hovercraft swarms.


"Not to my knowledge, it is an internal combustion design." The Azami tech replied.


"Surely the Canopians still have their license to produce them, make a note to mention it to Raventhir, if Black Jack looses control chances are we're going to have to deal with several years of very well armed pirate bands with no way to guess where they're going next." Gene remarked... not that even with Black Jack in charge they knew exactly who the fuck was going to have a nasty surprise in the morning... this whole situation bothered him. Black Jack's grudge with ComStar was weird, but they could work through that.


The hover tank had been designed to swarm battlemechs. It made sense that the Rim World would have made a lot of them and that not just them, all the member states probably had caches, or had had caches at one point. The Taurians too. It was an old design, but a PPC was a PPC at least on the battlefield. The individual quirks of a particular model didn't matter when it was hitting battle plate, or worse exposed sensitive electronics.


Gene glanced back out the ferro aluminum slab of the view port across the impromptu salvage yard once again. He had too many questions, and not enough answers about this mess. The Aurigans would need to be able to hold on from here... but hopefully with Fjaldr's clans on the back foot, the Aurigan infantry could do that, and that the Aurigan presence would assure or deter the capellans from intervening in this and making it even more complicated.


The pirates were, had been using old technology so the situation wasn't identical to the attack on coromodir... most of these pirateses, in spite of the clans' preparedness to defend had been using technology that was not specifically SLDF , or rather not SLDF machines. It was a small mercy, and it certainly had made the battle easier, but not easy.


Pacification in the long term of Fjaldr would require the Aurigans to invest heavily in holding the planet... in setting up a government that was loyal to Coromodir first, and so on. It wasn't Gene's problem. The immediate military threat had been answered, and it was an aurigan world and there were other threats. "In the best situation, if such a thing can be said the-" The Azami tech paused stumbling over his words for a minute, "Most likely they are from a Rim World depot somewhere in Taurian or former taurian space. Unfortunately I would suspect that they were unearthed recently and given the pirates use of Trojan dropships we would have difficulty ascertaining where that might be without explicit evidence."


Gene didn't bother to comment that they didn't have that. They had recovered some star charts. There were other electronic intelligence, but they hadn't had time to interrogate prisoners effectively... and the Aurigans were going to want custody. They might very well need to extradite pirates to the capellans as a show of good faith, but again that wasn't really their problem. Then of course... while yes a RWA depot could have been in taurian or former taurian space... it was just as possible they were further rimward still


His immediate responsibility now that they were in the Rimward periphery were to insure that the Exodus fleet made it safely to the separation point... and also with the consent of the Azami elders began the process of establishing trade connections with various planets... that was part of the reason they needed to formalize relations with both large states like the Magistracy, but also smaller independent worlds like Detroit.


... and in order to be part of those conversations he was going tohave to be in space with the fleet.


--
The trip into space was a basic un noteworthy lift off, and at a few gees the flip and burn to return to the comfortable furnishings aboard the Star Lord placed him in the brain trust put together managing the company's assets... and in connection with the Aurigan's efforts.
The Fjaldr campaign would still last months. It would tie down tens of thousands of men and hundreds of vehicles but it could be understood that the most draining portion of the campaign was now over. What would follow would be low intensity warfare , and frontier policing.


You didn't use mercenaries for that kind of work... some states did but it was expensive, and it generally suggested you couldn't afford to trust the local troops to do the work. From what he understood of fiscal politics, and defense spending most of the council didn't like the idea of the expense when their own troops, which was an expense they didn't seem to want to spend on either, could do the job. Legislative deadlock was the bane of good government.


"We should be done loading shortly."


Gene flipped the holographic display. "You did well with theartillery, Alois, especially given that most of our manpower thereare green recruits. Were there any problems with the Thors?"


"No Colonel," The self propelled thumper carrier did have problems with sustained fire, requiring a not insubstantial pack train for army operations in the 28th​ century, but for short duration time on target attacks they had done fine.


"I'll leave them under your command full time." He remarked, "Truthfully if... if things get worse than they are you're probably going to need them." he had been reluctant to seriously entertain discussions of land holds... but the current command the current situation... were well beyond what he had been expecting... had been expecting. Defending a fortified position required more infantry and dug in tanks, and that meant professionals leading those combat arms rather than just mechwarriors serving as a mobile highly aggressive cavalry and breakthrough force. That was what mechs were best at.


They hadn't planned for this when they had been hiring on. They still had money in escrow in the Federated Suns. It was only a matter of time before word got back to the Dragoons, assuming it hadn't already that the Marauder II, Badger and Bandit orders they had been able to take possession of... but that hadn't been enough to meet requirements.


He suspected that he was going to have to divide the command, which was the driving reason to asking Hammer if he could hold a defensive position. That would require the permission of the host nation... Detroit for whom Hammer had some experience working with...or the Magistracy. There was nothing that was sure about that agreement... on the other hand given what had happened at Coromodir it was pretty likely that Raventhir would if not the Centrella would make good on their ambassador's feelers. He was expecting Raventhir though, given past connections, but it didn't change the fact.


They were going to divide the force, pushing out to secure groundwork for moving out through the periphery. He already planned to take the Ice Cubes with him for the drop against Grim Sybil and have Hammer hold a reserve position then most likely push on from there to Aquagea to reconnect with the locals and see what the situation was there.


The two mens' discussion of the situation was interrupted as MacIntyre's holographic image joined them, and that was a reminder that they would need to collect Bardiche and their other assets as they rotated 'westwards' across the rimward periphery. "We'll reconnect with the force at Weldry, then jump to Kimi collectively." He replied. While they might have materially benefited from returning to the Aurigan capital and basking in celebratory moods and goodwill... he wanted to move quickly on the next targets... and well Kimi raised questions.


They were going to need to speak with both Tamati of House Arano and his captain of the royal guard, but that could be done aboard the JumpShips or on Weldry even. The Aurigans couldn't afford leaving their head of state out at the front for longer than was strictly necessary.


From there, "Well as I've outlined previously," Gene remarked to his two battalion commanders in the conference, "Is we will move to Detroit with the trade caravan, and then to Alloway where a task force will strike Grim Sybill. We will be splitting the elements out as needed." He knew the elders were hoping Aquagea had Germanium available for purchase since that had been the world's principle export so it would be a stop off point after that... but the the plan was still to have the Azami contact Raventhir and the Magistracy as well while he was dealing with Sybil and others. He had to be able to delegate those responsibilities, and it was part of that why he was sending Beau to ur Cruine with Easy Company to collect their others and see what Magistracy Metals was doing there. He probably wouldn't actually detach Beau for anything, but he did need the two other pilots to come back to the ranks if Raventhir did want to post a force on Luxen. Sybil first, then to Aquagea, and then take the circuit to Luxen as quickly as possible... deal with things from there. "We need a firm idea of where the Magistracy stands... you should also be aware that there are serious concerns about the recent Rim World marked equipment, and what it could mean in terms of local operations."
--
Notes: We will do a Luxen volunteers interlude in a couple weeks, but this mostly finishes the aurigan branch for the time being, barring probably an interlude later in the summer, and sets up the travel plans. Espinosa and Victoria and Kamea will all show up in that interlude, but the next few travel time interludes are Kimi, Detroit, the Sybil Fight and Aquagea, and to be honest the Sybil fight isn't really a fight so much as a boot party on the pirates.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Pirate Wars III: Travel Interlude
Part 1
Gene paused to take a pull from his drink. The workspace was dominated by the three dimensional star chart of the Aurigan Reach, the stellar complex of stars that formed this part of known space from which the the polity took its name.


The truth was he would be glad to get back onto a planetary gravity well when they had the time. He didn't hate low gravity of course, but the realities of being ship board meant working out was even more time consuming given the gravity deck only provided a fraction of the normal gravity. On the other hand... Weldry was an unpleasant barely habitable world. Not somewhere you wanted to stay... which was sufficient enough reason to remain aboard the comfortable offices set aside for administration of the Company. Gene moved to gesture to the assessments. They were as of assessments, that meant they had been the body of materiel processed before they had left Fjaldr. He had made sure that the Espinosa heir understood that.


"These are conclusively machines we can establish were of Rim World Provenance, these are ones were certain belonged to the Star League Defense Force and most likely were in caches, these were SLDF machines that left service after the collapse of the league and have seen action regularly from the 29th​ Century," Those machines were prone to all sorts of abuse and retrofits over the centuries, "This batch we're not sure of their provenance in that they could be commercial production for the league, or that they were former territorial army purchases but not in the Regular Army," House Forces in other words.


Ordinarily he would have expected a lot of commercial machines, or machines built for contracts outside of the SLDF , house armies, private military establishments including the usual corporate and free lance mercenary outfits of the 28th​ century and later... the Rim world machines were a surprise, and they appeared to have been unearthed relatively recently.


Nothing they had encountered and tagged seemed to have been in service after the Christmas disaster or at least hadn't received Royal Technology or more restricted technology. The fighting onFjaldr had not involved League machines like the Demon... there were no Gauss Rifles. A relief to be sure.


The Catapult pilot mused carefully before speaking, "So the clans on Fjaldr were given support? From outside the Reach,"


"Yes, that appears to be the case," He replied as Victoria looked at the papers biting her thumb in contemplation. "There is no evidence Fjaldr which was at the time of the uprising breaking out a Capellan world should have had a stockpile with anything approaching these contents." He didn't mention the likelihood of a Castle Outpost...that the RWA might have overrun here but they hadn't found it and hadn't checked, or ascertain if it had been self destructed to prevent it from falling into enemy hands... "These machines were brought in from off world, someone knew where they were." Did that necessarily imply that Fjaldr was supposed to be a staging ground for further violence into Capellan space, no. They had no evidence for that. "You have a question?"


"Raju says that Kimi venerates the Star League."


Gene's felt his face twitch slightly, he'd heard the same, and there had never been a reason to visit, but Abner had mentioned it. The Church of St Cameron had been nascent at the end of the Star League, it had existed in the 28th​ century but really as one of those rather embarrassing things that was looked away from. The martyring of House Cameron by Amaris.... in the same timeframe as the destruction of Mecca and and the atrocity against the Holy See had apparently done a lot to expand the church. Kimi's new Salvationists were a theocracy, but the staff discussions were probably right. ... and of course he suspected there was something more to her statement, "Given Kimi's opinions, and even without them it seems likely that their star league shrines will attract attention, even if they weren't," They still needed to pass through in order to reach Detroit which would anchor the short term command circuit... but those impact decisions were largely a matter of the travel times. Detroit to Alloway would take up most of his focus, "The plan is to neutralize Grim Sybil while we have the element of surprise," They'd capitalize on violence of action... it was the whole reason he was willing to bring the 331st​ 's white shields into the deployment while allocated his battalions elsewhere.


He knew Hammer didn't particularly like the idea of distributing the command if they were at risk for facing Star League Machines but he planned to attempt to moderate that once they were in a position to congregate.


The door opened with an audible chime a notification from the door itself, and passed through his suit's communication system, but not actually dialed into his neuro circuit. "Colonel Shepherd, this is the report from analytics," The Highlander pilot, a recent graduate from Northwind, handed over the data slate look concerned, "Its a priority, Also Captain Montgomery is outside sir."


Gene nodded at the notice about the Royal Guardsman's prescence and had the biometric censor authenticate his receipt of the report.


He read, and digested. The hairs on the back of neck set, his eyes narrowed.


Dante must have already shared it with the Fusilier officers on watch... and it was only a matter of time before it reached MacIntyre and the BattleMech other battalion's officers given one of Claymore was delivering it... and then of course there was the Azami response.


"IS," Victoria's voice had hitched into her throat at the first world, she sounded as if she were across the room at least, "there a problem?"


He took a breath and looked at the highlander, "Only that Kristofur Kelly," the man the Precentor New Avalon wanted dead, "claims to be working on behalf of a living descendant of Stefan Amaris," He replied watching the man in front of him. "I'll spare you the death to oppressors baathist rhetoric, but the claim has been made." It was something that he would have to make sure was relayed to Northwind, if not higher Davion authorities, better that it come from him than cycle back from down the chain. That would at least... that would have time built into the system he would have to send the message. A message would take time. The message would arrive, and then have to be read, people would have to digest the information... and then of course finally they'd have to send their reply which would then have to reach him.


None of that was really true, turnaround was much shorter for the Azami consideration, even though they would almost certainly dispatch their own message back to within the combine. The possibility of the combine ledership knowing that the hpg recording was out there put him on edge, they would also have to react. That would take time, but the Azami here... the Azami here were not only on edge they were in geographic proximity, they would make a decision that much more quickly. "Lieutenant," He stated after a moment, as he sorted his thoughts the young highlander had started to grow pale, "go inform the council of elders I have a priority development report for them, and show in Captain Montgomery when you leave."


"Yes sir." The pale, paler, red head departed with a swift salute.

He took the breathing space as the lieutenant left, and carefully smoothed his features. "Captain Montgomery, I apologize for the delay the Regiment had responsibilities to our civilian oversight, and the pirates are ever a concern." Gene was already mulling over telling the Lyran former mercenary about the problem, "As I'm sure you were aware the pirates have been of late appropriating Rim World Republic symbols. Poor taste in most situations, but they have laid claim to more than that." It was the polite, formal way of dealing with this.


Victoria Espinosa had little time for the etiquette at least in the face of her mentor, and battlemech instructor, and just blurted out the problem as it had developed. Raju almost stumbled taking a step back from the Coromdir heiress, "Are they, for real?"


"We don't know. The claim has been made, the validity of it, I can't attest to, only that the pirates have made it, and they seem to believe," And they had a lot of Rim World gear to go along with it... which worried him. "I am going to forward the intelligence report to High Lord Arano shortly, but since you were already here I thought I would proceed to inform you. Now, I assume you have some other business?"


Raju who had had the benefit of experience with the Eridani recognized the phrasing as not all together unlike that of language that the Eridani Light Horse chose to use when conducting business. "I do, but-, they're saying there is a descendant of the usurper leading them?"

"No, Kristofur Kelly is claiming there is an heir to Amaris, Black Jack McGirk is by all indications still in charge," From the sound of it Kelly was trying to weld together the two of them into an alliance against 'inner [sphere] tyranny' and so forth, but it appeared from the report that they were dealing with two separate bodies.


"But a descendant of Amaris? Here?"

"Perhaps, we don't have sufficient information, but I'll brief the regiment, and our civilian leadership shortly." ... and compile a message to Davion... and maybe Vandal too, maybe he could justify having an HPG transmission made to New Avalon even... but he'd need to speak to Dante first, "If this Amaris claimant exists, and he's supported Black Jack then he's the enemy, kill the evil swiftly." He muttered more of the last a phrase in the dialect of the coordinators court the flicker of burning hate in amber eyes.

 

[Wargamer08]

Never understood the logic of claiming to be BT's mega-space Hitler. Seems like a lot of heat for little gain.

 

[RazeByFire]

Never understood the logic of claiming to be BT's mega-space Hitler. Seems like a lot of heat for little gain.

Click to shrink...

Apparently, there are some that look upon the rim worlds republic fondly. And Amaris being space-Hitler is just a case of the victors' writing the history books. Or, at least, that's what those with the RWR equipment and the 'Amaris' Heir' hope the common people will feel.

Anyone with real power on a planetary scale just doesn't give a damn who's name they are fighting under, as long as they get theirs.

My prediction, as always, is C* treachery. They have star league records of RWR stockpiles That the star league may have just left in place to wither on the vine without ships.

 

[Bofors40mm]

Apparently, there are some that look upon the rim worlds republic fondly. And Amaris being space-Hitler is just a case of the victors' writing the history books. Or, at least, that's what those with the RWR equipment and the 'Amaris' Heir' hope the common people will feel.

Anyone with real power on a planetary scale just doesn't give a damn who's name they are fighting under, as long as they get theirs.

My prediction, as always, is C* treachery. They have star league records of RWR stockpiles That the star league may have just left in place to wither on the vine without ships.

Click to shrink...

i mean amaris legitimately blew up all sorts of stuff in the TH especially on Terra to make him reviled by vast chunks of the inner sphere's and periphery's population.
For example he hit deliberately hit mecca with a city busting nuke so that's basically every follower of islam hating him by default.
And that's just the most notable thing he or his followers blew up , defiled, or looted. There a lot of other ones.

 

[Wargamer08]

Apparently, there are some that look upon the rim worlds republic fondly. And Amaris being space-Hitler is just a case of the victors' writing the history books. Or, at least, that's what those with the RWR equipment and the 'Amaris' Heir' hope the common people will feel.

Anyone with real power on a planetary scale just doesn't give a damn who's name they are fighting under, as long as they get theirs.

My prediction, as always, is C* treachery. They have star league records of RWR stockpiles That the star league may have just left in place to wither on the vine without ships.

Click to shrink...

I mean Amaris set off a massive war defined by his many war crimes and copious WMD usage with civilian casualties in the mega-Hitlers. He's not a dude done dirty in the history books by the victors, he's mega space Hitler.

 

[Imperator Pax]

I mean Amaris set off a massive war defined by his many war crimes and copious WMD usage with civilian casualties in the mega-Hitlers. He's not a dude done dirty in the history books by the victors, he's mega space Hitler.

Click to shrink...

Yeah as the canonical in universe historian put it more less I was hoping (guy is from the periphery) that there was some exaggeration but no amaris was in fact worse than history generally records. Will have to find the direct quote later I've put it up before

"	As a citizen of the Outworlds Alliance and a descendant of the Rim Worlders, I had hoped that in the course of our research on this volume I might find some mitigating factor to modify history's judgement of my most famous countryman. I regret to say that I have found none. As far as Amaris is concerned, the ancient slogan applies: Ig fallou blaos, dem ressensu glottuo. ("What you see is what you get," or, literally: "if you catch this, you will have to eat it.") Amaris may have been worse than even past historians have claimed.	"
	— Anastasia Marcus, Historical: Director, Davion Research Project, ComStar Research Archives, Terra, 3028

 

[Imperator Pax]

Federated Suns Interlude​

The combine offensive was wasteful, but it was highly aggressive... and maybe that was for show... for domestic consumption. Even after decades in her post Yvonne was not sure that she fully grasped the nuances of the driving forces within the Coordinator's court. Sun Zhang was the largest mech warrior academy in the Inner Sphere... and an entire cadre of recruits had been destroyed on Dieron.


A gross waste of young soldiers lives.


Shepherd didn't need to be present though for the Draconis March to do its job. It might not have been the same envelopments mobile ambush tactics, but the daily HPG reports were clear that Lord Aaron had honed his talents of defensive strategy to a previously uncommented upon degree. The combine could be dismissive of tanks and combined arms operations but the Field Marshal of the Draconis March had his brigade well protected by overlapping fortresses.


Alexandria was seeing more action than she had at the front on Dieron but true front line leadership fell to Colonel Cameron representing the Robinson Rangers in the field. In a way that was desirable to Yvonne's interest, all the better that the Combine focus on Bard and his flamboyant reputation than on her aide.


It was unfortunate that the duelist group put together out of the sixty odd mechwarriors of the brigade were not really going to be able to demonstrate any gains effectively ... not with the strategy that Aaron Sandoval had settled on. They had received less feedback from Dieron as well... for the sheer ferocity of the otherwise brief fighting on the planet, here any engagement that occurred was coordinated closely by the Duke of Robinson. Robinson's defense was avoiding large sweeping maneuvers in favor of bursts of activity from existing defenses built up, to put down the Combine as they tried to move in their companies.


The Combine would complain about the lack of honor, probably already were. This was an engagement of attrition, and it was better that Robinson was handling this than some less prepared world, in that sense the combine's arrogance, and hurt pride was working to the advantage of the Federated Suns.


Her nephew the First Prince would be pleased at the progress. The failure at Robinson might force the Combine to take a step back and avoid any further hasty commitments, or it might very well expedite further rash offensives in the name of simply being on the offensive. If that happened they would probably be at other targets, and would be harder to predict.


Jeffries interruption of her review didn't come with any better news. The Dragoons had been raiding up and down the Lyran border with the Free Worlds League, their crash into Hesperus and departure left a gap in the line, and she had presumed that had been what this was about... it wasn't, even if she was sure she was going to have questions about the Dragoons from the First Prince when she made her report, it had become habit, "We've managed to confirm that Rasalhague separatists, not ones we might be considered affiliated with of late, attempted to assassinate Takashi Kurita a few weeks ago."


They had failed obviously, but the attempt had been made.

The current coordinator had the devil's own luck when it came to scraping through that sort of unpleasantness. "What do we know?"


"Not much I'm afraid," He replied regretfully, "just that it happened, really."


Immediate effects to the attempt were likely to be redoubling of the ISF's existing actions. Even units that Davion intelligence were confident were loyal to the Kurita regime were being reshuffled to different theaters... that was devouring Combine JumpShips forcing a disruption of trade internally as commands were shuffled to other areas, and that also complicated or would obsfuscate what was paranoia and what might be a massing for an attack. Robinson had been an example of that, because they hadn't expected an attack on the capital of the Draconis March given the Combine situation coreward.


It did remind her that they had managed to wrap up the remnants of the Reimei ring, apparently there had been suspicions in civilian counter intelligence they just hadn't actually acted on it. The ring had been in place a long time.... they might have found it if there had been more corroborating information passing between civilian and military intelligence but that was something looking forward ,watching for other combine probes.


The year was running long, so much had happened during the spring campaigns ... she wondered if really there was no relation to an attempt on Takashi Kurita's life. The Coordinator had no shortage of people who wanted him dead, even especially within his own realm. Any group of Rasalhague separatists making the attempt was in itself nothing special, but it could be interpreted or misinterpreted based on other details. It could be completely unrelated to the establishment of Bardiche under Shepherd's company, and probably had nothing to do with them... but there would be questions all the same.


"Is there anything else?"


"The rumors are that the Arkab legions are being prepared for a deep raid into Marik space."


"That doesn't make sense." Oh certainly House Kurita brindled at any defiance of their of their supposed rights to dominate the galaxy, but, "What did the Free Worlds League manage?"


"We don't know, only that the coordinator directly ordered it, and that the DCMS is complying with the command. Why the Legions? It appears to be political, but details themselves are sparse at this time."


It did allow the Azami troops in the combine to be directed at an external enemy, that was true She'd have to think on it... but she was already going to have to brief Hanse ... and probably as quickly as possible even though they didn't know much. They knew enough, even if Takashi had survived numerous previous assassinations it still warranted informing the First Prince.


Hanse hadn't changed his office terribly much from how his older brother had held the private chambers during those years. The Dragoon raid on Hesperus reiterated Ian's reign in some aspects... if she were being honest Hanse Davion looked for a solution that was probably too clever, and too perfect ... but if he could succeed, if he could pull it off well... that would be different. Hanse's focus though as so much of the realm was to looking towards the front with the combine. He was already waiting, expecting news of the battle of Robinson's progress... and of course he was also waiting for any word of whether or not the Dragoons had been sighted returning.


On that, the Highlanders had managed to convince the Dragoons to hear them out. What had been said exactly was unfortunately a mystery... but Yvonne had cleared the delegation to make contact with the dragoons as they had departed Marik space after the Hesperus campaign. Yvonne would have preferred greater control of the situation, and she suspected given the demonstrated behaviors of the dragoons that they would move on to the Lyran commonwealth, regardless of how much the sovereign wanted them to return to Davion employ.


The command to lay the cards on the table to the dragoons beforethey disappeared again on one of their supply runs had been carriedout.
--
Notes: This space is short and foreshadows what changes in thewider timeline, and why.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Pirate Wars Travel Interlude​

Victoria had replayed the IFF data break down from Kaga countless times of just digging through her roms of the battle. The twelve meter tall Marauder's iconic silhouette hung in still image its outline in white haze around its theater applied alpine camouflage.


She expected lectures... more lectures when they returned to Cormodir but of a different sort than just a criticism of her recklessness. What else was she supposed to have done? Not advance, not destroy the enemy, or at least attempt to attack the enemy in front of her, be more like one of the tepid weak houses that filled the council. She wanted a strong reach, a strong state with a military to be proud of like the Star League of Old. Kamea would understand, why she had charged forward. Besides, it was the council's weakness and unwillingness to commit to decisive action that was the problem.


Fjaldr was just an example of what her father had been saying all along. Coromodir's nobles weren't the problem, the nobles of V and VI understood what the reach faced. In order for the Aurigan Reach to... well reach its potential it had to grow, it had to stretch, it had to be able to protect itself, and not turn every discussion on the use of military force into a paralyzed committee meeting.


She looked plaintively at the frozen images on her personal holographic projector. There was going to be so much to tell Kamea, after all in defending Coromodir they'd been together, but Kamea hadn't been able to come to Fjaldr.


They were due to complete separation soon, preparing to make the jump eventually back, and back to Coromodir meant boring. Raju and Commander Markham would have lessons dissecting the campaign here...but they probably wouldn't spend enough time talking about the pirates and what caused them to be a problem in the first place. The lack of a strong central government, the lack of a military force to police the border, and unrelated to the Reach's own failings, the idea of an heir to Amaris being out there trying to rally support.
--
They would make the Jump to Kimi as soon as safety checks were finished on the Jump Drives. Part of that entailed making sure Dante was asleep and safely shielded from any adverse reactions to the K-Fdrive moving them into JumpSpace.


He really wished that the Hegemony ... whatever data the Hegemony had on Jump Space was more available. He didn't understand and maybe the Hegemony hadn't understood why AIs didn't respond well to making the Jump. The only real exceptions were when there were crews aboard, lone AI didn't respond well to jumping. The safest practice was to have them asleep when the K-F drive was activated and to wake them up after they made it.


That was the procedure that they would be following. Hedwig, Braunfelds, and Dante all would be in sleep, would be 'shut down' in the lead up to making the jumps, and then they'd be brought back online once they were in Kimi. If there weren't any pirates already there, or any other threat the two M3 pattern Drones would remain docked. Dante would be woken up and leave the AI active to manage company business not limited to administering training in the simulator pods to the Highland 'mech Battalion while they were aboard ship.


The problem was what might be on Kimi, the planet had had recent instability... and well too much of the Star League veneration of succession war era religious groups imagined that one day the SLDF would return... that Kerensky's people would come back. That was hard to reconcile with the truth, both of Kerensky leaving, and also of what Kerensky's people had become.


Kimi was also only a stop over. They weren't chasing Kelly. They didn't have the leave to do that, and wouldn't until after the Azami's civilian laden jumpships were on the road deep into the rimward periphery heading for Alamut. Kelly was the direct lead on this Amaris pretender, and presumably the lead to where the Rim World material came from... whether or not he could elucidate on where Black Jack had gotten his SLDF metal well that was debatable.


It was part of the reason why if the needed to take action on Kimiit would be Bardiche leading the way to secure Hammer a place to offload. Gene hoped that didn't come to pass, he wanted the comfort of being back in a terran standard gravity but they wouldn't be able to spend much time on Detroit either.


There was a solitary tone telling him that the channel for communication were now operational across the various Azami commanders alongside his men.


They needed to move on Grim Sybil as well. Sybil had a known base, and one that known to the Magistracy, the magistracy just couldn't afford the assets to deal with the problem, so the plan was, Gene rotated the chair, which was a pointless gesture since the camera was oriented on his face and moved with him to keep him in frame, and no one was going to care what was immediately behind him, "Our aim is to be proactive," He said over the data link joining his conversation with the other officers, "Sybil may or may not know anything but the base needs to be cleared out," Much as how Fjaldr did, active pirate nests were likely to be used by Black Jack, and he had the muscle to come in and push other pirates into line if he chose to do so. That was what really concerned him. "If only to deny it as a base of operations," or staging ground, "to Black Jack."

There was a slight rumbling of agreement in the background channels. The Azami command involvement had pushed down to company level officers in Azami formations men who ranged in age from his own, up into men in the fifties and across all 'mech weight classes. It was a BattleMech conversation though, Armor officers, and Fighter Jocks were largely absent from this assembly.


"My understanding is you have already drafted an assault plan for the attack." An attack plan which did not prioritize the Azami, and an attack plan drafted based on information before the landing on Fjaldr.


The statement produced grumbling as no doubt the variety of battlemech officers across all ages were now chomping at the bit for the next slice of action. Sybil had gotten away from Coromodir. There had been Rim Job iconography on Coromodir but they couldn't say for sure whether or not Sybil had any such symbols in her formation. Still, he was obliged to answer Dara's question... or not really a question, "Yes, that's correct."


"We would like more representation in the assault force." The Azami elder not quite suggested. Another elder was quick to agree but moderate the position by insisting he would not find the contribution lacking. That wasn't the issue he'd been concerned about, really far from it... and the truth was this was not the conversation he wanted to have.


Yes there was the claim there was an Amaris descendant rallying pirates in the periphery, pirates who already had a large volume of SLDF metal somehow, but the original mission to get the civilians free and clear of Combine retaliation still needed to be fulfilled. That was the plan that had been in development since before they had even come in from the periphery, that the Azami would put together a fleet, this fleet, and depart the Inner Sphere to escape the retaliation from House Kurita.


If there was an Amaris descendant running around, if there was some neo rim world empire in the making then those civilians needed to be out of the line of fire. So the priority wasn't to chase Kelly... but they were going to hit Sybil anyway., there was flexibility there, depending on the situation on the ground on Detroit, Detroit had the industry that they could come in and top off supplies which meant Detroit was a good rest stop before they moved on.
--
Notes: We do the brief stop over in Kimi, before Jumping to Detroit and then in a few weeks we will deal with the pirate moon

 

[NPC]

I'd say you got an incoming war a la Whites vs Reds Russian Civil War style but it probably going to have more in common with the Latin American post-Napoleonic civil wars due to the lack of intuitions.

Though I suppose the colors would depend on what color the Cameron Star is typically displayed as, there seems to be a lot of different versions. Amaris seems more consistent as a red background with a blue shark.

Also I really like how everyone is trying to decern Gene's intentions while if they would just ask him, they'd probably get 75% of what they wanted to know. Battletech's people are so caught in their scheming ways, they can't help but project their own world view onto him.